August 5, 2024 • 27 mins
Dr. Katie Eastman joins Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino to share the five best books Dr. Eastman recommends to recreate your life after loss. Grief and loss are profound emotional experiences that everyone encounters at some point in life. They can stem from the death of a loved one, the end of a significant relationship, loss of a job, or even changes in life circumstances. Understanding and managing grief is crucial for emotional well-being. The books are: The Wheel of Life: A Memoir of Living and Dying by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, MD UPLIFTING: Inspiring Stories of Loss, Change, and Growth Inspirited by the work of Dr. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross by Dr. Katie Eastman Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankyl Good Grief: A Companion for Every Loss by Granger E. Westberg Percolate: Let Your Best Self Filter Through by Elizabeth Hamilton-Guarino and Dr. Katie Eastman
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Best EVERU Show with Elizabeth Hamilton Garino,
here to help you find success in all areas of
your life. The power is in your hands. Join our
network for free at bestveru dot com. And now here's
Elizabeth and doctor Katie.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Hi everybody, It's Elizabeth here with doctor Katie Eastman. Happy Monday.
I almost started the show off with a giant sneeze
Katie shoo. Hello whatever, right pretty early where you are?
So we are literally coasts apart. Like I'm in Maine
(00:40):
and you are in.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
I'm in the state of Washington in the San Juan
Islands yep.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
So here we are pretty early out there. But you know,
I love this five best blog on best ever you
dot com and I love I'm gonna love this episode
because I think this is going to help so many people.
So doctor Katie is here with us to give us
her recommendations for the five best books to recreate your
(01:11):
life after loss. Now, if you've know doctor Katie, have
worked with doctor Katie, follow doctor Katie and social media
or her websites, or have read her book, you know
that she is just an expert in this area and
she helps us navigate grief and loss, because Katie, those
are pretty profound emotional experiences that at some point all
(01:33):
of us go through. Correct yes.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
And one of the things I love about these books
that I'm going to talk about is they leverage loss
as an opportunity to learn how to be better, to
learn about how to be your best self. And that's
what best ever you is all about. And I want
people to recognize that loss is something to lean into,
(02:00):
something we go through on a massive basis when we
go through major loss, but also every day we have
smaller losses we can learn from. And I love this
opportunity to talk about that.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
You know, I met doctor Eastman years ago now, in
the midst of my father being very ill. My father
had a stroke in two thousand and four and was
they called him the ICU Warrior because what he survived
most people don't and so forth. And he passed away
in twenty eighteen, in October twenty eighteen, but he was
(02:38):
a stroke survivor for that long and he had so
many amazing things. And one of the things that I
learned from doctor Katie during that period of time, and
we wrote a book during that period of time too,
but I learned about doctor Katie's words pain into Purpose,
and that just completely resonated with me. Do you want
(02:58):
to explain a little bit before you get into the books?
You don't go on and on either, guys, everybody listening,
but do you want to explain what pain into purpose means?
Because it's such a profound way for me to look
at loss.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
It is to live a purposeful life, is to make
any experience into a meaning. What is the meaning behind
the experience? What can I learn from it that I
can help? That helps me identify what I value, what's
most important to me? So any loss that we have,
(03:34):
whether it be small or large, allows us the opportunity
to ask the question what's important to me? What am
I missing? What what do I need? And something like
a stroke, there are multiple losses that go with a stroke.
At every juncture, there's a choice point. How do I
(03:55):
cope with it? What do I do about it? What
can I do? Instead of what can't I do? So
it's looking at all of our experiences in life as
opportunities for growth.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Love it. My phone was listening in the background. It's
like I didn't quite get what you said, Like, don't worry,
doctor Katie, will explain it hang on so anyway, all right,
so here are five best books to recreate your life
after loss. Take it away, Katie.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
You know the first book is from my mentor. My
mentor happened to be doctor Elizabeth Koobler Ross, who is
the one that you probably don't know, but she is
the one that crafted the idea of the five stages
of grief. And I want to say right off the bat,
it was not intended to be linear. It was not
(04:48):
intended to be a pass through one moved to the
next book, to the next pass go. No, it was not.
It was intended as something that gives you a framework
to start a conversation about grief. The Wheel of Life
is Elizabeth's autobiography. She loved why because she took stories,
(05:11):
and those in those stories of her own life, she
identifies her own process of learning about grief, learning about loss.
You probably don't know this, but Elizabeth Coopler Ross, when
she was very very young, when the World War two started,
she went to the front lines of Poland. She didn't
(05:31):
just sit back and just let the war happen. She
got in there and started working to help and support people.
Her idea of creating meaning out of loss was frontline
work and she never stopped. Her entire life was about
leveraging loss into growth helping others do it, and it
(05:52):
gave her life meaning to keep her going in her purpose.
