Mythic U
Join us to explore practices for discovering the stories that animate each of us. By understanding the meaningful stories that are your personal mythology you can choreograph your own unique way of attending to the needs of your soul. Hosted by Karen Foglesong and Erin Branham
Mythic U
Grief & Gratitude: Stretching Large
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Join hosts Karen Foglesong and Erin Branham as we discuss the quote by Francis Weller, "The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them." We explore the balance between grief and gratitude, and how grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, enabling compassion. We take a look at how modern society's avoidance of grief and discuss the lack of collective mourning for COVID-19 victims. The conversation touches on the importance of empathy, creativity, and rituals in processing grief and gratitude, and how these practices can foster a deeper understanding of human experience and connection.
SHOW NOTES
Living a Soulful Life: Francis Weller's website
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Hi everybody, welcome back to Mythic U I'm Karen Foglesong
Erin Branham:and I'm Erin Branham. We're happy to have you back with us. This episode, Karen and I became very intrigued by a random quote on social media, because isn't that how everything starts these days?
Karen Foglesong:Right?
Erin Branham:And it was by an author who neither of us knew particularly well, but we were both really struck by the quote. The author is Francis Weller, who is an author of a number of books, largely about grief. Quote Is this "The work of the mature person is to carry grief in one hand and gratitude in the other and to be stretched large by them. How much sorrow can I hold? That's how much gratitude I can give. If I carry only grief, I'll bend towards cynicism and despair. If I have only gratitude, I'll become saccharine and won't develop much compassion for other people's suffering. Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible." End quote, so when I saw that, I immediately sent it to Karen, and she had what reaction? What did you think when you first heard that?
Karen Foglesong:Wow, I really love this idea of stretching large, because I've always felt that there has to be a balance in life. I've always struggled with being gray rather than choosing black or white, or if, anytime somebody says to me, this one or this one, I'm like, can I have and? There's got to be a third choice. And I think this quote encapsulates that idea for me, that there's a balance, and sometimes it's a razor edge, but there is a balance.
Erin Branham:Definitely, I think it relates as well to me, to the idea of balance, which, like you, I consider a very sacred idea and and one of the things that has helped me reach for wisdom. I don't think I've achieved wisdom, but I think I reach for it.
Karen Foglesong:Right.
Erin Branham:Is that idea of whatever I have felt not in touch with things. I can come back to balance, and that idea that there must, that must exist in all things, it is just the way the universe is built. But what was really interesting to me, as you said, that idea of stretching large, yes, that sometimes when we think about balance, we think about it in terms of either being able to move fluidly from one to the other, you know, to not just to be able to go with things as they come along, whether they be up, whether they be down -
Karen Foglesong:Like surfing.
Erin Branham:Yeah, but this idea really has to do with encompassing them at the same time, the opposites, and being and that I like, said that idea of stretching large, of having your being, or your soul made bigger, was really interesting. Or I didn't think it's about being made bigger, being I don't know, just an idea, because I don't feel like it felt like taking when I thought of stretching large, it did not feel like taking up more space. It felt like being able to get around more space. Does that make sense?
Karen Foglesong:Yeah, I think I understand what you're saying, because it's not. It really is not about getting bigger. It's about a greater capacity for understanding, which is not, is that better? It's not about a physical enlarging, it's about, and I think that's where you're getting to, the wrapping around a thing is because it's about incorporating the understanding of that thing, right? Does that help?
Erin Branham:I think that's very good, I guess. But that all that idea of in general, we all want to fight against suffering, against grief, to try not to feel the pain of life. Sometimes we repress anger, or, you know, all of these negative things. But grief in particular is such a such a hard one, especially in our culture right, which does not have a lot of room for grief.
