A value that lights me up is joy, the deep soul fulfilment of happiness that is beyond any thing or action, but just emanates from us. Yet my experience is that those people who really personify joy are those who have been willing to face into their pain, hurt or depression with an honesty that requires considerable bravery.

Reflecting on my own process and those of my clients, I see again and again that whatever someone’s ‘superpower’ is, there is usually some kryptonite close by. For instance, those with the clearest thought have often spent much time living with doubt, those who are emotionally and physically brave have and do live with bone shaking fear when they take their next risk to do something amazing.

It might sound strange to assert that clarity of thought and the fogginess of doubt can coexist in a person. However, if we could just take our ‘nemesis’ selves out of the shadows for long enough to see them, we might find there is wisdom hiding in their imperfect ways.

Getting friendly with your shadow self

Let’s take doubt, the sucking, confusing, de-energising space of doubting oneself, others, life, often at the most inopportune moments as we want to make key decisions. In fact, you might have become so used to doubt in your life, that you just don’t make decisions very much now, or let circumstance choose for you, the pressure of owning a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ choice is just too much.

Can you feel its power already? This doubt has substance, a commitment to show up regularly and some significant ju ju behind it! Basically it’s pretty motivated to have its voice heard so the question is, what is motivating it? If you could step into the shoes of your doubtful self (rather than ignore, banish or judge her), what would the behind the scenes interview reveal?

Maybe ‘I need some space to connect to me’, ‘I’m overwhelmed by the size of this choice’, ‘I’ve lost touch with what I want’, ‘can I really have this?’, ‘how can I trust myself?’.

These are all core, transformational starting points of inquiry for exploring how you can be more of who you want to be. If you heard them in a good friend’s voice you would likely feel compassion, perhaps even admiration for their willingness to own and face their vulnerabilities. In short, these ‘shadow’ qualities are often hiding the sparkly gems of self fulfilment and empowerment that we are all looking for.

So what if you could relax the tightness you hold around that which you ‘shouldn’t be’? What if you could see doubt or fear as one expression of your life energy right now that brings insight and is always seeking to evolve? What if you could even make friends with and enjoy this subconscious aspect of you? Maybe even bring kindness and a smile as you greet them? If you could, all the energy that’s currently put into the self conflict of not being something would be free to create personal transformation based on self acceptance.

Plus (having seen the surprise and delight of clients making this shift), rather bizarrely, ‘shadow work’ starts to feel amazing because you are no longer at war with yourself. This is such a sweet journey where the shadow’s creative power is returned to you and it becomes part of your rich textured inner landscape.

How the Legendary Heroines create self empowerment through wholeness

I often work with the archetypes of the feminine when seeking to get the bigger picture for my clients. According to Jung, archetypes are patterns of our collective conscious and the myths and legends surrounding the Gods and Goddesses are psychologically speaking our symbolic maps for personal growth. As I speak about in the Heroine's Journey, the journey of the Heroine (our inner feminine) is different from the journey of the Hero (inner masculine).

Indeed the Goddess maps provide some unexpected keys to how to access our true potential and power. For Instance Lakshmi, the goddess of abundance and joy, was born out of a great war between the Gods and demons. Through conscious witnessing of this churning ocean of anger and conflict Lakshmi, the elixir of life, was born. Or Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty and love born from the sea, with her unusual conception through a great argument between Gaia and Uranus, resulting in Uranus cut penis falling in the waters of life!

So perhaps love and beauty is not all about being nice and sweet and acceptable? Perhaps abundance and joy is not all about being positive and smiling lots? Of course these are caricatures of our societal obsession with ‘being good’, yet I suspect that you, like me, can see seeds of that thinking backing up personal justifications to be critical in ways that are potentially self sabotaging?

The Goddess myths free us from this good-bad polarity through a Radical Wholeness. They say that it’s not only that the shadow is useful to our growth, but rather that it’s an essential and integral part of becoming our greatest potential.

“Often the shadow is the most vivid, alive, creative part of ourselves, and it has to be taken back from others and returned to us.”
Barbara Somers ‘The Fires of Alchemy’

So what if you could just put down the ‘shadow is bad’ protest banner? Perhaps you would discover that right now, in your imperfect state, you have all the ingredients of stepping up into the legendary Heroine in your life.

The Heroine’s perspective is that all of life is connected, and that harmony comes from being in right relationship to everything around you, even those parts of us that you would rather not recognise. It’s one of the greatest powers on the Heroine’s Journey, the unilateral choice to love, include, be kind and fair. As I share in ‘3 Lessons in How to be Fierce and Commpassionate', this is not about being a walk over, or accepting unacceptable behaviour. Rather it’s knowing you are sovereign in your own space, relationships and experience and that means not fearing the shadowy depths, but reclaiming your hidden self and all the potential she holds.

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