input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

In reading things about co-creating, it can sometimes seem that “accentuate the positive, ignore the negative” is a theme. (Not necessarily the rule, but my general impression!)

what are your thoughts (or what you've seen in writings/movies) on facing our dark side, exploring our fears, embracing the shadows as a learning/growth experience?

when it's not possible to just choose happiness, but it's a rocky path that must be travelled?

this is very relevant to something i am writing for an interview, so i'd love to hear your thoughts soon.

thanks!!
katie

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Katie, you don't know it but I am sitting here jumping up and down with a gleeful joy!!!!  THANK YOU!

I think that to avoid, deny, hide, cover up, or run away from the “dark side” of what we do…. simply creates a reactionary state in which we tend to increase doing that.  It is so much easier to co-create a life we wish to have when we have pulled all things to the light of day and have dealt with them.  Otherwise, it is the tail wagging the dog.

I get to watch a whole lot of people come to the place I work at ready to address and change and grow.  The most fearful of the bunch will always be the people who do not want to face their foibles or own their crap.  It is more likely to hear from them “I stay focused on the positive.”

Conversely…. those that face it.  Own it.  Transform it.  The fear level is less and they are genuinely more positive and hopeful about their future and less brittle in the need to rigidly define what the next thing needs to look like.

I think that once you are no longer reacting to the fear and darker side of nature…. you become more responsive and the choices you make and the future you envision is empowered.  It is what makes co-creating a beautiful life possible.  Hiding from the shadow is what makes co-creating a brittle and fearful life possible.

I could go on and on and on, but I'll stow my soap box for the moment!
Thanks.
Jill

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Dear Katie and Jill,

While waiting for Whitewave to jump in :) are you here Ww? I would like to say that dealing with our Shadow is essential to becoming truly positive. Any “don't worry be happy” person who tries to skate on the surface and not deal with the cold dark depths under the ice is doomed to crack through the thin parts of the ice and flounder helplessly in the water it tries to deny is there.

I believe, Katie, that a lot of people here are working tremendously hard on their stuff, and have already done a lot of inner work, which is why they are so truly joyful and positive. It may come across as fake - how could we know, since we are not dealing with each other face to face but only cyber-personae? - yet in some cases is deeply real. For example everything I have read by Jill resonates with a life thoroughly lived and examined and sings with joy and love.

Of course, some of us who are less evolved can have a tendency to present our very best self online, and may come across as happier than we appear in person. But I believe there is a truth in at least aspiring to joy and peace, even if in our day to day life we struggle to know every moment the truth: that we are blissfully known, loved and free. Too often, I fall and forget. But the struggle reminds me that I am alive, and I am grateful for life!

L'Chaim! (To Life!)

Nicole

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Nicole, you are so eloquent!  :-)

And you're right.  My dark goop has been pulled out and examined and worked on….. and in that layered process I have found contenment, peace, joy and a real honest understanding for the ebb and flow that life presents.

I don't know a single soul that grows when they are comfortable.  It is the discomfort that forces us to seek a solution.  I also don't know a single person that doesn't jump on the “easy way out” a time or two until they realize that it hasn't helped much.  LOL

I don't often use the words “Dark side” because I really think what we're saying is the wounding.  We each have a wound that we must attend to and the degree of happiness and peace comes from the healing we are willing to allow.  The degree of dysfunction we hold becomes the quick fix we try to staunch the wound with.  So, do we co-create the healing or the quick fix?  That I guess is the bigger question we each have to face at one time or another or many times!

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Dear Jill,

So true! We have all those coping mechanisms we have developed to protect our wounded selves and to keep others safely at a distance… The healing process slowly breaks them down as they are revealed as counter-productive and no longer useful, and we gradually close the psychic gap between ourselves and others. We learn to love and appreciate people for who they are, and to need less and less that they be any different from who they are, while being ready as the Spirit moves to offer truth-in-love about a way that they could grow more into who they truly are instead of the false selves…

Love,

Nicole

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

thank you nicole and jill!

nicole, i wouldn't say it ever appeared “fake” - i just questioned whether some people did this healing work and just not talk about it, or what! or maybe were deceiving themselves…

i do agree with what everyone has posted here, just wasn't sure how that fit in with the main topics of discussion here.

i'd love to post more but i just used up all my brainpower for a sunday night, in a lengthy chat/tarot reading for someone, so i'll be back to talk more!

oh i think jill said she doesn't use dark side, i often use “shadow” side, not as something “evil/dark”, but just the unexplored sometimes scare stuff. ;o)

namaste and bright blessings!
katie

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Hye : ) katie, Nicole and Jill ,  please allow my contribution

Mine may not be as eloquent i am afraid my English stands sometime in the way.
but allow  me to share your perspective; i think that going all the way down along
the pit of despair and letting the Shadows be, take part and express, is necessary
if i want to cope with life truthfully, but also because otherwise our life is grayish
unware and ill..
 
if one overcomes major emotional or other breakdowns by introducing
darkness back to life with other living parts, one can then deliberately  reclaim further abilities and perhaps even grow.

thus growing is along our ability to pause and look into the void, allow the wilderness and  admit vulnerabilities, by actually let it live and not be enslaved by fears.

