I am not sure what I was doing in 1979…college…hmmm…. anyway I have no recollection of an eclipse. Happily this year I do. I’m not sure in the future I’ll remember the date of this eclipse (unlike my grandson who is already planning for 2024!) but I was out there with my glasses watching with wonder as the moon meandered in front of the sun. The sky was darker, the temperature dropped noticeably and I waited to see if my dogs would freak out but they didn’t notice anything…played through the whole thing….such unobservant creatures…just like me.
While I was quietly watching the eclipse, I was thinking about all the warnings I heard about protecting your eyes. If you watched the eclipse without the proper eyewear you could permanently damage your eyes and not even know it at the time…apparently our retinas don’t have any feeling…so you could basically fry the crap out of your eyes and not know for a couple days…then your vision would become blurry, and it could be permanent. Now if you ignored all the warnings and looked at the sun anyway, get yourself to the eye doctor right away! I am momentarily stepping in for the moms of the world chastising whoever needs it…we moms think it has to be done. 😉
Then I began to consider the eclipse as a metaphor for anything we don’t want to deal with in our lives. We had an abusive childhood, a nasty divorce, troubles in a relationship, a lost job, mental health issues we’re afraid of, health issues we won’t acknowledge, difficulties with our children, substance abuse issues…the list could go on and on…anything that stirs strong emotions in us that we don’t want to deal with. We take all those things and burry them…we take them out of the light of day and tuck them away into a dark place…a place we need special eyewear to uncover…or bravery, support of friends, or a therapist…or just fearlessness. The longer we keep these things buried the more powerful they become and the more capable of frying our eyes, or so we believe.
We put our deepest secrets and fears and traumas away in a dark place where we hope to never see them again. Then we go on our way as if they have no effect on us or our lives not noticing the pain of looking at the darkness because our retinas don’t have nerve endings…we numb ourselves…we don’t feel the pain…until one day something happens that triggers us and our eyesight is gone and we have a real crisis on our hands. We have waited too long and have potentially caused ourselves permanent damage or at least created a boiling tragedy in our lives…and we enter crisis mode trying to figure out what to do. The crisis is completely avoidable if we wear our glasses and look at the darkness.
The final straw for each of us is different. For me it was dealing with chronic pain and being physically disabled…in the reality of my body and officially. That label haunted me and I avoided it for years…and caused myself tremendous physical and emotional pain…and that was only the final straw…there are many other straws to choose from. At the time I did not see any of the eventual damage I only saw my blinding fear and ran from it far and fast.
The things we resist in our lives become stronger the more we resist them. The stories we believe about whatever we are unwilling to deal with become the truth we subscribe to and live out…they also become the limitations we live with…our vision isn’t so great since we fried our eyes. The good news for us all is that, unlike with the eclipse, which might cause permanent damage, we can heal and be well. We can face whatever the darkness is and recover from it. No matter how big the secret, damage, or trauma we can heal ourselves by bringing it into the light and facing it. Now we may need help with this task and certainly it’s wise to consult a professional if you need some help sorting it all out…the discernment to do that is wisdom and strength…much like wearing the protective eyewear rather than taking a foolish risk.
Perhaps it’s time to open that closet, dust off those skeletons, look at them, and if they aren’t needed anymore let them go. Perhaps we even embrace a skeleton or two as we recognize those events, painful as they may have been, helped us become the person we are…and although they don’t define us they are a piece of us. This personal eclipse doesn’t require physical glasses only the eyes of compassion, the desire to see clearly and fearlessness to keep moving forward.
Kai Raines 