Episode 52 - How Grief Teaches and Changes Us

In this episode of Three Questions, I explore grief through the questions that have helped me make sense of loss over time. This conversation isn’t about having the right answers… It’s about giving yourself permission to feel, reflect, and understand how grief evolves rather than disappears.

We’ll talk about honoring the people we’ve lost, the beautiful and uncomfortable shifts that follow, and how grief can reshape our relationships, priorities, and sense of purpose. Because grief doesn’t just take something away, it also changes how we see everything else.

In This Episode You’ll Hear:
• Why honoring the person, not just the loss, can change how you grieve

• How grief impacts motivation, identity, and emotional responses

 • How to find meaning, agency, and clarity after experiencing loss

Whether you’re navigating loss yourself or supporting someone who is, this episode offers space, perspective, and questions to help you move through grief in your own way.

Links & Resources For This Episode:
Episode 49: Motivation Part 1: Three Questions That Shape Your Drive
Episode 50: Motivation Part 2: Little Moments, Real Motivation with Nick Giangreco
Find a Neuro Studio Teacher Near You
Connect with me on Instagram
Connect with me on Threads

Transcript

Meghann Koppele Duffy: Welcome to Three Questions where critical thinking is king, and my opinions and research are only here to support your learning and deeper understanding. Hey, I'm your host Meghann, and I am truly honored that you clicked on Three Questions today as the topic is a tough one. It is grief. Now, before we get into the episode and I ask you any questions, I just want to let everybody know that grief and grieving is very personal.

And if at any point in this episode it becomes too much, I invite you to turn it off. I invite you to never come back to it or to come back and listen to it. Maybe when you're in a place where you have the time to have all the emotions, so might not be a podcast you want to listen to when you're around other people.

I think this one probably would be best listened to alone and a place where you feel most comfortable. I also want to not make this podcast about me, my grief, and how I deal with grief because grief is truly personal. And I hope by asking you these three questions, it might help you through the grieving process, maybe help you adjust how you're grieving or lean into how you're grieving harder.

I just hope you give yourself the space. The time and the permission to feel all the feelings that you have, whether it's sadness, anger, happiness, laughter. We're gonna go through all the emotions today and we're gonna do it together. I will admit, this is the second time I recorded this podcast episode.

The first was too soon after I lost my dog, Charlie Bear. I found that I got, um. I cried more than I would've liked through the episode. And while I have no problem with showing emotion or crying in front of people, um, I felt the episode was a little too much about me and not about you. But Charlie Bear was such a big part of my life.

He was my first dog and Brian and I adopted him together. We rescued him together, I think when we were only dating for like six months. And we have had Charlie Bear. Our whole life. And what was so beautiful about Charlie's passing is we kind of knew he had a liver tumor, but it went from zero to 60 fast.

And we were so blessed that someone could come to the house. And I swear when the vet walked in, Charlie Bear looked up at me and said, thank you. And the joke Brian and I say is Charlie Bear raised us. And from where Brian and I started to where we are now, he kind of said, I've done my best work. I'm ready.

And you might be like, grief, you're talking about a dog. Well, that dog is a bitter part of my grief. And unfortunately, 13 years, yesterday was the anniversary of my cousin, my best friend, brother, Jason passing. It was the most traumatic thing that's ever happened to me and still is. And it has shaped who I am now and the trajectory of my life.

And while I do not have grieving figured out, uh, these are the three questions I always go back to because grief comes in waves. It doesn't disappear, it shifts, it morphs, it takes a lot of different. Uh, positions in your life. So I will reference Jason throughout this podcast because he was so important to me and I love to tell stories about him because it helps me keep him alive and answer question one.

And question one is the honor. So when we lose someone, something. A part of our world is completely changed, but rather than talking about the loss, let's talk about the person. So something I always hated after Jason passed was people asking me how I was doing, and I try my best not to ask other people.

Because how do you actually answer that question? Talk about a bad question. How are you doing? Uh, pretty terrible, right? But people, they're not trying to be mean. It's just hard to ask a good question. You'll see this in the interview episodes. I'll have this great question teed up, but based how the person receives it, I go, that was not a good question. Let me change it. So don't feel bad about any questions you ask when someone's grieving, but I'll please use this if it resonates with you. Something I always say, I am so sorry you're going through this loss. The loss is so big because the love was even bigger, and I feel like that encompasses loss.

