The darkness was absolute. Nothing could be seen. I stretched my arms trying to find something, anything. My groping hands touched the wall. I started feeling my way around moving forward gingerly. The sudden rattling sound startled me. It might be an empty can I kicked in the darkness. The clattering sound reverberated for a few seconds and then faded into nothingness. The eerie silence returned. I could hear my heart thumping away wildly. Trying to control my fear I inched forward. Something snaked across my legs. I felt myself screaming but the sound died inside me. Was there something else in the darkness? Was I not alone? The gloomy thoughts froze me up.

Deep inside me, the instinct for survival wanted me to keep going without giving up. In the back of my brain, something urged me to get out of this darkness and push forward towards the light, wherever it might be. I remembered reading that at the end of every tunnel there is light. Offering a silent prayer to God to get me out of there, forcing down my fears I started going ahead. How long was I in there? I lost all track of time but kept stumbling on and on. After what felt like ages I sensed that the intensity of darkness was lessening. Did my eyes grow accustomed to the darkness or was my mind playing tricks on me?

Then all of a sudden bright light was everywhere. It was hurting my eyes and I tried to keep them tightly shut. But I was forced to open them with familiar sounds in my ears. I was lying on my bed with the bed sheet twisted around my legs. It was almost 8 o’clock. Near the bed, a bottle of water was lying on the floor. Through the window, bright sunlight was streaming in…

Our world has been going through a very dark phase for the past several years due to the pandemic. We have never seen nor experienced such a situation in our lives. More than 500 million people have been infected and the death toll is more than a million. Such troubling times bring despair to many but the human spirit is indomitable. The world has seen much worse pandemics like the Plague which killed about 200 million or the Flu with half a billion infected people and almost 100 million deaths. Humankind did not give up hope and kept going leaving the darkness behind. Let us pray to God to give us the strength to help us walk into the light.

Anyone who thinks that he/she is going through a dark phase can take courage by keeping in mind the fact that ‘tough times never last but tough people do’ (title of Dr. Robert Schuller’s book). 

"It might be stormy now but it can’t rain forever"
Karunakar. T

Note: Opinions expressed by authors are their own.
Pics Source: Pixabay