Melissa Etheridge’s beliefs about love helped her navigate the death of her son Beckett.

“When I lost my son, I learned how much my capacity for love was,” said Etheridge, 62,

on the latest episode of the Making Space with Hoda Kotb podcast.

Beckett died from causes related to opioid addiction on May 13, 2020, at age 21. He was Julie Cypher’s only son. Cypher and Etheridge are also parents to daughter Bailey.

“Not only loving him and missing him and being OK but loving myself enough not to go into major depression and guilt and shame which so many families that lose loved ones to opioid addiction, just the shame is too big,” she continued. “It’s huge. So, I had to believe that there’s an over surrounding love to everything. Everything is love.”

The musician shared that dealing with her grief is “a practice.”

“There can be days where the shadow comes on me. And I find myself thinking, ‘Oh, what if? What if I had done this? What if I had only done that?’ And that doesn’t serve me, and it causes me pain,” she explained.

Etheridge shared that she’s learned to understand that “he has gone from this physical world” and that he is “in heaven” and a “joyous space.”

“For me to feel him there, I need to be in a joyous space. So when I’m in a dark space, I’m away from all of my loved ones. It’s my job to find my space again, of loving myself, going, ‘No, no, I did the best I could. And he made his choices,’ ” she continued. “And there are some that check out, and there are some that leave earlier than others. And he could not handle his life at this time.”

Melissa Etheridge in New York City in June 2023.
Bruce Glikas/WireImage

In a conversation with PEOPLE in September, Etheridge shared that she reflects on Beckett’s life as a “great time of living and learning.”

“I can look at my son’s death as a great loss, or I can look at it as his time here was a great time of living and learning. He’s taught me so much, and I find great comfort in him in the non-physical,” she said.

She told PEOPLE that writing her book, Talking to My Angels, helped her be “upfront and open” about his death.

“I knew that this was not an exception, that this was something I wanted to share with those who wanted to know just how I walked through my son’s death and how I still, every day, keep a bright outlook. It’s not easy,” she said.

If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, please contact the SAMHSA helpline at 1-800-662-HELP.