the sad little lump and the sun sprite
a story of how sadness learned to shine
i recorded myself reading this one. if you’d like to have a listen.
once upon a time there was a sad little lump. she had always been this way, or so it seemed to her. and she felt, in the way that sad little lumps do, that she would never be anything different.
all she had ever known was sadness, and all she could ever imagine was sadness too.
one day a little dapple of sunshine, making her way across the sky with her friends, happened to see the sad little lump sitting all alone in what had become a wide, dark moat all around her.
she appeared as a small stone castle, surrounded by water so dark it wouldn’t reflect the little sunbeam no matter how hard she tried to make it sparkle and dance.
soon her sunray friends began to call her back up into the air to continue their journey across the sky. not wanting to be left behind, the little sunray swooped up to frolic with them, dancing and soaring onward.
as she flew off, she looked back one last time at the sad little lump. and the sad little lump looked up, for the first time in what felt like eternity. for one small moment, something fluttered and stirred through the wet and heavy strands of her being.
but soon the sunrays were gone from sight. and as the sad little lump stared into the dark water around her, she felt herself sink deeper and deeper still.
a tear trickled down her cheek. she let out a soft sigh.
all she had ever known was a sadness so deep and raw it spiraled down down down a bottomless well.
oh well, she thought.
was there ever a time when i wasn’t a sad little lump?
she sat and thought and thought. the sky turned from day to night and the seasons folded one into the other. and still she sat. and still the dark water held its silence around her.
one day, while the sad little lump was busy feeling as hopeless as can be, the same little sunray swooped back down. but this time she brought many friends. they were laughing gaily and dancing in a fairy ring.
as they landed on the little lump, their laughter and dancing began to wake her from her long sleep. she felt a tickling and a tingling all along her surface.
she couldn’t help but feel a lightness settle into her being, a gentleness she had almost forgotten. and before she knew it, more sun sprites arrived, and with them came merry little breezes dancing so happily, singing the softest melodies, touching the sad little lump in a place deep inside she had forgotten existed.
it was as if from the bottom of that endless well, something soft had begun to rise.
slowly. tenderly. up and up it came.
and as it rose, so too did a great sob. it gathered in her, growing stronger and stronger, trembling through her like something long held. she felt it before she understood it. she felt it the way you feel a storm before it breaks — that stillness, that held breath, that terrible gathering.
and then she cracked.
the sob broke free, immense and total, and the shaking grew so wild that pretty soon the little lump was no longer a lump at all. she was a million pieces. the dark moat that had surrounded her scattered far and wide, swept away by the force of that cracking open.
all at once she began to feel for her old form, to search for the well at the center of her being. but there was no well. there were only pieces.
for an instant she panicked. what did it mean to be a million pieces strewn in every direction? did she even have a self anymore, or would she simply dissolve?
she sobbed again, deeply, from somewhere among the wreckage. and in that sobbing she realized something: letting the sadness go was the scariest thought she had ever had. but she had no choice. all she could do was sit with all her pieces and gather herself back, in whichever way she could.
and then, all at once, the merry little breezes and the gentle sun sprites began to move around each and every piece, and ever so tenderly wove them into their dance of soft radiance and quiet breeziness.
and she realized she had transformed.
she was no longer on the ground. she was stitched together with a soft radiance all her own. and though it felt like the sunrays’ light, it was also clearly shining out from within her, from the very places where she had been woven back together. this lightness lifted her, and she floated freely along with the breeze and the sunshine.
she looked down at the place where she had spent what felt like eternity, and saw that it had passed like a dream, in the blink of an eye.
with one last gaze below and a gentle sigh that rippled outward from her being, she floated up up up toward the light.
sadness was just a different way to hold the light. she understood that now. a heavier way, yes. but still hers. still part of her, and always would be.
and then she smiled. a smile so large it made a rainbow across the sky.
thank you for being here, it truly means the world. i love hearing your thoughts, if you feel called to comment.
i am a writer, speaker, and musician devoted to healing and embodiment. i share essays, poetry, and original music through venus consciousness. i’d love to walk this path with you. 💞