Ep. 126: Courage Casts - The Price of Love

After experiencing deep personal loss, a simple idea changed how I see grief: it’s not just pain, it’s proof of how much we loved. In this episode, I share stories of loss, the moments that stay with us, and how reframing grief can shift us from emptiness back to meaning. 

Transcript

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Welcome to the Courage to Live Podcast. My name is Josh Pitskill, and I'm a retired police captain with 24 years of experience out of Las Vegas. Currently, I travel the country and I teach people about courage, resilience, and leadership. So, in a recent podcast, I shared about my brother's suicide and um how I was the emotions I felt during the process and shared some funny stories and some good stories about him. Um and I I talked about a quote that, or at least a comment made by Andrew Garfield, the actor, and I wanted to kind of expand on that a little bit. So he was asked about his mom who passed away, and he got emotional, but it was interesting how he did it because he he really started smiling while he was like, you know, you could tell he was, you know, eyes were tearing up, his voice was catching, and he makes a comment about grief. And he says that grief is the price you pay for love. Uh that is really stuck with me so much now that I'm doing a second short podcast on it, uh, because I have experienced quite a bit of grief in my life, and I think most people do, especially as you age, you start to lose friends and loved ones. You know, I I lost my father when he was, you know, fairly young of cancer. He was in his 50s. Uh, lost my brother to suicide, uh, lost good friends uh in the line of duty, uh, all of my grandparents. And, you know, it grief is interesting. I've heard a couple different theories on it. And, you know, one of them, you know, they describe grief as you have a box with a button inside, and there's a ball in that box. And as you get further away from the event that's causing the grief, that box expands, and that ball is bouncing around and hits that button that makes you feel you know sad or feel that grief. But as time passes, you feel it less often, but you never feel it less intense. And there's a lot of anecdotes when it comes to grief. And because I think you know, the the human experience is we try and process that loss and that, you know, death is still that big unknown that we don't know. You know, I know people, a lot of people have faith, I do, but um, you know, it still is that that question mark of where is that person? And you know, I'm gonna share a uh funny story or not funny, but it was a weird experience, I guess. My dad loved the show Justified, and so did I. And we would talk about it every week when there was a new episode, and you know, with Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens. And in that episode, or you know, when we would talk about it, it was a strange sensation because my dad passed away during the last season, and I remember thinking like he's never gonna know how that how the series ended. And it was kind of like a like a real like gut punch to me because it was something that we shared and something we talk about, and it's probably one of the reasons I still like it's a comfort show that I'll rewatch from time to time. But I really like that comment by Andrew Garfield has really struck me and stuck with me that yeah, grief is really the price that we pay for love. And so rather than looking at grief as just this bad thing, it just it represents how much you loved that person that you lost. And so when I feel that grief, because I put it in that perspective, it often brings me back to the positive things. It's you know, I loved my dad, I love my brother. We had so many good experiences together and hard experiences together. But that tends to push me more towards the positive memories than, you know, that feeling of loss or emptiness of, you know, because I had those two. Like I used to call my dad even when I was a sergeant, um, after after my day and tell him about my day. And I remember those first couple of weeks when he was gone, I couldn't call him and talk to him about it. And that really hurt. Um, but now because I I see grief as that price that we pay for love, it it comes back to more a positive space for me. Um, so if you're experiencing or have experienced loss, like so many of us have, try to reframe it as that. Reframe it as, yeah, that's the price we pay for loving somebody so much. I appreciate you listening today. Um, I talk about this and other stuff in my book, The Courage to Live. It's available on Amazon. And um, if you enjoy the podcast, please share it with a friend. Uh, subscribe, leave a review, and thank you for spending time with me today.