Illuminate the Committee in Your Head – Day 18
Illuminate the Committee in Your Head Day 18
By Stephanie Foley
Shadow Work
Have you stumbled across a subpersonality that you wish to hide from others or that you have tried to hide from yourself? This aspect could be positive or negative and for some reason you are reluctant to face this committee member. This could be a trait that doesn’t fit your values or it could be a latent talent you have yet to develop. Shedding light on the shadow ultimately frees up a lot of energy that you are currently using to keep the aspect hidden. This subpersonality is hidden for a reason – often for a sense of safety and comfort or it is trapped by your beliefs and weighted down by shame or fear. For example, people hide addictions from themselves or others and the addictive committee member is sent to live in the shadow. How often do you hear in the news that a spokesperson for some cause is caught doing the very thing they speak against? These are examples of shadow.
Today, please do the following exercise for finding committee members who live in the shadowlands of your internal wilderness:
- Think of 5 traits you really like about yourself, then write them in a list. Next to each, write down how you display this trait. For example, I choose “open-minded” and I display it through “curiosity.”
- Now narrow the list to one trait by any means you choose – strongest feeling, intuition, random, or alphabetical. Whichever means you choose will be the correct one.
- Give this trait a name fit for a likable committee member.
- Now consider what would be the opposite of this trait. What would this committee member find distasteful, react from negatively, or meet with downright disapproval? In the example, the opposite of “open-mindedness” might be “closed-mindedness.”
- How does the opposite make you feel? Do you see this quality in anyone you know? Do you have this trait within you? In the example, “closed-minded” feels restricted, the people who portray “closed-mindedness” seem limited, and I might be “closed-minded” sometimes myself. This shadow work doesn’t mean that I am “closed-minded” but it does mean that I am giving “closed-mindedness” my energy. Are you giving your energy to shadow? How does this serve you?
- Consider what it might feel like to simply have a neutral reaction to this shadow? Would that require a change in values or beliefs? Get to know the likeable committee member you named as well as the possible shadow monster that may have been revealed.
