There’s an Old Testament story that people always tell the wrong way. (According to me.)

In the story, King David’s beloved child—a tiny infant—gets very, very sick. 

For 7 days, David sits vigil. He refuses to eat. He prays and pleads with God for his son’s recovery. He wears sackcloth and sleeps on the floor, refusing all his normal luxuries and creature comfort. 

And then the little boy dies. 

David’s servants are so concerned about how he’ll take the news that they’re scared to even tell him. But he figures it out. 

And when he gets confirmation that the boy has died, David gets up off the floor, takes a shower, washes his face, gets dressed and asks for a meal. Then he eats. 

David’s household staff was like: “Wait what? You were sooooo devastated when the child was just sick. But now he’s dead and you’re good?” 

David said something to the effect of: “Before, I was hoping that my cries and pleas would help him survive. But now that he’s gone, all the tears in the world won’t bring him back. I’ll see him again someday.” 

Every time I’ve ever heard that story, I’ve heard it told as a story of resilience. When you hit the rough stuff, when you lose something precious, when a season ends against your will, don’t wail and moan. 

Get up, wash your face, get back in the saddle. 

But the most powerful part of the story hasn’t even been told yet. 

After David ate, he went to comfort his wife. And during all this “comforting”, she got pregnant and eventually gave birth to another son, Solomon. 

That baby would eventually become King Solomon, the historical Jewish emperor whose very name symbolizes wisdom, clear-minded discernment and incredible prosperity.* 

So, as I read it, the moral of the story is not “get up and wash your face”.

The moral of the story as I read it, is that after a grave crisis… after a season of loss… after death and mourning comes creation and wisdom. 

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All the ancient spiritual traditions had the principle of death preceding rebirth and creation, or the destruction of war being paired with the blossoming of wisdom.

The Hindu goddess Kali was a dark mother, representing death and destruction of the ignorance, ego and illusions that keep us trapped in our cycles, including and especially the delusion of permanency, aka the fear of change. 

Kali’s black skin symbolized “primordial”, meaning she was present before the Earth and before human time began. And so she holds the primal balance of the Universe in her symbolic hands: death before life, darkness before dawn, destruction before creation. 

Paintings of Kali have four hands, two for destruction and two for creation—her right hands held out to bestow blessings, and her left hands holding a sword to destroy illusion and a severed head (no big deal).

Kali destroys demonic forces in order to liberate, then creates fresh blessings and possibilities each and every day.

The Egyptian goddess Neith the Terrifying? Same. She wielded the power to destroy all things… then weaved the sun into the sky and re-create the world each morning.

The Greek goddess Athena? Same. Goddess of war strategy… and wisdom.

Destruction. Creation. Death. Rebirth. War. Wisdom.

They go together in spirit… and they also go together in science.

The elements of everything that has ever lived and died on this Planet are recycled into the new things that now live. 

Including you and me. 

And everything you’ve ever wanted that didn’t work out, everything you’ve ever tried and failed at, every season of your life that’s ever ended… all of that creates and prepares the space for fresh, new things to be born. 

But more importantly, all your past “endings”—the death, the destruction, the collateral damage of the wars within you and around you—they create clarity and wisdom.

But please catch this principle: You can’t start receiving and leveraging the clarity and wisdom of your crises or losses until you acknowledge them, grieve them and open yourself to the creation that wants to flow to you and through you next.

Only you can leave the death season, and only you can know when the time is right.

A good sign is when you’re getting bored of telling your own (rightfully) sad stories… or when you’re feeling drawn to a new thing.  

But only you can elect to emerge from the dark season, and you must make that election in order to emerge.

Only you can decide not to let your traumatizers have any more of the precious moments of your life.

You will have to step out of your Comfort Zone and into your Discomfort Zone, sit down at your loom like the goddess Neith and begin to weave your new world into life. 

And there’s no exact instructional PDF for this. There is no exact instruction manual for this. So you may feel untethered and the process may feel messy.

It might even feel terrifying. 

But radical liberation is, by definition, untethering. 

You’ll find ground again, eventually, and it will be higher ground.

And anytime you’re in a dark season, or you feel the darkness beginning to lift, know these things: 

1. The darkness will end. It’s the cosmic balance. 
2. The end of the darkness is not the end of the story. It’s the beginning of the next chapter.

Let things take the time they take. Grieve what needs grieving. Process what needs processing.

And then, when the time feels right… begin your gracious, graceful, grateful exit from the grief story. 

Gather up the pieces of yourself you may have rediscovered in the shadows. 

Collect the clarity that is always trying to come to us during a crisis.

Keep everything from your past and current circumstances that establishes wisdom and clarity and Divine Order in your mind, body and affairs, beginning now.

And ask the power within you to sweep everything from your consciousness, mind, body and affairs that is not Divinely planted or beneficial to you.* 

Decide to forgive everyone in your life and release them with love so they can be free and you can be free.**

And allow your wise unconscious to reorder your understanding of what has happened in a way that bypasses nothing and distills the wisdom you’ll need to feed and fuel your future.

Let nothing be lost on you.

Then, slowly or exuberantly, participate fully and joyfully in weaving your new world—your new projects, your new body, your new relationships, your new ways of being, your new life—into creation.

Head up + heart out,

*If you’re upset at the idea of one child “replacing” another, remember this: The way to get the most out of any sacred text you’ll ever read is to read it symbolically. David’s “children” were historical, but also symbolized any important precious thing we create: our most sacred contracts, callings, relationships and realities.

**Adapted from a Florence Scovel Shinn declaration in Your Word is Your Wand

***Adapted from a Louise Hay affirmation in You Can Heal Your Life

P.S.: Did you miss last week’s newsletter? Want to watch, listen or read again? Here you go! 

Transformation Tuesday | What do you worship?

Watch: https://www.instagram.com/tv/CVA2ysbM3uF/
Listen: soundcloud.com/tara-nicholle-nelson/transformation-tuesday-what-do-you-worship/s-DSXqPKRiOYb?si=73546ddd0a5844468896fe294f2d81cc
Read: taranicholle.com/transformation-tuesday-what-do-you-worship