Reality

Observing the world around them, they saw two moons in the one sky—light Ashla and dark Bogan—and they understood the dual aspects to the Force, light and dark.” – Ketu

The “Reality principle” proposes that each person acting out the desires of the ego will do so without consideration of consequence. These impulses are held in check by societal norms and the boundaries imposed by acceptable behaviour. Most well-adjusted, normal people do not indulge their vices whenever the impulse strikes. They inherently understand the need for restraint under most circumstances because it has been conditioned into them since childhood.

The inverse is true for alcoholics. We maintain a different and distorted view of reality. Self-restraint is sometimes necessary to avoid trouble which may remove or inhibit access to alcohol but not for long. No amount of reason or rational thought will prevent the alcoholic from abuse. We will rationalize our insane behaviour to reflect a distorted view of reality. For alcoholics, the reality principle is cast aside as the need to satisfy addiction overrides everything else. This self-defeating strategy stems from the need to become whole and avoid feeling powerless.

The Sith encouraged immediate and unfettered gratification of desires, particularly the lust for power and control. The only reality which they saw was the reality of the ego run riot. Any constraint to that was seen as a threat that had to be destroyed. If societal norms were contrary to their own, it had to be forced to conform with their own. The natural order had to be bent to the will of the Sith. By their definition, the unfettered and relentless pursuit of power, the dominance of the Dark Side of the Force, was natural and imperative.

The lust for power, the need to overcome powerlessness drove the Sith. The very nature of the Sith was synonymous with desire and addiction. There was a Master and an Apprentice who was enslaved to the Master. The Apprentice desired to usurp the Master and take power from him. This is the nature of grasping attachment and desire, whether it is alcohol, drugs, fame, power, or wealth. One is the Master and one is the Slave. One becomes the other. The ego runs rampant and ultimately controls the self in a struggle for dominance in the attainment of what is desired.

Light is synonymous with truth and truth is reality. Darkness hides the truth and conceals reality. The Light is an expression of the divine and its expression as life. Darkness is an expression of death, destruction, and despair. One symbolizes recovery and the other is a slow death through abuse and addiction. Reality resides within a balance between the two.

In light, there is a darkness and, in the darkness, a light. It is the way of us all. Be a prisoner of neither Bogan nor Ashla. Strive to live in balance.” ―Ketu

To recover is to strive to live in balance. Recovery is a rejection of what is unreal in our lives. Recovery is the embrace of reality over time. Sometimes the fog clears quickly, and the shroud of illusion is removed revealing the truth or who we are. Sometimes it takes years and decades. The ego is deflated in the process. The reality principle now becomes a guiding principle in our life not because of social pressure or acceptable behaviour but because our sanity and survival, both physical and spiritual, depend on it. We become aware that our sobriety is contingent on the daily maintenance of our spiritual condition.

The journey of Luke Skywalker is a story of recovery while the fall of Anakin is a story of descent into drunken lust for power. On his journey Luke learned to face the truth of who he was. Luke made choices that ultimately led to his own redemption and the redemption of the father. Doubts, fears, biases, and ignorance was cast aside as he chose the path of Light. Luke understood that true power resides in powerlessness and surrender when turned over to the Force. Through his struggles Luke was able to find balance in the Force between his own light and dark sides.

Anakin in comparison chose the path of the Dark Side even before he knew it and became blind to the truth. The years that led to his final fall were laden with the milestones of that slow but steady descent into darkness as he sought power to control others and life itself. Darth Vader had power and he wielded it at the will of the Emperor, but he was powerless and a slave to his master. In finally facing the truth laid before him by Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader was able to cast away his illusions and free himself from the cage he had made for himself.

Carl Jung wrote that “Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism”. Sobriety requires that we maintain a healthy grasp on reality. That we do not unwittingly replace one addiction for another. Jung also wrote that “we stand in need of a reorientation, a metanoia”. This means a spiritual and a practical realignment of ideas. To succumb to evil results in evil but a desire to do good can also bring unforeseen and evil consequences. We should attach to neither. Recovery means recognizing that the Force exists in a perfect balance between light (Ashla) and dark (Bogan).

