SHADOW EFFECTS

                                                         

There are some profound insights that you probably don't know about yourself, and they are repressed in what I call a ”Shadow”. That is basically a mechanism we use to suppress traits about ourselves that we are oblivious to and don't really want people to know about. So anything  that your ego doesn't want to associate itself with is hidden/suppressed in your shadow. Often times We hide behind personalities that do not resemble the actual self at all.We tend to adopt multiple personalities that we use to escape from the actual self, and we chose to reveal certain aspects about us to people in our spaces, and some we chose to hide, because there are just some parts we don't love or maybe feel embarrassed about.

 I read a quote that said that,  what the world thinks of you, what you think of yourself and what others think of you, if you were to meet those people, the three of you wouldn't recognize each other. Truth is, we are hiding from ourselves, Everyone, everyday. Sometimes we wear these personality masks so much that we forget who we really are, and sometimes if we lucky, someone comes along and shows us who we really want to be, who we should be.

Shadows do not only mean repression of negative traits. If for example you were raised in a traditional family, where education was made priority, more than anything else and that is most common in most black households. A major  part of your creative ability will be repressed. Maybe naturally, you are a visual artist, fashion designer, or in my case a writer. For the most part of my childhood, even when I phased into adulthood,those traits about myself were hidden subconsciously. That is repression of natural talent. Society will also play a huge role in that aspect as well, the kind of place you grew up in, for example, the school you went to, or the church you grew submitting under, will repress your creativity.

 One factor that has the most effect into a dense shadow, is lack of self awareness. Self awareness starts from the day you do your own introspection about yourself. What drives you, your values, your beliefs and your goals. It basically  a conscious knowledge of your character and feelings. When all those factors are aligned and constantly reviewed. They now become your guide into knowing who you really are, what you are meant to be and reveal what your real purpose is.Your lack of self- awareness will insulate you from feeling strong emotions, like happiness, love, and compassion, hence you will start projecting your own fears onto others.

Dogmatic people for instance, let's say that person holds strong negative emotions about engaging in sexual activities and they decided upon themselves that it will never happen to them unless its under certain circumstances.In return, they will be upset and judge people who engage themselves in those activities. The reason for their judgement is because they want to reintegrate both the hope that, if they see those traits in someone else, they can learn to love it from that person, thus learn to love those traits themselves, then reintegrate them. Also, Dogmatic people are easy to spot other  people’s flaws, with the believe that they have everything in their lives figured out, that its all good on their side, you on the other hand have too many faults that need fixing. That is a sign of lack of self awareness. 

Other aspects like relationship problems, they direct back to these shadows that are repressed.I am one person who has had a dense shadow at some point, and I came to realized that most of my relationships not working out in the past were the result of these shadows, and yet I wasn't aware of that. I for one has never had a good/ close relationship with my father, and I knew it hurt me as I grew older, but because I was bitter towards my dad, I chose to ignore that and just carry on with life. Basically Instead of confronting that problem, I chose to tuck it in my shadow and turn a blind eye to it, and somehow that had a huge impact in my relationships. Remember, the places where you have most issues, will always link back to your shadow.

Another  shadow effect would be, the Law of Attraction. Probably you all know what the law of attraction is about. You attract what you are, what you think about and talk about, right?. Most times, because of the shadow, you will find yourself attracting the same type of people, because its the shadows way of getting you to reintegrate those traits. It will keep putting you in the same situation over and over, and will even use your emotions to get there. Even if those people you meet are not good for you.

 I used to drink and smoke weed, and a lot of times, I would meet people with the same habits, in social spaces where those habits were normally practiced, and it was the cool thing to do. You should realize that often times we will attract to ourselves what ever is in the shadow. It took a lot of self introspection which led to me becoming more aware of myself,for me to realize that, just because everybody seemed to be doing that, it didn't make it right for me to do.So yeah, I attracted shitty people, because I was a shitty person too. 

The last factor  that leads to a dense shadow effect is not being in touch with reality. This is when you have learned to associate yourself from what is, and not really accept the present moment, which  is your current reality. That includes, daydreaming, revisiting the past, thinking more about the future, insight seeking and generating ideas. I won't dispute the fact that some of it really comes from a good place, but on the other hand, some of it comes from disassociation, so that we don't see those traits we don't want to see. I must admit, this is one area I struggle with also. It's sometimes hard to accept my current status, and I would find it hard to live in the present moment and actually embrace that. 

And often times I find myself contemplating about life and fixated in future endeavors, just to escape from current reality. I think it all stems back to self-awareness, because when you are aware of yourself you begin to understand why you are in that space at that specific time, instead you ask yourself these questions. ”What am I learning from this? ” , ”how will it get me to where I want to go? ”, ”how is it preparing, me for what I asked for? ”. Instead of, ” I don't deserve this”, ” why me?” or ” I blame my father for the situation I'm in now”. Truth is Self pity will never give us the results we hope to get.

Often the shadow becomes too dense that, you don't know who you really are anymore, and it starts to control every area of your life, and that really sucks. But it's possible to get rid of it, and it starts with you becoming fully enlightened, getting in touch with yourself first. If you are the type that sees fault in the world, or everything around you. That's the problem right there, because everything that is wrong is within you, hence you think everything on the outside is.

 Once you shift that paradigm, you will have a whole new perspective on what surrounds you, and watch how you begin to attract anything and everything that is positive. Self- judgement is also a great indication of what your shadow is, the ” I am not pretty enough”, the ” I am not cut for this”, The ”I hate myself for doing ABC”. All that is a reflection of the shadow. So instead, integrate the shadow, because it is constantly trying to bring you back into alignment with yourself. In alignment with your natural state of being. Into a life where you can love yourself. Treat it as a self- correcting mechanism.