“As the sun sets on the old world the shadows loom big in the evening light.”

                                                                                                                                       ~ Step JurJahn

The shadow phenomenon has long been apparent, in psychology studies, ancient mythology, and between the lines of our human history. These times can look dark and troubled, but remember: the brighter the light, the darker the shadows. It is because we have already done the first steps in self love, that embracing the shadow is simply the next thing on the list.

You have been taught to hate and fear the dark. It is just a trick so that you don’t find your way out. In time you’ll process that “darkness” within you, by loving and accepting it. Then nothing can touch you. 

                                                                           ~ Stuart Wilde

If we are not split from within, if none of our parts remain hidden or kept in the dark, then there is no underground resistance, no opposition “sabotaging” us, and we are not holding our own power back. Openness is the way to reconciliation and to wholeness, within us and within our societies.

Our collective shadow is projected large across the planet. Our own separatism, our energy games, our control tactics and our power trips are reflected glaringly back at us. They are magnified in the restrictions and the manipulation we see in the power structures around us. These represent the insecure part of us, resisting change, clinging to old behaviors of mistrust and exclusion.

When we focus on, criticize and blame that which is outside of us, little ever changes. But as we look within, we become aware of our own unconscious patterns that really rule us. And as we discover these within us, understand them and accept them, they lose their grip on us. Parallel to this, the outer shadow is also exposed and loses its power over us. On all levels we take back control over our own lives.

By finding more balance and harmony within ourselves, we help to create the same in the outer world. The state of the planet mirrors our own internal imbalance, our own split, and our own belief in struggle, our stored pain. It is our own disempowering behaviors and victim stance that attract rulers and abusers. We just cannot expect the world to change without us changing. That is why we have to become the change we want to see in the world.

The unconscious can only exist without the light of awareness. Once we do our own shadow work we are no longer controlled by our unconscious parts. Now, equate that to the world picture. We have been shadow boxing. Like my old philosophy teacher: we have all been scared of our own shadows, projected larger than life on the movie screen of Earth.

The biggest tool the “dark” has and uses, seemingly “against” us, is fear. But in facing us with it, “they” actually help us to recognize our own fears. To become aware of, to face and thus go through, our survival fears is very empowering indeed. By labeling them as something “bad” or “dark” we give them power over us, we give our own power away. By simply recognizing them as a normal aspect of physical life, caused by the feeling of separation, we thus accept, re-integrate, and finally en-lighten those areas ~ both within us and “outside” of us.

That is why it is the darkest before the dawn. The dark is not the enemy; it is just the unconscious part of us, the last and deepest residues of humanity’s stored pain, that is calling for healing.

Our shadow character embodies the very traits we took on to integrate. It is by discovering and nurturing our inner relationship that we take on our own evolution. It is the part we came to do here at this epic time. That is why it keeps bugging us until we do. This inner reconciliation is nothing less than our personal contribution to the uniting of humanity.

Passage from: EMBRACING OUR SHADOW   Read the chapter »

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“As an interconnected part of the human consciousness, our greatest contribution to the uniting of humankind is to dissolve separation by creating peace and harmony within ourselves.”

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