Love, Loss, and the Practice of Coming Home: A Valentine’s Day Reflection

Valentine’s Day, for some, means flowers and romance. For me, it’s a quiet ache that returns each year like a familiar tide. Valentine’s Day typically sells romantic love as the main course—loving couples, roses, reservations, a celebration of love, but also the idea that love is something we prove to others in a commercialized and materialistic way.

I believe loving ourselves is like a seed, the quiet beginning where all love can bloom from—wether for partners, friends, family, or most importantly the parts of ourselves that feel tender.

My big brother Lea, as a toddler

My eldest brother Leandro, died on a Valentine’s Day. Every year on February 14th, love and loss arrive together—two threads woven into the same cloth. I know this day is heavier for my mom and dad in a way I can’t fully measure. Losing a sibling is devastating, but losing a child changes the shape of time. And every year, I find myself wishing I could somehow make it easier for them.

I call extra leading up—more than the usual check ins—just to be there, to offer my presence. Not to force any sort of conversation, but to let them know without words: I’m grieving with you, too.

When love and grief share the same room

Grief is often treated like the opposite of love, but I don’t experience it that way, to me grief is love with nowhere to land. It’s the heart still reaching for someone who is no longer here in the way we think they should be.

Sometimes it’s not the “big” memories that visit first—it’s the small, overlooked ones. I remember Lea painting my toenails, completely committed to the job, and somehow making me laugh the entire time. It’s such a simple memory, and yet it holds so much of him: his playfulness, his care, his presence. Or the memories that are almost too funny to explain, but somehow they hold the whole heart of a relationship.

Leandro a few months before he died

When I was a young teen, my mom wouldn’t let me shave my legs (which, at the time, felt like a very big deal). So my brother would sit with me in the backyard and tweeze the little hairs on my shins—an impossible job that would never actually be finished. We’d talk. We’d hang out. We’d laugh. Back then, I didn’t understand how sacred those “crazy” moments were. I didn’t know I’d one day miss them with my whole chest.

And then there's the wondering! What he would think of me as a grown woman. What kind of uncle he would be to his 3 nephews and niece. I wonder what his life would look like—what he would be doing, who he would be loving, what would make him laugh. These questions don’t always hurt in a sharp way. Sometimes they’re simply the shape love takes when it outgrows it's container.

Today, during a long walk with my sweet yoga dogs I noticed how the snow is beginning to melt after a heavy winter. So much has already softened and washed away. And yet, there’s still so much snow and ice that remains—stubborn patches of ice in the shade, slick places of slushy water you have to step around, places where the ground hasn’t fully returned.

Grief can feel like that. Some of it melts with time. Some of it loosens its grip. Some days you can breathe easier. And then you turn a corner and there it is again—another patch of ice, another wave of memory or wondering that catches you by surprise.

Yoga invites patience here. Acceptance. The kind that doesn’t force anything to change before it’s ready. The kind that says: It’s okay that some of this is still here.

As the years pass, I notice something else too. Some of the little details feel harder to reach. I find myself wishing I had more pictures of him… more pictures with him. Not because photos are the only way to remember, but because grief can be like that—it makes you want something you can hold in your hands when the heart feels full.

And grief doesn’t only touch the relationship we had with the one we lost. It can shine a light on the relationships that are still here.

I think about my other siblings—my little sister and my two older brothers—and how distant we’ve become. It doesn't happen slowly. Life somehow moved us apart, both geographically and emotionally. One day you look up and realize the people who shaped your childhood now live in different cities, different rhythms, different worlds.

Mami holding me, Lea (making the funny face), Christian in the foreground and Henry in the background.

I wish we could be closer. I wish we could spend more time together. But life keeps moving—husbands, wives, kids, jobs, responsibilities—all of it seems to take priority, even when the heart is quietly asking for something else. Perhaps, connection is also a practice? Not something we either “have” or “don’t have,” but something we return to—again and again. Maybe, in the same way we return to our mats, to the breath when the mind wanders, we can return to love when life pulls us away? Maybe, we can appreciate the moments together more—because we feel their absence so deeply. A group text. A FaceTime call. A meme that says, “I’m thinking of you.” Love doesn’t disappear just because of the movement of time and space.

Yoga doesn’t ask us to bypass our pain

One of the most healing gifts of yoga is that it doesn’t demand we “get over it.” It doesn’t rush us toward positivity. It invites us to be with what is real. To sit with it, to observe it. In practice, we learn to stay present with sensation—heat, trembling, tightness, softness. We learn that we can breathe even when something feels intense. We learn that we can hold tenderness without collapsing into it and losing ourselves. This wouldn't be possible without the introspection of our practice—the willingness to slow down enough to feel our breath, to listen beneath the noise, and to meet ourselves honestly. When we pause long enough to notice what’s happening inside, we create space for grief and love to exist together, without needing to fix either one. Yoga becomes a gentle training ground for the heart.

The body remembers—and the body can soften

Loss doesn’t live only in the mind. It lives in the body.

Sometimes grief shows up as a tight throat, a heavy chest, a clenched jaw, or a belly that feels unsettled. Sometimes it’s fatigue. Sometimes it’s numbness. When we move slowly, when we breathe with care, when we create space in the ribs and the hips and the belly, we’re not “fixing” grief. We’re giving it room. We’re letting the body know: You are safe enough to feel.

And on the days when the mind can’t hold every detail—when memories feel far away or blurred—yoga offers another kind of remembering. Not a perfect replay, but a powerful living connection: breath, sensation, presence. A way to sit with love without forcing it into words.

Self-love in grief can be quiet and practical

Self-love doesn’t have to be grand. It can be simple, and honest:

• Let yourself feel what’s true, without judgment

• Speak to yourself the way you would speak to your best friend

• Choose one small supportive action (a walk, a nap, a warm meal, a candle)

• Let your practice be gentle—more listening than pushing

Sometimes the most loving thing we can do is stop fighting our own hurt.

A practice for love and loss

Try this, if you’d like a few minutes of support:

1. Sit comfortably or lie down.

2. Place one hand on your heart and one hand on your belly.

3. Inhale slowly through the nose. Exhale softly.

4. On the inhale, silently say: “I am here.”

5. On the exhale, silently say: “I can hold this.”

6. Stay for 10 or more breaths.

If tears come, let them. If nothing comes, let that be okay too.

Love continues—just in a different form

I don’t think we ever “move on” from loved ones we lose. I think we learn to carry them differently. On this Valentine’s Day, I’m holding not only my brother Leandro, but all my siblings in my heart. I’m letting love be wide enough to include my grief. And I’m letting yoga remind me—again and again—that compassion is not a destination. It’s a practice.

If you’re grieving today, I send you gentleness. May you feel supported. May you feel held. And may you remember: your love is not a problem to solve—it’s a sacred presence to honor.

Closing invitation

If you’d like to practice with me in a way that supports the nervous system and the heart, I invite you to join one of my gentle classes or explore the on-demand library. Come as you are. There is space for you here.

With Love,

Francia 💖

Sunday Vinyasa + Dharma Talk