When you find yourself cocooned in isolation and you cannot find your way out of darkness...
Remember, this is similar to the place where caterpillars go to grow their wings.
-Necole Stephens
Life is such a fickle, ever-changing, and evolving thing. Just when you think you’ve gotten the hang of it, boom! A pandemic hits sending all of your plans, goals, and dreams to the waste side. Whether it’s a pandemic, a shift in plans, or some other monkey wrench that throws us off the path we were sprinting down, times of darkness are bound to happen.
Here’s the thing though—they don’t last. Just like when a caterpillar goes into its cocoon and it’s facing darkness for an unknown amount of time only to emerge as a beautiful butterfly, we emerge from our dark times better than ever. But being in the dark times can be hard when you’re knee-deep in it and not sure when it’s going to end. So what do you do in the meantime?
The optimist in me says you focus on growth and the beauty of gaining lessons that are pushing you to be a better person. The realist in me says growth is hard and doesn’t always feel worth it but just like caterpillars and plants when we have times where we feel buried in darkness, beauty is on the other side.
I remember when I was in one of my darker times. I was going through the divorce of my first marriage. My dad sent me a ticket to come home and spend some time getting my head together. While I was home, I read two books by Iyanla Vanzant. The first one was “Yesterday I Cried”. I remember thinking, “what’s the point in doing all that crying”. And then something in me broke and the waterworks flowed. I cried hard. I mourned the forever I thought I was going to have with my ex. I released the guilt of having to file for divorce. It was truly cleansing.
But sometimes being motivated to keep moving and emerge from the dark place is hard.
Here are some ways to help you stay motivated as you push through the hard times:
I truly hope that you know that for every ebb, there will be a flow that will lead you to an emergence of another beautiful aspect of you.