Being Jedi is facing the truth, accepting reality, and ultimately finding balance in our lives between our own inner Ashla and Bogan. Reality is immutable and tied to the truth. Illusions and misconceptions need to be removed to reveal what is real. Reality is impossible to ignore we can only choose to. For more than half of my life I walked a similar path as Anakin as I slowly descended into the despair of alcohol, wanting to be the master but only a slave to the addiction. In recovery I try to walk in the footsteps of Luke Skywalker, seeking only to bring balance to the Force that resides within. The road is long and hard, mistakes are made but it is the path to freedom and knowledge and therefore a life worth living.

The Inner Child

A child stolen is a lost hope.” – Moral “Spheres of Influence” The Clone Wars

 

Truly wonderful the mind of a child is” – Yoda.

 

Let’s not kid ourselves; Star Wars is essentially for kids. I’m not ashamed to say that I like Star Wars and don’t mind being called a “big kid” because of it. We go to the movies to escape reality for a while and to enjoy ourselves. Even to remember what it was like to be a child again.

 

As a ten year old I saw Star wars for the first time when it hit theatres in 1977. The experience was indescribable. It blew away all expectations. My life was changed from that evening 42 years ago.

 

Ever since that I day I feel that same sense of wonder every time I sit down to watch the original trilogy. The nostalgia dented only by the re-mastering and editing that replaced the original cinematic version. The movies belonged to my generation. Star Wars was made for us. It belonged to us.

 

We often tend to ignore how much of a child is still in all of us.”  – Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, “On Death and Dying”

 

 

Kids Stuff

Children still enjoy Star Wars of course. The prequels  entertained the millennial generation and the current trilogy has been made for the current generation of kids. Let no one tell you otherwise, Star Wars is meant for the kids first and us critical and adoring adults second.

 

The way we view Star Wars can even differ between generations. In “How I met your Mother”, Barney comes to the conclusion that a girl he is seeing is much older than he is because she hates the Ewoks. Barney reasons that because she was a kid when Star Wars first came out and a teenager when “Return of the Jedi” screened in 1983 the Ewoks to her were annoying at best. The Ewoks were cute and adorable and made for the kids. If Barney’s girl fiend hated Ewoks, he reasoned, she would have to be up to ten years his senior. This also annoyed Barney, he could not be with someone who hated Ewoks.

 

The Ewoks were annoying, I still find them mildly annoying but Star Wars is a modern fairy tale and while fairy tales have a moral they are also written for children or at least the inner child in all of us. Time to get over the Ewoks.

 

The Ewok LineHow I met your Mother

 

Blessings

Children are a blessing. My life changed when I had kids. All of the sudden there was more than just my self to live for. I was responsible for another human being that was powerless in every way and utterly reliant on me. This is a revelation that only a parent can describe. In one sense it is amazing beyond words and in another it is utterly terrifying. Your mortality is revealed as is your human vulnerabilities. Every selfish act becomes shockingly apparent. There is no hiding from the truth. You have the most important job on the planet to fulfil.

 

For me it was not enough. I loved my kids of course and tried my best however alcohol was more important to me. There were nights when I drank secretly in the study while my wife and kids slept completely oblivious to the fact that I was drunk. If they needed me in the middle of the night I would probably have been completely incapable of caring for them.

 

Thank God for their mother who truly looked after their every need and never drunk. I can only imagine what would have happened if they had been left alone in my care. Who was the bigger child in all of that I wonder. It is my biggest shame as an alcoholic. A Father is meant to protect his kids and put them first always. This is not sacrifice but a sacred duty.

 

We did not come into this world loathing ourselves or wishing to numb or feelings. As small children, we operated from a place of wonder, curiosity, spontaneity and creativity.” – Christopher Dines, “Drug Addiction Recovery: The Mindful Way”

 

 

Memories

I recall being a child. I remember Star Wars and a lot of other cool things that happened. There are also plenty of memories of a drunken Father, my mother’s bitter tears and despair at a husband who put money for food in to his drinking and stayed out for days and nights. One day I saw my mother taken in an ambulance and that’s the last time I saw her before I saw her lowered in to the ground in a coffin.

 

The years that followed were not childlike in any normal sense of the word. There were orphanages, homes and hostels, abuse from care givers and intermittently my drunken Father would appear. No wonder I hated the Ewoks when I went to see “Return of the Jedi” at 16. They were lame and stupid and reminded me of everything I wanted to forget, my childhood. The promise of Star Wars had failed me.  The inner child within me was smothered out, all but dead.