Karen Foglesong:No part of it, I think. And we've talked about being numbed out too, repressing the pain. And I know I go back to this idea a lot, but I think capitalism has a lot to do with this idea that we we can't really look at the grief or the pain, because we have to go on to the next new thing. And if we really try to grapple with it and understand it, then you're not moving on to the next new thing. I don't know. I've had this experience when somebody has passed away that I really felt close to, that the world should stop for that. And the world doesn't stop for that. There's not unless there's a wider group of people that that person was connected to, or that loss is connected to, it doesn't, doesn't go anywhere. And I think it has to do with the push of capitalism. I mean, we there is some sense of of avoiding pain, just to be avoiding pain. But also there's this idea that I need you to come buy a new pair of jeans, and if you're depressed that they don't play slow ballad music in in stores, like it's got to be popping hopping next thing on Ready go. Here's some here's some sequins, some glitter.
Erin Branham:Definitely, And there's also the, I mean, think about it. If you have a, you know, a professional job, and say, your spouse dies or your child dies, you are allowed to take a little bit of time off, but in general, you're probably, within a few weeks, going to be back at that you have to, you have to put your labor in, or you, you know, starve to death in this culture. Again, there's no space for -
Karen Foglesong:That's true too.
Erin Branham:For you to say, I need to, you know, to go through whatever and you're, you're just supposed to process that in whatever you know, time you have left out of life. It is a strange thing, when you think about it, that there used to be a lot more space for that, or at least acknowledgement of it.
Karen Foglesong:It's true. Well, again, I'm going to go back to capitalism. I'm sorry if it's boring, but that's where I go. We're selling happiness now too. So this numbed out feeling is important, like the next new beer, the next new drug, the next like, Are you depressed? Here's this set of pills. Oh, that, that pill didn't work. Well, here's another pill to augment that pill. You know, like, it's -
Erin Branham:Right, we don't have -
Karen Foglesong:There's not a lot of room.
Erin Branham:Yeah, no room, no and that certainly that idea like that, you shouldn't be sad. I remember reading, that's why I'd like to read this gentleman, Francis Weller's work, because it is about grief and sadness, and I've read several other people's works as I've worked through losses in my life that get into melancholia. You know the idea that sometimes, yeah, you have a period in your life where you're in melancholia, where you you are not at your most vigorous you are. But there's a process that's happening there that should be allowed to happen, this idea that we must always we should be on it. We should be being our best selves every day, accomplishing and doing all the things, and self improving and getting to the top of Maslow's pyramid. And there's also that,
Karen Foglesong:also. I mean, even I don't know, I guess that kind of self improvement. And if you go, No, I'm going to there's a few people that are isolated enough that they didn't lay fallow for a while. That's not generally done, or even to, like I said, so there's not a, I don't know, that people are have sudden deaths in their family, but I know a lot of spending as much time exploring, I guess, the melancholy side of life, or the grief, the side of life that has to do with grief. people that idea of the whole culture One of the things that struck us as we talked about this was the mourning, if some of us are still fighting the idea that it lack of any real mourning over covid and the million or so people who died just in our country alone. And there really hasn't ever been any mass there's not even been any kind even existed or that it was handled incorrectly by our of mass ceremony or acknowledgments or remembrance, and it feels real, that feels really weird, that just has left us all. It's part of the reason why I think we had this long post lockdown hangover, because and and people were so angry. I mean, I feel like it's starting to subside a little bit now, but people were so angry just on the road. government, you know the mask wearing thing, the big you can't tell me what to do. You can't make me wear a mask. Uh, really freaked me out when, if you do a little bit of research, you find out when the Spanish Flu hit America, we were the same way. Nobody wanted to wear a mask. Everybody acted like it wasn't real. Yeah, if you died, it was your own fault. You know, those kind of things.
Erin Branham:I've read a little bit, yeah, I've read a little bit about other pandemics, and, yeah,
Karen Foglesong:that numbing.
Erin Branham:Humans are humans. There's always going to be some set of people being cantankerous about the whole situation.
Karen Foglesong:You made that up!
Erin Branham:That's the nature of it. Well, I mean, and it gets to this in a way, that's that sometimes people use anger to repress grief. What's that famous? Oh my god, the James Baldwin quote. So James Baldwin, the great African American queer author who I believe today is his 100th birthday, as a matter of fact, would have been his 100th birthday.
Karen Foglesong:Oh, whoa.
Erin Branham:Quote. I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.
Karen Foglesong:Oh, that's very nice
Erin Branham:and very true.
