“What first started as a necessity of what I was going through, really evolved into this larger calling and feeling like, Why stop here? There’s so much to uncover.” ~ Brianna Hernández Hi! Guest host Julia Mark here. In this third (and final!) installment of the Doors to Grief miniseries, we’ll hear from the artist, curator, educator, and death doula Brianna Hernández. It was a joy to talk with Brianna about her journey, and what motivated her to create art around grief and dying. While our soc...
Mar 15, 2025•39 min
“Your body already knows how to ride the waves. I think we’ve gotten so used to only trusting our minds and not trusting our bodies to do what’s good for them, and I think our body has a deep knowing.” ~ Erin Collins Hi! Guest host Julia Mark here. In this second episode of the Doors to Grief miniseries, we hear from the insightful Erin Collins about her journey to becoming a breathwork guide and sound healer. Erin Collins offers both a scientific and spiritual perspective on how breathwork can ...
Feb 27, 2025•31 min•Season 5Ep. 105
“In this movie you've got this guy who's, by all accounts, trying really hard to just keep everything together...That ends up being a much more potent thing for communicating this message than something that's more directly trying to address grief.” - Andrew Clinnin Hi, Julia Mark here. I'm honored to share the first installment of my Breathing Wind miniseries called “Doors to Grief.” In this episode, I talk with Andrew Clinnin about how Asteroid City —a visually playful Wes Anderson film—became...
Feb 11, 2025•28 min•Season 5Ep. 104
“We need to stay open to this very natural response to how we experience the big losses changes in our lives. And if we can do that — it doesn’t come at once, it doesn’t come in big ahas — but there there is transformation, and there’s healing and wisdom and creative inspiration and new perspectives. There’s so much that we have access to that we may never be moved by or never encounter if we avoid or shut down our grief.” ~ Naila Francis In this farewell episode, Sarah and Naila revisit the emo...
Jan 27, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Season 5Ep. 103
“I've been very present to the fact that there have been these huge, huge joys. But every time I meet a huge joy, it just drops me deeper into the grief, which is part of what I always say about grief. The more you open yourself to the joy, the more you open yourself to the grief and vice versa. So that kind of feels like where my journey has been this summer.” ~ Naila Francis In this episode, inspired by our conversation with grief activist, author and podcast host Lisa Keefauver, we reflect on...
Oct 08, 2024•36 min•Season 5Ep. 102
“So if our narrative understood that it's emotional and cognitive and physical and spiritual and relational, how might we attend to ourselves differently? How might we attend to other people in our lives differently? How, if we believed it as a culture, would we institute policies and systems that attended to grief differently?” - Lisa Keefauver In this episode, we talk with Lisa Keefauver, grief activist, author and podcast host of “Grief is a Sneaky B***h,” about grief as a multidimensional ex...
Sep 24, 2024•57 min•Season 5Ep. 101
“As a death midwife, one of the things many of us do is work on legacy projects with people who are dying and their loved ones, and yet sometimes I think it's really not up to us to know what our legacy is. I can hope it will be this particular thing, but at the end of the day, the people we leave behind are the ones really making the meaning and interpreting our lives for us.” ~Naila Francis Welcome to our celebratory 100th episode of the Breathing Wind Podcast, where we reflect on some of the ...
Apr 02, 2024•35 min•Season 5Ep. 100
“I think some of the clearest decisions I've ever made have come in the aftermath of grief.” ~Naila Francis In this episode, we look back on our enchanting and insightful conversation with Mara June, an educator, facilitator, community weaver, writer, caregiver, death doula and community herbalist. Reflecting on her deep belief in the creative energy inherent in grieving, we discuss grief’s transformative power in our lives and some of the ways we’ve been creatively called to change how we show ...
Mar 19, 2024•40 min•Season 5Ep. 97
"In allowing ourselves to feel our grief, or to feel present with whatever is coming up for us — not excluding our joy — that's actually helping us to feel more deeply in all of these areas in our life. And I think that is part of the enchantment piece for me...When we feel more deeply, then we can also feel enchantment and wonder and awe and all of these other things as well." ~ Mara June In this episode, death doula, community herbalist, educator and writer Mara June invites us to consider the...
Mar 05, 2024•49 min•Season 5Ep. 97
In this episode, inspired by our powerful conversation with communal grief tender and song circle leader, Alexandra “Ahlay” Blakeley, we discuss our own experiences with song circles and how they impacted us — as well our thoughts on community grief spaces in general, and how grief support is so much broader than the stereotypical basement circle for story sharing that people are used to. We share our “safe” places to cry and reflect on the varied responses we receive to working in the grief spa...
