Yesterday (Sunday) around 11:00 p.m., I said to myself, “What the hell happened today?”

I reviewed the day: lots of unhealthy eating. HOURS surfing the internet. Diversionary porn. (You know what I’m talking about.) Oh yeah…napping, impetuous DVD purchases, begging off my goddaughters’ birthday party (!), and watching about 5 hours of DVDs.

What happened to me? That is NOT how I intended to spend the day. I felt viciously ambushed by sloth. Or perhaps ambushed disinterestedly. Hard to say. Who knew that sloth could mount an actual attack?

Well, it only took me 2/3 of a second to think of my shadow mission, that mission I use to destroy all the beautiful works in my life and the lives of others. Shadow: that part of us that lives just beyond consciousness, the things we repress and deny. It’s not that I actually *want* a shadow or the articulation of a shadow mission. But according to Carl Jung, I already have one. (So do you.) In fact, unless I’m aware of this shadow mission, I’m likely to undercut myself over and over, in sundry, subtle ways.

Luckily, I do have a pretty decent understanding of my shadow mission and have articulated into actual words that I can repeat to myself. A few years ago, a warrior I greatly respect told me once that you should be absolutely ashamed to say your shadow mission aloud. It should disgust you – that’s how you know you’re not bullshitting yourself. You read it, say it aloud, and think “Ugh. I wish that wasn’t true.” That’s how you know that you nailed it.

Sometimes the most useful thing that would happen in my Wednesday I-group was when a man would listen to me venting and gnashing my teeth, vexed and vigorous, and then quietly ask me, “And what’s your shadow mission?” Oh. That. Turns out my ranting and seething was actually me churning that shadow mission into frothy, judgmental paste.

So as soon as I asked myself yesterday, ‘What is up with this crazy, lazy, obnoxious day?’ the answer came immediately: I’m living my shadow mission today.

My shadow mission: : I destroy relationships by swallowing my anger, worshipping food and comfort, and focusing on who is wrong.

Ah. Yes. That pretty much describes the day. Worshipping food and comfort? Check. Destroying a relationship with my goddaughter by hanging out at home? Check.

But why so strongly today?

Usually, shadow is not this ON or OFF thing…it’s subtle, sneaky, little guerilla tactics. Why was today Winter ShadowFest 2007.

That answer came right away as well: I’m moving towards a bigger mission. I created a post recently (actually, the previous one, Year of Wonders) describing moving into a wild, risk-taking adventure. Friday night I cancelled my gym membership, the first small step towards creating that new reality – one in which I travel or take a year off “conventional work.” Saturday I discussed this idea at a dinner party and found my friends wildly supportive and rushing to give me excellent resources.

Saturday night, I dreamt about one of the resource websites all night: organic farming volunteer work in Italy. All night!

And then, Sunday.

The thing about shadow is this: it’s scared. And scarred. And like a twelve-year-old boy, it acts tough and tries to put on a big show, when what it really wants to do is cry a little bit and be afraid. It doesn’t really care for all this ‘mission crap.’ My shadow just wants Oreo cookies and to watch another hour of television. (Raise your hand if any of this sounds familiar.)

So after taking a few concrete steps towards manifesting an outrageous, spectacular golden idea, my shadow kicked in using every big gun it could draw. Because I wasn’t really fully processing what was happening, I kept saying to myself all day, “I need this. I’m tired. I need a day off.”

Only at 11:00 p.m. last night did I say, ‘What the hell happened today?’

And the answer came almost immediately.

I had a lovely IM chat with my brother Matt this afternoon and while discussing my Year of Wonders and yesterday’s ShadowFest, he asked me, “So how do you stop this shadow stuff?”

There’s the million dollar question.

I have found that if I say to my shadow, “STOP IT. YOU’RE BAD AND I WON’T BE STOPPED BY YOU!” it sorta shrugs (as much as a hallucination of a concept can) and continues to go about its business. To scream, to yell, and generally berate my shadow has almost no impact on it. In fact, I think shadow kinda likes that. All that outrage and inner judgment is like snicky-snacks to a shadow mission. Bring it on.

What I have found to be more effective for me is to embrace this shadow like the mischievous twelve-year-old and say, “What are ya doin’ there, Champ? I see what you’re up to. You just need a little attention.”

As one might expect with actual twelve-year-olds, that sort of attention has an effect of driving it away.

Shadow doesn’t go away forever…it shows up again. And it has many different appearances. But it also provided me this gift: it showed up SO HUGE yesterday because I’m pursuing a path that’s powerful. Shadow by its fearful, reflective nature, bares its teeth at the true mission. Because in the end, shadow is afraid of power.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 19th, 2007 at 10:12 pm and is filed under Warrior. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.