| This week, someone asked me what I’m doing with the “survivor’s guilt” from the storm. My first response echoed what I said in my blog a few weeks ago, where I’ve had to recognize that each of us is on our own journey. Our respective journeys are happening whether or not we have faced an epic storm. What I’m coming to recognize is that I’m wrestling with grief more than guilt.
I remember when my mom died, the fact that the world went on was maddening to me. Did they NOT understand that my world had stopped? How dare they! I remember driving through a large city, after dark, marveling at all the cars, the lights, the businesses that were going about their business, without a care about the loss my family was feeling. As I drove, what I noticed had changed. It seems my personal “polarized” filter only noticed things that made me cry. For the first time ever, I noticed a funeral home as I passed. Tears soon followed. There were appropriate times to drop into the full experience of my grief; driving through a big city at night was not that time. I had to work on my focus. With that awareness, I shifted my filter. Just like you can turn a polarized filter over another polarized filter, and have it block almost all light, I recognized that I needed to turn my attention to a different angle. Rather than focus on the loss, I found that focusing on what was in front of me dried my eyes. I began to drive fully present, rather than on autopilot. Doing so didn’t dismiss or stuff my grief; it simply gave it a place to rest. And it wasn’t a one-time action. For the next hour, I must have toggled in and out of being present to the drive several dozen times. That’s where the magic is. My definition of resilience is the ability to return to balance. Not the staying in balance. We waste a lot of time and mind space on trying to be perfect. The magic is in the recovery back to balance. If we know we can recover, we can handle more than we thought we could. It's taken me a while to acknowledge the grief from this storm. Grief is not reserved for death, although there was plenty of that. Grief also comes with loss, and loss creates change. Every day, it seems I’m aware of something else that has changed. Most notably, one of the main routes coming into Lake Lure through Chimney Rock is gone for the foreseeable future. Miles of important arteries washed out in the flood, prompting the need for helicopter evacuations for hundreds (probably thousands) of people. In the unstable days immediately after the storm, our first foray out showed us that the one road that did exist was sliding down the bank. For days we were down to one lane. I carried a bugout bag and my dog with me for a couple of weeks, aware that we might not be able to return home for a variety of reasons. Gratitude washed over me the day I saw well over a dozen NCDOT trucks full of material lined up waiting to repair that vital artery. My usual impatience over stoppages due to road construction metamorphized into deep, heartfelt gratefulness. Somehow that road has become the touchstone of gratitude for me. Over the weeks, the initial repair was shored up further, and eventually, the guardrail was restored. Every time I pass that place, I’m grateful. On the flip side, the loss of the road to Asheville has deeply affected us. What was once a 25 mile drive is now a 55 mile drive. Traffic on the route is wildly unpredictable. When I drive this road, I am keenly aware of how much I took the road we lost for granted. It may be years before it’s restored. I really have to work on my focus to remember that we still have that road. Be grateful doesn’t come quite as easily. When I reflect on the question of what to do with survivor’s guilt, I come back to gratitude. Not in a “thank goodness it was them, not me” way, or even in a “this could have been much worse” way. Of course, I vacillate between feeling those things. But the gratitude that is a balm to my soul is more of a recognition of what I DO have when I think about loss. We can’t build a foundation where there is no ground. If I focus on what isn’t there, I’m left with a soup of anger, resentment, and grief. If I focus on what I have – with gratitude - I can keep the losses in perspective. One of the exercises I have given my coaching clients for years is the Gratitude List: Write a list of 100 things you are grateful for. The concept is simple; the execution is sometimes daunting. When someone is stuck, I typically remind them to start with the fact that they woke up that day to do the exercise. Then they might consider they have the paper to write on and the pen to write with. When the polarized filter opens to the tiny items of daily living, the floodgates of gratitude tend to open. The resulting pivot in mindset is often transformative. So that’s how I’m dealing with survivor’s guilt and grief. Yes, I feel both. And…I am able to recover through gratitude. |
