The dark brooding thoughts sometimes take hold over the light positive ones.  Demanding, delusional, destructive, deep, depressive and disconnected is where the dark mind can dwell.  Positive, playful, powerful, present and patient dwell in the light.  Or do they?

Sometimes going to those dark corners is welcomed.

“I will love the light for it shows me the way, yet I will endure the darkness because it shows me the stars.” – Og Mandino

In the darkness we are sometimes lost, but do we have to be?  Sometimes my negative thoughts live in the dark recesses of my mind and hover over my spirit like dark clouds.  I smile but feel numb inside.  I laugh without joy.  I cry with deep sadness or worse feel nothing as I sleep walk through life.  What is powerful during these times is the realization that I don’t have to ‘do’.  If I believe this a normal cycle of my emotional state, a sort of lunar eclipse, then I can sit quietly in the darkness.  When I am able to do this, it passes more quickly and ironically the darkness begins to wax and wane rather than grow and consume me.

“Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein lies content.” – Hellen Keller.

It is when I fight this darkness.  Believe there is something wrong with me for feeling this way that the darkness begins to feed upon itself and grow.  When I feed the darkness with negative thoughts it begins to pull me into its empty embrace.  Here I feel alone.  Isolated.  Unworthy.

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.” Carl Jung.

I don’t dread the darkness anymore.  For me it represents a time to rest.  A time to reflect.  A time to appreciate the stars.  Those bright lights that come into focus in my life; my children, close friends, the smile of a stranger.  I believe it’s the negativity I associate with the darkness that creates those things which I fear most; depression, disconnection and self destruction.

I no longer fear the dark as much.  I used to always be in motion in hopes my “shadows” would never catch me…  They were always there.  The faster I ran, the larger they became and they haunted me.  Now I am aware my shadow is a part of who I am.  It is there.  It does not have to mean something is ‘wrong’ with me.  It is just a reflection of one aspect of my potential.  There is much to learn in that recess when I am no longer afraid to sit quietly and learn from what it has to offer.  I do not have to feed it negativity and allow it destructive power in my life.  Instead, I can observe it as one would their own shadow and maybe even play with it like a child who notices their hands shadow against the wall can make animals.

My mind can be my playground instead of my prison.