So that inspirited me to write my own book, Uplifting
and Uplifting is my own memoir as well as inspiring
people I have known and like Elizabeth. Through story, I
(06:13):
describe people's personal process of change, loss and growth, and
it is a process of identifying what it is in
your life that you miss the most, what you want
to change, how you want to go about changing, and
how you can grow the most to provide a more
(06:33):
meaningful life. And meaningful life is always as a component
of giving back to others. My book starts with a
quote by a young man who was dying, who was
eight years old, and he said that the purpose of
life is to make a difference, but we forget that
because we grow older. Now, that's out of the mouths
(06:56):
of babes, and that really is the framework for the
whole book, all of these inspiring stories, and at the
end of each chapter, I have prompting questions that help
you move forward in your own life by asking you
reflective questions about what you want, what you need, and
how you can change. So that's the second book. And
(07:18):
the third book is Man Search for Meaning by Victor Frankel.
Victor Frankel found himself in one of the most unimaginable
situations of suffering, and in the midst of that suffering
he discovered meaning making through and I won't give you
I won't tell you how it happens, but there is
a pivotal point where he realizes what the meaning of
(07:41):
life is and how we can all live differently, and
his growth through an unimaginable suffering living in a concentration
camp is It's a compelling story. It's a magical story.
There are pieces of this book that you will not
want to put down. I have read it, Oh my god.
(08:02):
I think I've read it about fifty times because every
time I read it, I get something else out of it.
And by the way, Victor Frankel and Elizabeth Hubler Ross
were friends, they were colleagues. And then the other book
is Good Grief. Good Grief is a little handbook. It's
a little book. It's packed with wisdom about how to grieve,
(08:25):
about what's most important when you're grieving. It's a pickup
when you need it kind of book when you're going
through any kind of loss, small or large. It's been
a classic for years and I go to it and
I tell people to go to it whenever they need
I pick up. They need to remind themselves that grief
(08:46):
is normal, grief is organic, grief is personal, and there's
no right way to do it, but this magical little
book will help you walk through that process. And then
the last one is Percoly, which is the book that
Elizabeth and I wrote together, and you'll find that Elizabeth's
story of her own losses related to having allergies. Food
(09:12):
allergies were numerous, and all of these different things that
happened to her in her life can be related back
to this concept of loss is opportunity for change and growth.
And it's a great book. We enjoyed writing it. It's
got commentary by me from a clinical perspective at the
end of each chapter or throughout the book, and you
(09:36):
will find that her story relates to all of the
other stories in these other books, which is a profound
opportunity to learn from loss.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Thank you for your list of books. There's amazing I
love your descriptions of everything too on percolate. I want
to add too that you know, I was fully comfortable
writing a book. You know, I really didn't know how
to write a book, and I I didn't know exactly
what to write about. And so one of the things
that was super important for me was having doctor Katie's
oversight throughout the whole process. I know she just said
(10:09):
that she you know, wrote a little bit at the
end of each chapter and kind of downplayed it, but
really doctor Katie was there for kind of every word,
like kind of what you really mean to say is this,
don't you you know kind of thing? And the brilliant
coffee metaphor that that book is wouldn't be what it
is without doctor Katie. So I just want to maybe
(10:30):
give some you know, props back over to Katie where
they should be, because you know, that was really hard
for me to do and I would have never done
that without you. So I that was a really good
moment in my life, like one of those moments where
another human being picks you up and goes, you know,
here's what you could be doing, and let me set
your path in this way and let me give you
(10:52):
a little boost and that's that's where that was for me.
So I'm always grateful for you there. I have a
couple of questions for you, if you can, do you
have a little bit of time?
Speaker 3 (11:00):
Sure?
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Okay? Sure. So I seem to notice that these conversations
around grief, loss, death, dying and so forth are not
so hidden anymore. Do you agree with that? Because like
last night, we had two of the four boys in
the pool with us and the conversation shifted to your
(11:22):
name because someone was going through an issue. And I said, well,
they need doctor Katie. And you know who doctor Katie is.
She studied under Elizabeth Coopler Ross and here's their books
and things like that. And he goes, yes, I feel
like my friend is in stage three, you know kind
of thing. And I said, oh wait a minute. You
know here's how that all ties together to your world,
your life and helping your friend. Do you agree? You know,
(11:46):
this is a twenty two year old kid talking yeah
about the five stages of grief.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
I love that. And what I want to remind everybody
is stage three doesn't mean that you've passed through one
and two. It means you're at stage three now and
you could go back to stage four tomorrow, and you
could go back to stage three next week and they
flip around. But yeah, let me give you a very
brief description. Okay, denial. Have you ever had an experience
(12:15):
where something's really hard and you go, oh God, this
just can't be happening. That's what denial is. Anger. Have
you ever been pissed off that something happened that dust
doesn't seem fair? Say you're anger? Have you ever ever
just like went, well, maybe if I do this, this
(12:35):
will get better. That's bargaining. And acceptance is not I
accept that this happened in my life. It's rosy and
peachy and I've moved on and it'll never bother me again. No,
it's an acceptance that you go back to over and
over and over in your lifetime. We revisit our grief.
(12:58):
Depression is something that happens throughout grief. I've missed my
parents terribly on Mothers and Father's Day, and.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
What do I do?
