The View of Grief from Letter 99

Letter 99 from Seneca talks about how we are responsible for our own grief in the sense that we shouldn’t milk it and grieve excessively. He’s not wrong, but to label the human action of grieving as womanish to ungrateful is problematic in how we view how grief should be handled. Grief could be looked at as ridiculous or absurd if we go about it by giving ourselves excuses about uncalled for actions against another person or ourselves rather than somebody expressing themselves in whatever way helps them sleep at night. Thinking about this in the way that a wash cloth may be holding more water than another. But we also don’t want to wring ourselves out and tear the threads that hold us together.
In the fourth section of Letter 99, Seneca explains how the loss of a friend should be handled by valuing what you had in past times. His reasoning is supported with how grieving would be thankless action from the lack of appreciation for what we once shared with that person. So, we should value the past times that we once had, but that doesn’t mean our human expression is completely useless for our own health than it is externally to what can’t be undone. The relationship we shared with that person can’t be objectified into where it goes, but rather into how close it bonded the two people. A bond as such being separated could be painful.  Like a strip of gorilla tape being ripped off of your arm, it would bring all of those hairs and cells up along with it. The spot on your arm will hurt and be vulnerable, but it’ll heal and you’ll value every single particle that once made up the skin and hair that once took place on your arm. You might cry because it happened, but that doesn’t mean you’re not appreciative of what kept your skin together, the experience is painful in tender places.