Dark Night Of The Soul: Sacred Darkness Meditation

For souls navigating spiritual crisis, emptiness, and sacred darkness
This meditation offers deep support for:
- Spiritual disconnection and emptiness
- Loss of faith or spiritual doubt
- Meaningless spiritual practices
- Integration of mystical experiences
- Moving beyond performance spirituality

Sacred Understanding:

Spiritual crisis as initiation, not failure
Finding gifts hidden in spiritual darkness
Honoring authentic spiritual experience
Building a genuine connection to the source
Transforming spiritual shame into wisdom

Who This Serves:

Those in spiritual transition or crisis
Mystics integrating difficult experiences
Anyone feeling spiritually "lost"
Religious trauma survivors
Spiritual seekers beyond beginnings

Transcript

So hi everyone and thank you for joining me.

So today we are going to explore something that many people experience but very few talk about openly.

Those times in your life when the very foundation of your spiritual life seems to crumble beneath your feet.

If you found your way to this meditation you might be in what mystics have called the dark night of your soul.

That sacred,

Terrifying and deeply transformative period when everything you thought you knew about your spiritual path no longer makes sense.

Now let me paint a picture that might feel painfully familiar.

You used to feel connected to something greater.

Prayer,

Meditation,

Nature,

Maybe you had some spiritual practices and at the time they all felt alive.

They gave you safety,

Meaning,

Nourishment and a purpose.

But now you just feel like you are going through the motions.

The meditation cushion feels cold.

The sacred texts that you were reading,

They are like foreign languages now.

And the practices and the meditations that once brought you peace just feel hollow.

Maybe you are questioning everything,

Your beliefs,

Your teachers,

Your entire spiritual journey and maybe you feel abandoned by the divine or maybe somehow you feel like you have failed spiritually or doing something wrong and you are wondering now if you ever had a real connection at all or was it just wishful thinking.

And here's what makes it even harder.

In our social media spirituality world,

Admitting to spiritual crisis feels like admitting failure.

Everyone else seems to be posting about their breakthroughs,

Their gratitude,

Their connection to the source.

Meanwhile you are sitting in what feels like spiritual darkness,

Wondering what's wrong with you.

I want you to know something crucial right from the start and you don't have to believe me.

There is nothing wrong with you and what you are experiencing is not a sign that you failed spiritually.

It's often a sign that you are growing beyond the spiritual containers that once held you.

It may not be punishment,

It may be purification,

It may not be abandonment,

It may be an invitation into a deeper and more authentic relationship with the sacred.

Now the mystics knew this.

Now for those of you that know this,

Saint John of the Cross who coined this term understood that sometimes the soul must be stripped of all its familiar,

Comfortable environment to discover what lies beneath and not the spiritual ego that collected experiences and insights but the essence of who you are when everything else falls away.

So today we are going to sit with this darkness,

Not to fix it or rush through it but to discover the strange gift it carries.

We are going to learn and read the wisdom of spiritual crisis and to find the light that can only be discovered in the deepest darkness.

Now this is not about spiritual bypassing,

This is about learning to trust that even your spiritual wilderness is sacred,

Even your crisis is grace and even your darkest darkness is a part of the light's great work in your life.

Find your most comfortable position and if you are in the middle of what we spoke about spiritual crisis,

Be gentle with yourself.

Your nervous system might be raw,

Your heart might be tender and we are creating the safest possible space to explore this sacred territory.

Now,

Let's begin not with trying to find the light but let's first honour the darkness that you are experiencing.

Now,

In our light obsessed spiritual culture,

We forget that darkness is also sacred and some truths can only be discovered in the depths.

Take three breaths that acknowledge where you are right now,

Not where you wish you were but where you are actually.

Now breathing in first,

Acceptance for this phase of your spiritual journey even if it feels unbearable right now.

Breathing out the pressure to be spiritually on all the time.

Breathing in the permission to not have it all figured out and breathing out the shame of being disconnected from the source.

Now breathing in trust for your soul's process even when it makes no sense and breathing out into this moment where it's safe not to be enlightened.

Now,

Imagine that you are in a sacred cave right now.

Not a frightening darkness but the kind of protective darkness that holds the seeds before they sprout.

Now let this cave,

This landscape,

This vision just represent the sacred darkness that you are in right now and this sacred darkness may be questioning everything.

For some of you it may be physical,

For some of you it may be self-doubt,

Whatever it is that you are experiencing,

Let's call this sacred darkness and the cave represents this darkness that you are in right now.

