True personal growth ultimately will lead to fulfillment, and it's my intention with these podcasts to connect more deeply with you. Thank you for joining me, Anne Corbin and my guests and welcome to this episode. Today's topic appears to be one that kind of frightens many people who are either studying personal development or particularly people who are trainers in that subject, very few like to discuss the importance of the shadow.
So this episode might be one of the more important conversations that I've ever invited you into. It involves going really deep beyond limiting beliefs and beneath the surface, sort of explaining your strength and your struggles because the truth is you are not just light and you were never meant to be. As we grow up, oh and particularly when we get into spirituality work or personal development, we are told to shine our light, to develop the good characteristics, the ones that make us fit in.
We are we're trained as children to be kind, to be calm, and to be positive. The words might differ, but you get what I mean. Oh, yes. We're told to control our anger. In fact, we learn to bury our egos. We learn to keep the peace and to keep quiet about it even if we're falling apart inside. And while that all sounds good and noble, it's also the reason why so many adults feel disconnected and unfulfilled. And this is the key they are stuck in patterns that they can't explain.
So what if I told you that all those emotions that you've tried to hide or been trained to hide, your anger, your ambition, your jealousy, your desire to speak up for yourself or set boundaries rather than let others control you, these aren't flaws. These emotions are clues because they are the remaining fragments of your power. They're hidden, but they're still alive and they're still waiting in your so called shadow. So let's describe exactly what this shadow is.
In psychology, it refers to the parts of ourselves that we have rejected or denied or suppressed because often, traits that we learned were bad or unacceptable growing up are a real necessary part of our personality. Yes, we need to control them, but we need to recognize that they're there. So think back to your childhood, your school days. Maybe you were told not to be too much or you were accused of being too full of yourself.
Maybe your anger was slapped down or it made people pull away and you didn't like the response you got. Maybe you showed confidence and you got labelled arrogant or bossy or perhaps you were made to feel selfish if you tried to set boundaries. It happens to all of us and we adapt. This is a kind of programming. We become nice, acceptable, good. But the problem is that in the process, we also become fragmented and we have no idea of the damage that this sequence is beginning.
Because what lives in our shadow doesn't disappear. Suppressed feelings and emotions, they simply go underground in the shadow. And from there, they run the show. In other words, your life is being controlled either by a personality that you don't even recognize as you or indirectly by those individuals who caused you to suppress that very important part of your character.
And the anger that you suppressed will come back as resentment and ambition that was buried could turn into envy and jealousy. The power that you were taught to deny results in your becoming submissive to others. And we tell ourselves that this is maturity, that we've grown up, that we are in charge of our emotions, we're peaceful, and we're evolved, but we are not whole. Carl Jung said, until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.
So reflect on that for a moment, think of the iceberg we used to be told that 10% showed up on the surface and 90% was under underwater and this apparently was the relationship between our conscious and subconscious nowadays it's only five percent of how we act that's controlled by our conscious mind and 95 is our subconscious. And when you talk about fate, that implies something over which we have no control. And so much of what we call fate sabotage. This is all a part of the shadow self.
You think you've dealt with those so called bad emotions, but they're crying out to get your attention using the only means that they have at their disposal. So what am I saying? Not that we give free rein to our dark side. No. But it's about becoming honest and it's learning to integrate all those exiled parts of yourself. Not so that they control you, but so that they serve you. So that they are reinstated as part of the whole you.
Because when you reclaim what you've pushed away, you do not become a worse person. You become whole. You can be authentic and that means really true to yourself. Now there are three reasonably simple steps that you can take to begin this shadow work. It's practical and it's worth doing. The first step is projection. Become aware. Notice what triggers you and be curious about what it means. Is it another person who's loud and dominating? Is it a specific noise?
The dominating person might be showing you your own buried desire to take up space or, well, simply to be heard. Odd noises could be bringing you back to your childhood when you were suppressed by angry voices for example or a location which caused you deep discomfort where you were forced to show up. What about that friend who always seems to be manipulating you? Maybe you've been trained to reject what we would call strategic power even when you need to use it.
Our strongest emotional reactions are very often mirrors of the parts that we're still rejecting. I I spoke about the mirror principle very recently. Now, what does all this reveal about ourselves? This is step two. Give this tray or tendency a title. That's right. Name it. When you name that hidden part with honesty, there is no shame involved. Just say to yourself, I see that part of me that wants control. I acknowledge the tyrant in me.
I notice the manipulator, the seducer, the controller, or the coward. You aren't making judgments. This is simply about getting clarity what you're dealing with. Don't call fear shyness, don't label your need for approval as kindness and don't consider that a people pleasing tendency is generosity. It isn't. When you name something clearly, then you give it form. And what has form, of course, can be transformed. And this is the reason for adding clarity to our labeling.
And the final step, step three, is called alchemy. And alchemy, of course, means change. So ask, suppose I owned this part of me consciously, how could it serve me? Could anger become a force behind setting firm boundaries?
Do you know I didn't even learn about boundaries until I'd already been employed in more than a couple of jobs as an adult, I was at the beginning of my personal development journey which is not that many years ago, I'd never heard of boundaries, they never used to speak about them far less encourage them when I was at school. Could your ego be thought about as your healthy self worth?
We're all trained to think that the ego is something terrible that we don't want to acknowledge or that we need to suppress or that there's something wrong with letting the ego show through. This is absolute rubbish. And another question, could your strategic mind help you negotiate with power and do it ethically. And this is what you could consider as turning poison into medicine.
That was an analogy that I saw in something I was reading recently and it's very apt because a lot of medicines are good for you in small doses and then if you take too much, even with paracetamol, too much can be a poison. And remember always that you're not fixing yourself, you are simply reclaiming what was always yours.
Now this work is not trendy or surface level and it does come with a warning because if you awaken your shadow and you don't integrate it, then you don't become empowered, you actually become unstable. This is what's called the spiritual ego and it can be rather tricky because it says says all the right words, talks about healing and vibration and compassion, and yet it's using those words to hide judgment and control and superiority.
And those are the things that we need to take great care about. I recommend that you do a little bit of your own research on this topic because it's very fascinating. Integration is not a vibe, it's a responsibility. You can't unknow what you've seen and you can't unfeel what's been revealed. Either you master it or it masters you. So what comes next? I think I just said recently there is no requirement to fix yourself. What you need to do is focus on becoming whole.
And this is a real life both and situation, it's not an either or choice. You can walk with your shadow, not fight against it. Allow it to be a part of your power, not a secret, not a secret side of you that you're ashamed of. Real strength isn't about always being calm and being responsive not reactive. It's being connected to your own personal fire but knowing when and how to use it. You can feel deeply. In fact, you should. Emotions are good. And yet, you can still be unshakable.
You can love fiercely and yet have those boundaries. So the person, the object of your love is not in a position to take advantage of you. And you can experience chaos, but make the choice to remain centered. And this is what integration really means. It's something you have to work on, It's something that you have to recognize and to practice. But you stop hiding, you stop performing, and you stop shrinking. And you begin showing up as a full and luminous and powerful soul led being.
This is the truth of who you really are. This is your whole self, your integrated self. And just recapping briefly, the advice is to notice what triggers you, ask yourself, what does this teach me? What does it reveal about myself? Name the tray as honestly as you can and ask, how can this tray serve me consciously? And if you want to anchor it in, here's a a statement you can make every day. I am whole and my shadow serves me. You can set yourself up to win at the game of life.
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