Grief, Growth & Grace
Embracing Loss and Healing Forward: An Interview with Cindy Dhalai on Healing Across Cultures
Cindi Dhalai, the author of Grief Is a Price You Pay for Love, shares her powerful journey through grief and healing, reminding us that grief is not a problem to solve but a process to embrace. In this powerful and very candid interview episode of Life Made Easier, I sat down with Cindy Dhalai, a former teacher, author of Grief is a Price to Pay for Love, and a woman of remarkable insight and resilience.
Cindy shares her journey through loss, her multicultural upbringing between Guyana and the U.S., and how navigating religion, culture, and family dynamics helped her find healing. Together, we explore grief as a spiritual teacher, the power of storytelling, and what it means to return to your authentic self, no matter where you come from.
A must-listen for anyone navigating the complexities of identity, healing, or grief.
“There are different sectors of Christianity, Pentecostal, Catholic, Roman Catholic, Anglican, and then there’s Islam, Hinduism, and more. But overall, people here understand and accept each other’s religions. Yes, some are strict or dogmatic, but where Cyndee grew up, there is a wide-growing population of interfaith friendships, marriages, and shared communities.
Faith vs Religion
Cyndee explains, “Faith gives you a broader scope, you know? Because sometimes, it’s by learning about other beliefs that you find little pieces that fit into you”. Faith isn’t one-size-fits-all. Someone once asked me what I believed in. I told them, faith is just having a sense of knowing of trusting that something greater than us exists.
We didn’t create the oceans or the sky. We were born into a ready-made world. You didn’t choose your eye color, your hair well, okay, now people can with surgery, but initially? We don’t get to pick. Yet we each have a mind, distinct, powerful, different from the brain.
That’s faith. You breathe, but can you see air? Do you command your lungs to fill with oxygen? Your body knows what to do. That’s faith in motion.
Look at the trees. A leaf falls when it’s ready—who tells it when to sprout or when to drop? No one. That’s the unseen intelligence that governs life. Whether you call it God or something else, logic tells you: “There’s something greater than us in control.”
Be Still And Listen
She once wrote something, spontaneously:
“Heaven help me, I cry out loud, from a missed colossal crowd. How can one voice be heard? Will anyone heed the spoken word? Maybe just one.”
Sometimes that’s all you need, just one person who listens. Just one person you reach. You don’t need to fight for attention in a crowd. If you can help even one person, that’s enough. But that person has to be you first.
I shared with Cyndee that’s something I had to learn. To take responsibility for my own life. To say, this is my life, about me, for me, and because of me.
People say that’s selfish. I say, no, it’s necessary. Because when I lived my life for everyone else, and I fell apart, those same people disappeared. I sat there one day and realized: I had no idea who I am. When the realization of “You haven’t built anything inside” hits you, it hits hard. That was terrifying.
So, yes, it’s okay to be selfish sometimes. To focus on yourself. You matter. You deserve the same compassion you give to everyone else. It took me until I was 50 to understand that. I call it “healing forward.” Before I could do that, I had to take the trash out. All the old stories, identities, and expectations.
I had to clear space. It was like God hit the reset button. Everything burned, everything flooded. He just cleared it all. And then I could begin. That’s when “Healing Forward” started.
For you, maybe the foundation was already there. A calm faith, a sense of belonging. For me, I had to rebuild everything. I had to burn it all down to start again.
Challenging Contradictions
Cyndee went on to share, “I grew up different. I asked questions. I challenged contradictions. People didn’t always like that. I remember being a kid. There was a blind neighbor, and I wanted to know what it was like to be blind. I closed my eyes and tried walking down the stairs. I fell. Cut my head. There was blood everywhere. People were angry. “Why would you do that?” I just said, “I wanted to know what it felt like.”
That’s always been me. Curious. Empathetic. Wanting to see through someone else’s eyes. And I learned, if I tell the truth, if I’m just me, I don’t have to pretend. I don’t have to lie. I just get to be real.”
Choosing Myself Meant Losing My Family
“I chose to be me and that meant walking away from everything I knew.” When I was 21, I made a choice that changed my life. I fell in love with a man I had known since primary school. We were both teachers, reconnecting as adults, and we decided to marry. But my parents didn’t approve because he wasn’t the right religion. After all, they expected an arranged marriage. They gave me a choice: him or them.
And I chose myself. I chose love.
