Cloe Shasha Brooks: Hello, TED Community, you are watching a TED interview series called How to Deal with Difficult Feelings. I’m your host, Cloe Shasha Brooks, and a curator at TED. This past year has been full of both personal and collective grief. And this grief has taken many forms. And to dive deeper into the world of understanding and managing grief, I'll be speaking first with Nina Westbrook, a marriage and family therapist who has supported clients through loss. Hi, Nina.
克洛伊‧莎夏‧布魯克斯: TED 社群的會員們,大家好。 你現在正在觀看的是 TED 的系列訪談之一: 「如何處理負面情緒」。 我是克洛伊‧莎夏‧布魯克斯, 今天的主持人, 也是 TED 的策展者。 去年是充滿個人與集體悲傷的一年。 悲傷以很多形式出現。 為了更深入理解與處理悲傷的世界, 我會先訪談妮娜‧衛斯特布魯克。 她是婚姻與家庭治療師, 為經歷失去的個案提供支持。 嗨,妮娜。
Nina Westbrook: Hi, Cloe, good to see you. Thank you so much for having me.
妮娜‧衛斯特布魯克: 嗨,克洛伊,很高興見到妳。 很高興妳邀請我。
CSB: Thanks for joining us. Nina, you have talked about how grief can be about the loss of people and tangible things. But that it can also be about the loss of dreams, something that many people have experienced over the past year. Can you give me some examples of grieving for lost dreams and talk about what it means to experience this kind of grief?
克:謝謝妳加入我們。 妮娜,妳已經談過失去親人的悲傷, 以及失去實物的悲傷, 但失去夢想也會導致悲傷, 而這是去年一年中,許多人曾經歷的。 妳能不能給我們一些 因夢想破碎而悲傷的例子, 並告訴我們, 經歷這種悲傷的意義何在?
NW: Absolutely. I believe that grief can take so many different forms, and I think oftentimes when we think about grief, we associate it with the emotional process that takes place when we're coping with the death of a loved one. I don't know. It's just not as common to associate grief or correlate grief with the loss of a dream. So when you think about dreams and when they begin and how deeply they're rooted into our daily lives and our routines and how much our dreams determine our decision-making process and the choices that we make throughout the course of our lives, they hold a pretty significant amount of space in our minds and in our hearts. Imagine a child who, you know, from a young age, we begin to dream and they begin to dream about becoming an astronaut one day and walking on the moon or becoming a professional athlete. And then as we grow older, we begin to focus in on what our needs are and what our wants are, and our dreams begin to look more like acquiring our dream careers or job positions or opening businesses, having children or finding love. And the reality is that these dreams do not always work out and manifest themselves in a way that we have imagined, right? And that can be so devastating for so many people. The loss of careers and jobs or our divorces, the loss of relationships, or infertility can all be extremely devastating things and those types of devastating events propel you into the emotional process that takes place during grief.
妮:當然。 我相信悲傷有很多種形式, 而且我發現,當我們想到悲傷的時候, 我們常將它與 因痛失親人產生的情感歷程相連結。 該怎麼說呢? 我們不那麼常將悲傷 和失去夢想連結在一起。 夢想和夢想甚麼時候形成、 它們有多麼深刻地 紮根在日常生活跟例行公事中、 我們的夢想 對我們做決定的過程影響有多大, 以及我們在人生各階段裡做的選擇, 這些事對我們的情感與理智而言, 意義都非常深刻。 想像有個小孩, 就像我們都從很小的時候就開始做夢, 他開始夢想有一天 能變成太空人在月球上漫步, 或者變成一個職業運動員。 但是,當我們漸漸長大, 我們開始專注思考 「我們到底需要甚麼」, 還有「我們想要甚麼」, 我們的夢想也會逐漸改變: 像是得到心中夢想的事業、 工作職位、創業、 生小孩,或是找到真愛。 很現實的是,這些夢想 並不一定都能實現, 也不一定會以想像中的 那種樣子實現對吧? 這對很多人來說,是很大的打擊。 職涯生活的結束、失業、 離婚、分手 或是不孕,都可以讓人心情盪到谷底。 而這些毀滅性的事件, 會將你推進 陷入悲傷時的情緒歷程。
CSB: Let's bring a question up from the audience. What are comforting things to do or say when someone is grieving? So I guess someone else in this case.
克:我們先回答觀眾提出的一個問題: 當一個人陷入哀傷時, 我們能說甚麼或做呢? 意思是說陷入哀傷的不是自己。
NW: That's a really amazing question. A lot of the time, simply being present and offering support and encouragement is really going to be important when you're trying to support someone else through their grief. I think communication is also important, asking that person, "What can I do," or "What do you need from me in this moment and how can I best support you," is kind of going to be the best way to figure out how to support this person. Sometimes they just want someone to listen to. Sometimes they need someone to make them laugh or to help, you know, keep them distracted for a moment or sometimes they just need someone to be around them. It just really depends on the person, since grief is so subjective in the way that we go through it.
