THE LIMITATIONS OF POSITIVITY: As we approach the Thanksgiving-Christmas season, many of us notice a curious mix of feelings in us. There is joy and anticipation of good times together with family, friends, church.

Yet as our lives have unfolded, there also comes the twinge of sadness and sorrow. This season also can bring the pang of grief for times gone by, for missing people forever in our hearts but no longer in the world.

In our culture, we often get the unspoken ‘message’ to be upbeat, positive, to say/pretend we’re fine even when we aren’t. Sometimes it’s called, ‘the tyranny of positivity’.

We might even surmise something is “wrong” with us when we can’t snap out of our sadness. No question, most of us enjoy being happy more than sad. Yet can we/need we be constant Tiggers, kaboinging along in ceaseless happy-ha-ha bliss?

In BITTERSWEET: HOW SORROW & LONGING MAKE US WHOLE, Susan Cain explores the tender blessing of what she calls ‘bittersweet’. This is being capable of somehow holding together both the joy and sorrow, gladness and sadness, often intertwined in our experiences. She contends such opens us to a wider, fuller range for our lives.

I think of Jesus’ words: “I come so you might have life more abundantly.” As in a cup running over…see Psalm 23.

STEWARDS OF GRIEF: Cain explores how the ability to be aware of our grief – our own and that of others – enables us to be more sensitive and compassionate persons. Such sensitivity to what we and others miss and long for does not diminish but expands our lives.

Cain alludes to Eeyore (I trust you have at least a working knowledge of the Winnie the Pooh gang.) Book providence led me to THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO WINNIE THE POOH, Bruce Epperly.

“Despite his gloomy disposition, Eeyore matters to his friends…they gain wisdom, become larger spirited, more accepting of the diversity of human and non-human experience." p.56.

I have often observed that grief is the God given healthy, healing process that enables us to take the untakeable and go on after the un-go-on-able losses and hurts that happen.

+ We are good to remember Jesus cried when he heard his friend Lazarus had died not because of a lack of faith but an abundance of love.

+ Our grief is an experience of the capacity God gives us to love – the only way to grieve less is to love less.

+ GRIEF by GRACE leads us to a deep GRATITUDE for the people (pets, too!) and times of our lives.

Here’s a question for your prayer and pondering: What does it mean to be a steward (care-taker) of our grief? To recognize and appreciate grief in ourselves and others? To find how what’s missing can join with what’s present to increase the richness of our lives?

POIGNANCY PUDDLES: Cain examines poignancy in our lives – a daily experience we recognize, but perhaps not a daily word. It refers to a twinge of sadness/longing often interwoven with our joy/glad times. Again, such expands our lives, not shrinks them.

Cain’s example: our delight seeing a child have fun splashing in a puddle, remembering our childhood. Yet we have a twinge as we recall those times are long gone for us. Or we feel the bittersweetness of knowing the child’s innocent, uncomplicated life will become complicated and not so innocent in due time. Poignancy magnifies our experience of the preciousness of it all.

+ The poignancy that goes with watching a child’s puddle fun, I think goes for seeing our children, perhaps even more for our grandchildren, excitedly opening their presents.

+ I’ve shared how the fun of our pup Sam also twinges with memories of Jack. The combo enriches both the missing of Jack and the enjoyment of Sam.

+Flipping through old photos at out house is a guarantee for a poignant mix of laughter and tears.

+ Cain shares how her lifelong relationship with her mother was both edgy and loving. She has a mix of grief and gratitude for what it was and wasn’t. Anyone else know the odd blessing of grief and gratitude for certain relationships across our lives?

What are your poignancy moments?

BITTERSWEET BENEFITS: Cain gives a a summary of the benefits of embracing real life with it’s real poignant mix of griefs and joys…

+ Move from going wider to deeper

+ Live in the present

+ Forgive more easily

+Love more deeply

+ Experience more gratitude, contentment

+ Less stress and anger (p. 185)

I have barely done justice to Cain’s book. She shares a lot about how so-called sad music – minor key – can touch us at deep levels. Among them, there is the Moonlight Sonata to the heartful ballads of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, Dance Me to the End of Love and more.

The book is one of those as I read it, I found it ‘reading’ me. It reminded me of the diverse ‘dimensions’ of a being fully alive person. So…

“I pray that you, together with all God’s people, may have the power to understand how broad and long, high and deep, is Christ’s love.” Ephesians 3.18