Embracing the Shadow (Connie Zweig, PhD)
\u201cIf you have a reaction to a stranger or someone in the media or someone in politics or someone who's just providing this kind of blank slate because you don't really know him or her, then it's a projection. And yes, there's often a sensation in the body that's negative. It could be fear, it could be distrust, it could be disgust, right? And then there's the flip side. There's positive projection, which happens in the spiritual universe a lot. When someone is looking for a charismatic leader, then they're going to project their own awakening, their own compassion, their own wisdom onto the leader, the clergy person. So the content of the projection can be anything, what we view as negative, what we view as positive.\u201d\nSo says Connie Zweig, a Jungian therapist and author who has focused much of her career exploring and teasing out the implications of the shadow, which is how Carl Jung referred to the unconscious. Chances are that you\u2019ve been hearing more and more about shadow work\u2014it\u2019s having a moment\u2014in part, I\u2019m convinced, because it\u2019s a concept whose time has come. As I\u2019ve written about a lot in my Substack newsletter, we are swimming in collective shadow, unable and unwilling to process our share of it. When we don\u2019t take on this unconscious material, or darkness, our tendency is to project it onto other people and groups, to get away from it as quickly as possible. But, of course, it doesn\u2019t work like that\u2014our shadow is ours. It\u2019s our blind spot. When we\u2019re willing to face our shadow, to access it, to allow it to emerge, we often find that it\u2019s full of gold. In fact, Jung believed that the shadow is the source of all of our energy, the main mechanism for growth\u2014ask anyone who has gone through hard or dark times and they will likely tell you that the experience propelled them forward in unexpected ways, often for the better.\xa0\nConnie and I explore all of these concepts and then some, as she\u2019s one of the most prodigious writers in the space. She co-authored Meeting the Shadow and Romancing the Shadow, which are essential anthologies and texts, and then more recently wrote Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path, which explores what happens when the shadow, or darkness, is unresolved in spiritual and religious communities. She\u2019s also the author of The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul, which is an exploration of the shadow of aging in our ageist culture. I\u2019m hoping she comes back to the podcast soon so we can discuss that book at length.\xa0\n\nMORE FROM CONNIE ZWEIG, PHD:\nThe Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul\nMeeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening\nRomancing the Shadow: A Guide to Soul Work for a Vital, Authentic Life\nMeeting the Shadow: The Hidden Power of the Dark Side of Human Nature\nA Moth to the Flame: The Life of the Sufi Poet Rumi\nConnie Zweig\u2019s Website\n \nTo learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy\n \n Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices