Bingo Night of the Soul

One of the few times I've played Bingo, I got a blackout. And wow, was it great in a mediocre sort of way.

Being ADD, it kind of sucked to sit through all the number and letter combinations being called, and repeated, for those not paying attention. There were times when I wanted to just give the hell up and go get more pancakes (this was at Pancakes and Bingo night in college. Self-explanatory.). Anyway, when I got a blackout I scored bag of cheap plastic toys from the Dollar Store and a pencil with one of those rubber aliens that fuck around while you try to do homework.

A Dark Night of the Soul is kind of like that, but the actual game sucks harder and the prizes are a lot better than crappy alien pen hats.

*****

I'm a skeptic at heart, and it kind of sucks.

There are times when all that "love and light" shit makes sense to me, and elsetimes it just sounds stupid. Trite. Meme-like. But that's none of my business.

Anyway, as witchy and spiritually-oriented as I am I can't help but try and rationalize the purpose of magickal workings. Sort of like psychoanalyzing my spiritual practice. When I feel the twinge of power outside of myself, or an altered state of consciousness, is it a placebo effect? Are my trances psychosomatic? I really wish I could push those intruding notions aside, but they are sort of rooted in me like a malignant kind of parasite. I guess doubt is kind of parasitic. But at the same time, it exists for a reason.

Doubt is a facet of instinct, and instinct is what kept our ancestors alive long enough to evolve and carry on a lineage. I really do think that a certain amount of skepticism is healthy. How often do we hear about somebody who adhered to their religion or political ideals so much that they hurt people who didn't believe the same as they did? Just check the front page of your least-favorite news website. Actually, don't. You know it's gonna be there.

Skepticism sometimes works in a way that actually reaffirms the beliefs we doubted before. There was a cool dude named John of the Cross who wrote a beautiful metaphorical poem about finding truth through doubt. He called it "The Dark Night of the Soul." In this poem (and adjoining commentary) he likened the person searching for the Divine through the darkness of doubt to a lover searching in the night for her beloved. It's damn beautiful. Some of the greatest luminaries and mystics went through periods of intense skepticism. Thérèse of Lisieux, Paul of the Cross, Mother Theresa of Calcutta all went through it.

Yes, I just listed a bunch of Catholics, but I'll remind you that I was raised in Mother Rome's brood since I was a chicklet and some things are just base knowledge at this point. 16 plus years of theological study, ahoy! And spirituality really transcends religion, doesn't it? By the way, speaking of enlightenment, a fabulous non-Christian example of someone who found the light in the darkness was Buddha Shakyamuni. Kind of an obvious one. I'd love to hear from you about luminaries from other religions who have experienced the Dark Night in some form or other. Post in the comments!

I think I've been in my own Dark Night since I was a late teen. It weirdly coincided with my depression getting really bad*. Before the Dark Night came around, I was pretty connected with my spirituality. I was a cradle Catholic and just dipping my toes into pagan waters with a couple of friends at our Catholic high school. I still felt something when I prayed the rosary or communicated with faeries. Then all of a sudden, nothing. I was pretty lost at first, but I've since become pretty calm when faced with my spiritual shadow. Not having those tingles in my soul makes it much easier to think rationally about philosophies that I had previously taken for granted, and as such I was able to weed out thoughts and practices that didn't jive with me. It led me toward Buddhism and Christian mysticism as well as ancient Celtic philosophies.

It can still be disappointing when I chat with spiritually attuned friends about their experiences (I have a very close friend who is a fellow empath as well as a budding medium, and she is able to tune in to Spirit in a way that I currently am blocked from). I want to feel that connection. But I just gently remind myself that I'm on a different trail leading back to the main Path. And weirdly, I have finally been able to connect in small ways this past year or so. I'll post more on that later.

When I was in session with my therapist yesterday we got on the topic of the Dark Night of the Soul. She gave me some good validation as only a shrink can, explaining that the Night was basically a form of introspection, like the Jungian idea of the assimilation of the shadow self. I won't get too much into that, since my aim is spirituality and not psychology (though I do enjoy studying the latter). But it is definitely something I'd like to revisit at another time.

The Dark Night is not that scary. I'm just making my way through in order to get that alien pet hat.

*****

"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."
Joseph Campbell, from A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living

"There is no coming to consciousness without pain. People will do anything, no matter how absurd, to avoid facing their own soul. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious." - Carl Jung

*(NOTE: a Dark Night of the Soul and depression are very different things. This link provides a good explanation and distinction between the two ((http://www.everydayhealth.com/columns/therese-borchard-sanity-break/depression-dark-night-soul/)). I do NOT condone replacing psychiatric treatment with religion. Just sayin.')