Light In The Dark

On winter, darkness and the surprise of healing

A few months ago I was talking with a friend about the impending winter months, and the inevitable gloom that seeps into my soul when the days shorten, and the cold feels like it soaks right through to my bones. We were lamenting the very real feeling of oppression in winter for those of us whose equilibrium is upended by the distinct reduction of sunlight.

My friend said to me that she was determined to look for the beauty in the dark and her words pricked something in me that I’ve not been able to shake. She was talking about perception, about intention, about counting gifts—”treasure hunting”, (as my friend

Omnishambles

and I often call it).

“You Are Here” mixed media, by Kris Camealy

I’ve read and re-read Barbara Brown Taylors book, Learning To Walk In The Dark and underlined the same passages reading after reading. Taylor talks about the gifts of the dark, the treasures that one can only find when the lights have gone out. I know what Taylor says to be true from my own experience,

“I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.”¹

Having spent the last three years wandering around in a personal “dark night of the soul”, I can look up from where I stand now and see the treasure chest of gifts of those “locust years.” I have learned so many good and hard things—things that can only be learned when you’re flat on your belly with your face in the floor. Things that only come through tears and railing against the injustices of the world at large, and your own smaller world, too. I have seen long-held dreams crumble to dust and scatter in winter’s icy wind. I have gathered the shards of broken relationships and buried them in the private memorial garden of my heart. I have feared sickness and death and asked the greatest existential question of life—for what purpose is all of “this” (said with hands motioning towards the wide world). I have watched life and death pass before me in rapid succession, without time to fully grasp one, before the other came on it’s tiny blue heels.

When my friend said that she had set her mind to look for beauty in the dark I remembered the power of perception. I remembered that sometimes, the greatest gift we can give ourselves is to choose to see things differently.

How we see things matters a great deal.

“There is a light that shines in the darkness, which is only visible there.”²

When the darkness was the heaviest, the weight of the locust years made this choice to see things differently seem impossible and beyond my strength. I had no ability in myself to see a silver-lining in the rubble. All was lost in those desperate hours and I needed to feel the weight of that, and work my way through the rubble. The process could not be rushed. I needed to stumble around. I needed to feel the burn of my own scraped knees. I needed to name my offenders, my own offenses, and find my way towards the path of forgiveness. This is the gift of the dark—room to wrestle. Space to weep and rage and feel the full spectrum of our wounds. And a private place to grieve the ways we’ve wounded others too. And finally, the dark offers us the privacy of the hiddenness of healing.

Learning to walk in the dark is a discipline as much as counting one’s gifts is a discipline. We can practice. We can do the work. We cannot will-what we crave-into-being.

But the inevitable darkness isn’t the problem. Darkness is a promise. Our trouble begins and persists when we deny that the Light is even a possibility, or that the Light exists at all.

“Solstice”, mixed media, by Kris Camealy

I took my friend’s words to heart. I made a conscious decision to look for the treasures where they might be found. I’ve watched the stars, tracked the moon, noticed the wildlife that comes alive when the lights go out. I’ve kept the shades open, I’ve given thanks for every sun-soaked day and charged myself like a battery in the rays of that light.

So far this winter hasn’t felt nearly as oppressive as winters past. I’m sure the reasons for that are multi-layered. This is a new season, and though historically, winter has been a bitter season for me, I find myself unfurling. It’s as delightful as it unfamiliar. This fact is it’s own surprise treasure.

“I always wondered why it took "three days" for significant things to happen in the Bible—Jonah spent three days in the belly of the whale, Jesus spent three days in the tomb, Paul spent three days blind in Damascus—and now I know. From earliest times, people learned that was how long they had to wait in the dark before the sliver of the new moon appeared in the sky. For three days every month they practiced resurrection.”³

Three days. Three years. However long it takes, there are gifts to be found in the dark.

“Again…” mixed media, by Kris Camealy

If you’re waiting in the dark this season, still aching for the Light to break, I’d like to give you a small gift, a few gentle words of encouragement to keep you company on this, the longest night of the year. Simply click the button below to access the reading.

Merry Christmas, friends. Happy New Year, too. May your holidays be joyous and full of good cheer as you remember that the Light of the World has come in Christ, who is our promise of hope and peace, whether we are in light or dark.

I look forward to writing again in 2024.

1

Taylor, B. B. (2015). Learning to walk in the dark. Canterbury Press Norwich.

2

Taylor, B. B. (2015). Learning to walk in the dark. Canterbury Press Norwich.

3

Taylor, B. B. (2015). Learning to walk in the dark. Canterbury Press Norwich.