Why does it suck so much? Because that person was such a big part of our life. So I would like to invite you when you have the space and the time to think about your favorite quality about that person or a few people. What was it about them? I have this like story keeps popping into my head. Jason was a tormentor. So when I was in high school, he lived with us.

He was going to culinary school, so he was like my big brother and he would play Nintendo Wii, a video game while I was sleeping, you know, on a grumpy teenage girl. And it would, he'd be playing this baseball game. And my family were all New York Yankees fans, so I knew all the Yankees. And those were the years when the Yankees won the World Series every year.

Okay. Just laying the the scene. He would play the video game and be like, Derek, her Deter. And I'd be like, Jeter. And then you'd be like, Bernie Bernard Will Wills Bernie Williams. And he would miss Paul O'Neill. Paul O'Neill. And he would do it to just like, scratch that itch, pick on me. And I'd be like, oh my God, I hate you.

You're so annoying. But we would laugh our asses off. Jason made me laugh. He made serious, not so serious. And I read his eulogy yesterday that I wrote, 'cause I posted every year. It's a way for me to keep his memory alive. And I talked about when we would watch TV, because we also lived together as roommates in Hoboken, we would be watching and you know, all the shows with like a laugh track.

I hate laugh tracks. You know why? Because Jason was a laugh track. He would laugh out loud to every show and you couldn't help but laughing. And I don't know if I was laughing at two guys, a girl in a pizza shop. Do you remember that show, Ryan Reynolds or like Seinfeld or Curb? Was I laughing at them or Jason?

He had such an infectious laugh, so he made me laugh. He would annoy me. He made me feel all the emotions. All the emotions, and he had that big effect on people. So think about your person. What was it about them? Were they serious? Did they make you more serious in a good way? Did they make you think more?

Did they frustrate you? Did they pull out a deeper side in you? What was it? And I wanna invite you, how can you carry that forward? How can you bring that forward with you every single day? Noticing it in yourself or the people around you?

I always was a jokester. I get that from my uncle, Steve, Jason's dad, Jason, my dad, and me. Like everything, not everything was a joke, but we always were able to find the humor in things. My uncle Steve, who talk about traumatic, he was my second person in the family. He died shortly after my cousin Jason, but my uncle Steve, it would be everybody was at my parents' house.

We'd have a big barbecue and he would yell, Meghann and I knew what that meant. Wherever you are, you stop what you're doing. You run across the house, you run across the lawn because you had a job to do. And that job was to pull Uncle Steve's finger. And he would wait, I'd pull his finger and he would pass gas.

And I thought that was the funniest thing as a kid. Okay, so people joke when I have bathroom humor, I carry all those people with me. I tell jokes. I try to bring lightness to the darkness every single day. Now, laughter isn't always the cure for things. So if that is not appropriate for where you're at, I want you to define that feeling.

I am going to pause and I want us all to close our eyes. I want you to put your hands someplace on your body where you can fully feel like I've got my hands wrapped around my knees. If you prefer, you can keep your eyes open. I want you to think of the best memory of that person. Feel free to get upset.

Feel free to laugh. Feel free to do anything you need to do.

How did that feel? What's always interesting for me, if you're watching me on YouTube, you could see me smirking when I think about the memories of Jason. I don't get sad. I smile and laugh and two came up. So why the Charlie Bear was so drastic in my life. Jason was a dog person, huge crazy dog person. I was not.

I thought dog people were weird. Now, when I got a dog, my sister who had cos Cosmo, God rest his soul as well. Cosmo was a black pug. He was a menace to society. Um, he would snort, fart, you know what pugs do? And my sister like treated him like the king. I thought it was weird. But then when I got Charlie Bear, my sister goes, Meghann, I go, I can finish your sentence.

I am way worse than you ever were. She's like, yeah. And it's so funny, I, if Jason saw me now, I think he'd be so proud of me at as the dog mom that I am. And why? I want you to honor these memories. I cannot tell you the other memory that made me laugh, but Diana, you know the memory I'm thinking of. The day before, the day of Jason's funeral, I am in bed, kind of struggling to get out of it. Brian was like, okay, we gotta get on the road in 30 minutes. He kind of counted me down and then all of a sudden he's like, yo. I'm like, what? There's a dog on the porch? And I'm like, no. Charlie Bear's with me. And Charlie Bear, who wasn't a cuddler, never left my side.

I'm like, what? There's a dog on the porch. Brian opened the door, this dog, pit bull that looked like Jason's dog, pork chop walks in, jumps on our couch and just sits there. And I'm looking at the dog and I go, Jason, and he was like goofy and laughed. And then Brian opened the door and the dog just left.

