what happens in the darkness before realization

Writing

Oct 6

I think the most profound realizations take place over the course of many years.*

Like seeds hidden deep in the soil, we can’t always see the wild intertwining roots as they spread through us, doing their work slowly, fed by the many experiences and influences that nurture them.

By the time they bloom fully into our awareness it can feel like a sudden surprise that’s come from out of nowhere. Like having the lights switched on in the dead of night, only to reveal that we’ve been dreaming in the dark all along.

And I often wonder, with a creeping anxiety: how did I not realize this sooner?

In these moments, it’s your job to turn compassionately toward the questioning part that feels caught off guard, afraid you’re somehow late to the party, worried everyone else already knew the thing that only just now feels so deep in your bones obvious to you.

Try to remember that this startlingly sudden bloom of realization, has only just now arrived with such intense color, because of the many years it spent slowly rooting and growing somewhere deep within you.

Our days and months and years and lifetimes are filled with the small seeds of our own evolutions.

Tiny glimmering moments of magic get planted in the soil of your subconscious, gathering strength in the darkness until you're ready to behold the fullness of a profound realization that will at once change your life and perspective forever, while seeming as laughably obvious as your need to breathe.

May we resist the urge to rush the organic experience of our unique growth and evolution.

May we trust the timing of our lives.

May we be open to receiving the glimmering seeds of awareness without trying to force their blooming.

May we trust that we know all that we need to know right now, and that whatever we are meant to understand later will make itself known with time.

—

*This is a thought I’ve been pondering. Not at all meant as an absolute truth, for what do I know about anything, and whatever I think I know in some what today could very likely change completely with time.