I have been wanting to write about this for some time. I wanted to wait until I felt the timing was right and when I felt there was alignment in the cosmos. What an odd time many would think, while mercury is in retrograde? It’s a perfect time. You will read this when beloved planet mercury has gone direct. Perhaps you have experienced the dark night of the soul? Or maybe it’s the first time you have heard anyone talk about it or give meaning to something you may have already experienced. What is the dark night of the soul? What does this moment in time, in your life mean? How do you emerge anew out of this state?
The dark night of the soul feels like you are walking in a cornfield in the middle of the night alone. I am sure you have seen horror movies where the mystery that lies within the fields is just as captivating as it is horrifying. Dark Night of the soul feels like you are sitting in the middle of the desert plains with no one in sight, just you, alone with your thoughts and God. The dark night of the soul is the depths of the ocean that will only be known to those that forever live there and those that are brave enough to enter the unknown.
What’s interesting about the dark night of the soul, the here, now and in between, is that you’ve never felt more of a desire to live. Suddenly feeling alive becomes an endless mission, life is more than just being alive, existing. Those who know dark night of the soul, that have gripped it with their hands and sunken to the depths and emerge anew will tell you it’s as if they have been reborn; here to live again.
Dark Night of the soul shouldn’t be compared to or described as depression. It’s probably what most people would think. Some people don’t know that this is the transition that they are currently enduring. Dark Night of the soul can happen after a tragic moment in life or it can just happen out of nowhere. It’s not about happiness or sadness. It’s about purpose, it’s about God. It is during this time, whether you believe in God or not that you will connect deeply to the ever eternal being unknown. What you believe doesn’t matter. Whether or not you go to a religious building doesn’t matter.
In the dark night of spirit, there is painful awareness of one’s own incompleteness and imperfection in relation to God; however, one seldom utters morbid statements of abnormal guilt, self-loathing, worthlessness, and suicidal ideation that accompany serious depressive episodes.
Kevin Culligan
You will learn very quickly as your soul dwells between the here and now and gets enveloped by the mysterious force that takes hold during the dark night of the soul that God is for everyone. However you decide to cultivate this union, it must always be with love. Love will be what you cling to first and it will be the only thing that will help you emerge. It seems simple, but how many of us have been taught we aren’t good enough? How many of us have believed we aren’t worthy of love? What is love? What does it mean to love?
For the first time you will recognize what isn’t love. It won’t be about what others have done for you. It will be about what you haven’t done for yourself. How you have forgotten, that you are love. This goes against everything you have ever been taught. You will question every decision you have ever made, particularly the one’s that weren’t driven by the pureness of love.
As you look in the mirror you won’t see yourself simply as a reflection of what’s on the outside. You will see your soul, the being within you looking at itself. They say that we glow from the inside out, the dullness you see reflecting back at you is within you. The dark night of the soul will propel you to work on your inner self like you never have before. All this time while you were working on the outside, your appearance, you forgot about the soul, the fire, the light, the love within.
Wading through the depths of the waters of your inner anguish, as tiring as it may be will force you to swim deeper. The loneliness and fear that is felt walking through the cornfield at night will push you to find your way, not out, your way to begin once more.
You will feel love like you never felt love before. The darkness will become your light.
I want you to know that you will be okay. Everything will be okay.
