Spiritual Life Grows in the Dark

We tend to be afraid of what is waiting for us, hiding in the dark.

We prefer to deal with things we know we can control. When we cannot see what is out there in the dark, we do not know whether we can control whatever it is. We try to control the darkness around us with street lights, headlights, flashlights.

Darkness is more powerful, more primal than we realize.

We are born in darkness, our eyes tightly shut against the light. Like plants that will only begin to bloom in darkness, spiritual life grows in the dark.

Sometimes we need to sit and wait in the dark. We turn out all the lights, even the screens of our phones, and remember the darkness in which we were born. We close our eyes, listen to ourselves breathing, and bloom.

There are things we can see only in the dark.

Darkness teaches us what light cannot reveal to us. It may be the darkness of closing our eyes, the darkness of night, or living in dark times. Darkness can show us what we need to remember. It may be a struggle to find the lessons hiding in the dark, to recognize the gifts darkness has for us. We sit in the dark, working to complete the struggle. We close our eyes and receive the gifts of darkness as we sleep.

Familiar spaces become unfamiliar in the dark. We lose our sense of where we are. We need to see in new ways.

Spiritual life blooms in darkness. We learn to let go, to get out of our own way, to close our eyes. Darkness shows us what has been there all along.

What lessons are hiding in the dark for you today?

How do you begin to bloom in the darkness?

[Image by Philip Male]