Timothy Shriver: "If You Get Grief Wrong, You Get a Lot of Things Wrong"

Timothy Shriver, chairman of the Special Olympics and son of Eunice Kennedy Shriver, was born into one of the most influential families in American history. The Kennedy family's prestigious legacy includes an American president, senators, war heroes and public servants. The family also experienced its share of tragedy, including the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert Kennedy.

Reflecting on his childhood, Timothy says there was an unspoken rule when it came to grief and loss: "The unspoken rule was 'We don't talk about that. Move on.'"

That approach to grief is one taken by so many families, he says, but it's also an important one to change. "If you get grief wrong, you get a lot of things wrong. You hide from a lot of pain. You hide from a lot of frustration," he says. "And in my family, of all the gifts we had, that wasn't one of them. We didn't really know how. I didn't feel like I learned to face grief and transform it."

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