The Myth of Moving On: Redefining Healing After Loss

Namaste Nesh
Nov 23
3 min read

There’s a quiet pressure in our culture that whispers: “Move on.” “Get over it.” “Let it go.”

As if grief is a season you simply outgrow.

As if love has an expiration date.

As if absence ever becomes empty.

But you and I both know loss doesn’t vanish.

It shifts. It reshapes. It settles into new corners of the heart.

Healing isn’t erasing what happened. It’s learning how to breathe again in a world changed by what you lost.

Moving on is a myth. Moving forward is where life begins again.

Not in forgetting, but in remembering differently. Not in closing your heart, but learning how to hold tenderness without drowning in it. You heal not by walking away from your grief…but by allowing it to walk beside you without leading your life.

Grief Isn’t Linear. It’s a Landscape.

Some days are clear skies. Some days lightning catches you off-guard. And some mornings you wake up to sunshine only to feel rain mid-afternoon. It’s normal.

Healing after loss looks like:

Laughing again and feeling guilty for a moment
Remembering a smell and suddenly needing to sit down
Having long stretches of peace, and then one song breaks you open
Feeling joy, then longing, then gratitude… all in the same breath

There is no wrong way to miss someone or something that mattered.

The relationship changes form, but the love remains.

Why “Moving On” Hurts Us

When we judge ourselves for still feeling:

We disconnect from our emotions
We tighten instead of soften
We force a faster process than our nervous system can handle
We confuse emotional endurance with emotional avoidance

Grief isn't a delay in healing. Grief is healing. It is the soul reorganizing around a truth it never asked for. You don’t move on. You grow around the loss. Just like a tree grows around a scar in its bark.

Scarred. Still growing. Still reaching for light.

Practices for Moving Forward (Not On)

Here are gentle ways to honor connection while rebuilding your life at the pace your heart can hold:

1. “Love Still Exists” Ritual

Place your hand on your heart. Say:

“I don’t have to forget to heal. Love can stay as I learn to live again.”

Let your breath soften the space around your chest.

2. Memory as Medicine

Choose one memory that brings warmth, not pain. Write it down. Return to it when you need a reminder that love leaves gifts too.

3. Permission to Feel

When emotion rises, whisper:

“This moment matters. I am safe to feel.”

You aren't regressing. You’re releasing.

You Are Not Behind

Grief does not make you broken. It makes you human.

Healing doesn’t require amnesia. It requires compassion, patience, and space to feel without judgment.

Your future is not threatened by honoring your past. You are not stuck. You are evolving in the slow, sacred rhythm that real healing demands. And you deserve support through every breath of it.