Ear of the
Heart
Reflections, guidance, and gentle stories for listening deeply — to yourself, your loved ones, and the world around you.
Using Storybooks to Help Children After Pet Loss
Books can't do the grieving for a child, and there isn't one perfect story that will make the loss understandable or take away the pain. What a story can do is create a shared space where a child and adult can encounter death, feelings, memories, and questions together. Sometimes it is easier to begin by talking about what happened to an animal in a story before talking about the animal whose absence is still so painfully present in your own home.
The Gentle Art of Letting Go: Preparing Emotionally and Spiritually
Letting go is a complicated phrase. It can sound as though there is something we are supposed to accomplish: a final emotional task in which we gracefully accept death, release the person we love, and arrive at peace.
Real dying, and real grieving, are rarely so tidy.
An End-of-Year Reflection: Living with Death in Mind
To live with death in mind is not to dwell on sorrow, but to live with deeper awareness, to recognize that every moment, every relationship, and every heartbeat exists within a greater cycle of becoming, ending, and beginning again.
Helping Children Cope with the Death of a Pet
For many children, the death of a beloved pet is their first experience with loss. It can be confusing and painful, even frightening. Yet, with gentle guidance, honesty, and inclusion, these moments can also become powerful lessons in love, empathy, and the cycles of life.