And the craziest part about that is that dog lived about five blocks from our house. Never saw that dog before and only saw that dog one time after. I kid you not, you're gonna think I'm making it up. Unfortunately, my husband also lost his best friend tragically in a car accident before I met him.

It was the anniversary of his friend's death and he was struggling. And I kid you not, I go, Brian. Look at the porch. That dog came back. I swear on my mother's life. So the honor of these persons finding the moment, finding, oh my God, that bird or that flower, all those moments. I believe in past lives. I believe that there's more to this all. And just those moments with the dogs just make me smile, and that's why my dogs are so important to me.

So I hope question one has given you the space and the time to figure out a way to honor the person you love the most. And if you're not ready to do that, well take your time and when you're ready, you'll be ready. Don't push it. Okay. Now question two is a little of a tougher one. I am going to be brutally honest about this one.

This one is the toughest for me because it's a little bit of the ugly truth I don't like about how I handled my grief. So I wanna ask you first, often when something traumatic happens or a big loss, there becomes a before and after. Right Before Jason passed. After Jason passed. Okay. And I wanna ask you, what part of you shifted first in the after?

Now that could be a positive shift or a negative shift. Now I just wanna read a little research. I wrote it down so I could stay on track. There was a ton of studies to support it, but a study that was in 2021, the, when I was reading the study, I, I really like how they wrote it. Uh, Pena and Vargas, they reviewed how grief affects the reward pathways and why I bring this up because I just did a podcast.

Two episodes on motivation. And what was so interesting to me is grief suppresses motivation. It suppresses motivation. So no, I didn't wanna get outta bed or shower. No, I did not wanna wear black. No, I didn't wanna go to work. No, I didn't wanna do anything. That is normal. It's gonna suppress those pathways.

Dopamine's not gonna have effect all our other pathways. But in later phases we have a recalibration based off what feels meaningful and of purpose, and that was huge to me. So what was the biggest shift? I think most of us are kind of s, I don't wanna say stuck, maybe I was a little stuck, but what I felt like it shined a light on.

I wasn't happy before he died. I wasn't happy in my career. I wasn't focused, I wasn't motivated, and that loss kind of shone a big light on that, right? Luckily, I had great support from my husband and my family, and I talked about Jason, a lot, lot of people don't like to talk about loss. That's how they process.

I found if I talked about him, told stories, kept him alive, that was the way that I would grieve. But it, it kind of stunted me 'cause I couldn't move past that. I was so in this, talking about Jason and I am so grateful to my girlfriends. My girlfriend's from Scranton. Oh my God. Every time we went out drinking, Meghann would be fine until she wasn't.

And it was always a story about Jason. So I'm so grateful that they were able to tolerate my grieving strategies. And honestly, if that's how you grieve, do it. It was very helpful to me. And when I was done with that, I moved on. And what's really cool, well, I don't know if it's cool. It is cool looking back on it now, but I had a huge shift when I was ready because I was focusing on the Neuro Studio, something that had real purpose and passion behind it, and that reinvigorated my motivation.

But I'm gonna be a hundred percent truthful with all of you. And the only reason I am telling you all this is because if you come in contact with this, I want you to know you're not alone and you're not a bad person. My career really took off after Jason died, and I had so much guilt about that now, there was a lot of reasons my motivation shift, and there's also research to support when something bad happens.

A lot of us recalibrate our life. We look and see what was bad, what was good, but it felt very uncomfortable to be like, I'm doing great when my best friend is no longer alive. So this is where I highly recommend therapy. Shout out to Rhonda. And Rhonda helped me identify what my actual shift was and my actual shift was anger.

I was so angry, but it was, I was misplacing my anger in all of other things. Okay? So it was easy. I didn't wanna admit I was mad at Jason. I didn't wanna admit I was mad at the situation. So my biggest shift was anger. Ugh. I wish it was something else. It wasn't. It was anger. And if I'm being totally honest, I'm still a little angry.

And when I don't do my work, when I don't do my movement, when I don't feel grounded, I get angry about shit. That doesn't matter. Why? Because underlying there is this low level anger in me. So when I am pushed past my boundaries. I can kind of pop off a little, which is funny because that's not how the old Meghann used to respond.

She would keep it down. You're angry, don't tell everybody everything's fine. So the beauty of being angry, it's help me stand on my own two feet, stand up to people when they wrong me, be true to what I say, match people's energy. Right. It's okay to be angry. It's not okay to take out your anger on other people.

