To describe the "Disowned Self", let me turn to the book RADICAL SELF-FORGIVENESS, by Colin Tipping.
Our disowned selves are the parts of ourselves that we have rejected as unacceptable and have put completely out of sight and out of mind. We accomplish this through the mechanism of repression. That means that we have pushed them so deep down in the subconscious mind that we have absolutely no awareness of them whatsoever.
Repression is not the same as suppression. When we suppress parts of ourselves, we know that they are still there. This would be true of our lost selves. We know those parts exist in us, but we intentionally keep them suppressed. Conversely, those parts of ourselves that we have disowned and repressed are out of our awareness altogether. Carl Jung referred to this repressed material as our shadow. Let's look at how these parts of ourselves initially got denied, rejected, and then disowned.
When we were growing up and looking for approval and love from those around us, most notably our parents, we soon learned which of our attributes won us love and approval and which did not. Out of a sense of survival, we selected the most approved attributes to live from and quickly disowned the others.
From the acceptable list, we created the socially modified self that we present to the world, and we dumped the rest into our shadow. It's likely that we've added even more material to our shadow as we've developed, but most of our disowned selves were repressed early as a result of our being shamed over them. Having shifted all the UNAPPROVED attributes into our shadow and repressed them, we might think they are safely buried and inactive. They are not. Attached to every one of them is an energy, which is both active and reactive. Each attribute has the ability to rise up from the depths of our unconscious to be recognized and accepted.
For that reason, we remain ever fearful of our shadow, and we do everything we can to avoid coming to terms with it. The act of repressing it is an avoidance strategy. But an even better way to avoid dealing with our shadow material is to project it onto someone else. In other words, we symbolically take it out of ourselves, project it onto someone or something else OUT THERE, and then convince ourselves that we no longer have it.
Here's how it works: we first find someone who seems to have a lot of the qualities we hate in ourselves. Next, we criticize or judge him or her unmercifully for having those qualities, unaware, of course, that they are our very own attributes. We then become angry and self-righteous and go to great lengths to make the person wrong, and to punish him or her if possible. With our focus strongly set on the "bad" person out there, the need to see what is "in here" is neatly sidestepped and avoided.
Projection is a powerful defense mechanism. It has the potential to keep us stuck in self-loathing, because it automatically prevents us from recognizing and accepting a significant part of ourselves. Nevertheless, it does offer us a way to retrieve our disowned selves. Once we understand the mechanism of projection and can recognize when we are doing it - that is, when we are criticizing another for our own shortcomings - we can decide to reverse the projection.
When we become more aware of our tendencies to project, we are in effect recognizing the principle "If you spot it, you've got it." We reclaim our projection by recognizing the person we are judging as someone who has come into our lives to mirror what we have disowned and to give us the opportunity to see it and welcome it back with love and acceptance.
The exercise that accompanies this section is a most interesting one. Where all the previous exercises have asked me to select traits from a specific list, this one is different. Because these traits have been "disowned", I don't even know that they are there. So, how do I recognize the traits that I may have disowned, only to live deep inside of me, fighting to occasionally get out? Well... it's easy.
In this exercise, I am to list 2 individuals. Now, to not offend anyone, I need not list their names. I merely list two individuals and create a list of all the reasons why I hate or (in my case) strongly dislike the person. If you do this exercise, you are free to choose someone who you may deal with on a daily basis, or it may even be someone that you have never met... like a celebrity. In my case, I will be listing both an individual that I work with AND a celebrity. I find it interesting that in the case of my two individuals, there are some extremely similar, if not identical, traits.
INDIVIDUAL #1: Co-worker
- Arrogant
- Critical
- Condescending
- Pretentious
- Uncaring
Most items that I listed are related, and if I were to continue, the list would just consist of things like "holier-than-thou", "cocky", etc. I feel that they are too closely related to the previous things listed in the list. As a general rule, I try to be a person that overlooks the negative in people. From my perspective, we ALL have negative issues that may or may not annoy other people. I know I have plenty of personality traits that probably annoy other people. I tend to be very outspoken, especially about things that I feel very passionate about. Whether it be politics (although, for the most part, I have pretty much divorced myself from the contentious world of politics), music, film, or even celebrities... like the one I am about to talk about... I try to look at the positive in people. However, in some cases it's just downed right impossible.Case in point:
Individual #2: a celebrity
- Egocentric... dare I say, egomaniacal? Is it really a word? Spell-check doesn't think so.
- Manipulative
- Self-promoting
- Pretentious
- Shallow
- Disingenuous
Okay, so in hindsight, I guess this list isn't that similar to the first person... yet, I still find myself disturbed that if this exercise is, in fact, accurate.... I'm a dick. So, if that is, in fact, the case... I'm sorry to all of you. BUT, before we all get bummed out about the fact that I am potentially an unpleasant character, let's keep in mind that THIS is the reason why I am going through these exercises. I am going to accept the fact that I am a pretentious, condescending, shallow, self-promoting individual... exercise those traits from my being... and next time you see me, I'm genuinely going to be a sweet guy. Wait... was that a pretentious thing to say?
No comments:
Post a Comment