Grief as a Doorway with Melissa Word
Mon Jan 05 2026
In this episode, I sit down with artist and death midwife Melissa Word to explore grief as a doorway into the vast field of creative, visionary, and even erotic information that lives at the core of the psyche. We talk about what it means to retrieve these scattered parts of ourselves—the aspects of self that have been lost across timelines, memories, events, and family systems—and bring them home to reify our own wholeness.
Melissa shares her philosophy of tending to grief through creative practice, from the improvisational quilting work of Grief Threads to the somatic, embodied approach she brings to all her facilitation. We discuss the underworld not as a place of peril but as fertile ground where parts of us have been steeping, learning, gathering intelligence we can't access through conscious striving.
This conversation is for anyone who has avoided their grief work, who has wondered why we can't just skip to the good part, or who senses that creativity and loss are more intimately connected than our culture acknowledges.
Connect with Melissa
Visit Melissa's WebsiteFollow Melissa on Social Media
Topics We Explore
Grief as retrieval: collecting the parts of ourselves scattered in the underworldThe daffodil bulb teaching: why some things require deep darkness to growThe intelligence of hands and what fabrics can teach us about lossWhy grief work makes us honest—and why avoiding it makes us a liabilityRitual, creativity, and what gets recalibrated at the level of soulThe symbiosis between personal grief and collective healingGetting free: what happens when the roots go deep enoughAbout This Podcast
Soft, Earthen Futures is a podcast about imagining and crafting a more whole world. We explore what it means to stand at the threshold between what has been and what is trying to emerge—tending to that in-between space, listening for what the earth is dreaming through us, and giving those visions form. This show is for wild-hearted creatives, entrepreneurs, and visionaries. Hosted by Daje Aloh.
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In this episode, I sit down with artist and death midwife Melissa Word to explore grief as a doorway into the vast field of creative, visionary, and even erotic information that lives at the core of the psyche. We talk about what it means to retrieve these scattered parts of ourselves—the aspects of self that have been lost across timelines, memories, events, and family systems—and bring them home to reify our own wholeness. Melissa shares her philosophy of tending to grief through creative practice, from the improvisational quilting work of Grief Threads to the somatic, embodied approach she brings to all her facilitation. We discuss the underworld not as a place of peril but as fertile ground where parts of us have been steeping, learning, gathering intelligence we can't access through conscious striving. This conversation is for anyone who has avoided their grief work, who has wondered why we can't just skip to the good part, or who senses that creativity and loss are more intimately connected than our culture acknowledges. Connect with Melissa Visit Melissa's WebsiteFollow Melissa on Social Media Topics We Explore Grief as retrieval: collecting the parts of ourselves scattered in the underworldThe daffodil bulb teaching: why some things require deep darkness to growThe intelligence of hands and what fabrics can teach us about lossWhy grief work makes us honest—and why avoiding it makes us a liabilityRitual, creativity, and what gets recalibrated at the level of soulThe symbiosis between personal grief and collective healingGetting free: what happens when the roots go deep enoughAbout This Podcast Soft, Earthen Futures is a podcast about imagining and crafting a more whole world. We explore what it means to stand at the threshold between what has been and what is trying to emerge—tending to that in-between space, listening for what the earth is dreaming through us, and giving those visions form. This show is for wild-hearted creatives, entrepreneurs, and visionaries. Hosted by Daje Aloh.