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The Dark Night of the Soul: Navigating Spiritual Crisis · The Spiritual Shitshow Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome back to the Spiritual Shit Show, the podcast, where we get real about the messy, magical and sometimes maddening journey of being a soul in a human body.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: I'm Julie Nguyen, and today we're diving into a topic that many of us know intimately, whether we've had the language for it or not.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: We're talking about the dark night of the soul.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: You've probably heard this term tossed around before, especially in spiritual or healing spaces, but what actually is a dark night of the soul?
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Why do we go through them and why?
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: This is a question I ask myself.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Why on earth do we sometimes experience them more than once?
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: So let's talk about it.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: What is the dark night of the soul?
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: The dark night of the soul isn't just a bad day or a rough patch.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: It's a spiritual unraveling.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: I'm going to say that one more time.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: It's a spiritual unraveling, a moment or a season or a decade when everything that once gave your life meaning starts to fall away.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: You lose your identity, your relationships, your work, your beliefs, your sense of direction.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: It all dissolves and you're left standing in the void, questioning everything, feeling lost, feeling alone.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: The term itself comes from a 16th century mystic, st John of the Cross, who wrote a poem about deep spiritual crisis that eventually led to divine union.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: But this experience isn't reserved for saints or mystics.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: It's just a deeply human experience and if you're on a path of awakening, more than likely you're going to meet it, probably more than once.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Really sorry about that.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: Dark night of the soul is not easy, but here's the thing no one really tells you the dark night of the soul isn't a one-time initiation.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: My God, why didn't anybody tell me this?
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Indeed, it's a spiral, it's not a straight line which is healing itself, and it is important to remember that we always evolve in layers.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: We heal in layers, and each time we outgrow an old version of ourselves, each time we're being called to embody more, more of our truth, we may be invited into another dark night.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: It can happen after a big loss, a betrayal, a sudden spiritual awakening, or even after achieving something you thought would make you happy but it didn't.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: It's the soul's way of saying there's more, go deeper, Let go.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: And that's why it can be so confronting, because to be reborn, something has to die, and in that, that is pain and grief and loss, and grief and loss.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: Now I know when you're in it, you want out of it.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: Trust me that when we're in it we're so desperately wanting clarity.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: We want a ground, we want a freaking flashlight.
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Sometimes we even want to go back to the old life, because at least it was something that we knew.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: But these moments, these dark nights, are sacred invitations and I'm going to say that one more time and dark night of the soul.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Breathe deep and know that this is a sacred invitation and initiation into a deeper awareness of what is A dark night of the soul experience.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: It's hard, but what it's doing is it's stripping away the illusions, the ego, the identities, which is scary as hell.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: It was for me, it still is.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: But you know, you just know, you know and you're yearning to make these knowings a reality, to be part of a strong foundation of self.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: They're reminders of the eternal, the wise, and eventually, eventually, you become less afraid of the dark because you start to remember you are the light and eventually the dawn does come Every single time.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: So what actually helps you when you are in the thick of it?
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: Here are some soul-centered tools that can help you while everything feels like it's falling apart.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: So number one is grounding rituals.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: This can be as simple as putting your bare feet on the earth, taking salt baths or doing breath work, bare feet on the earth, taking salt baths or doing breath work.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: I also have some grounding meditations that you can check out here on the podcast or over at Numinous Wisdom, which is my website for all energy and healing things.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: But it's good to remember that when your body becomes an anchor, when you're really grounded into this earthly experience, it allows the energy to really move through, to clear, so that way you're not holding onto any trauma and that things can find their way towards completion.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: Number two is let yourself feel.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: Allow yourself to cry, to rage, to be angry, to scream into a pillow, to journal like crazy.
