443: Is It Possible to Grieve and Grow at the Same Time?

Kevin Lowe: Maybe it was because something happened, something changed, something ended sooner than you ever could have imagined.

Kevin Lowe: Or maybe it Was simply that.

Kevin Lowe: Something in life or a series of things didn't go like you planned. And now you're At the point where.

Kevin Lowe: You're trying to move forward while still holding on to what you had. And the truth is, Is that nobody really shows you how to do both.

Kevin Lowe: How to grieve what you've lost while still building a life Ahead of you. So that, my friend, is what we're going to talk about today.

Kevin Lowe: Is how to grieve and grow.

Kevin Lowe: How they don't have to be total opposites, but instead they can work together to.

Kevin Lowe: Help you move Into your next chapter of life. So, inside of today's episode, I promise I'm going to share with you three simple yet effective mindset shifts that.

Kevin Lowe: Are going to Have you realizing that you don't have to choose.

Kevin Lowe: Between grieving and growing. They can work mutually with one another.

Kevin Lowe: It's all inside of today's 443rd episode of Grit.

Kevin Lowe: Grace, & Inspiration!

Kevin Lowe: Welcome to the podcast.

Kevin Lowe: What's happening, my friend, and welcome back to Grit, Grace, and Inspiration. I am your host.

Kevin Lowe: Kevin Lowe, and man, As always, such a pleasure to have you joining me here on the podcast.

Kevin Lowe: In case you are new here, or maybe you've been here for a while, but you've not actually started following the podcast on your favorite app, I'm talking like Apple Podcasts or Spotify, well, please do me the favor.

Kevin Lowe: And just scroll up.

Kevin Lowe: On the top of the page and hit that little follow button.

Kevin Lowe: It gives the algorithms.

Kevin Lowe: Yes, the algorithms, a notice that, Hey, people actually like and care about this podcast.

Kevin Lowe: Helping us reach more people. And then what it does for you, Because, of course, that's what matters the most.

Kevin Lowe: Is you're going to be sure that every Tuesday morning when a new episode is released, It's going to pop right up to the top of your feed in your podcast app of choice.

Kevin Lowe: All you have to do Is just hit that little button at the top that says follow. Easy as that.

Kevin Lowe: So for today, we're talking about this topic of.

Kevin Lowe: Learning how to grieve And grow at the same time. When we speak specifically about grief.

Kevin Lowe: Well, grief comes in many forms that we Typically talk about. Because it's not just losing someone you love.

Kevin Lowe: It's maybe you losing a dream, a relationship, a version of your life that you thought you would be living. And what makes grieving difficult, in whatever form it comes in, Is that life doesn't just have a pause button.

Kevin Lowe: Everything doesn't just stop and allow you time to fully grieve, to fully overcome, to get past, Whatever that's supposed to mean.

Kevin Lowe: The loss that you've experienced. And again, I'm talking about grieving in a general sense.

Kevin Lowe: I grieved the loss of my eyesight, But.

Kevin Lowe: More so maybe Is the fact that I had to grieve the.

Kevin Lowe: Loss of the Life that I thought I was going to have.

Kevin Lowe: And in my situation, Just as yours, life doesn't take a break. Everything doesn't stop.

Kevin Lowe: It doesn't give you time to process it. No, it keeps moving.

Kevin Lowe: It keeps going and expects you to somehow be able to keep up.

Kevin Lowe: And with that, you tend to find yourself in a Spot of tension.

Kevin Lowe: Where you're trying to grieve what you lost Yet you're trying to keep up With the world.

Kevin Lowe: With your life And to be honest, At some point in time.

Kevin Lowe: You want to move forward You're tired of being sad You're tired of grieving You want to grow You want to Figure out the next thing to do.

Kevin Lowe: And yet you Find yourself in this trap of being stuck.

Kevin Lowe: Torn between what you had, what you thought you were going to have, and what reality is.

Kevin Lowe: And so today, what I want us to begin to understand is.

Kevin Lowe: That grieving and growing, and we're going to use the term growing, but it's basically moving on, starting over, starting new, turning the page, beginning the new chapter, heck, writing the whole new book.

Kevin Lowe: They don't have to work against each other, but instead they can coexist in amongst one another.

Kevin Lowe: Basically, think of grieving and growing as teammates.

Kevin Lowe: But without first understanding how they work together, Well, you're going to feel like you're constantly being pulled in two different directions.

Kevin Lowe: Because there's a part Of you that.

Kevin Lowe: Wants to grow, that wants to move forward. and yet there's the other Part of you.

Kevin Lowe: That keeps holding on to what was or what was supposed to have been and to be honest sometimes what happens is as we start to grow as we start to love again to live again to dream again that other side always Finds a way of.

