Celebrating Your Widow Wins

The primitive human brain is designed with the primary goal of keeping us safe from danger. So, it makes sense that it naturally focuses on the negative, or things that can potentially harm us. Although we hear good news, our brains instinctively fixate on the bad news. Although someone pays us a compliment, we automatically focus on what we dislike about ourselves.

Survival depends on our ability to spot that which is dangerous, therefore our brains are hardwired to see the negative. So, it makes sense that we don’t readily focus on what is going right, or celebrate the wins. Yet if ever there was a time to find the wins, it is in life after loss.

Losing a spouse is a catastrophic event that levels everything that was once familiar, safe and dependable. As we stand in the wreckage and attempt to put some pieces back together, we are hard-pressed to appreciate any real progress.

I often ask widowed people what is going right in their life. It is a good question to ask ourselves. Although our brains are hardwired for the negative, we can choose to give equal airtime to the opposite. Where are the wins?

I would offer these wins worth celebrating.

If you feel like you are suffocating under the weight of grief that is parked on the chest, but you draw the next breath anyway.

If you know what it’s like to freefall into an abyss of uncertainty and confusion, but you choose to have hope in the future.

If your long days turn into impossible, sleepless nights, but you keep putting one foot in front of the other.

If you know the cruelty of the transition from “we” to “me,” but you keep searching for your new identity.  

If you show up to work exhausted and do your best anyway.

If no one in your life understands your journey, but you love them anyway.

If you have so far survived 100% of your worst days: horrific, cruel, torturous days that you wouldn’t wish on anyone.

You are winning.

I see you.

I celebrate you.

In what other ways are you winning?

If you need some help finding the wins, consider applying for my six-month private coaching offering called Life Reconstructed. Simply click here and we’ll see if it’s a fit. If not, I’ll share other supportive resources.