Feel how this darkness isn't empty right now,

It's full of potential,

It's full of mystery and it's full of the deep work that can only happen when the superficial lights go out.

One hand on the heart,

One hand on the belly,

Feel your breathing,

Your heartbeat,

The life force that is continuing even in this moment.

Now this life force is your spiritual connection,

Not separate from it but the very foundation of it.

Now from this cave of sacred darkness,

Call upon whatever supportive presence feels right and accessible to you.

Now this might not be the divine as you once understood it,

It might be the wisdom of your own deeper self,

The intelligence of your body and the love that exists in the very fact that you are still here,

Still seeking and still caring enough to do this work.

And if no spiritual presence feel accessible,

That's okay too.

Sometimes,

Dark night means learning to be your own loving witness and your own compassionate companion.

Now,

Let's gently explore what this spiritual crisis actually feels like in your body.

Because the dark night of the soul isn't just a mental or emotional experience,

It lives in your cellular memory,

Your nervous system and your energy field.

With your hands still on your heart and your belly,

Just bring your awareness to how spiritual disconnection feels in the physical form.

The feeling that your prayers go nowhere now,

The questioning of everything you once believed,

That loneliness,

Everyone else is connected but you are cut off,

The isolation,

The confusion.

Now whichever way you are experiencing this,

Maybe it's a churning in your stomach,

Tightness in your chest,

Constriction around your heart.

Now,

Here's what I want you to understand about what you are experiencing.

Every spiritual crisis contains information.

Your soul is trying to tell you something important,

Not through punishment,

But let's call it sacred disruption.

Now,

Maybe your crisis is saying the way you've been relating to the spiritual is too small for who you are becoming.

You've been performing spirituality instead of living it.

You've been seeking God outside of yourself when the divine has been waiting inside all along.

And your dark night might be burning away the spiritual ego,

The parts that collected experiences,

Compared your progress to others,

Made spirituality another form of achievement.

And this period might be dismantling any spiritual bypassing.

All the ways you use spirituality to avoid humanity rather than embracing it.

Now,

Place both your hands on your heart.

Now,

We are speaking to your present moment experience.

We are speaking to this sacred disruption.

I see you.

I feel you.

You're not here to destroy me.

You're here to free me from spiritual patterns that no longer serve my deepest roots.

Thank you for caring enough about my authentic connection to the source to disrupt what was false.

I see you.

I feel you.

You're not here to destroy me.

But you're here to free me from the spiritual patterns that no longer serve my deepest roots.

Thank you for caring enough about my authentic connection to the source to disrupt what was false.

Now,

We are going to explore something that might sound impossible when you're in the middle of a spiritual crisis.

The profound gifts that can only be discovered in the dark night of the soul.

Now,

First,

Let's acknowledge what spiritual darkness strips away.

It strips away spiritual pride.

The ego that accumulated insights like trophies,

That compared your progress to others,

And that made enlightenment a form of competition.

It strips away spiritual bypassing.

The ways you used spiritual practices to avoid difficult emotions,

Challenging relationships,

Or the messy reality of being human.

It strips away borrowed beliefs.

The spiritual ideas you adopted because they sounded good,

But you never actually integrated them into your experience.

It also strips away performance spirituality.

The way you shaped your spiritual expression to look good to others,

Rather than to serve your own connection to the source.

Feel the relief in your body.

As you imagine being free from these spiritual burdens.

Even though the stripping away feels painful,

Notice if there is also a sense of lightness or freedom.

Now,

Let's explore what remains when everything false is burned away.

In the dark night,

You discover unshakable presence.

Not the presence you perform,

But the presence you are.

The awareness that witnesses that even spiritual crisis is sacred.

Feel into this right now.

Who is aware of your spiritual darkness?

Who is witnessing all this?

Who is witnessing your crisis?

That witnessing presence?

That's the divine you've been seeking.

Closer to you than your own breath.

In spiritual darkness,

You discover your authentic compassion.

Not the spiritual compassion you perform,

But the raw tenderness that emerges from your own suffering.

Your spiritual crisis becomes a bridge to understanding all beings who suffer,

Who doubt,

And who feel lost.

You discover your own inner authority.

Not the borrowed wisdom of the teachers and the books,

But the knowing that emerges from your own direct experience of being stripped down completely and rebuilt.

Sense this emerging in you now.

After being lost in this spiritual darkness,

What do you know to be true from your own experience?

What remains when everything falls away?

Now rather than trying to escape your dark night,

Let's learn to move through it with grace.

