Strengthening Your Inner Light

When its dark, just look my way

For I know what its like.

To lose yourself, to hope and pray

You’ll find your inner light.

-

For me, one of my biggest frustrations when trying to voice my feelings is the immediate invalidation of them, and making it seem like I am the problem because I had the audacity to feel something. Something real anyways.

“You’ll be okay, you’re strong”

“You worry too much; you need to think more positively”

But the thing is, sometimes there really is no bright side. Sometimes life just sucks. Tell me what the bright side of having someone you love kill themselves is? Or watching your child die?

We like to lie to ourselves and tell ourselves that “at least they aren’t in pain anymore”, which might be true, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be. And rightfully should be.

Personally, I think too many people have mistaken the idea of having a strong inner light, with not acknowledging any of the darkness at all. The problem is, if you have a chandelier that’s just been collecting dust for a couple months making it seem dull, do you think you should take the time do clean the chandelier or just buy brighter bulbs?

Sure, the brighter bulbs are going to give it the appearance of being brighter, at least temporarily. But that dust will just keep building and soon no matter how bright the bulb, your light is still going to look dim.

So then, how do we start to clean our chandelier? Well, first we must collect the necessary tools to clean the chandelier and put up our ladder to give us something sturdy to stand on. How do we do that? We start identifying the things that we not only love about ourselves, but the things that bring us peace, and start cultivating a lifestyle that promotes those things.

The problem is, many of us allow other people to dictate the things that we like about ourselves, and the way that we choose to live our life. Our lives have become more about appeasing the public eye then they are about living life to the fullest and making the most of every moment. Think back to the artist who was shunned by their doctor parents, or the musician that waited until his 30’s to ever try and get into a band. How silly to think how many talented and beautiful souls have been muted because someone told them they weren’t enough. Not good enough. Or that money and status were more important than their own happiness.

Sometimes the hardest part about identifying the things that make us feel whole and make us happy, is also realizing that in order for us to be our most authentic selves and shine our brightest inner light, we must start to eliminate or control our exposure to the people and situations that make us feel otherwise, even though it might be the hardest thing you’ve ever done.

I’d be lying if I said that not talking to my mom for a couple years was easy, it wasn’t.

I’d be lying if I said that quitting drinking myself to sleep every night helped right away with my depression, it didn’t.

And I’d be lying if I said that fighting for yourself and your happiness is easy, it isn’t.

But it is worth it, I promise.

For example, not talking to my mom more then once a year for several years was not easy, matter of fact, it really sucked. It sucked not being able to call my mom for advice, or to use as a shoulder to lean on. But it made me do a lot of reflection, not only on myself but on our relationship as a whole. I thought about how she got to be the way she was and why she treated me the way she did, making me realize that it had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with her. I was enough, even without her validation. My happiness was enough, regardless of if she was in my life or not. I was finally able to forgive her, and was able to set healthy boundaries in our relationship. I let her know that I am who I am, she is who she is, and while we have both made our fair share of mistakes and choices that the other one didn’t agree with, we can either accept and love each other for those things, or we cannot be in each other’s lives at all. Now, she is one of my closest friends and confidants. No, we don’t have a typical mother-daughter relationship, but that’s okay, because it works for us. Our relationship now facilitates both of our happiness, while still allowing each other to be a part of it.

People will tell you you’re selfish, that blood is thicker than water, that having a successful career will make you happy, that if you don’t hit certain metrics in life then you will never be happy, that you don’t know what’s best for you, they do, that quitting the job you’re miserable at is a mistake, that pursuing something that makes you happy is a fool’s errand. The list goes on and on.

To that I say, don’t listen.

You’re not selfish for wanting to be happy and taking control of your life in order to get there. Yes, sometimes self-preservation and healing looks, and might even feel, selfish. But it’s not. It only makes you feel selfish because you are so accustomed to dimming yourself at the risk of blinding others, and it only makes others believe you are selfish because they are so used to having control of the switch.

So, you see, having a bright inner light isn’t about just thinking positively, and finding the good behind every bad situation. Having a bright inner light is about identifying the things within yourself that make you feel whole, and make you shine the brightest, then working to identify the people and things in your environment that are trying to keep you from doing so, and making healthy changes.