Created by Cara DeLaRosa - Pet Loss Grief Coach
1. Go SOLO or with one trusted companion to the beach or largest body of water you can access.
2. Bring your beloved animal's photo (printed), bring a journal.
3. Write your grief out, directly to your baby. Tell them everything you love and miss about them. Include anything you’d like here, including the “I wish we could have’s...or I wish I would have’s…)
4. Visualize the Ocean as the most loving, divine feminine, mother energy you can. You can imagine her as Quan Yin, Mother Mary, Isis, Yemaya, Gaia, or any nurturing mother energy you personally relate to and feel supported by.
Send the note into the arms of mother ocean, who has enough power to hold the world's collective grief and therefore all of yours as well. Alternatively, you can bury the photo and note in the sand.
5. Say aloud or in your head: "Mother Ocean please take and carry my grief. It is too heavy to hold on my own. " (reword as necessary)
ASK: For guidance, a sign of connection or support. Example: "Please show me an obvious sign, one that I CANNOT miss, that my heart animal is still very much connected and present with me." or "Please help me resolve this guilt that I am carrying about the situation. I am ready to release this burden." (You can reword/restructure this intention until it feels correct for YOU).
6. Write in your journal:
- How did it feel to prepare for this? What feelings arose during planning and preparation?
- How did it feel to complete the ritual? What was the overall experience like?
- What was the weather like that day? What was the physical experience of being at the ocean like? Did the birds come visit you? Did you find a special rock or shell that called out to you? What sensations or intuitive knowledge did you receive from just being there?
- What physical sensations do you notice in your body afterward? Is there any relief? A lightness or a heaviness?
- What obvious signs and gifts do you start receiving? Record coincidences, synchronicities, thoughts that pop in during the next few weeks.
7. You can keep revisiting this experience in your mind and you can also call out to Mother Ocean to carry your grief and offer you support, even while you are home. You do not have to be in proximity to the ocean. Use this ritual as a reference point, to continue to feel connection and support from the Universe.