The Shadow

There once was a King whose kingdom was rich in plants with healing properties, fields of beautiful flowers, natural oceans alive with millions of various species of fish and seabed plant life, and skies that were full of diverse and amazing birds and species that flew in the air, whistling and singing beautiful harmonies of the spheres. His kingdom was known as the Middle Kingdom. The citizens of the Middle Kingdom were organic farmers who sowed and reaped bountiful harvests due to their knowledge of the phases of the moon, sailors who knew the secrets of the tides and waves, astrologers who observed the seasons and the times suited to various tasks and projects, and magicians who knew the secrets of life. The Middle Kingdom had great natural wealth and magical power, yet the King was insecure.

Whilst his kingdom was rich in natural resources, it was landlocked.

To the East he was bounded by a kingdom of great material power, bankers, stockbrokers, financial advisers, and technology gurus. In the South, he was bounded by a kingdom of great artists, actors, musicians, film producers and creative directors. In the West, lay a kingdom full of sensuality, sexual hedonism, dancing, and gastronomic delights. To the North, the King faced a kingdom of enormous physical strength and might. The subjects were proud of their physique and their beauty; the men were physically strong and the women outstanding in beauty and allure.

The King of the Middle Kingdom lived in fear of the surrounding kingdoms, yet he also secretly envied them. He shared his secret envy with no-one. He was both afraid and envious, of the prosperity in the Kingdom on the East, the passion and creativity of the Kingdom of the South, the sensuality of the Kingdom of the West and the physical strength in the Kingdom of the North.    

A day came when the Middle Kingdom was invaded by the Kingdom of the East. Their army was brash and confident. Their arms were state-of-the art technology and limitless wealth. They came to buy land from the citizens of the Middle Kingdom and to hire the astrologers, magicians and moon farmers so that they could input the secrets of life, the cosmos and nature into the giant computers in the Eastern Kingdom and produce even more material wealth for themselves. The citizens of the Middle Kingdom were greatly tempted and took to the streets to pressurise the King to agree to the Eastern Kingdom’s demands. They swarmed onto the steps of the King’s palace chanting, “we want money! We want wealth!”

Also greatly tempted, but afraid of the consequences that would follow selling out to the Kingdom of the East, the King ordered that all the army invaders from the East, and the protesters from his own kingdom be imprisoned for life! He ordered his own army to “Shut them all away in the deepest dungeon. Feed them only bread and water and keep them in darkness. I don’t want ever to see or hear from them again!”

Thinking he was safe from the invaders from the Eastern Kingdom, the King returned to his duties. But a few days later, he was once again interrupted by one of his messengers, banging loudly on the palace door.

“Your Highness!” the messenger gasped, “We are being invaded again!”

The King was shocked and appalled. The armies of the Southern Kingdom were advancing on the Middle Kingdom, with their weapons of music, beautiful women, charismatic men, storytellers, and enchanters. “They are putting our citizens under their spell,” cried the messenger. “Even our army is powerless, hypnotised by the images and stories that their armies are able to create!”

  The King was furious. He commanded that the invaders from the Southern Kingdom be hunted down immediately and thrown into the darkest dungeon that could be dug into the ground. “Make sure that they can’t escape!” the King exclaimed, “They must never see the light of day again, for the rest of their lives!”

Satisfied that the threat was over and that his subjects had gone back to the fields, the King returned to his duties in ruling the Middle Kingdom. Several days passed peacefully. Yet again, he was interrupted when he least expected it, by the news that another invasion was taking place, led by the vast number of citizens from the Kingdom that lay in the West.

The King jumped to his feet. “Who? Where? When? What do they want?”

“They are from the Western Kingdom,” the messenger blurted out. “They are tempting our citizens in every part of our kingdom. They are doing it now, as we speak, and no-one can stop them!”

“What do they want?” asked the King in desperation.

“They want to seduce our men and our women away, to have them leave our kingdom and return with them to the Kingdom in the West.”

“What weapons do they have?”

The messenger was embarrassed as he answered, “Beauty, allure, sexuality; they offer pleasure. Fire, food and passion to fill the belly. High excitement and release from constraint!”

