Living Your Dash

 What an honor it was to speak at Full Circle Grief Center's Live Your Dash Luncheon! 

This fundraiser helps Full Circle provide comprehensive grief support for those in the Richmond, VA area. When Jack died, I was in too much shock to even look for or access this kind of grief support. If you are grieving, or know someone who is grieving, I'd encourage you to see whether there is a grief center in your area. They often offer individual counseling and family groups and activities. 

By just EXISTING, grief centers help acknowledge to our world that grief is a real issue that lasts well beyond the few days between a death and a funeral. 

Something really special happened after my speech last Friday. The setting was a super fancy country club, and many of the servers were young adults. After the luncheon, 5 of the servers came up to me to share how my speech impacted them. We often wonder about this next generation, but let me say, they are all right! They were on the clock, working, but they let themselves open up and be touched by my words and then took the time to share with me their impact. Wow! I am so grateful.

The theme of the luncheon was Living your Dash, and it refers to the dash on a gravestone between the birth date and the death date. 

I'be been putting too much pressure on myself lately about what I'm going to do with my dash during this  short and precious life. It's overwhelming and I feel burnt out and ineffective. 

Maybe you do too.

So today I will just try to do one small thing: be kind.