Light in the Darkness

In this episode of “Coping”, Kathy and Kevin discuss the symbolism of lights during the holiday season, highlighting familial traditions around decorative lights and the spiritual meaning of light in the Bible. Light represents hope during dark times, and as people who are called to shine their light into the world, we can think about what type of light we are, and the need to plug into spiritual sources to refill our light when it dims. The conversation covers how illness, trauma, grief, exhaustion, and lack of boundaries can dim our light. Practices like reading, walking, and unplugging can refill us.

Reflect this week on your current light using a 1-10 scale - how bright are you shining? Identify factors that may be dimming your light right now. Commit to one new practice this season to plug into spiritual sources and refill your light. Reach out to friends or helpers if your light feels dim and you need support. Intentionally shine your light this holiday season to bring hope to those in darkness.

Kathy: Welcome back to another episode of "Coping". Today's episode. We have a special advent holiday.

Kevin: That's right today We're gonna talk a little bit about the theme of lights and what that means for this holiday season. 

Kathy: Okay, let's get started.

Kevin: So it's that time of year; we start driving around the neighborhood at night and we see lights and people's lawns on their trees outside. We can see through their window, the Christmas tree is decorated. Even in our own home our Christmas tree is up and the lights come on automatically on a timer. It's such a beautiful time of year with all these Christmas lights. What was your tradition growing up? How did you guys decorate your house inside and out?

Kathy: Oh, that's a really good question. So we grew up in South Florida so it was not cold and so there wasn't like snow and that whole part of the winter celebrations.

Kevin: Right you almost have to decorate a little bit more just to bring in the Christmas season because you don't have the natural changing of the weather there.

Kathy: Sure, so a lot of people in South Florida do lots of lights because we don't have those extra winter effects. So Yeah, we would put out the lights and then one of our favorite family traditions was to drive around and look at all the lights. When we were young our parents to drive us in the car around and look at all of the neighborhood or other little neighborhood pockets where people put on big light displays. 

Kevin: Yeah, so my brother and I, when we were older, took the initiative to decorate the house ourselves and so we would pull out those dusty boxes filled with old Christmas lights. And this was back in the day where you would test one light at a time when the strand was not working and we would try to find that broken light or the one that had you know blown and we would then use a little plastic pack with like three extra ones and then refill it in. 

Kathy: The fuses.

Kevin: So we would be hours and hours just trying to get the lights to work and then we had the bright idea of, "man we've done all this work and it looks beautiful this year. Let's leave it up the whole year and see if we can just you know not have to go through--"

Kathy: Oh you were one of those families. 

Kevin: We tried until just a few weeks later the lawn guys came and cut into the bushes and destroyed all the lights. I think that was the last year that we ever did Christmas lights. Yeah, well this episode it's our holiday episode so we're going to talk a little bit about lights this season and what the symbolism of lights are for us as we celebrate this holiday season.

Kathy: So tell us a little bit about why lights are so important spiritually and the symbolism of that.

Kevin: Yeah, that's such a good question. So I think from Judeo-Christian perspective, light is such an important theme in the Old Testament and the New Testament. Some of the very first of verses in Genesis talk about God's command, "let there be light." And then we see this certainly extended into the New Testament where light starts to become a symbol of people who are set apart in the world, but also an example of our call to shine our light. 

I'm thinking about John 1 1:7, where it says, "but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another." And I think it's just such an important reminder that when there's so much darkness in the world, so much darkness around us and our personal lives, that we be a light, a light for other people when they're in their darkness. And when we shine a light, it's a symbol of hope, especially in challenging times in the world.

Kathy: Yeah, it seems like every Christmas, things are getting darker and darker, not just outside, but in the forces that are working against the light. And we come to Advent and to this Christmas wondering, "is the light actually going to overcome the darkness? And what are ways we can be spreading more light since it's just so needed?"

Kevin: Right. One of the teachings that we've done a few times with our community is to describe the kind of light that we are when we think about all the different kinds of light sources in the world. Would you mind just sharing a little bit about how you would describe yourself as a light? What kind of light do you see yourself as in the world?

