So what it comes down to is this… You are what you think you are, and you also are what you think you are not. You don’t identify everything as being something you are not, but you do come across these things ever day in other peoples behaviour  (or so you think) or in philosophies or attitudes expressed through communications channels, conversation or media. Not everything disturbs you, but some things do.

Or so we think? Indeed, they have a deeper root and more substance than we give them credit for. Our inner demons are quite lively. It’s your pet peeves. Those things that are special to you that specially hurt or offend you. These are your shadow self, and your subconscious mind does think of them, sees the world filtered through them, tries to plan and anticipate what it should do “when you are not looking” so to speak. You have a collection of experiences, everything from human physical characteristics to key words or even choices of dress or even things like cars or houses, a whole vista of prejudices, a whole world of things you don’t like, things you choose not to believe though you have thought none of it over, and you are in control of none of it. It controls you.

Is it presumptuous of me to say that I think I have felt or been aware of my own shadow thoughts? Oh, not at all. You can which is what makes the world-wide habit of ignoring them even more of an issue. You can sense that even though you consciously “feel all right” that you are having a nightmare at the very same time. Even though you are genuinely fond of your best friend you also hold them in contempt. Though you swear you would never hurt a soul you can sense an inclination to intensely violent actions. Is this what you mean? Like people imagining hauling off and slugging a cop even when the cop didn’t do anything wrong. He may have even been polite. The thoughts are there. You feel like you would just “feel like it.”

So, is this something we can just ignore? They say stress related illness is the world’s biggest killer. They don’t even know what causes heart attacks. They have recently learned it is not things like saturated fat, or salt, or cholesterol. Can we just keep going on pretending like our world isn’t on the verge of insanity? Or is it really already insane?

Can we find sanity in our preferences? Or morals? Our ideals and fantasies of being the better person? Has anyone had any luck with that? The now deceased leader of the Westboro Baptist church did genuinely believe their churches actions were moral, even loving.

We do find it. Whether we manage it is the question.

The two worlds, that meet to make a singular real world, meet at the point of your perception. In each moment you have an opportunity to be fully present, to involve both sides of yourself. That shadow self is not actually a demon or out of your control. It has been running the show, running amok, only because you have pushed it behind the curtain. You should indeed pay attention to the little person behind the curtain, because they hold the other half of the truth.

Funny thing. If you do consciously consider those things you have ignored, shunned or neglected, those things you don’t like, they start looking really very relative. They can even seem attractive under the right circumstances. You can come to see that when your shadow self stepped in and made you act out of character, it was in a misguided way making you act more true to yourself than your conscious thinking really does.

When you really look at that shadow world, it doesn’t look very much different from the world as you have come to believe it is. Hell is unusual cases. It’s in the shadow world that some people find their positive attitudes because they have turned against themselves for so long, self vetoed so much. It’s only the shadow that remembers what it was like to feel and express genuine love or enthusiasm for those pleasures life gifts you with.

If you feel guilty about eating cookies and still eat the cookies, in time you will realize that it was the guilt that ruled your cookie eating, and you would never have been able to free yourself as long as you kept ignoring it, denying and rejecting it. Healing is often where you least expect it.

Comfort can be a poison. It’s actually a very popular poison, widely used, even carefully engineered these days. Comfort sources are the Monsanto of the psyche.

Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.

Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~