 

Alcoholism was the natural progression from that point.

 

Oh Annie, you’ll always be that little boy I knew on Tatooine” – Padme.

 

Growing Up

Its no wonder then that when I finally became sober I had to rekindle my long lost inner child. Not just the “big kid” that comes out to rough house with the kids and make a convincing go at playing dress ups at parties without feeling completely foolish. Also not the petulant and obstinate child I became when I was drinking. Playing the drunken idiot was also easy. The inner child is something different. It is something wonderful.

 

The inner child represents the strongest, the most ineluctable urge in every being, namely the urge to realize itself.” – Carl Jung

 

 

The Divine Child

If you could personify the divine I have no doubt it would appear as a wide eyed and amazed child, playful, curious and innocent. This inner child would be eager to learn and discover and create. She would have boundless energy, enthusiasm, optimism, empathy and compassion. Most of all, the child would have an imagination that knows no limits.

 

Now think Star Wars. Is Star Wars not for the inner child that resides within all of us? I would say that Lucas created Star Wars from his own inner child for the child in everyone.

 

Carl Jung created the “divine child archetype”. Star Wars fans may recognise the young Anakin as the embodiment of the archetype in “The Phantom Menace”. Anakin was innocent and vulnerable but at the same time he was far beyond his years in so many ways. He could repair racing pods and knew his way around a ship. The boy had an amazing talent for racing pods and had the instincts of a survivor.

 

There was something compelling about Anakin which drew Qui-Gon Jinn to him and endeared him to Obi-wan Kenobi. Anakin was a powerful force sensitive, incredibly intelligent while at the same time naive and easy to mould. At first sight he was an ideal candidate for Jedi training but something troubling loomed within him. Yet to all he appeared to be the “chosen one” as foretold in prophecy.

 

“You open the gates of the soul to let the dark flood of chaos flow into your order and meaning. If you marry the ordered to the chaos you produce the divine child, the supreme meaning beyond meaning and meaninglessness.”  – Carl Jung

 

 

Supreme Meaning

Krishna, Jesus, Horus, Dažbog and Zoroaster were all divine children who were born under auspice circumstance to bring great change to the world. King Herod did all he could to stop the prophecy of the coming messiah by having all new born male babies slaughtered. Mary and Joseph forewarned fled to Egypt to keep Jesus safe. Demons plotted to kill the baby Zoroaster but failed.

 

Anakin was the Jungian “divine child” archetype of Star Wars.  Darth Sidous sought out the “chosen one”, Anakin, to either kill him or preferably bring him to the Dark Side. The new born twins Luke and Leia were secreted away in to hiding after Anakin’s fall. The truth kept from them until the prophecy could be fulfilled. The children were the hope for the future of the galaxy.

 

Yoda in essence was also a symbol of the divine inner child manifest. Despite his 900 years of age he recognised the divinity in children and allowed his inner child to shine through before and after his transcendence to the Force. In exile that inner child was still alive in Yoda with all its wonder, wisdom, humour and optimism.

 

“In every adult there lurks a child and eternal child, something that is always becoming, is never completed, and calls for unceasing care, attention and education. That is part of the human personality which wants to develop and become whole.” – Carl Jung

 

 

 

Vulnerable

Yet the inner child is vulnerable. In “Revenge of the Sith”, Darth Sidious completed the conversion of Anakin through the slaughter of innocents at the Jedi Temple. The massacre of Younglings by Anakin is symbolic of the final destruction of the inner divine child. It is the loss of final hope and the future.

 

For children are the future. A society that forsakes its children has no future. A person who denies his inner child also betrays his soul.

 

“I believe that there is a sacred child-like spirit in all of us (often referred to as our younger self or sacred inner child), one we can access and heal in recovery. We can gradually learn to integrate our youthful spirit into our everyday life. There is sweet sacredness when a person truly dedicates himself or herself to reclaiming his or her forgotten and abandoned inner child.” Christopher Dines, “Drug Addiction Recovery: The Mindful Way”.

 

 

Recovered

So it is with Alcoholism. The disease eventually all but snuffs out the inner child within us. That is a tragedy. In its place the shadow inner child emerges to fuel our addiction. The shadow child is the dark, spoilt, belligerent and selfish brat that clawed, kicked, screamed and berated us in active abuse.

