Why do we go through the Dark Night of the Soul?
Written by
- Carlos Barraza
- Personal Development, Spirit
One phrase that I heard and might fit the best to summarize why do we go through a Dark Night of the Soul is that “it is always darkest before dawn”.
It is similar to the proccess of diamonds, where the carbon has to be under high pressure until being turned into a diamond.
And more analogies can be said, but what is the real reason of going through such spiritual experience?
In this article I will write about my thoughts and opinions of why I have experienced such tremendous moment.
The call of our Soul or is it Destiny?
Have you seen in people or has happened to you that when you give or get something easy, it is usually not totally appreciated, or being taken care of, as something that cost even more to get.
Usually, for the things that have taken more work, more time, more effort or seem impossible to get, as we get it, the value of either that thing or experience has even more value, mainly because of the arduos proccess that had to be passed in order to achieve it or become it.
Similar could be an experience of the Dark Night of the Soul, but of course in a broader spiritual and mindful escence.
The spanish mystic and poet, St. John of the Cross with his poem makes allusion to the feelings of this experience.
I think that we, the ones who have experienced a Dark Night of the Soul, start to value even more life after it.
Probably before, we already have enjoyed the ups and downs of life, but now, with the eye open (literally the Pineal Gland activated) and a deep sense of meaning and a purpose driven life.
It is said that there are some who experience a longer Dark Night of the Soul and some who have a harsh quick experience.
For the first ones, the spiritual growth and life changes are gradual, where for the second ones changes are more drastical and faster.
I could consider myself in the second type.
As I remember how it was my 2020, the year of my spiritual awakening, at the beginning of “my call”, it was about questioning the meaning of life and asking the divinity for the love of this world, specially for the COVID-19 worldwide events.
Day by day of that lent of 2020, I dedicated time for meditating and praying at a place in Heilbronn named “Liebespunkt” which means “Love Point”.
I started to be aware of synchronicities and I had a sense that something started rising within me.
But little did I knew, even though I considered myself christian-catholic but I was never taught by the church about these concepts, that people who do strong spiritual practices could also end up in a strong experience such a Kundalini Awakening, which in conjunction also goes through the Dark Night of the Soul.
I was in the dark, because I was not aware that for the emptiness that I wanted to fill, I was searching outside for the external to do so.
While most of the world was in a lockdown, my spiritual experience ended up in a different kind of lockdown, in a mental hospital in Germany with what I could say an Ego Death.
I stayed 9 weeks at the clinic, which to be honest, the clinic was really gorgeous surrounded by nature.
For this period of time, I could refer it as a symbol of the 9 months of a mother’s pregnancy, a gestation period.
My time at the mental health hospital was an inflection point for me, a death and rebirth process and the continuation of the awakening of my true self.
After I left that place, my life started to change drastically and completely.
I had the urge to build a new life, to quit my wonderful job, to leave behind the lovely and comfort life I was building in Germany and return to my home in Mexico.
That might sound strange. Probably from an Ego perspective, it is.
If I was enjoying a life like that, then why change?
Eventually, this crave to learn from spirituality after the Dark Night of the Soul, teach us that everything is connected and as within so without, as above so below.
That inner voice, that higher true self is already connected with the divinity and it guides us.
So I decided to follow that “instinct”, that “inner voice”.
And as one person in the clinic told me, “only God knows“.
The purpose of the Dark Night of the Soul in the Spiritual Awakening Process
So after almost 4 years of my experience, what has happened or how I have found meaning to living a dark night of the soul?
I could consider that living this experience eventually is a catalyst of personal development and growth.
Spiritual Development
One main area that expands exponentially is the acknowledgement of the spiritual journey.
I started to crave for “spiritual information” and started to read, view and listen to blogs, books, videos and audiobooks that covered such topics.
As it is, the Youtube algorithm eventually started to show on my feed more and more related videos that talked about spirituality.
I started to search for keywords like spiritual awakening, kundalini awakening, dark night of the soul, spiritual depression, hero’s journey and find out worldwide and locally known people who were already talking about such experiences like Eckhart Tolle, Alan Watts, Saddghuru, Deepak Chopra, Stanislav Grof, Joseph Campbell, Christina Lopes, Teal Swan, Zack Alexander, Loner Wolf Blog by Aletheia Luna and Mateo Sol, Jamie Munday, Gogo Ekhaya Esima, Yvonne Speck and many more.
Learning from other people who have make through such experience really help to develop on this spiritual journey.
Certainly, at some point, the “mind” starts to understand such spiritual experiences.
As well, I am sure that this spiritual proccess also helps to learn how to become more the “observer” of the thoughts and not neccesarily believe that one is the thought.
This, the “observer” part, also helps to ease life and to don’t be attached to the thought, specially for negative or diminishing thoughts.
Another part of this spiritual evolution is becoming conscious about synchronicities.
The psychiatrist Carl Jung is one who have talked about this meaningful events.
And synchronicities are not just observing the numbers 111, 222, 333, 444, 555, 666, 777, 888, 999, but also to observe events that seem that there is no direct correlation.
