Page 39 - Reader's House Magazine Issue 49

“Comfort for Grieving Hearts” by Gary Roe is a compassionate guide offering solace, encouragement, and practical wisdom to help individuals navigate the challenging journey of grief with hope and healing.
Gary Roe is a compassionate, award-winning author whose pro- found insights and empathy offer hope and healing to grieving hearts.
about how writing helped you personally through your grief, and why
you believe it’s such an effective method for others?
At the age of 15, soon after the sudden death of my dad, I started writing poetry. I found
Your journey into grief counseling and writing
began with your own deeply personal experiences of loss and pain. How did these early life experiences shape your approach to helping others navigate their grief?
I was raised in an environ- ment of mixed messages and sexual abuse. I experienced massive losses in childhood
and during my teen years. As I experienced healing in my life, I found myself wanting to help other wounded hearts heal and grow. This has been my mission since my late teens.
In your book Grieving the Write Way Journal and Workbook, you emphasize the power of writing as a tool for healing. Can you share more
erful habit that can help
us navigate life in general. What we don’t express stays locked in our hearts and often becomes some of the baggage that weighs us down.
Your book Shattered: Surviving the Loss of a Child addresses one of
the most devastating losses a parent can experience. What was
the most challenging aspect of writing this book, and how have you seen it impact the lives of grieving parents?
I wanted to write a book
that met parents in their grief, connected with their hearts,
and gave them hope amid this shattering loss. I knew this was an almost impossible, Mount Everest type goal, but God enabled me to write a book
that was, frankly, beyond me. Grieving parents write to me all the time, saying how transform- ative and helpful Shattered was for them. It continues to be my best-selling book.
As someone who has
served as a college minister, missionary, pastor, and hospice chaplain, you’ve interacted with people at various stages of grief and faith. How do you approach the spiritual aspects of grief in your counseling and writing?
As much as possible, I try to meet people where they are in their grief journey, including their spiritual life, and love them there. The impact of loss on our souls is massive, and how we process this matters greatly. I believe that Jesus Christ is the ultimate grief expert. In the Bible, He is called a “man of sorrows, one well-acquainted with grief.” He empowers me to love people where they are, as they are, which brings a sense of safety and healing. We all need healing at the soul level. Our soul - our heart - is who we are.
Your work has been widely recognized and featured in various media outlets. How do you balance the demands of writing, speaking, and being a grief specialist while also maintaining your own emotional well-being?
This kind of balance is always a moving target. I try to maintain good, healthy boundaries, while remaining flexible enough to meet needs as they arise. My wife is my greatest asset in
this. She can quickly see the warning signs that I’m leaning
a bit too much in any direction.
I also have several invaluable mentors whom I touch base with regularly.
Looking ahead, are there any new projects or topics you are passionate about exploring
in your writing or speaking engagements that you feel could further support those dealing with grief?
I’m excited about producing more courses for my online school, Overcoming Grief. These courses will address issues such as anxiety, depression, guilt and forgiveness, changing relation- ships, and walking with God in suffering. I am also planning workshops on these topics as well. By request, I’m currently writing my own life story, which will hopefully be published early next year. If I can recover, heal, and grow, anyone can.
myself emoting as I wrote. I cried. I paced and talked to my- self. I yelled and screamed.
Writing opened an avenue for my heart to express its anguish. Sadness, confusion, anger,
fear, anxiety, and guilt spewed out of me, one word at a time. Expressing myself felt good and relieving. Keeping a journal became a habit.
Writing steadies our hearts enough to express our emotions in a healthy and productive way. It slows our spinning minds down enough to get our thoughts on paper and begin to process them. Writing gives us a safe place to express and process spiritual questions, doubts, and fears. It allows us to share our frustrations about our relation- ships in an honest and uncen- sored manner.
Writing can become a pow-
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