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I think you have to deal with grief in the sense that you have to recognize that you have it, and say that it's OK to have all the sadness.

People talk about grief as if it's kind of an unremittingly awful thing, and it is. It is painful, but it's a very, very interesting sort of thing to go through, and it really helps you out. At the end of the day, it gets you through because you have to reform your relationship, and you have to figure out a way of getting to the future.

One of the things that happens to everyone who is grief-stricken, who has lost someone, is there comes a time when everyone else just wants you to get over it, but of course you don't get over it. You get stronger; you try and live on; you endure; you change; but you don't get over it. You carry it with you.

The thing about grief is that it's a roller coaster - it's up, it's down. The emotions sometimes take over.

I think that's very sad, that I haven't allowed my heart to be broken. I have broken a few.

I don't move away from grief, rather through it.

Grief can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life's search for love and wisdom.

My experience, with both my parents, is that grief has a lot of down, sad things, but I was also really emotionally raw, in the first year after each of them passed. Flowers smelled more intensely, my relationships were hotter, and I was more willing to risk. I was going for it a lot more. I was 'unsober' and I wasn't playing by my rules.

I lost my brother when he was 30, and that was devastating for me. I don't know if I will ever get over it.