I was listening to a Tim Ferriss podcast one day with Cheryl Strayed, she is the author of Torch, and Wild, Tiny Beautiful Things, and Brave Enough.
She also teaches a writing class she was talking about on the podcast.
In her writing class the first assignments she hands out is to write about your darkest teacher.
I loved this for so many reasons, one of them being that to consider the dark moments in life as teaching moments sheds a whole new light on those moments.
So I sent an email to my email list asking them who their darkest teacher was and what did they learn from it.
The responses I’ve been getting are beautiful.
“I realized I am who I am today because of those moments.”
“I learned I am enough for whatever life sends my way.”
“The truth is, I’m glad they happened to me. Because if not, how would I know I could survive?”
Some of us choose to walk into the storm and for others, the storm descends upon us.
When I knowingly walked into my storm it was because I couldn’t live the way I was living anymore…and it was a mighty big storm.
But the price of living unhappily, feeling like something is missing, feeling alone and unheard is too high.
I promise you, happiness exists for all of us on the other side of the storm.
It will become your darkest teacher, and you will become a stronger, and wiser person because of it, in ways you can’t even imagine right now.
Don’t be afraid of the storm it will teach you how to become the person you are meant to be.
And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” – Haruki Murakami