 

Recovery heals the shadow child and restores the inner divine child. We learn that the divine child is a manifestation of the Higher Power within us. It has been all but snuffed out but a tiny glow remains in a sea of blackness. Soon that glow becomes a flame. For me it is the Force that burns within. With time it has grown brighter kindled by walking the 12 Steps.

 

I have had to grow up, perhaps for the first time in my life. The inner child has guided me along the journey and still does. To be Jedi is to allow the inner child to step forward and be heard.

 

“When you learn how to re-parent yourself, you will stop attempting to complete the past by setting up others to be your parents.”  –  John Bradshaw, “Homecoming: Reclaiming and Healing Your Inner Child”.

 

The Inner Child

The inner child is that small still voice. You will know it when:

  • A creative idea takes root in your mind and you feel excited about it.
  • You look up at the stars at night, witness a glorious sunset or wander through nature and feel awe, joy and a connectedness with creation.
  • That “kid like” excitement and abandon you get visiting a theme park and getting on rides.
  • The mystery and wonder that causes the heart to race and time to stand still when you get that first kiss.
  • The thirst for life and yearning to explore.
  • The feeling you get when the light in the theatre dims and everyone hushes as the 20th century Fox anthem plays and then the words “a long time ago in a galaxy far far away” appears and then fades  to  the loud crescendo of the opening note of the Star Wars musical score and title.

 

Listen also to the Child when you are feeling down, it is trying to tell you something when you feel;

  • Regret at abandoning an idea you was excited about.
  • Frustration at being denied your creativity or held back.
  • Depression that comes with not being able to fully realize your self.
  • Grief over loss.

 

These are natural responses. It’s OK to be not OK. Let the inner child in you express itself.

 

Be a Kid

If you approach life with the eyes of a child you do so with the divine guiding you. The world suddenly reveals that there is still wonder and beauty in it. Despite the odds there is still hope for the future. People become inherently good despite their shortcomings. Life will not be all “Puppies and Kittens” but it does get easier. Your mind will seek to create rather than destroy, to flow with, rather than resist and to accept rather than reject what life offers. Let life surprise you for certainly it will.

 

Learn from the wisdom of children and take something from their insights like Yoda did.  No matter what happens allow your inner child to completely take over the next time you watch Star Wars. Learn to be a kid again. Ewoks or no Ewoks, I guarantee you will enjoy it.

 

Star Wars (Original release crawl 1977) Lucasfilm Ltd.

 

Further Reading

John Bradshaw; Homecoming: Reclaiming and Championing Your Inner Child. New York, NY: Bantam Books. 1990. ISBN 978-0-553-35389-1.

The Shadow

Luke, trust your feelings – Obi-Wan Kenobi

When you look at the dark side, careful you must be. For the dark side looks back.” – Yoda

 

We are each made up of three distinct aspects. There is the Shadow, the Watcher and the Persona. The part of me which I know best and which presents to others is the persona. The Shadow is what lurks beneath the surface of my consciousness and my ego. It is the Dark Side of the psyche, the inner beast. The Watcher is the unseen observer, the inner pilot which comes from the Force. Today I would like to talk about the Shadow.

 

This meeting with oneself is, at first, the meeting with one’s own shadow. The shadow is a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well. But one must learn to know oneself in order to know who one is….” – Carl Jung

 

Ahuyuasca

A friend of mine recently came back from Peru where he had attended an Ahuyuasca retreat*. Over a period of three days he participated in ceremonies where he took a brew made from the Ahuyuasca plant. The plant is a potent psychedelic drug. Users can attest to profound life changing experiences under its influence.

 

My friend was curious and being a veteran of recent wars he had deep seated issues he wanted to confront and resolve. Depression, alcoholism, drug abuse, self doubt, suicidal thoughts and PTSD clouded his existence as it does with many other veterans.

 

During one of the ceremonies my friend came face to face with his Dark Side. Decades of repressed emotions were revealed and released. Spiraling deep in to a dark abyss his whole being was made apparent in all its millions of facets. All of the guilt, self doubt, the anguish and pain he held within, all the buried memories were revealed to him in a swirling sea that stretched to eternity. The vision was tangible and alive. It was terrible and wonderful at the same time.

