I’ve watched Debbie Ford’s, The Shadow Effect DVD a few times now and she mentions the poem below, which likens being human to a guest house with new emotions arriving every day. I think this poem is a great one to have in our diaries so when we’re having a hard day, we can read it and remind ourselves to accept what is and that all from all hard times, good things arise.
I think this runs parallel with what Eckhart Tolle suggests in The Power of Now (Page 218); “Become and alchemist. Transmute base metal into gold, suffering into consciousness, disaster into enlightenment.”
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
~ Rumi
(The Essential Rumi, versions by Coleman Barks)
I’ve also been reading Debbie Ford’s The Dark Side of the Light Chasers and participating in a virtual book club with Liz Foster, who has been working closely with Debbie for some years now. I’m finding the book and the book club offers me a wonderful opportunity to understand those ’shadows’ that bring me down. Debbie’s words help us realise that each shadow is indeed a guide and a gift which, if we embrace enthusiastically, we can use to forgive ourselves. So, we use it, instead of it using us.
