The shadow personality and photography

“The greater the contrast, the greater the potential. Great energy only comes from a correspondingly great tension of opposites.” Carl Jung

This is the fifth in the series of key elements of shamanic healing and how they can be reflected in photographic expression. These now start to delve into areas which are foreign to many peoples’ everyday experiences and which they might rather not explore. This is OK and if you feel this, read no further but simply appreciate the images for what they are. They’re certainly more challenging to write about in ways that make sense in the context of the theme – but here goes!

“If we didn't have shadow we'd just sit around loving the light, likely doing nothing with it.” S. Kelley Harrell

What is the shadow?

In psychology, the shadow side of one’s personality is the self’s emotional “blind spot”, generally regarded as the unconscious. These include the collection of negative or undesirable traits we keep hidden – the things we don’t like about ourselves or are afraid to admit to others e.g. violent tendencies, unconventional desires of social taboos etc. They lie deep and often unrecognised; however they also include our positive, untapped potential i.e. qualities we may admire in others but disavow in ourselves e.g. “I’ll never be as good as they are”. As David Richo in Shadow Dance suggests: “It is the realm beyond our limits, the place where we are more than we seem. Our shadow can be called a ‘cellar of our unexamined shame’. Our positive shadow is an ‘attic of unclaimed valuables’.”

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” Carl Jung

Jung goes further by postulating that this can also include the “collective subconscious”, including societal and ancestral norms and attitudes which can also be positive or negative. A light-hearted day-to-day example is queuing in Britain is almost sancrosanct but is seen very differently across the English Channel!

How all this might be manifested varies from individual to individual e.g. through dreams, visions, or disturbing feelings. We all have a shadow side, recognised or not, reflecting everything that normally we refuse to acknowledge in ourselves. For some, this can become the root of much dysfunctional behaviour and relationships with others. Whether extreme or less so, neglecting or denying these aspects we inadvertently give them power over us. However, given the will to explore these for personal healing/improvement, with skilled therapy or guidance it’s possible to integrate at least some of the features of the shadow in a positive way to support a stronger, more grounded consciousness and personality than before. Some even believe that the shadow is the origin of creativity and drives an ongoing search for reconciliation of conflicting energies without which the urge for creativity would be absent. How many artists, sports people etc. seem to have ‘tortured souls’? As this blog is a creative art, I wonder what that says about my unconscious tensions?!

“In the end, bless the darkness and hold the light, because the two aren't divisible.” S. Kelley Harrell

The shadow in shamanism

One of the core purposes of Shamanism is to recognise and integrate conflicting aspects and energies of the human psyche, including individual illness, trauma, ancestral blockages, the wider collective subconscious, and the universe. For interest, in the shamanic world the nine shadow areas are: Jealousy, Manipulation, Obsession, Judgement, Indulgence, Attachment, Denial and Greed. Each of us has a unique combination of these and denial suggests a blind spot! However, once identified, they can be worked on through self-help or with the guidance/healing of an experienced shaman/healer. The psychological analogy would be through psychotherapy. A core text about this process is Shadow Dance by David Richo. One of my very positive, if challenging, pandemic lock-down experiences was to create the mental time and space to work my way through this quite intense book chapter by chapter, exercise by exercise, to challenge myself in a way I’d not done previously, except through a couple of periods of therapy some years ago. The results were fascinating, and I learned through sometimes painful self-honesty to slowly accept and embrace various aspects of my shadow side. In fact, my main learning was not to try to “conquer” it but to embrace and work with it for more positive outcomes. In so doing, it was like a weight lifting and a number of doors opening for me at the ripe old age of 67! Was it by coincidence that it was after this time I conceived, developed and launched this website and blog?

