A Widow’s Guide to Navigating Principled Political Engagement

Navigating our political landscape with grace, wisdom, and courage after loss

As widows, we’ve walked through the valley of profound loss and emerged with hard-won wisdom about what truly matters. We’ve learned that life is precious, that compassion heals, and that our voices—shaped by grief, strengthened by survival—carry unique power. In these uncertain political times, we have an opportunity to channel our experiences into meaningful civic engagement guided by enduring principles.

I’ll admit, growing up, politics was never part of our dinner table conversations. I lived in a comfortable bubble where policy decisions felt distant and irrelevant to my daily life. But as I matured through education and experience, I began to see how deeply my life was shaped by decisions made both before my birth and throughout my lifetime. This realization changed everything—how I viewed the world, and most importantly, what I understood about my power to influence humanity's trajectory. The discovery was both fascinating and unsettling.

When I became a young widow at age 37, I felt like I'd been thrust into a Squid Game-like system—complex, unforgiving, and requiring knowledge I simply didn't possess to navigate successfully. It took me decades to understand this reality and create enough emotional distance to avoid overwhelming my natural empathy. Given this experience, I completely understand why many widows would choose to avoid the political arena rather than add another layer of complexity to their already challenging lives.

Yet we must engage. We represent a demographic with urgent, unmet needs affecting far too many generational women and families. The question that drives me is simple: if I don't speak up about these issues, who will?

The Humanitarian Heart: Leading with Love

Grief has taught us that everyone carries invisible burdens. This understanding becomes our superpower in political discourse. When we encounter those whose views differ from ours, we can remember that they too may be fighting battles we cannot see. The same compassion that sustained us through our darkest hours can extend to our political opponents.

As widows, we’ve often found ourselves on the receiving end of unexpected kindness from strangers. Perhaps it was the cashier who noticed our wedding ring on our right hand, or the neighbor who brought soup without being asked. These moments remind us that beneath political labels, we’re all human beings capable of grace.

Martin Luther King Jr.‘s wisdom rings especially true for us: “You have very little morally persuasive power with people who can feel your underlying contempt.” When we approach political conversations with genuine curiosity rather than judgment, we create space for understanding.

This doesn’t mean abandoning our convictions, but rather holding them with the same tenderness we’d offer a grieving friend.

The Common Good: Our Shared Humanity

Widowhood often strips away the illusion of complete self-sufficiency. We discover how much we need community—

-the friend who drives us to appointments,

-the support group that holds our tears,

-the systems that provide security when we’re most vulnerable.

This experience makes us natural advocates for the common good.

“We understand that individual liberty and community care aren’t opposing forces but complementary needs. When we advocate for better healthcare, stronger social safety nets, or more compassionate policies, we’re not limiting freedom—we’re expanding it. We’re ensuring that others don’t have to face their darkest moments alone.”- Carolyn Moor

President Jimmy Carter’s words about the common good being overshadowed by special interests resonate deeply. "We are, of course, a nation of differences. Those differences don't make us weak. They’re the source of our strength." -Al Smith Dinner, New York, October 21, 1976.

As widows, we’ve often felt overlooked by systems designed for couples. We know what it’s like when our needs aren’t represented behind those “locked doors.” This experience can fuel our commitment to inclusive decision-making and policies that consider all voices.

Radical Imagination: Birthing New Possibilities

Loss forces us to reimagine our lives in ways we never expected. We’ve had to envision a future that looked nothing like the one we planned. This painful gift of radical imagination becomes a political asset. We can envision a more just, compassionate world because we’ve already proven we can create beauty from ashes.

Our widowhood journey often involves “reverse engineering”—starting with the life we want to build and working backward to the steps that will get us there. This same approach can revolutionize political engagement. Instead of accepting “what has always been,” we can ask, “What could be?” and then chart a course toward that vision.

Kurt Vonnegut, a dark humor American novelist and author known for his humorous social commentary suggested “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be”, often summarizing that our aim as a human species is to make the world more beautiful than we found it. Having experienced profound loss, we understand that beauty isn’t about perfection—it’s about meaning, connection, and hope. We can bring this nuanced understanding of beauty to our political vision too.

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