We recently experienced an ice storm that caused our electricity and landline phone to stop working. The house was silent and at night shrouded in darkness. We live on a dirt road, deep in the country, and dark is really dark. I found myself singing, “Hello darkness, my old friend, I have come to talk to you again”, every night.

I am not afraid of the dark or things that go bump in the night, I connected with Spirit and parts of myself, in a deeper way, because the energies from electricity were silenced.

Living in the silence and darkness, hyper stimulated my senses, opening portals to other dream realms. I felt stripped naked, no other distractions, cell phone/TV, keeping my mind busy. My mind, body, and spirit seemed to tune into another level of vibration.

My dreams were psychedelic vivid, and seemed like I was awake, being part of the dreamscape, feeling myself present inside of the dream. I am currently working on a small painting of the face of a blue person that visited me in the darkness of my bedroom. I saw him appear before my open eyes and was very disappointed he did not speak, he did communicate something, mind to mind, but do you think I can recall the information? I figure I have it in my cellular memories and will recall the information, when the time is right.

My dream state also brought me insight into a painting I was struggling with, I did not like it, and I asked for insight before I went to sleep, and I saw the most vivid alizarin crimson red encompassing the animal's skull. I was astonished at how it made the skull pop. Albert Einstein, Nicola Tesla, and many others stated that they received their best ideas in the dream state.

Many spiritual modalities utilize darkness as part of their journey to enlightenment, which is like an oxymoron, if you think about it, dark to light. But, I do believe immersing yourself in darkness can cause a shift in your physical brain, helping your mind, body, and spirit to touch deeper into yourself and into higher realms.

When I ran Sweat Lodges, we were immersed in darkness, except for the hot, glowing rocks that represented our ancestors' giveaway. The Sweat Lodge also had the added factor of steam heat, from pouring the water on the hot rocks. I also played the water drum and we all sang sacred songs. That is another experience with darkness that can take you deeper on your spiritual journey.

There is something to be said about sitting in darkness, being completely disconnected from this world, in total silence, reconnecting to my spirit self. I believe we are first, and foremost Spirit, that activating force for our bodies, and Spirit experiences life through our bodily senses, taste, touch, hearing, sight, smell, and the 6th sense of intuition, with help from our minds. Not our minds in control, as most of us seem to be living our lives in this upside-down world.

We have all of the information and wisdom we need inside of ourselves, we need to be open to sit with ourselves and listen. That seems really quite simple, but being brave enough to go to those dark spaces/places inside of ourselves can be a little overwhelming, but worth the effort.

Taking silent time, in the dark, can help you on your spiritual journey to yourself. Start out slowly, maybe 10 minutes a day, and build up from there, giving yourself the grace to be gentle with yourself.