Speaker 3 (13:07):
I go into a day of depression. That's okay, I
revisit my grief. Why because I dearly loved my parents.
Some people revisit their grief because they had really conflicted
relationships with their parents. Am I surprised they were talking
about the Five Stages? No, because Taylor Swift just announced
that her whole album was based on the Five Stages
(13:31):
of grief. So yeah, it's everywhere, but it's misunderstood, and
unfortunately it's slammed by people who want to say that
it was intended to be linear. It was never intended
to be linear. And to the day she died, Elizabeth
Cooper Ross really resented a lot of people taking her
(13:51):
work and making it something it wasn't. It was sad
to her. So let's just change that. Okay, let's see
everybody commit in the world. It wasn't meant to be
stages that follow one after another, but instead it's an
opportunity to talk about it.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yeah, and I reminded him of that last night too.
I'm like, remember, this is not, as Katie Easmon would say,
this is not intended to be line near I mean,
I kind of thing. It was pretty funny.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
He goes, Okay, oh my got it.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
And yeah, I was telling that we were doing a
show on this and all that stuff. So it was
a It's an interesting moment to help. The other question
I have for you is just reading these books. This
is gonna be choppy. Sorry. You know, if somebody passes
away and you hand them a book, that is probably
not the right moment. Perhaps, I don't know. But the
(14:43):
but the second part of the question is what if
you've read these five books in like the little tucked
in there as like best ever you tools in your
toolbox kind of thing, so that when you do encounter something,
you know how to navigate just a little bit better,
even if it's terribly sad, horrible and all these things.
But maybe something somewhere will help you. I don't know
(15:05):
that's silly or not.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
No, it's not silly. I think grief books are not
meant to be handbooks. I believe very strongly that grief
books or books you pick up at different times in
your life, throughout your life man search for meaning. I said,
I've read it fifty times. Okay, whenever I go through
any kind of major or even minor change transformation, I
(15:30):
look for my losses and I pick up that book
and I just go through and I say, oh, yeah,
that's right. I need to be reminded of this. I
also from my book develop these cards that are these
prompting questions that people can get that allow them to say, Okay,
I'm going to just grab a card and go what
(15:52):
am I thinking about today? And how does this card relate?
So anything like that. They are all tools for whenever
you decide you want to ask yourself certain questions about
what's most important in your life and how you want
to change, how you want to become better best ever you.
(16:12):
That's what these books are for. But they're not intended
to read them cover to cover anytime you go through
a loss. They have girls of wisdom throughout.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Okay, and then the third question I have for you is,
let's let's be any outside looking in. Let's let's just
say you know, scenario with me here a little bit.
You are friends or relative of somebody who just had
a major loss in their life, or whatever kind off
it could be. You know, a pet is a major
loss in someone's life, whatever it is, or whomever it is.
(16:48):
We say really silly things to people. Do you have
any words of wisdom? If your tongue tied and don't
know what to say to somebody, you know, you know,
you feel it, and you feel bad and you feel
awful for them, and go forth, But then out of
your mouth comes something that just isn't helpful or just
isn't what they need in that moment, maybe you think
it is. Or the second part of this is, you
(17:09):
know we're judging, like you know, it's been a year already,
aren't you done grieving yet? You know that those kinds
of statements get said to people and it's like, oh wow,
do you have any words of wisdom for how to
help out our fellow humans?
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yes, oh, I absolutely do. No platitudes. No platitudes, Never
say to someone it's gonna be okay, it'll get better.
That's not what people want to hear when they're hurting.
People want to hear I care, that's it. I don't
know what to say, but I care. I'm here for you.
(17:44):
I I hope you I you know, whatever you need
from me, let me know I'm here. They do not
want to hear it's going to be better, it's going
to be okay, it's fine, it's all right. It's not
all right. They're hurting. Don't we all do it? I've
done it, all of you have done it. Don't do it.
(18:05):
Try not to do it. Less is always more, be compassionate.
Compassion is not platitude, compassion. Is I care? That's if
you if you remember anything from this conversation, it's I care.
That's all you have to say. I don't know what
(18:26):
to say. I care.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, that's that's a lot better. And then I don't
know if I have more I always have more questions.
But you know, just for the sake of the listener,
maybe that's a good chunk of information for now. I
don't know. What do you think? Is there anything? Is
there anything else you want to cover before we go?
It's a it's a really much needed topic.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
It is, and it's interesting. I spoke at a rotary
group a few weeks ago and it was like the
most popular topic because we don't talk about it. Talk
about it. Be the one who brings it up, and
be curious. If you don't know what to say, ask
(19:08):
a question. Always ask questions. What do you need? I
don't know what to say, I don't know what to do. Ask.
Don't walk away, don't shy away, but be the brave one,
be the compassionate one, and talk about it.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I do have one more question at eilaid on the
just spark a question. Sorry, it's a always hard to
get off the phone, if you're again on the outside
looking in. How do we not judge other people's behavior
as they're grieving? For example, if somebody picks up excessive
drinking or super depressed, or you know, all the things
(19:50):
that go with just flat out being horribly sad. How
how do we know when someone's in trouble grieving?
