Taking the Time to Mourn Our Losses

[Image above: the sign that my dear friend Laura Whitaker put up in her front yard this morning. She got the idea from her brilliant sister Sarah Whitaker.  I love them + their immediate action SO much. ]

​Today, for the first time in my life, I've cried over the political state of our country (multiple times since waking up).

​I've spent the morning sending + receiving texts from loved ones asking how this could have happened. I've been pouring over articles written by those as devastated and scared as I am. I've looked at my 2.5 month-old daughter and held back tears of sadness for my dashed hopes that her first year of life would also be our first year with a female president. I never believed that this wouldn't happen, so I feel totally blindsided. 

I so appreciate everyone on social media (and IRL, see image above!) who is trying to stay positive, and I am trying my best to do the same. I usually try not to post to the blog when I'm emotional--I try to wait until the dust has settled and I've processed whatever it is that is causing me to feel emotional--but today I couldn't stay quiet.

If there's one thing that this election outcome has taught me, it's that you cannot stay quiet. You need to speak up and stand up for what you believe in, even if it ruffles feathers or causes you to lose some friends.

Because I believe in equality, love, acceptance, kindness, and giving, I need to start speaking up WAY more about living according to these values and I need to be sure that in every way possible, I teach my daughter to do the same. I only wish I had done more speaking up over the past year, but I guess we live and learn, and there's no use in beating ourselves up for not doing more at this point {sigh}. 

So today, I'm in mourning. I'm giving myself the space to mourn this election outcome in the same way that I would mourn the death of a loved one. In many ways, I think we are mourning the death of someone we loved--the country that we thought we lived in and the kinds of people that we thought we lived amongst.

If you, too, feel devastated by the outcome of this election in a way that you never have before, give yourself time to mourn that loss and feel all of the feelings today; it's okay to be sad when someone you love disappoints you.

But then, once you've moved through that sense of loss, lets agree to do everything we can to spread love and acceptance each and every day, in every way that we can. And lets agree to speak up for those whose voices aren't as loud as our own; they need us now more than ever.

Deep down, no matter how devastated I am, my inner optimist still has hope that goodness will prevail. I so hope I'm right.