#126: Dara Kurtz (When letting go of grief lets you move on)

For 20 years, Dara Kurtz had a successful career in finance. “It was based on society’s definition of success—done with dollar signs and size of house.”  At age 42, the words “you have cancer” stopped her dead in her tracks.  “After that I changed. I decided I [didn’t] want to go back. [Finance] didn’t speak to my heart.” Despite resistance from her husband, Kurtz quit her job and began to write a blog. “I didn’t know what I was doing....I didn’t know how to get from point A to point B.”  Kurtz had always been a journal writer, penning her thoughts about the day to her daughters and placing her journal on their pillows to read. They would write back.  “Going through breast cancer, that stopped. None of us were in that space to communicate,” she says.  Years later she rediscovered the journals tucked away in a desk drawer. Also uncovered, a Ziplock bag of letters from her mom and grandmother.  “I was blown away by how much wisdom they contained. I had a conversation with my mom 20 years after her death. I sat and sobbed... I could feel her personality and hear her words….I knew after reading those, she would have never wanted me to be stuck in grief or let her death impact my life. It was permission to go on with my life.” From that insight, her second book, “I Am My Mother’s Daughter: Wisdom on Life, Loss, and Love” was born. (https://amzn.to/3qkV0pY)