How 9/11 widow has helped others find better living through knitting

FAIR HAVEN — When Lisa Luckett lost her husband and father of her 7-year-old daughter in the 9/11 attacks nearly 15 years ago, she turned to therapists for help in dealing with her despair. What they told her, and what eventually came to pass, was to find a creative outlet that could lift her up.

Luckett's story forms the backbone of Cozmeena Enlightened Living, which she began in 2007 and describes as a lifestyle brand focused on "warmth, comfort and care, consideration, grace and decency."

Luckett, a longtime knitter, began using her hobby after 9/11 to thank those who had cared for her in the aftermath of her husband's death. But she saw how many of those people also were in need of care. That is when creativity struck.

"Because I was so open and clear, I had a rush of creative energy like nothing I'd ever experienced," Luckett says.

Knitting, she says, "taps into the right side of your brain, it opens your intuitive, creative side, and quiets our very loud, left-brain, analytical side."

Luckett's knitting later evolved into what became known as the Cozmeena Shawl, which she now teaches women how to make at her home in Fair Haven. She offers basic knitting and shawl kit tutorials at Cozmeena.com.

So what exactly is Cozmeena? Luckett said it's a made-up word representing "where coziness meets glamour," but it has come to symbolize much more than that. Her group's mission is to help people find comfort through their five senses, prepare and help themselves to take care of others and connect like-minded thinkers.

"It's a word to describe this kind of living, when you live in the moment with grace, with humility, with gratitude, just being grateful and joyful to be right here, right now," she said.

Cozmeena has helped Luckett keep perspective even all these years after that tragic Tuesday morning in September 2001

"I have never stopped seeing beauty," she said. "I have never stopped seeing the resilience and the incredible decency and kindness and unconditional love that was showered on my children and I."

Patrick Lavery is a news producer, reporter and anchor for New Jersey 101.5. Follow him on Twitter @plavery1015 or email patrick.lavery@townsquaremedia.com.