Embracing Our Humanity

I have been thinking a lot lately about concepts of light and dark, love and hate, bravery and fear, compassion and indifference, joy and sadness. Many spiritual teachings would lead me to believe that enlightened beings cannot hold these opposites simultaneously. We are supposed to always be striving to be filled with light, love, bravery, compassion, and joy. If we somehow feel these “lower” emotions, we have strayed from the spiritual path.

Is it really possible or desirable to feel these opposites at the same time? If I may use my own experience as an example – the answer is ‘yes.’

Grief is a perfect example of holding contradictory feelings. When my brother died several years ago, I was filled with so many emotions. I felt deep grief at the loss while at the same time I felt joy and gratitude for the times we had together. I felt totally alone since, with his passing, none of my immediate family remained. Through the many friends who supported me, however, I felt uplifted and connected. I felt anger that he would leave us, but also a sense of hope that his passing was at the right time for him.

I felt all of these emotions, and many more, all at the same time. Each emotion was absolutely appropriate for the time. Each emotion was totally genuine. Each emotion, when taken separately, would seem to be in contradiction to all the other emotions, and yet each one was exactly right.

I keep reading about being a container and holding love and light for these tumultuous times. While I certainly don’t disagree about the goal, I feel that we, as humans, are much more complicated. Personally, I work hard at being a channel for love and light, while at the same time, I feel a great deal of fear for the future. I hold a huge amount of compassion for the world, but I can also feel numbed by the constant barrage of hurt and devastation in the daily news. I am filled with an abiding joy because I have faith in the goodness of humankind, but I also feel a deep sadness because of the evils that I see.

I have a very large dog which wants to protect me from other dogs and golf carts. Because he goes into a frenzy every time he sees either of those things, I take him on his walk very early in the morning before the neighbors venture out. We walk in the dark every day. On these walks I see the play of dark and not so dark. The trees are black against a dark grey sky. The sky gradually begins to lighten with the approach of dawn. The light of the street lamps fades into the surrounding darkness, and the darkness creeps into the light. There is a fading in and out of light and dark. There is seldom a sharp delineation between the two.

Although Patriarchal religion would lead one to believe that light and dark are opposites and that light must always prevail over darkness, I have come to believe otherwise. The Yin and Yang symbols hold their opposites within each side. There is an ebb and flow, each containing the other.

As humans, we are filled with light and dark. We need both. In fact there is no light without darkness. There is no joy without sorrow, bravery without fear, compassion without indifference. Not only do opposites delineate each other, they contain each other.

 While Patriarchy would have us eliminate the dark completely, Goddess teaches us to embrace our whole selves, light and dark, joy and sorrow, bravery and fear, compassion and indifference. We find wholeness and balance in accepting ourselves and the full range of our feelings. The containers we hold for ourselves and each other are big enough and strong enough for all of our emotions. As spiritual beings, our task is to midwife the full range of human emotions. In doing so we reveal the true essence of our humanity.  The Divine Feminine calls us to be fully human, to embrace the light and the dark, to revel in the opposites, and to love ourselves as we walk this human/divine path.