Karen Foglesong:Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth.
Erin Branham:Right, that so many, I think, of how many angry, the really angry people that you've known? Yeah, there's often a lot of grief hanging right behind that - unprocessed grief that just, it's like the the Stages of Grief right getting stuck in the anger stage and just rolling right there.
Karen Foglesong:Well, and coming from the south, where spousal abuse is often more prevalent than other places, I think it still happens everywhere, but the South is kind of codified, is what it seemed like to me. But many women that were being abused have said to me that he doesn't mean it. He's just in pain. Like, okay, so he's just causing pain to deal with pain. That's, I guess that's really kind of you to to let him use you as a whipping post to get his pain worked out.
Erin Branham:Yeah, but I do you know, that's true. That's the saying, hurt people hurt people. Yes, that is definitely a thing that happens. And so, yeah, in an attempt not to deal with pain and grief, humans will even throw anger at it. Will throw numbing at it. We'll throw all kinds of things. And I think what's interesting about the quote we started with is that idea that if you don't feel it, what is it? Grief keeps the heart fluid and soft. This, if you don't allow yourself to feel grief, can you really feel compassion? Because compassion has to do with understanding somebody else's suffering. So if you have not suffered, you know, let yourself your laid your own heart open, then how can you really understand anybody else's suffering? And I thought that was,
Karen Foglesong:it's difficult to put yourself,
Erin Branham:it's very interesting idea.
Karen Foglesong:Yeah, it's difficult to put yourself in somebody else's shoes, if you have no idea how you're feeling. Yeah, I would, I would say that too, like you say throwing something at it, repressed, numbed out. If we can't feel pain, then can you feel pleasure? And this idea is, I think we discussed this when we were building this episode about whether destruction and loss are kind of built into the structure of the universe, and we're struggling with these limitations all the time. And I think you said this, Erin, that the because of the little picture making brains, can imagine that they might not exist, right?
Erin Branham:So, right, we can sit here and imagine a universe in which you didn't have to have destruction and loss, right? Like, that's Eden, that's paradise, that's heaven, that's the - we can construct this idea that, Oh, if only there didn't have to be destruction, loss, everything would be great, right? But in the universe, there's only so much material, and the universe must create that is actually, I mean, when you really look at the science of it, it is absolutely about it must continue. Like the things are going to run into each other, the quarks are going to pop, they're going to form, they're going to they're going to move and create things.
Karen Foglesong:Right.
Erin Branham:So stuff has to be destroyed.
Karen Foglesong:Right.
Erin Branham:So that it can be reworked into something new. This novelty creating aspect of the universe is is built in. It is like it's just part of it. It's where life comes from.
Karen Foglesong:It's built in. It's where life comes from. And it's there's finite material, like you said, both energy and matter. So without the grief, without the death, I always think about this when you're thinking about what to eat, and I still maintain that intelligence may not be a good survival factor, because we're sitting here deciding whether what we eat is okay has like some psychological significance to it, but there's no getting around that no matter what your diet is, you have to take life to have life. Like you can decide that it's easier to eat broccoli than it is to eat a cow. That's your own decision. But it's still killing, like you're still taking the life of something to eat it, you know. So it's built in. It truly is built in. The energy for you to breathe is the life of something else, and it continues. You know, what is the Lion King, the circle of life.
Erin Branham:That's right. That was a really good one, though I remember setting up sharply, and I love children's stuff. They come up with the best little succinct, right?
Karen Foglesong:Right.
Erin Branham:But Dad, don't we eat the antelope? We do eat the antelope, and when we die, our bodies become the grass, and the antelopes eat the grass.
Karen Foglesong:Right?
Erin Branham:It's the circle of life.
Karen Foglesong:Yes, yay.
Erin Branham:That was a good one.
Karen Foglesong:It was.
