The past few days I’ve been thinking about times of darkness. My reflecting on my past was inspired out of gratitude. That sounds odd to be grateful for the dark, sad, and overwhelming times from my life. My gratitude is for my survival. The remembering is a stark reminder that pain and suffering is a part of living.

There are so many pieces that still lay within me with deep roots to my dark periods. They are forever a woven part of my heart, mind and body. While I have done so much to heal those parts, bits of them will stay as a reminder of what I’m capable of. I’m capable of not only surviving darkness, but of living in spite of them.

It’s heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time, to know I couldn’t be the version of myself as I am on this day, without all of the sad, traumatic, and grief stricken times I’ve had in my life. I wouldn’t be able to connect with the teen who’s struggling with divorced parents. I wouldn’t understand the grief of clients who’s hearts can’t fathom life without their loved one. I wouldn’t understand with my whole heart the clients who as adults struggle with abandonment from a parent who walked away. Most of all I wouldn’t have been so broken that I would fall into a million little pieces and have to put myself back together again.

As each part heals it leaves behind a scar. The scar is the reminder of how life is equal parts brutal and beautiful.

I wish like hell I hadn’t lost my loved ones. I would’ve liked for my 8 year old self to know the love of her father. I also know that without that trauma, I wouldn’t be me. Who’s to say what I would’ve been without those things. All I know is, I’ll never know. I choose to channel those dark times, and use them to help other people through empathy, compassion and most of all understanding.

The darkness of your life can change you in a multitude of ways. It takes time, like the earth uses seasons to create new life. You will crumble to the ground like the leaves in the fall. Parts of you will die and return to the earth, just as the flowers do come winter. As you begin to awaken from your grief, new bits of you will begin to bloom in ways you never imagined, just as the earth does in spring. And one day you will look in the mirror and not recognize the face staring back at you. You will be riddled with battle scars, but take on the day with a fire you never knew lived with in you. As the darkness fades you will rise from the ashes with a fiery flight just as a Phoenix does. You will live again, although this time wiser, scuffed up, and with an appreciation for life that one can only truly feel once you’ve felt life slip through your finger tips.

May you rise from your ashes, and breath in new life. I send you healing wherever you are in your journey on this earth. 💫