“When Summer Slips Away”: Holding Personal & Global Grief with IFS
There is something undeniably tender about late summer; the golden light, the weight of warm air, the growing awareness that something is ending, even as the world still hums along. As August turns the corner, many of us begin to notice the quiet ache of grieving parts within our systems – some of these may be harder for us to name. They might be cued by the sadness of summer fading, or the anticipation of what's ahead. Or, it could be something even deeper: a mix of personal and global sorrow that feels too much for our systems to hold all at once.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) gives us a compassionate infrastructure to attend to the complexity of grieving parts. IFS teaches us that we’re made up of many parts – thoughts, emotions, and sub-personalities – that all have something to say. During transitions, these parts often get louder, in an effort to access the validation they so desire. And, with grief, we know that validation is vital to healing and restoration.
One part might mourn the end of summer’s spaciousness – reveling in the long evenings, spontaneous moments and increased sense of freedom. Another part may brace for the return of structure, obligations, or even isolation. And yet another part may carry sorrow for things much bigger than the season: climate anxiety, political unrest, war, displacement, collective burnout.
We live in a time when personal grief and global grief often overlap. A quiet afternoon might be pierced by headlines of tragedy. A family milestone might be shadowed by a warming planet. Our nervous systems are carrying the weight of both—whether or not we consciously acknowledge it.
IFS invites us to turn inward, noticing the grieving parts of us that are angry, sad, despairing, overwhelmed, numb, fearful. There may also be other feelings that you and your parts have experienced within the constellation of grief. Take a moment to reflect on the grieving parts you have noticed within your own system.
Rather than pushing these parts aside, we offer them a safe space to come and sit with our Self energy. Here, we can gently ask them questions like:
- What do you need right now?
- What are you afraid will happen [to you and/or to others]?
- What wisdom are you holding for me?
We can also choose to silently bear compassionate witness to their grief.
When we tend to parts with compassion and curiousity, they begin to soften in their intensity. And as they do so, we experience more freedom and space vs. constriction and rigidity within our systems. The weight of micro and macro grief will still be present, but we may find we have just a little more capacity to hold it as we go.
As summer ends and fall approaches, notice the parts that are shifting inside of you. There is wisdom in your grief. There are parts of you asking for a compassionate witness – not a problem-solver or fixer. IFS reminds us: healing and restoration doesn’t mean we stop feeling. It means we learn how to feel safely and fully both individually and collectively.
Notes
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