(11-13-2017, 09:58 AM)Aleksi Wrote: How does one do the process of accepting and integrating the shadow self? Mine seems hugely powerful and terrifying and I feel lost and anxious and I'm concerned it might not even be me but a negative entity feeding off my fear. It even sloppily tried masquerading as Ra. It speaks to me as a voice in my head and seems to be activated especially when I have a hangover. Is this schizophrenia?

Chödrön Wrote:Once there was a young warrior. Her teacher told her that she had to do battle with fear. She didn’t want to do that. It seemed too aggressive; it was scary; it seemed unfriendly. But the teacher said she had to do it and gave her the instructions for the battle.

The day arrived. The student warrior stood on one side, and fear stood on the other. The warrior was feeling very small, and fear was looking big and wrathful. They both had their weapons. The young warrior roused herself and went toward fear, prostrated three times, and asked, "May I have permission to go into battle with you?" Fear said, "Thank you for showing me so much respect that you ask permission."

Then the young warrior said, "How can I defeat you?" Fear replied, "My weapons are that I talk fast, and I get very close to your face. Then you get completely unnerved, and you do whatever I say. If you don’t do what I tell you, I have no power. You can listen to me, and you can have respect for me. You can even be convinced by me. But if you don’t do what I say, I have no power." In that way, the student warrior learned how to defeat fear.

(11-13-2017, 11:40 AM)rva_jeremy Wrote:

Chödrön Wrote:Once there was a young warrior. Her teacher told her that she had to do battle with fear. She didn’t want to do that. It seemed too aggressive; it was scary; it seemed unfriendly. But the teacher said she had to do it and gave her the instructions for the battle.

The day arrived. The student warrior stood on one side, and fear stood on the other. The warrior was feeling very small, and fear was looking big and wrathful. They both had their weapons. The young warrior roused herself and went toward fear, prostrated three times, and asked, "May I have permission to go into battle with you?" Fear said, "Thank you for showing me so much respect that you ask permission."

Then the young warrior said, "How can I defeat you?" Fear replied, "My weapons are that I talk fast, and I get very close to your face. Then you get completely unnerved, and you do whatever I say. If you don’t do what I tell you, I have no power. You can listen to me, and you can have respect for me. You can even be convinced by me. But if you don’t do what I say, I have no power." In that way, the student warrior learned how to defeat fear.

(11-13-2017, 09:58 AM)Aleksi Wrote: How does one do the process of accepting and integrating the shadow self? Mine seems hugely powerful and terrifying and I feel lost and anxious and I'm concerned it might not even be me but a negative entity feeding off my fear. It even sloppily tried masquerading as Ra. It speaks to me as a voice in my head and seems to be activated especially when I have a hangover. Is this schizophrenia?

(11-13-2017, 02:08 PM)Coordinate_Apotheosis Wrote: I'd recommend not letting your inner voices trick you too much.  Just listen to them, but without reaction to their words.  

You might find that the shadow self is a copy of you, but just inside of your head and heart, it is the crimped and censored self, the part of you rejected by you.

You may find parts of yourself here that are in no way who you feel yourself to be, yet they are there, like the tumors of darkness effecting your health.

You might find you enjoy things like murder, domination, winning, sexual fetishes, being selfish, or even lying.

Whatever parts of yourself you find, it is utmost integrally important that you do not judge them, that you hold an open mind and detach judgment, and instead find the compassion for these parts of yourself, their reason for being.

For instance, I am a very dark person myself, I have a great desire to be brutal and overpowering, this stems from a long period of feeling helplessness.  It drives my anger and the sharpness of my analyzing mind.

Yet being brutal is not what I want.  I don't want to overpower anyone.

These aspects of my darkness are survival traits of my humanity, they are not there for me to judge myself through, or to be judged individually, they are tools to help me in life, just like a saw blade, it can be used to trim a bush, or cut a person.  Go trim a bush, save cutting a person for if someone is trying to hurt you.

