Your Inner Light

At this time of year when we feel, quite significantly the change in the angle of the sun and its effect on the amount of daylight, as we move into the season of winter, it can be helpful to contemplate the effect of light in our body, our mood, and in our spiritual wellbeing.

Mind
Our minds are quite sensitive to light. Many of us feel the effects of this loss of available light from the sun, diminishing daily at this time of year as we move into winter. The daylight becomes progressively shortened until the time of the winter solstice. It gets dark pretty early in the afternoon. And it can really affect how we feel. 

We might feel tired, down, and for some, seasonal affective disorder, and it can be quite challenging. We feel the pressures of the holiday season, exciting us in many ways, but also putting stresses on us on top of our regular daily duties. We can also honor this time of year, by allowing ourselves to rest when we feel like we need it.

We notice acutely how we feel on a clear sunny day compared to a cloudy day. But sometimes just remembering that the sun is always there, just behind the clouds. Something else that I find helpful this time of year is knowing that soon, as soon as December 21st this year, that the days will start getting longer again, bringing more light into our daily lives. During this time, it’s the darkness that helps us to really appreciate the light. 

Sometimes we’re looking for “bling” to make us feel better. But we too have our own inner bling.  When we remember to connect to and sense and feel the light, we have more clarity, joy, and a sense of our own inner wisdom. There is goodness inside all of us. I like to call them “sparklies”. When we connect to the positive, we're choosing that frequency. It's in there, we just need to make some room to receive it. When we tap into it, it empowers us to keep going, to keep doing good things, and it makes us feel good too.

Body
Changes in light affect us physically too. In fact, during this time of year in Maine, there is no vitamin D available from the sun. It can affect our bones, our immune system, and the neurotransmitters our body produces. Physically light affects our health and wellbeing on many levels. Just think of how you feel on a sunny day. We just feel better. Physically we are made of the same components as we find in the world of nature and we interact with it on many levels. We are in it and it is in us. As Carl Sagan put it, “The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.” 

We might not be aware of it, but it’s fascinating to consider that on a physical level, there is light within our bodies. It may not be visible to the naked eye but it's in there, and it helps to consider this light within us. Interestingly, human photonic light has a rhythm to it, connected to the diurnal changes in daylight. We have a kind of permeability, a transparency in our body. Without even realizing it, the sun is being reflected in us, every day, even in the darkest time of year. 

It’s incredible to consider the design of our bodies as receptacles for light. From a physical standpoint, we are not as solid or impermeable as we think. In physics we have discovered that we as human beings emit biphotonic light, thought to be a bioproduct of biochemical processes. “The human body literally glimmers.” (see footnote)

From this inner vantage point of awareness, we can tap into the “space in between” where we are literally lit up. These biochemical processes fuel our metabolism, our endocrine system, our nervous system, and our immune system. The light within our body supports our health on many levels. 

Spirit
On the level of spirit, at first the concept of light may seem elusive. Perhaps only something that those who are highly evolved or enlightened get to experience. Something only priests or monks have access to. But think again. Or better yet, make room for the possibility that the light of our being is something anyone can feel. 

Let’s consider a few examples of spiritual light. An example that I believe almost everyone has experienced is when someone or something “lights us up”. This might happen when we’re doing something we love, or when we see a family or friend that we have a special connection to. It’s something that we feel. We reflect the light of our being in one another. It’s a kind of warmth, an inner fire, and it feels good. 

Another example is that which we feel in our spiritual practice or contemplation. So often we are seeking a sense or experience of something greater from something outside of us. But one of the most important things that I’ve discovered is that divine light can illuminate our spirit within us. and spiritual light is something that we can feel. The bible even talks about it in Luke 11:34, “The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light…”

It was during a difficult time in my life that I learned to experience a feeling of spiritual light. I was having trouble sleeping so I was trying to pray and meditate. Just for a moment, I tried to imagine what it would feel like if I could actually feel God or spirit. Then something happened. I’m not going to tell you what I experienced, because I hope you will suspend your own disbelief and allow yourself to sense and feel spirit in you, in whatever way feels right. Just take a moment, wherever you are, or perhaps just before you drift off to sleep or when you wake up in the morning. If you could sense and receive the experience of light in your mind, body, and spirit, what would it feel like for you? Perhaps it feels like love, holiness, reverence, peace, connection to nature, or the stars in the night sky. What color, temperature, or texture would it be? How does this feel inside you, mind, body, and spirit? This is just a start of something that is available to all of us, if we just take a moment to feel what’s possible.

Incredible to consider, right? From science to spirit we are beings of light. The Light of Creation is vivifying us on all levels. We need only be aware of the possibility, to receive and experience it. And the more we relate to it within ourselves, the more human we feel. It gives us strength and purpose to keep going, even when things are challenging. As Oprah put it, “You have to find what sparks a light in you so that you in your own way can illuminate the world.”

It's in times of challenge, the dark night of the soul, the depths of winter, that it can be so helpful to remember the Light that is always there, supporting us, guiding us, strengthening us. It's the forgetting that keeps us struggling and suffering. There is no light without darkness and it's the struggle, or capacity for consciousness, to be human, that is what helps us to grow our own inner light. But no one can do it for us. This is your own personal experience of Light in your being. Every time we remember to connect to it, we can become renewed, reborn, illuminated, and lit up. 

“This is Now. Now is all there is. Don't wait for Then; strike the spark, light the fire.” Rumi

The Light of the universe is a true blessing to us all as human beings and I hope you take some simple moments and give yourself this gift this season.

*Kobayashi M, Kikuchi D, Okamura H. Imaging of ultraweak spontaneous photon emission from human body displaying diurnal rhythm. PLoS One. 2009 Jul 16;4(7):e6256. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0006256. PMID: 19606225; PMCID: PMC2707605