Why should one want to integrate an evil, hellish shadow?
Video by Einzelgänger
Key Takeaways
This video is about a Jungian concept called the shadow. More specifically: integrating an evil shadow.
As Swiss psychologist Carl Jung stated: everyone has a shadow. The shadow is an unconscious collection of undesired characteristics.
The positive thing, in my opinion, is that you are at least conscious of it to some degree.
- What makes you think that this shadow part of yours is hellish?
- What are the characteristics you’re aware of?
- Do they appear in your dreams?
- Do you have strong projections onto other people that, basically, represent the things that you’re unconsciously repressing?
- For example: if we react emotionally and aggressively against, let’s say, homosexuality like Frank Fitts did in the movie American Beauty, this might be a sign that there’s some form of repressed homosexuality in ourselves.
- The same goes for strong disapproval of someone who’s sexually active or even promiscuous, which might come from sexual repression or frustration in the person who has this strong disapproval.
Now, a shadow is mostly out of control because it operates unconsciously. Unless you manage to make the unconscious conscious which is the purpose of shadow work.
So, this might be a result of many years of repression of unwanted characteristics, that sometimes tend to come out in an extreme form.
Accepting these things, no matter how dark and hellish, doesn’t mean acting upon them. Instead, it means shedding light upon them to understand them better.
The acceptance of the shadow self lies in, at least, temporarily letting go of societal norms of what is good and evil, and accept that the dark side is part of your nature.
In nature, is there good and evil?
Let’s say that, somehow, you’ve discovered within yourself that you have a deep desire for killing, or perhaps even for torture and in your free time you bully people online and torment animals. It sounds like a pretty dense shadow to me.
In nature, we see that most animals carry these drives with them.
- A cat, for example, can be a very cute, cuddly animal, but have you ever see it catching a mouse and toying with it until it dies? This part of the cat is very cruel and murderous. But I think that we can all agree that a cat isn’t a cat without both its cuddly and murderous sides.
Sure, we have norms, religions, et cetera to get along better, as they are the basis of civilization. But the sacrifice we make as humans is that we hide our darker sides — the things that are not socially accepted — just to fit in. Thus, we wear a mask — the persona.
"There is no light without shadow and no psychic wholeness without imperfection."
An evil shadow is part of the complete self. So denying it would be denying yourself. The question was, of course, how can you integrate this evil shadow?
“Be silent and listen: have you recognized your madness and do you admit it? Have you noticed that all your foundations are completely mired in madness? Do you not want to recognize your madness and welcome it in a friendly manner?
You wanted to accept everything. So accept madness too. Let the light of your madness shine, and it will suddenly dawn on you.
Madness is not to be despised and not to be feared, but instead you should give it life…If you want to find paths, you should also not spurn madness, since it makes up such a great part of your nature…Be glad that you can recognize it, for you will thus avoid becoming its victim.
Madness is a special form of the spirit and clings to all teachings and philosophies, but even more to daily life, since life itself is full of craziness and at bottom utterly illogical.
Man strives toward reason only so that he can make rules for himself. Life itself has no rules. That is its mystery and its unknown law. What you call knowledge is an attempt to impose something comprehensible on life.”
The madness you may find during periods of introspection, and using methods like active imagination and dream analysis, could be considered too disturbing to integrate in your daily life.
But integration doesn’t mean the we should ‘act’ upon it.
- A great example of this is David Goggins, who’s regarded the toughest man alive, partly because of his almost superhuman achievements in the area of sports, like the world record for most pull ups, running several ultra marathons and triathlons and facing many obstacles like asthma, obesity, difficulties in learning, et cetera.
- He also completed Navy SEAL training in his thirties, against all odds. In his youth he was severely physically abused by his father and also severely bullied at school. His early life was filled with violence, which created a tremendous amount of anger and grief below the surface of a very timid, anxious, obese man with a stutter.
- When he decided to turn his life around, he was able to channel his rage and fear into extraordinary accomplishments.
"Denial is the ultimate comfort zone."
And I think that’s surprisingly true in regards to the shadow. It’s also true that staying in the comfort zone of denial and the unwillingness to see the dark in oneself, will only lead to bigger problems later on.
Integration can simply be the acknowledgement that it’s there, just to prevent that it leverages one’s awareness of it to take control.
Imagining these disowned qualities can give one insight, and channel the energy that comes from it into better, productive things.
"What you accept you go beyond."