Often times I find the fuel of my darkness is fear and paranoia.  My inner voices speculate greatly on the intents of others.  I often think people just want to hurt me because of it.

I must remind myself they are as me, as is their darkness as mine.

If I can come to terms with this, find forgiveness for these things, and then further let go of any expectations of any kind of outcome of these aspects of the self, I can give them the space they need to be accepted back, to be welcomed to reintegrate, to unify back.

Each voice in your head is a small part of you, they can fight each other, argue, even confusingly become delusional, the point is to direct these voices like a compass needle all to the same direction.

That direction is unconditional love for your self, and through that, of your other-selves, and yet this does not mean indulge the murderous desire, it means to let it voice itself internally, but to not react to it, so that it may be, and so may you be as you wish to be.

The darkness is really light.  Please don't be afraid to let your shadow self vent at you, scream, lie, attack you.  You have after all left it chained up in darkness for so long.

(11-13-2017, 03:54 PM)Coordinate_Apotheosis Wrote: Well, it probably would help to determine if the voice IS your own, or another seemingly so.

This discernment is mentioned, that one may note thoughts that do not appear to stem from the self.  Albeit in this instance thoughts are the voices we're discussing.

I might be getting a bit fantastical here, but I do believe in nature spirits, or basically what some might call nymphs and fairies.  I have experienced a water nymph in my own pool, fire wisps aka salamanders and sylphs when I was younger, and overall I now find some fields of grass, trees, and areas of trees have these types of entities associated sometimes.  Even cacti and bushes or beds of flowers.

Nature is very alive, I think if the thoughts sit well with you and provide you happiness or peace, then you can react to them without worry.  Its when things get dark and 'heavy' that you should just sit with it rather than react so as not to give in or deny it, to listen and know without doing, to be a rock and not to roll, to let yourself be transparent and let the waves of heaviness pass right through you unmoving you.

So, it may be an external voice of a spirit guide, or of a resident loving nature spirit.

It could also just be your own voice masking itself, as they do so well.  My voices mask themselves with many identities.  The victim, the offended, the oppressed, the disgusted, but also in many good ways as if to be silly and playful, the lover, the admirer, the awed, the starry eyed wondrous one, the contentful, the optimistic, the cheery, the cutesy, the happy laugher, the joker, the teaser.

So, its up to you to discover if the voice is you or not, but if you want my advice on a sort of shortcut through confusion...

All the voices are you in another style of uniqueness and various distortions and circumstances.  You should treat them how you'd want to be treated.  If you're upset and all down, try to cheer yourself up.  If you're happy and loving, bask in that joy.  If you're losing it (like I occasionally do), then sit with it until you've calmed down, try not to react, its okay if you do, but its much easier on your nervous system if you respond with stillness.  Its much easier on your mind, body, emotions.

Especially if you have despairing thoughts and such.  Don't give up, there's a way through, enjoy the good, help the down, sit with the mad, praise the fearful.

We've all got those voices inside of us, they've all got those things they think and feel, and you are made up of all of that.  You are them, they are you, work with them and they'll work with you.

Cheer up your sad voice, or offer it comfort.
Thank your happy voice.
Guide your scared voice.
Encourage your uncertain voice towards certainty.
Remind your doubt of your intended outcome.
Let your sadness flow but don't get swept away by it for too long.

Life is an amalgam of consciousness.  We're so much more than just one, we're also many.  Sometimes there's confusion with that.

I think irrelevancy can deny circumstantially relevant associations, so don't worry too much.  Just try to be the best you that you want to be, and realize there's no failure in not being able to do that, since you always get another chance.  In some new way in a different time, but it will come around.

So, I don't know lol, I just want you to not be scared.  You have your own self power, you can choose to do good and not do bad, regardless of the thoughts/voices you may hear.

You can be an observor, you can be the rock that doesn't roll.  The picturesque tree in the portrait, the focus, or the background.

