What is the Shadow?

Written by Jessica Hadari
© 2010 Ripe Paradigm
Reproduction with proper attribution is encouraged

Women today are in an enormously important conversation about our power, our shadow and even our sexual and emotional expression – each of these tied to the next –

we are all looking at a new way of holding and wielding our power and a responsibility for the impact of our power – acknowledging all that has been impacted by our actions and expression and all that is impacted by our holding ourselves back from action and expression.

We now take the first steps in a very very long time toward harnessing the potency of the gifts of our shadow; the parts of ourselves we have kept hidden away…

Some of the points that I will discuss in this article:

Patterns of Self-Undermining Behavior
Triggers & Reactions
Blind Spots
Masks (veils)

Gifts of the Shadow

The 4 Elements of Shadow transformation:

• Community
• Awareness (of shadow)
• Relationship (with shadow)
• Actualize (to dance consciously with shadow)

Layers of the Shadow:

• Surface Layers: Outward presentation – manifestations of the Shadow in ones day to day life
• Mid Layers: Family of Origin Consciousness
• Deepest Layers: Collective or Cultural Consciousness

Our Shadow is a synthesis of all parts of ourselves we have split off, repressed or denied.

We learn to manage these parts of ourselves, because we fear they might bring disapproval from others, might hurt others or other parts of ourselves;

Sometimes we wish these parts would “go away!” and, It is common to feel out-of-control when they inevitably do emerge.

Everyone has a Shadow, yet, somehow people feel very alone when confronted with their own. Our shadow will always find ways to express and manifest itself in our lives

The Shadow presents in our lives as

• Patterns of Self-Undermining Behavior: One way to spot these fragments of our Shadow is to take note of what we do / say / create / react by default.

• Triggers & Reactions: Another more obvious way the Shadow presents is through triggers which set off Rage, Grief, Fear and Shame to name the big ones

• Blind Spots: The Shadow also presents as “blind-spots.” – aspects of ourselves that can only be reflected back to us by others.

• Illnesses: psycho-somatic conditions; cyclical & chronic depression; anxiety, stress, fatigue…

• Masks (veils): We can even see our Shadow through our finest personality traits. These traits are wonderful gifts, yet they can also be masks covering up parts of ourselves we wish to keep hidden.

Patterns of Self-Undermining Behavior

Repeating behavior involuntarily, is a sign that your shadows are manifesting and running portions of your life

For example, one may promise to spend more time exercising and staying healthy, yet, ends up choosing foods, drinks and activities that are unhealthy.

A person may ignore decisions around money management or sexual choices.

Or, one may choose friends and partners that just aren’t good or healthy people to be involved with – our Shadow dances with theirs in unconscious ways that can be addictive or even hurtful.

These patterns may also be lived out in the ways that some people just never seem to make enough money, or get fired often. This is why some people are almost always left behind in relationships, or why some people are always the ones doing the leaving.

When we want to work with our Shadow and money, wealth, scarcity, we look at the places we create our life by default – the seemingly unchosen ways we do, say, create, react in our lives

The money we make or lose.

The friends and partners we make or lose.

None of these reoccurring patterns are “bad,” they are simply what is so, what is actually happening in your life.

Ultimately, any pattern in your life that is frustrating or keeps you from what you honestly want is an example of the Shadow living through you.

Triggers & Reactions

Another more obvious way the Shadow presents is through triggers. Triggers which set off Rage, Grief, Fear to name the big ones

Triggers are often set off in the most precious places in your life – because here is where our Ego perceives that there is more is at steak.

The unconscious mind has no sense of time, so you may find that you are still triggered by a person even if your relationship to them changed years ago.

The vastness of the Shadow can be confusing, even scary. You may begin to ask yourself questions like

- What is even useful about my big or “negative” emotions?

- Can I work with my Shadow to be sure to attract the right people and situations into my life?

- Can I be at more choice about my triggers?

Just behind Anger, fear, grief, shame are also the felt experiences of worry, jealousy, hesitancy, indecision, self-doubt, uncertainty which are tagged in western culture, as “negative.”

Emotions never go away. Ever. And we don’t want them to;

Our emotions are the corridors to our connections with others; They help us attune to our bodies, and to what we cherish.

Every emotion has the capacity to open us, affirming our vulnerability and need for belonging.

