Re: The Dark Night of the Soul

I too love this its my a guy called St John of the Cross who was a Christian Poet...I did a long essay a few years back about counselling and spirituality and I came upon the conceptof 'The Dark Night of the Sou' with regard to Depression and anxiety being a spiritual issue that will enable us to let go of our ego and become more real, in order that we live a more authentic and for filling life. I like to think that this is true and that there is a purpose to this pain. That it is darkest before the drawn.

Below is some info on where the term comes from.

The term and metaphysicality of the phrase "dark night of the soul" are taken from the writings of the Spanish poet and Roman Catholic mystic Saint John of the Cross, a Carmelite priest in the 16th century. Dark Night of the Soul is the name of both a poem, and a commentary on that poem, and are among the Carmelite priest's most famous writings. They tell of his mystic development and the stages he went through on his quest for holiness.

The "dark night" could generally be described as a letting go of our ego's hold on the psyche, making room for change that can bring about a complete transformation of a person's way of defining his/her self and their relationship to God. The interim period can be frightening, hence the perceived "darkness". In the Christian tradition, during the "dark night" one who has developed a strong prayer life and consistent devotion to God suddenly finds traditional prayer extremely difficult and unrewarding for an extended period of time. The individual may feel as though God has suddenly abandoned them, or that their prayer life has collapsed.

Rather than being a negative event, the dark night is believed by mystics and others to be a blessing in disguise where the individual extends from a state of contemplative prayer to an inability to pray. Particularly in Christianity, it is seen as a severe test of one's faith. The Dark Night comes in two phases: a first "Night of the Senses," and a second "Night of the Spirit."

Bernadette Roberts, author of The Path to No-Self, What is Self and The Experience of No-Self states:

"My view of what some authors call the "unitive stage" is that it begins with the Dark Night of the Spirit, or the onset of the transformational process - when the larva enters the cocoon, so to speak. Up to this point, we are actively reforming ourselves, doing what we can to bring about an abiding union with the divine. But at a certain point, when we have done all we can, the divine steps in and takes over. The transforming process is a divine undoing and redoing that culminates in what is called the state of "transforming union" or "mystical marriage", considered to be the definitive state for the Christian contemplative. In experience, the onset of this process is the descent of the cloud of unknowing, which, because his former light had gone out and left him in darkness, the contemplative initially interprets as the divine gone into hiding. In modern terms, the descent of the cloud is actually the falling away of the ego-center, which leaves us looking into a dark hole, a void or empty space in ourselves. Without the veil of the ego-center, we do not recognize the divine; it is not as we thought it should be. Seeing the divine, eye to eye is a reality that shatters our expectations of light and bliss. From here on we must feel our way in the dark, and the special eye that allows us to see in the dark opens up at this time."

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