When Death Becomes Us
The Personal and Public Work of Grief
As we approach the end of April, I’ve thought about what words I wanted to share with my online community. The result of that personal reflection was simple: Tell The Truth. Truth is the past couple months have been amongst the most difficult in my life. My family is preparing one of my aunts to transition from this life, and I have had specific roles and responsibilities during this preparation. I find myself carrying grief again, amid so many other cares, passions, relationships, and work.
The impending death of a loved one is the reality of my personal life, and that is the reason why I am operating at about half of my capacity. Death is the reason why my days start slower, why I am ending some things early and starting others late. It is the reason why have missed some deadlines and why my inbox is out of control. It’s the reason that I haven’t intentionally checked in with my paid subscriber community. (I apologize to y’all.) It is also the reason why, in this season, I have released those standards about whether I have had a good and productive day. I have been moving at a slower and more intentional pace, and that has been good for my soul.
And yet, I am not aloof to the realities and injustices that continually press in on the local, national, or global scale, often a result of poor governance. As a Gen Xer, I have not been one easily tempted by the influence and distraction of the news, online entertainment, or social media, so I can silence the noise or turn off the notifications. That’s a good thing because if I was constantly distracted and only focused on all those external things, I would never be able to attend to the reality, needs, and losses in my own life, family, community, and work.
And yet, I understand that we do (all of us) have an important responsibility to the public. How we live out our collective responsibility may look different for everyone but for me, as a Christian who takes the Holy Bible seriously, I long to continually lean into the prophetic work of truth telling. I am currently studying the minor prophets with the women in my Sunday School class (yes, I still I attend those). Often, the prophets are messengers of God who are speaking to nations (not individuals) about the injustices, abuses, and violence they have bestowed among vulnerable people because of their denial of God, greed, and commitment to idol worship.
So, while I am not performative in my public and communal justice work, I am invested and deeply committed to this level of truth telling, and how I spend my time, talent, and treasure (especially with Leadership LINKS, Inc.). There is much to grieve in the public sphere for death is all around us. The public death is not simply the loss of physical life, for it can also include the death of our hopes, dreams, futures. We can grieve the death of what we thought this nation was, or what we hoped our lives would be. Death and grief are able teachers.
When we think about the personal death and grief that we carry, I want us to consider:
What is happening in me/us?
When we think about the public death and grief, we might ponder:
What is happening to us?
Is our brush with death or grief making us better? Is it because of someone else’s bidding or a result of our own doing? The work of prophets is to warn the people and speak truth regarding the pain, violence, and destruction that is sure to come among an unjust and unrepentant who do not uphold the Lord’s standard or submit to the way of Jesus. This is some of the work that I do through writing and sharing in this community.
However, I want us all to pause long enough to consider that while it is true, sometimes we have no control over the losses that come into our lives. It is not true that we have no agency in how we respond to the various ways that the thief of “death has climbed into our windows” (Jer. 9:21). I shared some of that pondering and reflection, along with the tension of personal and public grief during a keynote address that I gave at the University of Virginia a few years ago.
The video includes an introduction and Q&A session. My keynote begins around 4:30 and ends around 37:10.
So, what shall we do with the death that so easily besets us?
I begin to close the address with the words:
I think we have allowed the death to make us emotionally numb, because the truth is: It takes work to choose life. It takes work to go against the grain, to care, to pause, to listen and learn, and to tell the truth about history. It takes work to inform yourself and do research so that you can respond intelligently about issues, to act in humility when you have done wrong or don’t have all the answers instead of pretending that you are right and that you do. It takes work to tell the truth when society tells us that everything is relative and only the people in our camps have common sense. It takes work to build and lead well when everything around you is rubble. It takes work to connect with people who are not like you, to forgive, to care, to trust, and to love again. It takes work to hope and have faith despite what we see.
Robert E. Quinn wrote, “When given a choice been deep change and slow death, we tend to choose slow death.” In this place of conversion tonight, I am inviting you—the right now and future leaders of our country—into deep change. This is the conundrum of our lives: death and life are the only two choices. Who are you becoming individually, and collectively as a community?
Through my writings and in the face of death, I hope to encourage you to choose life, love, integrity, compassion, and courage again and again. Death does not have the final word!
I am now booking speaking engagements for Fall and Winter 2026 and into 2027. To get started, explore the “Book Dr. Natasha” tab and complete the “Speaking Request Form.”
In Love,
Dr. Natasha
Reflecting on the themes of this month’s writing, I am recommending the books My Folks Don’t Want Me to Talk About Slavery and When Life and Beliefs Collide.
My Folks… is a book of twenty-one oral histories of former North Carolina slaves edited by Belinda Hurmence. As we approach the 250 Years of American Discourse, I think it important that we continue to Tell The Truth about this nation’s founding, how our country has been able to accumulate it’s massive wealth, and then use that power for global dominance and domestic terrorism across generations.
After we lost our firstborn child, my son, a mentor and friend invited me to attend a women’s conference where Carolyn Custis James, author of When Life and Beliefs… was speaking. I received her book that weekend, and that was the beginning of my healing work to reconcile such deep lost and disappointment with my faith, and what I understood as truth concerning God’s character.
I offer these two resources to you this month as you reflect on the personal and communal work of grief, loss, and injustice.
As a Black girl from South Carolina, I have held on to my faith, education, a commitment to love, and community as survival tools for this journey we call life. I believe that reading is important, which is why I have faithfully committed to writing, reading, and sharing resources over the years.
I also believe and am encouraged by the faithful witness and testimonies of the elders and ancestors that have gone before me to show us the way. I believe and accept their words as true, so I leave you with the words of formerly enslaved, Mr. W. L. Bost (who was interviewed on September 27, 1937 at 87), who said, “I know folks think the books tell the truth, but they sure don’t. Us poor niggers had to take it all.” To this statement I say, “Don’t just read. Read the right books” with ears that are willing to hear and eyes that are willing to see the goodness that God intends for all people, how far we have fallen, and the opportunities that we have to choose life.
Support Black-Owned Bookstores in America (listing by state) with your purchase.
This weekend, I am supporting my friend, fellow author, and retreat co-host, Natasha Smith, at the Grief Grows Here Summit. I will be facilitating a Garden-side Chat about Leading Through Grief.
If you are not able to join us in North Carolina this weekend, but need support, care, and community, please consider joining us for my B.L.A.C.K. Women “Leading Through Grief” Retreat with Natasha Smith. Dates: August 30-Septembet 1, 2026.
