Thu, 07 Aug 2014 00:52:24 +0000
A week ago or so I did a blog on how to stay in the light when the world has grown so dark. I used tarot and channeled the message, and afterwards I had all sorts of epiphanies. When you channel it’s a lot like doing psychedelics; it opens you up to epiphany after epiphany.
What came to me was that a lot of people have despair right now, and they may read that blog about staying in the light and feel helpless afterwards or even wrong. Well, I’m so depressed that I can’t stay in the light so what use am I to the world? I have my own demons, and I can’t stand it when I read messages that tell me to just be happy. It makes me want to punch somebody.
So here’s the epiphany. I’m not using tarot this time, but the following was channeled.
What if your despair IS the light? What if you think you’re not in the light because of your depression, but that the depression itself is actually being in the light?
What if your anguish is love?
I’m a highly sensitive person. I’m devastated by a few things that happened to me in the past – I grew up on a farm and often think of my “barbed-wire heart”, an image of my devastated heart put back together by barbed wire, which although it holds my heart together has sharp points that still pierce my flesh and anyone who comes near me.
As a writing coach and metaphysical coach, a lot of people I counsel are also broken hearted. Even if a person didn’t have a lot of trauma in their lives, the destruction of the earth and global violence could put any sensitive person over the edge.
What I channeled was this: All of this despair is really love. Think about it. You feel awful about the Ukraine violence, all those airline passengers shot out of the sky, because you love this world, you love people, you can’t bear this much pain. You are overwhelmed by messages around climate change and it angers and upsets you tremendously…because you love this earth. You love it. Your rage is love.
Let’s say someone harmed you. I mean really harmed you. They screwed you up for decades if not for the rest of your life. Why are you so upset? Because you loved this person or because you love yourself or because you know what love is and that makes the absence of it even harder to bear. It’s all love.
When I coach people, I often read cards to them that say: “Don’t double whammy yourself.” You’re depressed, don’t slam yourself as useless or horrible or a loser because of that depression. It’s hard enough to feel that bad, don’t add your judgment of yourself on top of that.
Every Sunday early morning for years in Seattle, I’d jump into my truck and drive, just drive. I would have no plans other than to end up down some dirt road in some state park, or driving up the side of some mountain. I’d have camping gear in the truck, and I was alone, and I can remember several times it wasn’t safe, but I didn’t care. I had to get away from my despair. I had to run and run and run to get away from all that despair. Years later, I realized how loving and utterly beautiful those Sundays were. My despair was my love. I needed to be around the earth to heal. All that pain was because I loved.
I have noticed again and again working with writers and as a metaphysical coach that many many people are being called right now — hard and fast — to get aligned with their truth. In leaving the world of the ego, and entering a more spiritual life, for some reason there is this doorway one has to go through that is full of profound despair. Letting go of our mainstream ego way of seeing the world is for some reason scaldingly painful. Again though, that doorway is a doorway to love. It’s all love. I explore the theme of how to “find” ourselves in a world shaken by climate chaos in my novels EARTH, AIR, FIRE and WATER. How can I find my truth and live a sane life when the world is going insane? Understanding our despair as love is part of that path toward self-actualization.
Grab your despair and hug it to you. It will keep you in the light. Tell your anguish that you agree, it IS upsetting. Thank it. This will go a long way in aligning your life with the light. Depressed? What if that IS the light?
First Memory
Long ago, I was wounded. I lived
to revenge myself
against my father,
not for what he was
for what I was: from the beginning of time,
in childhood, I thought
that pain meant
I was not loved.
It meant I loved.
– Louise Gluck
Art of Storytelling is a coaching service for writers, www.artofstorytellingonline.com. We offer a free initial consultation. info.artofstorytelling@gmail.com. Artwork by caroline allen, www.carolineallen.com.