I yesterday recalled the perhaps most famous literature work done by one who
goes down into the dark side; i read the summery of  inferno of  The Divine Comedy  in Wikipedia..

and also, because  'Vicious circles'  manifest sometimes on this platform i went and checked what Wiki says about trolls

namaste  yosyama

we are human becoming allow us to become

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Yosyama, that was very well said!

I agree.  If you can't name it, you can't heal it.  I've disvoered that the more willing I am to state, out loud what the foible is or what the fear is…. the less able I am to use it to cover myself.  It has been when I am staunchly defending my messed up behavior and justifying it, that I stay stuck in fear and pain.

I think, Nicole, that you have just beautifully named something.  Standing in a place of love does not happen with purity when you have filled that space with fear and wound.  And we all have done it.  We have held onto relationships, dynamics, cycles, numbing agents, whatever…. to cover and ease our dis-ease.

There is a reason there are so many support groups for people who dance with love and sex addiction, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, gambling addiction, food addiction, smoking addiction.  All ways to escape and stay numb rather than face what is hurting us.  And the funny thin is….. these things also become part of what is hurting us and what keeps us from standing in a place of knowing love.

Fear cannot hold form when true love is present.   So, maybe that is the creation choice.  Do we create out of a place of love or are we creating out of a place of fear?

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

yosyama - thank you for your thoughts, you are very eloquent!

and jill again, thank you. i have been trying to formulate thoughts about how i mis-use alcohol at times - i don't feel it's an addiction, but often a self-medication.  i was at an event where self expression and acceptance are as prevelant as you'll ever see, and yet i felt a need to drink in order to truly let my guard down and be “myself”, as well as shutting up my over-active brain…  so your words are apt for me right now!

i'll be back again, i neglect these pods too much because i'm active on several other discussion forums and don't have enough hours in the day ;o)

love and joy to all of you -
katie

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Dear Katie, yosyama and Jill,

What light you all bring as you share! Yosyama, I always appreciate your teachings, and find them well-expressed. I wish I could speak your language at all, never mind as well as you speak English! I feel so frustrated and limited only being able to communicate fluently in French and English, and only knowing smatterings of Spanish, German, Italian, Koine Greek, Latin etc.

Love, peace and joy to you all,

Nicole

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

This has been such an interesting thread.

Just a few thoughts:

How do we define dark and light? In some thought systems there is yin and yang, and neither is associated with good or bad (although there is an association with dark and light). When there is discussion about our dark side, even honoring our dark side, it seems to hold the implicit judgement that this is our “bad” stuff. That's why we might talk about people putting their “best” self forward and hiding their shadow self. So what does that really mean and what makes it bad?

Thomas Moore talks about the distinction between spirit and soul, that “enlightenment” is associated with spirituality, whereas a quality that is soulful plumbs those juicy, heart-full, and often dark depths of ourselves. But both are valuable and rich aspects of our beings.

I love to garden, and I love compost. There is something so satisfying about taking what is discarded, rotting, decaying,  and tending and nurturing that to get the most fertile, rich and wonderful stuff imaginable and seeing beautiful plants grow out of it in the garden. Compost may be the dark side of the garden, but it is still full of goodness.

Just one other thought, about that idea that maybe some people “fake” a level of enlightenment beyond their everyday self: is that so bad? Even if it's done to impress and create a mask (and is there anyone who has never caught themselves doing that in a situation where they felt they had to work to measure up? Maybe not in the exact same situation, but how about that uncomfortable job interview, or a first date, or the first day of a challenging job? Not even a little bit?), sometimes we give ourselves the opportunity to try on the qualities we admire, want to embody and need to practice. And sometimes we might even find we can grow into them. Sometimes insecurity motivates us to grow stronger qualities, and sometimes the practice ground can get a little silly, we can overcompensate, get all full of ourselves, overact, say the “wrong” thing…but I hope that's ok, and that when I do it I can laugh at myself first so that everyone else will feel okay about laughing too, and then we can all go out and play.
Maybe in the dark.