Erin Branham:Um, for sure. So it's that idea, it's also this idea that I always think about this in terms of, I'm into tarot, I'm into astrology. I'm a pretty rational and scientific person, for the most part, but I love those systems, not because I actually think they predict the future, but because I think they are very old and very meditated upon pictures of the complexity of the human psyche. Like this is what, when I do somebody's birth chart, which is the only part of astrology I can do, I don't do any of that. We're in Mercury Retrograde, or I don't even know when that's happening. Only thing I know how to do is cast a birth chart. And what, uh, what, what I've learned by doing that is that like you, the whole idea of like, what is your sign? And all that is the idea that you that's where you have natural energy like you have your chart is a circle, and each one of the signs represents some part of a whole human being.
Karen Foglesong:Right.
Erin Branham:And the Tarot is the same thing. If you look at the Major Arcana, that is a that is a whole souls. It's an alchemical kind of idea of what a soul's journey should be, of living the most, of having the most experience, of getting the most out of this finite matter based existence that we have right now. That's why I like those systems, is because they put me in touch with that. They give me some symbols to work with. They're they're there. They have this mythic quality that Karen and I talk about that keeps me that has formed my spirituality, like, right? Such a funny show. Piece together. How do you piece together a spirituality in the early 21st Century? Just trying to make sense out of, like, the mishmash of everything that's happened in our lives in the world, religions and pop culture. Oh, and depth psychology.
Karen Foglesong:Oh right. And science and
Erin Branham:yeah, and science, exactly, all the things.
Karen Foglesong:Hey, you guys, this is a good place to take a pause and remind you that if you like what you're hearing, then join us.
Erin Branham:Yes! We would love to hear from you any comments, suggestions, criticisms and your stories. Definitely want to hear your stories, so like said, rate and review us on Apple podcasts, or whatever your podcatcher of choice is, we'd love to hear from you your mythic u@gmail.com
Karen Foglesong:thanks, you guys. Now back to the regular program.
Erin Branham:But anyway, that idea of like, the wholeness of it, which is the Jungian idea, like, that's parts with the Yin Yang. Like, that idea of wholeness and wholeness being about encompassing the opposites, and that you know, depth or breadth of existence is what is so interesting. And you really look at this quote, and it says, you know, if I only carry grief, I'll bend towards you, that idea that if you, if you do that, and people do get stuck in that side of life too, yeah, and you're cynical, those people who are cynical and and full of despair, you know, you can just wallow on that end of things, and it just, it is a real option a lot of people choose.
Karen Foglesong:I think conspiracy theorists live there too. Oh, that's a lack of hope.
Erin Branham:Oh, I think you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. Those are people who've decided it all sucks. It all sucks, and the best I can do is try to figure out how to understand how much it sucks, right? Like it is, it is a deeply cynical point of view. Yeah, and then there's all of the people. There's just like your average Debbie downers and yours walking around the world. Just sort of, did you hear the news? Everything's always getting worse. I know a lot of those folks.
Karen Foglesong:Actually, it really helped me when I started, like I said, with covid, the Spanish flu, people acted the same way. And in some ways it's disappointing, like you. Sometimes it feels like we haven't learned enough quick enough. But. It also helps me to see that human nature is human nature. We don't believe, or we believe in weird things, or, you know, like, it's just, ultimately, I think most of us are scared of facing ourselves, and we project that out onto everything else, and want to kill it, and then we want to kill the dragon. We want the hero to kill the dragon for us. But really the dragon is, is you inside throwing a temper tantrum because you haven't gotten your own island yet, or whatever.
Erin Branham:or because you've or because this, we're talking about grief because somebody you love has died. And yes, I mean, I remember that when somebody I love died, just my absolute rage at the universe. How am I supposed to go it's just, it's so ego based, right? Like, how am I supposed to go on? Yes, without this person, a P, you'll say that a piece of me is missing, yes, right? When we get into that and that, and there is, but there's this other place where you experience grief, and it is an enlarging experience in this very like ineffable way of letting the suffering in. I remember fighting the suffering. Oh, my God, fighting it so hard. Of I just can't let that in. I'll cry forever.
