As promised, I have been contemplating The Dark. It's something I can't pretend isn't happening, can't deny it doesn't affect me in ways I wish I would resist. So instead of trying to ignore it, I'm going to embrace it, explore it and try to scrounge around on the bottom of it. I am just forgetful enough that it's not safe for me to light candles on a regular basis; bringing more physical light into my world is not what I'm looking for this year. I want to use this time to see what The Dark can offer me, what its influence can bring in so that I can stop dreading this season and start using it to see the parts of myself that are often "in the dark". Yesterday I read Robert Munsch's, "The Dark", looking for metaphors. I read it through a couple of times, seeing different things and ending up with a children's story that is a delight to them because the protagonist is a child. Jule-Ann saves the day from the dark. Lovely and yes, I could have read into it that if we let it, The Dark will feed off of the darkness around us and grow until it covers our sky and turns our metaphorical days into nights.
I also dug out my deck of
Caroline Myss' Archetype cards, shuffled them and chose this one randomly:
I can relate to this, I do feel like an eternal student, like the light attributes of the card says, "an openness to lifelong learning". I love discovering new things, jumping in with both feet and often taking on more courses than I can logically handle because they all inspire me and I feel like I don't want to miss out. One of the shadow attributes that stuck out for me was, "unwillingness to translate knowledge into action". I wonder, "do I do that?" Do I take my knowledge far enough so that it does transpose into action? Maybe not. Taking so many classes means I short change myself, I don't give myself enough time to work the lessons in different ways, letting mistakes happen without getting thoroughly discouraged by them. I take what I consider to be failures to heart. But I do move on, find more classes to jump into. I think I need to examine my student attitude and see if I can't bring what I learn more fully into my life and my art.
I can relate to this, I do feel like an eternal student, like the light attributes of the card says, "an openness to lifelong learning". I love discovering new things, jumping in with both feet and often taking on more courses than I can logically handle because they all inspire me and I feel like I don't want to miss out. One of the shadow attributes that stuck out for me was, "unwillingness to translate knowledge into action". I wonder, "do I do that?" Do I take my knowledge far enough so that it does transpose into action? Maybe not. Taking so many classes means I short change myself, I don't give myself enough time to work the lessons in different ways, letting mistakes happen without getting thoroughly discouraged by them. I take what I consider to be failures to heart. But I do move on, find more classes to jump into. I think I need to examine my student attitude and see if I can't bring what I learn more fully into my life and my art.
4 comments:
To me, the fact that you love discovering new things and jump in with both feet means that you do embrace the dark – if you think of the dark as the unknown. Which it often is. I also think your amazing creativity is your way of taking action, of attempting to understand yourself, your life and what is within you – those parts of yourself you believe are “in the dark.”
Am I making any sense?
(I’m leery of using candles, too - for that kind of dark, I prefer a flashlight)
I like this post -- use the dark, learn from it -- go to it!
Last night at meditation, I asked my teacher, Deb, who is what I consider a really wise woman, "How is this time change affecting you ?" Her answer was "To tell you the truth, I love it. It tells me that it is time to get cozy again." She seemed almost embarassed to share this as she knew that most other people in the room where struggling with the change. This kind of threw me. I thought I was going to get the typical response of "Oh yes, it is hard." or maybe a tip from the wise woman about how to deal with the Dark...I guess that is what I got in the end. If I can change the perception from the Dark being imposed upon me like some heavy burden to a vison of a cozy, nesting time with candles, blankets, dim lights that evoke a dreamy slower state...then maybe it won't weigh on me so much. Not there yet but it did give me a lot to think about.
Can we learn to really love the Dark ?
I like the card you picked; it's uncanny that just as you opened yourself up to exploring the dark, your card says that you are open to lifelong learning. i haven't seen those particular cards before, but will check them out. Have you ever made your own Soul Collage cards? they're a wonderful art exploration, and there's a wonderful website devoted to sould collage.
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