I've snapped at students before and I said, you know what? I am so sorry. I apologize. I think my anger comes from my frustration. 'cause I thought I explained that well. However, I should not have snapped at you. Okay. I'm the first to admit because just because I'm angry doesn't mean it's your fault. So let's go away from me for a sec and go back to you.

What was the shift? Was it positive right off the bat? Why was it positive? Tell me, give me more, think deeper. Was it positive because it gave you the courage or maybe it made you realize that life is short? Was it negative? What was the shift? And kind of own it and ask yourself, how has that carried through and changed you?

Because I really do think. I am a very different person before Jason and after Jason. I'm still the same in so many ways, but I really think I'm truly myself and Mariska, my business partner, and I joke that deep down I am a grumpy old man. Like I can't wait to like I'm, or an old woman, I guess I should say, like, to be on my lawn and be like, kids, get off my lawn.

Like, I just, I identify with older people and I'm like, I see why you're grumpy. You know, I, and I joke about it, but it's just become an endearing quality or equality people don't like about me, but your opinion, their opinion about me is none of my business. So I'm grateful. Uh, I don't like that word. I'm not grateful.

I, Hmm.

What's a good word for you? When you have had growth after a tremendous loss, what is the word I'm gonna ask you the question. What's the word?

I am grateful. I didn't get stuck in the grief. I'm grateful I have been able to be the best version of myself on most days. But what sucks is I feel like I'd rather have Jason back than that. Okay. So, pardon That I didn't have the best word to give to you, but I think words are very personal and that's why when people talk about words and say, don't use that word, this is what it means.

Well that's what it means to you, but words are important, right? I have, um, a great student of mine, she's a therapist, uh, Rebecca. She really helps her patients identify what does that word mean to you? And I love how she takes the time to look at the words and really break them down and be like, well, this is how I define it.

How do you define it? How is that shaping you? And maybe that would be a really good, um, task for myself and us all to do, to understand the shift. And last but not least, I'm going to invite you if you're at your max on this conversation. The last question's gonna be a little tough to think about, but I do think it's worthwhile.

So as I said, grief doesn't disappear, it morphs, it changes. So if you aren't in a place where you are okay to receive this, please listen. But I wanna give you permission to like full stop and skip this question. We talked about the shift, maybe positive or negative, but how has the loss reshaped you? How have your values shifted?

Have relationships changed? Do you have a new sense of clarity? And this kind of goes along with my guilt because I think my loss changed me significantly, and I choose to look at the positives of that at this point. And what's super interesting is there were a lot of studies that showed that people become more motivated or more value driven after a significant loss.

Also, a another study in 2022 by Anselman and Specht show that after a major loss, some people, some. And I apologize, I didn't write, I, I should have grabbed the percentage on that based off the study, but actually developed stronger internal control beliefs. Not right away, but over time. So when I read that, I was kind of like, oh, control is not, not good.

And then I kind of looked deeper into it more. Control is not about being rigid. It's not about being in control of every situation and not letting your kids go there or do anything like that. Yeah, control is like having a sense of kind of, um, agency purpose, capacity to take some things. Um, feeling directed okay.

And thinking about the things we can control. So for me, the biggest way my grief changed me is I kind of make a rule of always showing up. Um.

I am just pausing because I would like to share another story with you, if that is okay. Um, the last time I saw Jason was Thanksgiving 20, um, 14, 13, excuse me. He passed March 7th, 2014 was Thanksgiving and I was annoyed with him because he was late to Thanksgiving 'cause he was a chef and was cooking for another family.

A famous person who, which I will not name, but if you ask me, I will tell because they did not send any condolences to my aunt and uncle send flowers or anything when he was their private chef at the time, who was in their home. So yes, I'm still bitter. I'm not going to say it publicly, but if you ask, I'll tell you anyway.

I left early 'cause I was tired. Why? Because I'll see you in a few weeks, Jason. We lived together most of like our young adult life. He was living in Brooklyn. I was in Hoboken actually, I think I was living with Brian at that point down the shore. I'll see you like, let's get together. But he didn't and that was something I would back out of things.

Ah, I don't feel like doing it. I was very selfish in that. And ever since then, when I'm traveling or doing something, it's like, let's stay out another hour longer. Well, I'll be tired tomorrow. Who cares? Something when I'm traveling and students have witnessed this, I see a lot of clients every day, and I say this out loud and I say it out loud 'cause I'm an auditory processor.

