[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Top thru Author” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_enable_image=”off” min_height=”250px” custom_margin=”0px||-40px||false|false” custom_padding=”0px||0px||true|false” saved_tabs=”all” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_4,3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/societyforritualarts.com\/coreopsis\/autumn-2023-issue\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/coreopsis-winter-2019-header.png” title_text=”coreopsis-winter-2019-header” admin_label=”Coreopsis logo” _builder_version=”4.22.2″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_5,3_5,1_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Title & Author” module_id=”author” module_class=”noindent” _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ admin_label=”Content Block” _builder_version=”4.16″ background_color=”RGBA(255,255,255,0)” background_enable_image=”off” custom_margin=”0px||0px||true|false” custom_padding=”0px||0px||true|false” saved_tabs=”all” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_4,3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ background_color=”RGBA(255,255,255,0)” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.16″ header_2_font=”Eczar||||||||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/societyforritualarts.com\/coreopsis\/autumn-2023-issue\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/Soar_shellykay.jpg” title_text=”Soar_shellykay” _builder_version=”4.22.2″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.22.2″ custom_margin=”||||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px|||” global_colors_info=”{}”]One of my long-standing concerns involves the ways in which people can recover when close friends or family members take their own life. Sometimes they turn to creativity, as it allows them to work through their feelings and express them in artistic formats. Here are two of the accounts that I received, and both promoted survivors\u2019 well-being.<\/p>\n KEYWORDS \u2013 grief, suicide, transformation[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”1_4,3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”1_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.22.2″ header_2_font=”Eczar||||||||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”3_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.22.2″ custom_margin=”||||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px|||” global_colors_info=”{}”]Jean Fox, of Gold River, California, wrote about an experience that demonstrates how one person\u2019s suicide can affect other people\u2019s lives, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse, and sometimes (as in this case) for both. For Jean, the loss of her brother and her friend were emotionally devastating experiences. However, her life was transformed in positive ways. She ends the following account with the song that emerged from the ashes of her despair. She sent me the following account:<\/p>\n One sunny California day in 2001 our neighborhood, a hamlet of about 800 homes bordering the American River, was having a collaborative garage sale. I was gardening in the front yard when quite unexpectedly a heavy-set, 40-something-year-old woman rode up on her bike and asked if I would mind if she put her belongings up for sale in my yard. Valerie lived on a street that didn\u2019t get much traffic and she was hoping to make some sales.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve heard it said that people tell you their truth within the first fifteen minutes of knowing them. Pretty soon it was discovered that we both had experienced the horror and grief that comes when someone you\u2019ve dearly loved suicides. Despite the many ways you\u2019ve tried to help, commiserated with, understood, and shared the pain of a loved one, they had lost all hope. They just couldn\u2019t find any other solution to their grief than to end their lives. They left unresolved the promise of their lost potential. They left unanswered queries about whatever could have been lingering inside. Those left behind are given a dissonant note, an incomplete verse, and a puzzle never to be resolved.<\/p>\n I quickly learned that Valerie\u2019s mother had taken her own life in 1999. That was the same year that my brother, Jaycee, shot himself in the heart after years of disappointments, bad decisions, letdowns, addictions, and self-loathing. Valerie’s mother had taken her own life on Valerie\u2019s birthday. \u201cWhy did she do that?\u201d Valerie asked. \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d I responded. \u201cBut maybe so you\u2019d remember her on your birthday.\u201d<\/p>\n I don\u2019t believe it really matters why, when, or how, although that\u2019s what people often wonder. The incompleteness, the hole inside those who are left, now becomes a link in a chain of grief, a chain that now connects those who loved the departed.<\/p>\n Over the next ten years I learned a lot more about Valerie. Indeed, she had some challenges. Valerie had diagnoses of attention deficit disorder (ADD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and bipolar disorder, so her friendship required considerable patience. There are two major type of bipolar disorder and Valerie\u2019s diagnosis was for the second type, which is characterized by manic episodes as well as episodes of major depression.<\/p>\n Valerie had an \u201cin-your-face\u201d personality. She was loud and blatant, a self-proclaimed \u201cenergy suck.\u201d But I like people who are honest and I appreciated many facets of her personality. Despite her shortcomings (and we all have them), Valerie was funny, and we laughed a lot. She was a caring friend, was patient and smart, and put a lot of herself on the line to help others. Most of all, Valerie was present, especially when we would ride bikes early in the morning. Cycling was one of the ways she kept her \u201cenergies\u201d in check. Riding her bicycle was Valerie\u2019s joy, and the one activity that nourished her and distracted her from her obsessions, abandonment, and pain as she rode merrily through Nature.