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There were others, however, who had dealt with their losses in a much more positive and useful way. When we would ask them about a loss, there would often be a smile and softening of the face, and a gentle lift of the shoulders, and deeper breathing. They could speak about the lost person with softness, caring and happiness. One woman said, “When I think of Joe, it’s as if he is right here with me. If I’m in the supermarket picking out oranges, he is right there with me helping choose the best ones, just like he used to.” This kind of response is clearly much more enjoyable, and provides easy access to all the special feelings that they had with the person who is now gone. These were the people that we studied to find out how they could be congruently happy about a significant loss.
When we asked them how they thought of the lost person, we found that they literally thought of them as if they were still present, and this gave them access to all the good feelings that they had during the actual relationship.There are a variety of ways to do this. Often people will simply think of the lost person as if s/he is nearby, life-size and three-dimensional, moving and breathing, and able to offer both verbal conversation and nonverbal response, as if s/he were physically alive and present in the real world. Some represent the lost person as if s/he were physically present in their heart, or chest area, or present in their whole body in some way. One person felt the lost person as if he were a comfortable close-fitting sheath embracing her whole body. Others had different ways of representing the lost person, but all of them resulted in a strong sense of the person being fully present with them in the moment, and easy to contact.
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