Fire and Darkness

" We are afraid of pain - emotional and physical - and we want to believe that there is a way around experiencing our own sorrow, that we can avoid the pain and lose nothing of the fullness and joy of living. It's simply not true."

quote from The Invitation
Oriah Mountain Dreamer

There's nothing I can do. You have to go through this, there is no question. There will be pain like you've never known - the kind that rips through flesh, the kind that physically assaults you, leaves you exhausted, curled in ball on the floor. The ache I feel typing those words, having lived sorrow like that, knowing you absolutely will experience this... that ache is so intense.

Instinctually I want to rescue you, you know that. We never want the people we care about to hurt, do we? I want to make you feel better, want to kiss the hurt away, save you from it, have it poof, be gone. But, my own darkness taught me you can neither run nor hide, it finds you, it envelops you, you have to let it, have to feel it, have to find your way through it. It has wisdom hidden there you only find when you stand and look directly at it - storms leave treasures deposited on the sand of a beach found once the waters calm. And you will stand, eyes open, and face it. You will.

And while you do, I'll be here. It's going to get hot, raging, overwhelming. I will stand in the center of the fire with you and not shrink back. You will not be alone.

I will replenish you when it's beaten you down, when you feel like you can't possibly get up another day to face the world, I will help remind you that everything happens for a reason, that this is an opportunity for you. I will hold you when your body collapses from the weight of it, not fixing you, just skin touching skin as you decide to live fully awake, let it wash over you, through you, not moving to "hide it or fade it or fix it". See these shoulders... linebacker shoulders baby!

I can't stop it, but I can be with you while you face it. You have some work to do, but I feel your strength even if you don't in this moment. I believe in your Spirit - genuine, kind, passionate, generous, honorable... you are all of these. You can "get up after a night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done to feed the children" - and you do.

And now, as you enter this darkness, the core of who you are will carry you through it... the friends you've cultivated will walk beside you, and you'll come out the other side and see the clearing of clouds, the infinite possibilities, maybe even a rainbow, certainly beach treasures. You will. I know you will.

I want you to know I wouldn't change my times of darkness. There were so many gifts - revelations, profound epiphanies, quiet wisdoms - scattered along the way. I want you to know even though there were times I thought it would break me, times I didn't think I could get up again... that it has ALL shaped who I am, where I am now. I have a contented soul, and that, that is something I wouldn't give up to avoid any pain.

Ready baby? Time to take it on.... You can do this, you will not be alone.