Karen Foglesong:Yeah, yeah. I remember when I was really young, I had this uncle that I loved a lot. I had two uncle Buds that I loved a lot, and I always thought it was funny. They're both on different sides of my family, they were both named Bud. But this particular one was a truck driver, and he Jack knifed his semi truck off of a bridge. And he was a practical joker. So when he was laying in his coffin, he looked like he had this, like funny little smirk on his face, and it looked like like he was about to jump up and go, ta da scoot. I got you guys, you know, like it was creepy. The adults felt that way. Everybody felt that way because he was such a joker. But they said the the people that worked on his body. What's the name in the funeral? Morticians? Thank you. They said that they didn't put that smile on his face, that they pulled him out of the wreck with that smile on his face. Like, and that's I've always tried to hold that as, like, yes, like, it was a ripping, tearing quality when I found out that he had died, but, and then it was creepy and weird to see him laying in the coffin, like it was going to be a practical joke. And then that information on top of it, that it that he was smiling as he was dying, like, to me, that's, that's life, that's the stretch, that's like, death is funny and, you know, like it's, it's, it is it is weird. It's bizarre. It makes us all feel weird. It makes us all lament the temporariness of it. But all of our fiction tells us that the temporariness of it is what makes it precious, you know. So it's all there.
Erin Branham:Very true, very true. But I think that's that it's interesting to explore that idea of, like, what happens when you do get trapped in grief and and, and we see, like, we see some of this happening politically, the people who are not able to feel their grief, who are full of rage and and their love and cult like, you know, devotion to a strong man in Trump. Yeah, you know, it's I alone can stop your pain. I alone can hold off that this changing world that scares you. I mean, honestly, I know. I mean, I know the people I grew up next to the people who vote for him, yeah, it's they're scared, and I truly feel compassion for them that they're scared because the world is changing. And then there's another part of me that's like, yeah, the world changes. Grow up. Deal with it like we all did. We all have to deal with it. I'm sorry that it's hard for you, right? I know it is, well,
Karen Foglesong:You brought up this idea of the strong man, and you know, but anyway, we're, we've said many times, we're both from the south, and I've seen it. I'm in I'm in the west now, and I see it here too. There's this idea that if a man cries, then he's weak. There's something wrong with him, and that plays into this idea of not being able to feel grief. So then that we we build this person, this persona, up where they can't cry, they can't cry, they can't cry, and then can they feel compassion, then they're so hard from trying to deal with the expectations of their society that but what can they feel?
Erin Branham:Very true, I think that is there is a quality of this whole conversation that's going on culturally around what is masculinity? and it has to do with exactly struggling with this and kind of traditional masculinity. You are allowed to feel anger, you're allowed to feel lust, you're allowed to feel domination and pride, but that's kind of it, yeah, as far as that goes, as a dude like you think, like the, you know, the traditional, like 50s guy, you don't, there's no space in there for womanly emotion, and all of these men today who are coming out and saying, We don't want to be part of that toxic masculinity. We want to redefine masculinity, and that includes taking care of your kids, being okay if you are the one who stays home and takes care of your kids.
Karen Foglesong:I love stay at home dads, teaching your kids to cry, teaching kids to cry. Sorry, yeah, but it excites me. I love dads that are willing to be I think they're manly enough to be stay at home, dad, that's how I look at it. Anyway, go ahead, yeah,
Erin Branham:absolutely, just, just all of those things, of we're having a big conversation around that. That's one of the things, I think that the anger, you know, the people who are angry and sad that the world is changing, that's one of the things they're mad is changing. That's why they're fighting so hard to get women back into traditional gender roles. Because that that, you know, all of this is an attempt to re establish those gender norms when they've got JD Vance running around, talking about people who don't have children, don't have, you know, basically, shouldn't be, you know, citizens in the same way, or have the same number of votes, or the same power of voting as people who have kids, because people have kids are devoted to the future of this nation. Like, it's so weird. It is so freaking weird.
Karen Foglesong:I have never, I'm sorry, as a teacher, I've not seen that so many people breed on accident. They don't even want to take, yeah, I don't want breeders all of the world. Yeah.
Erin Branham:Sorry. It's been a very strange conversation that's going on. But it all kind of goes back to, you know, this idea of we've got to get women back, you know they're going to, they've already going after abortion, and then they're going to go after birth control and no fault divorce. And if you've read project 2025, like, It's bananas, of because what they want to do is reestablish these old gender roles. And it's just like, so sad. It's so anyway,
Karen Foglesong:it is so sad. I've just, I've never been able to understand, like I'm smarter than all the people standing in this room, but I'm supposed to obey the ones that have penises because they were happened to be born with a penis. I mean, are you serious?
