Question: Sadhguru, how can we cope with the intense grief following the death of a loved one?
Sadhguru: On a certain day, a woman who had lost her husband and two eldest children, was grieving the death of her youngest child. She took the little boy’s body to Gautama the Buddha and challenged him to use his spirituality to bring the boy back to life.
Gautama knew that as long as this woman was in a state of heightened emotion, whatever he may say would not get across. So Gautama said, “I will bring your boy back to life. Go and get me a few sesame seeds from a house that has never known death.” The woman, carrying the boy’s body, went from house to house, looking for a home that had never known death. After going through the entire town, she realized there was not a single home like this. Then she stopped, did what she had to do with the body and came and sat in front of Gautama. She followed him for the rest of her life.
No one wants to see the death of a loved one. But if it happens, how does one go beyond this grief?
Going beyond something does not mean forgetting about it. If your child dies, you cannot just tell yourself that it is okay or natural. It is true that someone who meant a lot to you is gone, but the reality is that once they slip beyond what you see as life, they are no longer yours.
Life happens like a river – it always flows between two banks. Without both the right bank and the left bank, there can be no river, just as there can be no light without darkness, no man without woman, or life without death.
It is time to accept it the way it is and look at what you can do with the life that is here. If someone very dear to you has passed away, do not turn yourself into a wreck. There is so much life around you that needs love and care, and if you feel the need to express this love and care within you, please do that. If you do not, your grief will remain bottled up, and it will torture you for the rest of your life.
If you have lost a child, consider taking care of other kids as your own; find full expression to your love and parenthood. It can make your life beautiful. Unless you take that step, you will simply go on about something that you cannot change. Whatever is happening within us, regardless of the reason, it is still created by us. If we are willing, we can change that. And as long as you are alive, it is important that you contribute to the living, because there is nothing that you can do about the dead.
Question: Sadhguru, what would be an effective method to boost and strengthen our inner chemistry and mental health?
Sadhguru: Just a few decades ago, mental health problems were things that happened to others. But today, either someone that you know is going through it or you yourself might be going through it. All human experience – peace, love, joy, blissfulness, agony, depression, ecstasy – has a chemical basis.
Pharmacology is essentially trying to fix the chemical balance within the body by adding chemicals from outside. We must realize that taking chemicals from outside in the form of medications is necessary in an extreme situation, but working for an equanimous chemistry within ourselves is something that has to be brought into every individual’s life.
There is substantial scientific evidence today to show that the body is capable of producing various secretions which lead to different types of experiences within ourselves. The human body is capable of producing something called endocannabinoids. When endocannabinoids are up, you naturally feel blissful all the time.
Professors and scientists at Harvard Medical School, Rutgers University, and Indiana University have established through scientific research that by practicing Inner Engineering, the endocannabinoid secretion in the body goes up by 70 percent. That means you are always in a very pleasant state of experience, blissful by your own nature.
When you create an internal chemistry of blissfulness, your innate talents can be explored and you will want to scale the highest possible peak. You will not see how to restrict your life, but how to explore every possibility.
(Sadhguru is a Yogi, mystic, visionary and a New York Times bestselling author. He is also the founder of Conscious Planet – Save Soil)
