Anneke has experienced several dark nights, the first after an accident when she was sixteen. She has worked in mental health for many years, including in hospital settings and as a community psychiatric nurse, and has accompanied people on their descents as well as navigating her own.

Amongst many other things, we talk about how the dark night pushes us into “a deeper something,” including previously unrecognised trauma; crumbling, and not having anything to hold onto; and how “some things must die before something else can be rebirthed.” We discuss the difference between depression and the dark night; the “innate aliveness” that comes “from deep inside, like a seed”; and connecting to the innate intelligence that is inherent in nature. We touch on discovering intimacy with ourselves and life during the dark night; clinging to our identities; and meeting the place where “ deep love, deep grief, and deep healing live.” We also mention the stigma of labels like psychosis and the centrality of curiosity, openness, innocence and vulnerability; the importance of myths, poems, and songs, and the dark nights of Persephone and Inanna; being stripped of our “garments” and becoming an anam cara; and finding oaks on which to lean.

Anneke Sips is the author of The Wisdom of Psychosis, and an integrative trauma therapist. She pioneered the integration of yoga into psychiatric settings, and is a founding member of the Global Consortium of Yoga Therapy. Her work bridges psychiatry and embodied healing — exploring the deeper layers of human consciousness through an integrative and relational lens. Known for her grounded presence and clarity, Anneke supports individuals, families, and professionals worldwide in learning to meet altered states and lived experience with steadiness, dignity, and discernment.

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Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

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Mentions

We mention the myths of Persephone and Inanna.

Fiona quotes from Anneke’s dark night of the soul guide.

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Monica’s dark night journey has included periods of “dropping into deep, dark, contemplative spaces” and moments of expanded perception that, on one occasion, “could have been described as a psychotic episode.” She has experienced “a widening of spiritual perception,” and now understands the dark night as initiation; a landing in the body; and a movement of “compassionate discovery and reconnection to the whole.”

Amongst many other things, we talk about neuroses coming to the surface; the death of “the old concept of who you are”; and opening our own Pandora’s box. We touch on turning the lens inwards; being with people who can “hold the fullness” of all that we are in any given moment; and “creating enough space to lay what’s there on the table.” We discuss the power of story, metaphor and image; how trying to push or “hack” the dark night can cause damage; and how the dark night, for some of us, is a natural part of the seasons of life, so can’t be sped up or slowed down. We also mention spirit – whatever that means for each of us; how simple rituals create pauses or spaces; and how we might co-create rituals for the dark night.

Monica Douglas is an ordained Interfaith Minister and Relationship Coach with over 25 years of experience in professional and personal development. Certified in a range of coaching and wellbeing modalities, she supports heart-centred people to thrive in their relationships – at home, at work and within themselves. Her work is rooted in five core values: joy, love, alignment, collaboration and impact.

Monica is currently developing Ten Good Men, a project dedicated to supporting responsible, caring fathers as they navigate significant relationship crossroads, including separation, divorce and rebuilding healthy, loving relationships with their children, partners and other loved ones. The project creates space for men to navigate change consciously, strengthen their relationships and thrive as fathers, partners and individuals.

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Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

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Mentions

Monica mentions her mentor, the author and teacher Sobonfu Somé.

She also mentions The Reach Approach.

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

In 2024, Vincent was busy restructuring his restaurant business when he was hit by a car. He sustained a serious brain injury and was given a ten per cent chance of survival. He spent weeks in a coma, and then months in rehab, learning how to walk, talk, and feed himself again. Two years on, he is back at work, and is now sharing what he has learnt from his experiences.

Amongst many other things, Vincent and I talk about how his priorities shifted after the accident and how spending time with people he loves is now “non-negotiable”; the many losses he’d sustained beforehand; and having people hold him accountable. We touch on our love of life, including the adversities and obstacles; simplicity and overcomplication; growing outside your comfort zone; and realising that “nobody is setting the rules but yourself.” We discuss improving our relationship with loss; taking the next steps, however small they may be; facing rather than avoiding; and asking, “Why not me?” We also mention doing, and making a commitment to yourself; body and mind being one; the co-existence of beauty and heartbreak; and the idea of putting things in a jar for the future you.

