Earlier today I was writing a piece for the “Poisons to Essence ” chapter of  the Ego to Essence-Steps to Radical Wholeness book and I thought I’d do a series of blogs on the Shadow and the importance of shadow work. First, what are the four poisons that keep is in negative ego rather than Essence? Unintegrated Anger, fear (which includes jealousy and other limiting emotions), obligation and the shadow, I believe are the bad boys. The biggest and baddest is an unrecognized shadow.

One of my favorite examples from my own life took place several years ago before I did and anger or shadow work. I was in the Chic-Fil-A wearing my very cool as a cucumber “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff-It’s all small stuff” sweatshirt.  Must have forgotten that I was wearing it because I got angry with the clerk for being slow and started to lecture her on how to perform the details of her job more efficiently.  A guy next me interrupted me when he said, “Nice sweatshirt.” What was going on here??? Well…I was running late for a meeting because of my own incompetence. My father just informed me that even though I was the first born son, if something happened to him he has asked my sister too handle the very small estate because she is more “settled in life” than me. Can you see it? I was projecting my un-embraced feelings of incompetence out there on the clerk.

So what exactly is this thing called THE SHADOW?

The shadow is an aspect of ourselves that we have repressed or disowned. Making friends with, and learning to embrace your shadow-self is the most effective way to bring about positive changes in our lives.  These changes include more peace, freedom, wholeness, self-acceptance, and less conflict and judgment of others.

Recent research conducted by the Ken Wilber’s Integral Institute, found that a regular meditation practice combined with Shadow Work facilitated by a therapist provided the greatest increase in both spiritual growth and emotional intelligence.

The shadow includes all of the positive and negative, repressed or disowned aspects of our personality and character. If we don’t integrate these aspects within ourselves we project them on to others and the world and live in kind of a trance. Shadow Work is about something I call Trance-endence!

Debbie Ford, author of The Dark Side of the Light Chasers illustrates it this way:  “We come into the world as a psychological/ spiritual castle with dozens of rooms with unlimited potential. Through the process of socializing by well meaning parents and teachers, we close one room after another believing that this room is ‘bad’ or that we are not good enough for that room. Soon, we are living in a tiny, two-bedroom house that is best described as a fixer-upper.”

Visit the blog often for more about the Shadow over the next two weeks.

Until we meet again,

In Wholeness,

Michael