Guilt is the Teacher; Love is the Lesson

(JOAN BORYSENKO)

EXCERPTS:

· A healthy person is free to be himself and experience his feelings without worrying about pleasing or displeasing someone else. He can literally be true to his own Self. He can be happy or sad, angry or complacent as he sees fit, rather than pasting on a mask that leaves him feeling anxious, empty, depressed, and out of touch with the true, authentic feelings and impulses that lie beneath. These hidden impulses, the parts of ourselves that we stuff behind the mask, are what Carl Jung called the shadow.

· In facing our "dark" parts, the disowned parts of our being that we thought were unworthy of love, we learn to live whole, authentic lives After all, what else can mobilize us so well, and help us overcome the hypnotic inertia of day-to-day life? Isn't crisis and pain the universal great awakener? We re-own the energy deposited in what Carl Jung called the shadow - the long bag containing discarded parts of our self that we unconsciously drag behind us throughout life. In the shadow, we find the power that allows us to live life with enthusiasm, excitement, and joy - the natural impulses lost from childhood.

· While we're sporting the masks of niceness and conformity, our courage, impulsiveness, freedom, sexuality, anger, and so forth are building up a head of steam, getting wilder and wilder inside us. They become dangerous because they live in darkness, informing our behaviors without our consciously knowing they are there. They can express themselves quite suddenly and explosively in "accidents", impulsive behavior, illnesses or lapses of judgment involving errors that are out of character for us. They express themselves chronically in the SSDD syndrome: same stuff, different day. In other words, an unexplored shadow leaves us stuck without understanding why, assaulted by strange impulses, and powerless to change.

· Enlightenment And The Dark Night Of The Soul

Enlightenment is a shift in identity. Instead of identifying with the temporal, collective false self called the ego, we shift our identity to the eternal Self.

The process of working through our false identifications has been compared to peeling off the layers of an onion. You get through one layer and feel a lot better because the inner light and vitality of the Self can shine through more clearly. You get used to functioning with this increased level of energy and insight, and then, sure enough, you bump into another piece of your shadow. You feel temporarily worse again as you go through the process of recognizing and integrating yet another false identity. The deeper into the onion you go, the bigger the shadow dragons you will encounter, because you have the energy and insight to see them, integrate them, and move on once again. During the process of moving deeper into the onion, people often go through a terribly difficult period when they uncover some of their darkest shadow secrets. During this period, it is common to lose one's faith in the Self and in the journey, and to feel desperately afraid and alone.

The Holy Spirit, the Comforter, often comes when the heart has been ripped apart – broken open – by psychic pain, when the psychological defenses that keep us out of touch with the shadow are weakened or rendered useless. When the shadow is seen so clearly, the illusion of the "perfect" false self suddenly breaks down and the mask that we have falsely identified with is shattered. At this point, it's no wonder we experience a bitterness more than "a thousand times death," for it is actually the death of our ego. If we succeed in tolerating this bitterness, then the light of the Self will begin to shine more brightly, and the presence of the Comforter will grow stronger.

· From the journal of Etty, a woman gassed at Auschwitz:

“People sometimes say, “You must try to make the best of things.” I find this such a feeble thing to say. Everywhere things are both very good and very bad at the same time. The two are in balance, everywhere and always. I never have the feeling that I have got to make the best of things, everything is fine just as it is.”

Every situation, however miserable, is complete in itself and contains the good as well as the bad. The middle way is path of wisdom that informs the decision about when to fight for change and when to accept our circumstances. The middle way walked by contemporary heroes such as Etty is the same path of which the Buddha and Jesus spoke. The ancients told us that it was as "narrow as the razor's edge."

· Heaven and Hell

In an old story, a man dies and an angel ushers him into a gorgeously appointed room. There are bowls of steaming delicacies on the table, and the people are rosy-cheeked and well-fed. There are Jews and Christians, Buddhists and Moslems, atheists and agnostics, people of every race and religion, black and white, red and yellow, young and old. They're singing, hugging, laughing, and having a fine time. But, strangely, the spoons there are very long, too long for a person to feed himself. However, this just adds to the merriment because people are enjoying feeding one another and being cared for in return. When the angel opens the door to the next room, there are the same velvet drapes, celestial music, sweet aromas, and bowls of steaming delicacies, the same mixture of sizes and shapes, religions and races. But there is no joy and no song, only screaming and groaning. The people there are sallow and sickly, wasting away from starvation, and consumed with anger and frustration, each trying fruitlessly to fit the spoon into his own mouth. This, explains the angel, is the difference between heaven and hell: compassion. If we have not learned to suffer with, we will suffer alone.

· In working through repetitive conflicts, we begin to see our shadows and old baggage more clearly. There's an old Zen story that makes this point very well. It concerns an interesting "couple," two monks who were walking in silence by a river at sunrise, early in the spring. Swollen with the melting snows, the river had overflowed its banks and swamped the small footbridge that was the only point of crossing for many miles. A young woman, in much distress, stood forlornly by the swiftly running river, pleading with her eyes for the monks' help. Sweeping her into his arms, the older monk bore her aloft through the swirling current and put her down safely on the other side. The two monks walked in silence until sunset, when the vows of their order allowed them to talk. The younger monk then turned on his brother with unbridled fury. "How could you have picked that woman up!" he accused. His face grew red as he shook his fists at the older monk. "You, of all people, know the vows of our order. It is forbidden even to think of a woman, let alone to touch one! You have defiled yourself. You have shamed the entire order!"

The elder monk turned to him complacently. "My brother," he said. His eyes were soft with the wisdom of forgiveness. "I put that woman down on the other side of the river this morning. It is you who have been carrying her around all day."

· The psychological and spiritual journey of soul mending is without beginning and without end. Although we may have been unaware of it, our soul has always been seeking for its Source of being. Our problems, mistakes, sufferings, and regrets have been no less a part of our innate movement toward that wholeness than have our conscious efforts to live a life of compassion and love. The journey never ends because our souls continue to grow in wisdom and experience, both in this temporal life and in worlds unseen. We are on a journey with no end and no goal other than living this very moment in its fullness, saying “yes” to life.

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