Some examples I lived in the recent years are that once it happened that I was checking Instagram stories, and a friend who lives in another country had on her Instagram story the song “Memories by Maroon 5”, and right after, I got into my car, and the song that was on the radio was the same “Memories”. I don’t know how to describe the feeling, but it was so curious for me.
Another example, as I was walking with a friend in Cancun, and talking that now I am observing more number synchronicities, a taxi with the number “111” on its side just passed.
And the most recent synchronicity as I write this article, some days ago I have started to listen in the morning the audiobook of “How to win friends and influence people” by Dale Carnegie. In the night of that same day, I started to watch a movie “Medios Hermanos” and in a part of it, the main actor makes a Google search and what he starts typing is “how to make friends”, which the Google results show the book. It was another, “Oh God” funny moment.
At the beginning of the acknowledgment of the spiritual journey, synchronicities were a “what the heck” moment, but as time passes, one enjoys synchronicities even more.
And last but not least, in terms of spirituality and religion, as being used to consider myself as “christian-catholic”, it fell down the need to go to church. I attend a couple times to the church mass, but it did not felt right anymore. At least for me.
As I recall, Echkart Tolle mentions in one of his books a New Earth, there are signposts in religions that eventually move people forward to realize about the connection with the divinity.
In my opinion, yes, in some matter religions do point to the connection with the God within, but not mention literally and directly, at least the christian-catholic, about what is that dormant kundalini energy within that rises up the spine and activates the pineal gland.
For me, religion has turned out a dogma that keeps people seeking for their desires outside, rather than inside.
Ancient civilizations understood this and taught this with the use of mythology, but we only take those stories as merely folk fantasy tales.
What I have kept doing, is to do prayers and meditations. Those spaces of alone moments with daily spiritual practices have become also a reinforcement of the connection with the divinity.
After a Dark Night of the Soul, a new level of consciousness is achieved.
Mental Development
Mental Health
The mental and emotional aspects of a person are a motor of how we behave, feel and react to our environment.
For the decisions that we take, we either rationalize and think things, what is good for the Ego I suppose, or we follow our “gut”, which is listening to our soul.
In the last years, it has taken even more relevance the topic of mental health and its care, but unfortunately, that also has included the stigma that if you have a certain behaviour, then you have an illness and you need to be medicated.
And I say unfortunately or maybe fortunately for a higher purpose, because I also experienced from first hand at the german mental health clinic being medicated for my “depression”, for my “psychosis” and “symptoms of schizophrenia” without even being questioned, or without the doctors doing a profound investigation of what happened, a spiritual emergency and an altered state of consciousness.
People who experience a spiritual awakening and a Dark Night of the Soul, in some cases end up in such mental health institutes and are medicated, inclusive against their will, even if all the labs like electroencephalogram or MRI were proven to be “normal”.
Mental health treatment models are based on “what the statistics and the medical books have shown”, without even considering in first place the individual, his or her experience, his or her root causes, and in general the full body-mind-soul spectrum of what is unbalanced.
Visiting a mental health clinic might be part of a healing proccess, but what I can say is that the current way of being treated and medicated by such mental health clinics is not the path towards healing. Mental health clinics must change their approach on how they treat the patients.
In fact, such approach, of basing the 6-12 week treatment on what the medical books say, having 5 minute sessions with the “specialized psychiatrist doctors”, and 5-10 minute sessions with a “specialized psychologist”, only impedes or diverts the person’s healing journey.
The good thing I have read is that there are some clinics that are already applying a different approach towards the spiritual emergencies. You can find more throught the Spiritual Emergence Network.
Two videos that I find relevant are the Ted Talk of Phil Borges “Psychosis or Spiritual Awakening” and “Sick or Gifted? Bridging the Connection Between Mental Health Issues and Spirituality” by Gogo Ekhaya Esima.
This talks bring up the awareness of different spiritual experiences that are quickly labeled as “mental illness”.
If the doctors who are in charge of such places are not “spiritualized”, then the spiritual emergencies cases might take even more time to heal, hence the need to bring up more holistic healing spaces and develop doctors that have an holistic healing view.
Personal development on Mental Level
As for myself to keep developing on a mental level I have done several things.
One simple action like, dedicating time in nature, helps not only to calm the mind, but actually helps to bring the stress levels down, and as consequence by lowering the cortisol levels, also the inflammation levels in the body and the brain go down.
Time in nature is a common effect of a spiritual awakening, and as well, animals like dogs and cats do come closer, which also helps to relax.
I have been planting more trees in the last couple years after my spiritual awakening, than in my whole life.
As well, I also have been focusing on learning in general about personal development as well in topics like wealth creation.
The focus on the growth of personal finances has been a controversial topic for people who are in a “spiritual community”, and it is understandable because at one point of the awakening journey, one part is to “leave behind any attachment” and that also includes money.
The talk about money and spirituality can have plenty of contrasts, but as for me, money has to be seen as a tool that helps to build a life that one desires. As said by some authors, money is energy, and we can see it as simple and plain as that. If we use it for good or for bad, is the personal decision.
Another aspect that has helped me in the last years, is to write my set of goals and commit to myself.
Doing a personal development course by Marco Antonio Regil, and listening to other personal growth speakers such as Bryan Tracy and Jim Rohn, goal setting has become also a part of me.
