<p><em>New episodes come out every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for free, with 1-week early access for Wondery+ subscribers.</em></p> <p><em>---</em></p> <p>A journalist explores one of humanity's most brutal and unavoidable experiences.</p> <p><br /></p> <p><a href="https://delistraty.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Cody Delistraty</a> is a writer and speechwriter, most recently working as the culture editor at the Wall Street Journal Magazine. He has written for The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and was the European arts columnist for The Paris Review. He has degrees in politics from New York University and in history from the University of Oxford. British Vogue named him a best young writer of the year, and he has given talks about art and creativity to companies like PwC. He lives in New York City.</p> <p><br /></p> <p><strong>In this episode we talk about:</strong></p> <ul> <li>Why our culture is so repressed when it comes to grief</li> <li>We dive into the many experiments that Cody launched to help cope with loss; from book and laughter therapy, to psilocybin and AI</li> <li>The concept of grief as an addiction </li> <li>The importance of rituals </li> <li>The scientific possibility of deleting our memories to avoid pain </li> <li>And how to live along side of grief when there is no cure</li> </ul> <p><br /></p> <p><br /></p> <p><strong>Related Episodes:</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.happierapp.com/podcast/tph/abby-wambach" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Abby Wambach On: Grief, Addiction, And Moving From External To Internal Validation</a></p> <p><a href="https://www.happierapp.com/podcast/tph/jennifer-senior-583" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#583. Jennifer Senior On: Grief, Happiness, Friendship Breakups, and Why We Feel Younger Than Our Actual Age</a></p> <p><a href="https://art19.com/shows/4695c3c0-9a34-436f-a807-ea4787d273ab/episodes/0484417d-2094-4500-b6be-8f1215a0ef1e" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Joe DiNardo, Grief and Meditation</a></p> <p><br /></p> <p><strong>Sign up for Dan's newsletter</strong> <a href="http://www.danharris.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>here</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Follow Dan on social:</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3tGigG5" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Instagram</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3FOA84J" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>TikTok</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Ten Percent Happier online</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/46TZglY" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>bookstore</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Subscribe to our</strong> <a href="https://bit.ly/3FybRzD" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>YouTube Channel</strong></a></p> <p><strong>Our favorite playlists on:</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3Qa8kMT" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Anxiety</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3MjtMxF" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Sleep</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3QvyA5J" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Relationships</strong></a><strong>,</strong> <a href="https://spoti.fi/3QxZASc" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Most Popular Episodes</strong></a></p> <p><br /></p> <p><strong>Full Shownotes:</strong> <a href="https://happierapp.com/podcast/tph/cody-delistraty-872" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://happierapp.com/podcast/tph/cody-delistraty-872</a></p> <p><br /></p> <p><strong>Additional Resources:</strong></p> <p>Download the Happier app today: <a href="https://my.happierapp.com/link/download" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">https://my.happierapp.com/link/download</a></p> <p><a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-grief-cure-cody-delistraty?variant=41111741825058" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Grief Cure: Looking for the End of Loss</a></p>
Actionable Insights
1. Embrace Impermanence to Reduce Suffering
Recognize that everything changes and ends, as ignoring this reality sets you up for suffering. Leaning into this truth requires less energy than living in denial.
2. Hold Grief While Continuing Life
Instead of trying to ‘move on’ or repress grief, learn to hold it in one hand while continuing with your life in the other. This approach prevents grief from taking over your existence.
3. Openly Discuss Grief and Loss
Break the cultural repression around grief by talking about it with others, as many people are waiting for the license to share their own experiences. This helps normalize the universal experience of loss.
4. Offer Compassionate Presence to Grievers
When someone is grieving, offer your physical presence, compassion, and understanding, giving them license to feel their emotions without minimizing their pain. Often, simply being there is the most meaningful help.
5. Witness Your Own Grief Internally
Be an empathetic witness to your own internal grief, neither feeding nor fighting it, which allows you to notice other coexisting mental states and function without denial.
6. Create Personalized Grief Rituals
Develop cheap, specific, and repeatable rituals (e.g., listening to a favorite song, visiting a meaningful place) to honor the deceased, as these can be more valuable than a single funeral.
7. Engage in Bibliotherapy for Grief
Read books and memoirs about grief to realize your story is not exceptional, normalizing your experience and understanding its ubiquity across history and cultures.
8. Practice Daily Laughter Therapy
Engage in daily laughter (even fake laughter) for a few minutes to experience physical catharsis and release trapped physiological tension associated with grief.
9. Reflect with Recordings of Deceased
Listen to recordings of the deceased to honestly face your grief, reassess your relationship, and consider what questions you would ask them.
Broaden your understanding of grief to include all forms of loss, such as divorce, financial ruin, or ambiguous losses like climate change, recognizing that all are legitimate.
11. Use Meditation for Stress & Grief
Utilize guided meditations and community sessions (e.g., via the 10% Happier app) to help with stress, anxiety, sleep, focus, self-compassion, and to rethink yourself and your loss.
12. Consider Psilocybin for Reframing Grief
Research suggests psilocybin can help reframe grief, allowing individuals to view it as something that doesn’t have to take over their life.
13. Join Grief Support Communities
Seek out ‘second spaces’ or communities, like The Dinner Party, where people with similar losses can gather, talk openly, and support each other.
14. Observe Death in Everyday Life
Consciously observe instances of death in everyday life, such as roadkill, to lean into the truth of impermanence and prepare for personal loss.