Kevin Lowe: Creeping in of almost kind of like hey, don't forget about me remember what you lost?

Kevin Lowe: You're supposed to still be sad. You're supposed to be upset.

Kevin Lowe: And we find ourselves almost feeling guilty for moving forward with our lives.

Kevin Lowe: But we have to understand that that's not what life is. That's not what it was meant to be.

Kevin Lowe: It's meant to constantly evolve, constantly change.

Kevin Lowe: And yeah, trust me, I wish things in life didn't happen. I wish that you didn't Have to lose that.

Kevin Lowe: Family member who you're grieving the loss of.

Kevin Lowe: I wish that so many bad things didn't have to happen in this world, but they do.

Kevin Lowe: Unfortunately, that's just the way this world is.

Kevin Lowe: And so being the fact that it is unfortunately a part of life.

Kevin Lowe: We have to be willing to keep going, to keep growing, and to use what we've gone through not to hold us back, but to make us better.

Kevin Lowe: Maybe it doesn't necessarily propel us forward, but I believe it can certainly help us grow in amongst ourselves of who we are, Becoming bigger, better versions of.

Kevin Lowe: Us as we continue On with wherever we're headed in life.

Kevin Lowe: So the question that we have to ask ourselves is, how does this play out?

Kevin Lowe: How do you actually move forward without ignoring what you've gone through, without forgetting what you've been through, without trying to pretend that everything is okay?

Kevin Lowe: Basically, how do you grow without forgetting about what you've lost, what you've been grieving, the fact that you're still hurting?

Kevin Lowe: Today, I'm going to explore just three things that I believe help to make this possible.

Kevin Lowe: What may feel completely impossible, I hope that these can make it possible.

Kevin Lowe: Now, truth is, there's many different ways to go about it.

Kevin Lowe: I'm just sharing three things that have worked for me.

Kevin Lowe: And I hope that maybe they can help you as well.

Kevin Lowe: So starting off our list of three things, three mindset shifts.

Kevin Lowe: That are going to allow grief and growth to coexist.

Kevin Lowe: And so the first step, the first pillar, the first idea.

Kevin Lowe: Whatever you want to call it, The first mindset shift is grace.

Kevin Lowe: When it comes to grieving, there's no timeline. There's no finish line.

Kevin Lowe: There's no moment when everything just suddenly makes sense again.

Kevin Lowe: It's true. Some days you'll feel okay. Other days it will just be the smallest.

Kevin Lowe: Most minute thing will just set you off and have you crying. Will have you Feeling like everything in life is spiraling out of control, that you can't possibly do it anymore.

Kevin Lowe: When those moments happen, When those days occur, it doesn't mean that you're broken. It doesn't mean that you've gone backwards.

Kevin Lowe: Honestly, it just means that you're human.

Kevin Lowe: Grace is giving yourself permission to feel what you feel.

Kevin Lowe: Grace is you not judging yourself because of where you are.

Kevin Lowe: It's not judging yourself because you feel like you should be over it by now.

Kevin Lowe: Grace is you giving yourself permission to not rush it.

Kevin Lowe: To understand that healing takes time.

Kevin Lowe: And that everyone is different.

Kevin Lowe: Every situation is unique. And just because others may try to tell you that.

Kevin Lowe: You should be over it, my friend, they have no business saying that at all.

Kevin Lowe: They are not you. They have not gone through what you have gone through.

Kevin Lowe: Every person is different. Every situation is unique.

Kevin Lowe: And the most important thing here is you are you. and you are the only person who knows when you are indeed ready to begin growing.

Kevin Lowe: But what I do want you to understand is this.

Kevin Lowe: You don't have to be fully okay, fully over it to be willing to take just The next step.

Kevin Lowe: I'm not talking about crushing it. I'm not talking about making a giant leap.

Kevin Lowe: I'm just saying a single step.

Kevin Lowe: And yeah, sometimes when you take that step.

Kevin Lowe: You may regret it. You may take a step back. And that's okay.

Kevin Lowe: Because giving yourself grace gives yourself permission to test out the waters a little, to dip your toe in, to feel it out, to see if maybe you're ready to take the next step.

Kevin Lowe: And once you give yourself grace, Something inside begins to shift. Because when you finally stop fighting what you feel You finally create space to learn from it To grow And that is where the next piece comes into play And that.

Kevin Lowe: My friend, is growth When we're talking about growth, I want to be real.

Kevin Lowe: Nobody wants pain. Nobody signs up for bad things to happen.

Kevin Lowe: No, I don't care who you are.

Kevin Lowe: You don't want stuff to go wrong in life.

Kevin Lowe: But you know what's crazy? Is that pain has a way of revealing things that you never would have seen otherwise.

