What do you do when you’re doing you’re best and it’s not enough?” – Keith Urban in an interview in Rolling Stone
Been there, done that. More than once. There are words I could use to describe that feeling that are not very polite. It’s a scary, potentially debilitating experience. People choose options at that point that can include numbing out, checking out, stuffing feelings, or going into what can be described as the dark night of the soul. I used to think of this as falling into a pit and having no idea how to get out. It is what happens when you place all your expectations on the outcome.
Keith Urban goes on to describe his “dark night” that involved drug and alcohol abuse and much soul-searching. And thankfully, like many others, he discover that it was not a pit, but a tunnel he was stuck in, and with tunnels there are ways out. Gratefully he has found his way to the other side and is now an example to others of learning to use what has been given you, without the expectations.
I can so very much relate.
A few years back, I had an idea, one I felt was absolutely divinely inspired. It was for a place for women to come together to learn, to connect and to relax. All was going beautifully, until I ran out of money to keep it afloat. To say I was devastated was an understatement. How could this be? I was doing what I was supposed to be doing. I was doing my best… and it was evidently not good enough. Shutting those doors was a crushing experience for me — a true dark night of the soul. And one that took years for me to recover from.