One Step Further

This wonderful illustration by Marcos Alvarado shows our life in three stages:

Before inner work, dragging around the ballast of our unprocessed life experiences, stress, trauma. Burdened by the negative charge of our wounding that keeps surfacing in our choices, patterns and triggering. The stuck energies of difficult emotions, negative beliefs and somatic pain haunt us at every turn. They attack, sabotage and undermine us until we start to unpack them consciously.

During therapy shows that courage is required to face our inner demons. Shadow work is not for the faint hearted. We all need strength and maturity to turn towards the pain, rather than keep avoiding, distracting, using our addictions to numb. We also need a good holistic psychologist to hold space, map what is going on for us, facilitate the process work and celebrate the wins with us!

After therapy we see the person lighter and freer, walking now hand in hand with their wounding. The ghosts look happier and cooperative now, not so scary and attacking. More a supportive truce of acceptance and collaboration.

I suggest there needs to be one more frame in the series; Reintegration.

Imagine the person turned in loving embrace towards the previously hidden parts. Imagine these once demonic parts fully released from the darkness of fear-guilt-rage, transmuted into light. See them restored to a childlike innocence, reintegrated into the wholeness of the individual and contributing in a positive way to their ongoing life. The gifts that struggle and challenge bring are fully unwrapped now, adding strength, resilience, empathy and other priceless qualities to our soul character.

When we fully heal our trauma, the parts of us once buried in the darkness of difficult experience are liberated back to their true nature of truth, beauty, goodness. Eventually, we are fully restored to our stature as children of Source, yet somehow stronger, wiser, more compassionate for the journey into darkness now completed.