Speaker 3 (20:01):
If someone's daily living is overwhelmed by grief, If they're
not eating, they're not sleeping, they're not taking care of themselves,
they're not able to function. Then you suggest that they
get help with their grief. It doesn't mean that they're
(20:22):
grieving incorrectly. It doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with them.
It just means they need a little extra help. But
we need to all stop judging people for how they
grieve because we're all different and our losses are all
related to our other losses, our previous losses, what we've
(20:43):
learned about grief, how we know how to speak and
about our emotions, our emotional intelligence. So many different factors
influence how we choose to grieve. Everyone needs to back
off on the judgment and instead compassionate caring approach is Hey,
(21:06):
I love you, I care about you. How can I
get you to help? You need to make this bearable?
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah? Do you find people need listening too? Like I
love you, I care about you, I'm here for you,
and my ears are open.
Speaker 3 (21:23):
Yes, absolutely, especially stories, you know, when someone has lost
something or someone that's important. What I hear all the
time is my friends are sick of hearing this. Be
the one who doesn't get sick of hearing it. Let
them tell the stories, Let them tell them over and
over and over. And one of the things that's really
(21:45):
important about understanding how the brain operates is your brain
operates that way. It needs to tell a story over
and over and over because it's trying to find a
place of HOMEO spasis where it says okay, I'm okay now,
because your your brain is saying to you, this is
(22:06):
not feeling good, this is not safe, this feels my
life feels threatened by this loss, and your brain is
trying to make sense of it. So telling story over
and over and over is perfectly natural.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Love it. Where okay? Do you want? How do you
want to end this? Should we repeat the books again
and then you share your websites? Or do people? What
do you think? Should we go just repeat the names
of the books some more time.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
Sure, Yes, Elizabeth Coogler Ross's Wheel of Life, my book
Uplifting Inspiring Stories of change, loss and growth, Mansards for
Meaning by Victor Frankel, Good Grief, and I don't have
the author right now.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Granger west I got I got you, I got you
covered there. Good greet Your companion for every Loss by
Granger E. Westburg. Did I get that right?
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Yeahnger, yes, and then percolate by Elizabeth and I and I.
My website is doctor Katieastman dot com and I welcome
comments people who want to work with me. I am
a grief counselor and a grief coach. I'm also an
executive coach, and I love to help people navigate loss,
(23:29):
change and growth through organizations, professional life, personal life. And
I just love to chat about this because I just
believe that the world could be good grievers. We'd have
a lot less more and a lot more peace and
a lot lot more compassion.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Hey man, all right, And then I want to say
one more thing. You are active on social media, and
social media is a big component of being an author
these days. So I just want to give a little
shout out again to Katie's book Uplift, Inspiring Stories of loss,
change and Growth inspired by the work of a doctor
Elizabeth Kobler Ross by doctor Katie Eastman. So, and it
(24:10):
is a great book. And I really love your budding Instagram.
I think it's d I don't know that I'll put
a link everybody but doctor Katie's Instagram. It's one to follow.
And then you're on Facebook and your website, and I
don't see you on Twitter, but you are on LinkedIn, correct,
make sure people can follow you. Yeah, I like LinkedIn
(24:32):
the best out of all of them. Everybody LinkedIn is
just fabulous. It sifts through all the nonsense and keeps
things super professional. So I love LinkedIn. But which social
media platform are you most comfortable with and most active on?
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Well, I actually am budding on like you said on Instagram.
I have started doing reels, which absolutely took me forever
to get the to do, but I started doing. And
one of the ways that I do them is I
stopped and I let go of having to always look
professionally polished. So you're gonna see me brushing my hair,
(25:13):
You're gonna see me in the car, You're gonna see
me in all different places because loss is everywhere all
the time, and so my inspiring thoughts they don't come
to me when I'm just looking polished. So yeah, I'm
trying to be real. I'm trying to be real on reels.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Good, trying to be real on reels. Well yeah, so far,
so good, and yeah I hear. Yeah, I'm on there
with often without makeup on and all sorts of stuff
so you can't see me in the pool waving anyway. Yeah,
I love it all right, everybody, Doctor Katie, thank you
for being here, thank you for sharing this fabulous list
of the five best books to recreate your life after loss.
(25:56):
And it's just fabulous, fabulous having you. It's always great
to hear from you, and I know people appreciate and
love these shows, so as as our best ever you
following goes, please make sure you share this show, support
our show. We still are yeah, you know we're grassroots
and we're definitely kind of still husband funded at moments,
(26:16):
so you get it, share, share us, Buy the books.
Maybe that'd be pretty cool, right, doctor Katie, I love you.
Go to Amazon and buy the books, right, buy the books,
leave a review. We're not shy here to ask for
what we need to continue to be authors and professionals.
