177: How To Move Grief to Relief After Losing A Love One With Marie Alessi
Marie Alessi is Dr. Brad Miller’s guest on Episode 171 of “The Beyond Adversity Podcast.”
Marie is an influencer, speaker, and author of a book inspired by life’s adversities that deal with a loved one’s passing. She is a grief coach who helps people go through the experience as efficiently as possible and help others by sharing her take on the negative aspect of life.
In this episode, Marie talks about her personal experience dealing with the death of her loved ones, the grief, the pain, and the negative emotions that she struggled to deal with alongside while raising her two children without a father figure.
Marie had lost two significant people in her life: her father when she was 20 years old and her husband when they were both 45 years old. Her spouse was in his prime; he went on a business trip and never returned. It was unexpected, and Marie was heartbroken when she found out more.
Before answering the phone, when she received the call from the police regarding his husband’s untimely death, something clicked inside her – it was as if she switched into function mode and was able to prepare herself for the worst thing she could imagine mentally. When one of her sons wondered who would look after them if they found out the truth, Marie bravely said, “I will.”
Many people are oblivious to their choices. People, often imprisoned and numb, which can lead to despair or sadness, and they are unaware that not deciding to heal is also a decision not to make. The majority of individuals, if they have a choice, choose to grieve.
A week after the funeral, Marie had a nervous breakdown in the kitchen. She started yelling at the lads. Due to Pickering’s presence or people cleaning their teeth, she needed quiet. And the noise got louder and louder. On the other hand, she went off on the other subject; she only wanted peace or the lack of noise. Marie was thrown into this spiral out of nowhere and was helpless to stop herself. She yelled and screamed it over and over till she collapsed on the kitchen floor, whacking the kitchen cabinet and shouting at the top of her lungs. Then there was nothing but quiet.
Beyond Adversity Podcast Episode 171 serves as a reminder for anyone struggling to cope with the loss of a loved one. Remember that beyond the agony and suffering you are currently experiencing, there is hope and a better life ahead of you. This episode discusses the value of intimate circles and how they can provide emotional and social support during difficult times.
“The Beyond Adversity Podcast with Dr. Brad Miller is published weekly with the mission of helping people “Grow Through What They Go Through” as they navigate adversity and discover their promised life of peace, prosperity and purpose.
Website: https://www.mariealessi.com/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvmG__TXI1qQWqEMnt6R43w
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marie-alessi/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/loving.life.after.loss/
Transcript
Dr. Brad Miller 0:00
How to move from grief to relief
Dr. Brad Miller 0:04
after losing a loved one,
Dr. Brad Miller 0:06
with the author of loving life after loss
Dr. Brad Miller 0:11
Marie Alessi on episode number 177 of
Dr. Brad Miller 0:17
the Beyond adversity podcast with Dr. Brad Miller.
Marie Alessi 0:25
That I will be creating the most beautiful and happy life
Marie Alessi 0:29
I possibly can for those people. It was my mission,
Marie Alessi 0:32
it was my promise that Robin had made to
Marie Alessi 0:35
each other before he passed,
Marie Alessi 0:37
not even knowing that that will happen
Marie Alessi 0:38
why we had to go through with it
Marie Alessi 0:40
if something would ever happen to either of us.
Unknown Speaker 0:45
Hi, this is Kelly Calibri and I help
Unknown Speaker 0:47
women become intentionally fabulous.
Unknown Speaker 0:49
My mission is to help women going through
Unknown Speaker 0:52
any stages of separation and divorce to go
Unknown Speaker 0:54
from fearful to fearlessly pursuing what sets their soul on fire.
Unknown Speaker 1:00
Here on Dr. Brad Miller's podcast the beyond adversity podcast.
Unknown Speaker 1:05
His mission is to help you to crush adversity,
Unknown Speaker 1:09
and discover your life of peace, prosperity, and purpose.
Marie Alessi 1:15
Welcome to the Beyond adversity podcast with Dr. Brad Miller,
Dr. Brad Miller 1:19
the show dedicated to helping you
Dr. Brad Miller 1:21
crush adversity and succeed in life.
Dr. Brad Miller 1:23
Brad believes you deserve a life that is fulfilling and impactful.
Dr. Brad Miller 1:27
And this show is designed to help you navigate
Dr. Brad Miller 1:30
beyond adversity and achieve your life of peace, prosperity and purpose.
Dr. Brad Miller 1:34
Now here's Dr. Brad.
Dr. Brad Miller 1:38
Hello, good people. Welcome to Beyond adversity with Dr. Brad Miller.
Dr. Brad Miller 1:41
What a privilege, what a honor it is to have you join me today
Dr. Brad Miller 1:45
on this podcast where we are all about helping you
Dr. Brad Miller 1:48
to grow through what you go through helping you
Dr. Brad Miller 1:51
to navigate adversity, and achieve your life at peace, prosperity, and purpose
Dr. Brad Miller 1:57
we invite you to head over to our website, dr.bradmiller.com,
Dr. Brad Miller 2:01
where we have a free gift for you there
Dr. Brad Miller 2:03
and you can check out over 170 episodes of this podcast,
Dr. Brad Miller 2:07
which helps you to deal with things like depression
Dr. Brad Miller 2:11
or divorce, or disease or debt, or even death.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:16
That's our focus here today is believe it or not death
Dr. Brad Miller 2:20
of a loved one and how that impacts our life.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:24
Our guest today is Marie Alessi and
Dr. Brad Miller 2:27
she has the book loving life after a loss.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:31
And in our conversation, we're going to talk about her
Dr. Brad Miller 2:34
process that she used to deal with the loss of her husband,
Dr. Brad Miller 2:38
which was a devastating loss in her life, and what she did.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:42
So we're gonna learn a few things.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:44
Today, we're gonna learn about have finding
Dr. Brad Miller 2:46
how important it is to find a safe place to process your grief,
Dr. Brad Miller 2:51
that you don't have to be alone on a journey of grief.
Dr. Brad Miller 2:54
And you need to have a find a space to shower
Dr. Brad Miller 2:58
yourself with love and support and a time to do that.
Dr. Brad Miller 3:00
Don't allow yourself that struggle, your learn that
Dr. Brad Miller 3:04
you're going to feel the emotion that Marie talks about
Dr. Brad Miller 3:08
and losing her husband and all the terrible drama and trauma
Dr. Brad Miller 3:13
that was involved with that. And then how that's impacts on
Dr. Brad Miller 3:17
so many people's lives. We're going to feel the deep, deep loss
Dr. Brad Miller 3:22
and what the process is to recover from that.
Dr. Brad Miller 3:26
When we come back on the other side of the interview,
Dr. Brad Miller 3:28
we're going to talk about some specific things that
Dr. Brad Miller 3:30
you can do to overcome grief, overcome death in your life
Dr. Brad Miller 3:37
and to have great joy in your life you believe it or not,
Dr. Brad Miller 3:41
even after going through a time of grief.
Dr. Brad Miller 3:43
So come back to us after the interview for more about
Dr. Brad Miller 3:47
what you can do for her to be helpful to you
Dr. Brad Miller 3:51
and to navigate adversity in your life.
