BROADCASTS.com

b'In This Episode:\\n\\n\\n\\n* Creative grief worker & curator Charlene Lam shares how grief impacts us\\u2014as humans, leaders, and business owners* How she discovered a passion for understanding grief and helping others process after the death of her mother* The practical exercises she uses to process feelings of loss\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\nToward the end of 2020, I started to hear the murmurs of something I\\u2019d come to learn was called \\u201cambiguous loss.\\u201d\\n\\n\\n\\nOf course, 2020 was full of loss and grief. There were goals, events, and\\u2014of course\\u2014people who were no longer with us.\\n\\n\\n\\nBut there was also an amorphous, chronic type of grief that set in. The murmurs spoke softly of pain and exhaustion that couldn\\u2019t be attributed to any one particular loss.\\n\\n\\n\\nIn 1999, Pauline Boss coined the term ambiguous loss for exactly this kind of feeling. In a conversation with Krista Tippett, Boss said:\\n\\n\\n\\n\\u201cWe like to solve problems. We\\u2019re not comfortable with unanswered questions. And this is full of unanswered questions. These are losses that are minus facts.\\u201d\\n\\n\\n\\nFor me, the ambiguous loss of the last 2 years has been felt as a sort of ongoing liminality. I\\u2019ve felt stuck between the life, goals, and identities that were part of my pre-2020 life and the next life, goals, and identities that have yet to take form. And while this is my sense of a personal ambiguous loss, I think it also mirrors the ambiguous loss we\\u2019ve faced as a society.\\n\\n\\n\\nAs the pandemic has worn on and social change has stagnated, we keep catching glimpses of what might be on the other side.\\n\\n\\n\\nBut the promises that \\u201cit\\u2019ll be over soon\\u201d have become ever harder to believe. We\\u2019re stuck between our pre-2020 world and the world that has yet to come into focus.\\n\\n\\n\\nGrief in general, and ambiguous loss in particular, might seem like an odd topic for a business podcast. But it was conversations with small business owners that made me realization how important talking about grief is for us.\\n\\n\\n\\nBusiness owners like us go through all sorts of experiences that can bring on a sense of loss or grief: the failed launch, a canceled event, the lost opportunity, an unmet goal, the loss of a team member, or the end of a working relationship. But our natural optimism as entrepreneurs, as well as a culture that doesn\\u2019t make much room for grief, means that we rarely pause to observe and process the transition.\\n\\n\\n\\nSo last December, we decided to devote this December to letting go, processing grief, and beginning again. At the end of last year, this topic felt urgent\\u2014but now, this topic feels timely.\\n\\n\\n\\nWhile I think we\\u2019re all still feeling deep uncertainty about what\\u2019s next, we have a little distance from the onslaught of fear. I\\u2019ve talked to a bunch of people who finally feel like they have the capacity to make a decision about moving on and process what that means for them.\\n\\n\\n\\nToday, I want you to meet Charlene Lam, a creative grief worker, as well as a business mentor, content marketing strategist, and curator. She\\u2019s the creator of The Grief Gallery and Grief. Grit. Grace., where she writes, speaks, and curates exhibitions that help people process their grief.\\n\\n\\n\\nCharlene and I talk about what grief is and how we process it\\u2014as well as how grief shows up for us as business owners and what we can do to let go of what was and begin again with a new vision.'