poetry

The Darkness Within You, Unacknowledged… {poetry}

“It is somewhat less dangerous to feel that malevolence is located outside oneself, in an object from which no one can escape, than inside oneself, from which there is no escape.” ~ Stephen A. Mitchell & Margaret J. Black

It is true you have suffered.

It is true you have been subject to unfair treatment.

It is true you have come out of despair to make yourself new again.

 

You have found your path of healing

after years of fear and torment.

You can breathe a little deeper.

You can now reflect in the past.

With some questions still unanswered

and some fear still about the future.

 

It is true that you are lovely.

It is true that you are amazing.

It is true that you are a reflection

of the great capacity of survival

humans are born with.

 

It is true that there have been moments of rejection,

of others intentionally abandoning you,

therefore becoming masterful at abandoning yourself.

 

And here lies the difficult part to own,

to own how you have become part of your own suffering

because there is a dark side residing within you

that needs to be named.

It is a side that is deeply painful and agonizing to acknowledge.

How to acknowledge that part of you that treats yourself with disdain?

And…

How to acknowledge that part of you that hurts those you love?

 

You have already singled out those responsible for your misery

but you know there are some little steps to take

to acknowledge the ways your suffering has taught you well

On how to abandon yourself

On how to criticize yourself

On how to make yourself suffer

On how to become your worst enemy

On how to sabotage your healing journey

On how to use others to indulge your wounded ego

Making you blind to your own dark side,

your own shadow that resides within you.

And in your attempt to deny your dark side,

you unravel it and show it to the world with fury,

with aggression, with revenge,

without even being aware of its monstrosity

until it is too late,

because you do not want to acknowledge

a part of you that you and others find shameful.

 

Lack of acknowledgement

does not make it less real,

does not make it less powerful,

less painful.

 

Your dark side, unrecognized, becomes a monster.

Your dark side, ignored, controls your actions.

Your dark side, a byproduct of years of suffering

perpetrated by others has become your blind spot,

teaching you about doing the things you are against

becoming your biggest enemy unrecognized

molding your psyche into becoming

who you do not want to be.

 

It is time for you to acknowledge your inner dark side.

It is time to acknowledge it has lived within you

uninvited, unacknowledged, denied, repressed, dissociated.

It is time to own how your dark side, unrecognized,

has hurt many people, including you.

Since those early times you were diminished in painful tears

that no one could see.

Since those times you looked up to the sky wondering

as a child, why you were feeling so much despair.

Since the times you thought you did not deserve

to be loved, recognized, admired,

to be the best version of yourself because no one was there

to mirror your beauty, your talents, your brilliance and your amazingness.

So you learned to obtain that mirroring of your amazingness

through your dark side,

through your dark side, unacknowledged.

 

Your dark side, within you,

is waiting for recognition,

but the right amount of recognition.

To embrace it and not dissociate it,

To talk to it and not ignore it,

To understand it and not indulge it,

To place it where it belongs within,

To become an imperfect balance

with your own inner light.

“When we take the time to look into our bag of shadows, something magical happens. We begin to see ourselves for who we really are. We start to understand that we weren’t born to be perfect. Our greatest qualities are tethered to our most feared flaws.” ~ Michaela Chung

***

MerariFernandezMerari Fernandez is a native Puerto Rican woman, who has found in writing the power of healing herself and the world. Encouraged as a child to put her mind into writing by her grandmother, she has found it beneficial when she cannot find the spoken words and when she has something important to say that can shake someone’s perspective. She is a therapist in private practice in Chicago at The Healing Journey Psychotherapy, and has devoted her life to work with survivors of abuse as well as with any suffering human being who has come to her for support and help. She loves Yoga, animals, the sun, the moon, the sea and the forest and anything that claim to be alive. Although, she feels deeply connected to her past ancestors. She continuous finds new ways to be present with her current life and is open to what life brings to her.

***

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