The Dark Room | Encounter with the Light

“And this is where my mind gets tangled. — What am I even doing? Trying to find some poetic meaning in my own collapse? — . The frustration is with myself. Not for the sadness, but…”

Here I am again. In this darkness that is more than the absence of light; it is a presence. I feel its pressure in the air; I see how it warps my perception of time. The seconds drag. The silence is so heavy I can almost touch it, and it seems to be born from my own bones. I’ve been in this room in my mind for too long.

In here, my ‘whys’ are no longer questions. They are the bricks of my cell. The ‘why’ for that project, my project, that fell apart after I poured my soul into it. The ‘why’ for the silence from those voices that were so important to me. The ‘why’ for this horrible feeling of being a fraud, always on the verge of being found out.

Every thought like that is another layer of weight on my back. And it’s suffocating. — How PATHETIC. Look at you, Camilo — . The thought cuts in, not like a shout, but like a cold whisper. It’s my cruelest truth, told by myself.

I reached a point where everything inside me stopped. A collapse. My internal engine shut down. And in this paralysis, I’m left with only one question, is this my end? Is this inclination of mine toward darkness a factory defect, something irreparable in my being? Or is there something more to this whole process that I just can’t understand right now?

It was in one of those pauses, my gaze lost in nothing, that an image appeared. A flash of brilliant blue in the darkness of my mind, a Morpho butterfly. A memory, perhaps. Its beauty, compared to how I feel, seems like a cruel joke.

I started thinking about its story. And I remembered the chrysalis. That voluntary confinement in absolute darkness. I remembered the brutal fact I once read, out of every ten, nine die in the process. For the butterfly, transformation requires risking everything.

And what does this mean for me? A simple story of hope? Or my own mind reminding me how likely it is that I will fail? The idea of being “something better” doesn’t even exist right now. My only aspiration is, simply, to be. To stop feeling the way I feel.

And this is where my mind gets tangled. — What am I even doing? Trying to find some poetic meaning in my own collapse? — . The frustration is with myself. Not for the sadness, but for this blockage, this inability to build something from my own broken pieces. The doubt is total; What if I am one of the nine who get left behind? What if this self-analysis is just my final signal before the lights go out for good?

But something inside me refuses to accept that my suffering is just noise, that it means nothing. There HAS to be a purpose. Like the fire that purifies metal. And with that idea, I clung to a story that once struck me. The story of that man, Job. His extreme pain was what prepared him to understand himself and, in the end, to see the most important thing in his life face to face. (Coordinate 1)

That idea — that suffering can be a tool that polishes me, instead of a hammer that shatters me — stayed with me. Not as an answer, but as my only possibility.

And with that possibility, I made a decision. Not to act, but to surrender. Although “surrender” didn’t feel like a defeat. It was, rather, to stop fighting with myself. To stop analyzing every mistake, to stop looking for culprits in my past. Instead of fighting my darkness, I decided to observe it, to feel its weight without resisting, and to accept that I am right here.

As I stayed still, without the noise of my own struggle, I began to notice something else. That inner light, my “factory-setting light.” And I understood that it wasn’t a light I created through effort. It had always been there. It was the result of a decision I made a long time ago, a door I opened and then, with the noise of the world, forgot about. My own successes had covered it up. But here, in the silence and the absolute darkness, its presence was undeniable. Just then, I remembered some words, a voice that spoke of being the light so that no one would have to remain in darkness. The promise wasn’t to avoid the darkness, but that I wouldn’t have to live in it forever. (Coordinate 2)

With that clarity came my deepest revelation. I understood that the light is not my goal. The light is the essence of what I am. In that instant, the metaphor came to life, the caterpillar was always a butterfly in potential; it was just in a different stage of its life. That is my true identity. It’s not something I acquire; it’s what I am in my original design. My darkness didn’t come to extinguish me; it came to clear everything else away so that, finally, I could see it. I realized that my real identity doesn’t come from my achievements or failures, but from this light that has always been in me, waiting for me to recognize it.

For the first time in a long time, my need to “move forward” disappeared. What mattered now was to witness my own process. To see myself from the inside. And to recognize this light that I finally see clearly.

I understand now that this room is no longer a cell. It is the place where I am transformed. And the light I see within me is the only thing that motivates me to prepare, in this stillness, for the best version of me that is yet to come.

Coordinate 1 — Codex Leningradensis | Jb 17:7

Coordinate 2 — Codex Sinaiticus | Jn 12:46

Camilo Pimor is the founder of Jesus Project, a global personal transformation platform that breaks traditional paradigms. As a project creator with innovative, disruptive thinking, this podcaster, author of books, blog article writer, and speaker of talks, fuses science, philosophy, and theology. Distinguished by his impactful voice and an iconic minimalist style (total black look, long hair, beard), Camilo, of Latin and Jewish roots, has cultivated 15+ years of leadership in social, political, and business entrepreneurship. His modern, disruptive vision, forged through profound life experiences, difficulties, and triumphs, aims for global impact across America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. With Jesus at its core, his message is deeply embraced by Generation Z and Millennials for its vibrant authenticity and genuine approach. Far from conventional, his work in personal development, success mindset, and life hacking is propelling a silent revolution in people’s lives.