The Shadow-Self

Blessings, Courageous Ones!

I write to you on this grey afternoon; the drenching, quenching rain has finally moved on and the gentle twinkling blue and white lights on my Yule tree are warming my heart.  Even as a Summer-baby, I find so much to love in this time of year:  the darkness—giving us opportunity to truly delve into ourselves, to know and learn more about our Dear Shadow-Self—and the beautiful, hopeful lights that we bring within both our homes and our bodies, like the Hermit’s sacred lantern.  This is the solar point of the cycle that matches the waning Moon; we move closer and closer to that moment of greatest darkness, greatest Mystery, and greatest opportunity for fertilizing and preparing our internal soil for those seeds of dreams we wish to plant in preparation for the quickening at Imbolc.

It is auspicious that during this Dark part of the Wheel I am co-teaching a class about the Dark Moon.  My co-teacher, Lady Carolina Amor, and I have structured this class so that it is not just about learning magick for the Dark Moon, but that it is about the dark of the Self as well, the Hidden Self, the Shadow.  It is our intention that this additional layer provides a strong foundation for self-exploration for all of our students, but also for ourselves.  Carolina and I have a shared desire for lifelong learning, continual deep work, self-knowledge, and understanding.

This work is the epitome of solitary work, yet in this group of ten women there is a feeling of solidarity and support as we each encounter those aspects of ourselves that were hidden, forgotten, shunned, and intentionally set away in the dark.  I know this for myself to be a never-ending process—as I examine each layer, another one waits just below it.  As I spiral closer to who I am truly meant to be, I must be willing to go deeper and deeper, into places within myself that might initially seem scary or impossible to face.  During this time of year, I always feel the necessity to descend, like Inanna, into the depths of my Soul and see what is there.  What serves me?  What holds me back?  What can be released?  What must be brought up into the Light and given its rightful place in the multifaceted being that is me?

We are working with several texts in this class, but the two that are currently speaking the most to me are The Secret of the Shadow by Debbie Ford, and The Wisdom of the Enneagram by Don Richard Riso and Russ Hudson.  Both of these books have practical journaling exercises that are helping me to find clarity in the layers of myself that I have ignored or only taken the time to get know in a cursory way. 

Debbie Ford writes about how we all have a Divine purpose, and how every single aspect of us and our lives contribute an essential ingredient that allows us to fulfill our Divine purposes.  This is a concept I’ve always embraced without truly delving into it, and I am really enjoying how far she takes it.  She writes about how each of us has a unique destiny—a gift that absolutely no one else can offer to the world.  She talks about how the stories we tell ourselves are ways we use to limit ourselves and define ourselves so that we don’t feel lost in the world.  When we listen closely to the story we tell ourselves about ourselves, we can find our shadow beliefs that control our “words, thoughts, and behaviors.”   Once we recognize our stories as stories, we can access the “exact ingredients we need to become the people we always longed to be.  Inside each of our stories is a Divine recipe for a most extraordinary life.”

The Wisdom of the Enneagram is allowing me to acknowledge my Shadow Self from a different perspective, the perspective of a certain “type.”  As Riso and Hudson write, “…what our hearts yearn for is to know who we are and why we are here.”  Yes!  This is exactly why I choose to know my Shadow and why I have doggedly continued to work on this relationship with my inner Self for so many years.  I am looking to learn, to transform, and to manifest who and what I am meant to be in this lifetime, in this time and place.

As I move towards completion of the Ethics class I’ve been taking since September, I find myself reflecting upon how much of this course has centered around the necessity for Clergy to be aware of who we are:  What character traits do I have?  What are my behaviors?  What do I value?  What biases do I hold?  What are my beliefs?  So many things in my life right now are whirlpooling around self-knowledge, and the journey towards knowing myself as much as I possibly can in this lifetime. What about you?

Blessed be,

Lady Jesamyn Angelica

HP, Sisterhood of the Moon