There are many things in life that we feel sad over. We feel sad when we experience loss of something we value such as a relationship, material good, a job, health, a dream, a plan, or a hope. Sadness can be felt as disappointment, hopelessness, or depression. Sadness has to be felt before we can find true acceptance. The grief cycle has five stages that include experiencing sadness.

Denial: If the loss is sudden or painful, you will experience a period of shock or denial where you don’t fully recognize what happened. This is a protective coping mechanism.

Anger: You feel anger toward people, God, yourself, and whatever contributed to your situation. Part of the anger includes these questions: How could this happen to me? How could this person do this to me? How could God allow it? Why didn’t I make changes to prevent this?

Bargaining: You will try to figure out a way to change things. It might include making deals with God or another person, changing yourself, or just figuring out ways things could be different so you won’t have to deal with the way they are.

Sadness: This is where you feel the loss physically and grieve over it. You may feel it as heaviness, a stomach ache, a headache, fatigue, a blue mood, or tears. Sadness is uncomfortable and can feel like it will endure forever, but it won’t unless it turns into depression.

Acceptance: Acceptance comes after you work through the other emotions. This is where you let go of what you wish you could have had or what could have been and accept things as they are. Acceptance brings peace, hope, a new perspective, and empowerment.

There are many things to feel sad over in relationships. People don’t meet our expectations and don’t give us everything we need from them. Life doesn’t turn out quite like we dreamed. People hurt us even when they don’t mean to. People leave us when they die, pursue other priorities, or when they abandon us emotionally or physically. Many of us have unresolved sadness from relationships with our parents, siblings, spouses, children, friends, partners, and other people close to us that we carry around still hoping that it could be or would have been different. If you are struggling with acceptance in any area of your life, the best way to find it is to allow yourself to grieve the loss.

By Karla Downing

Relationship Devotional Prayer

 
God,

Help me grieve the losses in my relationships. Guide me through the emotions and help me not to be afraid to feel the sadness. Move me toward acceptance so I will be empowered and hopeful for a future full of promise and potential.

Relationship Devotional Challenge

• What do you wish were different in your relationships?
• Allow yourself to grieve the losses including unmet expectations, disappointment, hurts, and endings.
• Purpose to work toward acceptance of things as they are today, not how you wish they would be or would have been.

Scripture Meditation

 
Psalm 42:11

“Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God” (NIV).

Psalm 30:5b; 11-12

“Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning. You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing to you and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever” (NIV).