MSI Press Blog

Chapter 14 Grief Guide: Tips and Validations  “I’ve developed a new philosophy— I only dread one day at a time.”  —Charles M. Schulz  This chapter provides tips to make it through each day, and to validate your experiences. As stated frequently in this book, grief is a powerful experience. You can participate in its power by using your own power to experience it and direct its course or by surrendering to its power. Using your power and surrendering are both important. Swimmers instinctively learn when they can swim, when they can dive into a huge wave, and when they can ride the wave. It is trial and error, and eventually inner knowledge and wisdom are attained, with tumbles and falls, and mouthfuls of sand along the way. Simply scroll through the topics to give yourself a boost. Or stop at one or two of them to read completely. Grief is natural to us as human beings. It may not feel good, but it is good. It is a good process. It is a powerful process. Each loss is uniq

  Chronic Grief How We can Help Ourselves and Others                                                                                                      Sponsored by Widowed Person Outreach – Helping and Healing, Washington, DC With Julie Potter, LCSW, Thursday, March 23 rd  - 7:00pm on zoom Julie Potter will discuss the clinical manifestations of chronic grief, the danger signs to watch for, and ways you can help yourself and others. In addition, there are other grieving processes that we may see as chronic but are still part of the journey: returning grief, traumatic grief, ambiguous grief, grief as we age, and global grief. In whatever form it takes for you (and it may sometimes be chronic grief), grief is natural to all of us, it helps us to incorporate our losses into our lives, it helps us to move forward into the future in a changed and sometimes completely new way, it helps us to remember, it is as powerful as love. It is love. Julie Potter is a certified social worker with ex

Extracted from photo by M. Katherine Shear, M.D. See original photo with words and blog article at aspire.com .   Whether they die in war, from illness, by suicide, or as a result end-of-life issues, their loss affects relatives, friends, acquaintances, neighbors, and colleagues in  devastating ways. The following books are gentle but helpful treatments of the issues of bereavement and grief. Damascus amid the War by Muna Imady Written by popular author, Muna Imady, whose book, Syrian Folktales, has delighted an uncountable number of readers outside of Syria, Damascus amid the War tells the very human story of the devolution of a society. The book containts 29 pre-war poins, vibrant with imagery of daily life in a robust Damascus. The 100 war poems that follow show the devastating affect on the people who navigate a daily existence after war came. This is a posthumous publication, containing Muna’s very last works and an introduction by her mother, Elaine Imady, author of Road to Dama

  Harnessing the Power of Grief is an enlightening book to help anyone process grief from numerous kinds of losses. It acknowledges that we all have a need for different ways to grieve, there’s no one way for everyone, and that many factors come into play. It is practical and spiritual, but not religious.   With that said, this book could be helpful to people of all faiths or none. This book is an “easy read” because it is so well written, and the chapters are short. I enjoyed Chapter 16,   which was helpful to me at a particular time in my life. I am looking forward to picking this book up again,   when other situations may arise that need my attention.          -Jackie Durham, Lay Chaplain For more information and commentary about Harnessing the Power of Grief and its author, click HERE .

  (picture from 9/11 Tribute Museum) In honor of 9/11 and all the sorrow it has engendered and sorrowful memories it raises each year at this time, we have placed Harnessing the Power of Grief on half-price sale (closest we can come to half-mast) for today and throughout the weekend in our webstore . May you find in this powerful book thoughts, suggestions, and support that help you turn sad memories into positive energy. For more posts on Harnessing the Power of Grief , click HERE .

  With cancer, it does happen. Many stories do not have happy endings, and some endings come sooner than we would like. MSI Press has published several books on bereavement. Broader in scope than the experiences of those who have lost loved ones to cancer, they share many, if not most, of the emotions of those who have grieve for those medical science could not save -- and they give hope and a wide range of options of how to go on and LIVE.  Harnessing the Power of Grief (Julie Potter) get the book or ebook In this book, Julie Potter traces back decades the research on understanding and coping with grief, which she describes as a natural human response to loss. Pulling from the work of Worden, the author prescribes four tasks for those in grief to use in managing their grief. She also walks the reader through special situations like tragic loss without warning. A book for those who are grieving and those who are walking with grievers. Read more posts about Julie and her book HERE . Lif

  Just released -- the hard cover version of the powerful Harnessing the Power of Grief  by Julie Potter. Other versions of this book include  paperback  and  Kindle . For more posts about  Harnessing the Power of Grief , including excerpts, click  HERE . For more posts about Julie Potter, click  HERE .

