This reflection continues a three-part exploration of the unknown in our inner worlds, sometimes called the shadow. Part 1 took up the question “What Is Shadow?” and parts 2 unpacked the question “What Do We Do with Shadow?.” Third and finally, “What Is the Gift of Shadow?”

The Awakening

What Is the Gift of Shadow? (Part 3 of 3)

Part one of this series on shadow considered shadow primarily as that which is unknown within us and yet carries a wisdom that can move into our consciousness. Part two explored some practices that expand our awareness of the shadow and its wisdom. In submitting to the process of vulnerable conversation and compassion with ourselves and others, we experience a “thinning” of the persona and a “moderation” of the otherwise “massive” shadow. To review these ideas, visit part one, The Unknown: What Is Shadow? and part two, The Summons: What Do We Do With Shadow?

With more awareness about what is hidden in our inner world and some practices in hand to help welcome those mysteries into the light, I want to emphasize and celebrate that profound treasures are waiting to be received from the shadow through encounters with the unknown, as well as encounters with others. Beyond mere practicality, I suggest we prepare our hearts for awakening.

I am speaking now of the spirit of awe and fascination that comes with recognizing both our humanness and our loving acceptance by God. We are each “fearfully and wonderfully made” as the Psalmist cries (139:14). To face the shadow and witness the hidden becoming known, even bit by bit, is to be reminded over and again that the complexity of our being exceeds our own imaginations. We are not deficient or faulty models of some self, but living witnesses of what it means to be fully and naturally human. We have strengths and limitations. We behave in ways that need to be celebrated and forgiven. In all this, we remain fearfully and wonderfully made.

I believe that God loves the absolute whole of us, what is known and unknown to our selves. Further, I believe that God works in the world through our complicated selves. What we practice through engaging the shadow, then, is coming home to the confidence that we are loved—as we are—and empowered to grow in relationship to God, self, and others. We practice disposing ourselves to this confidence by surrendering to the lifelong process of shadow work and watching for emerging beauty in our selves and in others.

The Gift in Opposites

In part 1 I confessed that I was not yet convinced of Johnson and Miller’s central principle of shadow work, that there is a sort of equilibrium or balance to be recognized in opposites. For example, that a thick persona is matched correspondingly by a massive shadow. It was the 1:1 formula that seemed a little too fixed for me. But now, having lived in these themes for a time, I am coming to trust that the general principle is addressing a pattern that often holds true. I do believe I hold within myself both light and dark. I can appreciate how my authenticity with others, to whatever degree I can muster it, seems to have a good correlation to my willingness to surrender to the ongoing process of unknown becoming known.

Surrendering to the Unknown

For the past several months I have found myself trying to befriend some aspects of my shadow. The first sign of my summons to this process was the uncomfortable realization that my situation had become intractable. I had been creeping up to the edge of my knowing and seemed to have found it. It was then that I came across the words of Marie-Louise von Franz, quoted in Owning Your Own Shadow, and began to understand that I was coming close to the shadow. Franz wrote, “To be in a situation where there is no way out, or to be in a conflict where there is no solution, is the classical beginning of the process . . .” I had been feeling frustrated and resistant because I thought my difficulties were obstacles in the way of my growth and fullness of life. Franz seemed to suggest that the intractability itself was part of the program and was, in fact, ushering in something new.

The process had begun with the admission that my ordinary tools and approaches were no longer working. Apparently, that required something spiritually and psychologically beyond what I already knew. And Franz’s quote continued:

“In religious language you could say that the situation is meant to force the man [sic] to rely on an act of God. In psychological language, the situation . . . is meant to drive a man into a condition in which he is capable of experiencing the Self” (93-94).

Franz would have us consider the possibility that facing the limitations of our knowing is an essential part of the growth process. That process also leads us to rely on God and experience the self more fully. As I read her description of the moment, I personally appreciate the ambiguity between the spiritual and psychological language. In that holy moment of visiting the edge of known and unknown, I trust God is present. I also recognize that my truest self comes better into view. Although it might not always feel comfortable or immediate, there is a gift of divine presence and personal authenticity that can be received at the edge of ordinary knowing. On that threshold we are forced to acknowledge our own vulnerability and to trust in the movement of God. There we surrender to the process of setting down the persona and turning toward the unknown shadow. Whatever awakening emerges from this encounter with the unknown will likely foster a mysteriously larger and more humble self.