But grab a copy of Uplifting. It's brand new, it's
(26:37):
in a ebook, paperback, and hardcover, so there's three ways
to get it. And you can get that book wherever
books are sold. And doctor Katie is always awesome chatting
with you. We got to go.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Thank you so much, Take care everyone.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
All right, everybody, take care, Thank you for listening.
Speaker 3 (27:00):
I'm so glad you tuned in.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Be brave, be bold, See you and remember to visit
us at besteveru dot com
Welcome to the Best EVERU Show with Elizabeth Hamilton Garino,
here to help you find success in all areas of
your life. The power is in your hands. Join our
network for free at bestveru dot com. And now here's
Elizabeth and doctor Katie.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Hi everybody, It's Elizabeth here with doctor Katie Eastman. Happy Monday.
I almost started the show off with a giant sneeze
Katie shoo. Hello whatever, right pretty early where you are?
So we are literally coasts apart. Like I'm in Maine
(00:40):
and you are in.
Speaker 3 (00:43):
I'm in the state of Washington in the San Juan
Islands yep.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
So here we are pretty early out there. But you know,
I love this five best blog on best ever you
dot com and I love I'm gonna love this episode
because I think this is going to help so many people.
So doctor Katie is here with us to give us
her recommendations for the five best books to recreate your
(01:11):
life after loss. Now, if you've know doctor Katie, have
worked with doctor Katie, follow doctor Katie and social media
or her websites, or have read her book, you know
that she is just an expert in this area and
she helps us navigate grief and loss, because Katie, those
are pretty profound emotional experiences that at some point all
(01:33):
of us go through. Correct yes.
Speaker 3 (01:37):
And one of the things I love about these books
that I'm going to talk about is they leverage loss
as an opportunity to learn how to be better, to
learn about how to be your best self. And that's
what best ever you is all about. And I want
people to recognize that loss is something to lean into,
(02:00):
something we go through on a massive basis when we
go through major loss, but also every day we have
smaller losses we can learn from. And I love this
opportunity to talk about that.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
You know, I met doctor Eastman years ago now, in
the midst of my father being very ill. My father
had a stroke in two thousand and four and was
they called him the ICU Warrior because what he survived
most people don't and so forth. And he passed away
in twenty eighteen, in October twenty eighteen, but he was
(02:38):
a stroke survivor for that long and he had so
many amazing things. And one of the things that I
learned from doctor Katie during that period of time, and
we wrote a book during that period of time too,
but I learned about doctor Katie's words pain into Purpose,
and that just completely resonated with me. Do you want
(02:58):
to explain a little bit before you get into the books?
You don't go on and on either, guys, everybody listening,
but do you want to explain what pain into purpose means?
Because it's such a profound way for me to look
at loss.
Speaker 3 (03:12):
It is to live a purposeful life, is to make
any experience into a meaning. What is the meaning behind
the experience? What can I learn from it that I
can help? That helps me identify what I value, what's
most important to me? So any loss that we have,
(03:34):
whether it be small or large, allows us the opportunity
to ask the question what's important to me? What am
I missing? What what do I need? And something like
a stroke, there are multiple losses that go with a stroke.
At every juncture, there's a choice point. How do I
(03:55):
cope with it? What do I do about it? What
can I do? Instead of what can't I do? So
it's looking at all of our experiences in life as
opportunities for growth.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Love it. My phone was listening in the background. It's
like I didn't quite get what you said, Like, don't worry,
doctor Katie, will explain it hang on so anyway, all right,
so here are five best books to recreate your life
after loss. Take it away, Katie.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
You know the first book is from my mentor. My
mentor happened to be doctor Elizabeth Koobler Ross, who is
the one that you probably don't know, but she is
the one that crafted the idea of the five stages
of grief. And I want to say right off the bat,
it was not intended to be linear. It was not
(04:48):
intended to be a pass through one moved to the
next book, to the next pass go. No, it was not.
It was intended as something that gives you a framework
to start a conversation about grief. The Wheel of Life
is Elizabeth's autobiography. She loved why because she took stories,
(05:11):
and those in those stories of her own life, she
identifies her own process of learning about grief, learning about loss.
You probably don't know this, but Elizabeth Coopler Ross, when
she was very very young, when the World War two started,
she went to the front lines of Poland. She didn't
(05:31):
just sit back and just let the war happen. She
got in there and started working to help and support people.
Her idea of creating meaning out of loss was frontline
work and she never stopped. Her entire life was about
leveraging loss into growth helping others do it, and it
(05:52):
gave her life meaning to keep her going in her purpose.
So that inspirited me to write my own book, Uplifting
and Uplifting is my own memoir as well as inspiring
people I have known and like Elizabeth. Through story, I
(06:13):
describe people's personal process of change, loss and growth, and
it is a process of identifying what it is in
your life that you miss the most, what you want
to change, how you want to go about changing, and
how you can grow the most to provide a more
(06:33):
meaningful life. And meaningful life is always as a component
of giving back to others. My book starts with a
quote by a young man who was dying, who was
eight years old, and he said that the purpose of
life is to make a difference, but we forget that
because we grow older. Now, that's out of the mouths
(06:56):
of babes, and that really is the framework for the
whole book, all of these inspiring stories, and at the
end of each chapter, I have prompting questions that help
you move forward in your own life by asking you
reflective questions about what you want, what you need, and
how you can change. So that's the second book. And
(07:18):
the third book is Man Search for Meaning by Victor Frankel.
