
Have you ever felt like you’re drowning in a sea of sadness after losing a loved one? In the darkest moments of grief, it’s easy to get lost in emotions and grab onto anything that offers a sense of comfort. But as we navigate the uncharted waters of grief, it’s crucial to distinguish between what we want and what we need.
Wants can provide a brief escape from pain, while needs are the essential elements that help us build a foundation for true healing and growth. As performance leaders, we often put others’ needs before our own, neglecting our own wellbeing in the process. When dealing with grief, it’s important to focus on your own needs and take care of yourself in a genuine and meaningful manner.
Tune in today as I introduce a simple yet powerful tool to help you remember your five essential needs during grief. By checking in with each of these needs regularly, you can ensure that you’re taking care of yourself in a holistic way. I also share practical tips for prioritizing your needs and creating a sustainable path forward, even in the midst of profound loss.
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Are you ready to navigate the mourning process and connect with your emotions? Click here to get my Mourning Journaling Workbook to help you embrace your internal grief, expressing it through writing!
What You’ll Learn from this Episode:
- Why it’s crucial to distinguish between wants and needs during the grieving process.
- How to use the 5 healing hands model to identify and prioritize your essential needs.
- Practical tips for checking in on your sleep, hydration, exercise, social connection, and spirituality.
- The importance of recognizing that spirituality is deeply personal and can take many forms.
- How to remain open to the healing process and be gentle with yourself as you explore different dimensions of grief.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Are you ready to navigate the mourning process and connect with your emotions? Click here to get my Mourning Journaling Workbook to help you embrace your internal grief, expressing it through writing!
- Overcoming Grief: Championing Through Multiple Losses by Sandy Linda
Full Episode Transcript:

Welcome to Overcoming Grief, a show for women experiencing profound grief and looking for support in healing and transforming their lives. If you are ready to heal after loss, create a new self-identity, take responsibility to do the hard things, and get massive results in your life, this show is for you. Now, here’s your host, Master Grief and Life Coach, Sandy Linda.
Hello, creative humans. How are you doing today? If this is your first time, welcome to the show. It’s good to have you with us today. A special thanks to those who continue to support and listen to it. I understand the hardship and loneliness of the grief journey, but you are not alone. I’m sending you all my deepest empathy and wishes for healing as you navigate this challenging path.
When we’re grieving, it’s easy to get caught up in what we want at the moment. We might want to escape our emotions or distract ourselves from the pain, but what we want isn’t always what we need. In fact, focusing on our wants can actually hinder our healing process. Let’s talk about why it’s important to recognize our needs for better healing.
In the darkest moments of grief, it’s easy to get lost in the sea of emotions and grab onto anything that offers a sense of comfort. When we are feeling down, we often seek comfort in things like our favorite food, or work to distract ourselves. But as we navigate the uncharted waters of grief, it’s crucial to figure out between what we want and what we need.
Wants can be sudden and sketchy, providing a brief escape from our pain. Needs, on the other hand, are the essential elements that help us build a foundation for true healing and growth. In the context of grief, understanding the difference between wants and needs can be crucial for healing.
As performance leaders, we often put others’ needs before our own, neglecting our own wellbeing in the process. When dealing with grief, it’s important to focus on your own needs and take care of yourselves in a genuine and meaningful manner.
The problem is there’s no one size fits all guidebook for navigating grief. We are often left to figure it out on our own, relying on trial and error to find what works for us. I know this from personal experience. When I was thrown into the depths of grief, I thought that being around others would help me feel less alone. Despite the crowd, I still felt isolated and distant. That’s when I realized I needed to find a better way to deal with my emotions and take care of myself.
Through my journey, I’ve discovered compassionate strategies for identifying and addressing my needs, and I want to share them with you. I hope that by exploring the difference between wants and needs, we can work together to create a more sustainable and meaningful path forward, even during grief.
As I explore this complex and often challenging topic, I want to introduce a crucial difference that can help us better understand ourselves and our needs during this time. Wants versus needs.
In times of grief, we often seek things that can provide relief from our pain or help us feel better. But what we want isn’t always what we need. And it’s essential to recognize the difference between these two concepts, especially when you’re dealing with something as profound as grief.
What are our fundamental needs during this time? I like to introduce a simple yet powerful tool to help you remember your five essential needs. Take a look at your hand and let’s assign each need to a finger. Now, please, you don’t have to initially knit on your fingertips. As someone did that, I was like, no, you didn’t have to, but I guess you could wash it off, whatever works for you. But think of five basic needs you need to check in regularly.
Identify them in advance. Five needs in one hand. Assign them on your fingers. Your pinky finger represents your physical need. Taking care of your body and physical well-being. Your ring. Your ring finger represents your emotional need, acknowledging and processing your emotions in a healthy way. Your middle finger represents your mental need, maintaining a clear and focused mind.
Your pointy finger represents your relational need, nurturing connections with loved ones and community. and your thumb represents your spiritual need, finding meaning, purpose, and connection to something greater than yourself. These five needs are the foundation of our wellbeing during grief. By checking in with each of these needs regularly, we can ensure that we’re taking care of ourselves in a holistic way.
Now, let’s know the difference between wants versus needs. Needs are the essential elements required for emotional, physical, and mental wellbeing, especially when facing grief. These are non-negotiables that help maintain a foundation for healing and moving forward. Needs provide long-term resilience and are often rooted in self-care, connection, and personal growth. Wants, on the other hand, are desires that can add comfort, pleasure, or temporary relief, but are unnecessary for survival, for healing.
While wants can bring moments of joy or distraction, they often don’t contribute to deeper, sustainable healing and grief. While indulging in wants isn’t wrong, we all need joy and distraction sometimes, it’s important not to neglect needs. Needs provide deeper, more sustainable care that foster true healing and growth.
