I started processing my over 30 years of complex grief in 2020 when were globally confined to our homes. We were literally with ourselves, left with our thoughts and with all of our stuff including the pile of unresolved emotions…for me, the grief. As I started unraveling the years of grief, layer by layer, doing the hard work of grief work, there were times when I had to take a break. Times when I just couldn’t dive into the depths of the grief, I needed a break.
Thankfully, during research for my first book Can You Just Sit With Me, I found the Dual Process Model of Grief that gave me language and clarity to what I was feeling and actually doing when I took breaks from the grief. With this model, to rest from grief doesn’t mean avoiding the grief, forgetting, or pushing it away. It means giving our system, be it emotional, mental, physical a break from carrying the full weight of your loss all the time. It’s a kind of self-compassionate pacing.
To rest from grief means intentionally shifting into what the model calls “restoration-oriented” activities, those that focus on life, balance, distraction, or even joy, not to escape the grief, but to replenish your capacity to hold it. I go into more detail about the model in my book.
Here’s what rest from grief can look like in practice:
1. Letting Go of the Work (for a While) – If you’ve been actively processing through journaling, therapy, or memory work, it’s okay to pause. You’re not backtracking, you’re allowing space to breathe.
2. Consciously Choosing Lightness – Watching a funny show, singing in the car, playing a game, reading fiction. I read a lot of non-fiction and because I write about grief, I read and research a lot about grief, so sometimes reading fiction has helped with taking a break. Also, choosing small joys to bring balance to the emotional heaviness.
3. Getting Back into Your Body – Doing something physical (without emotional labor attached) like dancing, stretching, walking, even cleaning can ground you in the present.
4. Spending Time with People Who Don’t Require You to Talk About It – Just being in safe, neutral company, sharing a meal, chatting about nothing important can be restorative. I’m honestly still building in-person community to be able to do more of this. It does take time and intention.
5. Reclaiming Routine – Engaging in daily rituals or tasks that anchor you to normalcy: watering plants, cooking breakfast, folding laundry, organizing a drawer. I planted a garden this year and it has been so therapeutic.
6. Letting Yourself Not “Feel It” for a Bit – Some moments you won’t feel grief, and that’s okay. Resting means you don’t have to chase it, question it, or feel guilty about its absence.
7. Making Room for Beauty or Awe – Looking at art, being in nature, listening to music, or noticing a sunrise. These moments don’t cancel grief they just remind you that there’s still life alongside it.
Grief is a movement between. It’s not linear, and the back-and-forth is part of the healing. Resting from grief means honoring that rhythm instead of resisting it. I pray you are able to rest from your grief a bit.
Sitting with you,
Natasha
Get my book Can You Just Sit With Me Healthy Grieving for the Losses of Life. For more on the Dual Process Model of Grief and for navigating grief.
“Why are you still sad about that?”
It takes time and space to grieve well, but often our culture doesn’t afford us these things. Drawing from her own experience with grief, Natasha Smith invites us into a reflection on what it means to grieve. And how to cling to hope even in our darkest moments. Instead of providing quick-fix solutions, this book creates space for us to take time to just sit and grieve. To learn, and heal in healthy ways.
Can You Just Sit with Me? provides personal stories, biblical reflections, relevant research, practical tools, and prayers that point us to God. Who always sits with us in our grief. This book reminds us that every loss is worthy of the space and grace to grieve. Whether we are grieving a loss or supporting a friend who is grieving.
Get the book here.