Thirteen years ago today, I stood at my son’s funeral.

Thirteen years ago today, I stood at my son’s funeral. And hundreds of miles away, my granddaughter took her first breath. We were supposed to be in Texas that week. Our daughter was about to have her first baby, and we were going to be there. Instead, we were burying her brother. She couldn’t be with us at the worst moment of our lives. We couldn’t be with her at one of the best moments of hers. But all day, in the middle of the funeral, our phones kept lighting up. Updates. ‘She’s in labor.’ ‘The baby’s coming.’ Mom and the baby are healthy. And then pictures. Here’s what I learned from that. As a brain surgeon, and as a dad who’s been in the deepest dark there is, your brain can hold two things at once that are both true, equally true. Grief doesn’t cancel out joy. Joy doesn’t erase grief. They sit right next to each other. That’s because the mind is built on faith. Faith has always described life. See, scripture doesn’t promise there won’t be darkness. In fact, it promises there will be darkness, but that there will always be light in the middle of it. You’re in the darkest moment, I’m not going to tell you that dark is not there. It’s promise darkness, somewhere in that darkness, there is still light. If you look for it, if you wait for it, it’s there. And that means there’s still hope for you, my friend. We call that self-brain surgery. That ability to tell your mind to change your brain, your life, remember that two things can be true at one time. The light is always there, even if it’s not really dark around you. You can’t change your life until you change your mind. I’m Dr. Lee Warren, hopefully your favorite internet neurosurgeon, doing work with you in the darkness, because in the midst of the darkness, there’s still light looking that you can find. And that, and together, God bless you.