Shadow Projecting: The Dark Side of the 2020 Apocalypse
Why the answer to the wars ‘out there’ is to love your dark side and some ways to do that
Why the answer to the wars ‘out there’ is to love your dark side and some ways to do that
Do you think that there is a clear line between “good people” and “bad people?” Do you think as prospective Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden recently claimed “probably anywhere from 10 to 15 percent of people out there are just not very good people”?
If you think like this, have you ever stopped to ask yourself, “Why do I think this way?” And have you ever wondered if you may be wrong in your assessment and, if so, if this error in your perception may be causing you and the people around you trouble?
Watching the American political conversation, we see this thinking regularly. However, the purpose of this post is to help you, not to focus on the latest gaffe from the latest savior in a suit. Because no matter where or when you live, this psychological process is likely happening. Most likely, you’ve done it, you do it, or you are doing it.
But not to worry. By the time you reach the end of this post, you’ll see that my purpose is not to shame you.
No, my purpose is to love you by helping you learn to love yourself because that is the solution for this thing called “shadow projection.”
According to this article, when we are unwilling to acknowledge the destructive aspects of our being, we relegate them to the unconscious realm of the psyche (psychologist Carl) Jung called the Shadow. And sometimes, we’ll project these qualities onto another person or group.
Projection is one of the commonest psychic phenomena…Everything that is unconscious in ourselves we discover in our neighbor, and we treat him accordingly.” (Carl Jung, Archaic Man)
Why I’ve Got Some, Umm, Cred On This Topic
Now, I’m not a professional psychologist but I am a novelist. And a novelist needs to study the way we humans behave toward each other and, more importantly, why we behave as we do.
I’m in a reasonably unique position to study the collective psychology of America: I’m a middle-aged American who has lived in Japan for 16 years. Thus, I see my home culture mostly through social media and the Internet.
In doing this, my perception is that in the Trump years (and ratcheting up in 2020) shadow projection has been increasing. I believe it is a key culprit in why the American cultural landscape is so divided these days.
Rather than burrowing any further down that rabbit hole, I’d like to leave that observation there and use the rest of this post to explore how we can break this habit of shadow projection.
Are We Bad, Or Are We Merely Human?
I’ve done some bad things in my life. So have you. I’ve said some bad things; so have you. I’ve thought some bad things; so have you.
Does this make us “bad people”? Or does it make us human?
When framed that way, I think most of us would answer the latter. After all, do we really want to think of ourselves as “bad”? Irredeemable? I doubt we do. I know I don’t.
But I’ll let you in on a little secret — twice in my life, I started to believe that I was bad, and believed it so strongly that I began to kill myself.
The first time was in my mid-20s when, triggered by my growing understanding of the dark side of our society, I started medicating myself with drugs. Eventually, I began to feel shame about being a drug addict. I wasn’t conscious of this process then, but over the years I realized that getting addicted to heroin and cocaine was my way of trying to kill myself.
Fortunately, love saved me. Literally. I wrote about it in the blog post below but to sum up, I realized Nature was beautiful and I was, despite myself, beautiful, too. That caused me to call my parents, admit my addiction and ask for help. They rallied to my cause and I’m still here.
Acid Saved My Life (On the Healing Potential of Psychedelics)
Note: This is part one of a three-part post on psychedelics. This week, I'll cover Michael Pollan's book "How To Change…teachersandtrees.wordpress.com
The second time, though, was only a few years ago. Living in a marriage that not only had long lost its luster but was turning toxic, working at a job that had become a hamster wheel and feeling life had run out of adventure, I again started to self-medicate, this time with alcohol.
Fortunately, I’d gained enough skills over the years to see the pattern re-emerging, I prayed for help and a mentor entered my life at the right time and, again, here I am.
I’m sharing all this because the Shadow is a powerful force. And because in my life-threatening confrontations with it, I realized that the only way to survive that confrontation was to learn to love the Shadow and integrate it into my psyche.
A Few Tricks To Integrate Your Shadow
In these divisive times, lots of friendships, especially on-line ones, are being discarded over disagreements that in the past may not have done more than ruffle a feather or two.
Have you lost suddenly lost a friend or two and been shocked over why you were dumped? Or maybe been the dumper?
Not to worry. Emotional times and all, you’re forgiven. But more important than some random writer forgiven you is this: you have to forgive yourself. You are not a bad person. You are just a human who does bad things from time to time. Join the club!
Remember, this shadow projection is the following: the “bad” you see in others are things that you can’t accept about yourself so you project it onto others and then demonize “them” for it.
Does this make sense to you? Can you recognize if you are doing this? If you find yourself doing it, here are some questions to ask yourself:
What are the things I hate in others that might be things I hate in myself?
If I find those things, how can I forgive myself for them?
Can I learn to love those things in me?
If you’ll forgive me, I’d like to again use myself as an example (yes, one of my flaws is self-indulgence!). One of the things I discovered when I did this was arrogance. I have railed against arrogant people for most of my life. And most likely, been pretty arrogant when I did it! Ha-ha.
And that right there is a great trick I’ll share with you: humor is extremely useful in facing and integrating one’s Shadow so we don’t project it onto others.
One of the reasons I feel confident in suggesting that American culture has been increasing its shadow projecting is the way so many of us have turned on our comedians these past several years. Without going too deep into this topic, comedians play a very valuable role in a society and that is they say the things we don’t allow ourselves to say.
There is a lot of literature on this, but it ties to the archetype of the Fool and, in short, the idea in medieval cultures was that the court’s jester was the one person who could speak the truth to the king and when he did so, the court would merely laugh because, after all, he is just a fool!
Yet over the past decade, comedians like Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock have said they no longer want to perform on college campuses because too many students object to their jokes. This may seem a trivial matter but considering where I’ve gone with this essay I assure you it is not. For if we are not allowing even our professional comedians to express the darker, funny thoughts in our minds, then we surely are not going to allow others, or worse, ourselves to do this.
With this in mind, when I take my daily bike rides, sometimes my Shadow tells me some absolutely horrific jokes. How dare you! But rather than shaming myself for this, I merely laugh and say, “Good one, Shadow.” This allows me to accept that there is darkness within me and that means I am less likely to project it out onto the world, onto you.
Give this a try.
And Now, One More Trick: Be The Author of You!
See yourself as an author. Detach yourself from your personality and then observe your character. For me, this means I identify as the author Bryan Winchell writing the story of the character Bryan Winchell. I can then look at him more objectively and compassionately. And, yes, laugh at him when he acts like a total fool.
Bringing this full circle, I can then say, “Bryan’s not a bad person, he just does, says or thinks bad things sometimes. What a crazy human!”
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