FYI: if you haven't yet, read Part 1 here.

Grief lasts a lifetime, true, but what about love? That's not something that can be pulled out of you. It stays for the sorrow, it's there for the rebirth.

In a nutshell: death doesn't mean the relationship has ended. You can keep the conversation going -- in your heart, in your rituals, in your decisions.

Here's what I think...

Love lasts forever.

If you lost someone you love, too, how you live now is your greatest contribution to the love you both shared, and still share.

That love is part of who you are, in every step you take, intimately connected to your joys and your dreams.

The love between you both is a tattoo that can't be removed -- it's an eternal river running through your veins, a name that can't be unnamed, a thing made that can't be destroyed.

Even when your heart is breaking, that love is alive in you.

In everything you do to honor their name, there's love.

Their love is in your smile, your generosity, your service. It far outlasts your mourning, your fears, your questions.

It's in the seeds you plant today, and the dreams that shape tomorrow.

And when you start to feel like you can move forward again, that you can plant and grow and dream again, you realize it's not the same thing as moving on.

Moving forward isn't the same thing as moving on.

This, because you take their love with you wherever you go. You take your memories, your faith, and your gratitude for life and you plant their love, their influence, their spirit in new soil.

You bring them to life through the love you give, and the love you receive.

Through trial and trust, you find your heart has infinite depth. It's big enough to hold the hurt and the joy, the pain of loss and the promise of starting again.

Then you start to know your heart as something more than a beating reminder of your own existence. You meet it as the entryway for the unconditional love of the universe -- the support that life wants to give you. The support that they would give you.

It's like this: the love you shared is the love that continues to make your own heart beat.

You learn that at the bottom of your brokenness, there's a stillness, a wisdom, a knowing of oneness with everything seen and unseen.

It's that same love. That same, ever-present, intelligent energy that makes life possible.

Your heart becomes your point of connection with the divine and with all life underneath the sun. Through it, you send messages and get guidance.

Life after death isn't all darkness, just like it isn't all sunshine. It is everything and nothing less. It's old pain and new joy, a broken heart that still beats on purpose.

And this is how you give your relationship new life: through a heart open to love, even still, one more time. Even here. It's how you come back to life, too.

. . .

Tell me:

Which of these thoughts did you need the most today?

Tell me in the comments. I'd love to know what you think, how you feel.

~ Jen

P.S. If you're struggling right now, get my Healing Heart Space guided meditation. It's something you can have forever, to help you through all the hard times.