Tag Archives: shadow

Chuck’s Place: The Technology of Love

Embracing it all…
-Illustration © 2023 Jan Ketchel

Technology is planned habit. Love is nature’s instinct for union. By combining a planned habit with an instinct for union we create a technology of love.

To arrive at key efficiency, love must be employed at its highest impersonal truth: Action in alignment with what is right. What is right is the truth of the Spirit, that quiet whisper that issues from the heart of the Soul.

Love is the ultimate solution for our planetary woes. As one, united human race—the synthesis of all races—we will overcome. Union, however, has its stages of oneness and separation. Witness the evolution of the women’s process in the movie, Women Talking; sometimes love requires separation. Separation invites introspection and a study of one’s projections.

The psychological function of projection is not a function of conscious choice. Projections happen to us through the action of the instinctive unconscious psyche casting its shadow upon our view of the world.

Though we may become aware of this automatic projection and choose to change our behavior toward the actual person we’ve involuntarily projected upon, this has little effect upon the beliefs and emotions of the unconscious. Intentional consciousness must be applied to demystify unplanned projection, the necessary building block for truly responsible action.

A subset of this overarching tendency of the unconscious to make itself known via projection is the psychological use of projection as a defense mechanism. This defense seeks to unburden us of the tensions in the repressed part of our psyche that Jung called the shadow. The shadow houses all the unacceptable beliefs and emotions we repress in order to make ourselves socially acceptable people. This defense creates instability between conscious and unconscious regions of the self.

When our shadow is projected outwardly onto another person, people or situation, we resolve the inner conflict of opposing thoughts and emotions by assigning blame and badness outside of ourselves. We are then freed to outwardly hate our neighbor, who is truly seen and experienced as our enemy. By maintaining separation from, or by destruction of, the object of our projection, we achieve an inner, albeit tenuous, resolution of opposites: we are good, they are bad.

This projective solution is the dominant defense of nationalist forces currently seeking to maintain their security on the world stage. This same defense dominates both the individual psyche and the collective psyche of the human race. As individual cells of that one, collective human race, we are uniquely positioned to introduce the technology of love as a conscious pathway toward world stability.

We all project. Love thy projection. Love thy neighbor as thy self is actually easy, if we accept the psychological reality that what we defensively project onto our neighbor is our own disowned self. To love thy neighbor as thy self is actually learning to love thy self. This requires taking back ownership for the disowned self and loving it. Indeed, this may be painful and emotionally disruptive and require a lot of courage, but it is doable.

To own the fullness of self we must suspend judgment. We all harbor thoughts and feelings that uphold our survival and self-importance. We are all composed of positive and negative, good and evil. Can I objectively acknowledge the depth of my darkest thoughts and feelings? Can I love myself in this fullness?

The ability to bring the light of acceptance to the darkest of thoughts and feelings allows these dark and light opposites to find an inner reconciliation, which shifts outer projection to outer perception as the previously veiled prejudices begin to drop away. This is how we will end the mass shootings we see enacted daily, which are fueled by the veiled projections of the gunman’s own shadow.

This planned action of loving all—all for one human race, one human race for all—has the added benefit of allowing oneness and separateness  to coexist. In order to love my enemy, my enemy must first be acknowledged to exist as a separate being beyond myself. This acknowledgment is a step beyond narcissism, with its narrow fixation upon its own reflection.

Beyond separateness is the greater oneness of the human race, with separate parts respecting each other’s value, much the way the liver might view the heart as a different organ working synergistically to maintain the balance of the whole physical being.

The absolute union of self does not obliterate the operationally different parts of the self. For instance, knowing the different parts of the masculine and feminine self allows more fullness of being, in spite of these differing elements. Oneness and separateness are a reconcilable set of opposites.

The technology of love is the Aquarian Age’s greatest artillery. The army of love is the human race, at war with its projected reflections. Basic training begins at home, with each individual learning to love the self and the other, within and without, without exception.

In the fullness of loving acceptance,
Chuck

Chuck’s Place: The Day of Transition

The unrenovated shadow self…
– Photo by Jan Ketchel

I spent last night in dreams of renovation. I awoke several times in the night, my body feeling the physical download of great effort. The house is an older home, with good bones, purchased from people of positive intent, who never got to the renovation of the back half of the house. Under their care it remained a potentiality, dark and unexplored.

