No matter how many friends you have, you could always use one more, your own dark side.

Everybody has a dark side, but most people are unaware of it.

This is one of the most important things Carl Jung has brought to light during his career as a psychoanalyst.

Dr. Jung, along with Sigmund Freud and Alfred Adler, was one of the founders of modern depth psychology or psychoanalysis.

After some time, Jung separated from Freud's teachings to pursue his own beliefs.

He founded his own school of psychology alongside the field of analytic psychology.

Among Jung's published books are Psychology of the Unconscious, Man and His Symbols, The

Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, Modern Man in Search of a Soul, The Psychology of the Transference, Memories, Dreams, and Thoughts, and The Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious.

One of Jung's most important teachings was about the self and the psyche.

The psyche is what some people would consider to be our soul or mind, and it encompasses our consciousness as well as our unconsciousness.

The self is the psyche and all its potential, the totality of who you are and who you could become.

Our consciousness contains everything we are aware of, and in contrast, the unconsciousness houses everything we are not aware of.

Jung became immensely famous for his theory on the individuation process, an almost step-by-step plan that seeks to fulfill your psyche's potential by trying to make the unconscious conscious.

The most important part of the unconsciousness to focus on for this practice is what Jung called the shadow or your dark side.

The shadow contains all the aspects of yourself that you'd rather not have and are in denial about.

These are your bad traits and darkest side.

The shadow is what you try to pretend you don't have, even to the point of convincing yourself.

Examples of traits the shadow could house are explosive anger, jealousy, envy, greed, pride, laziness, vanity, and so on.

Generally, we tend to be completely unaware of our shadow, it's in our unconscious.

But the suppressing of your unconsciousness is exactly what sustains unhappiness, inauthenticity and misery.

While you might think your shadow sounds more like your enemy than your friend, in this video we'll explain why that's not true and why you should consider your dark side your friend.

Your dark side can reveal your true self Carl Jung says,

No noble well-grown tree ever disowned its dark roots, for it grows not only upward but downward as well.

A defining part of your shadow is the fact that you don't know it, that's why it's called the shadow.

Everything you know about yourself is in the light, all the other things are behind it, in the shadows, and in order to befriend your dark side, it's vital to shine a light on your shadow, to truly try and get to know yourself.

Remaining ignorant about your unconscious and especially the shadow is very dangerous.

In theory, when you repress your bad traits, you only show your good ones.

But in fact, you can never truly remove bad traits, whatever you push down is bound to bubble back up during unexpected, uncontrollable moments.

For example, the repression of your anger will result in sudden, out-of-the-blue outbursts every now and then in the most unpredictable ways.

The same goes for any other undesirable trait, if you ignore your flaws, they will always control you.

The denial of our shadow self, however, feels very natural, it's difficult to try and look straight into the aspects of ourselves that we despise or fear the most.

How could someone who takes great pride in their kindness and generosity ever acknowledge their raging envy?

How could someone who sees themselves as fully confident ever address their insecurities?

Well in most cases, they don't.

If someone sees themselves as a highly confident person, they will probably ignore and deny their insecurities, but that doesn't mean they are not there.

Instead, they might subconsciously avoid facing their insecurities by avoiding certain situations, not wearing certain clothes and so on.

People who remain in denial about certain parts of themselves have to stay in their own bubble in order to avoid running into those parts.

If you pretend to be confident, you will always have to avoid anything that could bring your insecurities to light.

But true confidence comes from facing your fears and insecurities.

And doing so can only be done by recognizing them, or in other words, by recognizing your shadow.

How can you work on something that you don't even know exists?

Since you cannot improve what you don't know, the first step of growing beyond your weaknesses is to get to know them.

How?

By interrogating yourself.

Get to know the deepest, darkest side of yourself.

This won't be easy.

It takes time, effort, focus without distractions and you have to keep the conversation flowing.

Take some time out of each day to ask yourself, what behaviors did I exhibit today?

Why did I do the things I did?

What motivated me?

What was I afraid of today?

The best ways to reflect on these questions that Jung recommends specifically are through meditation, journaling, or drawing.

When it comes to drawing, Jung specifically recommends focusing on drawing mandalas.

Drawing something, especially something as symmetrical and simple as a mandala, relaxes your brain and will help your thoughts focus on all the things that you normally suppress.

Moreover, the kinds of lines you draw and colors you choose can tell you things about yourself.

Do you use round, soft shapes or harsh lines?

Cold colors or warm colors?

And what do you think this reflects?

If you analyze yourself through mandalas every day, week, or month, you can track your growth and changes in a way you never have before.

Another particularly helpful aspect to examine when it comes to exploring your shadow is how you view others.

One big consequence of suppressing your bad traits is extreme and often unfair judgment of others, portraying that very trait you want to convince yourself you don't have.

For example, if you've convinced yourself you're never lazy and you've suppressed your tendency to be lazy into your shadow, you'll quickly brand others as lazy, even if you don't have enough information or context to do so.

This is called projection.

Instead of accepting the fact that you might feel lazy every now and then, you project that trait onto others.

Suddenly, everyone you see sitting down or taking a break is lazy and you judge them harshly, even unfairly for it.

So when you sit down to explore your shadow, take the extra time to ask yourself, who did

I judge today?

Why?

What traits do I find the most despicable in others and why?

And do I ever feel a tendency to portray that trait too?

However you do it, make sure you set aside a certain time to spend reflecting, like in the evening before bed or in the morning before work.

Getting to know your shadow is a difficult and never-ending process since you're always changing, but it's also one of the most rewarding things you'll ever do.

Once you get to know what it is that you push away, you get to know what drives you the most and what truly makes you, you.

After having gotten to know your shadow, you probably won't like it.

In fact, it might disturb or even disgust you.