Vincent Van den Broeck is a restauranteur, the author of Everything Feels Impossible Until It's Done: How the life you build becomes the life that saves you; and the founder of The Until It’s Done Club. He combines real-life experience with a simple, practical system designed to help people take control of their habits, decisions, and direction — and build a life they don’t need to escape from. He lives in Brussels, Belgium.

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Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Rose has been in a “profound unravelling” for years, “shedding beliefs, systems, entire ways of life.” After a period of awakening, she came to a “screeching halt,” and found herself going into the void or “cavern of darkness” as she “finally faced the story she had been too scared to face” – her programming around marriage. She has since gone through a “complete stripping down,” dissolving the layers of false identities and conditioning and repatterning her nervous system.

Amongst many other things, we talk about “diving into the unconscious layers to uncover the soul”; beginning to reckon with the pain of what we’ve done to ourselves; and realising that we “cannot do another person’s inner work for them.” We touch on revoking our participation in the crumbling old paradigm; seeing “behind the curtain”; trading in our souls for love and belonging; and being committed to the unfolding. We discuss “the centuries of repressed feminine rage” that are currently erupting; withdrawing our attention from the “old grid,” and the rage – or extinction burst – that follows; and seeing “the gold underneath.” We also mention the undoing of illusions; letting things fall; the nature of sovereignty; and how much our souls are “worth returning to.”

Rose Uncharted writes on Substack at The Remembering. She is a voice and mirror for those rebuilding from soul memory, speaking from within the raw interior of dismantling and return. Her essay, The Withdrawal of Consent, outlines her experience of unravelling.

Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

Mentions

Rose mentions the Twelfth House, an astrological term referring to the final realm of the zodiac wheel.

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Julie’s dark night – or her “descent into the belly of the whale” – first began when she lost her mother while pregnant with her daughter. “It just snowballed from one bad event to another,” and she was diagnosed with severe post-partum depression. Eventually, feeling “lost and alone,” she began seeking, “looking for a way to find solace.” Believing herself to be fundamentally flawed – as she’d been conditioned to believe by an authoritarian Christian upbringing – it took many years before she realised that “seeking was taking me away from myself,” and slowly began to turn towards herself.

Amongst many other things, Julie and I talk about being forced to stop; all the “good girl stuff” like keeping the peace and learning to perform; and the transgressive nature of carving out space and time for ourselves. We discuss eventually seeing the extent of our fawning; becoming aware of the pain of self-betrayal; and coming back to loving ourselves. We touch on knowing the inherent value of everything and everyone; the importance of calling back our rejected parts; and the need for stillness and slowing down. We also mention the “mystery larger than us that knows the way”; the sacredness of life; and loving weird insects.

Julie Freeman is a semi-retired psychotherapist, artist, feminist, spiritual seeker, highly sensitive person, recovering codependent and would-be writer. Her article, Dark Night of the Soul in Three Acts, is on Substack. She is the co-founder of Speak Up Sister, an international organization dedicated to helping women and girls build confidence, safety, resilience, and assertiveness for the advancement of gender equality and human rights world wide.

Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Julie was already a philosopher and psychoanalyst when her dark night began. In questioning her experience of depression, she came up with what she calls negative practice or negative philosophy, “installing places where negativity and suffering can be encountered without escaping into positivity.”

Amongst many other things, we discuss depression as a perspective on and compassion to the world; trauma as an initiation into the knowing of the too-muchness and horror of reality; and the concept of social death. We talk about the importance of truly witnessing horror, rather than trying to find solutions to it; trying to unhappen the past; and the end of hope. We touch on the idea of motherhood, both existentially and physically; being blamed, and accepting blame; and the pain of our children’s pain. We mention the radical transformations of labour, menopause, and aging; the idea of the therapy session as a funeral for what’s being lost; and the dark night as a time during which “you hold the world for a while.” Julie cites the work of Susan Brison, and her account of rape; she “imposes” some of Heidegger’s philosophy, and describes her idea of being-with-towards-death; and she questions the philosophical notion of the subject.

