If you've ever turned to creativity to make sense of loss, episode 422 of the Grief and Happiness podcast is for you. Author and grief specialist Laing F. Rikkers shares how losing her sister during the pandemic led her to a simple but powerful healing framework: walk it, talk it, write it. Through morning pages and botanical poetry, she transformed her grief into an award-winning book — and shows how even the most personal pain can carry something universal.

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

(00:53) Introducing Laing Rikkers and her book Morning Leaves

(03:17) How losing her sister and the pandemic sparked a creative awakening

(06:08) Poem reading: "Cactus" — on loneliness and self-protection

(07:16) Why loneliness is the grief emotion nobody warns you about

(07:58) Poem reading: "Lemon Tree" — on generosity and resilience

(09:00) How nature became the language of her healing

(13:42) Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way and the power of morning pages

(16:27) Walk it, talk it, write it: a three-step framework for healing

(17:41) How creativity switches off the inner critic and restores rest

(25:19) Why natural sunlight is the most powerful antidepressant

(26:17) How stargazing can restore your sense of meaning and purpose

Laing F. Rikkers is a business advisor, executive coach, award-winning author, and certified Grief Support Specialist based in Southern California. After 30 years in corporate leadership — spanning human resources at Hess and Walt Disney, and two decades in private equity at HealthpointCapital — she channeled personal loss into a profound creative journey. Her book Morning Leaves: Cultivating a Life of Beauty, Meaning, and Joy, a collection of botanical poetry and original paintings born from grief, won multiple awards in its first edition and is now out in an expanded second edition featuring nearly 100 original paintings.

In this episode, Laing shares how the sudden loss of her younger sister in 2019, compounded by pandemic isolation, became the catalyst for that awakening. Drawing on Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way, she began practicing morning pages, allowing grief, loneliness, and reflection to surface through writing — eventually shaping into botanical poems that use nature as metaphor for loss. She reads two of those poems and offers a simple framework for navigating grief: walk it, talk it, write it. She and Emily also explore how deeply personal writing can carry unexpected universality, with readers often finding their own stories reflected in Laing's words.

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