There is no coming to consciousness without pain….One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. – Carl Jung

I was always afraid of the dark. Things going bump in the night (which was usually just my big sister under my bed). Where did that fear of the dark come from? From the uncertainty of it, from not knowing what was behind or within that darkness, or from wanting to avoid the darkness of pain or sadness?

My more spiritually minded friends suggested that I “embrace my darkness,” that I “surrender to it.” At the time, I had absolutely no idea what they were talking about. Despite their enthusiasm, the darkness–my darkness–still terrified me.

And I had gotten really good at avoiding it. I pretended it simply wasn’t there. I wasn’t angry or sad or in pain (was I?) or at least I didn’t go looking for it or dwell on it. Life was good. Somehow I thought if I worked hard and knew what I wanted, I was in control of my life.

And then IT happened. Everything I thought I wanted for my small business, the big goal I had been working on for over a year with a business partner, collapsed around me. I was left standing in the rubble, choking on the dust.

The darkness came without me asking it to. I was enveloped in it, I struggled against it at first, and then I just surrendered. What now, I asked? It was my dark night of the soul.

The dark night of the soul comes just before revelation. When everything is lost, and all seems darkness, then comes the new life and all that is needed. – Joseph Campbell

I got it. This was the darkness I needed to face, to surrender to. So, I dove into it; I went deep.

I reexamined everything I “knew,” believed, assumed, and thought. I deconstructed myself bit by bit; decoded my dreams, which were full of messages; found a way to laugh at myself; faced and questioned my fears and demons with strength and resolve; made peace with them; and followed the slender threads that appeared before me seemingly showing me the way back to the light.

When I emerged from the dark, I felt like a whole new me. A more loving, compassionate and humble me. One that’s open to possibility, uncertainty and grace. A me that cares deeply about her soul and following its guidance.

Don’t get me wrong, I still have goals and aspirations, but they come from a different place inside of me now–a soul-directed place–and they sure as heck aren’t set in stone. We all know what happens to stone when a bomb goes off. Dust and destruction everywhere.

While I can’t say that I felt like a phoenix rising from the ashes–that was a bit too Icarus-like to me (and we all know what happened to him)–I did feel like a fledgling learning to fly for the first time. My flight was a little precarious and wobbly at first, but the fact that I’m flying again with the jet stream instead of against it is absolutely beautiful and oh, so liberating.