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<aside> 📅 August 9-11
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<aside> 📍 Center at Mariandale
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<aside> 🤲🏻 Max Participation: 10 PP
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<aside> ☹️ Is there a loss in your life you haven’t grieved, but want to?
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<aside> 💔 Are you mourning an existential disappointment that few seem to understand, or able to support you through?
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<aside> 🙅🏻 Do you have a hard time giving yourself permission to grieve a loss, because you feel like it is too small, too mundane, too common to feel so hurt by it?
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Bittersweet is a retreat dedicated to making space and time for something we tend to normally avoid: our grief.
Grief is a natural reaction to (un)wanted loss in life. That makes grief a constant presence throughout our life, not just in death. Think of the tumultuous feelings that come with the end of significant relationships and friendships, life transitions, job loss, loss of personal/other’s health, the loss of dreamed futures, of the state of the world. These losses can disorient us from who we identify as, and how we relate to the world. These “little” losses can still be heartbreaking. Instead of ignoring and minimizing these little hurts, what would it mean to consciously grieve? What if instead of breaking us, it potentially unburdens us?
Bittersweet will explore if how acknowledging our grief intentionally and collectively helps us live life with loss. You are invited to bring a loss you would like to grieve. It doesn’t have to be your deepest, personal loss* but one you would like to consciously engage with. We will do so through programming that includes:
Grief is an emotion we all feel, yet it is one that most of us struggle with in secret, and in silence.
Your grief is yours alone, but you don’t have to manage every aspect of grief alone. Being surrounded by others can provide models of how to live with loss, or at the very least, illustrate that grief is not what alienates us from others, but it is what we all share in common. Hopefully, this retreat will provide community and comfort.
Sometimes, we do want to acknowledge our grief, but our lives don’t afford us the ability of losing ourselves over to it. This grief retreat creates the pause to explore and interact with grief without worry of alienation, material obligations to “push through” the feelings.
Logistics such as meals, accommodations, programming and the social container have all been taken care of so you can just focus on feeling your grief.