Tiny Pools of Light in a Sea of Darkness

Exploring the nature of darkness and light in us and in our world.

I walk in the dark night from our rented bungalow along the well-trodden path to the big house. My dimming torch illumines only a small circle of the path ahead.

I am unsure of my footsteps, the surrounding darkness feels unknown, mysterious, a little scary. The familiar trees and shrubs have taken on a sinister shadow, what lurks in those pools of darkness?

I walk with hesitance, focusing on the dimming light of the torch, one footstep at a time.

The waxing moon glides out from a cloud, and her reflection shines back from the still waters of the lake.

I switch off my torch, stop walking, and close my eyes.

When I open them, I can clearly see the path ahead, the silhouettes of the trees are old friends, I feel safe, secure and I know where I am heading.

As I walk with confidence, I reflect on the light of the Self, the infinite presence which is always shining in all, and I smile to see how we struggle through life with our little torches, our tiny pools of light, trying to find our way in a sea of darkness, when all the time the moon of knowledge is shining brightly, illumining the path ahead of us.

Photo by Aron Visuals on Unsplash

This experience happened thirty years ago, and is still fresh in my mind.

What is darkness?

Physics defines darkness as the absence of light.

So, does darkness truly exist, if light can banish it in a moment of brightness?

Darkness is the absence of light, and it also holds the potential for light. The night appears dark because the sun has sunk below the horizon, to shine on another part of our planet. The eternal play of sunset and sunrise is one of the many gifts of life. Each day we have these two thresholds of wonder and glory to delight in. We need the darkness of night to appreciate the magnificent light and mystery of stars, the ephemeral and soothing light of the moon. We create darkness in our homes by drawing the curtains and cocooning ourselves in a cave of no-light so we can close our eyes and rest.

What is light?

Light is the essence of life. Light nourishes life. Without light, there is no life.

If light is in everything then how will I find and nourish it? How do I recognise light?

How, for example, is light in my pen?

The pen is a tool I hold in my hand and write with—it contains ink. The combination of ink, pen, my hand and my mind are creating words. Words hold the light of knowledge, understanding and imagination. Words are sparks of light.

Okay, so how about the table I write on? How do I find light in that?

The table is made from wood — so it holds the memory of the tree it was. Memory is a form of light—the light of awareness.

The table is also made up of atoms, which are minute forms of life/energy—light. When an atom is split there is tremendous, destructive energy. So each atom holds the potential of light— so much light!

So how then is light in everything, if darkness is the absence of light?

When a candle is unlit it holds the potential for light—wax, wick—all it need is the addition of fire.

Darkness holds the potential for light.

What about the darkness of a human soul? The dark emotions: anger, fear, envy, hatred? Are they also an absence?

Do they stem from the absence of love?

Is love the light that brings dawn to the soul?

Photo by Giuseppe B. on Unsplash

I made an intention at the beginning of the year:

I will cultivate contentment and weed out resentment.

I’ve been working on dropping resentment for many years, and yet there are still strands remaining, like weeds, in the garden of my mind. I am mostly content with my life. I have time to write and walk, read and simply sit and be. I am deeply grateful to be alive, to love and be loved, to live in a peaceful and beautiful part of the world. And yet…the voice of resentment still whispers complaints to me in unexpected moments.

Resentment is a tricksy adversary. It can creep into my mind about the pettiest things, connected to the people I love the most, leaving a sludge of self-loathing in its wake.

One of the biggest issues I have struggled with is food. Food takes up so much of my time. Before I had children I was fairly uninterested in food. I ate when I was hungry, grazed if I needed to. However becoming a mother meant that I was responsible for feeding five people, three times a day, every day of the year.

I worked out that I have planned and cooked around 60,000 meals in my adult life!

When I first tried meditating, in 1968 after attending a Transcendental Meditation session and receiving a mantra, my thoughts were mainly about shopping for food and what to eat that day, so meditation felt like a waste of time to me.

When I am deep in the flow of writing I resent the need to stop and create food because I am hungry. Do male writers experience this I wonder? Or does the woman in their life take care of it all, and magically produce lunch and dinner?

So, in the process of working on my darker emotions, and ‘weeding out resentment,’ I’ve come up with some solutions, which are working well.

I assemble all the veg for our main meal after breakfast, and my husband preps the veg. He also cooks a meal once a week. Every week I make my signature dish, a delicious pasta sauce, which lasts three days. I vary the pasta and add things to the sauce for variety, even have it on baked potatoes sometimes. I also buy something that requires minimum cooking sometimes, and doesn’t compromise our healthy, vegetarian diet.

I think I may always be weeding out resentment, or some other dark emotion that clouds the light of love in me. Self-enquiry is essential, in my opinion. For my own peace of mind, I need to excavate the underbelly of the beast, to examine what is pushing my buttons, and to reason with my hard-done-by child self like a patient mother, until we find the solution together. And it is so worth it. The relief of letting the light of love pour back in to the darkness of my being is like swimming in a warm sea on a clear blue summer day.

So, yes, the darkness of a human soul likely is the absence of love.

Perhaps we can shift the darkness of greed, anger and indifference by increasing the light of love, kindness and reciprocity in our world. It is definitely time for a global consciousness shift, so nobody ever has to suffer hunger when there is more than enough to go round.

Let’s bring the light of our love and creativity into this time of darkness.

With love,

Josie