Seeing the Shadow

On the day that Punxsutawny Phil pokes his head out of the ground looking for his shadow, I figured it was appropriate to talk about our own inner shadow lands. At least that's what I think of when I think of my inner landscape. What I forget is that to see shadow, there must also be light.

Looking within, do you expect to see light or shadow? In my protestant Christian background, it's clear that our "souls," if not all of who we are, are full of darkness. We talked about sin and forgiveness, and sang songs about ridding the soul of "one dark spot." Life in the world is a delightful, yet somehow wicked and sinful, journey, filled with temptations that cause spots to form on our souls. Over the years those souls become completely blackened from all those unresisted temptations, and we need an outside force, a god, to clean us back up. Martin Luther wrote, at an apparently low point in his life, "I am a worm." It was all bad inside.

Independent of our religious upbringings, our personality types affect how we perceive our inner landscapes. Being an extroverted type, I expect all the light to be "out there" and all the inner world to be draped with shadow. As a seven my compulsion is to avoid my inner life entirely, and focus on all those worldly delights out there, maniacally acquiring shiny, sparkly objects and happy experiences to avoid the shadows within.

At enneagram workshops I've asked what the point is to inner work, when I'm such a naturally (compulsively) happy type. Inner work can be dreadfully painful those hidden fears and motives are exposed. The response to my unwelcome question has invariably been "to find the truth."

In my younger days I did therapy. That was all about wading through the muck of memories and discovering how my truth had been skewed by my upbringing and those others who had treated me as less than a valued human. I had to get in touch with my anger and pain and "get it out." Surely those feelings could offer nothing to me other than to screw up my life. So out with the anger and pain. And as Shakespeare wrote, "out, out damn spot!"

One thing that I missed in all of the teachings of the religious leaders of my youth, and in my therapy days, and in my continued spiritual searchings, was that it's not ALL pain and darkness and sin inside. Sometimes it may seem that way, but the truth is there is also lightness and joy and hope and peace and love and goodness. As with the outer world, the inner world has sunny days and rainy days; day and night. It's all part of a glorious whole that is "the truth."

But the truth is bigger than my own individual truth. The enneagram shines light on my own personal truth, both the good and the bad. It helps me see what I'm doing and to loosen the grip of my personality. But I still find that I need the light of a larger truth to save me from myself. That is where my Christian beliefs come in. The apostle Paul often wrote about how he just couldn't stop doing the things that he didn't want to do, and looked to Christ to save him. Maybe I'm just not spiritually advanced enough to find the god within, but I also find the need for salvation from without. I need the hope that the light will conquer the darkness; that good will triumph over evil.

So much of modern spirituality has to do with the idea that we are all, somehow, god and that we create our own realities by our thoughts and beliefs. You can believe that if you'd like, but I'm sticking with a divine presence outside myself to cast light on my shadows.