I want to discuss the positive side of darkness. I am often in what people would call a dark state. I live in a sort of “half dead” spirit. I am not a very vital man, and for me the heights of emotion, intense joy, etc, are often just not available. I don’t understand what seems like euphoria in others, and sometimes I can’t even communicate with them when they are on a high. For me, the process of decay/regrowth is very obvious, and the state that allows one to be very creative/imaginative is not easy for me to get into. It’s not unavailable, but I don’t experience it the same way.

Life seen from the point of view of the “not alive” looks differently. It’s hard to feel betrayed when some support is withdrawn, or feel especially blessed when some support is gained or offered, and you tend to see everything as part of a single level. It has been said death is the great leveller. Maybe it has a hand even before the death of the body.

Is that because you feel disassociated? It is in part, but it feels like it runs deeper. It doesn’t make me hate life or being alive. If anything, I think I can appreciate it in some ways better than a more vital person.

When you do or do not feel this way is that your general modus operandi? I am almost always running on neither here nor there too. I think it has to do with my neurology. I suspect so in both our cases. For me it started at birth, but I have noticed two sides of it. The seemingly dimmed world, the less vital world of greater memory than activity, and a more numinous realm.

Would you agree this is about pushing the limits too far, too fast? Yes and no, mostly no. I have dealt with the struggle of trying to rectify a deep seated sense of being unwhole, and that struggle has been draining at times. But even at my peaceful moments, I find I just resonate more with the “end” phase of life than the beginning. One thing I find is being immersed in this end phase and sensitive to the process of death/closure, I find I am sensitive to the start of new life as well. It seems the deeper I sense the end, the deeper I sense the beginning as well.

How does darkness fit into this? Well, it’s like a door. I don’t feel like I will die, quite the opposite, it feels like death is a grey thing and not the inevitable weight. I can linger on the living side of the door more easily. In part because the “poisons” of life do not frighten me. No fear of life’s evils = no damage from the fear of life’s evils.

To contemplate the end is to be at the yang side of the cycle. Wanting balance swings us over to the yin or beginning. Yin and yang not used well, but just said to illustrate the principle of that unity. So the deeper we go, say, to the light, the more intensely we can know the dark too. Also true, so the positive side of darkness is the mirror image of the dark side of the light.

But to elaborate more on a point (though I don’t know why I am), this nexus phase of life, sort of a ground state it seems, has two sides. Like a coin, a numinous brightly lit state, much as some people who have near death experience’s report seeing, and a shadowy, by comparison slower/heavier state. The numinous state seems to have qualities much like Buddhists connect to liberation.

When do you have this? Any time of day, or you can call on, or it visits you? I go to it inside. It is like I have a surface self and then a core, and the surface self consumes a lot of energy.

I think it does that for all of us. It’s that upper space we do a lot in. Stronger with people who have a stronger inner dissonance, so I do try to balance those.

Perhaps you are two people then? I don’t experience the two people as having separate identities. The outer self feels artificial, but what I do find is this: Being in darkness so often brings a form of clarity, and when I experience other peoples darkness I’m not moved by it. It’s like reading a road sign, easily intelligible, and I can often help them get to where they want to be inside.

That is a state of mind where you are not being triggered by anothers pain. I do that all the time. It does make me far better suited to counsel for instance. Yes, but also by my own focus and seeming natural point of spiritual gravity or point of balance.

So using the logic of darkness, the whole world can be seen in a way that allows for deep insight. When I am in that state, I feel an “instinct” for an energy to die, like their sorrow. I am not so much seeking to comfort as I am seeking to end a disturbance, and often they don’t like my drive to make their sorrow die.

Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.

Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~