For everything there is a season… a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep; and a time to laugh; a time to mourn; and a time to dance….
– Ecclesiastes 3:1-4
By now, I think that you’d agree that when a major change occurs, something old often gets destroyed or taken away. As a result, your life as it was, is no more. In this sense, change means loss.
Our natural reaction to loss is grief. Depending on the nature of what’s lost, grief can manifest itself as various degrees of shock, denial, sadness, anger, loneliness, guilt, shame, anxiety, confusion, etc., making transition an emotionally rollercoaster.
In my work as mental health counsellor, I saw this happen all the time: following a major change, people would first go through a grief process, often intensely painful. I’ve lost count of the number of occasions I've guided my counselling clients through this process until they finally arrived at the place of acceptance and resolution.
To grieve is to be human.