This past weekend I made three SoulCollage® cards including
this one I’m calling “The Shadow.” It is in the Council suit. I must admit that this process, vs. art journaling, remains the constant in trying to track my life creatively.
Before I write about this card a la SoulCollage® language, I turned to Wikipedia to define the shadow. As you may know, in Jungian psychology, the shadow or "shadow aspect" is a part of the unconscious mind consisting of repressed weaknesses, shortcomings, and instincts. It is one of the three most recognizable archetypes, the others being the anima, the animus, and the persona. "Everyone carries a shadow," Jung wrote, "and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is." It may be (in part) one's link to more primitive animal instincts, which are superseded during early childhood by the conscious mind. (Jung's Red Book illustrations are revealing examples of the Shadow.)
According to Jung, the shadow, in being instinctive
and irrational, is prone to project, turning a personal inferiority into a
perceived moral deficiency in someone else. Jung writes that if these
projections are unrecognized "The projection-making factor (the Shadow
archetype) then has a free hand and can realize its object--if it has one--or
bring about some other situation characteristic of its power." These
projections insulate and cripple individuals by forming an ever thicker fog of
illusion between the ego and the real world.
Jung also believed that "in spite of its function as a
reservoir for human darkness—or perhaps because of this—the shadow is the seat
of creativity."
Now, for my take on the card. Because I have carried low grade depression all my life, I have programmed myself to look at life positively. So, I am the one who intellectually knows about the shadow part of myself, but I don’t allow myself to dwell there for very long. In fact, sometimes I build a wall around myself so I don’t have to feel that part of myself. I am the one, however, who dances provocatively in low light, casting a shadow on the wall. I am the one who knows she needs to “dance with death,” but often avoids it so it hovers like a raven, leaving its own ever-present shadow. I am the one who creates endless feminine art pieces and has a hard time incorporating the animus. I rarely incorporate males into my art, but I note that one has snuck in this card, a voyeur perhaps, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I am dancing for him. I have always had a tendency to adapt to what I think a male wants me to be.
If I could ask this card a question it would probably be, like so many of my SoulCollage® card questions, “How can I better incorporate the shadow into my persona without upsetting the equilibrium of my mission to remain positive about life?”
