Dark Night of the Soul - DMH podcast Episode 4

Hello and welcome back to Divine. Messy. Human. for those who've joined us before, and for those who are new, welcome, I'm so honored that you're spending your time with us today. 

Today I want to dive into dark nights of the soul, what they are, and what they're not, because I think there's a lot of misinformation out about them.

I think that a lot of people assume that dark nights of the soul are just hard times. It's when things are tumultuous, and challenging, and we need to go within to find some resources and tools to use. 

But a dark night of the soul goes a lot, lot deeper, and the original writings on it go back to St. John of the Cross, and Caroline Myss does some amazing interpretation of some of those ancient mystical writings. 

Now, I know that I've made this mistake before. I've said I've been going through a dark night of the soul, where really I'm just trying to navigate lifelong challenges. 

A true dark night of the soul has three parts, and this is summarized from Anatomy of the Spirit by Caroline Myss.

However, I want to distill it down into my experience and how it's played out in my life.

So, the first thing that happens with that true dark night of the soul is an absence of meaning and purpose well beyond what can be fixed externally. So, we're not just looking at what, you know, changing a relationship or changing a job could do, or you know, moving different friend groups, or those outside things that we look to fulfill us normally, it's not just numbing those feelings, and trying to find meaning and purpose, I don't know, through association with a club or through a new gym, or, it's really not external to ourself. 

The absence of meaning and purpose goes a lot, lot deeper. It is a soul level questioning of what we are doing here, and it goes into literally the core of our being.

We also experience then strange new feelings beyond the everyday. So it's like a real sense of loss and identity, and that's not just feeling abandoned by, your partner, or your parents, or some kind of relationship. It's not just feeling rejected, or some of those big emotions that we feel, it's not just when we're feeling unloveable.

It goes much deeper. It is like that existential crisis of; Who am I? Who am I, do I even exist? Who is this Self that I am? What is my identity? What is my personality? Who am I? 

It's this really, really deep feeling of crisis, and it's not something that can just be fixed in simple ways. Again, we start to question deeply at our core, what does it mean to be this human self?

There's also a need to experience a devotion to something greater than our human experience, and so sometimes you see this in people's addictive behaviors; they might join a gym and get really, really, involved with it, or they might join a political party, or they might you know, look for, again, it's something external to themselves, but this need to experience devotion is this real sense of needing to find an anchor and a tether to our Divine Source, to Divine Inspiration, to the Infinite Wisdom of the Universe, it goes so much deeper. 

It's like we are looking for that true surrender to God, beyond the external, it is all internal work. It's deep, deep internal behavior shifting and paradigm smashing, really. 

It is a true death and rebirth, the death to who we were before and a rebirth into something completely new, and that tunnel feels long, and dark, and it feels like that kind of blackness where no light at all is creeping in. You feel like you are having an absolute mental, psychological breakdown, you feel like you're losing touch with reality, and there feels like there's nothing to tether onto. It feels like you're about to disappear into this nothingness, and it is painful, and it is scary, and it is a time that you really need external support from people who understand this spiritual journey. 

It's not anything to do with other people, there's no blame attached, and you as a human being know that it's not about anybody else, it's about nothing outside of you. It is a truly deep questioning. Deep, deep within yourself. Is this all there is? Is there something more to life? Am I supposed to be doing more with my life? But not looking at that more as in more money, more success, more notoriety, more connection with others? It is about a deep connection to the soul part of you, the part of you that is connected to everybody else through the oneness, through the collective conscious, through God Source, through divinity, and it's a recognition of that bit in everybody else, not just those you love and you can see the beauty in, but also those you dislike and hate. 

You can see the gorgeous God source in them. You see the hurt child and the angry teenager within them that are lashing out inappropriately. You have an increased grace, and compassion, and empathy, and love for what you are seeing in the world, and that grace is something that sometimes you just can't explain. It is like a tidal wave of magic, and wonder, and awe, and mystery, and divinity washes over you.

And where you once saw somebody who was damaging you, or abusing you, or not loving you to the capacity that you wanted to be loved, you see children of God, you see children of the oneness of the universe, and it sits differently in your body. 

And that path that you are walking between a complete absence of meaning and a feeling lost, beyond just the lostness of your Google Maps not working, it is like your entire navigation system within your human psyche and soul is just smashed to bits, and you've got no idea which way's up, which way's down which way is back, which way front, you have no clue, you feel completely untethered.

And moving through that dark night of the soul, I know for me, I've been really blessed to have some incredible mentors, some incredible healers, and professionals who have helped guide me. I liken it to the little pinpricks of light from fireflies. That first one that you see in that tunnel, for me, almost reduced me to tears. It was like, oh my God, there is gonna be some lights one day, and then gradually as you move through that tunnel with that beautiful support and help from mentors, and guidance, and your own inner wisdom starting to kick in at a different level, more and more of those fireflies start to populate the tunnel, and eventually you can see the light on the other side. 

And, it is like going through that birth canal, it is dying to who you were before, who was somebody who was fully identified with that external pressure, with the external society, with the external beliefs and paradigms that most people work to. 

And it is about you breaking free of that collective mindset to start to experience your own connection with life at a much greater, deeper level.

We do when we start down this spiritual path, we have some little mini breakthroughs. I know that a few of my big breakthroughs where I started questioning my meaning and started questioning that, that loss of self and identity, feeling like I was completely losing my mind. I had a few of those, but about 18 months ago, I went through a complete, harrowing Dark Night of the Soul. 

I thought that I'd been through some dark nights before, but that it was like they were warmups to what I experienced and this dark night that I went through, I literally felt like I wanted God to take me home. I was done with this physical reality. I actually remember screaming at him at one point, "You take me home, or you make me Jesus and let me manifest shit out of thin air."

I was desperate. I ended up on my knees praying, either for this to end or for something to come and take my hand and show me a new way. , I was in a deep surrender. I had no control over anything. I had lost completely my identity. I felt like I was literally at the end of the path.

And as I moved through it, there was a greater freedom. There was a greater sense of peace. There was a greater feeling that everything was gonna be okay, that I had bigger things to anchor onto, but I had still purpose to live out and that whatever God chose for me, I would surrender to, and I would walk that path, and I would take those actions, and my devotion to the divine was going to be my guiding light from then on.

And it really has been. I have settled into this strange feeling within my body where even when things are going crazy around me, I feel like I still have this tether and this anchor to something greater. 

So, when you start to ask yourself those existential questions, Find yourself a spiritual mentor, find yourself somebody who can help you navigate. I always say that I can't help you navigate places I've not been. I can't help you, to show you the light in the darkness if I haven't navigated the darkness myself. And for me, that's a really big part of my journey, is holding people's hands. 

And it's not about giving the answers because you have the answers in your own devotion to the divinity you're looking for. You know it within yourself at a deep level. You just need somebody to hold the light for you until you can see the light for yourself, and you need somebody to just show you where to put your feet next so that you don't fall over, crash on the ground or run into walls. To just hold you as you navigate trusting that you know the way, that you are, the person who has the answers for yourself, who knows the identity they are growing into, even if it feels like they have no clue and no idea. 

I am sending you love. I hope this has been helpful. I hope that you've gotten something out of it.

If you have, please like, subscribe, and share this episode, and I look forward to having you spend time with me again in future episodes of Divine. Messy. Human. as we connect to our mind, our body, and our soul, recognizing our divinity, owning, accepting, and loving our messiness, and enhancing our human experience together.

Sending you love and blessings.