Shadows and Distortions
As we make our way along our sacred path, we face challenges. Shadows in the way we view ourselves and the world, distortions in our relationships and conditions of difficulty. In the context of the journey to a more heavenly earth, these are the manifestation of trauma and incoherence in the substance of the self, and must be cleared in order to make one’s way to a brighter version of their reality.
On our quest across the realms of our inner and outer world, we face challenges. Patterns of incoherence that we share with others appearing in our sacred mirror.
It is no easy thing to face one’s shadows. To come through the territories of one’s inner landscape where the wounds and traumas wait to be revealed, aching to relieved of their burden. To discover them, to make peace with the parts within ourselves that are still healing, is one of the greatest challenges on the quest.
Shadows, also known as distortions or defilements,are defined as misalignments with the nature of What Is. They are agitations that lay within the subtle structure of the self which distort our perception and manifestation of reality.
FOR AUTHORS
In terms of a classic narrative, as an Author one is the protagonist of their Quest. In context, the antagonist, the challenging aspect of that adventure, is the facing of Shadows. Distortions within the substance of the individual and Collective consciousness that are misaligned with the Grace and Love that is our true birthright. It is through the clearing of those patterns over time that we open the gates of Abundance and Wonder to move through our current self. Shadows, also known as distortions from the Abundance paradigm, are integral to this Age of humanity. They are the patterns, the traumas, the unresolved wounds and worries that mark the unrealized and unliberated consciousness, and are larger than the individual self, occurring in the underlands of collective consciousness that define the challenges of humanity at this time. As Author-Adventurers, we must clear our portion of the distortion, our aspect of the distortions (shadows) within the archetypical energies of our lives in order to receive more light and step deeper into the magickal World. As all beings are involved in this grand healing and revelation, this is an internal process that often involves other Characters on the journey. This requires delicacy as an Author. We wish to show the Reader that shadows and challenges are real, yet frame it in an authentic way which also takes responsibility for our portion of the distortion *and* recognizes, as best we can, that we are all in it, together. We strive for a compassionate clarity, aware of the subtle nuance of psychic patterns of error and the right-wielding of how to frame that in our narrative. As Author-Adventurers in the Mythica, part of our job is to describe our movement through the sticky situations and defilements of the underlying Love that is our true essence as part of our journey. However, in order to avoid causing suffering (or inadverdenetly slader or shame characters on our Quest), we are being mindful to narrate our Story in a way that makes it about our personal reactions to the elemental energies in circumstance, taking responsibility for our portion of the distortion to clear. It’s difficult to talk about conflict with others. Especially to do it in a way that recognizes that we are all doing the best we can with the awareness that we currently have. We don’t want to implicate or shame beings, but rather illuminate the vibrational pattern that we sense in our own sovereignty, framing the narrative from this place of personal journeywalk across one’s shared reflections.
Shadows in one sense are just that, flickering shadows that dance before the light of the fire. They are not your true self, but the distortions in perspective created from emotional trauma. They are the hurts, the confusions, the separations from Love that lay within our subconscious, waiting to emerge back into the light. They are our challenges. The distortions in our relationships with self and others. That which must be resolved to continue our journey back to the Garden.
Discovering your Shadows
Everyone faces their inner shadows. Everyone. Each and every one of us has our portion of the distortion to clear from the field. No one is exempt.
As we make our way to a more heavenly version of our reality, we must heal our portion of that distortion, that ripple across the realms of the Garden.
Yet while this can be difficult, face them we must, for only in transforming the patterns within our subconscious, only by confronting and dissolving the fears that lay within may be experience the brighter world. In many ways, they are the gatekeepers, the wayshowers, the parts of the self that have been hidden or locked away, holding in their grasp some of the keys we need to unlock the treasure beyond our trials.
In the landscapes of legend, the realms of Shadow are the distorted and incoherent versions of particular qualities in our reality. This can take many forms, yet is essentially a place within the inner and outer territories of one’s experience where there is a lack of light, where things are not seen cleared, and the world is blurry and distorted.
There are places within where we have been wounded, where we are quick to defend and demean. They are the unconscious places which lay beneath our perceptions and actions, that cause us to manifest realities which are disconnected from our Divine birhright, that which is always there within the field waiting to be discovered.
A grand example of this is a life without Love. Without fellowship, without connection. Such is not the truth. It is a distortion from that truth. As we clear the shadows and incoherence from our path, that life changes. Love appears. Fellowship arrives. Connection is made. Yet to do this, we must clear the shadows, the wounds that separate us from the clear version of our reality.
There are always difficulties on the quest. Places where the road seems blocked, where we are demanded to move in new directions, where we must suddenly change our plans and respond to the reality of Life unfolding.
Why are there shadows?
“The shadows have to happen for the unfoldment of the lotus.”– Joshua Free
On the most basic of levels, shadows, also known as misperceptions and distortions from natural law, must exist in order for us to have a progression. They are the proverbial mud that surrounds the lotus, defining the metaphor of it’s blossom of awareness through the darkness and shadow of unknowing. This applies to all beings within the cycle of death and rebirth within the mortal plane, and is tied directly into the nature of becoming. Shadows exist, simply because the state of being which perceives and acts from separation exists. As we are becoming something all the time, it is the shadows, the distortions from the absolute expansive nature of the Creation, that define our progression… LIke all aspects of alignment with the laws of Heaven and Earth, shadows refer to one’s alignment with the fundamental principles that underlie our reality. When we understand that the Universe is both Loving and Abundant, we see that the subconscious impressions which are out-of-alignment with this are not the Truth. They are, instead, distortions upon the lens of our perception. Misperceptions which repeatedly create constrictive circumstance which is out of alignment with expansion. These are the subtle, yet physical patterns in the akasha which must be cleared so that vitality and clear transmission of our Gift may move through the vessel of the self. Like all aspects of our perception of reality, distortions exist in the physical form, expressing themselves when they encounter other aspects of the larger impression.