Dr. Brad Miller 3:53
And Marie Alessi and her book loving life after loss.
Dr. Brad Miller 3:57
And her website mariealessi.com that's Ma Ri e a l e s si.com
Dr. Brad Miller 4:06
has plenty of resources to be helpful to you as well.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:09
Right now, our guests on beyond that adversity Marie Alessi
Dr. Brad Miller 4:13
the author of loving life after a loss.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:16
Let's get into that conversation. Right now.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:22
Marie Alessi, Welcome.
Marie Alessi 4:25
Thank you so much for having me, Brad.
Marie Alessi 4:27
I'm really looking forward to our chat today.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:29
Well, I should be awesome.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:31
You're coming to us from Australia. What place in Australia.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:35
Are you talking to us from today, Marie?
Marie Alessi 4:38
Actually just south of Sydney after beautiful gorgeous day.
Marie Alessi 4:41
I'm talking to you from the 22nd of October already. Like one day ahead.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:46
All right. I'm calling. Oh, that is awesome.
Dr. Brad Miller 4:51
I would love to love to go there sometime and visit
Dr. Brad Miller 4:54
and I'm calling from beautiful suburban Indianapolis, Indiana
Dr. Brad Miller 4:57
and we are able to meet this connection to share
Dr. Brad Miller 5:00
some similar insights to things that matter the things
Dr. Brad Miller 5:04
that matter people's life, including when they
Dr. Brad Miller 5:06
have an adversity,such as a loss and their life.
Dr. Brad Miller 5:09
And we're here to talk today about some of the things
Dr. Brad Miller 5:11
that you have experienced personally
Dr. Brad Miller 5:13
and how you could be helpful to others.
Dr. Brad Miller 5:15
But let's hear a little bit about your story, Maria
Dr. Brad Miller 5:17
about how you experienced the loss in your life
Dr. Brad Miller 5:20
and how that changed everything.
Marie Alessi 5:23
Yeah, thank you so much for for giving me this opportunity.
Marie Alessi 5:26
I always love sharing the story,
Marie Alessi 5:28
because my story is one full of hope.
Marie Alessi 5:30
And that's exactly what I want to spread into the world here.
Marie Alessi 5:33
So I have various losses in my life, two very, very significant ones.
Marie Alessi 5:38
One was my dad when I was 20.
Marie Alessi 5:40
And the other one very, very unexpected
Marie Alessi 5:43
of my husband, we were both 45.
Marie Alessi 5:45
So that was, you know, literally
Marie Alessi 5:47
the prime of his life. Very unexpected.
Marie Alessi 5:49
There was no pre warning or anything like that he wasn't sick.
Marie Alessi 5:52
He was absolutely fit for fame. You know, it's like loving life.
Marie Alessi 5:56
And Rob went on a business trip and never came home.
Marie Alessi 5:59
And it was just an absolute, unexpected and shocking message.
Marie Alessi 6:03
As you can imagine, when one day,
Marie Alessi 6:06
you're supposed to wake me at 730 in the morning,
Marie Alessi 6:08
and I remember waking up at 7:31
Marie Alessi 6:11
looking at the clock thinking something happened.
Marie Alessi 6:14
I could feel it in my heart. I had this tiny little niggle
Marie Alessi 6:16
I didn't pay attention to it because I didn't want to.
Marie Alessi 6:18
I ignored it all day. But all morning
Marie Alessi 6:20
I've been trying to get in touch with him.
Marie Alessi 6:24
I've been trying to call him text him
Marie Alessi 6:25
and my brain kept coming up with one
Marie Alessi 6:27
more excuses what could have happened,
Marie Alessi 6:29
you know, maybe he left the phone in a hotel,
Marie Alessi 6:31
maybe he lost it in the cab, I had this flashback of a memory
Marie Alessi 6:35
when Robin I got married. On the way back to our hotel after the wedding.
Marie Alessi 6:40
He left his phone in the in the cab, he lost it on our wedding day.
Marie Alessi 6:44
So that came back to me and
Marie Alessi 6:46
I thought maybe maybe lost it in the car.
Marie Alessi 6:47
You know, the longer I didn't hear from him,
Marie Alessi 6:49
the more my anxiety was rising.
Marie Alessi 6:51
And then I eventually contacted
Marie Alessi 6:54
the hotel where he was staying.
Marie Alessi 6:55
And I explained that obviously it's why for
Marie Alessi 6:58
the police on feet on one of those freaks,
Marie Alessi 7:00
I had wife talking her husband,
Marie Alessi 7:01
but I know in my heart something must have
Marie Alessi 7:04
happened because he didn't get back to me.
Marie Alessi 7:06
And I asked the staff, could you please send somebody up to his room.
Marie Alessi 7:10
And while I was ringing them is something I couldn't
Marie Alessi 7:13
share with the hotel because I thought they
Marie Alessi 7:14
They must think I've lost my marbles.
Marie Alessi 7:17
Literally. I had this vision of rock collapsing in the shower.
Marie Alessi 7:21
It was a very brief, short vision. And as I was reading them,
Marie Alessi 7:25
I said no, please check in a shower.
Marie Alessi 7:28
And that's where they found him.
Marie Alessi 7:29
Oh, my God. Yeah. Wow, he was how devastating
Marie Alessi 7:33
and let me just let me just share from my perspective.
Dr. Brad Miller 7:37
I'm sorry, I'm so sorry for for your loss that you experienced
Dr. Brad Miller 7:42
to hand the devastation that you had you got that?
Dr. Brad Miller 7:47
Probably most terrible of phone calls that almost any person could have.
Dr. Brad Miller 7:51
And you initiated it.
Dr. Brad Miller 7:52
And you had some sense of some sense
Dr. Brad Miller 7:55
of something that happened here.
Dr. Brad Miller 7:57
And everything changed.
Dr. Brad Miller 7:59
So what what changed for you at that moment?
Dr. Brad Miller 8:03
What were the impact for you of this devastating loss?
Marie Alessi 8:06
What happened that very moment when
Marie Alessi 8:08
I then resist the phone call because it was another
Marie Alessi 8:11
three to four hours before I finally received the phone call with the protocol.
Marie Alessi 8:15
Police is actually not supposed to tell you over the phone.
Marie Alessi 8:18
They were constantly trying to get somebody to come
Marie Alessi 8:21
to a house but we don't have a main police station in this little town
Marie Alessi 8:23
where I live south of Sydney. So nobody was coming.
Marie Alessi 8:27
And I kept bringing and then the coroner's officer made
Marie Alessi 8:31
the executive decision and said I need to put her out of her
Marie Alessi 8:34
misery because she obviously knows something's going on.
Marie Alessi 8:36
I was so connected with Rob I just knew you know,
Marie Alessi 8:39
it was something that I felt.
Marie Alessi 8:41
So the moment I received that phone call,
Marie Alessi 8:43
I often describe like, and needle scratching over
Marie Alessi 8:46
the record player while playing your favorite song. Everything was silent.
Marie Alessi 8:51
And in this moment of silence, it was almost
Marie Alessi 8:54
like it was almost like all the power, all the courage.
Marie Alessi 8:59
Everything that I needed for this very moment was sucked right into me.
