Glad No Matter What
Transforming Loss and Change into Gift and Opportunity
by SARK
New World Library, 2010. 224 pages.
Starred Review
Even though this is a book about dealing with loss and change, this is a truly joyous and exuberant book. I love SARK’s use of color and art in her pages.
She puts it well right at the beginning:
This is NOT a book about feeling glad when you don’t.
How annoying.
This is a book about finding and living from the glad parts in all of your feelings.
There’s so much wisdom in these pages. Stories. Insights. Encouragement. I’ll post a few more excerpts to give you the idea, but remember that if you read the book, you have the addition of SARK’s wonderful colors and fonts and interesting emphases.
I’ve seen and experienced over and over that grief and loss are always doorways to transformation.
My experiences with both have showed me that we can more actively work with time as we process grief and loss, instead of just waiting for time to pass. We really can consciously practice integrating loss and grief and living with them more fully and beautifully.
I know now that this healing happens in spirals and layers and NOT in steps like a ladder.
We cycle back around and start over, get stuck in the middle, and sometimes get to what feels like the end quickly.
We can weave all of these experiences together into an eventually elegant tapestry. I’ve been speaking with lots of people about the subjects of loss and grief, and it’s clear that in every case, whatever has been lost — job, savings, home, health, money, life — has tremendous gifts and opportunities to offer
if
we do our transformational work.
When we are caring for ourselves, we discover that there is actually plenty of time and energy to care for others and the world too. It is not negatively “selfish” to care for yourself brilliantly and exquisitely. In fact, as you fill your own well from the inside and tend to yourself with great love, it will naturally and effortlessly “spill over” for others to appreciate and utilize.
When you see someone who radiantly glows from within, you are seeing a self-caring soul. This kind of self-care is a living example to be inspired by, so that you can live that way also.
The opposite of old is not young.
The opposite of old is new.
As long as we continue to experience
the new, we will gloriously
inhabit all of the ages that we are.”
In short, I was so happy and supported to read this book after dealing with the loss and change of divorce and then a stroke. So I am convinced this is a wonderful book for after you’ve experienced loss and change, but I believe it would also be wonderful to read during loss and change. And I’m convinced it would be beautiful preparation to read it before loss and change happen to you (and they will). So we’re left with the fact that any time is a good time to read this encouraging book. I recommend reading it slowly, like I did, dipping in to it a part at a time and savoring what you find there.
planetsark.com
newworldlibrary.com
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