Feb 20, 2024•51 min•Season 5Ep. 97
“I believe that community singing, which I define as, when a group of folks come together and they sing songs together that are easy enough lyrically and easy enough melodically to be taught in the moment. And then we sing these songs, which I personally call spells or prayers together that are amplified and help put us in some sort of altered state through the process of singing these songs, it's a technology for belonging. It's a technology for metabolizing grief.” ~ Alexandra Blakely (AKA ahl...
Feb 06, 2024•1 hr 8 min•Season 5Ep. 94
“When I was on the Camino, there was this moment when I was spreading [my dad’s] ashes and just talking to him and I realized that was why I was there, that he wanted me there. And I felt so connected to him, and at that time I remember thinking, ‘This is so simple. I can turn off everything and go out for a walk in the woods and be connected with my dad.’” ~ Sarah Davis In this episode, recorded during the holiday season, we debrief our Christmases: how we spent them, how our grief showed up an...
Jan 23, 2024•36 min•Season 5Ep. 95
“If we have the intention to live with love and compassion, we can handle anything. We are amazing beings, we humans. We can also really screw up badly, but if we have the intention to live with love and compassion, it changes what we do and how we are.” ~ Susan J. Tweit In her memoir, Bless the Birds: Living with Love in a Time of Dying , Susan J. Tweit, an award-winning writer and plant ecologist, recounts her journey accompanying her husband toward the end of his life, following a diagnosis w...
Jan 09, 2024•36 min•Season 5Ep. 94
“Our Christmas lights now are all blue since Ron left. I want to honor the day and the spirit of it, but the bright, shining twinkle lights and jingle bells don't speak to my heart. When the blue lights are turned on, the room is bathed with a lovely blue, which creates exactly the right atmosphere to sink into the holy yet joyful season.” ~Marge Sexton In this holiday compilation episode, we offer a glimpse of others’ experiences of the holidays after loss. Sarah shares her journey with grief d...
Dec 19, 2023•26 min•Season 5Ep. 93
"If you're willing to open to the journey and if you're willing to really allow yourself to feel your grief and have practices to engage it, it does shape-shift over time. It does become softer. It does become something that you can carry maybe with a little more...lightness and grace." ~Naila Francis In this episode, we delve into varied facets of grief and loss, including the transformative potential that grief holds. Reflecting on our conversation with poet, dream yogi and grief guide, Ning T...
Dec 05, 2023•42 min•Season 5Ep. 92
“Just having that dream visit, even just one visit, can nourish somebody and really give them the courage to go into their grief because it's not enough to have those dreams. It doesn't negate the pain of their physical absence. You still need to do the hard work. You still need to go into your grief and really unwind all of those stories and all of the different things that are present, but being able to connect with them in that way nourishes you. You don't feel so hopeless anymore.” - Ning Te...
Nov 21, 2023•51 min•Season 5Ep. 90
“I think runners, by nature, have this environment of excitement and energy and support just built into a race. It doesn't matter how fast you're running. You're just all together and you're all part of this big happy bubble of energy. It's always a feeling of belonging.” — Sarah Davis In this week’s episode, we reflect on our conversation with hip-hop artist, educator, facilitator and activist Dwight Dunston. His faithfulness in honoring his grief moved us both, as well as his openness to feeli...
Nov 07, 2023•45 min•Season 5Ep. 90
“I have never been more practiced in honoring my grief, and I truly have never had more gratitude and joy and reverence for life…When you really feel into grief, my experience is you’re able to love and feel a part of the life force that moves through all living things.” ~ Dwight Dunston In our season 5 opener, artist, educator and activist Dwight Dunston reflects on his first big love and loss, the death of his grandmother Mamie Donald, when he was 10. He shares how that grief continues to shap...
Oct 24, 2023•39 min•Season 5Ep. 89
In this bonus episode, we reflect on our conversation with Dan Fischer of One Last Wave, an amazing project that invites grievers to memorialize their loved ones by having their names etched on a surfboard that Dan takes out to sea. This episode highlights the kind of exclusive content we share on Patreon. It also covers so much ground, as we muse on the vulnerability of men in grief, how time in nature opens us to feel our grief and to more fully inhabit our wildness, and what grief has taught ...
Sep 12, 2023•34 min•Season 4Ep. 88
“Having an established creative practice helped me in ways I would have never known, and I think it’s the greatest gift my younger self gave me now.” ~ Rosemmery Wahtola Trommer This month, we’re offering you a feed swap. This is the second episode we’re swapping. For the first episode in this swap, check out Episode Swap! Emerging Form Discusses Creativity in Times of Trauma . Emerging Form, co-hosted by poet Rosemmery Wahtola Trommer and journalist Christie Aschwanden, is a podcast about creat...
Aug 24, 2023•38 min•Season 4Ep. 87
“Grief cracks you open. It makes us vulnerable… I feel vulnerable.” ~ Christie Aschwanden “A creative practice prepared me for grief.” ~ Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer This month, we’re offering you a feed swap. Emerging Form, co-hosted by poet Rosemmery Wahtola Trommer and journalist Christie Aschwanden, is a podcast about creative process. These two friends cover everything from the business of creativity, to cultivating openness and pleasure, to meeting failure as part of the process. Whether they...
Aug 10, 2023•28 min•Season 4Ep. 86
“[Grief] breaks us open, which we may not expect. There's some allowing that has to happen. I'm going to allow this to break me open, to grow a new heart, to connect with people in a more meaningful way, to live a life that's more authentic. I think the breaking open, while it can be hard and scary, speaks to grief as a generative force and the ways it can deepen and enrich your life.” - Naila Francis In this week’s episode, our season finale, we reflect on our conversation with Grammy-nominated...
Aug 01, 2023•57 min•Season 4Ep. 85
“It's healthy, I believe, to touch these places. I don't know how you can touch your love place without touching your grief place. They're both there. They're layered on top of each other and your joy place. They're all there, and when we shut down, we shut down all the good stuff, too.” ~Nnenna Freelon In this week’s episode, Grammy-nominated jazz vocalist Nnenna Freelon takes us on a journey through her many realms of grief. As compelling a storyteller as she is a performer, Nnenna candidly re...
Jul 15, 2023•1 hr 11 min•Season 4Ep. 84
"Grief, for me, has been about following intuition. It's been about following the feelings. I don’t know what they're saying to me. I wish I knew, but I kind of have given up trying to figure it out. And I'm just letting the grief coexist with me, and that's where we're at.” ~Sarah Davis In this week’s episode, we explore grief as it’s surfaced — or hasn’t — in the days leading up to Father’s Day and how challenging it can be to make space for the grief over one parent when caring for another. I...
Jun 20, 2023•44 min•Season 4Ep. 83
"Something that I didn't have any sense of before...was happiness was up here and grief was down here, where it's really not. It's a universal human experience to lose. If we can recognize that we're all going through similar things and be able to share that, I think it's very healing." ~ Dan Fischer In this week’s episode, Dan Fischer reflects on his journey of grieving the deaths of his dad and his dog Rudy, his best friend of 15 years. He recalls how a moment of vulnerability unexpectedly cre...
Jun 08, 2023•53 min•Season 4Ep. 82
“I think with any person's life, there's a lot of joy. There's a lot of beauty, there's a lot of love and hope, but there's also a lot of grief and tragedy and, and sorrow.” ~ Christina Vo In this week’s episode, Sarah reflects on many of the conversations she had in Season 1, as well as a few from Seasons 2-3, contributed by guests who reflect on their grief over the death of their moms. As expected with such a significant loss, the grief is layered — touching on identity, memory, connection an...
May 14, 2023•35 min•Season 4Ep. 81
“Some people think solitude and loneliness are the same thing, but to me solitude is almost this soulful, nourishing kind of quality that I need, [that] we need, and especially when we're grieving.” — Naila Francis In this episode, we reflect on our earlier conversation with Sarah Chaves . We explore why silence and solitude are essential for both of us on our grief journeys and reflect on being the grief-go-to-girl in many of our relationships and how that can be both challenging and gratifying...
May 02, 2023•41 min•Season 4Ep. 80
“Grief is ever present. It's not like this little cloud that hangs above my head. That's not it. It's the fact that it is a lens through which I view the world and all my relationships constantly. I cannot take off that lens.” ~ Sarah Chaves In this week’s episode, author Sarah Chaves brings us a rich and stirringly honest conversation about grieving as a mom, daughter and writer who began crafting her story of loss right after her dad died. She walks us into a deeply cathartic moment on that wr...
Apr 18, 2023•46 min•Season 4Ep. 79
“Leaning into love is leaning into grief,” — Sarah Davis In this week’s episode, co-hosts Naila and Sarah muse on our conversation with poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer and all she gifted us with her openness and generosity. Inspired by how she’s being guided by her word of the year — “hello” — we share our own words for 2023. We also talk about our willingness, and protectiveness, when it comes to publicly inviting others into our own grief journeys. As we continue to encourage listening to these...
Apr 04, 2023•48 min•Season 4Ep. 78
“I really trust life itself to rise up and help me meet the things that I cannot control. I trust love to show up and help me meet the things that I cannot control.” ~ Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer In this week’s episode, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer cries and laughs her way through an expansive and nourishing conversation about grief, creativity and love. We talk with her about poetry as a practice for meeting each moment, her unfolding journey through devastating loss and where those experiences of c...
Mar 21, 2023•52 min•Season 4Ep. 77
