Module Three
Module Three
Reading and Reflections
Read from your chosen book, underline and make notes as you read. Perhaps underlining sentences that 1) resonate deeply with you, 2) offer a new concept or idea, or 3) you do not agree with entirely. Make notes in the margins or journal for our discussion. Your reflections and notations will be part of the continuing conversation of your experience of transformation through loss.
Journaling
Continue to journal about anything that shows up for you that feels significant. Notice the patterns of your life or the emerging patterns, and make notes about these and anything else that feels emotionally important. The act of noticing is powerful in the transformative process. When you complete the loss inventory, you may want to reflect on earlier notes and homework including the checklist from our first meeting as you do your loss history graph.
Ritual Action: Loss Inventory
Include a list or some representation in your ritual space of your circle of support. When you come into this space to do your work for the module, begin or open the space in a particular way that acknowledges your support and intentions.
Loss Inventory:
Create a an inventory of the losses you have experienced in your lifetime. This exercise is a time to step fully into non-judgment for yourself, and to value your instances of loss even if they seem insignificant.
Whatever emotions arise during this exercise, allow them to come through fully. Honor them as expressions that have been in waiting. Know that you have created space for parts and pieces of yourself that may not have had a chance to be fully seen, heard, or expressed.
Notice any resistance or fear that may arise before or during this practice. When you become aware of the resistance or any emotions that come, notice where they sit in your body. Place a hand or hands there to offer support and acknowledgment.
Instructions for the loss inventory:
On a horizontal line, put the date you were born on the left end of the line.
Put today’s date on the right end of the line.
Close your eyes, and allow the first memory you have to come to mind. Do not be concerned about when or what memory appears. Just note the memory and the approximate year on the time line.
Begin marking the time line with your most painful losses marking the year and event.
Continue filling in all of your losses big and small, drawing a downward line to indicate the intensity of the loss.
Take some breaths and be with the totality (at this point of memory and time) of your losses.
Bring this loss inventory with you to our next session.
This exercise is derived from The Grief Recovery Handbook by John W. James and Russell Friedman and The Grief Recovery Institute. *If you have already created a Loss History Inventory previously, 1) you may review what you already have and add any new losses that have occurred; or 2) we will design another practice exercise that best serves your current work.
