Please bear with me as I make this point. I know a depression that goes on and on and on and leads to complete and utter debilitation is akin to a form of illness in that life energy, a sense of joy, love, hope, faith and trust in life has completely departed from us while we remain in its grip, but never the less it appears to me that soul is still there bearing witness to truths in depression that need to be heard by us and may at this particular point our collective human evolution have some powerful messages for where we are as well as the collective trauma each one of us is carrying.
It is a point that Marianne Williamson addresses in her book From Tears To Triumph when she says that those who are tuned into life at this particular point in time almost need to be depressed in order to bear witness to what is going on out there in society and the way we are treating the earth and our fellow human beings. Many of us who are deeply attuned to our souls just know when things are not right. Many of us met harshness or uncaring in a world that could never see or know us. We felt out of place in the social institutions and other containers which did not really allow us to give free reign to our own vitality, needs and impulses.
I may be writing this from the perspective of being a 1960s child but I see the malaise manifesting in my older sister’s life right now who was born in the 1950s. We just spoke and I felt the deep place she was in was actually powerfully bearing witness to a reality. The drugs are not working for her and she is in a facility WHERE THERE IS NOT ONE SHRED OF DEEP EMOTIONAL CONNECTION BETWEEN ANYONE. It is almost like a psychic no man’s land. The furnishing and fixtures and fitting are luxurious but it may as well be a robot’s haven, sure there there is time for rest and deep contemplation there but I guess most of the deeper soul work is going on underneath a kind of amnesia. Yet inner soul work is perhaps what depression most often calls for. I admire the work of Jeff Foster who speaks of the call in depression for deep rest in culture that is pretty much switched on high power drive 24/7 and sees anyone who falls by the wayside or off treadmill laid down for them as ‘ill’ or defective in some way.
It was a relief today when talking to my sis just to be able to acknowledge the reality of where she is and of my powerlessness to change it. I spoke to my brother who said he was going to call her on Monday but did not, my sis wasn’t fazed as she knows she has no conversation much, that said I enjoy just to sit with her in silence on the phone and be present for her soul. The whole time we spoke today I was beaming love at her on an energy level for at the moment I know that is all I really have to give to her. My brother will not call because he does not really know what to say and that is fine.
Today I said to my sister : “I am sorry if anything I have ever done to you made things hard”, her simple reply was “don’t be silly”, which kinda makes me smile. I got hurt by my older sister a lot, things I longed for from her were hard to get and maybe the 8 years difference made it harder to be close but never the less I love my sis and I just long to hear from her, but I realised today IT IS PERFECTLY FINE IF SHE DOES NOT CALL THIS IS THE REALITY, I no longer wish to be in any kind of adversarial relationship with it.
I was thinking a lot about my own depression and long dark night of the soul this morning. I felt something breaking apart over the past two days, it was like this powerful energy of resentment and anger and deep deep disappointment over the way in which my life has turned out finally burnt up and left my body. It felt like a kind of spiritual cleansing. I also got an intimation that many of us have been engaged in a kind of clearing out or purging process over the past years since 9/11, that was when Saturn and Pluto opposed each other and we saw the rising up of fear and terror in response to a cutting down of twin towers which to me always appeared to be like the two upright posts in the symbol for Gemini which is where Saturn was placed when they fell. Maybe there is a level in which we have all needed to come back down to earth from the lofty heights. We will have the Saturn Pluto conjunction becoming exact some time next year. Saturn turned retrograde a short while ago on the 30th of April at which time it was only 3 degrees off its exact meet up with Pluto.
For those who do not know Pluto rules the birth death rebirth cycle. It is the energy that shows that even if matter appears to be destroyed it simply changes form, as the spirit departs for its sojourn ‘home’. The body remains and its parts, flesh, sinew and tissue break down leaving the bones or skeleton which is ruled by Saturn. Saturn represents the earthly structures and containers we make to give form to things, it can rule a sense of shame, inadequacy, feelings of being insufficient or not good enough and limitation. However on the positive side Saturn gives us spine often through the former mentioned harsh experiences of earthly life, it makes us come to grip with realities even if they are painful. The reality that many of us seem to be facing now that in order to deal with our depression we really need to get a good grip on what is dying or not working in order to free up form energy and breathe life and love into a world that seems to be crying out deep within us to transform, both personally and collectively.
We have the power to destroy our environment right now in so many ways, we have the power to destroy our lives or we have the power to transform them, to change their shape and form in order to give expression to the hidden deep soul life that longs so deeply to come to a new form of expression. It is my view that depression is often a wake up call and those who suffer it are like the virtual canaries in the coal mine singing tunes about our collective malaise.
Tim Grayburn wrote about this eloquently in his book Boys Don’t Cry. He mentioned how his depression was telling him what had reached its use by date and it gave him the impetus to look more deeply at his own hidden areas of shame and unawakened emotions that so strongly desired to be expressed. In the end speaking writing and performing a play about his depression and its meaning gave him a pathway into a new life.
Depression and anxiety to me are wake up calls. They exist for a purpose, they are asking us to wake up to what the hell is going on in our lives and on planet earth right now. Are we ready to wake up? That is the question. And our souls will in time give us the answer demanding that we either choose death, or rebirth, victimhood or empowerment, numbness and disconnection or re-engagement, staying the same or transforming, valuing or denigrating who we are and all that we have been given, most especially custodianship of this insanely mysterious and beautiful planet earth and our human relationships n matter how painful at times. Love is hidden there in the core of depression somewhere as is our abandoned spiritual or soul self. Often it is crying out and waiting for us to bear testament through destruction of old ways of living and perceiving and relating that no longer seem to be bearing positive energy or providing our awakening hearts and souls with a sense of true value and purpose.
Emerging From The Dark Night 