Dying in the dark.

As she lay in her bed.
Taking shallow labored breaths.
The corners of her mouth turned up.
Her eyes sparkled.
Her Face softened.
Her smile warm.

She thought to herself.

I have hurt many people.
I have lied.
I have been selfish.
I have made many miscalculations.
My life has been rampant with my own mistakes and misunderstandings.

I have induced so much pain on undeserving recipients.
I have taken my blessings for granted.

Substantial parts of my existence have been tainted by the darkness.
The darkness of others and the darkness I cultivated within myself.

I am close to the end.
I lay here alone.
I reflect on my being and I am not disappointed.
Not with myself, or with anyone else for that matter.

You see, life gave me just what I needed.

The shadows within myself and even the darkness imposed on me by others.

I have seen and come to know well the distinction of the dark and the light.

It has taken me every breath I have been granted to figure it out. I imagine that is why I was granted breath in the first place.

It takes us all every breath.

We get the time we need.

We are all given the opportunity. We are all invited to the occasion of life.

Our personal experiences and the experiences of others working simultaneously with one another.

All the work coming together to create the whole.

It is neither here nor there what our biographies look like stacked up against one another.

It is not a test, a game, or a competition.

Life is an offering from the powers that be to experience growth.

We cannot fail.

There are no winners.

But we do get to experience choice.

We can bloom or we can remain buds. It makes no difference, all parts of the flower are beautiful and in our own time we will receive the nurture and experiences, the light and the dark that we need to flourish.

For some of us the nudge simply comes from the darkness.

I am so thankful for my dear friend the dark. Darkness is the one who consistently held me, he never let me down, he was always waiting to hold me and point me back to the direction of the light.

Her breath stopped. Her thoughts stopped. Her fears stopped. Her body lay alone but she was not alone in the dark. She never had been.