Kevin Lowe: It changes your perspective. It reshapes what matters.

Kevin Lowe: And it forces you to ask deeper questions of yourself.

Kevin Lowe: Now, the secret is, Is that growth doesn't mean that you move on like nothing ever happened.

Kevin Lowe: Instead, growth is you carrying forward what you've learned, what you've experienced.

Kevin Lowe: Because again, we can't.

Kevin Lowe: Always control what happens in this life.

Kevin Lowe: I've said that statement more times than I can count on the podcast.

Kevin Lowe: But we can always control how we respond, how we react. And one Of those ways.

Kevin Lowe: Is by taking what has happened to us and learning from it, not letting it beat us down, but instead allowing it to build upon ourselves, To grow, to become better versions of us.

Kevin Lowe: And all of those Lessons learned And.

Kevin Lowe: As we grow, We carry them with us.

Kevin Lowe: You bring them into the next chapter.

Kevin Lowe: The next chapter isn't a brand new book. No, it's the same story.

Kevin Lowe: Just a new chapter. One of the most Powerful things that happens when we begin to enter into this growth stage is we stop asking the question, Why did this happen to me? And instead, you start beginning to look at it from a different perspective of.

Kevin Lowe: What can I learn Because of this? What lessons can I take from it?

Kevin Lowe: How can I use What happened to me not as a negative, but how can I use it as a positive?

Kevin Lowe: What can I do because of it? Inside of The hardest moments.

Kevin Lowe: Are some of the most pivotal lessons in life that are going to shape us moving forward.

Kevin Lowe: We just have to be willing to ask Ourselves different questions, to expand, to grow.

Kevin Lowe: And once we allow growth to take place.

Kevin Lowe: We can move Into the third piece of the puzzle.

Kevin Lowe: One of the Most powerful pieces of all.

Kevin Lowe: And that, my friend, Is gratitude.

Kevin Lowe: Now, when I say gratitude, I'm not talking about surface-level positivity. I'm not talking about toxic positivity.

Kevin Lowe: No, I'm talking about something way deeper.

Kevin Lowe: Way more meaningful than that. This is not Pretending that everything is just hunky-dory. No, this is not pretending.

Kevin Lowe: I'm talking about the small little things, the glimmers of hope, the little tiny things that remind you everything's going to be okay.

Kevin Lowe: The things that remind you there's still something good here. There's still hope.

Kevin Lowe: There's still a chance for me, for tomorrow.

Kevin Lowe: It might be something as simple as a conversation with a person in line at the grocery store.

Kevin Lowe: It might be as simple As the sound.

Kevin Lowe: Of the birds outside your window first thing in the morning. Just as the Sunlight's beginning to shine its light on the world.

Kevin Lowe: The birds start singing.

Kevin Lowe: Or maybe it's just a sense of peace that you weren't expecting today.

Kevin Lowe: and yet you all of a sudden realize wow you know what i don't feel so heavy i just feel lighter today you have that feeling of peace you weren't expecting this is gratitude gratitude for the big things found in amongst of the little things.

Kevin Lowe: Now, the powerful Thing about gratitude is the fact that gratitude doesn't cancel out grief.

Kevin Lowe: Instead, it coexists with it. And when you can begin to see the beauty in the little things, To experience the power of gratitude in just the littlest things, even in the midst of the bad.

Kevin Lowe: You, my friend, begin to become the version of you that you're meant to be.

Kevin Lowe: Gratitude, again, is something that honestly you can experience in amongst of the entire journey.

Kevin Lowe: Because even when everything is going wrong.

Kevin Lowe: Even when everything in your world seems Like it's falling apart.

Kevin Lowe: If you can focus on finding those little glimmers of hope, Those little pieces of things in life to be grateful for, my friend, it can help you dramatically.

Kevin Lowe: And one of the easiest Places to find it.

Kevin Lowe: Is in nature. I spoke about the birds singing Outside your window.

Kevin Lowe: In the morning.

Kevin Lowe: It can be Found in those first rays of sunlight coming through your window.

Kevin Lowe: It can also be found in a random pop-up afternoon thunderstorm.

Kevin Lowe: When you're tucked away in your office, or maybe you're at home.

Kevin Lowe: And it's storming outside, and it's gotten dark in the middle of the day, and the thunder is booming, just sit there and marvel at the magnificence of something as simple as the weather.

Kevin Lowe: and be grateful for the opportunity of how you're feeling, the peace, the ease that you're experiencing.

Kevin Lowe: Maybe it's a bad thunderstorm. Maybe the power goes out.

Kevin Lowe: Maybe your TV loses signal and you're just left to just sit.

