This is a set of cards – a toolkit – to help adults to be in the feeling of losses that they have experienced – specifically ambiguous losses, such as losing the life that you had due to Covid, losing a friendship, losing a part of your identity, losing a place that you loved, etc. Losses that are not deaths, but due to the invisibility of those losses to the outside world, could be hard to process.
This physical set of cards has four sections of activities – Walking, Arting, Sensing, and Writing. It can be just one card that will give you a prompt, or a combination of a few you can combine in your practice. On the back of the cards, there will be a few suggestions on how you can expand or build on the activity. Icons indicating the time needed to complete or work on each activity will help choose the right thing for the right moment. Activities will not require using a lot of materials, or an artistic talent. They will be rooted in 6 guidelines for increasing resilience from Pauline Boss’s book “Myth of Closure”. Activities in the cards will provide an opportunity to connect with nature, practice observation, find a creative outlet for your feelings, and provide opportunities for tactile experiences and prompts for reflection.
I have started working and developing this idea through some practices that I did on my own during the time of COVID-19 and I noticed that through the simple act of walking or writing in the mornings, I felt more connected to myself and the world. I created images using the found natural materials and tried to create rituals to commemorate or process the losses that I experienced. With the inspiration of my own practice, I tried to recreate something similar that a lot more people can find useful. My goal was a simple product that does not require a lot of time to understand, that can be visually appealing, and that you can easily take with you wherever you go. I have explored books, podcasts, and digital toolkits about loss and grief. In the process of creation, I got inspired by other toolkits and card games, an IKEA toy, an immersive nature exhibition, a book with prompts that explore your creativity, and a book with prompts for photographic practice and collages. Through the process of learning the design of a physical product, I have learned that it takes a lot of time and iteration to create a very simple product and that visual simplicity and simplicity of content are the result of process of heavy editing. Another important lesson I have learnt is how important it is to share your ideas and their iteration with the community of people around you and even a tiny comment or suggestion or idea provided by someone can move your thinking in the right direction more than reading and research on the topic, or can help you get unstuck.
