Don: Reality.
Grief-—-having an emotionally broken heart—---is the natural process of coming to terms with the way things are now compared to the way they were. You can expect things to be a certain way, for example, "We will always love living in this house." Then, reality happens, and you have to move because of financial changes. "This is the best dog we will ever have," and then reality happens: eventually, you get a new dog and feel torn up inside. "We will be together forever." Then, a partner suddenly dies. Grief is the natural process of accepting the difference between expectations and the reality of what occurs.
You will know where you are grieving as you note the degree to which events happening right now feel like now instead of being compared to the past. Another indication of where you are grieving is the degree to which you have imaginary conversations about what should, could, or would have been happening instead of what is occurring. Simply, the degrees between what your mind expects or insisting that isn't so.
Four specific reactions hold the pain of grief in place: (1) unresolved or unfelt resentments, (2) regrets, (3) appreciation, and (4) unexpressed emotions. The Grief Recovery Method focuses on transforming resentments into actions of forgiveness, regrets into actions of apology, appreciation into actions of expression, and unexpressed emotions into actions of acceptance.
Through this process, the mind's expectations lose their grip on your awareness, and you become free to see and work with reality--it is what it is--in your daily moments.
The Grief Recovery Method takes you through the action steps to loosen the grip of imaginary conversations of unreal expectations and free your attention to what is happening in your life. The resolution of grief is being more accessible to be present in what is happening in your life.