Kevin Lowe: Internet's not working, so you can't be on the computer. Instead, you just have to sit and listen to the rain.

Kevin Lowe: Find gratitude in that.

Kevin Lowe: So now with those three mindset shifts, those three principles in place to have you learning.

Kevin Lowe: How to grieve and Grow all at the same time.

Kevin Lowe: Let's begin to put them into action.

Kevin Lowe: So we're.

Kevin Lowe: Going to round Out today's episode with just three quick little action items for you to help you put this into practice.

Kevin Lowe: First, if you're into journaling.

Kevin Lowe: Why not journal? And I want you To journal on these specific three prompts Today.

Kevin Lowe: I'm grieving Today, I'm grateful for And today, I'm learning Those three prompts Just journal about them Do it every day Do it once a week Do it once and forget About it Do it as many times.

Kevin Lowe: As you feel it can benefit you Again, maybe you don't even have to write it down Instead, Maybe you just think about it Ask yourself.

Kevin Lowe: Today, I'm grieving. What are you upset about? What are you missing? What are you sad over?

Kevin Lowe: Talk it out. And then move to the next one.

Kevin Lowe: Reminding yourself of what you're thankful for.

Kevin Lowe: What gratitude do you have In your heart.

Kevin Lowe: Right now? And then, of course, today I'm learning. I'm expanding upon.

Kevin Lowe: I'm excited about. Frame it however you want. Just get the thoughts out of your head.

Kevin Lowe: Get them onto paper. Talk them out onto the Notes app of your iPhone. Get them out Of your head and let yourself then be able to see it, to read it, to hear it, to understand it, because that's going to help you to grow.

Kevin Lowe: My second little action item is that safe person.

Kevin Lowe: The person who you can talk to, who you can tell the stuff that you don't tell anybody else.

Kevin Lowe: I want you to tell them how you're feeling right now. Don't keep it bottled up inside.

Kevin Lowe: Let a friend be a friend. They tell you constantly that they are there for you.

Kevin Lowe: If you need them to reach out, I'm right now reminding you to reach out to them.

Kevin Lowe: Let them be a friend. And my third action item is right now, I want you to focus on finding one little glimmer of hope, one little thing to be grateful for, one thing of beauty in nature, in the world around you. Be grateful for it.

Kevin Lowe: Maybe it's something that ordinarily you would think is an annoyance.

Kevin Lowe: Maybe that bird outside your window actually drives you absolutely insane.

Kevin Lowe: Instead, I encourage you to just pause.

Kevin Lowe: and listen to it from a different perspective.

Kevin Lowe: A perspective of gratitude, of finding gratefulness in the normal, Everyday little stuff.

Kevin Lowe: And my hope is if you can do those three little things, Those activities, you, my friend.

Kevin Lowe: Are not just thinking about growing, but you're actually growing.

Kevin Lowe: You're stepping forward. You're dipping your toe in the water.

Kevin Lowe: And maybe you're ready to just go ahead and dive all the way in.

Kevin Lowe: So, my friend, what I want to leave you with is this reminder.

Kevin Lowe: It is possible to grieve and grow at the same time.

Kevin Lowe: You can Carry the pain.

Kevin Lowe: And the possibility all at the same time. You can honor what you've lost and still choose How you move forward.

Kevin Lowe: You can grieve and you can grow.

Kevin Lowe: My friend, this is Grit, Grace, and Inspiration, A podcast that I hope, I pray, does something more than just entertain you.

Kevin Lowe: But hopefully gives you a little bit of hope in something more, that gives you a little bit of inspiration, something better, and gives you the motivation to go chasing after it all.

Kevin Lowe: Because my friend, every day is a new opportunity for you.

Kevin Lowe: For me, to never give up on life. This life is meant for us to live, meant for us to thrive.

Kevin Lowe: So in spite of it all, let's just give it our wholehearted effort of doing just that.

Kevin Lowe: My friend, if There's ever anything I can do for you, please reach out to me.

Kevin Lowe: You can go to the website, gritgraceinspiration.com. It has an.

Kevin Lowe: Easy way to Get in touch with me there. You can also check out today's show notes, the episode description, find the links for contacting me.

Kevin Lowe: Listen, I'm here For you just as a friend.

Kevin Lowe: So reach out.

Kevin Lowe: Please don't hesitate to fill out the contact form on the website.

Kevin Lowe: To send me an email. Again, I'll leave my email Address inside of today's show notes. Reach out to me.

Kevin Lowe: If I can be a help to you just to offer you some encouragement, I would love to do so.

Kevin Lowe: Until next time, I am your host, Kevin Lowe.

Kevin Lowe: And this, again, was another episode of Grit, Grace, and Inspiration.

Podcast Outro Plays