“Any fool can run toward the light. It takes a master with courage to turn and face the darkness and shine his own light there.” ~ Leslie Fieger The only thing better than becoming a beacon of light in a dark world, is becoming a beacon of dark in the blinding light. This is because it’s easier to shine light than it is to make darkness shine. Making darkness shine is what Nietzsche meant when he said, “The great epochs in our lives are at the points when we gain the courage to re-baptize our badness into the best in us.” It’s the epitome of transforming demons into diamonds and victims into victors. If we can discover these “great epochs” in our lives, we can become a beacon of dark within the blinding light and make the passage clearer for others. Too much light can just as easily make the passage unclear. A beacon of light pierces the dark so that others can find their way home. A beacon of dark dims the light so that others are not blinded along their way toward adventure. Both are necessary, but becoming a beacon of dark in a world that’s becoming more and more blinded by the light, is the more challenging and essential undertaking. Lost in the blinding light “You are your own sun. Stop wasting time trying to orbit other stars.” ~ Anonymous Traditionally a beacon of hope is seen as a lighthouse for “lost” souls. But, as J.R.R Tolkien said, “Not all those who wander are lost.” Contrastingly, not all those who are lost are in the dark. Just as often they are lost in the light. And perhaps even more so within the cultural climate of today. Far too many people are hiding in the blinding light of apathy and indifference, afraid of the darkness that lies within empathy and conscience. Apathy is all too easy. It just requires us to meander grudgingly along with the status quo. Indifference is all too comfortable. It just necessitates a propensity toward intellectual laziness and spiritual ennui within a system of nine-to-five daily grinds and cog-bop-cog cultural clockwork. But what happens when the status quo is fundamentally unhealthy and unsustainable? What do we do when inertia, turning a blind eye, and cold indifference are only exacerbating an already unhealthy status quo by inadvertently transforming the molehill of an unhealthy culture into the overwhelming mountain of an unsustainable world? What then? Compassionate empathy within an unfeeling apathetic world requires a baptizing of our shadow, lest we demonize the shadows of others. This is a personal responsibility. The demonization of the shadow in others shrinks or expands in proportion to our ability to reconcile our own shadow. Our adaptability to our own shadow make us more adept at negotiating with the shadow in others. The more adept we become at negotiating with the shadow in others, the more compassionate empathy we will have. Two of the most blinding spotlights on the stage of our apathy are Security and Comfort. They blind us precisely because they make things too easy and painless. But we need the sharpening stone of difficulty and pain in order to build a character sharp enough to cut (whether through the pitch dark or the blinding light). So let’s not cling to security and comfort. Security provided by a so-called authority, is an illusion at best, and a prison at worst. Let’s be cautious with security and be courageous with our insecurity. Comfort can be more of an obstacle on our journey than even the obstacles themselves. Let’s cut the cords that are providing the current to the blinding spotlights of comfort and security. Like Farrah Gray said, “Comfort is the enemy of achievement.” Using the darkness as a guide for spiritual ascent
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