  MSI Press books have, historically, won many awards from a wide range of competitions. This is the first in a series of sharing the various awards that our books have earned. The first category is Best Indie Book Award. The following MSI Press books have been Best Indie Book Award Winners to date: A Theology for the Rest of Us (Arthur Yavelberg).  If God exists and is good, why is there evil? Avoiding such questions underlies the spiritual emptiness and anxiety in today's world. A Theology for the Rest of Us explores how to approach the divine through Eastern and Western religious traditions without dogma, challenging readers to "be you lamps unto yourselves."  This book also won the Literary Titan Silver Award. Read more about this book and its author  HERE . Andrew's Awesome Adventures with His ADHD Brai n (Kristin Wilcox & Andrew Wilcox).  T his book provides unique insights into ADHD behaviors and suggests highly pragmatic and successfully implemented stra

Released this week: Harnessing the Power of Grief (Potter). In this book, Julie Potter traces back decades the research on understanding and coping with grief, which she describes as a natural human response to loss. Pulling from the work of Worden, the author prescribes four tasks for those in grief to use in managing their grief. She also walks the reader through special situations like tragic loss without warning. A book for those who are grieving and those who are walking with grievers. See other MSI Press books on grief .

From the site: Julie Potter is a certified social worker who has experience in home care, hospice, nursing homes and hospitals. For 20 years, she turned her expertise toward coordinating a spousal bereavement program, as well as a hospital-based wellness program for people 60 and over. She has recently released the book “Harnessing the Power of Grief”. In this podcast we talk about being a social worker, burnout in the field, starting a spousal bereavement program, the death of her parents, her book, and grief dreams of her parents. Click HERE to listen to the podcast. For more posts about Julie and her book, Harnessing the Power of Grief , click HERE .  

  Harnessing the Power of Grief . Get it HERE . In this book, Julie Potter traces back decades the research on understanding and coping with grief, which she describes as a natural human response to loss. Pulling from the work of Worden, the author prescribes four tasks for those in grief to use in managing their grief. She also walks the reader through special situations like tragic loss without warning. A book for those who are grieving and those who are walking with grievers. Read more about Julie Potter and this book HERE .

  In her classic tome on death and dying, On Grief & Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief through the Five Stages of Loss , Elisabeth Kubler-Ross identifies five stages that those faced with shocking news associated with loss or potential loss go through: Denial (avoidance, confusion, elation, shock, fear) Anger (frustration, irritation, anxiety) Bargaining (struggling to find meaning, reaching out to others, telling one's story) Depression (overwhelmed, helplessness, hostility, fight) Acceptance (exploring options, new plan in place, moving on) Th subsequent works by Kubler-Ross, including those with colleagues, as well as works by others building on her research have pretty much confirmed these stages. How long it takes to go through any one of them depends upon the individual. Future Cancer Diary posts will dive deeper and personally into these stages. Grief is a complex and highly individual topic and intrinsically intertwined with cancer. MSI has published some helpful w

  Readers' Favorite recently reviewed Julie Potter's book, Harnessing the Power of Grief . Here are some excerpts:  - informative and inspiring  - I loved the format.  - If you are grieving from any kind of loss, like a family member's death or a divorce, then I highly recommend this book.   Read the full review HERE . To see more posts about Julie Potter and this book, click HERE .

  San Juan Books is the hybrid division of MSI Press LLC. It allows first-time writers to become published in a traditional way through the reduction of risk by sharing publication costs. All other publishing features are traditional in nature, and most SJB authors go on to be offered traditional contracts for their subsequent books. SJB publications are available as paperback, hard cover, and e-book versions. SJB authors' books very much hold their own against their contemporaries in the traditional publishing division. Indeed, a number of them have outsold their traditional compatriots. Today, San Juan Books presents author Julie Potter. Julie published  Harnessing the Power of Grief . Her book has earned 5-star reviews and won the Best Indie Book Award in the category of Grief and Bereavement. To see more posts about Julie and her book, click HERE .                                                          Sign up for the MSI Press LLC newsletter                           Follow