The Tribe Experiment Day 19

Your Box of Darkness

Dear Love Pies,
I had a very difficult conversation last night with a deeply connected soul friend. The conversation involved a dark time in our lives, when hearts were broken and spirits crushed. We hung up the phone at 4:44 a.m. and I couldn’t help but think on Mary Oliver’s quote.

“”Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”

There’s no way to avoid the dark. The dark is a part of life. But if we can move past blame and shame, if we can move past right and wrong and fault and responsibility, we simply see that everything in our lives has the opportunity to bring us further into the light, even our darkness.

Even the shittiest of shitty shit shit. Inside it, there is a gift, a seed, a fertilizer that has the capacity to turn agony into blessing.

So Im asking you today: name a box of darkness and tell me how it, too, was a gift. You don’t have to spend much time discussing the darkness itself. It doesn’t need any more power or energy than when you first encountered it. What I want to know most is, in hindsight or retrospect or with the eyes of soul, tell me how the box of darkness turned out to be a gift that brought you further into the light.

Name a curse that is/was a blessing.

(And if you’re in the box of darkness now, please know that the power of transformation lies within you. That the darkness is sucky and terrifying, but is not permanent. And you’re not alone. We’ve got your back. And your front. Help and companionship are your birthright.)

Brightly Woven,
Angi