Marie Alessi 9:03
It's such a bizarre way to describe it.
Marie Alessi 9:05
But it was gathering all my courage or my power
Marie Alessi 9:09
to get up and the minute I got up, I switch into functioning mode.
Marie Alessi 9:14
I really felt like something within me switched into functioning mode
Marie Alessi 9:17
and I had literally three seconds to prepare myself
Marie Alessi 9:20
while I was walking down the stairs from our bedroom
Marie Alessi 9:22
were received a phone call watch to say to my boys,
Marie Alessi 9:26
our boys were only 10 and eight at the time
Marie Alessi 9:28
they were sitting on the couch waiting for me
Marie Alessi 9:30
to take them to our key or to their practice.
Marie Alessi 9:33
We're doing martial arts at the time.
Marie Alessi 9:34
They were in their uniform already.
Marie Alessi 9:36
You know and I just asked them
Marie Alessi 9:38
to put down their iPads, put them on the iPad
Marie Alessi 9:40
that's so lovely do as a mom when when you want them to be distracted
Marie Alessi 9:44
because I knew I had to make a few phone calls. Sure.
Marie Alessi 9:47
Just by the look of my face.
Marie Alessi 9:49
I just knew instantly that something big happened
Marie Alessi 9:52
and I took them in my arms
Marie Alessi 9:54
and I told them what happened and they fell apart and screamed
Marie Alessi 9:56
and we we cried together and I held them and
Marie Alessi:And there are two very significant sentences,
Marie Alessi:one from my 10 year old who, who said,
Marie Alessi:Who's going to look after us now mom and I said, I will.
Marie Alessi:I will look after you, Flynn, I literally sit there twice
Marie Alessi:I still remember that so vividly. And later on,
Marie Alessi:I realized how important that moment was for me
Marie Alessi:that I've said that out loud, if that makes sense,
Marie Alessi:I really needed I needed to say it out loud, they needed to hear it.
Marie Alessi:And the other one was my eight year old who looked at me
Marie Alessi:and said, he was sobbing, he's like, I'm only eight,
Marie Alessi:and I'm not going to have a daddy anymore.
Marie Alessi:And that really pierced my heart that really broke me in that very moment.
Marie Alessi:And it was a moment for me where something inside of me
Marie Alessi:I didn't realize it consciously back then.
Marie Alessi:But I feel that very clearly now
Marie Alessi:something inside of me in that very moment made a decision
Marie Alessi:that I will be creating the most beautiful and happy life
Marie Alessi:I possibly can for those two boys.
Marie Alessi:It was my mission, it was my promise
Marie Alessi:that Robin had made to each other before he passed,
Marie Alessi:not even knowing that that would happen one day
Marie Alessi:we had these thoughts was that if something
Marie Alessi:would ever happen to either of us, promise me,
Marie Alessi:you'll create the happiest life possible for the boys.
Marie Alessi:We always said that to each other and
Marie Alessi:and that was my mission right there right
Dr. Brad Miller:So you have released yet that was a really a pivotal moment for you,
Dr. Brad Miller:knowing your own grief, but in your sensibility towards
Dr. Brad Miller:your responsibility towards your two kids
Dr. Brad Miller:that shifted to dramatically in terms of,
Dr. Brad Miller:are you going to do this/
Marie Alessi:it doubled, doubled in that very moment
Marie Alessi:you know, you take everything.
Marie Alessi:That's what you do that decision you make out of love.
Dr. Brad Miller:Wow. And so you had this devastating moment
Dr. Brad Miller:of an adverse life event that happened in Iraq beyond adversity podcast,
Dr. Brad Miller:we talk about these types of things happen.
Dr. Brad Miller:When Nobody escapes these type of things.
Dr. Brad Miller:It happens to all of us whether it's yeah, you know,
Dr. Brad Miller:depression, or maybe a divorce, or maybe
Dr. Brad Miller:you lose a business or whatever it is, or a death in the family.
Dr. Brad Miller:It happens to all of us.
Dr. Brad Miller:And then we have to have a moment of grief
Dr. Brad Miller:and to kinda suck air and have that moment.
Dr. Brad Miller:And then people either get stuck Marie has many people do
Dr. Brad Miller:any kind of stay in US or UK or go into a spiral Lane kind of a situation
Dr. Brad Miller:of decline or some destructive behaviors or things like that,
Dr. Brad Miller:or they do something about it.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I'm just interested if you experience any kind of the
Dr. Brad Miller:kind of the situation of being, you know, numb
Dr. Brad Miller:or stuck anything along that line.
Dr. Brad Miller:And then what are some of the things that
Dr. Brad Miller:you did some of the actions you took to respond to the situation,
Marie Alessi:I think the only moment of numbness
Marie Alessi:I really truly had in all those years.
Marie Alessi:In a whole lot of years, it's been three and a half years now
Marie Alessi:was the moment I heard the news, literally the first few seconds,
Marie Alessi:that was my numbness and after that it was functioning mode.
Marie Alessi:And after that it was decision time.
Marie Alessi:You know, you have this moment where it's decision time.
Marie Alessi:And so many people are not aware of the choices they have.
Marie Alessi:Often people stay stuck and say numb
Marie Alessi:and say sometimes these mean depression or slide into depression.
Marie Alessi:And they don't realize that when
Marie Alessi:they don't make the decision to heal.
Marie Alessi:It's also a decision not making a decision, it already is a decision.
Marie Alessi:So for me the decision was to focus on healing.
Marie Alessi:And most people, if they make a decision
Marie Alessi:towards that at all, they usually decide to grieve,
Marie Alessi:and I never did. I'm not saying I never grieved,
Marie Alessi:I never made a decision to grieve.
Marie Alessi:I made a decision to heal.
Marie Alessi:And the grieving is what happens along the way.
Marie Alessi:But the context is directed at something different if that makes sense.
Marie Alessi:I didn't direct my conscious towards grieving
Marie Alessi:I direct with my conscious towards creating
Marie Alessi:happiness and beautiful memories for the boys.
Marie Alessi:So what I did, basically in a nutshell
Marie Alessi:about that there was another pivotal moment
Marie Alessi:and I'm going to quickly share that because
Marie Alessi:that's really important to the question you just asked me
Marie Alessi:what what were my actions, about three weeks into it.
Marie Alessi:After the funeral of about a week after the funeral.
Marie Alessi:I had a nervous breakdown in the kitchen.
Marie Alessi:I started yelling at the boys. I just need peace and quiet
Marie Alessi:because they were Pickering or was brushing their teeth
Marie Alessi:and he went louder and louder and louder.
Marie Alessi:And I went louder and louder thing
Marie Alessi:I just need peace and quiet or just the peace and quiet please.
Marie Alessi:And all of a sudden I went into this spiral
Marie Alessi:and I could not stop myself anymore.
Marie Alessi:I was saying it louder and louder until
Marie Alessi:I was yelling it until I was screaming it until
Marie Alessi:I was literally breaking down on the kitchen floor,
Marie Alessi:whacking my kitchen cupboard screaming pitch tone on a top of my lungs.
Marie Alessi:And then everything was peace and quiet.
Marie Alessi:Not the way how I wanted it but I needed peace and quiet.
