Without the darkness, there isn’t Light to compare.  It’s still duality, and our choice to live it out on this planet.  If it were all Light, then we wouldn’t know the difference.  I don’t know about you, but I often grow weary of the darkness, and the duality and am ready to see it come to a close, for the planet, for each of us.

I think of the darkness before birth, safely tucked away in our mother’s wombs, not knowing that there exists a whole other world that we were conceived and destined to enter.  There’s security in that darkness, comfort – maybe this is why we are often drawn to traditions and family during this dark time of the year.  I remember when I was pregnant with Alan my oldest son, now 32 years ago.  I was 20 years old and taking a Spanish class at UC- Boulder and driving there every day for this class from Golden.  One day we learned the Spanish verb to give birth:  Dar la luz (to give the light).  I remember going over and over it in my mind, and focussing on the light.  At that time I saw “the light” as the new baby, full of light, which I don’t think is wrong… but now I see that it could be from the idea that the baby comes from darkness into light.  I thought that this was a beautiful way to describe the amazing process of childbirth.  Weirdly and ironically, we are born into light, as light, into this strange world of darkness, duality.  Our challenge is then to remember our own lights and let them shine forth.