It is, however, possible to know how to work with big emotions. To capture the potency of our emotions in order to release it as power to fuel our momentum towards what we deeply desire to have happen.

Blind Spots

The Shadow also presents as “blind-spots” – aspects of ourselves that can only be reflected back to us by others.

When you deny a trait in yourself, you tend to be very aware of that trait in other people. You either feel compelled or repelled by them.

Personal perceived inferiority becomes perceived moral deficiency in another.

We have all had days where we feel like the world is against us, yet we get feedback everyday about how we are “showing up” in the world, in our family, in community.

- Where in your life and with whom do you perpetually cast yourself as “a powerless bystander?” A martyr? A victim? A villain?

Illnesses

Aside from dietary factors, stress plays a major role in heart disease, autoimmune diseases and cancers in Western culture. Our manifestations of stress show in our bodies when we are overworked, and under-rested.

For generations upon generations, it has been the cultural and physical norm in Asian cultures to work very long and tedious days, with far less stress-related dis-ease than their western counterparts who for hundreds of years have worked shorter days.

To grow a crop of rice, to survive took longer hours each day and more meticulous attending; far more labor intensive than tending the wheat, corn and potatoes of Western cultures.

How do different cultures “code” stress? An evaluation of “too much” “too hard”?

What are the cultural or generational effects on how we experience discomfort, pain, even physical illness?

Masks & The Gifts of the Shadow

Often the parts of yourself which were once denied or hidden give rise to your most powerful attributes.

For example, you may enjoy being seen in the world as smart, hard working or fun-loving. You may carry out these abilities with relative ease. Others even enjoy these aspects of your personality.

These gifts are what help get you where you want to go. They attract jobs, partners, friends and experiences to you which feel good.

- When we set aside the masks, what do we see underneath?

If you take a look back in time however, you may find that the part of you that presents as smart, is actually covering up parts of you which used to feel slow, or even stupid; underneath the part of you that likes to be seen as fun-loving , is another part which is fearful of being seen as boring or not good enough…

These are just general examples. The point is that through our insecurities, past hurts and self-judgments we find ways, often even as children, to cover up our “weaknesses” to fit in, to experience love. In this way we are all alchemists, creating our best personality traits out of our shadow parts.

To conjure up gifts and strengths out of the parts of yourself you might rather nobody see

- What if you could do this consciously?

“Everyone carries a shadow…the less it is embodied in the individual’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.” – Jung

The 4 Elements of Shadow transformation…

In the Shadow workshop weekends, we are always engaging with these 4 categories

• Community

• Awareness

• Relationship

• Actualize

Your Shadow is much of YOUR world. It’s your self esteem, your confidence, and your state of mind, body, and emotion.

“Community”

Already the Shadow is comprised of fragments/parts which we take great pains to keep hidden.

The nature of the Shadow is paradoxical in that our own revulsion to our shadow parts often has us bear our “undesirable” parts alone – yet – the Shadow is itself a force of nature, after time hibernating in its lair, it simply must come out and dance and fight and breed and feats with the shadows of others.

Like a dragon, the Shadow is both frightening and magnificent – in many ways our shadow parts are living and breathing beasts which do need to be nourished.

The single most important step towards continual transformation of your Shadow parts is to to so in community. To provide yourself a group of people who will not only bear witness, but be willing to be witnessed in their own “dance of the shadow”

This is one reason I use a very unique workshop model: The facilitators who guide my shadow workshops are at the very same time, participants. When a facilitator is finished presenting she once again becomes a participant, a student of her own Shadow.

In this way she opens herself up, even as an experienced facilitator, to be witness in her own dance with her own Shadow parts – in community – nowhere else to be, nothing to hide…

“Awareness”

Taking a 360 degree look at where your shadow shows up in your life, and the ways you manage it consciously or unconsciously, un-layering the many fragments for the shadow and their effect on your life.

This can be done in a myriad of group processes and guided journeys. Remember that the Shadow wants to find ways to free expression. When we give it a stage to dance on we can even have fun looking at and becoming more aware of her omnipresent roles in our lives.

People often wish to explore their Shadow to

• Understand why they react/behave in the ways that they do

• Know how to use and work with big emotions like anger, grief, fear or shame, etc

• Navigate and transform the behavior of self-undermining patterns

• Access full awareness of how others perceive, react to and “dance” with their Shadow

• Feel supported while exploring the depth of their full range

• See the impact of their outward expression as well as the ways that they give power away

• Express power in exactly the ways they desire
  

“Relationship”

The process of shifting the way you relate with you shadow side; re-casting your shadow parts as allies and gifts.