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Hello guys, interesting discussion you have going.  I thought, I would compliment what you are saying with a personal example:

The part of myself I didn't want to see, or what I kept hidden from myself was how I allowed other's to treat me badly.  Since high school, I had some friends who never really liked me, but I refused to see my friend's as disliking me.  Consequently,  I allowed them to put me down for ten years.  My friends, are of the religious right, and I am not.  As far as I could tell, they looked down at me, for being New Age.   I tried to close off all the New Age parts of myself, for I never mentioned tarot cards, astrology, or charkas around my friends.  However, not sharing my New Age interests with my friends left me feeling ashamed and like a weirdo.   Before I chose to discontinue contact with my friends and still called for get-togethers, I wasn't conscious that I was afraid to be alone. 

After realizing my fear of being without friends, I did what used to be unthinkable to me. I erased their numbers from my phone, and deleted  their email addresses from my book.  My friends, who never really liked me in the first place, will never call me or write, so it is over, but it was over a long time ago; I just couldn't admit it.   If I wasn't able to embraced my fear of being without friends, I would still be friends with people who think their way is right ,and everyone who has a different way is worng. 

When I erased my friends from my life, I had this unusual sensation of happiness.  A sensation I hadn't felt in a long time. Finally sticking up for myself, I found a kind of euphoric state that lasted several days.  Even if dumping my friends means I don't have any friends, at least I found the beginnings of happiness.  I thought, I would be a complete loser without friends, but I don't feel that way at all.  Instead, I feel free.    

In conclusion, happiness is a choice, and one way to choose to be happy, at least for me,  is to see what I normally don't want to see.  I wouldn't say, I am completely happy, but I am working my way to that goal.  I was very afraid to be without friends, but once I acknowledged my loneliness fear, I was able to over come it. 

Acceptance of the complete self is happiness.  I am not there yet, but I feel I am one step closer. No longer am I friends with mean people.  I am not exactly the same person I was before.  I could only make this change by looking at what I didn't want to see, my choosing friendships that hurt me.

Thanks Rapunzel, and all others

I, too, read/study Thomas Moore and I had very similar thoughts as I read through this thread.  One additional teaching of his (besides those you have already mentioned) is that, from the SOUL's point of view “success” and “failure” are not differentiated.  It is the experience that matters, and BOTH can serve as food for soul expansion, (metaphor mine.)  I find Moore's teaching(s),  that acceptance of our own personal realities is absolutely necessary for conscious expansion, to be  very helpful—as long as we are confident we serve a “healthy ego”, not one out of control.  I hope I have expressed this clearly/accurately. I enjoy the discussion, thanks for the posts. 

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Hi ((((((((ALL)))))))))
I am Marina, I live in the Netherlands, iam member for a few weeks, not writing much and NOW I am ! :-)


May I suggest another one (view) please?

When WE (the People) Keep on looking at this in duality … we will “handle” it in duality.
When we see things as WHOLE, we will become whole.

Embrace ALL sides of you … !
(maybe there is a 3rd one too?)

… give energy to important things, whoops …. are there unimportants things then ??

There is a quick way of re-viewing things of your past :
ASK (of universe) : why this event is like this in your life.
You will get a flashback, feeling etc of that moment to show you when you forgot to follow the language of your heart.
(thas in the movie WTBDWK too!)

Ho'oponopono is a good way of feeling we are one and correcting what went “wrong” in the past.
Stay in the NOW!
The now moment gives us a really good chance to LIVE NOW< so not in the past or future, and center our energies to focus on Love.
If you feel you need to cry, be angry, and cannot do the suggested things here, please cry and be angry, dont bottle up, let it run freely to release it and then MOVE on!
Get on with your life! :-)
You are very strong, beautiful BEing of Light, An unique person with ALL Love inside!

Much Love, Marina

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

thank you to everyone who posted! this is a great discussion. 

marina - yes, what is duality but two sides of one coin? we still consider it one coin, as a whole. 

i think part of embracing what i termed the dark or shadow side is accepting it as who we are, part of us. by doing that, and no longer ignoring it, we eliminate the duality.  i don't actually think of myself as having “sides” - just on inner journeys, the one path goes deeper than others and it's a dark and sometimes scary path - but by exploring it we can bring it into perspective and no longer be scared or fearful.

must run now, but thank you and namaste!

katie

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Greetings,

When one is forced to reflect on the darker regions of their nature the key is not to just shake your head at it or ignore it, but to transmute it into light so that it may benefit you rather then dibilitate your efforts…

Namaste

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Now that's what I'm talking about….

good on ya….

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

One of the things I know to be true is if I ask a group of people to list their strengths and then list their weaknesses….. most of their weaknesses will be their strengths being used in unhealthy ways.

I can be assertive or aggressive
Compassionate or co-dependent
Nurturing or smothering
Supportive or reaching out to hold the bag
etc. etc. etc.