Kathy: Yeah, this is such an introspective, but very powerful and fun activity to think about all the different light sources around us from the lamps to the light bulbs to the matches to the campfires, to the lightning bugs. Yeah, there's just so many, and we take it for granted, I think that's something else you could say. Our power was out recently for 12 hours, and it was very, it was a wake up call to how much we rely on the light.

Kevin: So much so we bought a backup battery just to make sure that we had a source to keep our light shining when we need it.

Kathy: Yeah, absolutely. So when I think about the light source that relates to me, I think about lighthouses. I love the lighthouses, we visited some of them, but the idea that your light can emit far away to guide ships in, I think is one of the calls for me, and being a stable source of light people can come back to resonates with me. How about you?

Kevin: Yeah, I see you definitely emit that kind of light in your work as a life and vocation coach, certainly within our family, just a very stable presence of light. That's definitely how I envision you and your light. I think for me, probably opposite to you, my light changes over time and in different seasons and depending on what's going on. And so there's times where I feel like I'm a bonfire, where my light is ablaze. Other times it feels really, really dim, almost like a nightlight. And so I think the best example of my source of light is more like a dimmer switch. There's times where I find myself shining really bright and that kind of bright light is needed if I'm teaching or speaking or leading some type of group and shining up bright light is important. And then having the ability to dim way down if I'm entering into a patient room in the hospital, sitting with somebody who's just gotten a new diagnosis and being present to them in their pain and their story. 

Kevin: And so I've developed over time this ability to toggle my light switch up and down, depending on the scenario, depending on the encounter that I'm having with somebody. So I think the best representative of my kind of light is perhaps like a dimmer switch. 

Kathy: That's really good. And you have to obviously be aware then about how your light source is emitting and when you need to turn it down. I grew up without dimmer switches. I didn't even know what that was, but it's such a powerful regulatory mechanism that we have now and for you to use that as a light. For you, I think that's really interesting, but it's very appropriate for the work you do. So you mentioned that sometimes your light is dim. I think that brings up a very good topic about what makes our lights dim. You're talking about the self-regulation of dimming, but a lot of times our lights are hidden, turned down, covered completely. What do you find often dims the light in others?

Kevin: Yeah, that's such a great question. I think, as you're saying, the most important thing to do is to first be aware that your light is dim.

Kathy: Awareness.

Kevin: Yeah, awareness, yeah, exactly. I know in the work that I do, some of the obstacles or some of the ways that our lights are impacted is illness, trauma, pain, lack of support, those types of things can certainly impact somebody's level of light. I think for me personally the ways that my light dims the most is when I feel like I'm perhaps expending more energy or expending sending out more light into the world that I'm you know filling myself up with so I'm burning out quite literally emotionally, spiritually burning out and my light source is getting dim because it's you know the energy levels are pretty low. What about for you? What are some of the things that you feel like are dimming your light that that lighthouse that you are?

Kathy: I think it's exactly the same right as helpers, we don't we're getting tired of turning our lights. We have been turning on our lights probably on maximum, full force since COVID because there's been so many needs for helpers, loss of jobs and illness and the level of crisis we've talked about through our season is very great in the world, so helpers are very tired. For me, it's exhaustion, a lack of rest and just feeling like I can't turn my light on anymore. I'm just too tired to. I can keep plugging back into sources, but it's just like not enough to light. The amount of power it takes, I think, for helpers and leaders, it's a lot.

Kevin: Yeah, I'm even thinking about my source of light a dimmer switch often a dimmer switch is coupled with an outlet and so not only am I emitting light but I'm also an outlet for others to plug into and that can be exhausting I have to have double, triple, quadruple the amount of energy being poured in to me so that I can not only shine my light, but be a source of light for others. You think about a lighthouse -- I'm sure there's several outlets and other sources of energy for folks to plug into let alone helping them, guiding them to shore after a journey at sea, if you will.

Kathy: Yeah, and I would say also that for those in our community, you mentioned illness, trauma, grief as dimming. I would also say related to that, you know, the lack of boundaries, what we're talking about, and the inability to pause, to rest, to reflect. And then not taking enough time to plug into the sources that fill us up in proportion to how much, like you said, the energy is going out. 

