When Grief Comes to Visit
This week, I am writing to you from Unity Village, where I have been attending the Affiliated New Thought Network (ANTN) conference. I am surrounded by spiritual teachers, ministers, friends, laughter, hugs, prayer, music, and an extraordinary amount of love. And yet, strangely enough, I have also been surrounded by grief.
It has surprised me this week. Grief has come over me without warning. One moment I am completely present, enjoying a conversation or walking across these beautiful grounds, and the next moment, there it is. A wave. Sometimes tears. Sometimes exhaustion. Sometimes irritation or anger. Sometimes simply a deep ache that I cannot quite put into words.
I am learning not to fight it. Instead, I am asking myself a different question: What does my soul need right now? Sometimes the answer is prayer. Sometimes it is meditation. Sometimes I need to take a nap. Sometimes I need to step away from everyone, put the leashes on the dogs, and go for a walk. I notice the trees. I feel the ground beneath my feet. I breathe the air. I listen. I become present again.
And I am realizing that these spiritual practices are not ways of escaping grief. They are ways of making room for it. Perhaps that is part of the medicine for grief. We pray. We meditate. We walk. We breathe. We rest. We connect with Mother Earth. We allow ourselves to cry. And perhaps most importantly, we give ourselves an enormous amount of grace.
There is no correct way to grieve. Grief may look like tears today and laughter tomorrow. It may look like anger in the morning and gratitude by afternoon. We can be having a wonderful day and suddenly feel sadness wash over us. None of that means we have gone backward. It simply means we have loved.
And I am discovering something else this week: grief needs community. What a gift that my grief has chosen to visit while I am surrounded by people who love me. I don't have to explain everything. I don't have to pretend I'm okay. I don't have to put on my minister hat and have all the answers. I can simply be Bobby—and allow myself to be held by a community of love.
Tomorrow, I will stand here at Unity Village and receive my Doctor of Divinity degree from Emerson Theological Institute. I will also have the incredible honor of delivering the commencement address. There is tremendous joy in that. And there is grief. Both are true. Maybe spiritual maturity isn't learning how to eliminate one so we can experience the other. Maybe it is developing the capacity to hold both—to discover that a heart can break and expand at the very same time.
This week has reminded me that our spiritual practices aren't only for the mountaintops. They are especially important in the valleys. They become the places where we can rest when life becomes too heavy to carry by ourselves.
So, if grief comes to visit you, don't rush it out the door. Sit with it. Breathe with it. Walk with it. Pray with it. Let someone who loves you sit beside you. And above all, give yourself grace. Because grief is not the absence of faith. Grief is love learning how to live in a new form. And sometimes the most spiritual thing we can do is simply allow ourselves to feel it.
With love and gratitude, Rev. Dr. Bobby Kyser
Get Out of Your Own Little World!
“Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it?” Isaiah 43:19 (KJV)
Have you ever noticed how easy it is to get comfortable in our own little world? We have our routines, our favorite places, our familiar faces, and sometimes even our familiar ways of thinking. And while there's certainly comfort in the familiar, I've discovered that comfort doesn't always encourage growth.
This past week, I had the wonderful opportunity to attend the Affiliated New Thought Network (ANTN) conference at Unity Village. It was an especially meaningful week because I also received my Doctor of Divinity degree from Emerson Theological Institute. What a milestone! After years of study, reflection, and perseverance, I had the joy of celebrating this accomplishment surrounded by fellow ministers, spiritual leaders, teachers, and friends.
But something else happened that was equally meaningful.
I got out of my own little world!
As a minister, it's easy to become immersed in the day-to-day responsibilities of leading a spiritual community. There are meetings to attend, messages to prepare, decisions to make, and people to serve. Before we know it, our world can become rather small, not because we intend it to, but because we become so focused on what's directly in front of us.
Being at Unity Village reminded me how important it is to step outside those familiar boundaries. I found myself having conversations that sparked new ideas, listening to perspectives that challenged my thinking, laughing with colleagues who understand the joys and challenges of ministry, and reconnecting with the excitement that first called me to this spiritual path.
I returned home not only with a new degree, but with renewed enthusiasm, fresh inspiration, and a greater appreciation for the power of connection.
In Unity, we teach that our consciousness shapes our experience of life. But here's something worth considering: How can we expand our consciousness if we never allow ourselves to experience anything beyond what we already know?
Sometimes spiritual growth requires us to change our scenery, engage in a new conversation, explore a different perspective, or simply become willing to see life through someone else's eyes.
The prophet Isaiah reminds us, “Behold, I will do a new thing.” Perhaps the new thing isn't always something God is bringing into our lives. Perhaps it's something waiting to emerge within us when we become willing to step beyond the familiar.
And here's what I know: We don't have to travel across the country or attend a conference to experience this kind of awakening. Sometimes it begins with attending a class, introducing ourselves to someone new, volunteering in a ministry, or saying yes to an opportunity we might ordinarily decline.
So this week, I invite you to ask yourself: Has my world become a little too small?
Where might I be limiting my possibilities simply because I've become comfortable with the familiar? What new experience, relationship, or opportunity might be waiting just beyond the boundaries I've created?
One of the greatest gifts of spiritual living is recognizing that we are never finished growing, learning, or becoming.
Sometimes we have to step outside the world we've created to discover the possibilities we've been missing.
So go ahead. Shake things up a little. Meet someone new. Take a different path. Say yes to something unexpected.
Because the world doesn't get bigger by staying where we are. It gets bigger when we become willing to grow.
And who knows? You just might discover a whole new expression of the divine within you!
Join us this coming Sunday as our own Rev. Dr. Gerry Boylan shares his inspiring message, “Some Guidelines for Living on Planet Earth.”
With love and blessings, Rev. Dr. Bobby Kyser
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