The Dark Side of Meditation {part 1}

I love the winter. I find a surprising sense of energy and creative spark that comes with the darkest, coldest months. The cold makes me feel alive; soups and stews, fires in the fireplace, and rich oils for skin make me feel nourished and cared for; and the dark… well, the dark is where I feel most awake. 

I don’t mean that I'm a night owl… quite the opposite actually. I'm an in-bed-at-9-and-up-at-5 kinda gal. But those quiet, dark hours - when I’m in the liminal space of physical wakefulness and subconscious wakefulness… Those hours are my most insightful. 

This meditation series, The Dark Side of Meditation, is a nod to meditation teacher Deborah Eden Tull and her book, Luminous Darkness. Her teachings and my own experience have guided me to pay deeper attention to the dark; and so, we will use some of our winter months to stop chasing the light and learn how to savor the dark.

Did you know that humans lived on earth for more than 600,000 years BEFORE learning how to kindle a fire? That is 600,000 of living in the rhythm of daylight and darkness; of living in rhythm with the seasonal changes in light. Living in rhythm is a practice of being embodied. 

When we think about sinking into the rhythm of the seasons and this darker time of year, it is about inviting ourselves deeper into our own bodies. 

And, meditation my friends, meditation is a practice of embodiment.

Darkness has been a crucial teaching in so many spiritual and awakening traditions - Taoism, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Aboriginal and Indigenous traditions - and yet, culture today places so much emphasis on light, on progress, on achievement, and on growth. It is all about ‘enlightenment’.

On the flip side, darkness is associated with scariness, with the unknown, with spiderwebs and skeletons. Don’t go into that dark closet without a flashlight! Turn on the lights so you can look under the bed, but the problem is if you keep turning on a light, your eyes never adjust to the dark. 

This time of year asks us to be patient enough, brave enough, to linger in the dark. Join me for today’s episode of The Mindful Minute podcast as we explore endarkenment rather than enlightenment.

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