Ikigai thought for Today: Me & My Shadow
There is light and darkness in all of us.
There is a shadow in each of us.
Shadow work is some of the most challenging we will do in uncovering our Ikigai.
A two-sided shadow lives within each of us and consists of both positive and negative aspects.
📌 All that we hate and consider unworthy of ourselves is included in the negative shadow.
📌 All our untapped creative potential is on the positive or bright side.
Let me share a personal example.
I have a gift for seeing how to improve things. It wasn’t uncommon for me to walk into an area at work and immediately identify process failures and innovation opportunities.
Improvement opportunities jump out at me everywhere I go. That’s the upside.
The downside is I see opportunities where things need to be improved everywhere I go.
I can’t ‘not’ see it.
That can lead to frustration and, given the right circumstances, even anger if the terrible process keeps me from getting what I need.
Terrible customer service is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. It drives me crazy.
Keeping the Good while controlling the Bad
It’s not good to squash this part of me, it’s one of my gifts. I also can’t let it control me or take me to levels of frustration or anger.
Understanding this dark and light side of what makes me unique is essential.
With that understanding, I can tap into the energy while controlling the potential dark side.
Hiding the Shadow
As a child, I had to suppress my talent. The adults in my environment did not appreciate a ‘kid’ identifying solutions to problems.
As an adult, the kind of work I engaged in prized this gift and began to resurface it. Unfortunately, the dark side of frustration and early rejection surfaced as well.
It would be years later when I achieved a point of balance.
Is there a portion of your personality that has been shot down, unrealized, omitted, or condemned? Something is possibly hidden on the dark side.
Maybe it is time to take a look.
You had me at Fibonacci, David.
😉
Controlling the Good while invalidating the Bad seems to be the pattern most follow. May we look for ways to change that dynamic as early in the lives of others as possible.
It's all part of the "equation". We travel on that perfectly curvy path. It just depends on which side we lean to look over into at certain points along our way.
Allison Whitmore put It best in a DBT podcast:
"Acceptance is acknowledging the 'why' even if we don't agree with the 'what' ".
Thanks for sharing David and see from tidbits in this story perhaps the search for your ikigai was so important and seemingly trying to maintain that balance each day. All I will say is once a person does become in balance (reaches the point of let's say a K2) then what. This answer other than be in oneness with oneself is simply not enough for many. We strive for more that God has given us in our core (soul)....we strive for unity with the One Triune God and as Thomas Aquinas found out as many that this can not be achieved by ourselves but only with God's help! Peace be with you!