I am so blessed to do what I love, even when I'm tired and I remind myself of that because showing up used to be so hard for me and because of that great loss, I always wanna show up and be there. Not to make myself feel better, but because it's something I can control. Because I'm gonna have more loss in my life.

We all are. And if we are so lucky to experience loss, it's because we loved so big, right? The loss is so big because the love was bigger. So all the people in my inner circle, my people, I show up, I drive four hours to see them for a few hours after they had a double mastectomy. I not because I'm this great person.

I'm not trying to say that it's because it gives me control, because God forbid anything happens to them or me. I know we had our last moment was a good one together. That's something I can control now. Does it stress me out sometimes? Yeah, but you know what? Stresses me out more. Should I go? Should I go?

Just go. Right? So if you're someone who's struggling with that, I always say showing up is so easy. You don't have to do anything. Just sometimes being there and not saying much, it's just nice. Bring somebody a snack. Right. Another thing is honestly,

I feel, I, I used to say this all the time and one of my students was like, I don't like when you say that nobody died. So a client, if they're struggling, they're like, oh my God, I did that wrong, or I failed this test. I go, yep, but nobody died. It made me not take things so seriously, I think as a goofy person, but I also was very hard on myself and very serious.

So it's like, Hey, I made a mistake. I said the wrong thing. I say in my courses to people, Hey, if you ask me a question and I look annoyed, it's 'cause I am annoyed, but not at you. I'm annoyed. 'cause I thought I was clear, like I'm perfect. I say that to people now and the reason I do that is so I can have a sense of control over it to be like I'm not always going to respond my best.

Right? And it also like allows me to behave how I want to be. I don't always have to be perfect. I don't sweat the small stuff like I used to. Um, because if something goes wrong, it's like, well, nobody died. Now. My friend had said to stop saying that over COVID 'cause a lot of people are dying. And I said to her, people die every single day.

I don't wanna minimize that. The reason I'm saying it is I, it's a reminder to me to not take myself so seriously. So thank you for help letting me share that other story about Jason. Um. And I hope maybe it's not showing up for you. Maybe hearing my experience doesn't force you to do it my way, but help it help you see it through your way.

'cause you might be like, no, Meg, I completely disagree with you there. Good. Why do you disagree with me? Think about that. What clarity can you get out of this conversation? Because guys, we are all gonna grieve. We are all gonna experience loss and I hope we all experience loss because you not experiencing loss would be saying that you're not given enough love.

And I understand it's scary and there are certain types of losses that I think,

um, I'll just say it, I won't beat around the bush. We're all gonna lose our parents. Unfortunately, some of you already have. Luckily, mine are still here. Last year was very tough for me because my dad was very sick. He's doing great. Um, but it sucks and it's going to suck. But if you're listening to this and you've lost a child, I want you give you even more grace.

That's not supposed to happen. And sometimes things just suck. That sucks. There's no excuse. There's no silver lining. They're not in a better place. They should be with you. So these questions, how you can honor them, the negative shifts, the shifts, please take that with a different lens and give yourself grace because that is not the normal cycle of life.

And I am truly sorry, and I want to say that sucks and I wish that wouldn't happen to anybody, but it does too often. Okay. I am gonna leave us all with just a summary of the questions. So maybe the question one was the one that resonated with you the most. Maybe question two and three you did not like, you don't wanna think about, you're not ready.

I'm fine with that. Took me 13 years to get here and it's gonna take me a lifetime to figure it all out. But question number one, how can we honor that love every single day? That's the question. I want you to spend the most time on because that question will help you answer question number two and three.

I want to thank you for listening to this episode, being a part of the Three Questions community. I'm sorry if this episode was hard, but I'm glad this episode was hard. I appreciate you taking the time to listen. I would've told a hundred more Jason stories if you would let me and if you're ever interested.

Oh, he was so funny. He had such a personality. And he always had, like every girl loved him. Women just loved him because he was just such a cool, good dude. So something at the end I said of his eulogy at, oh my God, some, sorry. One more funny story. It's a melli thing. That's Jason's my mother's family. My mother and his mother's sisters, they always say sayings backwards.

They call everybody by the wrong name. And my aunt at Jason's funeral said, you were like two pods in a pea. And we started laughing and I wrote that in his eulogy. So it's, it's great that I'm tripping over my words, but at the end I said, I hope everybody here can be more like Jason. And I wish for all of you to live a life with as much joy as my cousin brought me.