Make Shadow Work Less Scary with This Buddhist Concept
There’s a Buddhist concept that the two wings of enlightenment are wisdom/awareness, and compassion.
Aka how much can you see and know about the world and yourself, and how much can you love it?
In order to expand, we need to strengthen both of these wings equally.
If you only grow your love / compassion but keep your eyes closed to the world and your mind closed to information, that’s I think where spiritual bypassing happens.
If you only grow your awareness of the world but not love for what you discover, the cynicism and resentment will be like poison.
But when your capacity to hold compassion expands at the same rate as your capacity to witness truth, then you can integrate the dual experience of this messy life with higher love. You can have that sacred union inside yourself.
This is a fundamental principle of shadow work. “Shadow” is a word used to describe the unseen parts of ourselves, the behaviors, beliefs, memories, that are outside the light of our awareness.
Shadow doesn’t mean “bad” or “evil”, just, unknown, unseen. (Your joyful full expression can be just as much in your shadow as your manipulation mechanisms.)
But a big reason we often hide these parts of ourselves into shadow, why we stop seeing them, is that we don’t yet know how to love them. Maybe our family system couldn’t love them so we thought they were unloveable, and in turn bad.
Our nervous systems understand this need for as much love as we have awareness, and so for our own sake and safety, will hide from our awareness what we are not yet ready to love.
So the reason the idea of shadow work can feel scary, is because if we go digging for more awareness of ourselves but have not grown our capacity to love and accept and integrate what we find, that’s when we feel like we’ve met the monster inside.
We will try to battle what we find, rather than learn how to accept, understand, and redirect it.
But shadow work can actually be quite gentle and natural, when we flip it around. Don’t go hunting for monsters. Instead, strengthen love.
When you build your capacity to tolerate, accept, have compassion for more of you first, those hidden unseen “monsters” (who are typically actually scared, unloved inner children), will begin to feel SAFE ENOUGH to come out of hiding.
When you focus on growing your resources for regulating, loving, understanding, you actually don’t have to go looking for a shadow to fight. Your shadow self will naturally emerge in the fluid timing and capacity that your love has to hold it. When they emerge, yes it might feel a little confronting, but it won’t need to be a massive meltdown, because you’ll have space in your lap to hold them as they come crying to you.
Some things that can help you create more love and safety for your shadow to emerge:
Learning how to feel your feelings (stay out of story and in sensation until the wave passes)
Building regulation resources (movement, sound, shaking, walking, meditation, nature practices)
Speaking to yourself like a family of parts (recognize when somebody inside is upset, and find out what they actually need)
Practicing compassionate boundaries with yourself (holding and understanding the tantruming inner child, while still being the “adult” who can say no, because there’s a higher good you’re choosing)
Each of these inner skills will increase your capacity for compassion, and often automatically bring shadows to the light as you do (which you’ll be more ready for).
When you expand your self-love first, you can offer each unloved part of you from the past a new seat at the table, you can commune with her, take care of him, and show them that you’re the one ready to hold them in the light now, with love.
With love,
Riyah Rose
Thank you ArtHouse Studio for the photo!