The Burn and Bloom: Finding Hope in Life's Messiness
In the debut full episode of From Here to Hope, host Eileen Walsh welcomes author and poet Cheryl Cantafio for an intimate conversation about navigating grief, finding purpose through storytelling, and reimagining a future built on grace and connection. Their discussion reveals profound insights about what it means to be fully human in a world that often seems simultaneously on fire and in bloom.
Cheryl opens the conversation with a powerful self-reflection: "I'm a menopausal woman who's watching the world burn and bloom." This visual metaphor becomes a touchstone throughout their discussion, symbolizing how destruction and renewal coexist in our lives. For Cheryl, the loss of her mother to pancreatic cancer shortly after the pandemic became a defining moment that ignited her next chapter. This life-altering loss led her to writing as a way to process grief, resulting in her debut poetry collection, "My Stay with the Sisters," which personifies grief and gratitude as sisters who provide different forms of comfort and understanding.
The conversation explores how grief fundamentally changes us, referencing psychologist Susan David's perspective that "Grief is the experience of being changed by loss." Through writing, Cheryl found a way to organize her difficult emotions and derive meaning from her experience. This creative outlet became not just personal therapy but a way to connect with others experiencing similar losses. The universal yet uniquely personal nature of grief emerges as a central theme – while losing a parent is a common human experience, each person's journey through that loss is distinctive and valid.
Beyond personal grief, the discussion addresses our collective grief following the pandemic and other societal challenges. Both Cheryl and Eileen acknowledge how we're all navigating a world that feels increasingly divided and uncertain. Cheryl observes that grace seems to have "evaporated" from our interactions, noting how people have become more concerned with being right than understanding different perspectives. This observation leads to a powerful vision for a better future – one where storytelling serves as a bridge that connects us through our shared humanity.
The transformative power of storytelling emerges as the conversation's hopeful core. Cheryl shares how vulnerability in sharing her poetry led to unexpected connections with readers who found solace and recognition in her words. She champions the importance of diverse voices and perspectives, emphasizing that each person's unique way of telling their story might be exactly what someone else needs to hear. As she puts it, "The future is as bright as the stories we tell and the truth that we provide."
The episode concludes with a moving reflection on friendship and the gift of human connection. Eileen acknowledges how Cheryl's unwavering support helped her stand up after her own difficult experiences, highlighting how meaningful relationships sustain us through life's challenges. Their conversation serves as a powerful reminder that hope isn't about perfection or having all the answers – it's about embracing the messiness of being human while extending grace to ourselves and others along the way.
This inaugural episode sets the tone for the podcast series, establishing it as a space for authentic conversations about finding hope not as a destination but as a direction forward, regardless of where listeners currently find themselves.
