10 Essential Books That Help Widows Navigate Life After Loss: A Healing Reading List

Books That Help Widows Navigate Life After Loss

Losing a spouse can feel overwhelming, and while grief is deeply personal, finding guidance and comfort from others who have walked this path can be invaluable. Here are ten carefully selected books that offer support, wisdom, and practical advice for women facing this difficult transition.

Finding Comfort Through Story

1. Tear Soup: A Recipe for Healing After Loss

By Pat Schwiebert and Chuck DeKlyen

This beautifully illustrated book serves as a gentle introduction to the grieving process. Through the metaphor of making “tear soup,” it validates the personal, unique journey of grief. Its simple yet profound message particularly helps those who need to share their feelings of loss with family and friends.

2. Healing After Loss: Daily Meditations for Working Through Grief

By Martha Whitmore Hickman

A cornerstone resource in grief support groups, Healing After Loss provides daily readings that offer comfort and understanding. These short reflections create space for processing emotions day by day, allowing readers to heal at their own pace.

Coping with Sudden Loss

3. I Wasn't Ready to Say Goodbye

By Brook Noel and Pamela D. Blair, PhD

Specifically addressing unexpected loss, this compassionate guide helps widows navigate the shock and sorrow of sudden bereavement. It offers practical tools and emotional support for those struggling with the unique challenges of unexpected grief.

4. A Grace Disguised: How the Soul Grows Through Loss

By Jerry Sittser

In this moving memoir, Sittser transforms his personal tragedy into universal wisdom about finding meaning through loss. His insights particularly resonate with those seeking to understand their spiritual journey through grief.

Modern Perspectives on Grief

5. It's OK That You're Not OK

By Megan Devine

Devine challenges traditional grief narratives, offering a refreshing and honest approach to loss. This book provides validation for those feeling pressured to “move on,” while offering practical self-care strategies for the grief journey.

6. Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy

By Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant

Following the sudden loss of her husband, Sandberg combines personal experience with Grant’s research-based insights to create a practical guide for rebuilding life after loss. Their collaborative approach offers both emotional support and actionable strategies.

Personal Journeys Through Loss

7. The Year of Magical Thinking

By Joan Didion

This acclaimed memoir chronicles Didion’s first year of widowhood with raw honesty and elegant prose. Her exploration of grief’s psychological landscape offers readers a profound understanding of bereavement’s complex nature.

8. The Widower's Notebook

By Jonathan Santlofer

Though written from a male perspective, Santlofer’s candid account of sudden spousal loss speaks universally to the experience of grief. His journey through shock, sorrow, and healing resonates across gender boundaries.

Understanding Grief Through Different Lenses

9. The Other Side of Sadness

By George A. Bonanno

Bonanno brings scientific insight to the grief experience, challenging conventional wisdom about bereavement. His research-based perspective offers hope by highlighting human resilience in the face of loss.

10. When Things Fall Apart

By Pema Chödrön

This spiritual classic provides timeless wisdom for navigating life’s darkest moments. Chödrön’s Buddhist perspective offers practical tools for facing grief with mindfulness and compassion.

Reading Through Recovery

Reading can serve as both a companion and guide while processing grief and navigating the complexities of widowhood. These books offer different perspectives, from emotional healing to practical advice, ensuring you can find the right resource for wherever you are in your journey.

Looking Forward

While no book can erase the pain of loss, these resources can help light the way forward. As you navigate this new chapter, remember that healing happens at your own pace. Whether you’re seeking emotional support, spiritual guidance, or practical advice, there’s wisdom within these pages to help you rebuild and rediscover hope.

Sara Zuckerman, CFP®, CDFA® is the founder of Reset Financial Planning located in Scottsdale, AZ.  She supports women across the country with a focus on helping divorcees and widows align their financial resources with their values to plan for the next chapter of their lives.

If you are interested in learning about how Reset Financial Planning can help you take charge of your finances as a newly single woman, please contact us at  or schedule a free 20-minute consultation.

Sign up for Reset Financial Planning’s Monthly Newsletter to effortlessly stay on top of my blog posts and occasional extra goodies and receive my Get Your Finances Organized Checklist for free!

Disclaimer: This article is provided for educational, general information, and illustration purposes only. Nothing contained in the material constitutes tax advice, a recommendation for the purchase or sale of any security, or investment advisory services. We encourage you to consult a financial planner, accountant, and/or legal counsel for advice specific to your situation. Reproduction of this material is prohibited without written permission from Reset Financial Planning, LLC, and all rights are reserved. 