Gold in Shadow

 Gifts from the shadow also become visible through the lives of those around us. My sense is that the people we admire most are pilgrims of the inner journey who have paused along the road in moments of great contradiction many, many times. The limits of what they have known have been reached, unsettled, and reformed as the shadow has eased or rushed into their awareness. Those we admire most have been formed by each encounter and shine with an embodiment of opposites. They exhibit wisdom about all they do not know, humility about their greatest strengths, compassion and joy forged by lessons of loss and suffering, as well as courage to name their fears and vulnerabilities. These pilgrims do not carry themselves as if they lessened their shadows by force. They walk in the world and engage with those around them as if they have discovered revealed gifts alongside still more unknown. They hold well both the joy of finding treasure within themselves and the uncertainty of so much they still do not know. Holding those opposites, they offer the beautiful gift of their own complex selves to the world.

Discovering Gold

The pilgrims who inspire us most also have the ability to awaken something holy from within our own shadow. Authors like Robert Johnson and William Miller call this effect the “Golden Shadow.” The genius of opposites comes home to this very point, for if we can say that we discover what is undesirable in us by looking at our projections about frustrating characteristics, we must also be able to claim the corollary. We can pay attention to the gifts we most appreciate in others, because that may signal some treasure already hiding within ourselves. Perhaps we had not yet been ready to claim or exercise our giftedness. We admire most in others that which is trying to come to the surface in us. Maybe some aspect of our gold (the unknown beauty of our soul) had been tucked away until we were ready to endure it. Seeing something in another may boost our courage to welcome something into the light. When we are moved by the encounter with someone else’s gold, our shadow is finding some expression of what is already within us.

In religious terms, again, we might say that the indwelling Spirit in me is recognizing the indwelling Spirit in you. We were never without that presence, but in a holy moment of being stirred toward admiration, I become aware of the beautiful treasure in you that helps me recognize that same gift, hidden until now, in me. When I discover myself admiring your earnest, truthful voice or experience profound respect for the way you live in grounded freedom, I awaken to that which has been trying to find expression through me.

This dynamic of gold reflecting gold (as much as undesirable reflecting undesirable) makes clear that grace-full relationships are indispensable to shadow work. As we welcome shadow and surrender to the process of unknown becoming known, we begin to see ourselves through others. Sometimes their observations about our shadows simply offer data we would not otherwise know. But even more subtly, it is in the process of doing life together that we can learn to watch how our persona is emerging toward the world and how our unconscious self is drawn in to or resisting what we encounter in others. We need one another for this work of thinning the persona and moderating the shadow. We need one another to practice receiving and responding to a grace moves well beyond our power and control.

Beauty and treasure reside in the shadow alongside everything else within us that remains unknown. If we believe this and trust that God is lovingly empowering us to awaken toward a fuller and more authentic self, then we are poised to engage the holy opposites of our relationships and challenges with hope. We are accustomed to learning about what is lacking or unwanted in ourselves. We must also be prepared to be surprised by our own giftedness coming into view. You will begin to see your Golden Shadow through the exercise of daily life. Watch, for the Spirit is working to make the holy known through you, to your self and to the world.

Golden Inventory:

1. On the sticky side of a post-it note, write the name of a person you truly admire.
2. Fill the opposite side with the attributes in that person you admire.
3. Repeat for at least three people, using a new post-it for each person.
4. Stick these post-its on a larger sheet of paper and inscribe your name on the top.
5. Pause for a moment with this thought: Some Gold in your shadow is expressing itself through the attributes you admire most in these people. You are drawn to them because this Gold lives in you.
6. Now write to this question: What gifts in you are trying to become known? Keep your pen moving for 10 full minutes.

Poem Exercise: I wrote this poem as I considered the tension of opposites that give us life and hope. It is included in my book Ice Break: A Collection of Poems on Slow Change. Linger with the poem a bit and then explore these questions: What “grace-filled unknown” are you entering? In 100 words (or as an image on a single page), describe the wholesome and necessary dawn and dusk that lives in you.

As A Shadow

As I face the setting Sun,
she casts a long shadow
of the man I want to be.

Brightness makes clear
what does not belong,
distills clarity and depth.

Sure and ever-faithful,
at times cloud-hidden,
never truly absent.

Little fear of darkness,
sinking calmly into
grace-filled unknowns.

Devoted to dusk
with a heart always
reaching east.

Explore the possibility of spiritual direction with Sam or another member of the Benedictine Center team.