<\/p>\n Valerie \u201cdid it her way,\u201d the best way \u2013 at least for her. However, Valerie would sit patiently and listen attentively as you described your way. This empathy was Valerie\u2019s gift. My life is crazy, chaotic, and constantly in transition. Valerie carefully created her world while I merely reacted to mine. Valerie did a great job at whatever her task at hand might have been, even though completing that task might take hours! How exhausting that must have been for her! I think back on Valerie\u2019s day-to-day life. That woman would wash her rocks! On the street! In her garden! It must have been exhausting!<\/p>\n Valerie would say, \u201cI\u2019m caught in a loop!\u201d She would follow an idea to the ultimate degree. Once, I encouraged Valerie to paint one wall in her house, an activity that ultimately led to her remodeling the whole house. Valerie\u2019s home never completely fell back together \u2014 and it hadn\u2019t needed to be remodeled in the first place.<\/p>\n Valerie was a child of the 1950s and 1960s. Her mother, who grew up during the Great Depression of the 1930s, was a bartender who charmed her customers by giving them the impression that she was \u2014 or at least had been \u2014 quite promiscuous. Valerie had two older half-brothers. Her verbally abusive father had abandoned her. She shared that he had created another family and lived right down the street from her in a house she had to pass as she walked to school. Sometimes Valerie\u2019s father would be out in the front yard watering the lawn and would act as if he didn\u2019t know her.<\/p>\n Although Valerie\u2019s mother often lavished attention on her, sometimes dressing her up like a little doll, in contrast she could also be neglectful. For example, she would leave Valerie with her latest boyfriend or even with total strangers, unexpectedly and at length. This left Valerie feeling vulnerable, and this is why her \u201cthings,\u201d her personal effects, were so important because they would not abandon her. The only sense of control Valerie had was that over her own personal belongings, especially those that she carried with her. Just before Valerie suicided, she had disassembled her house and was selling many of her precious \u201cthings.\u201d<\/p>\n Just a few weeks before Valerie\u2019s death, she requested, \u201cKeep an eye on me. I\u2019m not doing well. They\u2019re calling me from the other side.\u201d Later I discovered that Valerie\u2019s grandmother had attempted suicide as well. There had been three generations of women with suicidal tendencies. One day Valerie dropped by my house, and I could see how distressed she was. I invited her in and asked her to be at home. I told her that she could rest on the couch if she felt tired. Then I went to the computer to see if I could find some help for her and discovered a suicide hotline. Valerie did try to employ some local resources, but the cost associated with any kind of help was more than she could manage. No matter how we both tried to resolve her pain, it just wouldn\u2019t happen. We couldn\u2019t find an opening that would provide a small bit of hope.<\/p>\n To make matters worse, Valerie had sought out and found her neglectful father, who was now up in years. He hadn\u2019t changed his ways and was still using language that diminished Valerie even as she tried to establish some sort of relationship with him. Valerie had begun to do household chores for him, but her help was not appreciated. She expressed how much his attitude was hurting her, and so I suggested that she not see him anymore.<\/p>\n Valerie had been married, but her venomous frustration and anger had pushed her husband away. It was as if she would constantly test him. \u201cWill you love me even if I yell and scream at you? If I act in ways that don\u2019t inspire intimacy, will you still love me? If I\u2019m loud and obnoxious and overbearing, will you stick with me or run away?\u201d To me, these tests seemed like self-fulfilling prophecies. As the lyrics of an old Country and Western song proclaimed, \u201cIf you don\u2019t leave me honey, I\u2019ll find somebody who will.\u201d<\/p>\n Sometimes Valerie reminded me of my brother. He would often act out, causing consideration: \u201cIf I drink, and if I\u2019m angry and hateful, will you still love me? Will you still care? What if I do loathsome things? What if I commit acts that aren\u2019t acceptable in society, that are out of place in a world based on mutual agreements? What then?\u201d Both Valerie and my brother pushed the boundaries of ordinary social relationships to the breaking point. And when they broke, both were even more disappointed when friends called it a day.<\/p>\n Over time, Valerie ended up living by herself. Having some self-respect and not wanting to be a burden on anyone, she took responsibility for her own welfare and started living off credit cards. Valerie had determined that when she was $25,000 in debt, she would end her life. It was ironic that her home was paid for, and she could have sold it and lived off the equity for quite some time. She could have moved into smaller quarters to create a whole new reality for herself. In Arthur Miller\u2019s play Death of a Salesman<\/i>, Willie Loman (the salesman) suicides just after his wife made the last mortgage payment on their house. But all too often, suicide ignores common sense and reason.<\/p>\n The holiday season was an acute source of pain and isolation for Valerie. I discovered that she actually had quite a few extended family members, even though she had often told me that she had no relatives to visit when the holidays came around and it was time for celebrations. I thought, \u201cValerie, you just didn\u2019t like your family! Why can\u2019t you be honest?\u201d But then I speculated that perhaps family members knew about her abuse when she was little, and failed to protect her.