Marie Alessi:And I still remember this moment as it was like a pressure cooker moment,
Marie Alessi:you know, so much has happened over the three weeks of hearing
Marie Alessi:the news about my husband passing,
Marie Alessi:flying to the other side of Australia to identify his body,
Marie Alessi:you know, driving around informing his parents, obviously,
Marie Alessi:before we flew over to identify his body and
Marie Alessi:like all the things that had happened,
Marie Alessi:and then the funeral and my mom came over from Austrilia,
Marie Alessi:because her flight was already booked,
Marie Alessi:she was already due for a visit,
Marie Alessi:to come from my middle one First Holy Communion.
Marie Alessi:So everything happened in about three weeks, and I just collapsed.
Marie Alessi:And in this moment, I had, I had no vowels.
Marie Alessi:That was my mouth, I just first you know,
Marie Alessi:there was just everything just came out.
Marie Alessi:And in a very moment, I knew I had to get help for this,
Marie Alessi:I did not want to do this alone.
Marie Alessi:I've found a really amazing positive psychologist,
Marie Alessi:I worked with her for about four months.
Marie Alessi:And in those four months, I sat in her office one day.
Marie Alessi:And that was one very important actions
Marie Alessi:that to get held on to allow that in.
Marie Alessi:That's a huge that is really huge.
Marie Alessi:A lot of people don't know, a how to get help
Marie Alessi:and be how to allow it in that's even bigger.
Marie Alessi:And as I was sitting in the office with her,
Marie Alessi:I said to her, how overwhelming or founded all these expectations of society,
Marie Alessi:how I'm supposed to grieve under quotation marks,
Marie Alessi:you know, how they expect you to grieve how they almost expect
Marie Alessi:a few to fall apart and being able to have sadness and be numb
Marie Alessi:or whatever the standards are, I did not fit that label of a widow.
Marie Alessi:I didn't feel like a widow, although my husband had just died.
Marie Alessi:I just could not conform to that label.
Marie Alessi:And she looked at me and she said, so what does grief mean to you Marie's?
Marie Alessi:And to my own surprise, the first word that came up was empowerment.
Marie Alessi:And I was like, Wow, I did not expect that.
Marie Alessi:That is the answer that came from within.
Marie Alessi:And I looked at her and I said,
Marie Alessi:I think I need to write a book about this.
Marie Alessi:And so I did about a month after
Marie Alessi:I not only wrote but published my book
Marie Alessi:that had the title loving love after law.
Marie Alessi:It not only became a number one bestseller
Marie Alessi:it also ranked in the top 100 of Australia.
Marie Alessi:And then I took the boys traveling around the world.
Marie Alessi:Another really important action step.
Marie Alessi:So action number one was like hotel action
Marie Alessi:number two was I wrote our story down.
Marie Alessi:And action number three was I took the boys
Marie Alessi:traveling around the world for two months.
Marie Alessi:While I wanted to get away and needed a break.
Marie Alessi:I wanted to go somewhere where we could
Marie Alessi:create new and happy memories as the three of us
Marie Alessi:and we traveled really well together
Marie Alessi:it was such a well needed break from us away from
Marie Alessi:all the milestones that were coming you know,
Marie Alessi:the first Christmas the first New Year's, the first birthdays without their dad
Marie Alessi:and I knew I had to do something that was happy.
Marie Alessi:You know, I took them to the Maldives
Marie Alessi:and Canary Islands and Universal Studios and
Marie Alessi:I took them to Paris my son wanted to eat Eskimo boy.
Dr. Brad Miller:well yeah, it was the I love the word.
Dr. Brad Miller:I love the word empowerment that you use,
Dr. Brad Miller:that was what came to you out of a time of when you had your breakdown,
Dr. Brad Miller:you were having that moment of just excruciating pain that comes out
Dr. Brad Miller:and I'm sure it was a little scary for your boys to
Dr. Brad Miller:to see you going through through
Dr. Brad Miller:through that and you know,
Dr. Brad Miller:that's something else then you have to deal
Dr. Brad Miller:with that the you know the ramifications of that.
Dr. Brad Miller:But that that sounds like that also got your attention
Dr. Brad Miller:did that you know your your your breakdown,
Dr. Brad Miller:got your attention, and you knew that you
Dr. Brad Miller:had to do something about it.
Dr. Brad Miller:So you did your
Marie Alessi:a very beautiful monitor, talk to the boys about that.
Marie Alessi:What I felt and test area was for me as well not just for them,
Marie Alessi:and that I needed help to, I think, very pivotal moment for them to see it.
Marie Alessi:I wish I could have begged them to witness that.
Marie Alessi:But at the same time, it was really a great opportunity
Marie Alessi:to give us a moment to talk about that
Marie Alessi:and to talk about emotions and what can happen
Marie Alessi:with emotions when they go completely out of control after an adversity like that.
Dr. Brad Miller:They saw your real pain and they have their real pain
Dr. Brad Miller:to it comes out in whatever ways it may come out.
Dr. Brad Miller:But if you don't deal with your
Dr. Brad Miller:if you don't deal with your pain,
Dr. Brad Miller:it's going to come out very likely in some unhealthy manners.
Dr. Brad Miller:Or people can stay merged or tried to be in denial
Dr. Brad Miller:or to just live only in their grief.
Dr. Brad Miller:And you have to grieve appropriately
Dr. Brad Miller:and put that in its proper perspective
Dr. Brad Miller:and get on with your life which is what you
Dr. Brad Miller:and your life became this empowerment process
Dr. Brad Miller:of then making sure you give a good life to to your kids.
Dr. Brad Miller:And so that is awesome. I love
Dr. Brad Miller:I love to hear the action points that people take when they decide,
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, after their breakdown where they have decided
Dr. Brad Miller:, okay, this is what I got to do.
Dr. Brad Miller:I'm going to go traveling Get some therapy kind
Dr. Brad Miller:of do what I need need to do.
Dr. Brad Miller:Let's talk for a minute because that's kind
Dr. Brad Miller:of the the in a way the exterior things that you
Dr. Brad Miller:did you know, you took the action, the physical action,
Dr. Brad Miller:if you will, to go see the therapist to go traveling
Dr. Brad Miller:to universal and Paris the other things that that you you did.
Dr. Brad Miller:And that is awesome. I really am a believer,
Dr. Brad Miller:you got to move you got to move in order to you know,
Dr. Brad Miller:you're going to navigate through adversity,
Dr. Brad Miller:you gotta move, you got to take action to move.
Dr. Brad Miller:Yeah, but you got that that's kind of the outer life
Dr. Brad Miller:but I believe also see what you think on this Marie,
Dr. Brad Miller:you also have to do some work on your inner life,
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, you have to do work on your,
Dr. Brad Miller:on your mind and your spirit and your,
Dr. Brad Miller:the healthy aspects of your body.
Dr. Brad Miller:Yeah, let's talk a little bit about your inner life journey
Dr. Brad Miller:during this process of healing. I'm talking about meditation,
Dr. Brad Miller:or spirituality, or religion, or anything
Dr. Brad Miller:that you did that helped you to connect up to your inner life.
