Happy Grieving

The Happy Grieving Group Program

The Happy Grieving Group Program is six months, online, in a small circle. We meet regularly, we go deep, and between sessions you are not alone with it.

Why six months

An hour of being understood is a relief. Six months is something else. Six months is long enough for the group to know your person by name. Long enough for someone to notice when you go quiet in week nineteen. Long enough that when the birthday or the anniversary lands, you don't have to explain why this week is different, because the circle already knows.

The offer

What you get

  • Two calls a monthOne workshop, with teaching and something to actually do. One open call where you bring whatever you are carrying that week.
  • A private group chatDirect access to me and Blair on WhatsApp. Not a broadcast channel, a real conversation.
  • A daily check-inThe Gratitude Alarm: one small daily touchpoint. Genuinely useful on the hard days, and easy to ignore on the ones where you cannot.
  • A one-to-one with meA private call, just us, to go deeper on what is coming up for you.
  • A one-to-one with BlairA private call with Blair: facilitator, author, and someone who understands this from the inside.
  • A grief matchOne person matched to you on similar loss, similar age, living near you. Sometimes you need the one who really gets it.
  • The wider communityThe rest of Happy Grieving, plus reading and tools for the weeks between calls.

How the calls run

Every second Wednesday, 9:00am PT and 12:00pm ET, online by video. The link comes to you when you join.

They alternate. The first call of the month is a workshop: we teach something and work through it together. The third week is open. No agenda, no obligation to speak, and if what you need that day is to sit with the camera off while other people talk, that counts as attending.

The workshops Blair leads include the Navigating Grief framework and the power of gratitude, mapping your grief and letter writing, and writing your story. More get added as the group tells us what it needs, which is genuinely how we plan them.

Who is running it

Blair and I are both grievers, and both trained to facilitate. That is the whole point. Nobody in the room is explaining grief from the outside.

I'm Rachel. I founded Happy Grieving and Grief Trips after my dad died when I was 27.

Blair Kaplan Venables

I lead it together with Blair Kaplan, who knows loss from the inside the way I do. Blair is a grief and resilience expert, a motivational speaker and a bestselling author. She founded The Global Resilience Project and hosts the RESILIENT A.F with Blair and Alana podcast.

Who it's for

People whose loss is fresh, and people who are years in and tired of pretending they're done. People who can't get on a plane right now, because of work or kids or money or health. So many of you have told me the hardest part isn't the big days, it's the ordinary weeks with no one to say it to. This is for that.

The investment

Investment

Bonuses

This is not group therapy

The Group is not therapy, and I'm not a therapist. There are no stages to complete, no workbook that ends with you fixed, and no timeline to keep up with. You won't be asked to be positive, and you won't be rushed. It is the thing that actually helped me after my dad died, other people who get it, made regular and held.

If what you need is clinical care, we will help you find it rather than pretend we are it. And if today is dangerous rather than just heavy, please talk to someone now.

From $2,400Everything on this page, bonuses included.

If cost is the thing standing in the way, tell us before you rule it out. Money is never the reason someone can't come.

Apply

Apply

Tell me a bit about you. I read these myself, and I'll come back to you within a couple of days to talk it through and sort the practical part out. Nothing is charged now, and applying doesn't commit you to anything.

How you would rather pay

The Group or a Trip?

If you want a week somewhere beautiful with people who get it, that's a Grief Trip. If you want company across a whole season of your life, that's the Group. Plenty of people do both. Not sure which fits you? Write and ask. There's no wrong door here.

Not ready yet?

That's allowed. Start with the library, or take the letter, and come when it's time.