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: But we have to give our emotions permission to be present and to move.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: We don't need to fix them, we just need to witness them.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: We don't need to fix them, we just need to witness them.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Number three and this is huge for me, especially where I am in my own journey is community and soul support, and I really mean like I had support at the beginning of my healing journey and through the dark night of the soul, but it was all support that I was paying for, you know so, therapy and healers and all of that kind of stuff, and I'm really being able to notice how transformative it is to be able to lean on friends and family at this time and it feels for me a little bit more authentic because I know I'm not paying for a service, but it's genuine care, it's genuine authentic time and reflection and a holding from somebody else.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: It's just authentic because there's no exchange of money and that's been really transformative for me.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: But regardless, whether it's a friend or therapist, a healer, a spiritual guide, don't try to do and move through this alone.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: We are not meant to go through any dark nights alone.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Number four, I would say, is creative expression.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: When I was in the depths of my dark night, I remember I felt chaotic because I wanted to create films about it and I wanted to create photography around it and there was something about wanting to capture this raw, real essence of the human experience.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: I wanted to capture the pain, but what I'm realizing is that the creativity was presenting itself as a vessel, as a tool to move through, to be able to bear witness to the truth of what was happening in present time.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: So creative expression is really important, whether that's you sing, dance, paint, write poetry, even if no one's going to read it photography, film, whatever it is let your soul speak in the ways it needs to, without editing or judging.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: And I think in many ways, this is how this podcast is formed.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: So many ways I know that this is such a healing space for myself, for awareness, and in my share, in my creative share, in my authentic share, it is also hitting and resonating with those that are also needing these words, or you know the shared story.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: So creative expression is huge in the healing journey.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: And then also, I would say, meditation and prayer, and not the kind where you try to quiet everything down, but the kind where you show up raw and messy and honest.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: And it's the type of meditation and prayer where you can honestly say I don't know who I am anymore and let that be enough.
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: I had a friend that I was helping and in return, a few weeks later, I was like my turn, like in tears, like okay, I am waving the white flag over here, like I am surrendering, like give me clarity, drop it in front of me.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: Like I am asking for clear support and direction, like that type of meditation and prayer is okay and trust that you're going to receive the wisdom, the care, the people, the nugget that's going to move you towards the light.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: And then, finally, I want you to remind yourself that this is temporary.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: It might be longer than you want.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: You know, in the last podcast, I was like I'm almost getting to the point that I'm embarrassed to talk about how long it has taken me to get through this, and also I was telling my friend that and I was like and also you know, when we go to therapy, they're like let's talk about your childhood and that was so long ago.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: So it is valid to know that we carry pains, traumas, limiting belief systems, stories, sometimes for a lifetime, and it takes however long it takes for us to look at it.
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: It takes however long it takes for us to heal it.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: And in all of that, I want you to remember that you are not alone.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: If you are in a dark night right now, I want you to say this clearly that I am not broken, I am not failing.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: I am learning how to let go of those things that no longer serve me.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: I allow myself to become, I allow myself to be in my becoming.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: I allow myself to be in the fullest expression of self, always rebirthing, always holding an excited curiosity of and who else can In that?
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Also remember that it's okay to grieve, it's part of the process and, honestly, it can be annoying because sometimes you're like, wow, I healed that, I thought I healed that and here it is.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: But it's okay to grieve over and over, it's okay to rage and it's okay to rest.
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: It's okay to not have it all figured out.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: It's okay to not have it all figured out.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: You don't need to fix the darkness.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: It's about allowing it to integrate and be a teacher for you, a teacher of light and of truth.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: And the pain is really just showing you who you really are, which is a magnificent being of light.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: And on the other side of every dark night is a deeper sense of alignment, a more embodied truth, a you who knows yourself more intimately than ever before.
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: And hopefully you know as painful as it's like, ah, you might have multiple dark nights, because that's annoying and it's painful and it sucks.
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: And when you hear these words, I hope it also brings like hear these words, I hope it also brings like all right, I'm in it again Now, who am I becoming?
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Because every time you are in this process of learning and self-reflection and letting go or letting dissolve belief systems that are holding you back and ultimately holding you away from love.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: Know that every dark night of the soul is clearing out space so you can be closer to the light, so you can be closer to love, so you can really fully experience, see and expand into the fullest, most incredible version of yourself.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: The dark night, as painful as it is, it is not here to destroy you.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: It's here to awaken you again and again and again, until all that's left is love.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Thank you for being here with me today.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: I am definitely right in the center of my own dark night again, and being able to write and hear and speak these words for myself is reminding me that I am allowing myself to awaken over and over and over and over to the light of who I am.
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: If you are walking through the shadows right now, I'm sending you so much love and light and until next time, we got this.
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: We got this Big love.