Dr. Brad Miller:So tell us a little bit about what are the things
Dr. Brad Miller:you did to connect with your something
Dr. Brad Miller:greater than yourself to help you heal?
Marie Alessi:Yeah. I love that. Thank you so much for asking me that.
Marie Alessi:For me. Spirituality is really huge. In the full story,
Marie Alessi:I, I took me a couple of months to consciously understand what
Marie Alessi:I actually already felt within to make sense of that,
Marie Alessi:to put it into words for me, and then also to become
Marie Alessi:brave enough to actually share it with the outside world as well.
Marie Alessi:Something that I had known and felt quite early into the journey.
Marie Alessi:And I came to the conclusion, this was robbing my soul contract,
Marie Alessi:we had a soul contract. And that was the end of it.
Marie Alessi:And I've found so much peace in this and so much love in this, like,
Marie Alessi:Rob already loved me beyond measure in this physical realm.
Marie Alessi:You know, he was incredible, like we were so in tune, we were so connected.
Marie Alessi:And that connected that I felt when it happened,
Marie Alessi:I actually feel that I could tell them the time off this,
Marie Alessi:which they called as a question like in there because he was on his own.
Marie Alessi:And I said, I think I can tell you when that
Marie Alessi:happens if I actually woke up at that particular time.
Marie Alessi:But apart from that, I I really felt in realizing that this was our soul contract,
Marie Alessi:I realized how much more love There even was, from his end.
Marie Alessi:To do this for me to you know, to enter a soul contract
Marie Alessi:where he would accept that early without
Marie Alessi:seeing his boys grow up without physically being there to see them grow up.
Marie Alessi:And I realized all very quickly that this is way bigger
Marie Alessi:than the three or the four of us, you know,
Marie Alessi:this is so much bigger, what I have done with it now
Marie Alessi:what I have transferred that into, it's just so much bigger than us.
Marie Alessi:And I feel a huge amount of gratitude.
Marie Alessi:And I feel extremely humbled to be able to do what I do now.
Marie Alessi:And also seeing that my boys are so proud of me
Marie Alessi:and are my biggest supporter and love what I do.
Marie Alessi:It's just really humbling, absolutely beautiful.
Dr. Brad Miller:my I love what you're saying there about a soul contract.
Dr. Brad Miller:And this reminds me of, of the word covenant as well,
Dr. Brad Miller:which is this relationship between God or spiritual world and ourselves
Dr. Brad Miller:which helps us to navigate and to deal with the things in our life
Dr. Brad Miller:and you had this soul contract as you say,
Dr. Brad Miller:which means beyond self with with your husband,
Dr. Brad Miller:Rob and then that's helped to to transform yourself
Dr. Brad Miller:into speaking the lives of your your two boys particularly,
Dr. Brad Miller:but it's made a big difference for you as this soul connection.
Marie Alessi:Absolutely.
Dr. Brad Miller:Let's talk for Yeah, this that is so so awesome.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I'm so glad to hear that I'm just a huge believer,
Dr. Brad Miller:Marie that besides you know taking action which
Dr. Brad Miller:we've got to do to keep moving we do have to connect
Dr. Brad Miller:with the inner life and we have to you know, work
Dr. Brad Miller:on that we have to be intentional about our intention
Marie Alessi:it's also the opening up to it because one thing
Marie Alessi:that I always say when people say what changed for you after Rob
Marie Alessi:pass I felt that my intuition went through
Marie Alessi:the roof I felt so guided so looked after all the time
Marie Alessi:and I already had quite a strong intuition beforehand
Marie Alessi:yet was nothing compared to what I feel now.
Marie Alessi:It's like this inner knowing all the time what I need to do
Marie Alessi:where I need to be where I need to go who
Marie Alessi:I need to do this with you know people have come
Marie Alessi:on this journey with me that support the mission
Marie Alessi:of loving love after love that support me with my children even you know,
Marie Alessi:it's just incredible. The people that have been sent to
Marie Alessi:me along the way ever since Rob path I always feel looked after always.
Marie Alessi:It's incredible. It's really cool. I feel there's so many hidden gifts in adversity.
Marie Alessi:And sure, when we open our eyes
Dr. Brad Miller:for that part of spiritual discernment is this connection with others.
Dr. Brad Miller:And you said that the people have come into
Dr. Brad Miller:your life to be helpful to you, and you've been put
Dr. Brad Miller:into the lives of other people to be helpful.
Dr. Brad Miller:And that's the emotional piece of this,
Dr. Brad Miller:I believe this is, you know, where we start to connect not only kind of a head,
Dr. Brad Miller:but also heart with others.
Dr. Brad Miller:That's part of the healing process here.
Dr. Brad Miller:So I'm interested now, Marie, in connections with other people
Dr. Brad Miller:that have been helpful to you or that
Dr. Brad Miller:you see is part of what you teach to others.
Dr. Brad Miller:What part do loving, caring, emotional connections with others come to play?
Dr. Brad Miller:This might be with your kids or other family members,
Dr. Brad Miller:or with friends or with family, or perhaps with counselors, or even mentorships?
Dr. Brad Miller:Or even you know, maybe other people's book from the past back in your life?
Dr. Brad Miller:Let's talk about the emotional power of relationships for healing.
Marie Alessi:The emotional work sorry, of relationships,
Marie Alessi:you were breaking up with me?
Dr. Brad Miller:Yeah, we're just talking about the friendships or relationships,
Dr. Brad Miller:we have the importance of them in your healing
Marie Alessi:So people always, I shouldn't say always,
Marie Alessi:I heard people often say, when you experience adversity like that,
Marie Alessi:it often shows you who your true friends are.
Marie Alessi:And I want to bring that message back with a disclaimer,
Marie Alessi:because I don't think that those friends who do leave your life after that,
Marie Alessi:or who do distance themselves a little bit more than they used to before.
Marie Alessi:It doesn't mean that they're not your true friends anymore.
Marie Alessi:It just means your life has changed so dramatically,
Marie Alessi:that it doesn't necessarily have to align with their life anymore.
Marie Alessi:You know, you are on such a new path.
Marie Alessi:And to then stand there in blame of Oh, you're not my true friend,
Marie Alessi:doesn't seem to be fair to me, I can understand
Marie Alessi:how you can feel like that sometime, when you
Marie Alessi:are embarking on this new path that you feel in that moment
Marie Alessi:, I haven't chosen that. I actually believe on a soul level,
Marie Alessi:we have chosen that path.
Marie Alessi:But that's a different story that I've just shared before anyway.
Marie Alessi:But when you think about it as just from a neutral perspective,
Marie Alessi:whether you feel you've chosen it or not,
Marie Alessi:from a neutral perspective, you are on a new path,
Marie Alessi:they are still on the same path. It doesn't seem to be fair to say,
Marie Alessi:Hey, why are you not here with me now?
Marie Alessi:Why are you not? Why are you not getting me,
Marie Alessi:because they're still on a different path.
Marie Alessi:They're still on their path, they're still on their journey,
Marie Alessi:we all are on our journey. And some of our
Marie Alessi:really, really close friends, they get it.
Marie Alessi:And they can follow that path without having to change their path.