Erin Branham:That was generally how I felt as a young person in this both Karen and I grew up. We came up, like, eight, nine years old during, like, the really hardcore part of the women's movement in '78,'79 and yeah, or very much, remember that feeling you're kidding me, right, right?
Karen Foglesong:Like, what? Or my mom taught me to not if I was gonna go out on a date, I should eat before I go out on a date, so that the date wouldn't see my actual appetite.
Erin Branham:Wow. How Scarlett O'Hara of you, what, right?
Karen Foglesong:God. And then after we're married, then they see me eat. What is that? So another thing we're talking about these kind of personalities, the strongman personality and and how it creates this kind of hardness that doesn't allow and I think on a small level, it comes on a smaller level in all of us, we can see this when we talk about the difference between empathy and sympathy. I don't know if you've given this much thought or not, but we're talking about grief keeping the heart fluid and soft, which helps make compassion possible. And in many ways, I think you can say for self and for others, possibly the difference between feeling and judging is the difference between empathy and sympathy. The Center for building a culture of empathy describes empathy as four spokes on a wheel, and they talk about self empathy, being able to empathize with yourself, mirrored meaning, taking on another person's emotion, imaginative empathy, putting yourself in someone else's shoes, and an empathetic action, being able to actually contribute to the well being of others. So often, I've read that sympathy is like when you're at work and a co workers relative passes away, and you you get them a sympathy card, and it moves it completely out of your sphere. Then it's you don't have to think about it. You can kind of be in gratitude that it's not you, boom, done. Where empathy is a more involved, like putting yourself in that person's shoes or actually taking action. I don't know what that action would be. Sometimes flowers are appropriate, sometimes they're not, but moving on it, rather than pushing it away with gratitude that it hasn't happened to you. Does that make a kind of sense?
Erin Branham:Yeah, I think so. Like, if you actually, I think I've always understood sympathy is being to sort of understand, I guess, is almost like an intellectual I understand what that person's pain. I can see that that's happening. I can understand that they're suffering there. Whereas empathy is like actually feeling it. I mean, I would think of, if you're really assisting somebody with grief, it is, it is, you know, the empathetic thing is holding them, is sitting with them in silence as they grieve, making sure they have their everything taken care of, bringing them food, cleaning their house. Because those are things that you know often we will say to somebody, well, let me know if you need anything. And it it sort of puts it on them to call out to you. And so the better thing to do is go, if I were in this place, what would I need? And then to provide that for somebody.
Karen Foglesong:Sometimes you're not close enough to a person to actually move into their space and do something for them, and that's okay too. But being available, or sometimes just letting a co worker know that you've thought of them is enough in that kind of top tier level of interaction. You know, where you haven't been to each other's houses, but if you can absolutely you should go clean your friend's house. All the things that are daily, the daily living tasks, those are the things that we rebel against when grief hits us. I think,
Erin Branham:yeah, I think they can be really hard to do, and you just don't, you don't have the energy for it. You don't understand why it's why it's like that. But it's hard. It can be hard for people to be in empathy with other folks in grief, because of because we're so afraid of it, right? We're so afraid to hold that grief and and one of the other things I really liked about this quote was its pairing of grief with gratitude. That, you know, to hold one each those in each hand and be stretched large. So really, it's saying that the, you know, the opposite end of grief is not happiness or, you know, freedom from worry or anything. It's gratitude. It's it is that thing of understanding that the finite nature of life means being grateful for having it in this moment. Now, you know grief is grief is right. I had this thing, and now I don't have it. It is kind of up in time. Gratitude is right now, right right when you feel great, there's no way to Gratitude has no no other moment than now.
