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Explore Your Unconscious Mind (Shadow)
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Explore Your Subconscious Mind (Intuition)
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Explore Your Superconscious Mind (Inspiration)
Explore Your Unconscious Mind (Shadow)
A Simple Intuitive Collage Exercise to Discover the Parts of Your Personality That Need Love and Attention
Today, we are going to explore your unconscious mind which hides the shadow parts of you that feel insecure, unacceptable, emotionally needy, ashamed or rejected.
Psychiatrist Carl Jung believed that the Shadow could provide profound insight about the missing pieces of our character, and it could be damaging to our lives if not seen, acknowledged and integrated.
Repression, or the failure to embrace your Shadow creates psychological distress. And, your Shadow cannot be destroyed. Even if it is repressed into the dark basement of your psyche now, it will press up to the surface at some point in your life to create havoc so that it must be healed.
Collage as a Form of Psychological Projection
Typically, we reject the parts of ourselves that were socially shamed in the past. We learn to dislike parts of ourselves, and then defensively project our Shadow onto others.
Because projections occur unconsciously, I love to utilize collage to consciously project my activated emotions onto images and words, so that I can better see and accept the rejected parts of myself.
Intuitive collage involves choosing images and words that have an emotional charge, so that you can see and heal your shadow.
Why Would You Want to Heal Your Shadow?
If you are unable to accept your Shadow, you will struggle with low self-esteem and negative perceptions about yourself. If you do not heal your shadow, your negative self-perceptions can accumulate over time and overwhelm you. Negative self-perceptions lead to anxiety and depression.
Even the act of simply acknowledging your shadow traits through intuitive collage, and accepting them into your current reality, will bring more balance to your mental and emotional landscape and will heal anxiety and depression.
Once accepted, it is possible to transform all your shadow energies into positive energy. It is not easy to do Shadow work, though the fruits are worth the challenge. Bringing your shadow fully into the light where it belongs can lead to tremendous well-being and joy.
