The Key to Freedom Is Hiding in Your Darkest Moments

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[Applause]

i want you to remember a moment in your

life

when the darkness was so complete and

overwhelming

you felt it swallow you up

moments like this

stick with us

years later we still get that pit in our

stomach

when we remember and think

i don’t ever

want to suffer like that again

but

what if that darkness

is the exact environment that you need

to become

who you were meant to be

and for your true purpose to take root

like a seed

in the earth

years later

and i can still picture my darkest day

if you’ve ever spent the night in a

hospital room then you know

it’s never fully dark

never quiet

there are always fluorescent lights

glowing

doors opening and shutting

and monitors beeping

until you feel like the sounds are

coming from behind your own eyes

with a two-year-old and newborn twins at

home

even those lights and sounds

felt eerily calm

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and quiet

as i watched my husband’s

slow

rasping breaths

what had once been a strong and muscled

chest

now looked like a deflated balloon

we were at the hospital again

for the morphine that would give him a

short break from the pain that had

hounded him

day and night for months

i knew the doctors wouldn’t give us any

answers but

they could give us temporary relief

because on that day i realized

what the doctors were too afraid to tell

me

maybe the one thing we actually agreed

on

that my husband was dying

in front of me

and that is when fear

took over

my entire body

and all i could think was

i will save him

if it kills me

a doctor walked in the room

and echoed my suspicion

they had one option left

to remove

this 33 year old man’s colon

and that’s when it hit me

you see

all they ever knew to do was treat the

symptom

they never had any intention

of digging a little deeper

to discover the cause of the symptoms

the root issue

and if they can’t explain it

they’ll just eliminate it

it was the strangest feeling because it

was it was as if time slowed down

but something in my body

was quickly waking up

through my ears i heard the doctor give

us our next steps like they were written

in stone

but deep in my gut

i heard this small

voice

whisper to me another path

one that was risky

and untested

but hopeful

and brave

and in that moment

i knew exactly what to do

i was gonna listen to the small quiet

voice

i’d been ignoring her for way too long

you see

i believe that each of us has a true

self

the person that we were designed to be

and most of us

we spend our lives running from that

true self

allowing the world and our fear to

dictate and cover up our truth

but what i’ve come to realize is that

these seasons of cold lonely darkness

can wake up our true self

and foster it into beautiful fruition

the truth is

pain

it comes to all of us

i know you didn’t ask for it but it’s

here

and it chose you

and you won’t grow in it

or move through it

until you choose it right back

because pain is part of your story

whether you want it or not

it’s the one thing in life that we are

guaranteed

but you do have a choice

you can let it destroy you

or you can let it save you

pain

actually

isn’t the enemy here

maybe you didn’t cause the pain but by

avoiding it

you’re creating the suffering

because

when you accept the darkness

and embrace it

instead of trying to avoid and escape it

you’re doing what i call

the underground work

and it will teach you

it will empower you

and it will guide you

to your truest self

because in the hospital that day

it was the true me speaking up

and i listened

i demanded release papers and i drove us

home from the hospital for the very last

time

i wanted real healing

instead of temporary solutions

even if it meant doing the digging all

on my own

and slowly

after several months of questions and

trails of cookie crumb answers from

arkansan medicine men australian gut

experts and west coast functional

medicine doctors

my husband was healed and his life was

saved

and so was mine

because

my darkest day

was also the day that i came home to

myself for the first time

in a long time

and i made room for all of me

i gave voice to my fear

i felt my pain

i sat

in the darkness

seeing

some part of us

is going to demand that we become our

true self

even if we keep squashing it down so

instead of like me

letting catastrophe force you kicking

and screaming like someone being buried

alive into the underground work

what if you

turned toward

the darkness

daily

and did a little gardening

it’s not easy

but it is simple

and it starts with waking up to the ways

that you are

are

constantly doing distracting yourself

with busyness and distraction in an

effort to avoid your pain

let me share with you what this might

look like

in full disclosure

it’s probably going to get uncomfortable

maybe you’re struggling with addiction

drugs

porn

alcohol

your phone

approval

maybe you let everyone but you

call the shots in your life

your parents your job

your friends your partner

or maybe maybe you’re the one

calling the shots in other people’s

lives

like your kids

you try to control their friends

their grades their activities

their

future

and while we’re on the subject of

control

maybe you carefully curate your physical

appearance

your online presence

maybe none of this rings true to you

because you are so stuck

in a comparison loop

losing precious hours of your life

in being someone else’s house

their job

their relationship

could it be that

all of these are just

ways to avoid our pain

to silence our fear

because

we’re afraid

that the people who mean the most to us

won’t love us

or they’ll leave us

or they’ll judge

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all our ugliness

we are so desperate

to avoid any potential hurt

and in the process

we’re the ones hurting ourselves

pain

is a teacher

and it won’t leave you

until it teaches you

and you can’t teach an empty chair

so you got to stop running

stop avoiding

and get to digging

and look

i get it

the underground work

it

sucks it’s hard

it’s lonely

it’s certainly not post-worthy and there

will come a point where you feel like

you cannot do the underground work any

longer

you will feel like you are at your

breaking point

because you are

in order for a seed to grow

it must first break

through the soil

the breaking point means you are all

most

there

sunlight and freedom

are just inches away

and after you’ve broken through the

darkness

you aren’t afraid of it anymore

because you know it birthed you into

life

your life

and it probably won’t look anything like

the life your family

your fear

or the world told you to live

and you start to attract other people

who have already broken through the soil

they see your oak tree

you see their rose garden and you both

realize

there was never anything to compare

in the first place

but here’s the thing about the

underground work

it’s not a one and done thing

it’s something you have to remind

yourself of every single day

for me

i like to wake up with darkness itself

in the quiet morning hours

and i sit

and i breathe deeply

and i wait

and i listen

and i look into my own darkness

and i wait for a quiet voice to fill it

that voice

is familiar to me now

and after years of meeting the darkness

and let’s be honest

hundreds of hours in therapy

i can recognize

that my childhood trauma

my adult trauma

all the things that happened to me

actually happened for me

i stopped viewing myself as a victim who

survived and started knowing

i’m a survivor

who inspires

and that’s a voice

i can’t ignore

when i sat in the hospital room that day

it felt like a tomb

and i thought i would give absolutely

anything

to never have to face the darkness again

but now i see the fruit of the seed that

was planted inside of me

and that’s what keeps me turning toward

the darkness every single morning

you see

darkness isn’t a tomb

it’s a womb

that births something new

and now

i want us to end this the way we started

i want you to go back

to that moment of pain and fear

that swallowed you up whole

and i want you to wonder

what if that darkness wasn’t the end of

something

but the beginning

what if it wasn’t trying to suffocate

you but

just hold you

who could you become

if you let yourself grow

are you willing to embrace the darkness

and find out

thank you

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