Dr Julie Reshe is a philosopher, and the author of a negative psychoanalytic approach. She holds the position of a Visiting Professor at University College Cork and University College Dublin, and is also a Director of the Institute of Psychoanalysis, Global Center for Advanced Studies. She is the author of Negative Psychoanalysis for the Living Dead: Philosophical Pessimism and the Death Drive; Death and Love: Psychoanalytic and Philosophical Perspectives (co-edited with Todd McGowan), and Negative Essays on Death, Love, and Depressive Realism. Her essay on Ukrainian war widows is on Aeon.

Connect with Julie

Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

Mentions

Julie cites Susan Brison’s book, Aftermath: Violence and the Remaking of a Self.

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You’re welcome to contact The Dark Night of the Soul Unwrapped via email: darknightunwrapped@gmail.com

Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Allison’s dark night began with an eating disorder, depression, and “lifelessness” when she was twenty. She found a spiritual wellbeing class in the dance studio of a local college, and began “to become ready to face what it was.” Very gradually, she started to explore the “inner beast,” meeting it and letting it unravel through movement. Eventually, she built the capacity to stay with the “mini dark night” spirals, which continue to this day.

Amongst many other things, we talk about being paralysed in the dark night and how we might start to move, even slightly; beginning to follow the threads of what’s here; and the dark night as an “instigator of inquiry.” We discuss sensing into what wants to move, and how; dancing with beliefs and conditioning; and not “digging for trauma.” We touch on awe, unknowing and collaboration; being good listeners; and trusting “the greater mysterious thing.” We mention the relief of naming what’s here; the unpredictable unravelling of layers; and the moments of “oh, no wonder.” We also delve into going to the bottom of the well and not knowing if we’ll come back out; living in a fabricated existence; and giving what’s here a voice.

Allison Pagano has created a body of work – Embodied Dance – that bridges movement, somatics, and energy medicine. Born from over twenty five years of exploration, her work centres on the truth that the body is an intelligent guidance system. She has been a Professor of Dance at several US universities, and has undertaken many somatic trainings. She lives, works and dances in Brunswick Heads, Australia.

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Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

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Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit

Following on from our previous conversation in Episode 27, Fiona and I dive into shame. We begin with our understanding of the possible evolutionary purpose of shame, and how and when it becomes toxic and harmful. We talk about how shame “gets put on us”; how any kind of abuse is inherently shaming; and how we end up feeling the disowned shame of those who perpetrate shameful behaviour. We touch into the self-abandonment that comes when we’re shamed such that we feel there is something inherently wrong with us; feeling shame when the natural reaction to our circumstances would be anger; the layering or compounding of shame – including feeling shame for feeling shame; and how shame festers in isolation.

Amongst many other things, we also discuss how shame distorts the lens through which we see ourselves; being crippled with shame; and how it often dissipates “in togetherness.” We mention how the inner critic develops – in part – to avoid further shaming by being “good” and behaving according to the rules, and how in the dark night the rules “start to wash off.” Finally, we move into belonging to ourselves; gaining self-authority, dignity and trust in our own knowing; and giving shame “a seat at the table.”

Fiona Matalon is a somatic psychotherapist. She offers a holistic approach to those who are looking to deepen their relationship to themselves and to live a life that is led by their heart, soul and inner knowing. In sessions, together with her clients, she uses the intelligence of the body to allow a deeper exploraton that goes beyond the everyday mind. She brings her own deep lived experience and continuous learnings into her practice.

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Fiona Robertson is the author of The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence, and Eve Was a Realist: Poems for the Untamed Heart. She works one to one with people who are going through a dark night or spiritual emergency, accompanying them in this challenging terrain as they rediscover and deepen into their real selves. She also offers a monthly dark night gathering group, and occasional workshops for therapists and counsellors.

Connect with Fiona

Mentions

Fiona Matalon cites The Relationship Grid developed by Terry Real.

Fiona Robertson mentions Gisèle Pelicot, author of A Hymn to Life: Shame has to Change Sides. She also mentions her blog post, On Shame and Sharing.

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You’re welcome to contact The Dark Night of the Soul Unwrapped via email: darknightunwrapped@gmail.com

Music by James Waring / Design by Adam McKillop / Artwork by Stefan Armoneit