Shadows along the spiritual pathway
Journal of Religion and Health March 21, 2015 DOI: 10.1007/s10943-015-0037-2 via CORE
Summary
Spirituality that emphasizes only light and love overlooks humanity's dark side, and denying or repressing it can derail personal development, relationships, and spiritual movements. Transpersonal psychology provides tools to approach and reframe unconscious depths using metaphors of shadows and daimons, along with therapeutic practices that symbolically contain and transcend polarities. Without such integration, spirituality focused solely on holistic growth may produce the opposite of its intended effect.
Study at a glance
| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Keywords | Shadow work Shadow integration Unconscious integration Dark side integration Inner polarity integration |
| Citations | 4 |
| Key finding | Spirituality that denies the dark side of humanity, without the integrative tools of transpersonal psychology, risks undermining holistic growth. |
Abstract
Contemporary spirituality discourses tend to assume that a canopy of light and love overarches all spiritual pathways. Unfortunately, the dark side of humanity cannot be spirited away so easily, and aberrations of personal spiritual development, interpersonal spiritual relationships and new spiritual movements can often be traced to the denial, repression and return of our dark side. Transpersonal psychology offers a way of approaching, reframing and redeeming the unconscious depths of our psyche, with its metaphors of shadows and daimons on the one hand, and its therapeutic practices for symbolically containing and transcending polarities on the other. In its absence, any spirituality which eulogises holistic growth is likely to engender the reverse effect