On Loss

These are excerpts from a journal entry I wrote a while ago, but I really wanted to share it: 

It’s amazing how awful loss is but how everyone must experience it in some way or another.  It might be lost experiences, loss of a loved one, or something as seemingly simple as a breakup.

I was reading a book yesterday that had a picture of a little pioneer family eating their meal.  They looked like they had been through a lot and had experienced loss.  They probably lost friends and family members and had to move on without them.  That’s how it can feel as you are moving into a new phase of life and saying goodbye to old friends.  Yes, there are still other people to love and care about, but you don’t feel ready to leave them behind.  And yet, you have to.

During high school, I distinctly remember realizing that if there was one thing I never wanted, it was a breakup.  I had heard songs about breakups and loss my whole life, but it finally occurred to me how devastating it actually would feel to put so much into something and then lose it completely.  That was one aspect of human experience I didn’t want to understand. 

And yet, it happens.

So this whole loss thing!  Why do we have to go through it?  We put so much of ourselves and our souls into relationships and then it must be taken away.  Why do these trials happen?  I’ve discovered a couple reasons.

One reason for trials is it helps us to understand our fellow human beings.  We finally know what the widow next door has been experiencing for 20 years.  We finally understand the emotion behind Kelly Clarkson’s hazel eyes.  We finally understand what it might feel like to switch jobs and move your family across the country.  Just as Harry began to see threstrals after witnessing Cedric Diggory’s death, so we join a group of people that know.  And with this knowing comes empathy and the chance to help others. 

Jeffrey R. Holland said of Liberty Jail, “No, Joseph was not greater than the Savior, and neither are we. And when we promise to follow the Savior, to walk in His footsteps, and be His disciples, we are promising to go where that divine path leads us. And the path of salvation has always led one way or another through Gethsemane. So if the Savior faced such injustices and discouragements, such persecutions, unrighteousness, and suffering, we cannot expect that we are not going to face some of that if we still intend to call ourselves His true disciples and faithful followers.”  That brings me to my second point.  As we go through trials, we become more like the Savior. 

Alma 7:12 states, “And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities.”  Because Christ took upon Himself our pains, weaknesses, and afflictions, he can succor us.  That is what makes Him our Savior.  He understands it all.

We do not have to drink Christ’s bitter cup.  Our path is much easier.  But the trials that do come give us a chance to feel a little bit of what the Savior did.  Just as He suffered to understand us, so we suffer to understand Him.

That brings me to the concept of love. Huey Lewis song, “The Power of Love” has more truth than I used to think.  “It's strong and it's sudden and it's cruel sometimes, but it might just save your life, that's the power of love.”  As explained in the lyrics, despite its glorified pedestal, love can bring us to our knees.  When I have a loved one suffering, it breaks me to the core.  I’ve spent nights sobbing because those I love are struggling with sickness, friends, school, or loneliness.  When Leslie went through cancer treatment, I think that all of us would have taken that hardship in a heartbeat from her if we could.  Our love for her caused us to ache and we longed to take that pain away from her.  And yet we couldn’t.  

But the Savior can.  And He did.  The thought of us suffering alone and without hope was enough to for love’s power to take its effect.  Love allowed the Savior to perform the Atonement for us.   Because of the Savior’s love for us, we are redeemed.   

Is this what life is about?  We come to earth, get bodies, feel happy, feel sad, grow up, make families, have kids, and start this process over?   Actually, yes!  This is what it is all about. 

“For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39)

Life is one big cycle of growing and learning and becoming.  And you know what?  It’s wonderful.  Loss and suffering are involved, but so is JOY.  “Adam fell that men might be and men are, that they might have joy.”  (2 Nephi 2:25).  There is so much to be happy and joyous about.  The world is beautiful with its wooded mountains and sparkling rivers.  There are sunsets and butterflies and new baby fingers and toes.  There are friends and laughter and dinner with family.  There is running and moving and learning and creating.  There is performing and watching and reading and enjoying. 

Is it worth it?  I think so. 

Dumbledore told Harry, “If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love. Love as powerful as your mother's for you leaves its own mark. To have been loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever.”   Voldemort cannot understand, but he is missing out.  There's a line in "Ever After" I really like, “a life without love is no life at all.”  Guess who has two thumbs and wants to live?

To sum it up:  “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”  (John 17:3) As we increase in love, we come to understand the Savior, and that is life eternal. 

If I am seeking life eternal and am choosing between horcruxes and love to get me there, I choose love.