Waking up in the middle of the night to talk with God
Total darkness is beautiful. Velvet, thick inky black infused with green light.
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Lately, I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night and talking with God. I got this idea from Clark Strand, author of Waking up to the Dark: The Black Madonna's Gospel for An Age of Extinction and Collapse1, which is the first book club selection at my new Soul Caller School of Magic and Miracles.
Strand writes about the Hour of God, that time ‘between sleeps’ at around 2 am, when our biological clock wakes us up in the dark.
I have always awakened at this time but the middle of the night was often a time of worry: Are the bills paid? Is the door locked? Are my children all right, out there on their own? I’d toss and turn, worrying, Will I fall back to sleep? I’ll be so tired tomorrow if I don’t.
Now, it’s different. Now, I wake in the middle of the night and I talk with God. Well, in one sense, I am speaking to God - but actually, it's the darkness that's there, surrounding me, holding me as I pour out everything that is weighing on me - every niggly thought, every persistent worry.
I tell the darkness about intermittent fasting and how it worked and now, doesn’t work any more. I tell the darkness how much it bothers me that my hair is thinning, my chin softening and how I miss just hanging with my daughter, who lives six hours away by plane and walking with my son and his dog but that he, too, lives six hours away - by car.
I tell the darkness that I seem to be in a transition space between one voice and another. This makes it hard for me to finish my book - or even this blog post. I tell the darkness that sometimes, even now, six years after her death, I miss my mom.
As I speak out loud, the enveloping darkness takes all of it into its absorbent spongey spaciousness — the 35 pounds, the concerns about my children — and I exhale, empty and quiet inside, all the doubt and grief poured out of me.
I sit, surrounded by nothingness and I rest. In the dark.
No answer comes and that’s a good thing. I don’t think I’d feel good if some angel decided to materialize at the foot of my bed. Though answers do come. In the daylight, in dreams. Two nights ago, I dreamed of my mother. She was holding me … or something. I can’t remember more than this: She was here.
Along with, or perhaps because of this middle of the night conversation, my conversation with waking life deepens. I am more present to my body. More alive to my friends and family. More fully here.
Though lately, there’s this feeling of waiting - of idling, having been placed on hold by life itself. I am not alone in this. In my one-on-one sessions (many) people are telling me they feel stuck in place. “I feel called to get moving,” one woman said. “The energy is here but I’m not moving.”
It’s a holding pattern, I say. I feel it, too. Energy is reorganizing itself. We are officially in the Age of Aquarius. I’m not sure what that means yet I know exactly what it means.
Soon, the light will penetrate the dark.
In my room, when I am talking with God, it’s already here. Especially after I’ve covered the window with a pillow to block the security floodlight in my neighbor’s driveway. When every light bulb is extinguished and I am sitting in complete darkness, my eyes adjust and I begin to see. Moving patterns of illumination, mostly green, threading through the void.
Also, this other thing happens now. Things that I wrote long ago are echoed back to me in an email or shared post. These things remind me that I do (often) manage to say what I am trying to say.
When someone shares an old post or I receive a reply to one of my emails from months (even years) earlier. They tell me about a struggle with a loved one or something at work. Some stumble when something I once said was helpful. Receiving their notes is one of those strange miracles that loops back around for now, what they’ve written (always at just the right time) is helpful to me.
Recently, as I was clearing out my hard drive, I re-read this post: You are loved. You are blessed. You are already perfect. Nothing you do can exile you. It was just what I needed to hear. And it sent me reading back through other messages from the guides. If you want to, you can do that over here: The Flow Journals
One night last week, I dreamed that David Letterman was interviewing me about my work. The next night, I had a dream that I’d stumbled upon two women going through the boxes in my storage room.
It’s always a good sign when I’m dreaming. It wakes me up to what is always happening, always bubbling below the surfaces of things.
After dreaming, I read a Facebook post by a woman who’d blown up her online platform. It was scary, she said, but worth it. Getting rid of the past allowed her to start over - this time, more authentically. This month, she’s running a program called BecomingHER.
I laughed when I read that because ‘Becoming Her’ was one of the names that I floated for this blog. It’s a good name - and will probably become a title for that book I’m working on. That’s okay. Now that everyone is channeling the zeitgeist, all of my titles are taken.
When I was younger, a coincidence like this would have caused me to stuff the book project into a box and stash it in the storage room of my work-flat. Now, it’s okay - even liberating. We can all choose the same book title. Every book, like every person, will be unique. Everything we’ve written will come back to us. We will enter the Age of Aquarius free of all the names. We will all have one name. The same name. I wonder what it will be. I’m excited to find out. Perhaps I will ask God tonight or maybe I will let God surprise me.
Some announcements
In 2024, I have two new openings for steady one-on-one spiritual direction.
Single Sessions: 1:1 Illumination Coaching is also available.
Illuminated Journey: The way of the Soul Caller resumes the second week in January. Enrollment opens December 31. Get on the wait list if you want to be notified.
I am about to open the Zoom room for our New Moon Gathering at the Well but I wanted to get this to you before I do. So, I am sending this out with a full heart - and all the blessings of the season.
Be well, dear you. Be easy on yourself as you move through these days. Remember, as you carry the lantern of presence in this season of darkness, you are the light.
Blessings and love,
Amy