One of the greatest ironies of modern self-help and mainstream interpretations of shadow work is its near total unwillingness to go near the subjects of evil and morality.
Jung himself said that the shadow is a “moral problem, that…no one can become conscious of…without considerable moral effort.” I’ve made the case (including in The Four Hallmarks of Evil) that a true understanding of good and evil is not only a feature and benefit of shadow work—it is its logical endpoint, and that to competently discern the difference between mere preferences (what you do and do not like), vs. genuine moral transgression, is its holy grail. Not the ‘withdrawal of all projections and judgements.’
My wife over lunch today noted that ‘we often don’t see evil when it’s there,’ and she’s completely right. Not-seeing or not being willing to see evil is a problem of catastrophic magnitude in human society, both within AND without.
I am now myself approaching the age that many of my previous ‘superiors’ were at during my last involvement in employed work, say, a decade and a half ago—a select number of whom made absolutely no apologies for their disinterest in goodness (regardless of what that meant to them). These weren’t the regular majority of people who are just kinda indifferent to what it means to be good and hence chummy with them; these people were actively proud of their cruelty, and went to great efforts to loudly advertise as much. This is despite being the biggest brown-noses in the other direction as they perceived it—moral flat-worlders permitting themselves only to see the world and everyone in it as lined up side-by-side along one linear dimension.
But what is harder to see is the danger of the 90%—the ‘middle men’ who just didn’t seem to know or care what it meant to be ‘good’ or ‘whole.’ Those who ‘don’t want to get involved.’
There is no ‘not getting involved’ when it comes to evil. Failing to deal with evil is to become its accomplice.
It’s indeed often the bullies who have the most friends. “Friends” who long to be around them because it makes them feel safe. And who crave to look like the innocent while standing by their side, when in truth they become morally culpable by default. They are unwittingly playing with hellfire, because what you endorse implicitly is precisely the kind of world that will come back at you. While those who have been there and understand the value of goodness will be wise to stay away.
It’s not a new idea that it may be the man in the middle who poses just as much a threat to himself and others by mindlessly allowing evil to work through him (Nazi Germany being an oft-cited example today). One who actually admires evil without apparently realising, and simply cannot tell the difference. It seems to hold something tantalising for him. It’s often said that folks such as this secretly aspire to evil themselves but just don’t have the…what? The courage? The “guts?” (Again, notice how any apparently innocent person can unwittingly reveal their inner workings. If only they listened to their own mind.)
Obviously there is nothing courageous about evil. It is the ultimate falsity posturing as its opposite precisely because of what it isn’t. What the ‘middle man’ sometimes admires is not evil in itself but power, which it mistakes for freedom. Freedom from pain, from criticism, from bullying. But yes, often what he admires is evil. Often this is exactly how unconscious evil reveals itself, as one communicates through their actions and their associates what it is they truly value. It should be noted that the desire for power unchecked and unreconciled is precisely what becomes evil.
Shadow work done properly will only make ever more stark to you the extent to which most people serve power; their facile attempts to hide it from themselves, and how reliably they go and reveal it anyway through their words and through their actions. It also shows you where you yourself have been serving power, trying to force the world and other people to meet your pre-determined ends at almost any cost.
Most act like they can’t know what evil is. Whether dismissing it out of hand as a faulty concept (the masculine failing) or refusing to base discernment in anything at all, out of some dubious assumption that you ‘shouldn’t judge’ (the feminine failing). Meanwhile they go about their days unconsciously serving power at every juncture, stumbling straight into their opposites via enantiodromia, and doing implicitly what they themselves criticise. Their world continuing to scream at them the inadequacy of their thesis.
Many folks have confused ‘shadow work’ with the ‘denial of evil,’ through one means or another—moral relativism, subjective idealism or solipsism by other names. Many would have you believe that shadow work will lead you only to take less issue with the world. This is not necessarily the case, since it takes as its leading assumption that the world is basically fine and it’s just your mind that is the problem; a usefully one-sided philosophy indeed for those that serve power. While any sincere student of the mind, let alone German thought, understands that duality is everywhere. And so when even some leading Jungian scholars won’t go there, you know we have a problem, to say nothing of the world at large.
Naturally shadow work is a pursuit that becomes relevant around mid-life. Mid-life being a psychological stage, not a moment fixed in time. Power itself is not a problem, and neither is setting out to make things happen in the world. It is the primary task of the first half of life. But what proportion of the population is still, psychologically, in the ‘first half of life?’ And determined to remain there come hell or high water? And what proportion of folks are not only still psychological children, but have no real interest in what being a ‘good’ person actually means, beyond the arbitrary list of values and implicit commandments that their culture, parents or colleagues have handed to them?
Shadow work is what fixes this. It sensitises you to the lack of moral discernment in the world. And how that where there appears to be moral discernment there generally isn’t—just an attachment to one side of an issue posturing as the whole. It is not for those who are committed to their disfunction—for them its tools can only serve as weapons and camouflage. But such misuse is futile against one who is genuinely willing to take responsibility, cultivate empathy and honestly confront what is difficult in themselves and the world. Shadow work is what is needed to negate the spread of evil both inner and outer.
It is for those who are on the fence but have not yet decided. Is morality something that matters to you, or not? Indecision is unacceptable. Do you care about finding out what you can do in the world?—To honour goodness, and in a way that only you can achieve and do well?
This isn’t another ‘hack’ for ‘getting what you want.’ Perhaps you don’t truly know what it is you want yet. You might think you do, but until you converse and build relationships with the deepest hidden parts of yourself, how can you possibly know? You will be at war with yourself forever and you will blame it on the world, proudly peacocking about how much power you think you have.
What a caricatural farce that will become when you truly brave up to the hard work of being human. And what an honour it is.
Shadow work requires both study and action, inner and outer, both individual work and community. At Make it Conscious I have recently launched Hestia – the hearth of the Make it Conscious community, where you can gain access to the full Know Yourself Programme on a monthly subscription, including courses on both Inner Shadow Work and Outer Shadow Work, Active Imagination and the Seven Habits of Individuation. Also included are premium active imagination packs and a library of extended exercises for going deeper, and of course the community space featuring regular meetings with other sincere students of the Self.
