Someone said something to me the other day that almost ruined everything. I was feeling on top of the world. I have been feeling invincible lately, and totally in flow. Optimism has found me! I think positive, abundant thoughts and positive, abundant things keep happening to me. I’m in alignment with the universe. But one little thing someone says could bring it all down to the ground. I was teetering on the edge.
It was one of my best friends who I’ve known for ten years. She was angry because I am so positive. She was telling me that I am attacking her by being positive-minded when she was feeling really low. And I knew how annoying I probably sounded, so I stopped when I realized. I’ve stood exactly where she is right now. I know what darkness feels like.
But you see, I found my way out of the darkness with painstaking effort. It took a lot of time, too. Healing is hard work. I knew I couldn’t keep going with my heart full of misery all the time, so I looked up and tried to find a reason to keep living on this planet. Our souls choose to come here for a good reason, and since my soul enrolled in the life lessons of Earth, I wasn’t about to squander the chance to learn them.
I knew, through all the sadness and grief, that somewhere inside me a voice was screaming out: “You have to let all of this go!” There was still something good to experience. I had to leave the past behind.
In some hidden and archived part of my soul, I know that the goal of life is to find the light and to stay in it as much as possible. Innately, I came into this life understanding the concept of non-attachment.
It’s a universal truth that the mind is the source of all suffering, not the world. We create our own prisons.
When you’re deep in the darkness, it’s hard to remember the light. So, I told my friend I won’t be communicating with her in negativity. I told her that I am only trying to help her — and that I’ll wait until she wants that help. But I won’t be changing the way I think or talk just because someone else wants me to join their misery. I worked too hard to lift myself out of it.
She accused me of guilt-tripping her because I said I had been depressed and I am not going back. She said I am a bad friend. She blocked me.
The former versions of me would have been destroyed by that. I felt my mental health hanging precariously by a string. I was on the precipice of misery again. I really value this person in my life. it’s hard to say goodbye and to see her suffering so badly.
Somehow I’ve gotten stronger. I didn’t give in this time. But I could feel the darkness there, lingering — lying in anticipation.
The darkness is always there.
It’s creeping up on me as we speak. It’s available at any moment to take over — but it only happens when I choose it. Before now, perhaps I was weaker and I let my mind do things that I didn’t endorse. Perhaps I let my mind drive instead of being in control of the journey myself. But sometimes I still let the darkness in when it comes knocking.
The darkness doesn’t hate me. It’s not coming for me to tear me down. It’s my friend.
The darkness is there to let out the pain. It cares about me, and it’s a valid part of reality. We understand each other better now. It’s always there and I don’t try to ignore it. I simply don’t feed it like I used to.
Now I see beauty and joy in the present moment. I feel good about everything going on with my life right now. The darkness visits me only when a memory of my dead lover appears or I empathize with someone else who is deeply hurting. I let it take over sometimes for a little while. But the show must go on. I can’t function when the darkness is in charge of me.
You have to balance the darkness and light within you. Both are real things. They will both come to visit you. But learning to choose one or the other is the key.
I think most people just let life take control of them and they blame their woes on the world around them. They aren’t choosing their mindset. It’s choosing them. And when that happens, the darkness usually wins.
But me? I choose the light as much as is humanly appropriate. There is no such thing as toxic positivity. There are people who choose the light and people who fall into darkness.
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