Expression Beyond Words
Navigating the complexities of grief and emotional healing often requires an approach that goes beyond the everyday modality of “talking about it.”
Talking about grief, though important, often doesn’t reach the places that are yearning to be seen, held, and integrated. This is why talk therapy—while helpful in certain ways—is sometimes not enough on its own.
One way to understand this is by looking at the differences between the left and right hemispheres of the brain.
How the Body Expresses When the Mind Cannot
We live in a largely left-brain–dominant culture, one that tends to worship at the altar of the rational, the sensical, and the linear. The left hemisphere is more involved in language and verbal labeling, linear time (this happened, then that happened), and logical sequencing, among other functions.
The right hemisphere, on the other hand, is more involved in feeling, sensing, intuition, creativity, and non-linear experience. It plays a key role in sensory awareness, emotional tone, body-based knowing, and relational attunement.
Traumatic experiences—including grief—are often encoded in parts of the brain that do not primarily use words. Especially when we are overwhelmed, the nervous system prioritizes survival over language, storing experience as sensation, emotion, and implicit memory rather than narrative.
Because of this, healing frequently requires forms of expression that meet the body and emotional brain where they are—through movement, sound, imagery, touch, and relational presence—rather than relying on language alone.
Below are two examples of how grief can be met through expression beyond words.
Meeting Grief through Touch & Movement
I once worked with a client who had been through a gauntlet of recent deaths and losses. Her grief felt heavy, and it was difficult for her to keep moving through her life.
When she lay down on the table, I asked where she felt the grief. “In my heart,” she said, as tears began to well. I placed a hand over her heart and invited her to breathe into that space. Then, I invited her to gently tighten the muscles around her chest, holding the tension while continuing to breathe. As she released, more tears flowed. Something softened. We stayed there for a while.
Later, she noticed the grief in her legs—heavy, she said, like tree trunks. I moved to her legs and, with light, present touch, invited her to guide her awareness there, slowly tensing and releasing the muscles.
She became immersed in the image of the tree. “It’s life-giving,” she said, realizing that the stuckness she had felt still carried vitality within it.
After the session, she returned amazed at how much lighter she felt—both physically and emotionally. The weight of the grief had shifted, and she felt more able to move through her life with ease.
Art as a Bridge
Another client was processing grief following the loss of a family member. The grief felt nearly impossible to access through words; trying to talk about it left her feeling shut down.
In a virtual session, I invited her to gather art supplies from her home. We had already located where the grief lived in her body—her chest.
I invited her to imagine that place extending into her hands and onto the paper, allowing the grief to express itself with no right or wrong way to do it. I set a timer for fifteen minutes, and we sat quietly as she painted.
When the timer ended, I invited her to look at the painting and notice what arose in her body. Then I asked her to write down any words the image evoked, weaving them directly into the artwork.
This process supports integration between verbal and nonverbal systems in the brain, helping bridge sensory-emotional experience with language.
By the end of the practice, she shared that the grief felt lighter in her body—and that she felt a little more able to talk about it.
Inviting Your Grief to Speak
If you are grieving, here are a few gentle ways to invite expression beyond language:
Create a three-song playlist that resonates with your experience of grief. Allow your body to move—or be moved—by the music.
Set aside 20 minutes to create art: painting, drawing, or collage. Invite the grief to be the one who creates.
Offer your body touch. Notice where you feel the grief and allow your hand to rest there, breathing into that place.
Go into a forest or natural landscape and create a grief mandala. Let the grief lead the way as you mindfully gather natural objects and arrange them into a mandala or sculpture on the earth.
If you are seeking support around grief and emotional healing, you don’t have to do it alone. I offer holistic coaching to support grief, anxiety, and life transitions. If you are looking for a supportive and transformational container to hold you well in your process, check out my 3 month program, The Embodied Path.
