Healing Grief Through Music

“Beside Me Always” was a song I wrote at the age of 17, describing 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. In today's lesson, I share an important and therapeutic hypnotherapy technique that draws on the commonly held notion that “thoughts equal feelings.” This technique will help us learn how to reframe sad thoughts by changing the stories related to them.

I composed “Hang On” to share my optimism of hope, healing, and happiness. Although the song begins with despair, it transitions into a call for magnificent hope. 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. Like so many of my songs, “Hang On” emphasizes how love can “lift you up.” In today's lesson we learn that love is the key to healing. I will read a story titled “There was hope for me,” which helps to illuminate the stages of grief and how to best navigate them.

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. During this lesson, I will explain how I coped with anticipatory grief, as this song was written during the time my father was dying. We will touch on ways to gently make our way through the grieving process, in which, I share a story about an important hypnotherapy session that showed me that the suppression of tears wasn’t helpful for my ability to heal. I will continue to emphasize how I am grateful for the full range of feelings I have now and that I am certain my love ones’ essences will never leave me. Pure love remains 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. In today's lesson, I share a long list of words people used to describe their grief. Forever was the word most often listed. Today's lesson is about learning that suffering is not forever and that love will sustain us through the toughest times in life. Love will uplift you in times of discouragement and hopelessness. In fact, suffering with grief can be seen to prompt the emergence of the deepest depths of our love. Together, we will learn to will cultivate a deep love that will allow us to bring joy back into our life.

This lesson incorporates the song “Somewhere I Can’t See,” which begins with a metaphorical story relating the experience of grief to a forest fire. In this lesson, I will address the 'angry' stage of grief before sharing my belief that love can soothe this pain, anger, and anguish. Today's lesson touches on the powerful hypnotherapy tenant: “the more you look for something the more likely you will find it.”

My song “Clear” emphasises the importance of actively choosing to turn your life around. It suggests that finding clarity will allow you to overcome the fear of changing your 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. In today's lesson, I share some of my fears and how clarity helped me to overcome them. I encourage you to identify your own fears and find clarity, as it’s never too late to change your life.

“My Shining Star” reinforces many of the concepts we've previously covered. 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. In today's practice, we learn to give ourselves permission to let go of our grief.

For the 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 this lesson, I have a dialog with a woman who is deeply suffering and wanted me to explain more about my beliefs surrounding love and healing. Today, I’ll share these beliefs with you, and together, we will find the key to setting ourselves free from grief. This key lies within our grasp. Our loved one is holding it for us.