I think we need to own and pull out the patterns or behaviors we do that do not serve us, or that leave us in a place where we do not grow.  We need to look at them and own them and then yes… transmutate them.  But it has to start with accountability. 

I've loved “listening” to everyone on this thread.

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

OK not sure if this is the right placbut just need to talk

What happens when you hit empty - when you really feel down in the dumps.
When your mind and your body just get so very weak
How do you lift yourself up again
carry on walking, raise your spirit , lift your eyes to the sky and feel the warm glow
Im trying so very hard but all i see is emptiness and fear within

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Talk to somebody you trust and perhaps meditate on the emptiness. Find the witness, the observer within you and witness this feeling of emptiness. And if that is not possible than if you don't already have one buy a pet (cat) and hold it, love it, and call it a bundle of possibilities.

Good day,

The Buddhist

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

hye Fredie

What happens when i hit empty - when i really feel down in the dumps, is first off all total panic. as this feel as utmost emergency, a state of possible death or very nearing it, or an emotional death, one tries to escape by all means, but then if you are not dead already (?) you have escaped and escaping you can;  by being with someone alive and positive, someone who cares for you, and the best is perhaps off line, in real life, but as you addressed this place, let us see…

the first is that you and me we are still alive, this may or may not deserve a slight grin, but what if you hit emptiness again..? that is the fear of hitting it again and again…well, there are a few things to take into account; first is that being with someone who is literally happy and especially one who knows how hard it can be; this surely helps.

Then; there is a question of life preservation not only in a physical way but also one can not really show his face to others when so empty, as i used to be that low; i was deeply shameful for being like that - and you know what, i was ashamed because this kind of state or level of emotions was never put out, met, shared or worked on. People who in their turn do feel so bad, have you rather stay with it because this is frightening.

 you have not mentioned fear, as deep feeling down in the dumps fear is inevitable, and as far as each one feels so excluded and out, moments like that are doors to find goodness, to find friends and even love - this is my lesson
 
perhaps i know very little, so let's have some more of us reply here..

namaste

Re: input please! co-creating vs. facing our dark sides

Thomas Moore says to build an altar to Saturn, an altar to what is dark and heavy and slow and sad…I love this idea, and I interpret it as kind of a little goth altar and have been called to do this on several occassions, with interesting results. Infusing the dark with creativity rather than just running away from it seems to be fertile ground, for me, at least.
But there is also a point of choosing not to wallow in that place, not to keep building the neural net that supports depression and negativity, by consciously making other choices and taking other actions, even if they feel initially empty. Find three things that hold some kind of joy for you and nurture them, play with them, give them attention every day. Then find three more. Do something nice for someone else, especially anonymously. Practice benevolent mischief. Paint your bedroom. Paint your face. Make a mask. Write down your dreams every night and write a poem about them in the morning.
And the other part that is essential for me is, use your body. Run, dance (even if you can only bring yourself to dance when no one's looking!), chop wood, weed the garden, go hiking, climb a mountain, practice yoga, drum, learn to juggle, become a fire-twirler, learn to walk on your hands, splash in the water - just celebrate and honor the experience of being here in a body.
Sometimes effort is required and you are the only one who can make that effort, and sometimes you have to push along uphill for awhile, but at the crest of the hill there's an amaing view. And then after awhile, when you build up the consciousness-muscles to do it, going uphill gets a bit easier (that whole neural net thing).
Or anyway, this is what works in my life.

Re: soul vs ego

i have added this as a seperate post yet i felt compelled to answer directly:

how to make peace with the ego:

sacrafice is obviously the key but when it comes to the greater awareness of the benefits of sacrafice it becomes difficult. the way i see it: nowadays every time i sacrafice an egotistical desire the impending results always supercede the original desire in a way that i wouldnt of even begun to both contemplate and comprehend. each and every time im surprised beyond initial recognition and it confirms and supports my approach to the co-creation of my soul's evolution. it was never always like that, originally being sceptical was the only rationale i could administer but upon further investigation i could no longer deny the synchronistic element that was naturally unfolding before my very only sub-conscious and conscious eyes (you dont need eyes to see, you need vision!!!). beginning with a little faith is always an advantage, yet the further commitment required is definetly freewill based. but transcending the ego is beyond the mechanics of a third dimensional, dualistic subjective experience…love/hate, yin/yang, positive/negative, light/dark!

the point is to learn to spiritually overcome the ego which dominates your consciousness from the very time you are born and subjected to your environmental conditioning and surrounding. thats why death, tragedy and change are inherently required to create and enforce transformation and evolution…

learn to become friends and help progress your egotistical character cos without our ego we would dissolve into the beach of God…I am happy (maybe egotistically) being a conscious (god) grain of sand on the beach of god…

any thoughts?