Just Be With It

Once upon a time, I found myself in a pretty dark place.

As I spiraled into my own darkness, I tried to get a handle on it. I used all my tools. Some worked for a few minutes, and some didn’t work at all. Then, brilliantly, one of my teachers said to me: “just be with it.”

Right. Just be with it.

There is no denying how much it hurts when we find ourselves confronted with our darkness. We wish, sometimes desperately, that we could be freed from our pain and our old, worn-out patterns of wounding. We long to feel good! We long to know who we are, to know our higher selves, and to be affirmed in our light.

But we are human. We are flawed, we are messy, we get confused, and we get lost. We have wounds. And we contain both light and dark.

When our darkness comes to visit, we must remember that it is a very vulnerable place within us. And within that vulnerability, there is actually a sacredness. When we must be with our darkness, we have a special opportunity to be gentle with ourselves – an opportunity to pour tenderness and love into the nooks and crannies of our soul; into the places where we would not normally dare to tread.

This deep inner loving has the power not only to transform our inner landscape, but to trickle out into our relationships and into the world.

Nature herself can teach us how to love our darkness, as she loves us so deeply. In particular, the way plants love us – seemingly endlessly and unconditionally – should not be taken for granted. With that in mind, here are two herbs that can help us be with and love ourselves through the dark times:

Rose: Rose resolves tension in the tissues and in the spirit. Cooling, soothing, and strengthening to the heart, rose can help us move through grief, loss, and other forms of emotional upheaval, and help us to remember who we are through it all. Ruled by the planet Venus, rose is an especially wonderful remedy for anyone who carries a lot of heat, agitation, inflammation, or tension. Personally, I love this plant and its effects.

Hawthorn: The leaves, flowers, and berries all work well for fortifying and strengthening the emotional heart. This is a wonderful remedy for when your heart has been working overtime, or when a great deal is being asked of it. More masculine and grounding than rose, this magical tree supports us as we process challenging feelings or face the shadow aspects of ourselves and of life in general.

In truth, darkness cannot be defeated or conquered. It can only transform through love.

These dark places that we curse may actually hold the key to the restoration of our entire being. When the darkness visits, we can tell it what it so desperately wants to hear: that it is loved.