Gratitude

Without the shadows, how would we appreciate the light?

The sunset that drew me outside to stand with the darkness.

in these dark days
clouds catch fire at sunset
ephemeral awe

When I despair of the world and loose faith in humanity, when the sheer brutality with which we treat each other and this planet wears holes in my heart, I step outside and breathe in the everyday wonder that comes with Life, the capital L kind, going about its business.

Singing and hooting and creaking, winging and swimming and crawling and slithering and running and growing, the symphony of lives interwoven in a way that each individual cycle of birth and death and birth again is part of a greater whole. No matter the bombs and shootings, the ice melting and whales dying, that whole of life still pulses and throbs with vibrant being.

I step outside and into something greater than myself, greater than the “me” more or less contained within this boundary of skin. And I am reminded by the world outside that even what I call “me” is an ecosystem, an interwoven community of lives tinier than I can see. There are at least ten times as many microbial cells living on and within me as what I think of as human cells. I contain multitudes, as the brilliant science writer Ed Yong wrote in his book of the same name.

I step outside and the sunset blazes across the clouds to the southwest, a vivid reminder that this world is so much more than humanity. I watch the colors flare and settle, gradually fading to blue and then black as the stars, those pinpricks of ancient light from distant planets, wink on overhead in the depthless night.

I listen to the Great Horned Owl hoot from their perch across the road, calling, calling, calling for a mate. A coyote barks from the junipers nearby, and I jump, startled, and then laugh at myself. The night is alive, comforting in its animate darkness.

I stand as night enfolds me until my body begins to shiver and my lizard brain reminds me that I need warmth to survive. I have no feathers, no fur, no scales, no waxy coating to protect my skin from the cold.

I turn to go inside my warm house and carry with me the warmth of spirit from standing with the world outside—the community of life outside my skin boundary, outside my house, outside my existence. Just being with the more-than-me reminds me of my proper size in this life: small.

In the pulsing company of those multitudes of other lives, my grief at how humanity is behaving is not assuaged, but it is tempered by the reminder that there is so much more to life on this planet. The sunsets still explode, owls still hoot and coyotes hunt, junipers respire quietly; the darkness shapes the light, as the light shapes the darkness.

These short days and dark times remind me to appreciate light and warmth and life.

Without the shadows, how would we ever see the light?

Blessings.

How do you experience the shadows and how do you find the light? Hit the comment button below and let us know.