You don't want to associate with anything you've found, let alone befriend these traits.

But that is what you need to grow as a person.

2.

Your dark side can give you advice According to Jung, one does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.

Allow your new friend, the shadow, to give you advice every now and then.

No matter how badly you might want it to be false, your shadow is part of you.

And every single part of you can be helpful in different kinds of situations.

For example, your shadow might be made up of greed, anger, childishness and laziness.

Not an ideal friend, sure, but what positive qualities might these traits house?

A greedy friend might inspire you not to settle when you could have more.

Maybe in order to avoid being greedy, you've always been overly generous, denied yourself luxuries or convinced yourself you don't deserve whatever your shadow wants.

However, being the opposite of greedy can backfire in many ways.

Greed is, of course, a bad trait and generosity is greatly appreciated.

But those who find no balance between the two do themselves no favors.

If you want to get a raise at your job, you often need to ask for it.

If you want a lift from a friend, you should reach out and tell them.

If you want to treat yourself every now and then, you should be able to.

Instead of ignoring your greed, see it as a friend telling you you deserve more.

You might disagree from time to time, but you should at least hear it out.

Moreover, take anger.

Someone who's always angry isn't pleasant to be around, that's true.

Loads of people, especially those who want to be seen as kind, easygoing or gentle, repress their anger all the time.

They hide it in their shadow and never look at it.

Repressing anger, however, allows it to fester, which can lead to sudden outbursts or even serious mental health problems.

Besides that, anger can actually be incredibly useful.

When your friend, in other words you, is angry, ask yourself why.

Anger is often a basis for fairness and justice.

Sometimes the anger you feel is very much appropriate and can serve as a motivation for you to stand up for yourself.

So like with greed, instead of repressing your anger, you should listen to your shadow as if it were a friend saying, hey, you should be angry about this, and then decide whether you agree or not.

A childish friend might show you what it's like to regard the world with wonder and enjoy the little things.

Lazy friends will teach you how to relax and take breaks.

The longer you think about all those bad traits, you'll start to realize just how many upsides they have.

And in turn, you can show this friend how to balance all these traits and only give into them when it's useful.

To listen to these pieces of advice and put them to good use, you need to acquire wisdom that's hidden in every single part of yourself, even the parts that seem bad.

In order to befriend your shadow, you have to look past the discomfort of your bad traits and consider them truly and objectively.

Once you know it's what's been holding you back, you can actually use it to go forward.

So your friend gives you advice.

Okay, sometimes it will be bad advice, but sometimes it'll be really, really good advice.

Advice that you'll only know if you accept your shadow into your life.

3.

Your dark side can help you be unique In the words of Jung, becoming conscious of your shadow is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.

Getting to know your shadow means getting to know a whole new side of yourself and this can also help you become your most authentic, unique self.

Repressing the shadow asks for a lot of pretending.

You have to pretend not to be lazy, not to be scared, not to be insecure and more.

People who ignore their shadow the hardest are often the most inauthentic people because they're too busy trying to become what they think others want them to be, rather than actually being themselves and worse, they're in denial of their actual selves.

The shadow often houses the traits that are most unique to us because being different scares us.

We want to be like everybody else, so we've convinced others and ourselves that we are.

But having shoved away all those traits that are unique and unusual, it's impossible to embrace your uniqueness.

So getting to know your shadow and seeing it as a friend giving you advice is the way to become your most unique, full and authentic self.

Listening to your shadow's advice can help you come to creative solutions that you'd never have thought of without being conscious of your shadow, solutions, ideas and actions that are unique to you.

Knowing your shadow is vital for being proud of yourself and acting as such.

For example, if you accept the fact that you were greedy, you might suddenly realize you're great at advocating for yourself and what you deserve.

All the things you know about yourself thanks to your shadow and all the things you now do better, they all come together to make you a unique person.

Moreover, when your shadow is conscious, you'll face your deepest secret desires, hopes and dreams.

You'll find that you have aspirations you had no idea of before befriending the shadow and that you have personal goals in life that had been hidden to you before that moment.

Living authentically looks different for every single person.

That's what makes it so authentic.

So living according to the shadow means breaking free from the norm and embracing your own ideas and plans.

Discuss your life plans with your shadows, ask your shadow for advice and proposals and learn who you truly, uniquely are.

By befriending your shadow, you can embrace your true self.

4.

Your dark side can fight you In our final quote from Carl Jung for this video, he says,

Beware of unearned wisdom.

Like with any friend, sometimes you and your shadow will fight.

First and foremost, when you don't acknowledge your shadow, it will harm you.

This has already been discussed, but it's important to reiterate that getting to know your shadow is a continuing effort.

Exploring the shadow is never fully over.

Just like any friendship, your relationship with your shadow requires constant work and effort, and neglecting it results in fights.

So what does fighting with your shadow look like?

An uncared-for shadow will express itself in numerous ways, unhelpful gut feelings, outbursts, unfair judgment towards others, and self-consciousness.

This has also been discussed, but even after you've accepted and integrated your shadow, it can still trick you.

The advice your shadow friend gives you can be wrong, the feelings you feel as a result of your shadow can be deceptive, and everything can become too much.

So sometimes, our shadow parts get the upper hand in an unhelpful way.

We get destructive instincts or a bad feeling.

Your shadow can tell you to get angry in a situation where it would be an overreaction, or to relax when you should be putting the work in, or to go against the norm when it simply isn't the time.

It's your job not to just listen to your shadow blindly, but fight it every now and then, engage in discussions with it.

Befriending your shadow requires patience all the time, patience for yourself and patience when making decisions.

The shadow gets the most chance to destruct when you don't give yourself time to actually converse with it.

So fighting with your shadow doesn't mean you should start ignoring whatever intuitions you have, don't go back to repressing parts of yourself.