What I've learned from Shadow Work and Emotional Awareness thus far - My 2 cents

[billiesimon]

What up! This is an update on my spiritual journey. 

I have 1 year and a half of shadow work on my back, and a recent small psych awakening.

 

Lesson 1
Awareness is not just curative, but it shows you ALL the pain and sufferning you didn't know you had.

When I wasn't into spirituality, I was feeling "somehow ok", yet depressed and coping with videogames.
Now I am a lot more conscious with myself and others, BUT the pain that I generally feel in my body is a lot more intense, and so is the pleasure.
I generally feel EVERY SINGLE DAY all the small tensions in my body and emotions, and this led me to leave my last job, because my small psychedelic awakening led me to absolutely freak out and reject the toxic neurotic work-environment.

I literally freaked out because I can't stand excessive neurosis and tension anymore. When I was totally unconscious I was cool with it.

 

Lesson 2
I feel sadness a lot more. Suicidal thoughts arise a lot, and at the same time loving and deeply compassionate thoughts arise too.

I am a lot more bipolar and a lot more emotional and dramatic in what I feel in my body. But since my awareness has increased, I can still observe it patiently and wait for it to dissolve.

But pain is generally amplified because I'm NOT NUMB TO IT anymore.

 

Lesson 3
My dreams are becoming WILD, very vivid and realistic. And often I wake up touching the wall of my room to check if this is the "real" reality.

I've never had such vivid dreams and such intense shadow-releases in dreams. It's almost like in a movie, where they have mystic and prophetic dreams.

I also dreamt recently of being engulfed by Infinity and the dream turned into a nightmare because in the dream my identity resisted it and so I freaked out and woke up in sweat and vibrating.

It's WILD, man.... Sometimes it feels like going insane.

 

Lesson 4
It's becoming wild with my emotions and body feelings... I hate it, YET I LOVE IT ???

 

Yeah. 

I can't explain.

 

? I'm going on with my spiritual path ?

There's no going back now.

Edited May 27, 2020 by billiesimon

[Consilience]

Very interesting! Even though i don’t specifically perform shadow work, through regular consciousness work Ive definitely become increasingly conscious of my shadow and psyche... Ive felt similar feelings regarding being more bipolar. It’s as if everything is just felt more deeply because of the increased awareness. 

What does a shadow release in a dream look like? 

[Fishy]

I feel the same way. The sensations in the body get so its intense. 

[billiesimon]

16 minutes ago, Fishy said:

I feel the same way. The sensations in the body get so its intense. 

Yeah.... but sometimes it is unbearable...

43 minutes ago, Consilience said:

Very interesting! Even though i don’t specifically perform shadow work, through regular consciousness work Ive definitely become increasingly conscious of my shadow and psyche... Ive felt similar feelings regarding being more bipolar. It’s as if everything is just felt more deeply because of the increased awareness. 

What does a shadow release in a dream look like? 

Well... I've almost always had releases while awake, in emotional moments, or moments of relaxation with soft music. Pretty intense crying.

I've started to have intense dreams in these recent days. This last night I've had a horrible nightmare where I was being absorbed by the void/infinity and while waking up I had a strong release of tension and anxiety. But it might be related to my psychedelic awakening.

Apart from that... shadow work is amazing, and still useful for consciousness work.

[Lyubov]

what shadow work methods do you use and what books have you read? 

[Nahm]

@billiesimon

Great work man. I’d start a dream journal & write these dreams down when you first wake up, but then forget about them altogether.  Allow a few hours at least for any emotional remnants from the dreams to completely dissipate. Then go back & look and decipher (without emotional engagement) what the message of the dream is.  

Ever have a friend be freakin out, and you’re tellin them they’re fine, and everything’s ok...but they’re all tense & just ain’t hearin it? 

 

 

 

[billiesimon]

8 hours ago, Nahm said:

@billiesimon

Great work man. I’d start a dream journal & write these dreams down when you first wake up, but then forget about them altogether.  Allow a few hours at least for any emotional remnants from the dreams to completely dissipate. Then go back & look and decipher (without emotional engagement) what the message of the dream is.  

Ever have a friend be freakin out, and you’re tellin them they’re fine, and everything’s ok...but they’re all tense & just ain’t hearin it? 

Thanks  ?

I'm going to try a dream journal, even though some dreams are really hard to decipher.

How do you find the tools to correctly understand them? Usually they are very symbolic.

[Nahm]

@billiesimon

By syncing the hemispheres of the brain and ‘seeing through’ (knowing) oscillation & non, or “awake” &  “sleep”. The important part is not analyzing the dream upon awakening, but letting all of the emotion subside, raising the frequency (aka mood), and then interpreting the dream as a simple unitary message. The less variance in frequency, the clearer the interpretation. The correlation between the pain & tension experience is directly equal & opposite to the message of (receiving the message of) the dreams. 

Also, and please don’t take this personally...if that attitude / perspective arises “it’s hard to interpret”, just ‘cut through it’. Immediately ‘tell yourself’ - it’s simple, straightforward & obvious. Don’t allow any believing of the ‘it’s hard’ perspective. Don’t create it.  This is like wiping mud across a lens just as you are trying to look through it. 

[Aaron p]

V cool, I've been getting insane dreams lately

Edited May 28, 2020 by Aaron p

[billiesimon]

1 hour ago, Nahm said:

@billiesimon

Also, and please don’t take this personally...if that attitude / perspective arises “it’s hard to interpret”, just ‘cut through it’. Immediately ‘tell yourself’ - it’s simple, straightforward & obvious. Don’t allow any believing of the ‘it’s hard’ perspective. Don’t create it.  This is like wiping mud across a lens just as you are trying to look through it. 

Well, yeah. I get it that since these are symbols evoked by my mind, they are mine, but... I guess I shouldn't use the Freud approach of intellectual analysis, right?

More of a "feeling interpretation", I guess. It's still not so easy for me, even though I'm a lot more intuitive now. But the tendency to intellectualize is still there