Victor Frankel found himself in one of the most unimaginable
situations of suffering, and in the midst of that suffering
he discovered meaning making through and I won't give you
I won't tell you how it happens, but there is
a pivotal point where he realizes what the meaning of
(07:41):
life is and how we can all live differently, and
his growth through an unimaginable suffering living in a concentration
camp is It's a compelling story. It's a magical story.
There are pieces of this book that you will not
want to put down. I have read it, Oh my god.
(08:02):
I think I've read it about fifty times because every
time I read it, I get something else out of it.
And by the way, Victor Frankel and Elizabeth Hubler Ross
were friends, they were colleagues. And then the other book
is Good Grief. Good Grief is a little handbook. It's
a little book. It's packed with wisdom about how to grieve,
(08:25):
about what's most important when you're grieving. It's a pickup
when you need it kind of book when you're going
through any kind of loss, small or large. It's been
a classic for years and I go to it and
I tell people to go to it whenever they need
I pick up. They need to remind themselves that grief
(08:46):
is normal, grief is organic, grief is personal, and there's
no right way to do it, but this magical little
book will help you walk through that process. And then
the last one is Percoly, which is the book that
Elizabeth and I wrote together, and you'll find that Elizabeth's
story of her own losses related to having allergies. Food
(09:12):
allergies were numerous, and all of these different things that
happened to her in her life can be related back
to this concept of loss is opportunity for change and growth.
And it's a great book. We enjoyed writing it. It's
got commentary by me from a clinical perspective at the
end of each chapter or throughout the book, and you
(09:36):
will find that her story relates to all of the
other stories in these other books, which is a profound
opportunity to learn from loss.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Thank you for your list of books. There's amazing I
love your descriptions of everything too on percolate. I want
to add too that you know, I was fully comfortable
writing a book. You know, I really didn't know how
to write a book, and I I didn't know exactly
what to write about. And so one of the things
that was super important for me was having doctor Katie's
oversight throughout the whole process. I know she just said
(10:09):
that she you know, wrote a little bit at the
end of each chapter and kind of downplayed it, but
really doctor Katie was there for kind of every word,
like kind of what you really mean to say is this,
don't you you know kind of thing? And the brilliant
coffee metaphor that that book is wouldn't be what it
is without doctor Katie. So I just want to maybe
(10:30):
give some you know, props back over to Katie where
they should be, because you know, that was really hard
for me to do and I would have never done
that without you. So I that was a really good
moment in my life, like one of those moments where
another human being picks you up and goes, you know,
here's what you could be doing, and let me set
your path in this way and let me give you
(10:52):
a little boost and that's that's where that was for me.
So I'm always grateful for you there. I have a
couple of questions for you, if you can, do you
have a little bit of time?
Speaker 3 (11:00):
Sure?
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Okay? Sure. So I seem to notice that these conversations
around grief, loss, death, dying and so forth are not
so hidden anymore. Do you agree with that? Because like
last night, we had two of the four boys in
the pool with us and the conversation shifted to your
(11:22):
name because someone was going through an issue. And I said, well,
they need doctor Katie. And you know who doctor Katie is.
She studied under Elizabeth Coopler Ross and here's their books
and things like that. And he goes, yes, I feel
like my friend is in stage three, you know kind
of thing. And I said, oh wait a minute. You
know here's how that all ties together to your world,
your life and helping your friend. Do you agree? You know,
(11:46):
this is a twenty two year old kid talking yeah
about the five stages of grief.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
I love that. And what I want to remind everybody
is stage three doesn't mean that you've passed through one
and two. It means you're at stage three now and
you could go back to stage four tomorrow, and you
could go back to stage three next week and they
flip around. But yeah, let me give you a very
brief description. Okay, denial. Have you ever had an experience
(12:15):
where something's really hard and you go, oh God, this
just can't be happening. That's what denial is. Anger. Have
you ever been pissed off that something happened that dust
doesn't seem fair? Say you're anger? Have you ever ever
just like went, well, maybe if I do this, this
(12:35):
will get better. That's bargaining. And acceptance is not I
accept that this happened in my life. It's rosy and
peachy and I've moved on and it'll never bother me again. No,
it's an acceptance that you go back to over and
over and over in your lifetime. We revisit our grief.
(12:58):
Depression is something that happens throughout grief. I've missed my
parents terribly on Mothers and Father's Day, and.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
What do I do?
Speaker 3 (13:07):
I go into a day of depression. That's okay, I
revisit my grief. Why because I dearly loved my parents.