I have not only set my goals about money, but also about experiences that I want to achieve.
This has helped me as well to understand that is more about the proccess and the journey, not only about the end result.
Also, I have listened to audiobooks and videos of Neville Goddard, Wayne Dyer and Bob Proctor.
Such style of teaching has helped me to internalize the spiritual and mental lessons of ask and it is given and treat thoughts as things, which basically were lessons taught by Jesus-Christ.
Physical Development
I could say that also the Dark Night of the Soul experience was a medicinal experience for the body.
Before it, the autoimmune disorder that I had, Hashimoto, was also driving me nuts.
I experienced the “Doctor’s Dance” and visited plenty of endocrinologists, one after the other, searching for answers of why I don’t feel myself right.
Unfortunately, for autoimmune conditions, it takes time to spot what are the root causes that are generating those random symptoms such as sleep disorders, brain fogs, anxiety, depression, inflammations, rashes, arrhythmias, bulked eyes, fatigue and many more.
Eventually, also in the search for understanding the spiritual journey, I also learned more about healing the body.
That drive inside me, to take full responsibility on the well-being of myself without really waiting for the outside (doctors) to heal my body, was an important step.
For the autoimmune disorders, it is crucial to learn which foods are your triggers like Gluten, Egg, Strawberries and more.
I did a blood test ordered by an holistic doctor in Germany, which checks which are the foods that generate an immune reaction.
After knowing my results, eventually I started my Hashimoto diet that eliminated my food triggers.
I did a course on Trophology, which also has the idea of using food as medicine.
I commited to my juicing therapy, and every morning had different types of juices and smoothies like green juice, papaya-coconut smoothie or the banana, cacao powder, cinammon and nuts smoothie, and some others that included the vegetables and fruits that I can eat.
As well, I focused on not over excercising.
I loved to go to the gym almost every day and to play sports. It is usually recommended to do excercise to keep the body healthy, when in reality it is important to not over do it.
Doing too much work-outs also adds up stress to the body, and in autoimmune disorders, the aim is to reduce stress and inflamation in the body. Therefore, it was crucial for me to find the right balance of not being too lazy neither too extreme with my workouts.
And another big and important point to keep the body healthy is sleep.
Some people are night owls some other are early birds, and what is important is to get to know your own circadian rhythm and aim to sleep the full straight 7-8 hours.
In my thyroide case, the change of the right brand and reducing the dose of levothyroxine for my thyroid was really a big relief, since previously the doses that doctors gave me, plus the type of brand, were a factor that impeded me having a good and continous sleep.
As I am an early bird, I sleep around 9 pm and wake up around 5 am, feeling replenished and with energy most of the times.
Eventually, day by day after my Dark Night of the Soul, and with the slight changes done, the symptoms went into remission.
And I can say that my improvement is thanks to the development of the combination of the three factors, the body, the mind and the spirit, which God/Universe/Divinity guided me to.
If the three areas are balanced, it becomes easier to push oneself up back again.
Sharing is caring
I healed, so can you.
And as stories of people around the world that I have read helped me, I know that my spiritual and healing journey story can also help.
I know, I still have a long journey forefront that I will keep sharing, but as for now I wanted to share the insights learned along this path after 4 years of my Dark Night of the Soul experience.
Here are some short healing tips that helped me.
Healing the Spirit
- Practicing gratitude
- Acknowledging that a higher power, God/The Universe/The Greater Consciousness/ The Source, is already guiding us towards healing
- Practice own spiritual prayer. (In my opinion, regardless of religion, they can lead towards connecting with God
- Spiritual prayers for healing ancestral trauma
- Developing an attitude of not self identifying with the mind, and knowing how to merge and balance the spirit, the mind and the body
- Understanding that everything is connected.
- Angels follow you in your healing path and guide you in the form of synchronicities.
- Find out about chakra blockages and work towards it.
Healing the Mind
- Stress relief activities: Reading, going for a walk, listening music, dancing
- Nature / animal work
- Talking therapy
- Journaling
- Spotting and understanding own subconscious patterns
- Shadow work and integrating the suppressed emotions to be channeled into new form of energy such as creative arts or creative work
- Dedicating time to heal childhood emotional traumas
- Hashimoto and Thyroid Issues are psychological related to being unable to express oneself, and talk onself truth, therefore focusing on expressing such emotions and not suppressing them is important.
- Understand sickness as an invitation to change, evolve, grow and heal, similar to the point of view of the German New Medicine.
Healing the Body
- Stress relief activities: Reading, going for a walk, listening music, dancing
- Nature / animal work
- Talking therapy
- Journaling
- Spotting and understanding own subconscious patterns
- Shadow work and integrating the suppressed emotions to be channeled into new form of energy such as creative arts or creative work
- Dedicating time to heal childhood emotional traumas
- Hashimoto and Thyroid Issues are psychological related to being unable to express oneself, and talk onself truth, therefore focusing on expressing such emotions and not suppressing them is important.
- Understand sickness as an invitation to change, evolve, grow and heal, similar to the point of view of the German New Medicine.
More about Spirit
