The Shadow is the Key to Self-Growth
“To own one’s shadow is whole making and thus holy.”
-Robert Johnson, Owning your Own Shadow
Jung referred to facing one’s shadow as “the essential condition for self-knowledge.” He also makes it clear that this is a long and difficult process, which leads many people to not even start down the path of introspection.
Any form of genuine inner work cannot occur without “shadow work.” As I wrote in last week’s article, the shadow is not inherently bad. In fact, the shadow demands to be met. How we relate with it is up to us. One could say that to have a positive relationship with one’s shadow material means that we are constantly striving to relate to ourselves with self-compassion, curiosity, and awareness.
A negative relationship with our shadow often turns into neuritic behaviors that seek to numb or cover over this material. From a Jungian lens, many of the psychiatric conditions people suffer from could be seen simply as elaborate methods of avoiding facing one’s shadow.
Obsessive compulsive disorder seeks to keep our shadow at bay by compulsive actions that we believe will magically keep the darkness at an arm’s length. Addiction, which could be seen as another form of compulsive behavior, requires an outside substance or thrill to distract us sufficiently that we forget the sound of our shadow subtly knocking on psychic door. Narcissism could be seen as an extreme reaction to the unbearable shadow of someone who feels inherently empty at their core. The easiest reaction is to then inflate with grandiosity. Certain political leaders come to mind.
From this perspective, nearly everything we can conceive of in the field of psychology and mental health is directly related to the degree someone is willing to face their shadow.
It could even be said that without a knowledge of one’s shadow, one is not a complete human being. To deny our shadow aspects is to deny deeply important parts of ourselves, even potentially positive traits that our ego has been unable to own or relate with due to self-limiting beliefs or patterns--what is often called the “golden shadow”.
That doesn’t mean we just “do the work” once and move on with our lives. We don’t check it off our ever-increasing list of ways to become perfect. Our shadow doesn't go away. It is an omnipresent and essential aspect of the psyche. That is why learning how to relate to the shadow is so important. We’re not going to fix it, dissolve it, or heal it.
We cannot integrate our shadow out of existence. There is no “ascending” away from it, going up and out of ourselves, our bodies, minds, relationships, and responsibilities. As nice as it sounds, there is no flying away into the bright sunlight. There is only one direction of genuine shadow work, and that is downwards.
When not Owned, the Shadow is Projected
“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”
-C.G. Jung, Memories, Dreams and Reflections
When individuals or cultures are unable or unwilling to own the shadow within themselves, it is inevitably projected on to an identified “other.”
The “scapegoat” is a distilled term for how this often plays out. This is a figure that the unrecognized shadow of another is hoisted upon. Throughout history this has happened to countless peoples: Blacks, Jews, Gays, Gypsies, Natives, and “immigrants.”
The philosopher Hegel posited in his “master-slave dialectic” that people or groups who identify as “superior” need to identify an “inferior” other in order to bolster their own identity and existence. Interestingly, the identified “superior” eventually depends upon the perceived “inferiority” of their other, and will attempt at every turn to make sure that this power dynamic remains in place. For otherwise, they would cease to be.
How many racial, social, religious and geopolitical conflicts could be distilled down to this simple, insidious dynamic?
Scapegoating also happens regularly in families, social groups, and organizations. Sometimes, the entire shadow of a family can be thrust upon the “problem” child. Through their acting out, their drug use, their “symptoms”, they magnetically attract the shadow projections of the parents.
How many “perfect” families are plagued by that one child who just can’t get it together? Who just can’t kick that habit, or keep that job, or finish that degree? In extreme cases, this results in estrangement and the complete breakdown of the family.
When this goes on for long enough, the scapegoated child (or group) internalizes these projections, and begins to believe many of the narratives they’ve been cast in: that there is something wrong with them, that they are worthless, inferior, or shameful. The rest of their life will involve disentangling themselves from these internalized shadow projections - a long road of healing indeed. Long, but possible.
The Shadow is Revealed in Myth
“In mythology, we hear the world telling its own story to itself ”
-Karl Kerenyi
I’m all for personal shadow work. But we’d be fools to think it ends with us.
The shadow is collective, and therefore archetypal, so our collective unconscious knows its shapes and contours. Myths arise out of the collective unconscious like hulking trees sprouting out of ancient soil, containing teachings and medicine that can heal the soul.
The ancestors knew a thing or two about both darkness and light. They encoded this knowledge into the stories passed down to us as myths. Ancient stories are some of the best places we can look for teachings about this whole business of inner work.
Underworld descents are one way this occurs. In the myth of Inanna, the goddess descends to the underworld and confronts her dark sister, Erishkigal, Queen of the Great Below. Persephone spends half the year in the halls of Hades, only to return for a brief time to her mother, Demeter. Odysseus makes a journey to the underworld to consult with the ghost of Terisias, the blind prophet.
Other times, the shadow of entire cultures embodied in particular gods. The Norse trickster god Loki is a perfect example. He continually undermines the status quo of Asgard, the realm of the gods, and has clear disdain for many of his fellow divinities. He is not well loved, as his actions routinely result in problems and disputes with the giants - the ever-present adversaries of the Aesir gods like Odin and Thor.
Eventually, his actions spark Ragnarok, the doom of the gods, and the end of the world. But that’s a story of another time.
I go into much greater detail around all this in my book, Psychedelics and the Soul, available October 1st. You can pre-order it below.
All this being said, we should not suppose that ideas or behaviors that we today view as unacceptable or “shadowy” were viewed the same way by ancient peoples. Our ideals and morals are distinct to our time and place, not universal truths. Myths are not teachings about 21st century morality and ethics, but about the human soul and the soul of the world.
The sooner we can understand that, the better we will understand the myths themselves. And the better we understand myths, the more we will come to know ourselves.
My book, Psychedelics and the Soul: A Mythic Guide to Psychedelic Healing, Depth Psychology, and Cultural Repair, is now available for pre-order! Get your copy here or through my favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s Books.
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Thank you. I’m definitely going to pre order the book. I’ve been looking for some Jungian content related to psychedelics. But I’ve been experiencing some difficulty finding what I’m looking for in terms of support of integration and individuation. I’m looking forward to reading your book.