 

“….For what comes after the door is, surprisingly enough, a boundless expanse full of unprecedented uncertainty, with apparently no inside and no outside, no above and no below, no here and no there, no mine and no thine, no good and no bad…..” – Carl Jung

 

In that swirling chaos of his subconscious my friend found that he could let go of all that held him back and find peace at last if he chose. His past, present and future became as one. All time was now. Every place was now. Separation and duality did not exist. In that dimension he realized the illusion of self for what it is.

 

The effect the experience had on him was cathartic and complete. My friend had had nothing less than a deep spiritual experience.  I was drawn to this story because it sounded like the spiritual experience that had placed me on the road to sobriety. I had also met my Shadow. The difference was I didn’t take Ahuyuasca then but had fallen into a deep psychic rift leading to a mental and spiritual personal hell which I came back from as if reborn.

 

“….It is the world of water…..where I am indivisibly this and that; where I experience the other in myself and the other-than-myself experiences me” – Carl Jung

 

 

 

The Beast

Carl Jung wrote about the Shadow. Jung stated that every person has a Shadow, a Dark Side, which is always present. Some of us keep it buried deep within our psyche and never know of it. Others allow it to bubble to the surface and manifest on occasion but maintain control or keep it buried much of the time. Fewer people are dominated by the Shadow. Very few people are even acquainted with their Shadow. It is the repressed morass of everything we don’t want to know about ourselves. The conscious Ego refuses to acknowledge the Shadow at all.

 

The Shadow is like the creature that lurked in garbage compactor of the Death Star; hidden and insidious yet indifferent. The Cave on Dagobah was a symbol of the intrinsic Shadow. A place best avoided. The Shadow is in us but we’d rather not know about it.

 

The Shadow is not necessarily evil. To label anything evil or malign is convenient but not always accurate. No person is inherently evil but the capacity to do terrible things resides in all of us. The Shadow of the psyche plays a hand in that. At the same time the Shadow can also have positive aspects such as risk taking and competitiveness. It can also be entirely unknown to us and have us act in ways that baffle us and those around us. You may not notice your own Shadow but others do and they’ll rarely be up front with you about it. Likewise you will see it in others. You will project your own shadow on others and find fault there.

 

There is in every one of us, even those who seem to be most moderate, a type of desire that is terrible, wild, and lawless.” – Plato “The Republic”

 

 

Primal

We all have an inner moral compass. Much of our personal views and morality is based on societal norms and the influence of our family and friends. It is often said that a person who is “well raised” will display moral virtues even under the most testing conditions. Yet, a sense of morality is also built in to our psyche. We intuitively know right from wrong. Children are naturally empathetic and caring. An infant that is deprived of affection and human touch will fail to grow and likely die. To be human is to be more than just a product of our environment. There is a blend of nature and nurture in everyone.

 

Yet the Shadow resides within us all. Jung said it extends all the way to Hell. It is part of our nature and buried in the recesses of our psyche to levels you cannot imagine. The Shadow pulls at our sleeve and appeals to the Darker Side of our nature and manifests as aggression, selfishness and greed. There is an evolutionary advantage to that. After all as humans we are driven to compete, dominate and consume. Without that drive our species would not have evolved, prevailed and ultimately populated the Earth.

 

At the same time coexistence and cooperation has been a requisite for survival and mutual benefit. There remains a duality in Humans, a Yin and Yang derived from millions of years of evolution. But like it or not everyone is a loaded gun. You, I and everyone are capable of good, bad and even terrible things.

 

Everyone carries a shadow and the less it is embodied in the individual’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is” – Carl Jung

 

 

Archetypes

In Mythology there is usually a Hero and a Villain. Joseph Campbell’s “A Hero with a Thousand Faces” reminds us of this timeless formula. George Lucas based Star Wars on Campbell’s “Heroes Journey”.

 

We meet the Shadow in Star Wars. There are Heroes and Villains of course but none of the characters act always as expected. Some of the heroes are less than heroic and some of the villains also show redeeming virtues at times. Real life is no different. In reality we are both Hero and Villain in our own life story.

