Spiritual Awakening: The Dark Night of the Soul

“Soul work is not a high road. It’s a deep fall into an unforgiving darkness that won’t let you go until you find the song that sings you home.” ~ McCall Erickson

Let’s talk about the dark night of the soul. This event in one’s life is a spiritual awakening. The challenging time in which we’re living can be a catalyst for this experience. Exponential change is afoot and it can feel brutal. In alignment with the cycles of nature, the dark night of the soul is about life, death and rebirth.

There comes a time, or a number of times, in life when much or all of what we thought we knew comes crumbling down around us and is burned to the ground. We are left with ashes and we must grieve, for all that we knew and have lost. 

This time is disorienting, heartbreaking even, and can feel surreal. It can be accompanied by deep sadness and depression. It’s a period of intense, concentrated growth in which it’s common to lose friendships and relationships you didn’t expect to lose. It’s normal to question everything you once thought you knew as fact, down to your place in this world and the Universe, and even your relationship with your self. It is spiritual death. 

I believe we can gain incredible insights and wisdom from mythologies. In ancient Sumer (Mesopotamia) there is the myth of Inanna, Goddess of Heaven and Earth. This is the first poem of the Great Goddess, about 5,000 years old, written on clay tablets. Inanna possesses traits of the Great Goddesses: she is wise, courageous, erotic, fierce and at times, ruthless.

Inanna seeks wisdom and must travel to the Underworld, where her powers are stripped away one-by-one as she passes through the gates, into the depths. She is called to listen. With her descent, she experiences a loss of illusions about others and herself. Everything is stripped away. She encounters grief, mourning and even her very own death. 

With the assistance of tiny creatures who embody empathy, Inanna is revived and victorious, and ascends back up to the Earth. And every year she returns to the depths to die and be reborn again, as in the cycles of nature.

“We descend, not because we want to, but because we must. In many ancient myths, descent is an integral part of the Great Feminine Round of Life and Death. We are mortal and vulnerable. We live in a world of catastrophe and chaos, personal loss and social threat. 

We are thrown down. We are helped up. Miraculously, we find our way to life again.”

-- Elaine Mansfield

Synchronistically, I crossed paths with Inanna’s powerful story during my first dark night of the soul, at age 19 in college. Her wisdom helped me sync with nature, to embrace the transition from summer to autumn, and then to winter, when flowers and plants die and return to the Earth, remain dormant, becoming lifeforce for new growth come Spring. 

By tuning in to this rhythm in nature, you can choose to slow down as the days and nights grow short and cold, you can turn your focus inward to do your personal work, and nurture yourself. This is a time of increased rest and sleep, when it’s very important to nurture yourself. Self-care is the salve for the dark night of the soul. 

Through the process, you can remember your dreams, gain insights, learn and grow. You can be still and hear your wise inner knowing, your intuition. You can prepare and store healthy foods for winter, spend more time at your hearth and stove nourishing yourself, your loved ones and family. And in Spring, new life springs from the Earth, and you awaken and are reborn. You are renewed, and emerge stronger and wiser, ready for the next phase in life. I love the words of Carolyn Myss to describe this process:

“The dark night of the soul is a journey into light, a journey from your darkness into the strength and hidden resources of your soul. Navigating the dark night requires inner dialogue, contemplation, prayer, quiet time, and sharing with those who understand the profound nature of inner transformation. When you are in this interior place, you stand at the crossroads of your power, between your ego and your soul, between time and timelessness.”

If you are in the midst of a spiritual awakening and dark night of the soul right now, know that it is temporary and you will emerge, renewed and victorious. You will be different, stronger, wiser. You will be better at curating the life you want to live now. Despite the pain, it’s one of life’s greatest gifts. This is your invitation to let go of resistance, and take the courageous path of curiosity as you sit with the ashes and plan your own personal rebuild, according to your truest, most authentic self.