The Handbook for Companioning the Mourner

Eleven Essential Principles

Alan D Wolfelt, Alan Wolfelt

• Publisher: Companion Press
• eBook ISBN:
  9781617220371
• Year: 2009

Partly a counseling model and partly an explanation of true empathy, this handbook explores the ways companionship eases grief. For caretakers who work with grieving people or for friends and family just hoping to stay close, 11 tenets are outlined for mourner-led care. These simple rules call for understanding another person's pain, listening with the heart rather than the head, not filling up every minute with words, respecting confusion and disorder, and relying on curiosity rather than expertise.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• The Tenets of Companioning the Bereaved
• Tenet One - Companioning is about being present to another person’s pain; it is not about taking away the pain.
• Tenet Two - Companioning is about going to the wilderness of the soul with another human being; it is not about thinking you are responsible for finding the way out.
• Tenet Three - Companioning is about honoring the spirit; it is not about focusing on the intellect.
• Tenet Four - Companioning is about listening with the heart; it is not about analyzing with the head.
• Tenet Five - Companioning is about bearing witness to the struggles of others; it is not about judging or directing these struggles.
• Tenet Six - Companioning is about walking alongside; it is not about leading.
• Tenet Seven - Companioning means discovering the gifts of sacred silence; it does not mean filling up every moment with words.
• Tenet Eight - Companioning is about being still; it is not about frantic movement forward.
• Tenet Nine - Companioning is about respecting disorder and confusion; it is not about imposing order and logic.
• Tenet Ten - Companioning is about learning from others; it is not about teaching them.
• Tenet Eleven - Companioning is about curiosity; it is not about expertise.
• A Final Word
• ALSO BY ALAN WOLFELT