2599: Inescapable Light and Darkness

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Host: Black holes Black holes. Pretty cool. Fascinating. Not because they're big. It's not because they're mysterious. They are certainly both of those things. And not just because they bend space and time. I'm fascinated by them because they represent something that feels mildly familiar. And a black hole is often described as inescapable darkness. Inescapable darkness. Once you cross a certain threshold, escape seems impossible. Nothing gets out. Not matter, not information, not even light. And the more I thought about that phrase, the more I realized that many of us have experienced our own version of black holes. Not in outer space, right here in our everyday lives here on planet Earth. Some dead end job that we had to work, crappy broken relationship. Being trapped under a mountain of debt. Experiencing a season of grief, a period of depression, a struggle with an addiction, dream that seems impossible. And a life where you just feel stuck. And when we're inside those experiences that can feel exactly like a black hole. Inescapable darkness. No way out. Hopeless. No alternatives. No future. But here's the thing. Most of the time, we're wrong. Most of the time we are wrong. I think that one of the mistakes, one of the biggest mistakes that I've certainly made over the course of my life and probably most human beings make, is confusing a season with a sentence. We mistake temporary conditions for absolute, permanent realities. We experience hardship and we conclude, this is my life now. We fail and we conclude, I guess I can't do it. I guess I'm incapable. We struggle with money and we conclude, I'll just never get ahead. I'm bad at money. We experience loneliness and say, just always going to be alone. There's never anybody for me. We gain weight and we conclude, this is just who I am. I'm just this way. We suffer, and then we build an entire identity around suffering. We allow a terrible thing, the worst thing, to happen to us to define our entire lives moving forward. And then that darkness becomes part of our story. It becomes part of our identity. It becomes part of our reality. And it's not because that thing or that experience is permanent just because we believe that it is. And we're giving it so much power and control over us. But nothing is forever. One of the defining characteristics of being a human being and of life is impermanence. Nothing is forever. Not childhood, not youth, not success, not failure, not strength, not weakness, not joy, not suffering, not abundance, not scarcity, not power, not obscurity, not even life itself. Which we all know. We all know that everything changes. Everything is constantly moving. Everything is always in flux, in a state of transition. And the seasons teach us this. They show us this. The clock is evidence of this every day. Our bodies are constantly reminding us of that fact. And of course, if we're wise enough, history also teaches us this. And yet somehow, somehow we constantly and continually forget that. Especially when we're hurting, especially when we're afraid. Particularly when we're trapped inside of that most dangerous place in the entire world, which is our own heads. So what's the opposite? As I thought about black holes, I was wondering, found myself asking myself this simple question. What's the opposite of inescapable darkness? The obvious answer, well, it's light, but I don't think it's enough. And eventually I landed on with inescapable darkness, nothing gets out. With inescapable light, nothing remains hidden. And I really like that a lot. I think that that's pretty cool because light does a lot of things, but it reveals, it exposes, it helps to clarify, it illuminates, it allows us to see, it helps us to see. It makes seeing possible. I'm just in the dark. Well, I can't see anything. And often the thing that frees us isn't escaping darkness, it's just clearly seen reality. It is seeing reality clearly as it is not, uh, as maybe we want it to be. And sometimes the dead end job isn't actually a dead end job. It's just a temporary stop. Sometimes that financial struggle, it's not permanent, it's just a math problem. And sometimes that relationship isn't hopeless, it's just been neglected. Sometimes that dream, it's not an impossibility, it's just, it's just very expensive. And sometimes the obstacle isn't external, it's just right inside us.

Speaker C: Ah.

Host: Once that light reveals the truth, we can no longer pretend that we don't see it. Mhm. That's interesting, isn't it? Could we be afraid of it? I think it's interesting that people often think that they're afraid of darkness, But a lot of the time we're more afraid of the light. Darkness conceals and light reveals. Darkness allows us to make our excuses, whereas light demands we accept and we take responsibility. Darkness that, uh, lets us blame light demands that we choose. Darkness says you've got no options. Light says you've got options, but you're gonna have to do something, and that's way harder. Way harder. It's like building versus wrecking. Real easy to tear something down really hard to build something up really hard. Easy to take. Hard to build.

Speaker C: Huh?

Host: Huh? Where have we seen that in society? Once you see clearly accountability is sitting right there next to you in the room. And that accountability changes everything.

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Host: We've got plenty of black holes. But they don't look like black holes. They look like convenience. Looks like comfort. Endless entertainment. Distraction. Noise consumption algorithms. Notification scrolling Endless opinions. Constant outrage. Just. We're awash in the trivial. Many. All those things that consume our most valuable resources. Our time, our attention, our energy, of course, our money. We become trapped not by darkness, but by distraction. We become trapped by things that don't matter at all. Don't matter at all. The result's the same. We lose sight of those things that do matter. Your meaningful few. That's why I'm obsessed with this concept of the meaningful few. Because life is not primarily improved by doing more. It's improved by remembering what matters. The world constantly presents us with the trivial. Many thousands of inputs, thousands of options, thousands of demands, thousands of distractions. But our lives are shaped by only a handful of things. A handful of relationships, a handful of values, a few habits, handful of commitments. A handful of decisions, a handful of responsibilities, a handful of dreams. Those are your meaningful few. Ancient people. They carried symbols. They carried totems or talismans. There were objects that were designed to remind them of. Of what matters. That's why people Wear religious across around their neck. Or the star David. It's why we Muslim faith asks uh, us to pray. Ask them to pray several times a day. Maybe we need something similar. Maybe it's not a physical object, but a mental one. A phrase, a mantra. That reminder. Something to carry into moments of confusion which abound. Something to hold on to when that darkness does seem overwhelming, which it will. And something to bring us back to reality, which we all need. And maybe mine might sound something like this. Nothing is forever. This is a season, not a sentence. What matters most right now? Do that. That's it. Not 10 steps, not some complicated framework, not a productivity hack. Just a return to what matters. So, brothers, sisters, if you're feeling trapped, if you're feeling overwhelmed, if life feels dark, try this. Take out a piece of paper and write these down. Family, what matters most. Community. What matters most. Your work and your finances. What matters most. Your well being. What matters most. Personal development. What matters most. And then finally, peace of mind. What matters most. And now identify just one thing in each of those six areas. That single action that would make the biggest difference, the biggest leverage point. Not, uh, 10, not 20, just one. So it's total of six things if you're keeping track at home. And then ask yourself, what do I got to get rid of? What trivial many must I eliminate to make room for these six things? Because every meaningful yes requires a whole lot of meaningful nos. When you say yes to one thing, you're saying no to everything else. So you better be saying yes to the right things, to your meaningful few. Because when you say no, you still have your entire universe of options open. Black holes are, uh, inescapable darkness where nothing gets out. But life offers another possibility, that of inescapable light. Nothing remains hidden. The truth eventually reveals itself. Reality eventually reveals itself. And what matters eventually reveals itself. And when it does, our job is pretty simple. Remember what it is. Return to it. Refocus. Come back to your meaningful few. Because most of what consumes your attention just doesn't matter. Most of what worries you will not matter in the future, and most of what distracts you doesn't matter. But a few things do. And if you keep coming back to them again and again and again, you will find your way through most any darkness. It's not because the darkness doesn't exist. It doesn't matter. It's because you remembered where your light is. Until next time, we're really talking about doing your part by doing your best. So good.

Co-host: So good. So good.

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