Spiritual Direction: Facing the Secret Darkness Within Us

Facing the Secret Darkness Within Us

Many of us see ourselves as beings full of light and life who need to embrace the light within us. Some, though, believe there is secret darkness within us.

When I was a child I was told there was darkness within all of us. Spiritual life seemed to me to be a struggle between good and evil, light and darkness. Nobody was perfect, but it sure seemed like appearing to be perfect was a smart thing to do.

My beliefs about the secret darkness within me changed as I grew older. There are times when I struggle to understand and to do what is right, to live in the light. Sometimes I wrestle with my own secret darkness, and sometimes it feels like the darkness wins.

It is easy for us to try to turn our attention away from our inner darkness. Most of us prefer to try to forget about what we regret, what we fear, what we wish we had done differently. For some of us, spiritual life seems to be about putting our inner darkness behind us.

I have seen the damage forgetting about secret darkness can do, in my life and in the lives of others.

Spiritual life is not about covering up our inner darkness, ignoring it or trying to hide it. I believe spiritual life is about facing the darkness within us.

We need to look our darkness right in the eye and reflect on it. It has lessons t0 teach us. Darkness will show us things we cannot see in the light.

As we begin to face what we fear, regret, and would like to forget we will see it has gifts to give us.

Facing the secret darkness within us will bring new questions and insights to light.

The Secret Darkness Within Us

Some of us are only be prepared to glance at our darkness out of the corner of our eyes.

We have concealed the secret darkness even from ourselves. The darkness we hold feels so overwhelming and intimidating we just want it to go away. We hope we can ignore it for another hour, for another few minutes. It makes us sad, or sorry, or angry, or afraid.

The darkness within us holds us in its power because we try to keep it secret, to pretend it is not there.

We cannot imagine what would happen if our secret darkness were allowed into the light. Our world could be turned upside down if anyone knew our secrets. Some of the people we love most might be shocked and not love us anymore.

People might doubt we ever knew anything at all about spiritual life.

Facing the darkness within us may not be easy. It will be painful and will take all our strength and courage. We are talking about laying bare the parts of ourselves we most want to keep hidden. It will feel embarrassing and we may feel shame.

It is important to trust the people with whom we face our secret darkness, especially ourselves.

The time I have spent facing my own inner darkness has been full of challenging work. It has also been time of significant discoveries.

It is hard to explore parts of ourselves which we have kept in secret. We have told ourselves we were protecting our secret darkness, but we have actually been hiding from ourselves.

People who know us well, who listen and pay attention, can often see us more clearly than we see ourselves. They may not know our secrets, but they appreciate there is darkness within us.

Paying Attention to Our Secret Darkness

I believe the secrets we try to keep hidden in the darkness might be the most powerful parts of who we are.

We want people to believe we are nicer and better, and more spiritual, than we actually are. When I talk with someone as their spiritual director, we work our way into facing our secret darkness.

It is one of the ways spiritual direction is different from coaching someone into more effective performance.

I listen to what they are willing to tell me, and try to listen to what they are not willing to tell me. We explore the darkness together, looking to discover how spiritual life lives and works in us.

Most of the people who work with me are not looking for ways to be more religious. They often want to understand and appreciate what is underneath religious practices. What is their basis? Is there anything holding them up, and where are they trying to go? How are they supposed to help people?

Is there anything waiting for us in the secret darkness?

We will never really understand them unless we pay attention to the secrets hiding in the darkness.

Exploring Our Secret Darkness

There is darkness hiding within each of us. It is where we put our secrets to keep them safe.

We protect the parts of ourselves we believe are not perfect. Our weaknesses, our mistakes, our regrets and our fears, our fantasies and dreams, our vulnerabilities.

The parts of ourselves we hide do not make us weak or imperfect. They, for the most part, show us we are human.

There is deep, significant truth hidden in our secret darkness. Before we could make conscious decisions we chose to protect ourselves by keeping secrets and hiding them in the darkness. We hid them well and succeeded in hiding them from ourselves.

Spiritual life lives and is active within us and in the world around us. It is not ashamed of our secrets or hide them in the darkness. Spiritual life is all about facing the secrets we have hidden in the darkness within us.

When we turn to pay attention spiritual life has truths to tell us, to remind us of what we have forgotten.

How will we explore our secret darkness today?

When will we take time to pay attention to the secret darkness this week?

[Image by Historic Brussels]

Greg Richardson is a spiritual director in Southern California. He is a recovering assistant district attorney and associate university professor, and is a lay Oblate with New Camaldoli Hermitage near Big Sur, California. Greg’s website is StrategicMonk.com and his email address is StrategicMonk@gmail.com.