And there was a famous quote that my friend used to say to me all the time, and he would say to me, it’s not what you want, it’s what you need. Remember that phrase and that brought me to do this episode because I’ll never forget that phrase. It’s not what you want, it’s what you need.
Before we dive into the actionable advice, I have a quick ask. Would you take just two minutes to leave a rating and a review of this episode? Your feedback is invaluable to us as it not only helps us to reach more people who may benefit from our conversations, but also gives us insight and motivation to continue creating content that resonates with you. Simply share one key takeaway from our conversation today and let us know how we can continue to support and inspire you in the future. Your input makes a huge difference and we are grateful for your time and consideration. That was just my little promo and now back to actionable advice.
So your first basic need is sleep. Sleep is essential for our physical and emotional wellbeing. And so physical is on your pinky and your emotional is on your ring finger. When we’re grieving, it’s common to experience disrupted sleep patterns, but getting enough sleep is crucial for regulating our emotions and processing our grief. Here are some practical tips for checking in on your sleep.
Establish a consistent sleep schedule. Create a relaxing bedtime routine. Limit screen time before bed. Consider sleep aids or natural remedies, but always consult with a doctor first. And if possible, journal before bed to process your thoughts and emotions or read something that will allow you to release the day and go to sleep.
The second basic need is water, hydration, and H2O. Dehydration can provoke feelings of fatigue, anxiety, and depression. When we’re grieving, it’s easy to neglect our physical needs, including hydration. Here are some practical tips for checking in on your hydration. Set reminders to drink water throughout the day. Keep a water bottle within reach and in plain sight. Your daily water intake using an app or journal. Incorporate hydrating foods into your diet, green salad, vegetables, and another, experiment with infused water or herbal teas for variety. Like in the morning, I take warm lemon water tea, so good.
The third basic need is exercise. Exercise can help us release emotions, reduce stress, and improve our mood. I consider this your physical, mental, and your emotional wellbeing. When you’re grieving, it’s common to feel like we don’t have the energy to exercise. But even small amounts of physical activity can make a big difference.
Start with small, achievable goals, like a 10-minute walk. Explore different types of exercise to find what feels good for you. Schedule movements into your daily routine. Consider joining a fitness class or a group for social support. Use exercise as a form of self-care and stress relief.
The fourth basic need is social connection, and that’s on your pointy finger relational. When we’re grieving, it’s common to feel isolated or disconnected from others, but social connection is essential for our emotional wellbeing. Here are some practical tips for checking in on your social connections. Reach out to one trusted friend or family member that understands the grieving process, a grieving advocate also. Join a grief support group, either online or in person.
Schedule regular video calls with loved ones. Engage in community activities or volunteer work. Practice vulnerability and honesty about your needs with others.
The fifth basic need is meditation, and that’s your spirituality. Whether it’s meditation, reading your Bible, or grounded walking. When you are in the depths of grief, it’s common to question the very foundation of your existence. Losing a loved one can shake our beliefs to the core, leaving you dealing with profound questions about life’s meaning, your purpose, and the nature of faith itself. This spiritual disruption is a natural part of the grieving process. And it’s important to recognize that it’s okay to question, to doubt, and to seek.
For some, this might mean reconnecting with a higher power or religious practice, whatever it may be. For others, it could involve finding solace in nature, meditation, or thoughtful explorations. The key is to understand that spirituality is deeply personal and can take many forms. The goal isn’t to uncover exact answers, but to develop a sense of connection, whether that’s to something greater than us, the world, or your own inner wisdom. The connection can provide comfort, guidance, and a renewed sense of purpose as we navigate the challenging area of grief.
Remember, your spiritual journey in grief is special to you. Your experience can be unique and change as time goes on, and that ‘s okay. The most important thing is to remain open to the process and to be gentle with yourself as you explore this dimension of healing.
And there you have the five healing hands of five basic needs for your grief journey. So this episode focused on the key difference between wants and needs in relation to grief. We discuss how wants can provide temporary comfort or distraction, but often don’t contribute to deeper sustainable healing. On the other hand, needs are the essential elements required for emotional, physical, and mental well-being and are non-negotiable for healing and moving forward.
I also introduce a simple yet powerful tool to help remember the five essential needs, physical, emotional, mental, relationship. relational, and spiritual. Ask yourself every day, did you get sleep? Did you get hydration? Did you get exercise? Did you have your social connection? And did you have any meditation?
The key takeaway from this episode is that recognizing and prioritizing our needs is essential for healing and growth during times of grief. By checking in with each of your five essential needs regularly, you can ensure that you’re taking care of yourselves in a holistic way. Remember, it’s okay to indulge in wants from time to time, but don’t neglect your needs. Your needs provide the deeper, more sustainable care that fosters true healing and growth.
What I want you to do today is take a few minutes to reflect on your current needs and wants. Ask yourself, what are my fundamental needs during this time? Am I prioritizing my needs or getting caught up in wants? Use the hand model to check in with each of your five essential needs and identify areas where you may need to adjust. By doing so, you will be taking crucial steps towards healing and growth during this challenging time.
If today’s discussion helped you or gave you any insights, please share this episode with someone you know who might go through something similar. Each share brings support and understanding to our listener community. Thank you for joining me on this remarkable journey of healing and growth as we make changes and overcome grief together.
Until next time, remember to grieve with grace, nurture your inner strength, and lead with courageous hearts. Take care of yourself and keep making gradual progress. Have a beautiful week. Catch you on the next one. Bye.
Thanks for listening to today’s episode of Overcoming Grief. If you’re ready to move into a new, rewarding life experience, and want more information about how to work with Sandy, visit www.sandylinda.com.
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