Karen Foglesong:And I mean, one of the I've been trying to practice gratitude for a long time in my life, because I was, I think I was pretty solidly in the Eeyore conspiracy camp for a long time, and I've been fighting to get my way out, and it's difficult. And one of the things that I think about often is that it is literally, literally and truly a miracle every single moment of every single day that your body doesn't just fly apart into a bunch of little pieces. Yeah, I mean, like, it is, it's a thing. It's a group of cells that have decided to work together, to coexist. At any moment, they can be all, screw you. I don't like you, Bladder, you know, like, it's over.
Erin Branham:Oh, it's very true. It's very true, when you think about it, the the unlikeliness of the individuality of each of us, it is, it is a miracle. It's that all. It's the thing I've I think of all the time. You can either live as if nothing is a miracle, or as if everything is and I'm like, you know that everything is a miracle is way groovier place to be. I don't know why you would want to do yes, but we were also talking about this quote, and the idea of grief and gratitude and that as part of, you know, having kind of spiritual practice of coming in touch with that, and it being a part of an artistic practice. I work in the arts and education. Arts education, it's one of the things I frequently tell students, k 12, students, teachers, adult audiences, anybody that I'm talking to. You know, as we go into this room to look at the art, be prepared, because art is about the human experience. That means you may run into anything in there, any idea, any concept, anything that it doesn't, you know, art does not traffic in "we're not going to talk about that" like, that's not, it's not where art exists. Art is explicitly about talking about the things that we're not going to talk about, like, that is, it's going to be in there. And so it is an interesting part of that idea that artists we look I think it also in our culture, we sort of look to artists to hold, yeah, that kind of grief and joy and gratitude and creativity and, you know, yes, kind of for all of us. But I'm a big believer in that everybody should have a creative practice.
Karen Foglesong:I can't argue with you on that one. I totally agree there's, there's art for many reasons, but one of them is just simply acknowledging that humans are creative and you need something, some outlet, something to do with your fingers, something so your head and brain work together.
Erin Branham:Yep. Yeah. I mean, if there was something we would say in terms of ways, ways to practice stretching large, right? Would be to write. It would be to do some kind of creative practice, whether that's visual, you know, visual arts, painting, drawing, that kind of stuff, writing, poetry, dance, it just about anything, creating rituals for yourself. Cooking. I am cooking is a huge thing for me. I'm sort of a Kitchen Witch, in terms of, in terms of this, when I say that I truly believe, like in a very spiritual way, that there is the cooking is a kind of magic like, if you can't, you take -
Karen Foglesong:It's alcehmy!
Erin Branham:look at all the ingredients over here, and this other thing comes out the end, because you've carefully mixed in flavors and the healing power of food and the nutrition and the way, like just, there's all I could go on a whole thing about that. Maybe we'll have to do a food episode, or cooking episode, like
Karen Foglesong:we should do a food episode, yeah.
Erin Branham:But it's not also that you've just having a practice of doing something that brings cooking also brings you in touch with that. I have to dismember carcasses in order to cook. Yep, like that is a thing that happens, even if it's, even if it's a vegetables, you know, you peel the skin off of them, you take them out. You take their seeds out. You do like you dismember. You take these things apart in order to consume them. And it is, it is a really sacred act.
Karen Foglesong:It is, yeah, I would agree with that. And the grief and the gratitude is inherent in that simple act, the grief of taking life, the gratitude of getting the life, of being able to go on another day. Absolutely, absolutely.
Erin Branham:That's a very good point. It's right there in any ritual, like whatever ritual is meaningful to you, that that captures, that allows you to come in touch with that. I mean, really, when you're creating a private practice, you got to really decide, what am I trying to capture? What am I trying to embody here, right? And like, that would be for for us, as we're talking about, we both heard this quote and be like, Oh, that is something I want to incorporate into my regular practice to think about that. Yes, you know, sometimes it's keeping a little, keeping a little journal or record of these kinds of quotes. One of the things that we have running for this podcast at the top is just a whole set of quotes that we found that we like and that we come back to. Can this be an episode? Doing this podcast for us is is part of the creative yes process of embodying, bringing ourselves with thinking about, like, let's spend a couple of weeks thinking about grief, yeah, and what is that as part of the human experience?
