The Grief
Can We Grieve For Old Versions Of Ourselves?
Introduction
As we move through life, we transition through different stages. As a child, we’re dependent on our parents. We grow older, and gain independence, until we begin to make all our own decisions. Responsibility rises through this period, and as a result, change in our lives can accelerate.
Change is inevitable, and is generally seen as unpleasant. This unpleasantness can lead to us grieving our past selves, and resisting change. We could miss our childhood with unlimited curiosity, or our young adult life of socialising and adventure. We could miss our independence as we grow older and need greater support.
Hence, how can we manage these shifts through life, and how can we begin to understand the grief that we can feel for our past selves?
The Stages of Life
Childhood to Adolescence - An innocent, childlike curiosity that seems fleeting as we enter the chaotic shifts of adolescence. It’s here that we begin to form our identity. We learn right from wrong. We learn what makes us happy. We learn what makes us sad, angry, and joyful. We figure out what makes us laugh and cry. We learn about our own internal code. We’re influenced by everything around us and hence grow into a jigsaw of these influences. Each jigsaw piece represents an aspect of our lives, and the collective of pieces is our entire identity. As life moves forward, these pieces can be swapped, fade, or change shape as we ourselves change.
Adolescence To Young Adulthood - A period of confusion and change. We gain responsibility and independence and get to decide how we use this newfound freedom. It’s here where we could reflect on our jigsaw, and seek to change some pieces that were enforced upon us by others.
Young Adulthood To Midlife - We leave the safety of the nest and have to pave our future paths. We alone are the determinant of our direction in life, but we’re pulled in many different directions. The jigsaw could change here frequently, but the structure of the overall image remains as the pillars from childhood and adolescence remain.
Photo by Antonio Gabola on Unsplash Parenthood - A situation that we arrive in at different periods to those around us. Everyone buys the books and attempts to learn the theory, but it’s truly a sink-or-swim scenario, with no choice but to swim. This is one huge change in our identity and one that is reflected in changes to the centre of our jigsaw. This centre determines the structure of the outer layers of the jigsaw.
Midlife To Late Adulthood - Our children could leave the nest here if we have them, leaving an eerie quiet. Generally, retirement is considered the next major shift in identity, even though it doesn’t need to be. In this stage, we slow down, reaping the rewards of our previous endeavours, while also making large impacts from our experience in our fields. But we could look at our jigsaw and no longer see what picture it represents. Some pieces could become reshaped or faded as our sense of self transitions with changes in life.
Retirement and Older Age - Seen by some as the slowing down, or coming to a stop. But it doesn’t have to be. This is the start of a new stage. Another of freedom, in which you determine much of your own time. We always have the option to change our jigsaw pieces and to create a new image. This is certainly true in retirement.
Photo by Hans-Peter Gauster on Unsplash End of Life - The Great Reflection. What did you spend your time doing? Are you happy? Does your jigsaw tell you the story you want it to? It’s here that we can come to terms with the jigsaw we’ve built, or grieve the jigsaw we’ve spent our life creating.
The Painful Transitions
We should seek to look forward in life. Where are we heading? Because if we’re stagnant, we sink and become unhappy. We look forward in our lives by making the most of the present.
Life has the wonderful aspect of moving and changing even if we don’t want it to. We don’t control it. We’ll flow from childhood to young adulthood, to retirement, to the end of life in a blink. Change in life is a given. You can’t fight it. These transitions can be daunting, but change offers new opportunities. On the flip side, it can lead to us reminiscing about the past.
This inevitability of change can be seen as a wonderful enlightenment or a crippling limitation, dependent on interpretation. With change being seen as enlightenment, we know the stages of life will come and go, ruthless in its march. It’s hence that we decide to make the most of each stage for what it is. To throw ourselves in head-first, and aim to make the most of each change, since it’s going to arrive anyway.
Alternatively, we can resist change. We can live in the past, fuelling ourselves on decades past by. This can be comforting. A warm blanket of happy memories. But, it can also distort our perception of the present.
Realistically, I expect the scale between enlightenment and limitation to be a fluid one. We’ll often find ourselves in a middle state of ambiguity. But being aware of the scale’s existence allows us to lean one way or the other when necessary. We can see this as a gift or a burden, fluctuating between the two, dependent on the current jigsaw of our lives.
The opportunity is in the change we experience today, not in a past we cannot change. And so, we have to embrace what can change.
Concluding Remarks
We must distinguish between these memories of our past and who we are today, treating our past selves and ourselves today with compassion. Be patient with yourself, and remember, we grieve because we love, and that’s brave.
We can honour the past without living in it. We can seek to understand how the grief we feel towards ourselves can facilitate this. Our memories can exist in sync with the present, but we can’t allow the memories to become our present. With time, we can pass through the stages of self-grief, eventually reaching acceptance.
And so, what version of yourself are you holding onto, and what could you be willing to let go of given time?