The project is huge, the materials are modest and the effort is great. There is no sense of inflated expansion, but the expansion is solid and will serve the needs of all who will inhabit it.

Awakening to the headlines of today, legitimacy is being granted, despite reservation. The momentum of change is fully apparent. The country has spoken and chosen a new dream. The dream we have been living challenged us to take responsibility for our future dream. It truly became necessary to consent to the reality we would live in.

Consciousness, as expressed through the collective ego, has risen beyond the stage of pure narcissism to address the true needs of the whole. This has been a developmental process of necessity.

First, the purely self-serving ego needed to be lived and given full rein, so that the impact upon world survival could be felt and consciously assessed. All of the ego’s manipulative machinations had to be fully lived and experienced before it could acquiesce to a higher cause, the welfare of the greater whole. Though leaders mirror this ego, they merely reflect the internal process of us all.

We have all encountered the impact of allowing the desire body to rule the ego. The thrill of that ride, the bliss of excess, is a legitimate dream, but it burns out quickly through its unbridled appetite, leaving us all exhausted. We have now chosen continuance and evolution over the fascination of Armageddon. We know now that we can indeed go out in a blaze of glory that we have caused, but we have chosen not to exercise that option.

We have learned, as well, that the repressed in all of us can emerge with a self-destructive vengeance. We’ve all witnessed it acting out. To regain balance, we must responsibly find a life for all that we desire.

The Earth teaches us to move away from exploiting her bounty. We must follow her example. The future of desire is to turn this human spirit of manifest destiny to exploration of the energy body, away from rampant ego desires to the world of spirit and out-of-body travel and all that it offers. At this subtle level of the Soul, thought alone is the fuel. How’s that for clean energy!

As my dream portends, the dark unknown half of the house is ready for discovery and renovation. Despite the labor involved, it promises to solidly house all that we are. We must all begin with the self.

Take up the challenge of the repressed and the desired within the self. Bring light into the darkness. Be conservative yet daring. The time of transition has arrived.

In gratitude, and with love to all,

Chuck

Chuck’s Place: The Power of Belief

“There is nothing that is not divine.” – Aurobindo
– Photo by Chuck Ketchel

From a shamanic perspective, the cosmic dance of now lays bare the power of belief in generating the reality we live in. Our belief system is largely shaped by the messages we internalize from the outside world that become the internal dialogue that interprets our reality. The belief system we sign up for becomes our reality.

At present, the mass of humanity is engaged in a civil war of conflicting belief systems. The consequence of such disagreement is an instability of worldview that threatens basic security, both within the individual and in the world at large. Without a collective boundary of belief, the world is subject to a barrage of all that has been suppressed and repressed in the individual and in the collective human psyche as well.

Civilization has, at its root, civility, defined as a politeness and courtesy in behavior or speech. Clearly we are in a time that has overturned politeness and courtesy in behavior and speech. What’s been unleashed is the repressed energy that lies beneath the surface ripple of civilization, what Freud called the Id and what Jung called the shadow. Civilization is currently overrun by the power of these discontented parts of its psyche.

Our fragile civilization is charged with addressing the truth of its discontents. A new balance is called for. This balance must consider the animal within the human being. That animal has long been the sequestered Minotaur, lost in the labyrinth of the unconscious.

That shameful human, with animal head and tail, is filled with rage toward the civilized human it blames for its rejection. Meanwhile, its human counterpart is both terrified by its power and hungry for its passion. Clearly these two spheres of existence have a place in human reconciliation. Domination of the unconscious as a defense strategy to protect civilization is unstable and cuts off a wellspring of vital energy needed for a fulfilling life.

The opportunity of now is to construct a belief system that values and reconciles all parts of being human. Thus the human animal and human spirit are recognized as valid parts of a human being that both contribute to and enhance human life. Both centers of being are valued for their inherent knowledge and creative potential.

Alexander Lowen, Wilhelm Reich’s protege, pointed out that human beings rarely experience full orgasm in their sexual contact because they have lost their connection to their animal core that truly knows how to physically move. Thus, human sexuality is rarely fulfilling, dominated as it is by the ego’s mental control and expectations.