I was disowned and never heard from my family again.
Not my parents. Not my seven siblings.
It has been over 37 years.
Did it hurt? Absolutely.
Was it hard? Yes.
Would I change my decision? Not for a second. “If you put me in a position where I have to choose, I will choose myself. I will stand by that.” I built a beautiful life with my husband. We were married for 33 years. We raised two wonderful children. We built our home.
We faced struggles, like any couple, but we did it together. And when he passed away, I had no regrets about the life we created. His family welcomed me for a while, but that changed after his death. A relative once asked me, “Why didn’t you die instead?” It was cruel. It hurt. And still, I didn’t let it destroy me.
“Sometimes you have to let go of everyone—because the right ones will return, and the wrong ones will fall away.”
This kind of loss teaches you who you are. It teaches you to walk alone. It teaches you that healing often means choosing peace over connection, and wholeness over tradition. And to anyone who’s ever had to make that impossible choice: “You are not alone. You are not broken. You are brave.”
Family Rejection, Resilience, And Healing
This is a powerful, heartfelt reflection on family rejection, resilience, and healing. Especially in the face of cultural and generational challenges. It touches on so many universal experiences of feeling ostracized, misunderstood, and having to choose self-love and peace over continuing to fight for acceptance.
- The pain and confusion of family rejection
- The courage it takes to choose peace and self-acceptance
- The power of forgiveness, even when reconciliation doesn’t happen
- The hope and strength you can offer to others going through similar experiences
- How love itself requires courage because it makes us vulnerable to loss
This deeply heartfelt and powerful conversation beautifully captures the raw, messy, and deeply human experience of grief. How it intertwines with love, loss, faith, and healing. Grief is one of the most complex and deeply personal experiences we face in life. It’s not just about the absence of someone or something; it’s about the love that was there and what happens when that love feels lost.
Understanding Grief Beyond Loss
“When you lose someone, it’s not love that is gone,” Cyndee explains. “What you really feel is the loss of the person.” Whether it’s the death of a loved one, a lost job, a broken relationship, or even losing a pet, grief is the emotional cost of loving deeply.
Her book, written under the pseudonym Faye Aliyan, explores this messy, raw, and unfiltered emotional journey. It’s not a clinical manual or a step-by-step guide. It’s a heartfelt story about facing grief head-on.
The Reality of Grief: A Rollercoaster of Emotions
Grief is unpredictable. One day you might feel strong and able to carry on, and the next, overwhelmed by waves of sadness. It’s a cycle of ups and downs that can leave you feeling like you’re spiraling.
Cyndee shares how she initially believed she was managing her grief, only to have it come crashing down later, forcing her to confront the pain she had been avoiding. This confrontation, though painful, was necessary to begin healing.
Creating Space for Grief and Healing
One of the most important steps Cyndee emphasizes is creating space for grief. to acknowledge it, to feel it fully, and to accept it. You can’t erase grief or “cut it out” like a scar; the memories and feelings remain. But by accepting the loss and the emotions that come with it, you create room for healing.
“You have to agree with the fact that what you had before is no longer here,” she says. “But you are still here. You are still present.” Finding this acceptance allows us to begin moving forward while honoring the past.
Faith, Doubt, and the Spiritual Journey Through Grief
Grief often shakes our spiritual foundations. Many questions, where is God when being in the midst of suffering, feeling abandoned, or isolated? Cyndee describes this struggle as “the calls to God that feel unanswered and the spiritual darkness many endure.”
But through her journey, she found that God never left; instead, she had closed the door on that connection. When she stopped searching outside and started healing within, she began to feel that presence again.
“It wasn’t until I started making positive changes for myself that God showed up,” she says.
This reminds us that healing often involves reconnecting with ourselves and our faith on a deeper, more personal level.
Moving Forward with Hope and Self-Compassion
Cyndee closes with a powerful message: life’s hardships don’t define us or limit our potential. Each experience carries lessons and opportunities for growth.
“We should never let life experiences or others dictate what we expect from life or ourselves,” she says. “You have value. You are never less.”
Final Thoughts
Even in the darkest times, faith can be found in simple, everyday moments, the breeze on your skin, the warmth of the sun, reminders that life continues and healing is possible.
In grace and gratitude,
~ Lesley Pazdzioch
If you found this post helpful, please share it to support others facing grief. For more stories of healing and growth, visit lesleypazdzioch.com