When it comes to matters of working with the self, it seems important to not be worried and swept away in the vast macrocosmic being of our internal microcosmic selves.  Infinity has a lot going on, so its okay to take things one thing at a time. What's the rush? Lol

(11-13-2017, 10:25 AM)Aleksi Wrote: I had a conversation with a voice and it tried to lie to me all kinds of bullshit, I asked it to leave and then tried commanding it and either it didn't work or as I suspect there were many entities attached to me. I prayed angels to make them leave and help me protect myself. Now the shadow is still here but I feel love instead of fear.

(11-13-2017, 10:29 PM)Stranger Wrote: Arguing with parts never ever achieves anything. 

(11-14-2017, 12:17 PM)Elros Wrote:

(11-13-2017, 10:29 PM)Stranger Wrote: Arguing with parts never ever achieves anything. 

You do know s***, but I can't totally agree with this part.

There is usefulness to dismantle what's rooted as tangled in the mind complex. Sometimes arguing with convinction is the only way a part can be shaken in its belief and contemplate the dual counter-part of its thought which resolves the tension that part was stuck in.

Confusion is a big player here, so quite often there is the aspect of confused beliefs although it's just an aspect of the work to be done.

(11-14-2017, 01:59 PM)Stranger Wrote: Elros, I agree that it's useful to dismantle the beliefs and attitudes that parts are stuck in.  I'd even say it's essential to do that, if we want to be free and truly ourselves, unencumbered by internal obstacles.  So we're on the same page with this.

The question is how to make that happen.  Richard Schwartz, when he first discovered parts, started out arguing with them and trying to convince the self-harming parts to stop making his patients harm themselves.  They'd eventually agree, but would produce even more horrific injuries afterwards, when out of the session.

My personal experience in arguing with parts is similar.  You can have an inner critic telling you that you're worthless, and you can very nicely talk to it about how that's not helpful or accurate and all the reasons why, but it'll come back and say "that's all well and good, but the fact is that you're worthless and it's my job to destroy you"  (which, of course, it can't do - parts cannot cause any harm and can only affect you if you listen to their nonsense - the Chodron quote rva_Jeremy posted is very accurate).

I've therefore come to see parts as being frozen into their particular attitudes and emotions.  They are like computer programs.  They are stuck in their configuration.  There's no amount of arguing with an ATM that will make it give you a soda - it's just not what it does, or is capable of doing.

On the other hand, loving the part invariably unfreezes it and makes it open to alternative modes of being.  Often a critical part will even express gratitude for being healed this way, saying that it hated what it was stuck doing, over and over.  Love works with critical parts, sad parts, fearful parts - basically, it harmonizes all internal disharmonies. 

(11-14-2017, 02:33 PM)Elros Wrote: I really see it as two-way.

If you try to change the pattern without love then it won't work well as you are not pouring transformative energies within it.

If you appease the energy but don't seek to change the mental pattern, then the same charge will build up again.

The ways of learn/teaching as the Creator in realizing the Creator are quite profound and are hard to be put into words.

(11-14-2017, 03:46 PM)Stranger Wrote:

(11-14-2017, 02:33 PM)Elros Wrote: I really see it as two-way.

If you try to change the pattern without love then it won't work well as you are not pouring transformative energies within it.

If you appease the energy but don't seek to change the mental pattern, then the same charge will build up again.

The ways of learn/teaching as the Creator in realizing the Creator are quite profound and are hard to be put into words.

Loving is not appeasing - that's the interesting thing about it.  Focusing love on an inner critic/hateful part will make it scream like a vampire in the sunlight as it begins to break up and dissolve.  Maybe that's why Q'uo talks about "terrible Love".

Quote:if your head hurts, you don't begin hating your head for it; instead you look for ways to soothe and comfort it, because it's a part of you that's in pain.  The voice you're hearing is simply another part of you that's in pain, and love is the medicine it needs.

By Love I simply mean kindness, compassion, caring.