Karen Foglesong:And one time in my life, I even took post it notes and wrote quotes on them, and I have to say, I had to add tape, because the post it note doesn't like to stick to the wall, but I had them up all around me, things that I found that were inspiring to me, that I was trying to remember. You can put them on your fridge. You can just meditate on these ideas. Keep bringing them back into your daily life. Be present with them. Be present with your grief and your gratitude. How's that? Like you said, gratitude doesn't exist away now,
Erin Branham:yeah, definitely, and that's one of the things, I think, also about having mementos. We were talking about objects earlier. You know, objects and mementos and things like that are a way to, I know, I keep some level of mementos, my grandmother's Virgin Mary statuette that used to sit on her dresser. I also have her tea pot, her tea kettle. Tea is very important. Iced Tea, iced black tea, Southern sweetened iced black tea is like a generational thing for me. Goes back to my grandmother, so I got her tea kettle, and I keep them in my kitchen, and when I see them, or when I move them, or do you don't just encounter them, I It's their way of their avatars of grief and beauty and memory and, you know, all these things, but there's always a tinge of sadness, because I think I miss this person.
Karen Foglesong:I do, you know, I like to get sweaters. People are always like, I want that. I want this. And I'm always like, can I just have a sweater? Like, because I feel like that person is hugging me when I wear this sweater, it's, I know, it's, you'd never guess from knowing me that I was doing something so sweet, but that's true.
Erin Branham:no, but that's part of you know how we're talking about living mythically, is being able to get assigned this kind of meaning to to thinking about that this piece of clothing means this wearing this means this person is hugging me. It's a way of animating the world around you, to be full of significance and to connect you, to create connection. You know, that's the other thing about kind of stretching large. That's the thing. I think about it. The larger you can stretch, the more people you can hold, you know, within your heart. And if we all were to stretch ourselves really large, we could, you know, be that much more connected to each other. And I do think that that in the original quote, that how much grief you had was how much gratitude you can hold. Can you really? Do you really understand gratitude truly, like, until you've lost somebody? I don't know that I truly understood how much people meant to me in my life, until the first person I really loved died, and all of a sudden you're like, oh, wow, that's like, there. Nobody's joking about that. People will really be gone, right one day, this person now, like, certainly turn around, look at my mom in a different way, like, Oh, my God, I you've been there my whole life. I don't, I don't think I knew sort of abstractly. Of course everybody does, yeah, but I had not had the experience of this can go and so until that, I couldn't be grateful. Yeah, that's true for for the just, you know, it's a really, it's why it's a good quote.
Karen Foglesong:It's a good quote, well, and something else that I think this is a little odd, but I think it applies here, something that I've been thinking about for a long time. And it could be because I've worked at a state fair, but I really have noticed this idea that some things hurt and some things are fabulous in this world, but we still sign up for them. And I think an amusement park or state fair or county fair, any of these are a great analogy for that. We like, we know we're gonna it's possible we're gonna get sick, we're gonna get dizzy, we're gonna fall down skin our knees, we're gonna get sunburned, spend too much money, we might the ride, might even break and we might get seriously injured, but we still line up to Go, and we're really sad when it's over. So I think it's a great analogy for this grief, gratitude ride that we're on. Anyway. I hope it works for so that
Erin Branham:is, I love that, no, that's, that's fantastic. It's the carnival. You know, that's the such a great analogy, such a beautiful, mythic idea. I think that is all for this episode. Thank you all for joining us. And hey, follow us on your favorite podcaster. Leave us a review, drop us a note,
Karen Foglesong:join us. We'd love to hear from we'd love to hear from you, yeah,
Erin Branham:share, tell other people about us. Do review us. Do rate and review us if you can, because that helps us go up. That helps us to be more easily found yes on things like Apple pods and things like that. Okay, thanks, thanks. Thank you for joining us at mythic u we want to hear from you. Please visit our website at mythic u.buzzsprout.com that's m, y, t, h, i, c, u.buzzsprout.com, for more great information on choreographing your own spirituality, leave us a comment and donate if you have the means and the interest. If you'd like to support our work more regularly, please visit our Patreon and become a member of mythic you, depending on the level at which you join, members receive early access to new episodes, bonus episodes and free mythic you gifts you.
