Episode Summary: In this powerful and raw episode of Healing Starts With the Heart, grief specialist Sharon Brubaker asks a deeply uncomfortable—but necessary—question: What if the pain isn’t the problem… but the key to your healing?

Sharon breaks down why so many of us are still stuck in our grief—not because we’re doing it wrong, but because no one ever taught us how to feel the pain instead of managing it. From performative grief to inherited patterns, she shares how unprocessed pain keeps us in a holding pattern of burnout, resentment, and silence.

You’ll learn how to stop performing, start feeling, and allow grief to finally move through you—instead of staying trapped inside your body.

🧠 Key Points Discussed:

• Why pain is not something to avoid, but the portal to healing

• What "performative grief" looks like (and how it keeps you stuck)

• The difference between acknowledgment and acceptance

• Why crying, screaming, and "ugly crying" are necessary parts of the healing process

• How grief passed down through generations teaches us silence instead of support

• The truth about what happens when we don't let grief move through the body

• Why managing pain is not the same as processing pain

• The one-minute challenge to sit with grief (and why that’s so hard)

• What it means to stop apologizing for grief and let the nervous system exhale

📓 Journal Questions for Reflection:

• What pain have I been managing instead of feeling?

• Where am I pretending to be “okay”?

• When was the last time I gave myself permission to fall apart?

• What would it look like to acknowledge, out loud, that I am grieving?

• Who taught me how to grieve—and were they in pain too?

🩶 Conclusion: If you’re still in pain, it doesn’t mean you’re failing. It means you’re human. It means something—or someone—mattered. And you don’t have to perform your way through this anymore.

You are allowed to hurt. You are allowed to cry. You are allowed to feel this all the way through.

Because the pain is not the end of your grief story— It’s the beginning of your healing.

📬 Contact Us: Want to go deeper or get live coaching? Join Sharon Brubaker for weekly grief support:

📝 Grief Study Hall – every Wednesday @ 7PM CST 📍Live in The Grief School Facebook Group (link in comments)

🎤 Next ‘Grieve That Sh*t’ Live Lecture – Monday, August 4 @ 7PM CST Sign up once and get the replay, even if you can’t attend live! 👉 clickhereforhope.com

📧 Contact: [email protected] 📲 TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram: @thegriefschool