The Box of Darkness
The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek.~ Joseph CampbellAnd this morning, as my 44th year nearly draws to a close, I finally opened my Box of Darkness all the way.Sarah Durham Wilson (on FB as Do It Girl and Instagram as @themotherspirit) has invited healers and teachers, witches and warrriors from all over the world into a conversation about how to transform darkness and how it transforms us.For most of us the very idea of delving into these murky inky spaces AT ALL is anathema until by hook or by crook life gives us no other choice. When it comes to our darkness, the shadows that dance about us and the withered wounded within us, it is all too easy to point the finger at something or someone outside of ourselves, the trick of initiation and the doorway in.Stepping courageously towards instead of fearfully away and inviting us along, Sarah has assembled a formidable coven that includes many I consider my greatest wayshowers. It is humbling company to keep. For the very first time this morning I spoke about my crooked path here, a rocky rollercoaster of disowning and divorce, disease and despair whose root lay enmeshed in anger: at myself, at what had happened, at those around me, at the bloody world and its inconvenient truths. Early adulting can be brutal until the awful reality hits: actually it's not them. Gulp. It's me. Mine to open and untangle.My healing has been a decades long study in the anatomy and physiology of anger and rage, owning its terrible consequences and personal price until finally it has become my dark goddess. Oh what hasn't she taught me about myself and others. In turn, it has morphed into a foundation stone of the good shadow work of my life, reflected in my reading and writing, circles and retreats. I am no longer scared of the dark. Turns out I was born on Kali's birthday for a reason.
Here's a little taster of our conversation together.
"I once saw this YouTube video where parents are introducing their kids to their shadow - shadow in the mundane world. And these little kids are realising that there's this dark thing attached to their feet that they can't outrun. And they're running around screaming, they're hysterical thinking they are being chased by this thing.And there's this one kid, maybe 14 months old in his nappy, up against this big white house and the sun's behind him and somehow he stumbles on that amazing truth: he realises if he walks *toward* his shadow instead of walking away from it, it gets smaller. The closer he gets, the smaller it gets and the less scary it is.For me, when I saw that video it was this clanging metaphor for my entire journey. The number of years I spent running around screaming trying to get away from myself and blame it on everyone else. But the second you turn and walk toward her and beyond that, embrace her and integrate her, you become whole. It ceases to be terrifying. You find this place within where your power lies. The more we run from our shadow side, the more we disconnect ourselves from our personal power."I cannot recommend enough this conversation series. It will make you feel brave enough to do it yourself, I can promise you that. Yes, the learning curve is steep and sometimes ugly. It is not for the chicken livered or the feint of heart but we ALL have it in us. Truly. Shadow work emboldens you and as so many of us prove, alchemises your shit into gold whose shimmer then helps others.No more excuses. As Sarah says, the world needs your magic.You too can open the Box of Darkness and drink deeply of the wisdom held there at https://
Words © Kerrie Basha, 2018