妮:這是個很棒的問題。 大多時候,當你在努力 支持別人度過悲傷的時候, 只是在身邊陪伴他們, 提供支持和鼓勵, 是非常重要的。 溝通也是很重要的。 可以問問對方: 「我可以做甚麼?」 或者「你現在需要我為你做甚麼?」 還有「我要怎麼做 才能給你最大的支持?」 這些都是很棒的方法, 能幫助你了解如何支持對方。 有時候,他們只是想要有個傾聽者。 有時候,他們需要一個能逗他們笑 或幫他們暫時轉移注意力的人。 有時候他們只是需要有人在身邊。 這真的很看個人, 因為每個人經歷哀傷的歷程都不一樣。
CSB: Totally. And let's go right into some strategies, too. So I'm sure you have strategies for managing the grief of lost dreams. How do people pick themselves back up after that?
克:真的。 我們也來談談一些方法吧。 我相信妳一定有些方法, 能調適夢想破碎的悲傷。 人們該怎麼在夢想破碎後, 慢慢拼湊回一個完整的自己?
NW: You want to give yourself permission to grieve, first off. And it's not a linear journey, there is going to be lots of ups and downs that take place. Some days you're going to be OK and some days you might cry and sometimes you might go a month without crying. And then one day everything comes crashing down all at once. It's just a matter of giving yourself permission to go through these feelings and knowing and reassuring yourself that this is OK and it's normal. And also keeping in mind that it's OK to feel joy even in those moments of sadness that you're going to experience when you're grieving. The other thing that I think is really important is just to be proactive in the grieving process. Don't ignore your grief. You can seek support. You can't be afraid to ask for support or lean on others, people that you trust, friends, family members, coworkers, whomever it may be for support. And then making a plan, making a new plan. Mourning happens over time. What it's doing, what we're doing, and all of the emotions that were going through during that mourning process is we're literally detaching ourselves emotionally from the dream that we are mourning or from the object that we're mourning. And what that's doing is opening yourself up and making space for new dreams and new experiences and new opportunities in the future. So goal setting and planning is going to be key. A lot of the time we really focus on plan A. So this is a great time to pivot and focus on planning for a new future and a new outcome.
首先,你要允許自己擁有悲傷的權利。 悲傷不會是直線般的旅程, 而會起起落落。 有時候你會沒事, 但有時候你可能會哭, 有時候你可能整個月都沒哭, 但有一天,一切都突然崩潰。 關鍵在於,允許自己經歷這些感受, 了解這是被允許且正常的, 並以此安慰自己。 也要記得, 當你陷在悲傷中時, 就算你應該要難過, 但卻感受到快樂,也沒有關係。 另外一件我認為相當重要的事是, 在悲傷歷程中,要積極主動。 不要故意忽視自己的悲傷。 你可以尋求支持。 你不能害怕請求他人的支持, 或是害怕依賴他人, 不論是你信任的人、 朋友、家人、同事, 任何能提供你支持的人。 然後做一個計畫,一個新的計畫。 哀痛是逐漸發生的。 在哀痛的歷程中, 哀痛所帶來的意義、 我們為哀痛所做的事, 以及我們經歷的所有情緒, 其實都是我們在與哀悼的夢想 或哀悼的事物, 做出情感上的切割。 這能幫助你對自己 和自己的感情更坦率, 同時為未來的新夢想、新經驗, 以及新機會預留空間。 所以,設定目標跟制定計劃是關鍵。 有很多時候,我們太專注於主計畫, 所以,這是個調適 並專注於計畫新未來 跟新結局的好機會。
CSB: Absolutely. And just one final quick question for you, which is that sometimes people get mad at themselves for not getting over their grief. What would you say to those people?
克:說的沒錯。 最後還有個問題想請教妳: 有時候人們會因為無法跨越悲傷, 而對自己感到憤怒。 妳會向這些人說甚麼?
NW: It's really important to keep healing at the forefront of your mind. And I think that understanding the grief process and going through the ups and downs and knowing that that's all a part of it, you have to be patient with yourself, you have to give yourself grace and understand that you're going to have good days, you're going to have bad days. But when it all comes down to it, if you're keeping the idea of healing in the forefront, then you can focus your energy and your time into that process and going through it in a way that is productive to your emotional well-being in the future.
妮:將「治癒」銘記在心真的很重要。 而我也認為,了解悲傷歷程, 經歷高低起伏, 了解這都是悲傷歷程的一部分, 你需要耐心地對待自己, 允許自己犯錯, 知道自己有時能一帆風順, 有時也會跌到谷底。 但當它發生的時候, 如果你還記得「治癒自己」這個想法, 那麼在悲傷歷程裡, 你就能聚焦在自己的精力跟時間上, 而這也能對你未來的心理健康 產生正面影響。
CSB: Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for this conversation, Nina. We have come to the end, but really grateful to you for joining us. Take care.
克:太棒了。 妮娜,真的很謝謝妳今天的訪談。 我們的訪談已經進到尾聲, 真的很感謝妳願意加入我們。 保重。
NW: Thank you so much for having me. Take care.
謝謝妳邀請我,妳也保重。