How ‘The Gap and the Gain’ Can Help You Feel More Positive and Empowered

Woman in transition reading book

Reading is one of my favorite ways to spend time.  I read lots of books about health and nutrition, which is a passion of mine outside of financial planning.  I also love light fiction – think Bridgerton.  And as a business owner and entrepreneur I also read my fair share of business-related books.  One such book that I read recently was “The Gap and the Gain” by Dan Sullivan.  While this book is aimed at helping goal-oriented business owners appreciate their success more, the lessons can apply more broadly and might be helpful for you as you navigate the transition from married woman to single.

The premise of the book is that high achievers don’t find happiness and feelings of success in their achievements because they are always looking forward to the next goal rather than appreciating how far they have already come.  And even worse, the “goal” is often a moving target, so when you get close to a goal, you move the goal posts further away and never feel like you get there.

Understanding the Gap

Let’s say you have a new goal, like losing twenty pounds or growing your business revenue twenty percent this year.  We have all be taught to make our goals SMART or specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time based.  As a first step then, you have to define some specific target that you can measure (weight lost or revenue gained).  This is where the problem starts.  What you now know is the distance between where you are now and where you want to go.  Sullivan calls this “The Gap”.  While it’s important to know where you are going, by focusing on how far away you are from the target, you can feel overwhelmed, unhappy and unsuccessful.

Similarly, if you are at the beginning of a life transition due to divorce or death of a spouse you likely have goals around what you need to do to rebuild your life.  Maybe you need to get your finances in order or buy a new house or shift your career to match your new circumstances.  Whatever the goal, it probably feels distant and difficult to achieve from where you are sitting today.

Anytime you are a long way from where you want to be, it can be emotionally challenging.  Whether your goals are related to growing a business or reorganizing your life after a major transition, the emotional impact is the same.  So how do you work around this?  Well according to Sullivan, you need to shift your focus from “The Gap” over to “The Gain.”

Appreciating the Gain

Since we now understand that “The Gap” is the distance between where you are now and your goal, the Sullivan defines “The Gain” as the distance between where you are now and where you started.  As human beings, we are hardwired to always be looking forward and discounting how far we have already come.

Sullivan’s premise is that in order to be happy and feel successful, you need to look not forward to where you are going but backward to where you started.  By acknowledging where you started and what you have achieved to date, you are more likely to feel happiness and contentment on your journey, rather than feeling as if you have failed to meet your goal (yet).

How does this work in practice?  Let’s look at an example.  Say the goal is to lose twenty pounds.  Every day you get up and weigh yourself.  Maybe you lost a pound or two, or maybe you gained a pound.  Whatever small change you see on the scale is good information, but when the progress is very small, or non-existent, it can be difficult to stay motivated to keep going because the goal seems so far away.

However, what if instead of focusing on the number on the scale every day, you were more focused on how far you have come with the positive changes that you are making in an effort to reach your ultimate goal?  For instance, you have started walking every morning and you haven’t had dessert in three weeks.  While the number on the scale might not be moving as much as you want, you have to admit that you are feeling more energized and healthier.  By focusing on the positive steps, you are already taking you will be more motivated to continue putting in the work, which will eventually lead you to where you want to go.

The Gap and the Gain in Real Life

I have started implementing this in both my business and my personal life.  I have a page on my computer called “The Gain” and I keep a running list of all of the achievements I have already made towards goals that I am currently working towards.  I am definitely one to minimize my achievements when others point them out.  Creating the first version of this list was an eye-opening experience when I could see concrete evidence of how far I have come since I started. 

As it relates to my business, I realized that starting my own business wasn’t something I just did last year.  It was actually six years in the making.  I went back and thought about every step I took that ultimately led to where I am now.  While I am not yet where I want to be with my business, looking at all I have already done definitely helped me shift my perspective.  Adding to this list as I achieve milestones brings a lot of satisfaction, and looking back over it when I am having a bad day quickly helps me to shift from negative into positive.

What Is Your Gain?

Whether you have goals around your health, your career, your relationships or any other aspect of your life, you might want to consider the gap and the gain.  Using this framework as a lens through which you view your progress can be very empowering.  No matter what your goal is, it won’t happen overnight.  If you focus only on how far you have to go to reach your ultimate goal, you will be frustrated and overwhelmed.  If, however, you can focus on the steps you have already taken and how far you have already come, you will feel more confident and empowered to continue to march forward.

If you are interested in learning about how I can help you take charge of your finances as a newly single woman, please contact me at  or schedule a free 20-minute consultation.

Sign up for Reset FP’s Monthly Newsletter to effortlessly stay on top of my weekly blog posts and occasional extra goodies and receive my Get Your Finances Organized Checklist for free!

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