TIMES IN THE LIFE CYCLE WHEN THE SHADOW APPEARS

Marriage

There are times in our lives when seemingly inexplicably the Shadow rises from the unconscious, breaks through our defences and makes itself visible.

 Marriage and the Mid Years are times like these when the Shadow peeps out from behind its cover and becomes visible.  The time of courting is the time of blindness.  The best behaviour prevails, and in any case all is seen through rose coloured glasses.  The other and the self are perfect.  There are no warts; body is ideal, attitude all of love; behaviour is beyond reproach.  And then…time passes, the demands of everyday life take over.  In the routine of marriage, you become more at ease with each other, the defences are lowered, perfection gets nudged to the side and out steps Shadow, a stranger in the house.  The emergence of Shadow rocks many a marriage.

 “Whom did I marry?”  You ask yourself.  “Where did this stranger come from?  He/she isn’t the perfect other that I wed!  Something is amiss.”  It isn’t.  Shadow is simply crying out for acknowledgement, welcome and acceptance.

 You gentlemen be aware, the gentle, accommodating lady, may well have a virago as the Shadow side of the coin.  And ladies, the gentleman who is attentive to your every need, does all the gentlemanly things that women love – opens car doors, ensures that your chair is pushed in – may be a veritable controller.  Remember that what is hidden in Shadow is generally the opposite of the Persona that is visible. There are two sides to every coin!

The Shadow is not necessarily bad.  It is but the other face of who we are.  The inclusion of Shadow makes for less of a one dimensional person.  You are now less perfect but far more real!  The greater complexity within you becomes visible, a richness of personality that was not apparent before, a greater sense of mystery.  Relationship becomes more testing, more challenging, and at the same time, more fulfilling!

 The Mid Years

Another significant time for the emergence of Shadow is during the mid years when the Persona, or acceptable self, has done its work.  We’ve made our way successfully through the mine fields of the social world; our career is established; our need for approval and acceptance is no longer so great.  Our defences loosen and shadow slips through.

 As Shadow makes its entry, in fear we can bury it again or, if we are open to grace, we will find the courage to welcome this dark figure of the night, integrate it and so bring ourselves to a more balanced sense of wholeness than was possible before.  For this, as for so much else in life, we need faith and courage, and hope too, that despite our fears All Will Be Well.

 Robert Bly has a delightful story which is recorded in the book “Meeting the Shadow.”  Bly says that it is as if in the first half of our lives we put everything of which others disapprove into a sack.  As the years pass, we put more and more into the sack so that as we reach the mid years we are trailing a long sack behind us.  In the mid years when the awakening comes, we begin the process of emptying the sack.  Bit by bit we take the contents out of the sack and we free ourselves to be who we are with our contradictions and complexity. [1]

 I remember my own struggles in my mid years when the good little Sister, preoccupied with rules and regulations, preoccupied with the letter of the law, crumbled and a strange creature emerged who would no longer be confined, who questioned everything, who was ready to explore the unknown, ready to seek for deeper levels of purpose and of meaning.

 The shattering of the old order can usher in a time of great unease and anxiety.  The old order has passed away but the new has not yet emerged.  I am now on shifting sand in No Man’s Land!  This can be terrifying.  In fear, I can put the lid on again and repress the disowned stranger or I can welcome the disowned self, frightening as this may be.  I can come to wholeness, to the truth of who I am, only as I reclaim and integrate the disowned parts of myself and bring the opposites within into harmonious relationship.

 While the appearance of Shadow is generally a psychological wake up call inviting us to personality integration, it can also be a spiritual awakening inviting us to reach out to transcendence.  It was both for me.