Hi all,
As many of you know, I have been working on a book about dreams, dreaming and the history of dreamwork in the Western tradition. So, I have been thinking, a lot [so much], about these traditions.
One thing I have been thinking about this week is CG Jung’s use of the word “shadow” in regard to working with what is hidden in us or what is in our blindspots.
Jung named the hidden places shadow and said, “shadow is that hidden, repressed, for the most part inferior and guilt-laden personality whose ultimate ramifications reach back into the realm of our animal ancestors.” [Collected Works, Volume 9, p. 422]
In Jung’s theory of the psyche, this inferior place is projected into the world and works to distort what we see, understand or believe about the world.
For example, in this theory, if I have a shadow belief that I am unlovable and I am not entirely aware of it, then I will project this into my environments, seeing proof of this belief everywhere. In friendships, at work, in relationship to strangers, even.
Of course, the idea of projecting our trauma or trauma-informed survival way of thinking into the world around us carries truth. If I believe I am unlovable, then it does not matter how many times someone tells me they love me, I will not believe them. And there can be more negative responses, as well. If I don’t believe I am lovable, then I can justify terrible behaviours that are terribly destructive to myself and to others.
For Jung, his idea of shadow carries deeply negative implications, as you can feel in the quote above. He wrote, too, that the problem of evil lies within his idea of shadow.
And, to be fair, Jung also says this of his theory of shadow: “if it has been believed hitherto that the human shadow was the source of evil, it can now be ascertained on closer investigation that the unconscious man, that is his shadow, does not consist only of morally reprehensible tendencies, but also displays any number of good qualities such as normal instincts, appropriate reaction, realistic insights, creative impulses, etc. [CW9 p. 423]
So, while Jung placed all that is morally reprehensible into his theory of shadow, he did also seem to concede that there may be other things as well.
But, even in this, there is the quality of “inferior” and the “animalistic” when referring to anything in his theory of shadow.
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Last week, we explored what happens how, even after we learn a deep truth, a new narrative offered by our dreams, we often return to old narratives. And how this can be, actually, part of an important process of learning.
For me, the places we take our “wrong turns” or we are working with something that is hidden in us, do not have to be, first and foremost, places where we have “morally reprehensible tendencies”.
For me, the hidden places in us are just, well, hidden.
And yes, when we are not willing or able to be curious about what is hidden, then we can do and believe destructive things.
But. But. What if there is more than this simplistic idea of the hidden places we carry. What if these places do not need to be pathologized?
What if, even when we make a “wrong turn” in our work, there is something right or true we need to discover?.
| Because, often, this can be true. Even when we step into negative thinking or behaviour, even when our thoughts or actions cause suffering for ourselves or others. What if there is also something true that is hidden in the “wrong turn” that we need to learn in a new way? ~~~~~~~~ Let’s go back to the example I used in my own work around how I “disappear” from relationship, how I have caused hurt and confusion in myself and other people. This is true and I carry deep regret about this. And, what if I stay curious? What if I stay with being nonjudgmental and see if there is more in my hidden places? For me, there are many layers here. One layer is around my fear of love and being loved. It is not that I do not believe I am lovable – it is that I have carried a fear that a beloved, if I let them in close, will hurt me the way I was hurt as a girl by people who loved me. One layer in this process for me, then, is to know of this fear and to work with it around my beloveds. To work with, too, how I have been drawn to people who have not been trustworthy. To be curious about who I am in relationship with now in terms of the kind of love I want, not what I have experienced in the past. Another layer in this process for me is also related to fear, but in a different way. Sometimes, when I have disappeared from someone, it turns out that the person was not trustworthy or that they wanted something from me that I could not give without giving myself away. To learn this layer is to work with how, maybe, there was a knowing in my hidden places that I was getting into a relationship with someone who was not good for me. That there was something true in my response of wanting to hide. Of course, it is better to bring this kind of knowing to consciousness so I can work with it in a more transparent and kind way for others and myself. So I can work with communicating rather than hiding. Hiding is an old survival technique that worked well – when someone turned out to be scary, I would just hide. Good instincts, yes. But as a grown-up, there are other ways to work with it. |
To work with this layer, then, is also about learning to trust something in myself that I never learned to trust.
Yes, it is important to learn to navigate the world in new ways. Ways that are not reactive and based on survival when I am not needing to be in survival mode.
And it is important to be open and curious to see if there was something true when I stepped back from relationship with someone. To lean into a knowing, rather than pathologizing that knowing.
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This can be tricky territory because, of course, we could use this process of “I needed to learn something” as an excuse for doing something terrible. I am not saying this.
I am offering a possibility of being with “wrong turns” in many ways. One is to work to repair anything that needs repairing in an honest way. Another is to work within ourselves to bring our process to a different kind of consciousness.
And, another is to be curious about what is under the behaviour that may hold truth and deeper learning as well.