 

The “Heroes Journey” calls the protagonist to face his Shadow, overcome it and come out better from the experience. Along his Journey the Hero can also be a Villain and an Anti-Hero. This doesn’t only make for a good tale but it also develops character and provides an important lesson which is the purpose of myth.

 

Han Solo, Asajj Ventress, Boba Fett, Cade Bane, Lando Carlissian, Mace Windu, Quinlan Vos and Qui-Gon Jinn were neither all Hero nor all Villains. Each of the characters displayed attributes both good and bad. They were complex individuals who acted for reasons that seemed correct to them at the time. The Empire was not entirely bad either nor was the Republic entirely good. The Shadow was in everything. That is one of the gems of Lucas’s creation.

 

If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.” – Obi-wan Kenobi

 

 

Living with the Shadow

The Skywalker family seemed utterly cursed. Anakin of course was haunted his entire life by the Shadow of Vader. Leia struggled with her own inner Demons. There was the perpetual conflict in Leia between a responsibility to her family and to her position. Luke was torn by his own inner doubts. On Dagobah he came face to face with his Dark Side in the Cave, a crucial part of his training. Luke confronted it again, for real, as his rage took decades later and he almost killed his nephew. Kylo Ren equally infected saw beauty and purpose in a nihilistic pursuit of power.

 

Yoda summoned his Shadow and overcame it allowing him to unify with the Force. Obi-wan Kenobi also invited his Shadow “out to play” and let it cut him down thus releasing him to also unify with the Force,

 

The best way to deal with your Dark Side is to face it, know it and accept it. Ignoring the Shadow does not work. Trying to kill the Shadow is impossible. We Alcoholics are often warned of the danger of the Ego. The Ego we are reminded has a tendency to become inflated. In time we lose our humility to Ego and allow ourselves to be led astray. In fact the much maligned Ego is not all bad. It is essential to our persona as long as we don’t let it get away from us. The Shadow on the over hand is the overlooked enemy if we let it dominate and control us.

 

“It was on the moral side, and in my own person, that I learned to recognize the thorough and primitive duality of man; I saw that, of the two natures that contended in the field of my consciousness, even if I could rightly be said to be either, it was only because I was radically both” – Robert Louise Stephenson (Author of “Dr Jeckyll and Mr Hyde”)

 

Source: Star Wars (Luca Films)

 

Jeckyll and Hyde

Someone once told me that alcohol does nothing more than bring the real persona to the fore. That scared me because it meant that I was not a nice person. It also meant that I did not know myself at all.

 

If you knew me sober and then met me when I was drunk you would no longer know me. You would be confronted by a personality completely different to the individual you had previously met. The act of taking a drink had chemically altered my brain. After a single drink I was no longer the same person. One drink would lead to more drinks and the transformation would progress.

 

Eventually I would no longer resemble my sober self more than a passing physical resemblance. I resembled the duality of Dr Jeckyl and Mr Hyde. Drunk I was as base, antisocial and destructive as Mr Hyde.

 

Eventually the Shadow began to take over my persona entirely.

 

“Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

 

 

Three Steps

Look deep in to the soul of an Alcoholic in the later stage of addiction and you will see the Shadow staring back. The person you see is now the Shadow having completely taken over the person’s psyche. It is frightening if you pause to think about it. Even the Ego has been muted and forced down. The Ego needs the body to survive and won’t endanger it willingly. The Shadow does not care.

 

What remains in the late stage Alcoholic is the manifestation of something primal, desperate and nihilist. There is utter selfishness, anger, rage, self pity, self loathing, denial, indifference, resentment, grief and more than anything an urge that must be fulfilled at any cost. This is the Shadow. The only way out of the Shadow is through a spiritual cure.

 

In order to break from my Shadow I had to confront it through admission of my Alcoholism. My disease showed itself to me in all its detail. I saw clearly the harm I had caused to myself and others. I saw the past and the future laid out before me. The present moment stood still and I knew that I was on the edge of a great chasm.

My Shadow was laid bare before me. It was like I was detached from my body looking down at me and seeing myself for who I was for the first time. At that moment I turned to a Higher Power and asked it to take my burden. I became willing to let go without regret or reservation. In that moment I knew the shackles had been removed. I was free.

 

“In these ways, the personal shadow reinforces, encourages, and becomes dependent upon the addictive behavior to express itself, to have any existence in the light outside of the closet, the attic, and the basement where it has been locked up and hidden for so long.” – David Schoen “The War of the Gods in Addiction”.

