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Writer's pictureEliza Bailstein

Living Light

Light - Luminous LIGHT - for centuries during this season that’s all we humans focus on. At least on this side of the hemisphere. And that’s fitting. We tend to crave the very things we take for granted when they’re abundant. Why should sunlight be any different?

How scary it must have been in ancient times with the waning daylight. Less food to harvest. Less heat to warm us. Less protection from the beasts that lurk in the dark. We needed ceremonies and holidays that encouraged us to gather, to share food and goods, to light up the darkening world around us. So on the shortest days of the year we light up Hanukkiahs, trees, and kinaras. We gather and dance around bonfires.


Now many of us can sit alone in a fully lit house, fridge and pantries stocked to the gills, heat blasting, doors locked up tight. And yet the darkness that comes from loneliness can still creep in.


Gathering with one another. Sharing our abundance, our gratitude, our sorrows, our stories, our warmth. Living lightly on this Earth. Radiating a glow that makes ourselves and those around us feel safe and held—that’s what’s kept spirits bright since the dawning of humankind.


That doesn’t mean to say we should be staring so much into the light that we blind ourselves from seeing those in need. On the contrary, this is the time to shed light on those who need it, ourselves included.


Though traditions may defer, I believe we all want the same basic things for ourselves and our loved ones and I pray for it everyday:


May this coming year bring all of us these gifts and make us no longer afraid of the dark shift only seeing it as more space to shine our lights and stay lit!  


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