We often wish the darker aspects of our Shadow would just disappear – but like the cliche’ saying “What you resist persists” the harder we work at suppressing the totality of who we are, the more our suppressed parts try to bust their own way out into the open

Re-cast “inner demons” as inner Allies:

The Shadow has many, many, many layers. These layers can present as Masks which serve to hide the parts of ourselves we once wished to hide.  Though hidden, these parts DO come out, often when we least want them to. The shadow seeps out in a ways that seems beyond your control;

Underneath these idiosyncratic layers of Shadow parts, are the archetypes which form the psychic contents of all human experience.

- How might it be important for you to re-cast your “inner demons” as inner Allies?

Conscious participation with our darker parts allows us to discover the allies hiding in the shadows.

When we are allied with all of our parts, even our shadow parts we gain more and more choice and momentum forward.

- Can you open yourself to learn from your inner demons? What have they been trying to teach you?

We can “un-pack” our thoughts and beliefs about our emotional triggers to find the wisdom and tools and strengths which were always there.

In developing our ability to navigate and harness our emotions we find our own inestimable depth.

You are here to create a life you are meant to enjoy. To explore the tapestry of your power, climb deep within your heart and breathe life into your truest gifts…

You can face hurt, fear, anger while learning how to live more fully.

“Actualize”

To be at choice. You can dance more consciously with your shadow, actually allowing it to come out and “play, eat, breed, and dance”

– Your Shadow comes out anyway, often when you least want it to;

The KEY is

giving it an environment of YOUR choosing where your Shadow parts can come out and be regularly satisfied in ways which actually support you and others around you.

Harnessing the Power of ALL Emotions:

Big emotions can be a powerful transformative force.

Anger, Grief, Fear, the felt experiences of jealousy, hesitancy, indecision, self-doubt, uncertainty are tagged in western culture, as “negative.”

Yet, these signals and red flags might be ones worth listening to and delving into.

Spontaneous and sometimes illogical, emotions are often messages about other-than-conscious hungers that are not getting fed.

“…the shadow is the seat of creativity.” – Jung

– What would it mean for your life to harness the intensity of your big emotions as the powerful juice of passions?

Emotions can motivate us to say “no” or “yes” in service to what is truly, truly desired by the deepest parts of our Self.

The passageways to our connection with other people, emotions connect us with what we hold as precious. They can help us attune to our bodies, and to each other.

ALL emotions can open us, revealing our vulnerability and desire for belonging.

The Layers of Shadow

The Shadow has seemingly unending layers. Though cloaked, these layers do present, often when we least want them to.

• Surface Layers: Outward presentation – manifestations of the Shadow in ones day to day life

• Mid Layers: Family of Origin Consciousness – belonging to “the herd”

• Deepest Layers: Collective or Cultural Consciousness – belonging to the race, perhaps even the planet/universe

The surface layers are the behaviors and patterns we create our life from by default – the seemingly un-chosen (un-chosen by the conscious mind) ways we do, say, create, react out in the world;

The money we make or lose. The friends and partners we make or lose.

None of these re-occurring patterns are “bad,” they are simply what is so, what is actually happening in your life.

The surface layers are also the triggered emotions of Rage, Grief, Fear and Shame to name the big ones. Also, the felt experiences of jealousy, hesitancy, indecision, self-doubt, uncertainty which are tagged in western culture, as “negative.”

Emotions never go away. Ever. And we don’t want them to;

Our emotions are the corridors to our connections with others; They help us attune to our bodies, and to what we cherish.

Every emotion has the capacity to open us, affirming our vulnerability and need for belonging.

It is, however, possible to know how to work with big emotions. To capture the potency of our emotions in order to release it as power to fuel our momentum towards what we deeply desire to have happen.

We All Received Programming

The Mid Layers of the Shadow may be our link to our more primitive instincts to “herd” or to “clan” or  “tribe.” Which are replaced in power and position during childhood by the conscious mind.

You may have heard of mental or emotional “imprints”

We all have imprints which move us forward in our life with ease, and imprints which contradict on another and keep us from having what we deeply deeply want.