Kevin: Right. Tell me a little bit more about how you plug into sources of energy to keep your light bright. What does that look like for you and what advice do you have for other people that are assessing that their light is pretty dim at this time of year? 

Kathy: So one of the practices that we talk about and then I practice personally, I know you do too, is that we engage in what we call ING activities that are filling up and making us literally light up. For me, it's reading. I'm so proud to say I finished two books this week that I had started months ago, cooking, walking every day, napping. For some people, it's serving. For some people, it's cleaning. That's something that gets them filled up. There's endless possibilities. 

Kevin: Yeah, this teaching that we talk about a lot is making sure that your practices include that ING. What's the participle, what kind of word is that as an ING? I always forget.

Kathy: That's a gerund.

Kevin: A gerund. That's right.

Kathy: Of course.

Kevin: The English teacher in you is coming out, yeah. So basically ensuring that the practice that we have is something that we do and gives us not just something to strive for, but something to actually do practically. And so I have these ongoing practices, journaling, praying, fellowshiping, playing. I like to play video games as a complete breakaway, watching movies, that type of thing. But I think certainly this time of year, what I need more than just my ongoing practices of self-care and rest are practices, like my annual practices that disrupt the routines that I have, and so making sure that I'm taking time to reflect on the whole year. You and I have talked before on this podcast about our year in review workshop, but also when we talk about our favorite things from this past year, we have a journal that we do with that. 

Kevin: I also try to take some time away from work to completely unplug and to free up some mental space. So ongoing practices are super important, all those gerund words, the ING words. And then try to think at this time of year, ways to disrupt my normal patterns and routines so that I can do a real good assessment about where I'm at, how I'm doing, what I'm needing as I look back to start to envision what might be upcoming in this next year. 

Kathy: Yeah, so I think this is all very helpful, especially at this time of the year as we talk about lights and how we can dispel the darkness. The number one theme I think that we've emphasized today is to be sure that you're plugging into a greater source of light. 

Kevin: That's right. We have all these practices that we can do, activities that we can do, but the reality is that we may be a source of light, but we're not the main source. We have to plug into a source of energy bigger than ourselves so that that energy source can be filling us up as we're shining our light and being an outlet for other people's light to have energy as well. 

Kathy: And so to recap, step one, take a moment to think about the awareness of your light. How is it shining right now on a scale of one to ten? How bright is it? Step two, what is dimming your light? What is causing you to be not shining as brightly as the world needs you to be shining right now? And step three, plug into the source of a greater light source than yourself. We cannot get light from ourselves.

Kevin: What are those sources of light that we can plug into when you think about a bigger source of light? What does that look like?

Kathy: I think the bigger sources of life for most people are spiritual practices. For some others, it's faith, their deep faith, and all of the practices related to hearing from God and getting truth and light into their hearts and minds instead of believing lies and darkness. For others, it may be community and hearing how they're valued and seen from a group of people. So I would just challenge you out there. If you don't have any of those, please reach out to us at Be Well Resources. We want you to be shining your light brightly. the season and throughout the year.

Kevin: And so with that, what I would like to do to close our time together today is to play one of the earliest episodes from season one of "Coping". It's a reflection on light and the type of light that we can shine amidst the darkness this holiday season. And so with that, whatever it is that you may be coping with, we want to extend this holiday season blessings to you.

Holiday Lights Reflection

Kevin: During the holidays, Christmas lights decorate our homes inside and out. We wrap our Christmas trees with lights and hang lights from the roof. These lights switch on at night so that they shine brightly and beautifully in the darkness. 

The prophet Isaiah spoke about light saying, People walking in darkness have seen a great light. On those living in the land of deep darkness. A light has dawned. Our small strung together Christmas lights not only display the beauty of Christmas, but also, as Isaiah teaches us, help dispel the darkness. 

As we celebrate with lights this season, let us intentionally shine our lights to illuminate the world around us. How has God's light dawned in your life? Where is he calling you to shine your light today? 

Let's pray. God, you are the light of the world. We hear your call to be light in the world. Help us to shine brightly this season, and give us the power to bring light where it is needed most. We pray these things in your name. Amen.