The Sacred Darkness

As I'm guessing can be true for so many of us, this time of year can be hard for me. There are anniversaries of big losses, memories of holidays suddenly without loved ones or with loved ones we knew would no longer be with us by the next year. Birthdays of family members long passed. On top of that is the encroaching darkness, and this year, the pandemic; not only the anxiety and sorrow, the vast human suffering, the uncertainty and unknown, but all that we are called on to live without. Every night as the sun goes down, I am filled with such vulnerability, with so much sadness and sorrow that I just want to curl up in a ball and wish it all away. 

Making art is a big part of what gets me through most days. And the great news there is that I am taking more risks and new things are happening that are very exciting. But I am also in a genuine struggle with what to do creatively as I have become deeply disenchanted with the only social media platform I am active on, where I share my art in a vibrant community of like-minded artists and am so nurtured and inspired by theirs in return.

This morning an unbelievable gift arrived in my inbox. An answer to a "prayer" I was not even aware of having uttered. As I read the invitation to the online retreat, Basking in the Radiant Darkness (The Radiant Darkness!!) from Vera de Chalambert, whose writings and teachings have so nurtured me over the last few years, my whole body went soft and tears came unbidden, moistening the corners of my eyes. Ah, yes. This. This is what I have been longing for. I had initially come across her when I found her powerful writing about the Holy Darkness of Trump being elected in 2016 and instantly knew she was someone whose work I greatly admired. Reading her email, the first I had seen from her in some time, I suddenly remembered during this time last year, as I grappled with the same seasonal sorrows as we got closer to the Solstice, an epiphany had arrived, and from that a commitment to embracing the darkness of this holy time from then on, only to forget while being swallowed up by it again this year. 

Here is some of what she writes in her beautiful invitation to retreat, such eloquent, soul-infused words that bypassed my mind instantly, and settled deep into my being~

Today we all are called to step bravely into the darkness of our times... 

Intuitively humans have always known that there is an aspect of Reality that emerges to mercifully guide and protect us through the Dark Night the moment we consent to our holy ordeal. And in every tradition we look, it is the Eternal Feminine, the Great Mother, the very ground of the Being, Herself Darker than night, that emerges to harness our spiritual crisis, assist our spiritual evolution, initiate and transfigure the soul. 

 

Don't rush in to fix it. Let life have you. Let the Mother have your bones for her holy Stew. She knows how to turn our hungry ghosts into allies. Our psychic lead into gold. Crumble and let Her transfigure. Invite the truth you have been keeping at bay. Feel what you don't want to feel. Hold fast to your tenderness. Let your brokenness shine. How else will you know that Love has already swallowed you, even when you fail, even when you struggle, even as you cry out into the dark. Darkness is Holy. Darkness is medicine. Do not discard this doorway into grace. Our wounds are holy passages. Our darkest, most desperate nights, ways to wholeness.* 

Suddenly I find such clarity, such sense of purpose. I sign up for her online retreat which happens the next three Sundays leading up to the Solstice. And, I get it immediately that it is time to step back, to retreat in general, and to allow life to do its work. To let the Mother have my bones for her holy stew. To do my best to honor this sacred time of year, to try to honor every single divine feeling that wants to be let in and acknowledged. To nurture my soul and my spirit with all things that are warm, comforting, revered.

It's also so clear now that it is a good moment to step back from Instagram. It is so easy to lose myself there, to succumb to the likes and the features, the head-swelling highs, the torturous lows, and how easily the very ground shakes beneath the part of me that is still so vulnerable around my artistry. More and more I have become a very disgruntled user on its platform whose values could not be farther from my own as it becomes more and more commercial, and where the algorithms manipulate to their own purposes, often times, we now know, doing great harm. And even more, to have the intention to trust that at the end of my retreat, I will know what is the best thing going forward, returning to Instagram - whose absence would feel like such a big loss - or going in a new direction. 

This morning it feels as though I have come home. Again. For the millionth time. That I have found again that place in me that knows how to trust not only life but especially the darkness. If being a gardener teaches me anything, it shows me, as the seasons turn year after year after year that there is no life without the dark; that all life begins sequestered in the rich, silent earth; all life needs the precious time and space to stop, to incubate; as people, to go within, to renew, to find the fertile ground of our being, and to rest and be reborn. 

It's not that I expect the anguish to magically disappear, though anything is possible. But that's not even the point. Already I can feel a difference, and that difference is in how I relate with it, that difference is that I can feel the sacredness of this time. With that I can now lean in, even just a bit, and ritualize the coming dark each night. I can go outside and walk as evening arrives, watch the tall redwoods become mere shadows of themselves, then meld effortlessly with the vast night sky. When I come back home I can light a candle or some sage and put on music, classical or holiday or even Taylor Swift, whatever feels like it will sooth the ragged edges. I will, if that's what my body wants, curl up in a ball, though I will hope to do so tenderly, to remember that it is the Great Mother's lap that I lay myself upon, who receives me with the greatest love and compassion, and keen and wail the sorrow of normal life plus the ravages of 2020 if that's what the soul wants. Mostly, I will endeavor to remember that love has already swallowed me, even when I fail, even when I struggle, even when I cry out into the dark.

With great Love & Peace,

Debby  

Click here for Vera's website

Click here for information on "Basking in the Radiant Dark" online retreat

Click here for Vera's powerful article written when Donald Trump won the election in 2016