Some people revisit their grief because they had really conflicted
relationships with their parents. Am I surprised they were talking
about the Five Stages? No, because Taylor Swift just announced
that her whole album was based on the Five Stages
(13:31):
of grief. So yeah, it's everywhere, but it's misunderstood, and
unfortunately it's slammed by people who want to say that
it was intended to be linear. It was never intended
to be linear. And to the day she died, Elizabeth
Cooper Ross really resented a lot of people taking her
(13:51):
work and making it something it wasn't. It was sad
to her. So let's just change that. Okay, let's see
everybody commit in the world. It wasn't meant to be
stages that follow one after another, but instead it's an
opportunity to talk about it.
Speaker 2 (14:11):
Yeah, and I reminded him of that last night too.
I'm like, remember, this is not, as Katie Easmon would say,
this is not intended to be line near I mean,
I kind of thing. It was pretty funny.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
He goes, Okay, oh my got it.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
And yeah, I was telling that we were doing a
show on this and all that stuff. So it was
a It's an interesting moment to help. The other question
I have for you is just reading these books. This
is gonna be choppy. Sorry. You know, if somebody passes
away and you hand them a book, that is probably
not the right moment. Perhaps, I don't know. But the
(14:43):
but the second part of the question is what if
you've read these five books in like the little tucked
in there as like best ever you tools in your
toolbox kind of thing, so that when you do encounter something,
you know how to navigate just a little bit better,
even if it's terribly sad, horrible and all these things.
But maybe something somewhere will help you. I don't know
(15:05):
that's silly or not.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
No, it's not silly. I think grief books are not
meant to be handbooks. I believe very strongly that grief
books or books you pick up at different times in
your life, throughout your life man search for meaning. I said,
I've read it fifty times. Okay, whenever I go through
any kind of major or even minor change transformation, I
(15:30):
look for my losses and I pick up that book
and I just go through and I say, oh, yeah,
that's right. I need to be reminded of this. I
also from my book develop these cards that are these
prompting questions that people can get that allow them to say, Okay,
I'm going to just grab a card and go what
(15:52):
am I thinking about today? And how does this card relate?
So anything like that. They are all tools for whenever
you decide you want to ask yourself certain questions about
what's most important in your life and how you want
to change, how you want to become better best ever you.
(16:12):
That's what these books are for. But they're not intended
to read them cover to cover anytime you go through
a loss. They have girls of wisdom throughout.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Okay, and then the third question I have for you is,
let's let's be any outside looking in. Let's let's just
say you know, scenario with me here a little bit.
You are friends or relative of somebody who just had
a major loss in their life, or whatever kind off
it could be. You know, a pet is a major
loss in someone's life, whatever it is, or whomever it is.
(16:48):
We say really silly things to people. Do you have
any words of wisdom? If your tongue tied and don't
know what to say to somebody, you know, you know,
you feel it, and you feel bad and you feel
awful for them, and go forth, But then out of
your mouth comes something that just isn't helpful or just
isn't what they need in that moment, maybe you think
it is. Or the second part of this is, you
(17:09):
know we're judging, like you know, it's been a year already,
aren't you done grieving yet? You know that those kinds
of statements get said to people and it's like, oh wow,
do you have any words of wisdom for how to
help out our fellow humans?
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yes, oh, I absolutely do. No platitudes. No platitudes, Never
say to someone it's gonna be okay, it'll get better.
That's not what people want to hear when they're hurting.
People want to hear I care, that's it. I don't
know what to say, but I care. I'm here for you.
(17:44):
I I hope you I you know, whatever you need
from me, let me know I'm here. They do not
want to hear it's going to be better, it's going
to be okay, it's fine, it's all right. It's not
all right. They're hurting. Don't we all do it? I've
done it, all of you have done it. Don't do it.
(18:05):
Try not to do it. Less is always more, be compassionate.
Compassion is not platitude, compassion. Is I care? That's if
you if you remember anything from this conversation, it's I care.
That's all you have to say. I don't know what
(18:26):
to say. I care.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, that's that's a lot better. And then I don't
know if I have more I always have more questions.
But you know, just for the sake of the listener,
maybe that's a good chunk of information for now. I
don't know. What do you think? Is there anything? Is
there anything else you want to cover before we go?
It's a it's a really much needed topic.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
It is, and it's interesting. I spoke at a rotary
group a few weeks ago and it was like the
most popular topic because we don't talk about it. Talk
about it. Be the one who brings it up, and
be curious. If you don't know what to say, ask
(19:08):
a question. Always ask questions. What do you need? I
don't know what to say, I don't know what to do. Ask.
Don't walk away, don't shy away, but be the brave one,
be the compassionate one, and talk about it.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
I do have one more question at eilaid on the
just spark a question. Sorry, it's a always hard to
get off the phone, if you're again on the outside
looking in. How do we not judge other people's behavior
as they're grieving? For example, if somebody picks up excessive
drinking or super depressed, or you know, all the things
(19:50):
that go with just flat out being horribly sad. How
how do we know when someone's in trouble grieving?
Speaker 3 (20:01):
If someone's daily living is overwhelmed by grief, If they're
not eating, they're not sleeping, they're not taking care of themselves,
they're not able to function. Then you suggest that they
get help with their grief. It doesn't mean that they're
(20:22):
grieving incorrectly. It doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with them.
