Empiric Philosophy/Psychology: The Shadow and my experience dealing with it.
Overview
The shadow is a concept created by C. Jung. I'm a big fan of his work and I'm going to be talking about the so named "Shadow" aspect from my personal experience viewing it from an Empiric and Esoteric point of view.
This article will be dedicated to the subject and will be more of a personal description as to me dealing with the shadow as I began my spiritual road.
The Shadow
The shadow is described by Jung as a sum of many traits, aspects and segments of one's personality. Once bonded together they form something like a negatively reflected mirror of that personality, or in other words the opposite of the personality, hence the shadow runs in reverse of most of our doing.
The shadow forms because one tends to reject or remain ignorant of the least desirable aspects of one's personality, therefore, he will ignore them and let them sit in the subconsciousness until forming strong bonds, as if they were an extension of his being.
Although they do act as an extension, the segments are only negatively polarized and most people would prefer to get rid of them.
The shadow has been with us since day 1 and it is somewhat impossible for people to see it but once they do, they would go to extremes to get rid of it. It is like the dark side of the personality.
The shadow can appear in a person's dreams or in visions, it mainly appears as a black figure, exactly like one's shadow and is the same sex. Manifestation in dreams might state that the person has some inner conflict with his shadow side and is probably missing some vital information.
My shadow appeared as a vision that I had once my kundalini awoken.
Despite its negativity, the shadow holds the creative side of our expression and can adapt to shifts in personality, hiding yet again.
My Shadow
The day I met my shadow life turned around, it was the same day that I had my kundalini awakening and now looking back on it, there is a small chance that the Kundalini awakening could have been triggered by shadow work.
Shadow work is the practice one does to get rid of the so called shadow aspects.
The day I saw the form of my shadow I understood that I wasn't that great of a man and actually did some really stupid and annoying things to people, but really one needs to see the thing so he may understand his function, the mask it wears is like air, yet it can be seen through a refined prism that sheds light on it at a correct angle.
Once I saw the negatives that were in my life a decision was made to change for the better and that decision honestly has given me a blessing beyond anything I could ever want, yet it has fused with my life so much that at times one can forget he ever has it.
At first, I began fighting with the shadow aspect of my personality, leading me to a great amount of stress, anxiety, depression and at one point even hallucinations and nervous breakdowns.
In Alchemy this is the first stage named "CALCINATION", where one dives into the darkest corners of his soul so he may regain the missing link.
Honestly, dealing with the shadow is the same as fighting with yourself, it requires a great amount of power for one person to totally devour himself. This, in the long run, led me to a state of psychosis because once you start to remove and break down aspects of the shadow and ego you find yourself with a broken belief system, hence the core structure you've been building for years brakes down.
It's like deleting files from a game named " Personality", at one point it is doomed to crash or break down, the only difference is that you have the ability to structure a new code that would benefit the gameplay afterward.
After a year of shadow work, I've finally managed to integrate the shadow as a creative aspect of my personality, refined to take in the good qualities of negativity and merged them with the personality.
Although if I have to be honest I still have work to do and nobody knows what paths may open on the road ahead, for now, everything is working perfectly but from time to time I do notice some things that need to be attended to.
Otherwise, life starts to flow much better when one deals with his shadow aspects, only then can we really see that most of the suffering that we go through is actually self-made from bad decisions derived from ignorance and stupidity.
Also I must say that one of the requirements of Love is acceptance of the shadow, so one may accept the deemed negative qualities of another and truly appreciate their origin and role in life.
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Yep, Kundalini turns around life and world as well, over and over again. You keep walking while your shadows get eaten up. You better let go of what you think about yourself. And, what you feel about yourself, too. Discrimination and detachement, are your walking sticks. Patience, too. lol
Well said man.. I've had some struggle these days going about in the inner limbo, good thing you mentioned because kundalini is all about letting go. After that everything comes together, one way or another.
Cheers and thanks friend 🍻
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Thought i'd post this picture to illustrate :)
Its the cover of a psytrance compile "demeter shadow :D"
Hi @vangelov this is a great perspective! I love that you've brought in the shadow and encouraged its being there as a creative part of you. I think in many cases people try to challenge their shadows or shun them, but if we learn how to live with them positively like you're pointing out here, it can serve to give us great rewards in life. I remember my philosophy prof in uni talking about it, saying it's not a fight, there is no winner in a VS way, but in the end, there must be a cooperation with each other.
I'm happy to hear you've managed to find that peace for yourself =D
Thanks for the lovely comment. And yes you are right, fighting against yourself doesn't do any good for extended periods, rather finding balance and discipline.