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Twenty years ago, I went through a difficult, extended period in my personal life. Things were bleak. Hope seemed to be a thing lost to me… hiding in a dark corner of my heart, veiled by anguish and despair. I spent hours locked away in my studio, painting enormous pieces, unable to use colour, finding my expression only in black, white and grey.
I waited for colour to return to my heart, I waited for Grace to find me.
There are times in life when we find that the regular structures that normally hold us together seem to have developed giant cracks. The kind of cracks that precede the complete shattering of the vessel. I was going through one of those times.
But thankfully, the vessel didn’t shatter. I didn’t break.
As the Leonard Cohen song goes,
“There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in”
And, yes, eventually … light got in.
That was two decades ago. The thing is, we expect all the messy, hard stuff to somehow reach a point when they are ‘over’ and we can get on with the real task of living, and yet for some of us, the messy, hard stuff happens with alarming regularity, and we realise: This IS the real task of living.
***
You may have noticed that I have been rather absent from your inbox in the past few months. If you haven’t noticed (given how noisy and crowded inboxes can become), let me explain my silence anyway: I have been on an extended break from teaching and writing, as my world has been about caregiving and supporting a loved one who has been engaged in a battle for their life.
This role is not new to me; I have been here before: same-same but different, having nursed my late husband Greg through four years of chemotherapy and multiple surgeries. Shortly after he died, I helped support my beautiful mother in the last months of her life, sharing this task with my sisters and their children.
But this time around, care-giving has been harder: The stakes have been higher. The uncertainty is a million-fold greater.
Let me say at the outset that cheerful optimism is not my default trait. Instead, I have long been attracted to the ancient Stoic philosophy of premeditatio malorum, where one calmly visualises potential misfortunes and hardships in advance. It is said that this “helps build mental fortitude, resilience, and emotional preparedness, allowing one to face adversity with reason and calm rather than panic.” Negative visualisation is another way of describing it. In facing adversity, I ask myself what the absolute worst-case scenario is that I fear, I stare it down, then give it a metaphorical kick-in-the-balls. In doing so, I give myself the space to truly embody the belief – I will survive this, no matter what.
For most of 2025, premeditatio malorum didn’t work so well. Instead, I found myself realising, without a shred of doubt, that this time around, the worst-case scenario was something I would not survive.
So what’s left? Cheerful optimism? Nah.
Optimism annoys me. I never understood why until I read
Jamil Zaki’s book, where he makes a distinction between Optimism and Hope.
“Optimism is the idea that things will turn out well. Hope is the idea that it could turn out well. I know that sounds like a minor distinction, but I think it’s huge… Hope is an attempt to see that the future is unknown. Optimism, despair, and hopelessness all make us feel like the future is inevitable and, therefore, our actions don’t matter. Hope can lead us to feel empowered. So, that’s what I’m reaching for right now: to remember our uncertainty, and that in that uncertainty lies possibility and agency.”
***
Humans can survive the most horrible adversity. As a species, we have done what seems impossible, we have recovered from the unthinkable. When I ask myself, What do these humans have in common, I come up with four things:
They have all felt at some point in their journey that they could not go on.
They all felt alone and isolated in their suffering.
They ONLY got through it all with help from others.
Every single one of them did it ONE STEP at a time.
Surviving adversity is one of the most defining things about being human. To survive my Year of Very Ginormous Challenge, often when I felt I could not, I reached out to others for help, for accompaniment, for prayers, for companionship. I made art, I walked and I journaled. In the darkest of hours, often through tears, I counted my blessings even when they were mere glimmers.
Perhaps you, too, have faced, or continue to face, extreme uncertainty that has rocked your world. If so, perhaps together, we can take comfort in Hope… that when things are uncertain, and the future is veiled, things could indeed turn out well. We might discover that we can keep going, long after we believed that we simply could not.
But only one step at a time.
If you are wondering…
When am I going to resume teaching my in-person art workshops in Perth, Western Australia?
The short answer is I don’t know. I am a full-time carer at the moment, and I don’t know when that situation will change. I do know it will change, and that I will resume teaching in the future. I look forward to meeting you then (or seeing you again). When classes open for enrolment, I will announce them here, so stay tuned.
What about redeeming Gift Certificates?
If you have a Gift Certificate, please contact me on malini.parker@gmail.com to discuss our options.
Was it difficult to make art during this period of challenge?
Yes and no. During the very worst of times it wasn’t possible, but I have found pockets of time, often when I am most exhausted and can only paint from a lying down position. And still, the creative process has been like a balm.
Here is a sample of some recent work, entitled ‘No Mud, No Lotus’ after Thich Nhat Hanh’s book. It is dedicated to the brave and beautiful person I have been supporting, who has endured more suffering than anyone I know, and yet, continues to show up, day after day, through the mud and the pain … Like a lotus.
Thank you for reading ‘Where The Light Gets In’. If you’d like to share your thoughts or experiences, or just say hi, please do here. I love hearing from you.
www.maliniparker.com
Comments 2
Malini, i find your post to be profoundly enlightening & for me, shines a light on the path we all tred as we try to navigate the journey in the human condition upon this earth. Deepest thanks for taking the time to reflect & share your insights as you too navigate a path which seems to be littered with rocks, branches, brambles, holes & goodness knows what else.
Thank you
Author
I really appreciate your words, Yvonne. And I really can relate to the ‘rocks, branches, brambles and holes’ 🙂 Thank you for reading.xx