A belief system that incorporates both our inherited nature and our ability to elevate it to the spiritual heights of love, offers a reconciliation of the human condition that may better serve our evolving civilization.

As always, be empowered to begin within. All the forces without that both attract and repel us are also our own projections from within. All that we hate and fear are as much a part of us as all that we love and long for. A belief system that accepts this equation is poised to find true stability and wholeness within. Wholeness within, wholeness without.

Optimistically,

Chuck

NOTE: Taking a week off, so no writings from either Jan or I next week, including Soulbytes. We look forward to reconnecting starting the week of September 14, 2020.

Chuck’s Place: Capitulate

Time for Shadow Reckoning…
– Photo by Chuck Ketchel

Ego is at the center of the conscious personality. Ego exercises the light of consciousness, which enables choice. Ego is part of the divine consciousness but experiences itself as an orphan, charged with the task of navigating life.

Ego wears a mask, as it embraces a persona, to become acceptable to the world. Often, that which is unacceptable in the self is moved by the ego into the subconscious, where it develops into a hidden character, called the shadow.

The shadow holds views with a passionate vigor that often threaten to overwhelm the ego’s executive ability to suppress. The collective shadow of a nation houses views that may seem anachronistic to modern times. The Black Lives Matter movement, for instance, shines a bright light upon underlying racist beliefs and policies that control modern behavior.

Thus, at a subconscious level, the Civil War was never completed. Much the same can be said of WWII, as we see a major demonstration of  Naziism in current day Germany. The burgeoning energy of the collective world shadow, generally held in check by leaders who model morality and responsible behavior, is instead being invited to exact its toll on the very fabric that holds modern civilization together.

From the Hindu perspective, we are currently in the final stage of Kali Yuga, the time of passionate breakdown of civilization. Thus our world is currently in its autumn season, with its inevitable capitulation to death and resurrection.

The unsettling impact of shadow eruptions, acted upon the world stage, reflect the necessary encounter with all that truthfully is, including the known, the suppressed, and the deeply unknown of the repressed. For new life to form, all the hidden pockets of self must be known and reckoned with. These are exposed in the many dreams of excrement and broken toilets that many spiritual seekers must encounter on their journey to truth.

Fortunately, though ego is greatly impacted by its shadow passions, it retains the potential to face the full truths of all that it encounters, within the self. Ego can also withstand becoming identified with, and controlled by, its shadow personality, as it nonetheless listens to and attempts to resolve the challenges posed in an honest reckoning with its shadow.

Ego is tasked now with facing its shadow. The divine cannot be accessed through the veiled distortion of identity created by a personality that does not know its shadow. This is the value of the time we live in. The shadow is being completely outed and experienced. What remains is full reconciliation with shadow, so as to depotentiate its fury and fully integrate its value.

When ego has squarely faced and reconciled with its shadow it is fully poised to receive truth, the hallmark of the divine. From this place, the High Soul can be openly channeled by the ego, as it capitulates itself to manifesting what is truly needed in the world.

Capitulation is not surrender, it’s maturity. When one encounters the real truth, what higher purpose could there be than to serve its intent? Beyond the cauldron of now is the transformation of human life into a new personality construction, where ego capitulates to the guiding truth of the High Soul, who awaits its arrival at the heart center.

As within, so without. Be empowered. Reckon with the hologram of the self. Facing the personal shadow is also reckoning with the collective shadow that we are all a part of. Capitulate to the greatest task of all: owning and transforming the shadow, that the light might truly enter the soul.

Capitulating,

Chuck

Soulbyte for Tuesday July 7, 2020

When criticizing others don’t forget to look at the self and find the same criticisms. For that which is in others is also in the self. That which you find unnerving or frightening in the actions, language, or ideas of another lies also within the shadows of the self. For all are the same in the inner world; angel and devil, light and dark, good and evil. This is the universal duality that all suffer. Whether repressed or not, it is present in all beings. Resolution comes in knowing this and deciding which path is the right path of heart. The path of compassion or the path of hate? The path of equanimity or the path of disruption? The path of ego or the path of spirit? In the inner world there is always work to do. As within, so without. Change begins with you.

Sending you love,

The Soul Sisters, Jan & Jeanne