For example, have you ever been in a situation where you wanted to say something…yet then you remembered something scary or hurtful that happened in the past in a similar situation, or an uneasy feeling comes over you…and you decide not to speak up.

Where did that unease come from?

Fear? Shame? Sadness?

Where did the Fear / Shame / Sadness come from?

That past memory was an imprint.

Generally we aren’t conscious of our imprints or how much our past runs our lives; we can’t remember most of them. You have got emotional memories in your unconscious mind that make judgments and decisions for you.

Family Imprinting

Imprinting pertaining to the Mid Layer of the Shadow happens between the ages of 0-5 or 7.

You may have heard this quote, “In a family of thieves, the child who does not steal is the black sheep”

In a family where rage, violence, verbal or non-verbal lying, covering up emotions, etc were practiced, (even if they were frowned upon) children of that family would have “coded” those behaviors as normal. Not only normal, but even necessary for fitting in and surviving within the clan.

Children will develop parts of their psyche where rage, violence, verbal or non-verbal lying, covering up emotions, etc are ok, necessary behaviors of belonging.

These psychological parts are unconscious imprints and are not aware of the passage of time.

As the child grows physically and mentally and begins to move more out in the world, the greater tribe they receive mixed messages.

At this age 5 or 6 to age 17 they learn from school, from other clans that rage, violence, verbal or non-verbal lying, covering up emotions, etc are NOT ok. Children then take on these tribal imprints which are now in conflict with their clan imprints.

This thick stew of “Parts Conflict” is where most people do their conscious Shadow work.

This thick stew of conflict is where most people spin their wheels, sometimes for life.

Most human entanglement and enmeshment shows up as unconscious habits. Your entanglements reflect your ability to enjoy your life and your relationships. Toxic entanglements can cause chaos and suffering; they can hurt you and the people you love.

Beliefs can’t be erased, but they can be overwritten by new beliefs. It won’t happen overnight, but if you consciously work on this you will transform your negative convictions in a matter of months.

Unfathomable Depth

Underneath the complex Surface and Mid Layers of the Shadow, are archetypes which form the psychic contents of all human experience.

This deepest bottom layer of the shadow is what Jung referred to as the collective unconscious – Here is our psychic activity which goes on entirely independently of the conscious mind.

Archetypes

One way to explore these collective experiences is through archetypes.

Archetypes have been depicted in ancient myths for thousands of years, and are perhaps ways for the conscious mind to grapple with or dance with the depths of our shared human Shadow.

Therapies involving Archetypes have fascinated western culture for many years as well. Working with archetypes in a workshop setting can be entertaining and meaningful.

A way to bring a sense of fun and levity to your conscious dance with your Shadow.

 

 

The Way of Transformation

by Karlfried Gras von Durkheim

The man who, being really on the Way, falls upon hard times in the world will not, as a consequence, turn to that friend who offers him refuge and comfort and encourages his old self to survive.

 

Rather, he will seek out someone who will faithfully and inexorably help him to risk himself, so that he may endure the suffering and pass courageously through it, thus making of it a “raft that leads to the far shore.

 

Only to the extent that man exposes himself over and over again to annihilation, can that which is indestructible arise within him. In this lies the dignity of daring. Thus, the aim of (spiritual) practice is not to develop an attitude which allows a man to acquire a state of harmony and peace wherein nothing can ever trouble him. On the contrary, practice should teach him to let himself be assaulted, perturbed, moved, insulted, broken and battered – that is to say, it should enable him to dare to let go his futile hankering after harmony, surcease from pain, and a comfortable life in order that he may discover, in doing battle with the forces that oppose him, that which awaits him beyond the world of opposites.

 

The first necessity is that we should have the courage to face life, and to encounter all that is most perilous in the world. When this is possible, meditation itself becomes the means by which we accept and welcome the demons which arise from the unconscious, a process very different from the practice of concentration on some object as a protection against such forces.

 

Only if we venture repeatedly through zones of annihilation can our contact with Divine Being, which is beyond annihilation, become firm and stable. The more a man learns whole-heartedly to confront the world that threatens him with isolation, the more are the depths of the Ground of Being revealed and the possibilities of New Life and Becoming opened.

The Way of Transformation by Karlfried Gras von Durkheim

 

Written by Jessica Hadari
© 2010 Ripe Paradigm
Reproduction with proper attribution is encouraged