It just means they need a little extra help. But
we need to all stop judging people for how they
grieve because we're all different and our losses are all
related to our other losses, our previous losses, what we've
(20:43):
learned about grief, how we know how to speak and
about our emotions, our emotional intelligence. So many different factors
influence how we choose to grieve. Everyone needs to back
off on the judgment and instead compassionate caring approach is Hey,
(21:06):
I love you, I care about you. How can I
get you to help? You need to make this bearable?
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah? Do you find people need listening too? Like I
love you, I care about you, I'm here for you,
and my ears are open.
Speaker 3 (21:23):
Yes, absolutely, especially stories, you know, when someone has lost
something or someone that's important. What I hear all the
time is my friends are sick of hearing this. Be
the one who doesn't get sick of hearing it. Let
them tell the stories, Let them tell them over and
over and over. And one of the things that's really
(21:45):
important about understanding how the brain operates is your brain
operates that way. It needs to tell a story over
and over and over because it's trying to find a
place of HOMEO spasis where it says okay, I'm okay now,
because your your brain is saying to you, this is
(22:06):
not feeling good, this is not safe, this feels my
life feels threatened by this loss, and your brain is
trying to make sense of it. So telling story over
and over and over is perfectly natural.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Love it. Where okay? Do you want? How do you
want to end this? Should we repeat the books again
and then you share your websites? Or do people? What
do you think? Should we go just repeat the names
of the books some more time.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
Sure, Yes, Elizabeth Coogler Ross's Wheel of Life, my book
Uplifting Inspiring Stories of change, loss and growth, Mansards for
Meaning by Victor Frankel, Good Grief, and I don't have
the author right now.
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Granger west I got I got you, I got you
covered there. Good greet Your companion for every Loss by
Granger E. Westburg. Did I get that right?
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Yeahnger, yes, and then percolate by Elizabeth and I and I.
My website is doctor Katieastman dot com and I welcome
comments people who want to work with me. I am
a grief counselor and a grief coach. I'm also an
executive coach, and I love to help people navigate loss,
(23:29):
change and growth through organizations, professional life, personal life. And
I just love to chat about this because I just
believe that the world could be good grievers. We'd have
a lot less more and a lot more peace and
a lot lot more compassion.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Hey man, all right, And then I want to say
one more thing. You are active on social media, and
social media is a big component of being an author
these days. So I just want to give a little
shout out again to Katie's book Uplift, Inspiring Stories of loss,
change and Growth inspired by the work of a doctor
Elizabeth Kobler Ross by doctor Katie Eastman. So, and it
(24:10):
is a great book. And I really love your budding Instagram.
I think it's d I don't know that I'll put
a link everybody but doctor Katie's Instagram. It's one to follow.
And then you're on Facebook and your website, and I
don't see you on Twitter, but you are on LinkedIn, correct,
make sure people can follow you. Yeah, I like LinkedIn
(24:32):
the best out of all of them. Everybody LinkedIn is
just fabulous. It sifts through all the nonsense and keeps
things super professional. So I love LinkedIn. But which social
media platform are you most comfortable with and most active on?
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Well, I actually am budding on like you said on Instagram.
I have started doing reels, which absolutely took me forever
to get the to do, but I started doing. And
one of the ways that I do them is I
stopped and I let go of having to always look
professionally polished. So you're gonna see me brushing my hair,
(25:13):
You're gonna see me in the car, You're gonna see
me in all different places because loss is everywhere all
the time, and so my inspiring thoughts they don't come
to me when I'm just looking polished. So yeah, I'm
trying to be real. I'm trying to be real on reels.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
Good, trying to be real on reels. Well yeah, so far,
so good, and yeah I hear. Yeah, I'm on there
with often without makeup on and all sorts of stuff
so you can't see me in the pool waving anyway. Yeah,
I love it all right, everybody, Doctor Katie, thank you
for being here, thank you for sharing this fabulous list
of the five best books to recreate your life after loss.
(25:56):
And it's just fabulous, fabulous having you. It's always great
to hear from you, and I know people appreciate and
love these shows, so as as our best ever you
following goes, please make sure you share this show, support
our show. We still are yeah, you know we're grassroots
and we're definitely kind of still husband funded at moments,
(26:16):
so you get it, share, share us, Buy the books.
Maybe that'd be pretty cool, right, doctor Katie, I love you.
Go to Amazon and buy the books, right, buy the books,
leave a review. We're not shy here to ask for
what we need to continue to be authors and professionals.
But grab a copy of Uplifting. It's brand new, it's
(26:37):
in a ebook, paperback, and hardcover, so there's three ways
to get it. And you can get that book wherever
books are sold. And doctor Katie is always awesome chatting
with you. We got to go.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Thank you so much, Take care everyone.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
All right, everybody, take care, Thank you for listening.
Speaker 3 (27:00):
I'm so glad you tuned in.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Be brave, be bold, See you and remember to visit
us at besteveru dot com
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