Recognising selfishness in my shadow : undergoing necessary psychic surgery

Gradually, you will start to see the ego for what it is. Not only physically, but internally. Through dreams, through visions, through understanding. By stripping away, the ego’s desires and defences, we begin to understand the world in which we live and the circumstances that have occurred, which are easily explained and dissolved, through inner child and ego resolution, to strip back layers of conditioning and discover, the raw, limitless creative power and potential, we each possess is the ultimate discovery.

To be healed, we need a very profound surgery, very deep and very painful. It’s not easy, facing all the demons and voices in your head. Its not easy or pleasant to die psychologically. It’s not something that you will enjoy. You will feel pain. You will cry. You will have regret. You will have remorse. You will be ashamed of yourself. Don’t avoid any of the uncomfortable feelings or traumas. Embrace it, yet do not attach to it. Look squarely at the facts, accept them, and change.

Source : https://kellybristow.com/2016/07/10/the-shadow-opposite-of-the-seven-sins/

I admit I can be self centre even while I show care for others.  Sometimes its only after posting about some hurt feelings my ego is struggling with that I get to see deeper and try for at least just a little while to see myself less as a victim of an insensitive world and more as a very ordinary human being who struggles to feel she is good enough and deserves love while realising at the same time realising that as an adult the sense of good enough and love needs to come from within first and only then can be found without.

One of the things I struggle with is connecting emotionally to my family heart to heart.  As the youngest I tend to view my older family from a young part of my inner self.  I see them as all strong and powerful and therefor withholding something I essentially need.  I then forget that they struggle and may have trust issues too and do the very best with what they know.

Today I got a wake up call where I came to see how much I need to remember to think kindly and not see things from the point of view of solely what I am getting or not getting.  It is the young side of me that wants others to be the adult and forgets all the commitments and responsibilities they have and that often they too struggle with the voices in their heads telling them they should be somewhere else and this dark or shadow side of me that I am seeing today was highlighted after I read a post by Kelly Bristow that I quoted from above.

This afternoon I ended up having the chat to my Mum about the anger and resentment I am struggling with that I wrote about in a post earlier.   After this conversation I became aware that it is the mother of the past that was not very emotionally present.  It was the mother of the past who never was connected to by those she needed support from because they were often absent or preoccupied and that because of this she was so often that way herself.  And it was the mother of the past who lost her spouse and own mother in quick succession and then saw her family spread to all the far flung corners of the country  and struggled herself as we all struggled in our different ways, but me perhaps more in those early years following my Dad’s death when I had no loving partner and only painful relationships that ended causing my heart more hurt

In my disconnection during active years of alcoholism all pain was buried.  In recovery a lot of shadow pain has been resurfacing to be dealt with and this process is akin to a difficult kind of psychic or intra psychological surgery I have been undergoing.  As Kelly says, it hurts to have this kind of surgery and to face this level of pain, but at the same time bringing our shadow to light is really the only way we can grow and heal.  And it occurred to me this afternoon that on one level the prospect of having my tooth excised soon is a reflector on the physical plane of what I have been going through emotionally and will be felt on a profound emotional level when I have the dental surgery done, the prospect of it is triggering a lot of trauma to my head over years.

I am never grateful for the pain or suffering I feel at the time, but after wards I do feel a release when certain diseased parts of myself are revealed.  It may be shame, guilt, sadness, anger, disappointment, fear, resentment or some other emotion I am struggling with but I am much better off when the emotion comes out into the open or surfaces like a boil, letting its pus out.  Then the wound has a chance to form a scar and heal, the scar may remain but the wound will no longer be infected, the infected tissue must come out or blocks must be cleared to energy or life blood so that it can run clean and clear.

 

It became plain to me last week that my diseased tooth must come out.  It has to be faced and the process gone through.  I need to accept.  In the words of the AA Big Book “we thought we could find an easier softer way but we could not”.    And I know my higher power or higher self will always be there to help me through any pain if and when I call upon it to hold my hand as I find the courage to face the surgery.