A Dark Night of the Soul (not to be confused with The Dark Knight, the only superhero movie I saw twice in theaters) is a concept I’ve been familiar with for a while but haven’t had much direct experience with. The idea was first described by St. John of the Cross while he was imprisoned in the late 1500’s as a sort of purification of the spirit . Today, the phrase is commonly used to describe a crisis of faith or a particularly difficult period in one’s life.
Dark Nights and No Sleep
Recently I’ve suffered from a severe lack of sleep. I take care of Alora for the first half of the night. Her every movement and tiniest snort wakes me up. I hand her off to Grace or Grandma to take the 2nd shift. I’ve been unable to fall back asleep in those hours. I lay in bed thinking about nothing in particular, often just watching my breath. Yet the combination of a lack of sleep, which is probably my most brutal source of unhappiness, with many hours to stew in one’s own thoughts seems to be a bad combination. I’ve had a few figurative and literal dark nights where I felt like I was completely unraveling. I began to question my fitness as a father, Sifu, human being in general. At times I felt like I should just give up.
Luckily, after a few good nights’ rest I’m back to my dynamic self. Let’s hope Alora keeps letting me sleep.
The futility of Life
Ekhart Tolle describes the dark night of the soul as “a collapse of a perceived meaning in life…an eruption into your life of a deep sense of meaninglessness.” The experience is similar to depression and can be triggered by an event such as the death of a loved one. I experienced this for the first time when my mother passed from pancreatic cancer a few years ago. For the first time I came face to face with mortality. I still replay her final moments in my mind sometimes and question what you might call the futility of life. If it can all disappear in the span of a few ragged breaths, what is the point? I can usually steer this in a positive direction. I try to think about doing everything I can for the Dojo and my family in the limited time I have left.
Jouney into the Unknown
The Dark Night of the Soul is a journey with no clear destination. Where we are headed: enlightenment, the divine, God are by definition unknowable matters of faith. Thinking of this experience as part of a journey that takes us somewhere higher is useful. It helps us remember that at the very least this too shall pass. There are parallels with the eastern concept of enlightenment as it is seen as a period of “unselfing” or transcending the ego, a surrender to the divine, leading to an experience of oneness. Likely, we will emerge on the other side of a Dark Night reborn as something stronger, less tethered to our self-limiting points of view.
The Dark Night Before the Dawn
As Joseph Campbell says, “The dark night of the soul comes just before revelation. When everything is lost, and all seems darkness, then comes the new life and all that is needed.” This is part of what he calls the Hero’s Journey. In our practice, we endeavor to see challenges as opportunities. This allows us to be creative and flow with our circumstances rather than feeling stuck. We don’t necessarily want to avoid the suffering, for growth doesn’t happen without resistance. Yet thinking of our Dark Nights as opportunities to grow will help us get the most out of a period of difficulty.
If you’ve experienced a Dark Night of the Soul, you can probably appreciate the importance of doing some work to prepare. Meditation, prayer, reading inspirational books, exercise, sleep, and whatever else works for you are all important to practice regularly. Even so, it can feel like all you can do to lessen the blow, to make it to the other end. Keep up all your helpful disciplines!