 

 

The Journey

What I meant by a spiritual cure is not Divine Intervention but Faith in a Higher Power. The road to recovery for me had only begun at that moment. In order to express Faith I had to work. Self discipline and tenacity was necessary. Constant and honest introspection was required. I completed my personal inventory and admitted my faults and litany of wrongs to another and to my Higher Power. Little by little my Shadow began to dissipate becoming less black and dense. The spiritual burden I carried became lighter. I began to know myself more in weeks than I had in decades.

 

The process never ends. Daily introspection is required. Admit faults without hesitation. Seek to make amends where appropriate. Make a daily inventory and meditate on the Shadow often. Review, adapt, modify and improve continuously. Knowledge accumulates and wisdom follows.

 

Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.” – Carl Jung

 

 

 

Integrate

Once you acknowledge and accept that life is suffering and you suffer you can begin to dissect the reasons why. It will come as no surprise to discover that much of our own suffering comes from our own choices. Many of those choices will be contrary to your stated principles, values and virtues. An Alcoholic must at last confront the Shadow which afflicts his life and struggle to overcome it. Only by accepting that reality and seeing things as they really are do we stand a chance. Paradoxically healing comes from integrating the Shadow in to our consciousness.

 

We must constantly question the paradigm we find ourselves in. Does it represent reality or a projection of your own psyche? We must also decide what our values are and the virtues we wish to demonstrate. Are your thoughts, habits and actions objective and in congruence with those stated principles, values and virtues?

 

A Jedi constantly questions his or her reality. A Jedi trusts her feelings because she knows they are valid. Jedi are never satisfied with appearances alone and delve deeper to uncover the truth discarding what is false or redundant. Jedi practices such as meditation, physical training, mindfulness, awareness, objective inquiry and self discipline all serve to keep a Jedi in reality. Cooperation, diplomacy, reasoned discourse and respect for others creates an environment incongruent to the Shadow. Jedi strive to uphold the Code.

 

Light repels shadows and only barriers that we construct with our own minds create them. Light offers clarity through knowledge while the Shadow conceals the truth. A Jedi is simply someone who knows who they are both good and bad, warts and all. They know and accept the Shadow and fully and mindfully integrate it.

 

“People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”  – Carl Gustav Jung

 

 

Being you

My friend found answers in his quest for knowledge through Ahuyuasca. In reality all he did was confront his Shadow and fully integrate it in to his being. This he did through acceptance and surrender to the experience. As a result all of the repressed memories and emotions he carried were released. From there he was able to walk away from the experience a free man at least for a time.

 

Isn’t freedom from suffering what we all seek?  Is it enough to confront the Shadow? Is a spiritual experience alone enough to reach self actualization and lasting serenity?

 

The attainment of virtue, clarity of purpose and wisdom should be the pillars we seek in life. This is the highway on the journey to enlightenment. By confronting the Shadow we come face to face with our Dark Side and knowing it we can better know ourselves. Knowing ourselves we can then begin to lighten the shadow and express what we repress. We invite our repressed feelings out to play. We integrate our Shadow in a constructive way rather than leave it buried deep within our psyche.

 

All our lives we are conditioned to be and act a certain way. We repress and hide aspects of ourselves that we refuse to acknowledge. Our persona is a mirror of what family, friends and society wants from us. The Shadow retains the hidden morass of repressed memories and emotions like the refuse and the beast in the garbage compactor on the Death Star. Embrace the aspects of the shadow that serve. Be you entirely not a second rate version, a mere shadow of yourself.

 

“As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light of meaning in the darkness of mere being.” – Carl Jung

 

 

*Authors Note: I do not personally endorse or recommend the use of Ahuyuasca or any other psychedelic drug without the full supervision of a competent practicing psychiatrist. There are many retreats in South America and elsewhere that offer Ahuyuasca ceremonies. Readers who are considering traveling to a retreat and using the drug should fully research the topic beforehand and seek medical advice prior to proceeding with the experience.

 

Further Reading

Related article on Star Wars.com: https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-in-mythology-the-shadow

Jung, C.G. (1969). Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious [sic], Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Volume 9 (Part 1), Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-09761-9