Marie Alessi:And then there will be new people coming into that path
Marie Alessi:because they are on that new path that you're on, if that makes sense.
Marie Alessi:So I want people to who listen to the throat now to keep an open mind,
Marie Alessi:and in particular, an open heart about touching
Marie Alessi:others for not being in their lives anymore.
Marie Alessi:There is no judgment necessary.
Marie Alessi:There is just love and compassion. There's just empathy.
Marie Alessi:And I have learned that, that not every friendship
Marie Alessi:is meant to last I have learned this in my
Marie Alessi:early 30s was a really, really important lesson.
Marie Alessi:And then I was really happy that I had already
Marie Alessi:learned that lesson when Rob passed, because
Marie Alessi:there was no judgment from my end,
Marie Alessi:there was no oh, now I don't hear from you anymore,
Marie Alessi:or why you're not with me anymore.
Marie Alessi:Or while you're not my friend anymore.
Marie Alessi:There was just sending them a love and compassion.
Marie Alessi:I do all the understanding work, because I did.
Marie Alessi:And, you know, I think it's just the most important part is
Marie Alessi:to keep your heart open and to keep your mind
Marie Alessi:open that on this new path, you will need new people.
Marie Alessi:And it's also beautiful that sometimes friends
Marie Alessi:come in from way prior from your life that you hadn't
Marie Alessi:seen for a really long time in my case is a really
Marie Alessi:beautiful friend of mine that I have met 24 years ago,
Marie Alessi:when I first came to Sydney.
Marie Alessi:And he has reappeared in my life.
Marie Alessi:He hadn't met Rob, he knew him. But we were not very close. In that time.
Marie Alessi:When Rob was in my life. He was married, I was married,
Marie Alessi:we hardly saw each other we had very different lives.
Marie Alessi:And all of a sudden our lives are quite parallel.
Marie Alessi:We were both single parents and we were both in a very different set of our lives.
Marie Alessi:Interestingly enough, we both found ourselves in the state of grief.
Marie Alessi:He's got a motorcycle, funeral business,
Marie Alessi:I work in loving life after loss.
Marie Alessi:So we found a lot more parallels.
Marie Alessi:And he has sort of become like my next of kin
Marie Alessi:a really really close friend of mine you know
Marie Alessi:where it is just beautiful to have that love and support
Marie Alessi:and it's interesting relationship but it's a really beautiful friendship.
Marie Alessi:That is so important for me because
Marie Alessi:there's somebody else that you can talk about things
Marie Alessi:like parenting etc when you're on your own
Dr. Brad Miller:Well, that's interesting how you framed the changes
Dr. Brad Miller:in the ad that go in your various
Dr. Brad Miller:friendships and relationships that to me it
Dr. Brad Miller:kind of see like the nuance difference between sympathy and empathy.
Dr. Brad Miller:Sympathy has to do with your,
Dr. Brad Miller:how we feel sorry for someone, and we can, you know,
Dr. Brad Miller:be brokenhearted, for them.
Dr. Brad Miller:But empathy is being broken hearted with someone
Dr. Brad Miller:where you go through things together, and those roles can shift sometimes.
Dr. Brad Miller:And if you can still understand that those things shift, and you know,
Dr. Brad Miller:not be judgmental, but to try to know that,
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, really, if you want to heal,
Dr. Brad Miller:and especially in terms of emotional healing,
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, things like bitterness, and
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, regret and anger and hostility
Dr. Brad Miller:and all that kind of stuff is not helpful
Dr. Brad Miller:if you can have forgiveness and a sense of gratitude
Dr. Brad Miller:for what they can give you at the time, that's helpful.
Dr. Brad Miller:And then if you can then start to share that with others.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I love how you share that nuance there and how,
Dr. Brad Miller:you know, some doors kind of close or shift and other doors open.
Dr. Brad Miller:And that can be the case. And it sounds like you have done
Dr. Brad Miller:some things here to find that pathway for yourself.
Dr. Brad Miller:So it took some dramatic major action that you talked about there.
Dr. Brad Miller:And then you also had some remote, you know, the spiritual connection.
Dr. Brad Miller:And now we're talking about the emotional connection with other people.
Dr. Brad Miller:Let's talk a little bit now what I like to call the cognitive piece
Dr. Brad Miller:, which is kind of the the mind what I mean by that
Dr. Brad Miller:is what are some of the new habits or practices or patterns
Dr. Brad Miller:of life that you do now, or the new mission that
Dr. Brad Miller:you have has impacted you tell us how you live your life.
Dr. Brad Miller:Now, that gives you a continuous
Dr. Brad Miller:process of healing and oldest.
Marie Alessi:I would love to see one very pivotal moment for that.
Marie Alessi:So obviously, well not obviously
Marie Alessi:to people who don't know me,
Marie Alessi:but I had worked as a mindset coach prior to Rob's passing.
Marie Alessi:So I had all the tools available to me,
Marie Alessi:which I felt really, really grateful for because when my dad passed,
Marie Alessi:and I was 20, I had no idea how to handle it.
Marie Alessi:No idea because I wasn't trained in it.
Marie Alessi:I wasn't allowed to coach I had no idea I had no tools available.
Marie Alessi:I was falling apart back then I did the classic trade off falling apart after
Marie Alessi:losing him for about a year and
Marie Alessi:was Rob a I don't call losing it, losing him anymore.
Marie Alessi:I'll call it when he passed, you know, when our soul
Marie Alessi:contract finished, whatever you want to call it, but I don't call it a loss anymore.
Marie Alessi:But I had this pivotal moment after coming
Marie Alessi:home from traveling around the world with the boys
Marie Alessi:, they went back to school.
Marie Alessi:So we're talking about eight months into it,
Marie Alessi:you know, eight months of having every single thing planned from,
Marie Alessi:you know, driving to the parents, identifying his body,
Marie Alessi:the funeral, the writing the book, the traveling,
Marie Alessi:there was action steps, everything was planned.
Marie Alessi:I always knew what was the next step, what would happen next.
Marie Alessi:And then I came home and I need an extra work for
Marie Alessi:people going back to school. And I had nothing planned.
Marie Alessi:That was next for me. And that was the first moment
Marie Alessi:where I felt like, wow, what do I do now?
Marie Alessi:What do I do now I had an appointment with a mentor
Marie Alessi:and new mentor 10 days after I came back.
Marie Alessi:But in those 10 days, I had no plan.
Marie Alessi:And it hit me. It hit me unexpectedly.
Marie Alessi:And I remember I was sitting on the floor in our living room.
Marie Alessi:And I felt this. I still describe it as my the
Marie Alessi:hole in the heel experience that I had,
Marie Alessi:it was almost like a hole had opened up to me
Marie Alessi:that I say would resemble depression. But it was really dark.
Marie Alessi:And I didn't want to go there.
Marie Alessi:And to my left was that little hill of happy memories
Marie Alessi:that I had created just since Rob path.
Marie Alessi:And I felt I had nothing left to climb up there.
Marie Alessi:To have a better view. I really felt
Marie Alessi:I was drained, I was exhausted.
Marie Alessi:I felt how easy it could have been for me to slip into that hole.
Marie Alessi:But I felt it scary. So I didn't even want to look there.
