Me and My Shadow

     My reaction to the political events of the last few months has left me with a serious taste of rotten kibble in my mouth.  How about you?  Do you feel like either hiding for the next four years, or wearing black every day until the next election, or moving to another country, or standing in the street and protesting?  Do you feel this internal sense of pushing away what is going on in our world?

     I think that many in our country right now experience these feelings to a greater or lesser extent.  Sadly, the truth is that pushing away is resistance in its purest form and won't make the problem go away.  Remember?  Resistance creates resistance, and both sides become more entrenched and stronger.  Yelling at your enemy only creates a lot of noise.  It won't change any one's mind.

     This brought me to Carl Jung's concept of the shadow.  Here's a quote Jung's Aion (1951):

The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort.  To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real.  This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.

 Ouch!  You mean the ego-displays we see in our political realm, with the need to be right, the dominating energy, the intense feeling of competition and so on -- all that is in me? 

     Well, yes, it is in all of us.  And once we see it displayed in such a public manner, we realize that we have some work to do.

     I know that I certainly do.