I Wish You a Life of Great Joy and Great Grief.

I heard a sentence on a podcast recently that has stayed with me.

I wish you a life of great joy and great grief.

It was Scott Galloway speaking on The Diary of a CEO, and I was struck by it immediately. Because when was the last time anyone wished you great grief? That is not what we say. We wish each other happiness, success, peace, health. We do not wish each other grief.

But that sentence landed somewhere true.

Grief as an asset

Galloway was talking about his mother. He described himself as a middle aged man who still had not gotten over her death, and he had come to realise his grief was not something to overcome or fix. It was an asset, not a liability.

His grief was so great because the love had been so immense.

That stopped me.

It is one of those ideas you cannot really argue with once you sit with it. The depth of grief you will feel when you lose someone is a direct reflection of how much you loved them. To wish someone a life of great grief is to wish them a life of great love.

Earlier this year, we almost lost my dad

He is the cornerstone of our family. The phone call came in the middle of the night and we drove to the hospital to say our goodbyes to him.

In those hours, I was struck by something I will never forget. The depth of love I felt for him. The depth of love I felt from him. There was no question, no doubt, no unfinished business. I knew without ever having to ask that I was loved by my dad and that I loved him deeply.

There was a strange peace in that.

He did not pass away. He is still here with us today, and every day since has felt like a gift we were not expecting.

But I have thought about that night a lot. And about the sentence Galloway said. Because if my dad had died that night, the grief would have been the most profound grief I have ever experienced. And now I understand that the size of that grief is just another way of measuring how deeply I love him.

Cherish what you will one day grieve

There is something the sentence asks of us, once we accept it.

If great love creates great grief, then the people you love most are the people who will hurt you most when they are gone. That is not a reason to love less. It is a reason to love more, while you still can.

Tell them. Show them. Spend the time. Make the call. Visit. Say the thing you have been meaning to say.

Because one day the love you have for them will become the grief you carry without them. And the only thing that matters between now and then is how fully you loved them while they were here.

A reminder

I wish you a life of great joy. I also wish you a life of great grief.

Both of those wishes are the same wish. They are both wishes for a life full of love.

Cherish the people you will one day grieve. Love them more deeply, more profoundly, more often. While they are still here.

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What does "great love creates great grief" mean?

It means the depth of grief you feel when you lose someone is a reflection of how deeply you loved them. The two are linked. A small loss creates small grief. A profound loss creates profound grief. Grief is not a sign that something has gone wrong. It is the echo of love.

Is grief a sign of love?

Yes. Grief is one of the clearest expressions of love that exists. We do not grieve people we did not love. The strength of grief is a measure of the bond, and trying to remove the grief is, in a sense, trying to remove the love that produced it.

How do you cherish the people you love while they are still here?

By saying the thing you have been meaning to say, making the call, visiting, spending the time, and being open about how much they mean to you. The work is to stop assuming there will always be more time, because there won't be. Cherishing someone is not a feeling. It is a practice.

Why do we wish each other joy but not grief?

Because grief is uncomfortable and our culture treats it as something to avoid or hurry through. But avoiding grief means avoiding love, and a life with no grief in it is a life with very little love in it. Wishing someone great grief is, in a strange and beautiful way, wishing them a life rich enough to lose something.

How do you live differently after almost losing someone?

You stop assuming. You stop saving the love for later. You tell people what they mean to you while they can hear it. You make the time for the people who matter, even when life is busy. The near loss becomes a reminder that the moment to love them is always now.