My passion is to offer comfort though my stories and songs. My Insight Timer Course HEALING GRIEF THROUGH MUSIC is a wonderful opportunity for me to share my experiences and offer hope of healing. This course is available for free by clicking the image below:

On Insight Timer, I have three tracks that are medleys of the songs for this course. They are free and can be heard by clicking on these links:

 

GRIEF HEALING THROUGH MUSIC COURSE OUTLINE

Lesson 1 – “SO REAL”

The beginning of any grief journey begins with shock and numbness. I remember how unbearable it was to wake up and face a new reality after my son died. My song “So Real” is about dreading to wake up and wishing dreams were real. The lyric ending of “How I wish you were real,” expressed my aching desire to go back to the life I had before he died. Expressing my grief and finding other people who understood my pain helped me throughout my journey. Since I want my course to be comforting, I will reinforce hope of healing through my personal experiences.

Lesson 2 – “EVERY SEASON”

“Every Season” was my very first song composition after rediscovering music again later in my life. My lyrics describe poignant memories of sadness that I experienced with every passing season after my son’s death. For over a decade, I suppressed grief memories and tears. Even though I thought my sadness would always be, it turned out that there was hope of healing in my future. I learned by opening my heart and reaching out to others that I wasn’t alone. And then my son returned to me in a beautiful new way.

Lesson 3 – “BESIDE ME ALWAYS”

“Beside Me Always” was a song I wrote at the age of 17 and it describes the feeling of being surrounded and comforted by a breeze. When my son died, I rewrote the lyrics so I could read them at his funeral. After I found healing, I was able to look back and see signs that he was with me throughout my grief journey. I believe my survival was due to being carried through the darkness when I was collapsed in despair. I share an important hypnotherapy concept of “thoughts equal feelings” and discuss reframing sad thoughts by changing the story related to them.

Lesson 4 – ”HANG ON”

I composed “Hang On” to share my optimism of healing. I begin my song with complete despair in the verse, which is followed by magnificent hope in the chorus. Though my song was dedicated to helping others, the true miracle was how much it helped me while I was going through a very difficult time when I wrote it. Like so many of my songs, “Hang On” emphasized how love would “lift you up.” I realized that if love lifted me up through grief, then it would lift me up again as I struggled with impending loss of my parents and my marriage. I will read a story named “There was hope for me,” which is about a pivotal hypnotherapy session when I first began healing. My lesson will cover ways that I discovered to “hang on” during grief.

Lesson 5 – “SET YOU FREE

The title and lyrics to my song “Set You Free” imply that I’m setting someone else free. But although “Set You Free” expressed my struggle with letting go of what I loved, it was ultimately about setting myself free. For this lesson, I will discuss how I coped with anticipatory grief, because my song was written during the time my father was dying. I’ll share a story about an important hypnotherapy session where I realized how suppression of tears wasn’t helpful for me. I am grateful for the full range of feelings I have now. I continue to emphasize how love remains with each tear and whether my memories are happy or sad, I allow them. I am certain my love ones’ essences will never leave me. Pure love remains forever.

Lesson 6 – “IT’S NOT FOREVER”

I composed my song “It’s Not Forever” to uplift a grieving friend. Many bereaved people feel that grief is forever. I remember how I felt like my suffering from grief would never end. I share a long list of words people used to describe their grief. Forever was the word most often listed. Grief had a lifelong effect upon me, but my suffering did ease. I believe love is forever. Love sustained and carried me through my grief, especially when I felt discouraged and hopeless. I will explain how I wrestled with guilt over healing. Suffering with grief seemed to display the depth of my love. But a deeper love came from allowing joy back into my life.

Lesson 7 – “SOMEWHERE I CAN’T SEE”

My lesson for my song “Somewhere I Can’t See” begins with a metaphorical story relating my grief experience to a forest fire. My healing led me to write a story named “All I have left after the death of my child.” I address the angry stage of grief by corresponding with another bereaved mother who wrote a heartfelt poem about her discouragement. I share my belief how anger during grief can be soothed with love. “Somewhere I Can’t See” helped me anticipate healing; my song expressed how holding onto love and memories would ease my grief. This represented a powerful hypnotherapy tenant of: “the more you look for something the more likely you will find it.”

Lesson 8 – “CLEAR”

My song “Clear” emphasized that “I turned my life around, there was no reason to wait.” I wrote those words before I actually made changes to my life. But when I found clarity, I was able to overcome my fear over changing my life. During the time I wrote “Clear,” I lived with chronic pain from dry eyes. I learned that I could cope with physical pain in the same way I coped with my grief. I sought out support and information; I stayed positive with my thoughts. I let music soothe me and eventually, my eye pain did ease. Much like grief, they were never the same as before and this required acceptance. I share some of my fears and how clarity helped me to overcome them. I encourage my course participants to identify their own fears and find clarity because I believe it’s never too late to change your life.

Lesson 9 – “MY SHINING STAR”

“My Shining Star” reinforces many concepts I’ve already covered with other songs in this course. My shining star is a wonderful metaphor of finding light within darkness. Darkness represents grief, despair, confusion and feeling lost. Light can be a beacon of hope, clarity and illumination. My song was inspired by a poem I wrote not long after my mother died, which helped me cope with my grief. Hearing positive words that our loved one would tell us is very comforting during grief. The line “you whisper in my ear to heal,” moved me deeply because it gave me permission to let go of my grief. Our loved ones want us to suffer. Although you feel hopeless because the future you once imagined with your loved one will never be, let them become a shining star guide your way with light and love.

Lesson 10 – “THE KEY”

For my final lesson, I’ve chosen my most recent song composition “The Key” because it best represents my healing from grief. I see grief as a journey and have great empathy for anyone suffering on this lonely path. During my lesson I have a dialog with a woman who is deeply suffering. She wanted me to explain more about my beliefs surrounding love and healing. Her question was challenging for me to answer because when I was in deep grief, nothing seemed to ease my pain. But looking back now, I am able to see the things that made a difference and I’ll share those as “key” points. The greatest lesson from my song “The Key” is that the key to setting ourselves free from grief lies within our grasp. Our loved one is holding it for us.

Clicking on the these images will take you to stories, lyrics, performances and other recordings of these songs from this medley: