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satisfied, they are like a bottomless pit as become conscious of a characteristic or a
they can exhibit chronic discontent. trait we perceive as negative, it doesn’t give
us permission to act it out. What we now
This sign can find itself unable to cope have is more consciousness and this gives us
with life and its vicissitudes. Most of all, more choices about staying in balance with
they desire to escape the harsh reality that others and ourselves. That’s the real goal.
worldly responsibilities require of them,
which can lead to becoming a freeloader There are many things we as human
or swindler with a susceptibility to drug beings agree are immoral and they should
and alcohol addictions, or otherwise be. We are civilized and accountable for
passively waiting around for someone or a reason. We have laws to live by and
something to rescue them. They are also stop signs or chaos would reign supreme.
prone to excessive naivety in spiritual Are we to stand by while someone beats
guru worship becoming victims of their up a child? Are we to turn our back on
own denial, unwilling to see the reality of excesses of corruption and greed? I don’t
charismatic charlatans. think so. In owning our own Shadow, our
conscious position is to acknowledge our
“Seen from the one-sided view of the own greed, our own violence, our own
conscious attitude, the shadow is an capacity to be ruthless and still have the
inferior component of the personality moral courage to not act it out. It is only
and is frequently repressed through when we think we don’t have something
intensive resistance. But the repressed we perceive in others as negative, that it
content must be made conscious so splits off as a complex and creates a life of
as to produce a tension of opposites, its own and then unfortunately for us as
without which no forward movement is Jung says, “We don’t have it. It has us!”
possible. The conscious mind is on top,
the shadow underneath, and just as high To be continued …
always longs for low and hot for cold, so
all consciousness, perhaps without being Rebeca Eigen
aware of it, seeks its unconscious opposite,
lacking which it is doomed to stagnation,
congestion, and ossification. Life is born
only of the spark of opposites.”
— Carl G. Jung, Two Essays in Analytical
Psychology, paragraph78
After years of doing “Shadow Work,” I
agree with Jung’s assessment that once we
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