Notes from "How To Live When A Loved One Dies"

Interpretations and highlights

• The practice is to stop and take care of, tenderly embrace, painful emotions as soon as they come up. Don’t push them away.
• Embracing and understanding our suffering generates love and compassion, lets forgiveness arise naturally.
• We’re allowed to feel happy now, before the end of all our suffering.
• Let yourself be nourished by the Earth. Her stability, non-discrimination, perseverance, equanimity, forbearance.

Gathered notes

• Like the trunk of a tree, withstanding a storm. Gradually, eventually, the storm subsides.
• Whenever we become overwhelmed with grief, despair, or sorrow, our breathing is the stable, solid ground that we can take refuge in.
• Listening deeply to our own suffering is an act of self-compassion.
• When a painful emotion comes up, stop whatever you are doing and take care of it right away.
• We need to have a solid foundation in order to be strong enough to bear our suffering, to fully face and embrace our pain.
• Recognise that the conditions for happiness are available right now. We need only allow ourselves to be fully alive in the present moment, and we will able to touch them.
  • Try to selectively water the good seeds and refrain from watering the negative seeds.
  • One way of taking care of our suffering is to invite a seed of the opposite nature to come. Nothing exists without its opposite.
  • Stay in touch with the many wonderful and refreshing things that both inside us and all around us - the trees, the blue sky, the setting sun.
  • Let yourself be nourished by the earth, her stability and non-discrimination.
    • The earth is steadfast. She embodies perseverance, equanimity, and forbearance in the face of challenge.
• This is the practice: not to fight or push away sadness, grief, and loss.
  • To identify, name, and embrace them tenderly. Then, they calm down naturally and give space to something else.
• Our emotions are impermanent. They come and go.
• We need to understand the goodness of our suffering. Love and understanding are the lotuses that bloom from the mud of suffering. By embracing our suffering, understanding it, love and compassion will be generated.
• We do not run away from suffering, instead we embrace it, and look deeply into our suffering to understand it. With insight comes transformation and healing.
• Learn to accept that you did the best you could, given the conditions you had.
  • Forgive yourself–when there is understanding and insight, compassion and understanding, forgiveness arises naturally.
• Look deeply to see your beloved in other forms. Everything is inextricably connected with everything else. All things inter-are.
• We are life, and life is far vaster than this body, this concept, this mind.
• Nothing is born, and nothing dies.
  • There is no creation, only manifestation.
  • There is no death, only transformation.
• We don’t have to wait for the end of all our suffering before we can feel happy again. We are allowed to feel happy now. But we may need to change our idea of happiness to recognise the happiness that is available to us right here and right now. Our idea of happiness may itself be the obstacle keeping us from true happiness.

Raw notes

Grief

• To be able to cry brings comfort, relief, and healing.
• Like a tree in a storm. The trunk is very calm and still. It can withstand the storm.
• When a painful emotion comes up, stop whatever you are doing and take care of it right away.
• Gradually the storm will subside, our breathing and and our heart will clam down, and we will feel more at peace.
• Listening deeply to our own suffering is an act of self-compassion.
• Whenever we become overwhelmed with grief, despair, or sorrow, our breathing is the stable, solid ground that we can take refuge in.
• We do not need to wait until we feel like smiling in order to smile.
• Let yourself be nourished by the earth, the sky, the fresh air, and the sun.
• Let go of sadness and worries, and release them to the earth,

Surviving our strong emotions

• Our emotions are impermanent. They come and go. This insight can save your life.
• When we are feeling fragile and unstable, we can come home and take refuge in the earth, her stability and non-discrimination.
• This is the practice: not to push away sadness, grief, and loss. But to identify, name, and embrace them tenderly.
• When we can recognise, name, and embrace our difficult emotions, they calm down naturally, and give space to something else.
• The function of mindfulness is, first, to recognise the suffering that is there and then to take care of the suffering by identifying and embracing it.
• To have the strength to fully face and embrace our pain, it is important that we stay in touch with the many wonderful and refreshing things that both inside us and all around us - the trees, the blue sky, the setting sun.
• We need to have a solid foundation in order to be strong enough to bear our suffering.
• One way of taking care of our suffering is to invite a seed of the opposite nature to come. Nothing exists without its opposite.
• We don’t have to fight anything or push anything down; we just try to selectively water the good seeds and refrain from watering the negative seeds.
• We just recognise the feelings and let them go, gently.
• Love and understanding are the lotuses that bloom from the mud of suffering.
• We know that suffering plays an important role in generating understanding and love. So we do not run away from suffering, instead we embrace it, and look deeply into our suffering to understand it.
• With insight comes transformation and healing.
• In the world, there are many “mindfulness bells” in our daily life–the telephone, a notification, an alarm, a siren.
• Learn to accept that you did the best you could, given the conditions you had. Learn to accept your imperfections. Forgive yourself–when there is understanding and insight, forgiveness arises naturally.
• Our loved ones do not want us to suffer after they die–they want us to be happy.
• When we understand that we were doing the best we could, and that we are always doing the best we can with what we have, we feel less burdened.
• Meditating our who we were as a child brings insight to our current suffering.
• When we understand the suffering of our parents, we can accept their shortcomings more easily.
• With compassion and understanding, forgiveness can arise.

A could never dies

• Look deeply to see your beloved in other forms.
• A cloud can’t pass from a state of being into a state of nonbeing. It can’t become nothing.
• We don’t have to wait for the end of all our suffering before we can feel happy again. We are allowed to feel happy now. But we may need to change our idea of happiness to recognise the happiness that is available to us right here and right now. Our idea of happiness may itself be the obstacle keeping us from true happiness.
• By embracing our suffering, understanding it, love and compassion will be generated.
• Everything is inextricably connected with everything else. All things inter-are.
• We are life, and life is far vaster than this body, this concept, this mind.
• In our mind, to die means from something you become nothing; from someone you become no one. If we look deeply, we see that reality is not like this.
• Nothing is born, and nothing dies. There is only transformation.
• Recognise that the conditions for happiness are available right now. We need only allow ourselves to be fully alive in the present moment, and we will able to touch them.
• There is no creation, only manifestation. There is no death, only transformation.

Connecting with life

• The earth is steadfast. She embodies perseverance, equanimity, and forbearance in the face of challenge.
• When we practice mindful living, we water the positive elements in ourselves and each other.
• Just as the practice of mindfulness can help us release sorrow, becoming aware of all the good conditions for happiness we already have can give us a more balanced view and help alleviate our suffering. When we look more closely, we see that we not only have pain and sorrow, but we also have many conditions for happiness which already exist.
• We need to understand the goodness of our suffering. It is the compost that helps the roses to grow. It is the mud from which magnificent lotuses emerge.

Notes from “How To Live When A Loved One Dies” by Thich Nhat Hanh.

Added 2024-09-24, last updated 2024-10-19.