Heal the Split

First, some basic energetic principles

Through Jung, we have an understanding of how energy patterns operate in the psyche. Here are some fundamental principles that apply to these patterns.

A. Energy patterns always appear in balanced pairs of opposites. According to this principle, we can’t carry something without also carrying its opposite. These opposites together form a polarity, and each of the two opposite energies is a pole. Our ego likes to identify with either one pole or the other, so we’re conscious only of that pole. In general, the opposite energy lives in the unconscious, and is usually disowned. A disowned energy pattern is one that we judge to be unacceptable to have in us, and so we don’t want to know about it or don’t believe we have it.

B. That which is disowned will continue to operate from the unconscious without our awareness. Without us having a conscious relationship (or even awareness of its existence), a disowned energy pattern will either meet us from the outside again and again, or operate within us in ways that we can’t see (sometimes referred to as “shadow leaking out”). Since we don’t want to know about it, or believe it is part of us, it feels unloved. After a while it gets very clever about how to get what it needs without us knowing about it, since if we thought we had it, we’d surely make it wrong, or even try to eradicate it. If we disown it enough, it may become demonic, bringing about unwanted destructive results. (So a demon is something in us that is seriously and chronically disowned.)

C. The energetic character of a thing emanates from its creator. When someone creates something, the thing created is imbued with the characteristics that its creator carries. For example, if the creator’s inner agenda and life strategy is to avoid negative feelings, things he creates will be happy, “positive”, feel-good, and not deal with the negative. This, of course, is one side of a polarity. And over time, the disowned “negative” material that has been swept over by the preference for the “positive” either leaks out increasingly more and more without us knowing it, as the preference for the positive keeps the opposite at bay, or it keeps showing up “out there.”

D. Leadership reflects the unconscious unmet need of the collective. In any collective, be it a religious group, a service organization, or a nation, the power lies in the people, not the leader. When a collective carries a need that is not addressed, this constellates in the leader coming to power. If the collective owns the need, the leader will be a beneficent one; if they disown it, the leader will need to take control in a parental way to balance out the unaccountable collective. The greater the unmet need, the stronger the balancing force on the other side. As an example, the unmet need in the German people constellated Hitler coming to power to abuse power. So, if you discover the unmet unconscious need, you can see Hitler as being the balancing force.

E. Outside reflection is essential to gain consciousness, particularly around material in the unconscious. We simply cannot see what we’re not conscious of, and those reflections in others are what show us our own unconscious material, including our disowned shadow material, to us. It’s impossible to know our shadow material without using reflections from outside of us, and extremely difficult, if not impossible, to do so without doing work with others outside of ourselves who can be active reflections.

F. The energetic forces and patterns that exist in individual psyches are the same types of patterns that exist in a collective psyche. Just as each of us is made up of an array of parts, a collective is similarly made up of different people, each one primarily expressing a force and pattern within the collective psyche. And just as each of us is a psyche, a collective is likewise but a single psyche, whose parts are the individual psyches. (And the world is a single psyche, whose parts are the national collectives, the ethnic collectives, and so on …all the way to the cosmic or universal psyche). If you learn how to “read” the energetic patterns of the unconscious, it doesn’t matter which level of psyche you’re looking at, the patterns that can appear in the psyche are the same. This means that we can use similar tools to work with the collective shadow that we do when we work with our individual shadow.

And I’ll add two of my own:

G. The character of a consciousness or spiritual organization is reflected in the character of the people it produces. If people coming out of a group doing consciousness work reflect the intention of the work, then the organization is serving its intended purpose. For example, if a group is oriented around honesty, integrity, accountability, or relationship, and produces people who are dishonest, unreliable, irresponsible, or unrelated, the organization is not serving its intended purpose, or the orientation doesn’t match the actual purpose, which may different from the intended purpose.

H. Any collective in which people come together to do consciousness work will reflect and express the energetic patterns of the overall society that the group or organization is in.

Definitions: Shadow and Projection

I have sometimes heard people say that someone is “having shadows around xyz” or is “operating from shadow.” These phrases often seem to come with connotations that what’s in our shadow is negative or unacceptable. And in response to encountering in another person something that they find disagreeable or unacceptable, they talk about “calling other people on their shadows.”

Let’s examine the definition of “shadow.” According to Jung, shadow is simply that which isn’t seen or known to us. It doesn’t mean that it’s inherently demonic or even “negative.” For some, what’s in the shadow is our magnificence; for others, it’s power. Again, the shadow is whatever is not seen or known. It includes a lot more than just the opposite of what’s seen or known; it includes every human pattern other than what’s seen or known.

To project means that we superimpose an image or a personality of someone else onto a person, group, or thing. The image or personality that we overlay is known as a projection. We typically project either our own image or personality or that of a parent or sibling from childhood. When we project, it’s as if we obliterate the actual person, group, or thing from our view, and replace him, her, it, or them with something that may or may not be particularly related. We then proceed to have a relationship with the projection instead of the actual person, group, or thing.. Most of the time we are projecting. (Some say that we’re projecting all the time.)

The disowned shadow is that part of what’s not seen or known that has been purposefully repressed in childhood. As adults, this shows up in aspects of human existence or behavior that we judge unacceptable, that we don’t like, don’t know about, or don’t want to know about. What’s disowned may or may not be the opposite of what we regularly express or what we imagine we are. We project our shadow material onto others, and that precludes the possibility that we can see what’s really there. When someone says “He has a shadow around xyz,” I call into question whose shadow that person is really seeing, since when we’re projecting we can’t actually see who’s out there.

By definition, if it’s in shadow, I can’t see or know it. If I learn what it is and I try to get rid of it, it becomes disowned, buried in the recesses of the unconscious where I can’t see it at all or even know about it, and then I have no access or relationship to it. On the other hand, if I commit to reclaiming it and allow it to live through me in partnership, it’s no longer shadow.

I hear people saying things like “he has a shadow around xyz”, when what is more likely to be true is “I don’t like xyz”. Unless you have the particular gift to read the unconscious of another, you’ll want to verify that others actually have a shadow around this or that. Because if you are having a charge around someone else’s “shadow,” you’re likely not seeing the other person, and perhaps not even their shadow!

The use of the plural “shadows” is incorrect. There aren’t multiple shadows, unless you’re talking about more than one person (and then, only if you’re referring to the separate individual shadow in each of the people). All of what isn’t seen is said to be “in shadow,” so while it’s inaccurate to say “xyz is one of my shadows”, it is accurate to say “xyz is in my shadow” or “xyz is one of the things in my shadow.” Shadow is a place, state or condition, not an object or pattern. Those patterns that are in our shadow are the shadow material.

Part of my intention here is to reduce the tendency to make the shadow something wrong or bad, and to dispel the notion that we can get rid of anything that’s in it. All parts serve … it’s a question of how they serve. Anything that’s disowned is likely not to serve what we consciously want or intend.

(C) 2005 Cal Simone

[First published in the MKP New Warrior Journal, June 2005, as part of the article “MKP at 20: Evaluating and Recalibrating Our Relationship To Shadow”.]