Has Grief Changed Your Perspective on Life?

[Tania]

Grief can profoundly affect how we view life, relationships, and our priorities. Have you noticed any changes in your outlook on life after experiencing loss? How do you navigate these shifts in perspective?

[Tania]

Grief has profoundly reshaped how I see life. Losing several loved ones in such a short span of time felt like the ground beneath me had crumbled, leaving an unending void. It was a stark reminder of life’s fragility, its transience, and how fleeting everything truly is. We grow up clinging to this comforting idea that certain people will always be there—that they’ll grow old alongside us, that there’s time. But that illusion shattered for me. The myth of old age being the inevitable destination for everyone proved to be just that—a myth.

When my partner died unexpectedly at just 49 years old, it was as though the universe spoke to me, stripping away the layers of falsehood I’d unknowingly built around the idea of permanence. It forced me to confront a reality I wasn’t ready for: that no one, no matter how deeply cherished, is guaranteed a tomorrow. This loss tore through the core of my belief system, unraveling the narratives I had leaned on to make sense of the world.

Grief opened my eyes to something unexplainable—something I feel but cannot fully grasp. It led me to ponder the possibility of an alternate universe, one that exists beyond the limits of human comprehension. We were built to navigate the here and now, not to fully understand what lies beyond this life. This belief, oddly enough, became a quiet source of solace amidst my pain. At the same time, my experience confirmed something else for me: the comfort offered by mediums and “signs” from the departed didn’t resonate with my heart. If my mother were to reach out from wherever she is now, I believe she’d come directly to me—not through someone claiming to speak on her behalf.

Their physical presence is gone, and yet, they linger—in my memories, in the stories I tell, and in the quiet essence of my mind. Grief taught me that holding on to those intangible threads is both beautiful and deeply painful. There’s no greater pain I’ve known than losing someone you love; it changes everything about how you live. You’re left with this enormous task of restructuring your world, deciding whether to carve out an entirely new life or to cling to the traditions and routines that once made your time together meaningful.

Grief is also a mirror. It forces you to face yourself, to look at how you’re choosing to live your own fleeting life. Will you sabotage it with bitterness, or will you let the pain shape you into someone more aware, more compassionate? It’s a choice I wrestle with daily. And yet, grief does something else—it amplifies your love for those still here, even as it instills a quiet fear of losing them too.

But grief also reveals the hard truths about relationships that didn’t weather the storm. There’s an added pain in realizing that not everyone who should be there for you will stay. Some abandon you in your darkest moments, making you feel as though you’ve died to them. That wound cuts deeper than I ever imagined, but it has also taught me that their absence doesn’t define my worth. Death is forever, and life is painfully temporary. But within that truth, I’ve found a choice: to move through this void with kindness.

Every day, I try. I try to mend the wounds grief has left and still show up as a good person in a world that can feel so harshly indifferent. Because if nothing else, grief has taught me this: while we cannot control how long we have or who we lose, we can always choose how we treat others in the time we have left. And for me, that’s enough to keep going.

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