Like all of life, this summer season has been filled with wonder and worry, connection and loneliness, accomplishment and anxiety. Joys and sorrows. That used to disturb me more. But with mindfulness, it’s become easier to appreciate that everything is impermanent. We all face grief and loss, of those we love, of places and things we’ve grown attached to, of our younger selves. Even our moment-to-moment experience changes. With awareness, each sorrow can actually sweeten each joy.

Author/poet, Mark Nepo, says, “Everything is beautiful and I am so sad. This is how the heart makes a duet of wonder and grief.” Yet in our culture, it’s sometimes hard to express what’s really going on. Deep grieving can feel more primal than our rituals allow. Being numb can also seem out of place. It’s easy to feel like our emotions are too much or too little. Or too late if they emerge past a prescribed time period.

Rituals can support our shared human experience. The need to formally mark the passing of loved ones even predates humans, as evidenced by the discovery of Homo Naledi in 2015. I was awed and deeply moved to learn about this in the documentary, Cave of Bones, and even more awed and moved to witness the healing power of ritual some 250,000 years later at yesterday’s Black Poster Project event, commemorating International Overdose Awareness Day. Within St. Patrick’s Cathedral, this display of 800 posters brought to life the individual sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, and friends lost to addiction and overdose. Imagine every seat in every pew within that majestic space filled by a beautiful image of a lost loved one, including special words, wishes, and stories written by those who mourn them most.

Their presence was palpable, touching and connecting each one of us who passed by, evaporating the shame and stigma that often compounds the suffering experienced from this type of loss. I was struck by the amount of labor that went into both of these undertakings. For Homo Naledi, it was transporting their loved ones though a long and deep series of caves to their final resting place. For Dee Gillen, founder of Black Poster Project, and their committed volunteers, it is creating, transporting, and installing this immense exhibit to many various locations around the NY/NJ area.

We each have our own specific losses, yet we are not alone in trying to make sense of them through our rituals.

I’ll leave you with this image and close, again with the words of Mark Nepo, “It is there that I’m adrift, feeling punctured by a holiness that exists inside everything. I am so sad and everything is beautiful.”