The King panicked and immediately ordered his army to be assembled. “Hunt down the invaders from the Western Kingdom. Either kill them or throw them in the darkest and deepest dungeon that we have. Throw away the key. Lock them up for life!”

Confident that his kingdom was safe, the King relaxed his vigilance and became unaware and unattentive to any further potential dangers or threats from invasion. “After all”, he thought, “all my enemies have been locked away in the dungeons we have dug in the ground. They are out of sight, he reasoned, and won’t be able to bother me any longer.” But he was wrong!

Yes, you’ve guessed. Soon, news reached the King that another invasion was taking place, this time from the Kingdom in the North. The armies of the Northern Kingdom came with their great physical strength. They broke through the defences that had been built around the border of the Middle Kingdom. The whole land was taken by the sheer might and strength of the Northern Kingdom’s armies. The King of the Middle Kingdom was captured and had no alternative but to surrender. He seemed powerless against the strength and power of the invading force. It appeared that all was lost.

But the King of the North made a strategic error. He ordered the King of the Middle Kingdom to be taken to the same dark dungeon in which all the other prisoners had been sent. The King was horrified. He feared the other prisoners there. “They will kill me,” he thought. “I will never survive there. Those prisoners are so repulsive! I don’t want to even see them, let alone meet them personally!” Despite his pleas for mercy, the invading king threw the King of the Middle Pillar into the deep, dark dungeon. And there, in solitary confinement, he lay awake throughout the night in his dark, cold, lonely cell.

In the middle of the night, someone approached the door of his cell. Keys rattled in the door, and it slowly opened with an eerie creaking sound. The King looked to see who it was at the door of his cell. A thoroughly horrible, ghostly being stood facing him. Terrified, the King asked, “Who are you?”

“I am the Guardian of the Threshold.”

“Who? What . . . ?”

“Do you remember all those invaders from the Kingdoms of the South, the West, the East and finally, the North? Do you recall how you feared them, gave instructions for them to be hunted down, captured and thrown into the deepest and darkest dungeon in your Kingdom?”

“I do,” the King replied meekly.

“Are you aware that they are but mirror images, reflections of yourself?”

The Guardian continued, “they are what that great psychologist Carl Jung called the Shadow. They are the Vāsanās of the Hindu philosophy, Dwellers on the Threshold as they are known in Western esoteric tradition. They have been created by your own unresolved fears and unconscious desires. In actuality, the dungeon is your own subconscious mind. Many of these entities are so repugnant to you that you have imprisoned them in a special dungeon called the Unconscious. You have incarcerated them in the deepest dungeon of all because you haven’t been willing to admit that they are part of your own psyche.”

The King looked shocked and dazed. Nevertheless, he listened to the Guardian intently. Everything was making sense to him.

“What can I do?” he asked. “What can I do to get free of my fear of these aspects of myself?”

 “Come with me,” the Guardian said. “I will take you to meet them, one by one.”

“But they will hate me. They want to kill me, to shame me, to terrorise me.”

The Guardian smiled compassionately. “No, that is simply what you have come to believe they want. Have you ever wondered what they might need? If they are a deep part of you, have you ever wondered what you might have needed at one time in your life . . . and when you didn’t get what you needed you created a shadow; a lonely self, frightened and ashamed. Now come with me and meet your own shadows.”

And starting that night, the King of the Middle Kingdom followed the Guardian of the Threshold along the narrow passages underground and met the imprisoned entities one by one. He discovered they were not as ugly and repulsive as he had thought them to be and the longer he spent getting to know them, the less ugly and unacceptable they became. So much so that they metamorphosised into a different form. And just as the Guardian had suggested, they never wanted to invade the Middle Kingdom with malicious intent, but had come in need, and in search of help from the King.

Over time, the King lost his fear of the citizens of the three kingdoms that surrounded the Middle Kingdom. The four kingdoms united and became such a powerful force combining material security, technology, art and creativity, sensuality, sexuality and physical health and strength that it became a most powerful Kingdom of the World.

And that is my explanation of the Shadow and the Unconscious.

 Faith over Fear,

David

Watch out for next week’s blog: “The Vital Fluid ”

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