Today is Groundhog Day! …..it is a cloudy day here in Toronto so I don’t think the little guy saw his shadow and scared himself into hibernation for another 6 weeks!
How’s your shadow today?
Our shadow represents our repressed and unconscious instinctual energies. When the shadow remains unacknowledged we project it onto others, like a hidden shape over which we shine our inflated light. When we are polarized between light and dark, we are like a magnet drawing the opposite pole-we attract them, into relationships we cannot easily escape, and the greater the repression the louder the shadow has to yell to get us to hear it. While we may not like it, I for one, am thankful it does, how else would we heal.
How do you know if you are encountering your shadow?
Shadow qualities are often met with intense criticism and judgement, especially when we experience those qualities with others. We can use criticism and judgement as our clue to know our rejected self, our judgement is an attempt to deal with our discomfort of meeting our own shadow qualities.
Doing shadow work opens a space for us to shine the light. We reclaim lost and abandoned parts of ourselves. Like today, this midpoint between Winter and Spring, death and rebirth, hibernation and renewal, groundhog day is a reminder that we have a shadow…..but is it something that scares you into hibernation or do you embrace yourself.
Writing from Heart Centred Therapy 