Facebook COO Cheryl Sandberg took to the social platform today to express her thoughtful meditations on the untimely loss of her husband, David Goldberg, who passed away while on a family vacation in Mexico last month. Sandberg had just completed the Jewish tradition of sheloshim, the first 30 days of mourning a loved one.
Below are 7 poignant highlights from her statement:
- "I think when tragedy occurs, it presents a choice. You can give in to the void, the emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even breathe. Or you can try to find meaning."
- "I have gained a more profound understanding of what it is to be a mother, both through the depth of the agony I feel when my children scream and cry and from the connection my mother has to my pain."
- "I have lived thirty years in these thirty days. I am thirty years sadder. I feel like I am thirty years wiser."
- "Real empathy is sometimes not insisting that it will be okay but acknowledging that it is not."
- "I have learned how ephemeral everything can feel—and maybe everything is. That whatever rug you are standing on can be pulled right out from under you with absolutely no warning."
- "I have learned to ask for help—and I have learned how much help I need."
- "I have learned gratitude. Real gratitude for the things I took for granted before—like life. As heartbroken as I am, I look at my children each day and rejoice that they are alive. I appreciate every smile, every hug. I no longer take each day for granted."
Read the post in it's entirety here.