Pause and Reflect

It is Ok to Grieve

This weeks’ poll will be extended for another week. The death of Mike Rinder deserves to take top priority over anything else I would choose to post here.

When I was in Scientology, we were taught that people dropped their bodies. This distasteful phrase allowed people to put a barrier between themselves and the grief. Hubbard also called grief a misemotion. A bad thing. Scientologists were programmed to believe that grief was wrong.

We were taught “it’s ok, the person just dropped their body. They will pick up a new one.” Ok. But what about the time we spent every day in the presence of that person? What about the laugh we loved? What about that tender hug, that wry smile?

We were not given a moment to reflect on the person’s effect on our lives. We were not given time to adjust to the new reality of them no longer in our lives. We were just expected to move on.

Generally, a deceased person wasn’t even given a farewell service. We were just told they had dropped their body. Or not. Sometimes we didn’t find out until weeks or months later, if at all.

This post should have been the one in response to last week’s poll. But that can wait. The post is ready to go. It just seems disrespectful to the memory of Mike at this moment to say anything but thanks. This man could have taken a massive payout and walked away. He chose to struggle and live with harassment from when he left Scientology in 2007 until he died. This was what he knew was the right thing.

Redemption was more important than the almighty buck. If you haven’t read his book, please do so. Regular programming will resume soon, I won’t remain silent. Mike has asked me not to.