Loving Your Shadow

“What if we were to remind you that no one has a flaw?  What if we were to remind you that you are the spark of the Divine? What if we were to remind you that there are certain personality flaws that you chose to bring forth to work off your karma?  Therefore, you are in your truth, there is no flaw there. Whatever flaws you brought in with you were part of the lessons. It is kind of like using tools, using five or ten pound weights to help you get stronger. How does that shift the picture realizing those flaws are not flaws at all?  They are only tools.”
-Red Feather
 
We, Light workers, that’s you Dear Reader and me, are teachers. We came here to teach what we’ve learned from our own lives. This gives us meaning and purpose for the struggles of our lives. We can be of service in this way, through the experience of our own lives.

This understanding gives purpose for my personal inner conflict between wanting to be accepted and the desire to be my own person. I grew up with a feeling of lack of self-worth, a fear of not being enough, self-criticism and judgment, generalized anxiety, a fear of abandonment, a fear of life really, all of it pushing me, forcing me to find a place of balance and inner peace.

When I was younger my deepest prayer was for inner peace, refuge from the constant inner battle of my thoughts and emotions. Gradually, through pursuit of self-development and healing I found the tools that taught me to allow inner peace. That doesn’t mean I am always peaceful within. It means that I have the tools to return to inner peace when life throws me a curve ball. That then is what I have to teach and offer to others.

What have you learned on your path of inner healing?

Let’s take a new perspective on all of the perceived flaws that we came in with, those parts of ourselves that we reject as not good enough, not fitting into society, making us unlovable or unacceptable, our shadow selves.  What if as teachers we came in to live what we chose to teach so that we might serve in this way?

Imagine hundreds of thousands of teachers coming in to teach love, acceptance, forgiveness, in all of its myriad possibilities for expression. Hundreds of thousands of teachers, hundreds of thousands of individual approaches to learning about love throughout the world. The scope is mind-boggling and world changing as we each kindle the light within ourselves and then offer it to others.
 

Photo by C MA on Unsplash 

Your Spiritual Toolbox

Loving your shadow self, or even just making friends with it, can be challenging. Accepting those parts of yourself that for so long you have rejected because you believed those parts were unacceptable and unlovable may take time and practice.
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First, understand that you chose those parts of yourself for the growth and learning they make possible. There is loving purpose here, for as you heal and grow you are then able to offer your life experience as service and teaching simply by being all of who you are.

One of the most effective tools I know to grow into self-acceptance is deceptively simple. It is also surprisingly difficult.

Here it is.

At the beginning of the day, and at the end of the day, look into the mirror. Look directly into your own eyes and say out loud, “I love you.”

That’s it.

​Do this every day, twice a day for at least two weeks. Note how easy or difficult it is for you and if that changes over time.

I have personally been doing this exercise on and off for many years, and recommending it to my clients. I return to it when self-criticism and judgment turn up in my thoughts. It is amazing how something so simple can be at first so difficult, and yet grow into feeling so right and natural.