Observations On Pathworking/Shadow Work/Active Imagination

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7 hours ago, Starlight said:

Interesting... So, to use your example, anger isn't the shadow? The shadow is the facade shown to others by someone who has suppressed anger? The shadow isn't what's buried, it's what has developed in response to the suppression? Am I understanding that right?

 

Which makes shadow work slightly more different than I thought - you start with what you do actually see externally (that you didn't see before) and try to work back down to what's underneath it. It also means that there has to be something about the facade that doesn't sit right. Because if it felt ok, you wouldn't see the need to discover what was beneath it.

It certainly will play a part in what kind of masks and facades we put on, or at least what we wish we could.

The mask is what we show to others, but the light side is what we show to our self.

Masks are often more restrictive than that, because we push everything that we don't view as contained in "the light" down.

We seldom look back and see everything we are that we don't admit to ourselves.

Other people often see the shadow fairly well, yet they are often blinded by our masks.

So there is a slight difference between the two, though they are certainly connected and influence each other.

 

You could say that the light side is an adaptation to what we genuinely believe ourselves to be.

Despite how obvious it is to others that we are more than that, and that our ideal vision of ourselves is lacking.

 

The mask/facade on the other hand is an adaptation to what others expect us to be.

This may deviate from our ideal vision or not.

If it deviates the relation is strained, if it does not, we feel the environment as pleasant and right.

This is very obvious when people visit foreign cultures and get put in awkward situations.

 

 

Our shadow tags along regardless of this, we usually perceive it to be outside of ourselves in other people.

So to us, all the darkness that flow from our own shadow, is something that others create.

They are the problem and we are the solution, even though in reality it is very much us that is the problem.

Confronting someone about their shadow is a good way to end up in a fight of some kind.

As they will resist the notion to the bitter end, by insisting that it is you that is the problem, not them.

 

The reason I said that anger isn't by itself the shadow, is that it is just a body state.

Only by having a light that rejects it, will put it in the shadow.

Hence we our self are NEVER angry, it is all those other people who have the problem.,

Which means that every instance of our getting angry will be pushed into the unconscious.

It being unconscious we cannot deal with it or get over it, it just simmers there, and ultimately messes up our energetic state.

But it doesn't have to be anger, it could be fear, sorrow, shame and all sorts of other things that we reject as not us.

[Starlight]

I came across a clinical psychologist on YouTube who has a playlist on the topic of shadow work. I've watched a couple of her videos and I like what she has to say. (She has a lovely accent and her voice is SO relaxing, as a bonus!)

 

 

 

 

[Starlight]

Another couple of resources:

 

• Edwin C. Steinbrecher's The Inner Guide Meditation
• Jeffrey Raff's The Practice of Ally Work