To extract its medicine and to let it do its work of transformation.

Imagine your spiritual crisis is a wise teacher who has arrived in a terrifying disguise.

And this teacher is not cruel.

It's breaking down what was false so something true can emerge.

From your heart center,

Speak to your dark night as you would to a difficult but necessary teacher.

I don't understand you yet,

But I'm willing to learn from you.

I don't like this process,

But I trust it's serving my highest good.

Show me what you're here to teach me.

I don't understand you yet,

But I'm willing to learn from you.

I don't like this process,

But I trust it's serving my highest good.

Show me what you're here to teach me.

Now let's practice what I call spiritual survival skills.

Ways to navigate the dark night without bypassing or premature rush towards the light.

Place your hands on your heart and offer yourself the tenderness you would give to a dear friend and just receive my words.

This is so hard.

Feeling disconnected from Source is one of the most painful human experiences.

I'm doing the best I can.

I'm not failing.

I'm going through something sacred and difficult.

I don't know what I believe right now and that's okay.

I don't have to defend or explain my experience to anybody.

I'm in mystery and this mystery is holy too.

Just breathing and now seeing what these words are doing to your mind,

To your body,

To your soul and simply allowing this unfolding to happen.

Now,

Imagine that your spiritual crisis is actually a form of spiritual initiation.

In many traditions,

Initiations have a period of dissolution.

The old self dies so the new self can be born.

You're not being punished.

You're being elevated to a deeper level of spiritual maturity.

From this understanding,

Feel your dark night differently.

Instead of something happening to you,

Feel as if it is something happening for you.

A sacred restructuring,

A holy deconstruction that's making space for you and space for a more authentic spiritual life.

Now let's set our intentions going forward from this moment on.

You can either receive my words or gently repeat this after me.

I will honor this process even when I don't understand it.

I will let this darkness burn away what's false so what's true can emerge.

I will trust that even my spiritual crisis is held in love.

I will honor this process even when I don't understand it.

I will let this darkness burn away what's false so what's true can emerge.

I will trust that even my spiritual crisis is held in love.

Breathing these words in,

Not expecting to feel any different but just having more understanding,

More insights.

Now,

If you feel you're still receiving,

Downloading,

Shifting or you're in a process,

You're very welcome to pause this recording now.

As we prepare to complete this journey,

Let's explore how you might begin to rebuild your spiritual connection not back to where it was but forward to where it's evolving.

This rebuilding won't look like going back to practices that no longer serve you.

It will look like discovering what authentic spiritual connection feels like for who you're becoming.

Maybe your new spiritual life will be less about transcending your humanity and more about finding the sacred within it.

Less about following other people's advice and prescriptions and more about trusting your own direct experience of the divine.

Maybe it's less about constantly chasing a connection and more about trusting the rhythm of connection and disconnection as both natural and sacred.

Now,

Both your hands on your heart.

Feel this truth now settling into your being.

My dark night is holy.

My questioning is part of my spiritual growth not separate from it.

I am not abandoned.

I am being transformed.

I will move through this with compassion for myself and trust in the process.

I will seek support when I need it and honour my own authentic spiritual experience.

Now,

As you prepare to return to ordinary awareness know that now you carry something precious with you.

The wisdom that can only be learned in darkness.

The compassion that can only be borne from struggle and the authenticity that can only come when everything false has been stripped away.

Your dark night is not a detour from your spiritual path.

It is your spiritual path and this path even when it leads through darkness is leading you home.

Now,

Begin to feel yourself returning to this room,

To this moment carrying with you the courage to be honest authentic and real.

Wiggle your fingers,

Wiggle your toes take a deep breath now feel yourself coming back to the body when you are ready slowly open your eyes and come back to your space.

Take a moment to appreciate the courage it took to explore this territory with me.

In a world that often treats spiritual crisis or any other crisis as failure you have chosen to see it as a spiritual initiation.

Your willingness to be honest is in itself a profound spiritual experience.

Now remember wherever you are in your journey and whatever is happening for you you are still held,

You are still loved and you are still exactly where you need to be.

Thank you for letting me walk beside you in your sacred darkness Now with that thought thank you very much for joining me and Namaste.

Reviews

Incredible 🙏🏽 thank you thank you thank you

It is amazing to me how many times I have to go through the dark night of the soul. I was born with a very heavy pain body. I have many severe mental health issues, but I also know who I truly am. I know that I am divine, and that I have gifts to bring to myself and to my human family. Your meditations have helped me so much. I wish there was a way to express my deep love for the help you are for the world.