David Kessler Quotes

The time will come when memory will bring a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes." That's how it goes: pain first, meaning later.

She realized that for the dying butterflies were a symbol of transformation, not of death, but of life continuing, no matter what. Although your relationship with your loved one will change after death, it will also continue, no matter what. The challenge will be to make it a meaningful one.

"Your pain will not always be like this," I told her. "It will change." This is a message that the grieving need to hear, and in the moment of saying it, I often observe a shift. The person looks up at me and says, "It will?" And he or she suddenly becomes lighter.

One night I happened to come upon a documentary called Facing the Storm, about the buffalos in Montana. Robert Thomson of the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks discussed how buffalo run into the storm, thus minimizing how long they will be in it. They don't ignore it, run from it, or just hope it will go away, which is what we often do when we want to avoid our storms of emotion. We don't realize that by doing this we're maximizing our time in the pain. The avoidance of grief will only prolong the pain of grief. Better to turn toward it and allow it to run its natural course, knowing that the pain will eventually pass, that one of these days we will find the love on the other side of pain.

While death may look like a loss to the living, the last hours of a dying person may very well be filled with fullness rather than emptiness.

Ultimately, meaning comes through finding a way to sustain your love for the person after their death while you're moving forward with your life. That

. . . even twins are not here to go on each other's journeys.

grief is optional in this lifetime. Yes, it's true. You don't have to experience grief, but you can only avoid it by avoiding love. Love and grief are inextricably intertwined.

You are the only one who can find the meaning.

People often say, "I don't know how you're doing it." I tell them that I'm not. I'm not deciding to wake up in the morning. I just do. Then I put one foot in front of the other because there's nothing else to do. Whether I like it or not, my life is continuing, and I have decided to be part of it.

It shouldn't be too surprising that the person who is actually present as we cross the threshold of life and take our first breath once again appears at the threshold as we take our last breath.

Disenfranchised grief is the result of a loss for which people do not feel they have a socially recognized right to grieve. Disenfranchised grief is often not openly mourned or approved of.

I know you're drowning. You'll keep sinking for a while, but there will come a point when you'll hit bottom. Then you'll have a decision to make. Do you stay there or push off and start to rise again?

Visions, Trips, and Crowded Rooms: Who and What You See Before You Die.

Ultimately, meaning comes through finding a way to sustain your love for the person after their death while you're moving forward with your life.