.png)
Yes, there is pain, there is ugliness, there are past "bad" events in life. But there is also love, compassion, and understanding. If we didn't experience negative events, we could not grow in more love, more empathy, more understanding of one another. This is the contrast. Without dark, there is no light, without laughter, there are no tears. And there's a whole balance in between these extremes where we somewhere reside. For those of us who have experienced some really painful events in our lives, not knowing how to escape the pain, I feel that we have been given the GREATEST opportunity for growth and learning - a proverbial PhD. in life not taught in formal education! But first, we have to:
GET HONEST WITH OURSELVES
Yesterday, I posted a blog on recognizing the shadow. Some people will call the shadow "evil", and in ignorance, actually create more fear and add more momentum to the "black wolf", (reference to past blog). Lionel Corbett, in his book, "Psyche and the Sacred: Spirituality beyond Religion" stated,
"Human evil arises from the fact that God cannot use force to stop humans from doing cruel things to other people. Some of our suffering we bring upon ourselves, and this is avoidable suffering. God can help us to avoid such suffering. When we face our suffering with courage and dignity, God is manifested in us...Ultimately, our way of relating to evil is tied directly to our personal God-image, and each one of us will have to work out the God-image for himself or herself." (p. 132, 2012).
How do we develop courage if we are conforming, living in a pattern of action-reaction? Courage comes from feeling fear (the shadow) and doing it anyway.
What is your personal definition of God? Mine is that God is a power that permeates and flows through everything that is, including us. My daughter likes to call it the "Force", but she also loves Star Wars!
Where do you see "avoidable sufffering" in your own life?
If we ignore that this contrast exists in life, we cannot begin to recognize our thoughts, emotions, beliefs, and ultimately, that we are spiritual beings having a physical relationship. It is there, and when not recognized for what it is, can cause our thoughts to dwell, or ruminate on the shadows by constantly thinking about the negative stuff, and then create more bad events in our life to "prove" that we were right about all the bad stuff happening in life. Do you see how this spiral works? Some call it a "self-fulfilling prophesy" and it is indeed how it works. But this works spirally upwards, too. So the key is to become aware of what we are thinking, not just going through the motions in habit.
Our Minds are Transmitters and Receivers
I spent half of my life in wonder of the dark, and before I knew it, I was consumed by depression, anxiety and worry, and those feelings were vibrationally attracting more negative outcomes. I was never taught that thoughts are a vibrational energy, that our minds transmit information as much as they receive information, and that made me believe that I didn't matter. That my hopes and dreams were worthless, and that I was of no value. How naive I was! I forgot that I was indeed alive, and growing in every single event that I perceived as "bad". There is nothing "bad" about learning what you need to learn from where you are. What I learned from taking the journey down the "dark path" was that I had self-limiting beliefs that were holding me back from living the life I truly wanted, but that I felt were out of reach. I followed others whom I thought were successful, and then it turned out they were not perfect, and since I put my faith and trust in others, rather than knowing I could trust myself and the energy flowing within me, my trust was broken and my faith was crushed! I failed to realize that people have been living unconsciously for generations, and that unconscious programming is what was causing the "bad things happening to good people."
My grandmother used to ask me the practical question when I would complain to her about this and that, "so, how's that working out for you?" Those words have stuck with me for decades, and gave me the ability for self-observation - THE key to getting honest with yourself. And that is where embracing the contrast begins to take shape and make sense. I learned from my past by embracing the shadow, not supressing it, forgiving the unconscious parts of ourselves, and then releasing these parts of myself and others that were not serving me. It is through working with the shadow that we can learn empathy, forgiveness, resilience, and how best to support one another. We grow in understanding, wisdom, and boldness. Isn't that a great thing?
What I began to realize is that, logically, if I could spiral downward in my life, I could spiral upward, too. Why not? What was keeping me "stuck"? It was identifying with a VICTIM MENTALITY. I thought only bad things were "happening to me" and that my personal value was so low, that I was not creating the negatives in my life. That was from attaching to the shadow, not realizing my own power to change my mind and not using it to my advantage and growing beyond the powerlessness that I felt in my life. When we attach our perceived identity to past mistakes, expected outcomes, "bad" events, and disintegrating paradigms, then we limit ourselves in the unlimited Universe, and we are not free. We are chained to repeat the same behaviors. These are the lies we tell ourselves, and the basis for addictive behaviors and mental illness.
Realize that the contrast is all-that-is. We will have good days and bad days. There is a time to sow, and a time to reap. But we are never powerless to choose how we react to it, or change what we want to appear in our lives.
You are alive! You are capable and able to respond! You can change your mind, change your life. Embrace the contrast in life, but do not attach to it, it is only an adventure, and we are adventures in space and time. And when we attach to our adventures to strongly, we miss out on growth. Do not blame the darkness, bring in more light! Stay connected, don't condemn the things that you do not want in your life. You are learning what you don't want, so you can clarify what you do want. Realize that you are discovering what you really need from these shadow-y experiences so you can become a Master at bringing and owning your own light, Your life is unfolding every day, use time wisely.
Consider: Light (us) is what matters. Dark (outside of us) is the construct to learn how to bring our light. What do you need to learn from the contrast? Be fearless and honest.
A coloring sheet for you:
Comments