Marie Alessi:So I found myself in the middle.
Marie Alessi:And what I didn't realize at the time and again,
Marie Alessi:I found works for that a couple of days later,
Marie Alessi:I sat there and observed.
Marie Alessi:And I still offer that as a tool to people
Marie Alessi:who feel they've got nothing left
Marie Alessi:and no power left or no strength left.
Marie Alessi:I said just sit and observe.
Marie Alessi:Don't move in any direction.
Marie Alessi:Just sit and observe and listen to your thoughts.
Marie Alessi:And that's what I did. And I ordered his thoughts.
Marie Alessi:I literally tried to make sense of these thoughts
Marie Alessi:and to find a positive Condor to each negative thought that I had,
Marie Alessi:if that makes sense. So I wasn't consciously aware of that.
Marie Alessi:I was doing that at the time.
Marie Alessi:But I you know, went back later on thinking how did I get out of that?
Marie Alessi:What did I do and I trace the steps that I did?
Marie Alessi:So I went into observation Sheldon, I often offer
Marie Alessi:that as a really great tool when you feel you've
Marie Alessi:got nothing else left, observe your thoughts.
Marie Alessi:And then I became my my inner best friend,
Marie Alessi:or really look after myself, you know, because you,
Marie Alessi:you often talk to yourself a lot more harmful than
Marie Alessi:you would ever talk to your friends to your closest friends.
Marie Alessi:So I made sure that I would treat myself like my inner guidance, sure,
Marie Alessi:I would look after myself, I would watch my thoughts
Marie Alessi:that I would watch my language, and teach the boys to do the same,
Marie Alessi:I wanted to be a shining example for them.
Marie Alessi:The mindset in all of that is huge.
Marie Alessi:It's, I'd say at least, sounds great, and important, but also
Dr. Brad Miller:hugely important for you to observe
Dr. Brad Miller:and to march into your life positive or helpful self talk,
Dr. Brad Miller:the mindset shift, which you may or may not have had prior,
Dr. Brad Miller:but you had to really be very aware and cognizant of this now.
Dr. Brad Miller:And you're helping to impart that into your sons.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I also know you're trying to impart this and the teachers to others,
Dr. Brad Miller:through your book, and through your courses, and so on.
Dr. Brad Miller:So, that's a little bit about what you're doing now
Dr. Brad Miller:and how you're trying to teach this process to other folks.
Dr. Brad Miller:Tell us a little bit about your book.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I know you have an online course and some other things that you offer,
Dr. Brad Miller:what are people going to find when they go to your website?
Dr. Brad Miller:Or what they can find out more about you that can be helpful to them to process?
Dr. Brad Miller:The grief of losing someone?
Marie Alessi:Oh, sorry.
Dr. Brad Miller:Go ahead, please. Yeah. So
Marie Alessi:basically, on the website, they literally find all the pathways to me,
Marie Alessi:whatever they want to find, so they can get my book on there,
Marie Alessi:they can find how to join the group loving life after loss,
Marie Alessi:they can find a way to book a chat with me,
Marie Alessi:they find my whole history, my whole story, you know, and also podcasts,
Marie Alessi:video tools, interviews, everything is on my website.
Marie Alessi:So they literally find everything they want to know
Marie Alessi:or want to learn about me or loving life after loss.
Marie Alessi:And in the group itself.
Marie Alessi:This is really a for me, it's a very sacred space,
Marie Alessi:I've created a safe space where people can really join into share
Marie Alessi:their deepest interest. And they will find so much
Marie Alessi:love and support in this room.
Marie Alessi:And I want to highlight this as a huge difference
Marie Alessi:because most grief or grief support groups that I looked for,
Marie Alessi:they were full of messages, like, they'll always be a hole in my heart,
Marie Alessi:it'll never get better. I will always be crying for him.
Marie Alessi:And I'm like, how on earth is this supporting?
Marie Alessi:That's not a support group. That's,
Marie Alessi:that's a part where everybody wins doesn't stay stuck and suffering.
Marie Alessi:And now say that was all to expect, but it's not helping me.
Marie Alessi:I was drained after two minutes in groups like that
Marie Alessi:I had to leave most of these groups because there is no help.
Marie Alessi:No hope, no support, no happiness, no, hey, come on, we can do this.
Marie Alessi:Nothing is self whose loss is fresher, more horrible.
Marie Alessi:Younger, the kids younger, you know, it was almost like a competition
Marie Alessi:of who's suffering more. And also, this is not helpful.
Marie Alessi:I wanted to create a space of loving life after loss,
Marie Alessi:hence the title of the book, hence the title of the group.
Marie Alessi:Because to me, that's much of the call to action or a way of life.
Marie Alessi:It's also a very good filter for those who come in.
Marie Alessi:Because when you see a book title or group title, loving life after loss,
Marie Alessi:you don't expect to go in there and say, second suffering
Marie Alessi:or do you you know, that, to me was important. within the group.
Marie Alessi:There's a free healing journey because I'm fully aware that everybody's
Marie Alessi:in very different financial circumstances,
Marie Alessi:not everybody can afford to come to programs or retreats.
Marie Alessi:So there's also a free healing journey available
Marie Alessi:that really helps you with those first few steps
Marie Alessi:and tools that you need to really get yourself out
Marie Alessi:of the stuckness to get this healing journey going to open
Marie Alessi:your heart to the possibility of healing.
Marie Alessi:Record this journey together where people
Marie Alessi:can just watch the video step by step it's called from grief to release
Marie Alessi:very suitable and they can do that for free when they're in the group.
Marie Alessi:So knows also Yeah, sorry.
Dr. Brad Miller:I'm sorry. One more thing you have going on.
Dr. Brad Miller:Yeah. So in the grid, go ahead, please.
Marie Alessi:Yeah, there's the online program that I run
Marie Alessi:so it's really quite International.
Marie Alessi:It doesn't quite cover the European timezone we're still working on that because
Marie Alessi:it's just very tricky for me to do that within school hours.
Marie Alessi:That's where the UK and Austria and and all these European countries go to bed
Marie Alessi:and really tricky, but I have some my most
Marie Alessi:of my clientele comes from the US, Canada and Australia.
Marie Alessi:And I run a program called blank canvas
Marie Alessi:and a blank canvas is eight weeks of healing into creation.
Marie Alessi:It is really about seeing what other things still holding you back.
Marie Alessi:What are the things that you are still are struggling
Marie Alessi:with it is for people who have done a certain amount
Marie Alessi:of healing and just don't know how to really
Marie Alessi:get out of it or how to really move forward into creation.
Marie Alessi:And when I'm saying creation,
Marie Alessi:I'm talking about creating the life that you want.
Marie Alessi:I do some amazing virtual portal exercises with them.
Marie Alessi:Imagine going through the portal of creating
Marie Alessi:what you actually want in life, you know, people,
Marie Alessi:I took this based on this amazing book by Anita Mariani dying to be me,
Marie Alessi:where she describes exercise, not exercise,
Marie Alessi:but her near death experience where she felt she was
Marie Alessi:standing as something that you described as a portal.
