You’re lying in a dark room, and suddenly someone flicks the lights on.  

You’re walking along a dark road and a car turns the corner, headlights beaming into your face.  

The light is so intense that it’s uncomfortable, even painful. Your first instinct is to shield your eyes and turn away from it.

We’ve all been there!

The same thing can happen with personal development. When we’ve been crawling through the Long Dark Night of the Soul, or been stuck in Crisis Mode for too long; progress can have the same effect.  After so long of being accustomed to emotional and mental darkness, the blazing light of progress can feel painful at first.

When this happens, our first instinct (naturally) is to turn away. We’ve just spent weeks, months, years trudging through problems. Why would we want to invite in yet another painful experience?

This can lead us to turn away from good opportunities. To unintentionally choose to trudge in darkness and misery, rather than taking the time to accustom our eyes to the light.  

I’ve been thinking about this lately, as this is my second Spring in Ireland.

For those who don’t know, Irish winters are basically sun-less.  Not quite so severe as the arctic, but if you work in an office it’s certainly possible to go months without even seeing the sun. The sun that does make its way here are weak. For the last few months, I’ve longed for summer and brightness and warmth.

It’s finally Spring, and now that I’m able to spend outside and bask in the sun- it’s hurting my eyes!  After months of darkness, I finally get the sun I’ve been dreaming of and all I want to do is turn away from it. Head back into the cozy, relative darkness of artificial lighting.

I know that this is what I have been waiting for, though.

It’s worth staying outside and letting my eyes adjust. To watch the clouds and smile at the warm, golden light. I know that soon I’ll get accustomed to it again, be comfortable with it again, and I look forward to beautiful months on the beach.

Salvation isn’t always so obvious.

I’ve been through many dark periods of my life. Sometimes it’s easy to tell what the light is, and even if it’s uncomfortable and new, it’s worth it and met with anticipation.  Sometimes, though, I haven’t been able to recognize it.

I’ve seen this in friends, family, and colleagues as well.  We miss out on opportunities because we couldn’t recognize it for what it was.  We had spent so long in the darkness that the darkness had become our comfort zone, and we couldn’t recognize the light for what it was.

What does this look like, though?

It can look like finally getting a new job, only for impostor syndrome to take over and cause us to quit it.  It can look like meeting great new people and letting anxiety stop us from hanging out with them again. It can look like getting into an academic program but decide we won’t be able to handle it.

One time, I was scheduled to speak at an event. I crumbled and cancelled at the last minute, ashamed and convinced of my own lack of value. It was at one of the darkest points of my life, I was invited to speak there because of something I had written in a fit of rage and pain. Looking back, that had been a powerful opportunity to turn a passion into a career. Which I let slip through my fingers, because the prospect of the spotlight was too painful to face.

Getting out of the dark spaces means pushing out of our comfort zone. An act that is, by definition, uncomfortable. Even agonizing.

The best way to be able to recognize this is to lean on our support system. They can give us a broader perspective and help us see when our fears are really opportunities in disguise. They can also help us to find the strength to face our fears, get out of our comfort zone, and learn how to stand in the sun again.

No matter how dark the tunnel is, or how long we’ve been in it, we will always be able to find the light.

Photo: Simon Launay