Thank you, Sharon Miller, for this photo. It represents so much of what we are all trying to live into these days…a blossom from the muck of it all.
If, as I am beginning to accept, the dark is just as organic as the light, death as natural as birth, disintegration as inherent to living as integration, and shattering as ever present as coherence, then I am left to wonder…what to do when the dark, dying, falling-apartness of life becomes our reality?
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Persephone…abducted and forced to live half the year with Hades in the dark. It became her reality and she, like all of us, must have had to figure out how to live there without losing too much ground. As a young woman my only question in the hellish moments was, “How do I get out of here?”
Over time, that question evolved. With therapy and listening to wise others, and conversations with so many, I began to bring different questions into the chaos of divorce, financial upheaval, betrayal, diagnoses, and world suffering.
Who might throw me a lifeline?
What hidden opportunities might appear?
Are there allies in the dark?
And how might I be resilient?
Recently, in the storms of the moment…which feel like typhoons…which seem to be forever-lasting…I find myself considering a new question.
If, in fact, death is just as natural a condition as birth, if all things must fade, if the light cannot last, and the dark must be essential to life, then, what am I actually bringing to the dark?
If the dark is a party, an unwanted invitation, but an invitation nonetheless, what gifts am I bringing?
Persephone brought her kindness, and was known to help heroes navigate the underworld, enabling them to fulfill their quests.
So in this moment, what gifts might I bring? What strengths, wisdom, capacity? If Victor Frankl brought his intelligence and optimism to the concentration camps, and Rosa Parks her courage, and Helen Keller her perspective, and Anne Frank her love of life and, and, and….then what will we bring?
We cannot halt the natural disintegrations of all things organic, and much that is inorganic in our world today is being made hellish through compulsions of vanity and power and ruthlessness and selfishness, but we can – and I do believe we must – bring all the light we have to the dark.
We might choose then to blossom anyway. To stand tall anyway. To fight anyway. And like Persephone, stop pretending that rescue is coming and instead become the heroine of the tale, tears and rage and fear and all.
Love, Maria
A few new things to read and listen to:
1. Post-Traumatic Resilience for Living Fully After Spinal Cord Injury with Maria Sirois, Psy.D. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/275-post-traumatic-resilience-for-living-fully-after/id1526474466?i=1000721784917
2. Global Travel: Wellness Retreats: https://www.globaltravelerusa.com/ocean-edge-resort-golf-club-launches-wellness-retreats/
