Teoría constructivista-pedagógica

Our shadow contains the characteristics that we might see in others, which we would not want to see in ourselves. It is the disowned part of our psyche. Because it is disowned from ‘in here’ we project it outwards, where it has to be mirrored back to us by others.

We create our own shadow as a result of our judgments. Everyone has a shadow. The bigger you are the bigger your potential shadow. Think of a tall tree in a field. The bigger the tree gets the bigger the shadow that it casts in the field. Usually, as light workers, we are focussed on light and love, and looking metaphorically speaking towards the sun. We cannot see our shadow because it is behind us. Ask our enemies however, and they will describe our shadow to a tee.

When we have an interaction with another person and we are upset by it, the characteristic that we identify in the other person that we do not like can generally be termed part of our shadow.

Lynda

Lynda was a spiritual aspirant who had been brought up by a controlling and domineering mother. Her mother had used threat and withholding of love to get Lynda, a sensitive and intelligent girl, to do what she wanted her to. After several years of study with her spiritual teacher, Lynda got really upset when another of the spiritual aspirants was given an opportunity that Lynda thought rightfully should have been hers. She felt envy, jealousy, and

resentment for the teacher, who in her mind was favoring the other student. Her fear of speaking up held her silent, because she feared that if she spoke her truth the teacher would send her away, just as her mother used to do.

The pressure built up in Lynda who finally was so mad that she wrote a blistering letter to her teacher, accusing him of all the things that she thought were going wrong, how unfair he was being and so on. The teacher immediately sent her love. He knew that this was Lynda’s shadow showing itself so that healing could take place. He calmly emailed back a message of love and encouragement, and asked her to come and speak with him.

Lynda had expected to be yelled at, told she was wrong and rejected. Her jealousy of the other student was the driving force for her angry outburst. The Master was able to tell her why the other student had been chosen, and to help Lynda see how this situation had been created by her for learning about the shadow characteristics of jealousy and unfairness.

Lynda could not love herself if she was unfair. She therefore sought in this interaction to project these qualities onto her teacher and the other student. The teacher helped her to understand how fairness varied from person to person. What was fair could be changed according to what parameters one worked within. If we only look at events of the last 2 years, then Lynda’s position was fair. If we looked at the last two lifetimes, the Master’s position was fair. The Master was promoting a person with whom he had worked intensively for several lifetimes, and it was within his memory that this was so. He knew that the best person for the job was Amanda, someone who was relatively new to the school in this life but who had an ancient connection with the teacher.

Lynda went through the exercises you will see below, and identified various characteristics that helped her learn to love things that she used to find unloveable. In doing so she revealed part of her own shadow and pulled it into the light. You are invited to learn to do the same. Please complete the following exercise as frankly and honestly as possible. If you have done it before, do not just repeat the old exercise. Have a new look, choose a new person to work with (as explained below), and all kinds of wonderful things will be revealed. Every time I do this, and I have done it scores of times, I find out more about myself.

Firstly, choose a person that you like and respect and list 8 of their most wonderful attributes from your perspective. Then choose someone who has been a big challenge for you and put 8 challenging characteristics of that person in the other side. If you can’t think of 8 characteristics of one person, it is alright to have an amalgamation of a couple of people. What is it that just really delights you or frustrates you about these people?

8 characteristics I admire

in ……… are:

8 characteristics that drive me nuts about……… are:

Have a look at your list. The things that we like about others are things that we have already learned to value and love. We would love it if we could see those characteristics in ourselves. If we could, they would be part of our radiant light, or our beauty.

The things that we do not like about others are the things we would not love in ourselves. We would judge ourselves to be bad people if we displayed these qualities. These characteristics could be termed part of the dark of our existence, things that we have not yet learned to understand, accept or love. This is our shadow.