Marie Alessi:And that gave me the idea to actually do l
Marie Alessi:ike a virtual portal exercises that you don't need
Marie Alessi:to have a near death experience, to
Marie Alessi:actually imagine how life can be like for you,
Marie Alessi:you can do that at any given time and
Marie Alessi:guide people through this exercise. And, yeah, it's just
Dr. Brad Miller:a number of Wait, all this is on your website, and Maria Ellisee
Marie Alessi:all on my website, people can read all the details on the program on there.
Marie Alessi:And last but not least, also on the retreat,
Marie Alessi:so that at the moment retreat is only available in Australia,
Marie Alessi:which COVID It was pretty much impossible to drive anyway, thought of Australia.
Dr. Brad Miller:Just got off, got a whole lot of resources there.
Dr. Brad Miller:And we'll put a link to your website on our website, Dr.Bradmiller.com.
Dr. Brad Miller:And so people can find out more about you.
Dr. Brad Miller:They're just one more thing, Marie, tell us a story about at least one person
Dr. Brad Miller:who's gone through some of your teaching or training,
Dr. Brad Miller:and has had a transformation. Let's hear an
Dr. Brad Miller:example of someone who's had a transformation.
Marie Alessi:I can't think of so many, but one one that
Marie Alessi:I want to take because she's so close to my heart.
Marie Alessi:And she has also not allowed me to share her story.
Marie Alessi:She was not ready to share that. Chelsea had a few months back,
Marie Alessi:but now she's like, use my testimonies. My name, I'm more than happy.
Marie Alessi:Her name is Terry. And she came to me shortly after she lost her son, Ryan.
Marie Alessi:And she went from really a space of absolute darkness.
Marie Alessi:And she said I was numb. I had no voice.
Marie Alessi:I didn't know how to express myself
Marie Alessi:how to make sense of what he had done
Marie Alessi:and what had happened and how he had left.
Marie Alessi:And she was literally just in numbness completely stuck and no words.
Marie Alessi:And I remember I reached out to her one day
Marie Alessi:and we were in a fine for like one and a half hours. And she cried
Marie Alessi:and she had nothing.
Marie Alessi:She She even said in hindsight, Marie,
Marie Alessi:I did not think that you could ever help me.
Marie Alessi:And now she is one of my biggest supporters.
Marie Alessi:She is in my Modsquad she was actually the
Marie Alessi:one who named our team of moderators, Modsquad. I love it.
Marie Alessi:And, you know, I've got a team that supports me,
Marie Alessi:they're in the group, and she's one of them.
Marie Alessi:And she just, she's such a signing example of 180 degrees.
Marie Alessi:Transformation in her life, she has found her voice she's got an extremely
Marie Alessi:beautiful way of expressing herself of sharing stories in our group.
Marie Alessi:She shared one this morning that really touched
Marie Alessi:my heart and where she really she's such an advocate for
Marie Alessi:loving life after loss like literally for the philosophy of life after loss and
Dr. Brad Miller:Awesome. Terrible. Absolutely incredible. awesome to hear.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I know there's some other stories on your website as well.
Dr. Brad Miller:And it just shows that there's a need out here for people
Dr. Brad Miller:to process their grief in a safe place.
Dr. Brad Miller:And that is certainly what you offer a number of resources.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I'm sure it's an incredible story here today, Marie,
Dr. Brad Miller:on the beyond adversity podcast and we thank you for being with us.
Dr. Brad Miller:I would certainly commend your work your book,
Dr. Brad Miller:and your website to those who are experiencing
Dr. Brad Miller:a loss in their life and, and to reach out to her or to somebody
Dr. Brad Miller:reached out to somebody to be to
Dr. Brad Miller:find to take your first step towards healing.
Dr. Brad Miller:She is all about helping people to not be alone in this process,
Dr. Brad Miller:to find a safe place to process grief,
Dr. Brad Miller:and to find loving life after a loss, a place of hope
Dr. Brad Miller:and healing and happiness.
Dr. Brad Miller:Her name is Marie Ellisee and we thank her for being our guest today.
Dr. Brad Miller:Here on the beyond adversity podcast with Dr. Brad Miller.
Dr. Brad Miller:Profound conversation there with Marie Elessi,
Dr. Brad Miller:the author of loving life after a loss
Dr. Brad Miller:she blogs at Marieelessi.com nar ealessi.com.
Dr. Brad Miller:Lots of resources there for you.
Dr. Brad Miller:So we talked a little bit to today
Dr. Brad Miller:and our conversation about what we can learn about
Dr. Brad Miller:having a safe place to grieve
Dr. Brad Miller:and a process and you don't need to do that process alone.
Dr. Brad Miller:And we've certainly heard about how painful
Dr. Brad Miller:the grief process is and about how we can fee
Dr. Brad Miller:l that he heard the emotion and Marie's story
Dr. Brad Miller:, but let's talk about Right now for what you can do about it.
Dr. Brad Miller:Marie has a seven day online course.
Dr. Brad Miller:And she also offers other other offerings like us three day retreat.
Dr. Brad Miller:But it's all about discovering your hidden gift of adversity.
Dr. Brad Miller:And her mission is to uncover them.
Dr. Brad Miller:So you can utilize your gifts of adversity,
Dr. Brad Miller:to heal yourself and to share that with others and to move yourself from grief to relief.
Dr. Brad Miller:Her book, loving life after loss is a great place to start.
Dr. Brad Miller:But she's got other resources, an online course, and retreats
Dr. Brad Miller:and other things that you can do.
Dr. Brad Miller:And I encourage you to do just that, to help you deal with the adversity of grief.
Dr. Brad Miller:Here beyond adversity, we help you deal with all kinds of adversity.
Dr. Brad Miller:It can be grief, of course of death, or it might be any
Dr. Brad Miller:of the other five DS we talk about their depression,
Dr. Brad Miller:divorce, disease, and debt, and death.
Dr. Brad Miller:And we have over 170 episodes of our podcast over at Dr. Brad miller.com,
Dr. Brad Miller:where you can check those out where people can speak into your life.
Dr. Brad Miller:That's what I do.
Dr. Brad Miller:That's what my mission is to help people to overcome
Dr. Brad Miller:adversity and to find their way through the way to grow
Dr. Brad Miller:through what they go through the free gift for you Dr. Brad Miller,
Dr. Brad Miller:check that out. And say stay tuned to us every week as
Dr. Brad Miller:we bring you other great teaching, leadership and conversation with leaders
Dr. Brad Miller:who can speak into your life and help you to
Dr. Brad Miller:achieve your life by peace, prosperity, and purpose,
Dr. Brad Miller:but a joy to be with you.
Dr. Brad Miller:So until next time, friends, this is Dr. Brad Miller,
Dr. Brad Miller:encouraging you to always do all the good that you can.
Dr. Brad Miller:Thank you for listening to the Beyond adversity podcast with Dr. Brad Miller.
Dr. Brad Miller:You can find a complete archive of all episodes at Dr. Brad miller.com.
Dr. Brad Miller:That's Dr. Brad miller.com or subscribe for free through
Dr. Brad Miller:Apple podcasts and never miss an episode.
Dr. Brad Miller:Each week we bring you a message to crush
Dr. Brad Miller:adversity and live your life of peace, prosperity and purpose.