Amanda Held Opelt got a lesson in grief she never wanted. After a series of miscarriages, the loss of her grandma, and then her beloved sister, Amanda found solace in an unexpected place, in exploring ancient grief rituals in practices. In her first book, A Hole in the World: Finding Hope in Rituals of Grief and Healing, Amanda explores how such ancient grief rituals and practices can be a vessel for honest expression, communal connection, and even healing.

Amanda is an author, speaker, and songwriter. She writes about faith, grief, and creativity. She has spent 15 years serving in the non-profit and humanitarian aid sectors and lives in the mountains of Boone, North Carolina. This July, Amanda is releasing her second book, Holy Unhappiness: God, Goodness, and the Myth of the Blessed Life.

In my time with Amanda, we talk about the complexity of living in a world that can be both stunningly beautiful and so very broken. She helps us see the beauty of ritual and community and how loss has the potential to deepen our capacity for love, faith, and healing. She also helps us see how reading the Biblical narrative through the lens of grief, can open us to seeing God in new and transformational ways. Overall, Amanda bravely and authentically wades into the human experience, offering us so much compassion, hope, and hard-won wisdom.