“The key to all of your behaviours is hidden in a box that you can’t open using normal tools. Your subconscious needs a different recipe than the one you’ve been using.” Gerard Armond Powell

Expressing the shadow photographically

One might reasonably think that given its elusive nature the shadow is a major challenge to express through photography. However, as I’ve attempted to explore in previous blogs in this series, the link with photography becomes increasingly clear. One of the core tenets of photography is that contrast is the juxtaposition and distribution of light and shade in an image, both overall and in different parts of an image. This is one of the main ways in which the photographer works with light (see my June 2022 blog). Deep shadow and bright light would be regarded as high contrast – something akin to the psychological/shamanic shadow referred to above: part of the whole but not always identified and appreciated as such by the observer. It’s also interesting to note that the shadow in photography isn’t normally completely black but varying shades that are perceptible to the eye - rather like the varying degrees of consciousness of one’s own shadow - even if fleetingly…

Some examples

“With the manipulation of abstract symbols, an artist [photographer] can send you information without sound, change your feelings and, sometimes, even beliefs. Artists convey the unspeakable. Artists inspire.” Jonathan Culver

In order to try to illustrate all this, I share below five images from my past portfolio. I’ve reworked each of them to emphasise the shadow qualities, providing a commentary about my own interpretation of contrast and the unconscious shadow as discussed above. By definition this is a highly subjective endeavour but aims to illustrate how a photographer might attempt to express a subject to augment the notion of the shadow: and if successful, might even influence in some small way the viewer’s perception , mood and even understanding of the world, rather than merely creating a pleasant image. This is what I mean when I describe myself as “A landscape photographer searching for the deeper meaning”…

The dense shadow of the foreground trees initially impacts the eye. However after a while, the soft hues of dawn start to come into focus and attention. The more I look at this, the more I notice the structure of the branches, and then the detail of the leaves. As I half close my eyes and gaze at the overall image, it’s as if the clouds are slowly moving towards me. The shadow seems to balance the light, although the former is intense…

The overwhelming shadow in this image causes me an initial sense of despondency with the top and sides oppressively bearing inwards. A depressive state is imagined with little light or hope. The only bright light emanates from the end of the tunnel, although a little luminescence highlights the tunnel’s entrance: the tunnel itself is pitch black. Past seasons’ leaves strew the pathway edges, and the sad ambience is magnified by the nostalgic feeling of a past age. The shadow dominates: in some areas there is no light at all. However, a possible way forward lies in the tunnel’s exit - hope for the future?

Compared to the previous image, while there are areas of shadow, the overall sense is one of dereliction, but romantically so, aided by the soft afternoon light on the doorless wall. The building’s interior can just be made out, with creepers and plants having long ago taken over what was probably a very cosy dwelling. The afternoon light also falls on the foreground plants and touches the woodland in the background. There is a sense of stillness, of a bygone and probably privileged age…

Here, the shadow merges softly into the light with no hard edges, and adds to ones feeling of the coolness of the shade. The rather dreamy view through this bridge brings back memories of a long hot summer afternoon. However, the purposeful misty focus softens the impression and gives this image a more ethereal feel. The light from this tranquil scene is reflected in the moisture on the towpath edge. The darkness top left and bottom right seems to frame this image more, although the grafitti top right is rather incongruous, suggesting some antisocial elements…

The evocative light of early dawn pervades this image. There are no hard shadows: simply varying dark shades of orange and green within which one can just make out some details of this ancient landscape. In fact, the lack of detail is what defines this image. The rolling mists - the opposite of shadow - provide an additional quality to the atmosphere through which one can just make out the human habitation of Glastonbury town. Do we always need to know the detail to understand the world we live in? Sometimes just an impression can evoke more than myriad details…

Conclusion

Thus it can be seen that in both shamanism and photography, accepting the existence of the shadow and its impact on the entirety is the first step in understanding “the whole picture”. One can then consider how to work with its qualities and entities in order to achieve a desired outcome. This is equally true of the whole person or image, or any constituent part of either. It’s also a never-ending journey. Whether one considers ones life or ones photography, they are each in perpetual transition, forever requiring review, reflection and growth….

“Whenever we work on a problem that disturbs us and find within it a source of healing and transformation, we are befriending our shadow in the context of spiritual alchemy.” David Richo