The Bridge Between Grief and Gratitude
Many experience the holidays as a time of grief, loss, and loneliness, even though the season is often framed as one of celebration and connection.
Even those who feel they have moved beyond mourning or who consider the holiday season insignificant may notice that the collective energy can break through emotional defenses, allowing heavier emotions to surface.
As grief grows, it becomes more difficult to maintain boundaries. The expectation to feel grateful often collides with feelings of exhaustion, loss, and overwhelm. Many people feel conflicted, especially when those around them seem unaffected. At holiday gatherings, laughter and absence, belonging and loneliness, joy and grief may all be present at once.
The psyche thrives on holding multiple emotions, not singular ones. Like art with layered elements, humans can experience joy and grief, hope and heaviness, gratitude and sorrow simultaneously.
Jung’s concept of the Transcendent Function describes how the interplay between opposing emotions produces psychological growth by uniting consciousness and the unconscious. Transformation arises from the tension between such opposites, forming fertile ground for something new to emerge.
Why the Holidays Bring up Intense Emotions
The holiday season amplifies dominant emotions, intensifying what people already feel.
Sadness from the empty chair at the table
Mourning traditions that were connected to people and eras that have passed
Longing for connections that don't arrive
Pressure to perform and seem joyous, while carrying pain
Emotional burnout from caring for others, both professionally and personally
Mental health professionals are well aware of this pattern. We support others throughout the year, but during the holidays, we are often called to do even more. If we lack boundaries, our capacity to remain present and emotionally available diminishes. The holiday season asks us to extend empathy and compassion to ourselves just as we do to others.
Rituals and Self-Care:
Rituals offer structure, acting as boundaries for emotional containment. Without such outlets, heavy emotions can accumulate and stagnate. This can be especially difficult when grief and sadness pile up.
Creativity as Medicine:
Symbolic expression, through art, allows people to transform emotions into tangible forms that can be seen, shaped, and integrated—honoring all feelings.
Creativity offers:
Containment: a vessel to hold complex internal experiences
A method for transmuting pain
Opportunities for connection
Rituals provide structure for honoring what matters.
Grief is more than just sadness; it has been described as love that has nowhere to go. Creativity provides a way for these emotions to move forward, sometimes even giving them a place to belong.
Boundaries and Creative Practice
Boundaries function as containers rather than barriers. They serve as the frame for art; without a frame, even the most beautiful image loses definition. Similarly, without boundaries, the nervous system struggles to regulate, making it difficult to create or to be genuine in relationships.
Self-Protection, Healthy Boundaries, and the Holiday Season
This season, make conscious choices to care for yourself and nourish your inner self, such as:
Leave an event early instead of staying until you collapse.
Say no without offering an apology.
Choose silence over explanation.
Spend your time this season differently this year.
Allow yourself to rest. Focus on sacred energy over productivity.
Recognize that keeping your distance from certain environments is an act of care.
Protecting your emotional energy is not selfish. It is the precondition for creativity, compassion, and connection.
Rituals for Managing Complicated Emotions and Processing Gratitude and Grief
Here are some practices used across cultures to support emotional integration:
Light a candle in honor of someone you miss.
Create: collage, paint, write, play music.
Consciously move your body: i.e., Yoga.
Share a story or memories.
Create alters with meaningful objects.
Write letters to people or a version of life you grieve.
Pray and honor nourishing food and relationships.
These practices remind us: grief and gratitude exist together. Grief arises where there has been love; gratitude fosters respect and healing. The interplay between these emotions allows us to cultivate meaning and resilience, even in difficult times.
For Health Care Providers and Everyone with a Heart
If this season feels heavy, please know:
You do not have to be inspirational all the time.
You do not have to be strong all the time.
You do not have to choose joy instead of grief.
You are allowed to have your own emotional experiences.
You are allowed to rest and take care of yourself.
You are allowed to be human first.
This season, may you create space in your life to honor both tenderness and beauty, and to recognize the creative renewal that emerges when we allow grief and gratitude to meet.
by Dr. Amy Vail and Alli Fischenich