Loss is almost never a good thing. We lose our keys, our way, a job, a friend, in this day and age maybe even our house, our savings, and so on. For this reason a competent hypnotherapist never talks to a client during hypnosis about “losing” weight, for example. The subconscious mind is literal -- if there is any inner conflict about the weight issue, it may reject the suggestion to “lose” pounds and inches even though on a conscious level the person is ready, willing and able to do so.

The conscious mind can make distinctions, understanding the difference between loss that is acceptable and loss that is not. However, during hypnosis we are not addressing that smart part of the mind. We’re working in the place where emotions are stored.

Frank and I (Ginny) recently lost Frank’s mother. She was 85 and drifted away in her hospital bed, with minimal physical or emotional discomfort.

Two weeks later our daughter lost her baby boy in the fifth month of pregnancy. This took loss in our family to a whole new level, and I am still in a bit of a fog. I can feel myself pushing away the pain, keeping it at bay until I can deal with it properly. For now, I am taking care of business -- making calls for my daughter, packing away baby clothes, putting our crib back in the attic, etc.

Stories are teaching tools, and the subconscious mind interprets them in a highly personal way in order to internalize the message or moral so that a person can learn the lesson and apply it to their own life. The story that comes to my mind at this time is about the old woman who went to Buddha and said, “I have suffered a loss so deeply painful that I cannot bare it. Please say something to help me.” He gave her a bowl and said, “Go to every home in the village and at each place where no one has ever known this kind of suffering, ask for a single grain of rice and put it in your bowl. Then bring it back to me.” When she returned days later, the bowl was empty, and Buddha needed to say not a word.

My 4-year-old granddaughter recently broke a crayon and told me, “It’s okay Grandma, it’s just part of life.” As is death. For now, however, she only knows that her baby brother is in Heaven with Jesus and God and Falcor (the family’s St. Bernard) and Grandma Sarah.

If you are carrying around a burden of this magnitude, you might find the burning bowl ceremony helpful. It isn’t necessary to write a long letter, or anything at all for that matter. You can simply make a mark -- an x on a post-it note -- or use a photo or other tiny burnable object, Close your eyes and mentally send the pain from deep inside you down your arm, hand, and fingers, into that symbol of your suffering; then bless it, burn it, and let it go. This, along with your tears, can cleanse and comfort you.

It isn’t meant to replace suffering, because grieving is a necessary part of life. It is meant to ease pain when it has held you in its grip too tightly for too long. (In reality, it hasn’t been holding onto you, you’ve been holding onto it. ) Trust your instincts to let you know when the time is right to let it go.