<\/p>\n On Wednesday, October 5, 2010, my husband and I were leaving for a birthday trip to Nashville, so I called Valerie to let her know I\u2019d be gone for a few days. I told her that when I returned home the following Monday, I hoped we could spend some time together and apologized for my lack of presence over the last few weeks. Valerie sounded as if she was in an upbeat mood, so I didn\u2019t ask her how she was doing. The call ended with her expressing in a sing-song voice \u201cWeeell . . . haaappy birthdaaay! I love you sooooo much.\u201d \u201cI love you too,\u201d I replied.<\/p>\n My husband and I went to the famous Bluebird Caf\u00e9 when we arrived in Nashville, and the next morning we had some free time. Being spontaneous and curious, we decided to telephone Kathy, an \u201cintuitive healer,\u201d to address a longstanding health condition, and to see if we could obtain some insights. Kathy told us that she saw us surrounded by profound grief. We replied, \u201cThat doesn\u2019t sound like us at all. We don\u2019t know what you\u2019re talking about.\u201d Kathy was certain, \u201cYes! I see profound grief.\u201d So, we ended the call at an impasse, without understanding or agreement. Kathy\u2019s suggestion was not meaningful to us on any level.<\/p>\n The following morning, however, I awoke early, in my darkened hotel room, and casually checked my email and discovered a friend\u2019s message that would change my life forever. “I’m so sorry to say that Valerie couldn’t do it any longer and she has passed. She overdosed, most likely Wednesday night. I called the sheriff last night around 10:30pm after trying to reach Valerie for the last two days,telling them I was concerned. Once the sheriffs arrived, I gave them her key. A few minutes later they came out and said yes, she had passed. It seemed to have been well planned and well organized. One of the sheriffs told me that she had apparently overdosed and just went to sleep.”<\/p>\n So, there was the profound grief that Kathy had intuited. My husband and I were incredulous, and far from home. Valerie had taken her life the night before my birthday. So I would remember her?<\/p>\n Since her death, Valerie has been with me in profound, meaningful, and life changing ways. What I now have to share you may find unbelievable, but it is true. Every word is true.<\/p>\n I called Kathy, the intuitive, and told her what we had found out. Kathy replied, \u201cOh, that\u2019s probably why you called me in the first place. I often help people transition who have met an untimely death. I\u2019ll talk to your friend and will get back to you.\u201d I thought, “Well, whatever that means!” without comprehension of the import of her words.<\/p>\n My husband and I returned home two days later to the new reality in our neighborhood. The grief was so palpable that I kept wrestling to busy my mind and avoid the sadness altogether. In an attempt to set my grief aside and move through the day, I plugged in my desktop computer, that had been serviced while I’d been gone. A command popped up to \u201center a new password.\u201d I thought that this was strange because I have had the same password ever since I\u2019d gotten my first computer. And that was twenty years ago! Why would I be asked for a new password?<\/p>\n I assigned the word \u201cbluebird.\u201d Then the computer asked for an icon, and I assigned a butterfly.<\/p>\n My husband arrived to help me, and I told him about the change the computer had required. He asked for the new password. \u201cBluebird,\u201d I replied. \u201cBluebird?\u201d he exclaimed, \u201cWhere did that come from?\u201d \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d I said, \u201cI guess because I\u2019m blue,\u201d and also by association, because we had just been to the Bluebird Cafe.<\/p>\n A few days later the phone rang. It was Kathy, the intuitive, so I took the phone into my husband\u2019s office and put the call on speaker so we could both hear her. Kathy said, \u201cThank you for asking me to talk with your friend. It was quite a unique experience for me. She wants you to know that she\u2019s happy. Your friend said:<\/p>\n \u201cBe free of worry.<\/p>\n Be free of anger.<\/p>\n Be free of resentment.<\/p>\n And be free of guilt.<\/p>\n Life doesn\u2019t have to be hard. Choose your way.<\/p>\n Know that you are loved and forever and always will be.\u201d<\/p>\n Kathy continued, \u201dAnd she has a word for you.\u201d \u201cWhat\u2019s the word?\u201d I asked. \u201cThe word is BLUEBIRD. And then she turned into a BUTTERFLY and flew into the light.\u201d<\/p>\n My husband and I were gobsmacked! Our mouths were hanging open. What had just happened? And how did it happen? How, across time and space, death itself, did my computer enter into the consciousness of Valerie, Kathy, and myself? All three of us seemed to have been connected by those two words, and my husband was a witness. I explained to Kathy that I had recently assigned the word \u201cBluebird\u201d as a password because I was blue. She explained, \u201cNo. She wants you to know that the bluebird represents the Bluebird of Happiness. She wants you to remember to be happy! \u201c<\/p>\n This experience opened the door to what I would call an odyssey, and has influenced and changed my life, and countless others, in innumerable and astounding ways.<\/p>\n In retrospect, Valerie and my brother made choices that often brought undesirable outcomes and more unhappiness. But we must be guardians of our thoughts and actions. We have been given free will to the point of even choosing to end the most precious gift, that of life itself.<\/p>\n In the fall of 2011, I visited Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California with another friend, Jane Rivar, and together we wrote a song titled “Carry Me,” inspired by Valerie’s life and those who don’t have an easy path. We wanted to convey a message of hope and gratitude when we treat each other with care, love, and compassion. \u201cCarry Me\u201d placed Second Place in The International Song of Peace Contest in Ireland in 2012.<\/p>\nAbstract<\/h2>\n
The Bluebird<\/h2>\n