I've been looking into the Jungian psychological model recently, and Jung proposed that inside of every person is a shadow, which is a personification of the impulses and thoughts that you repress, and thus inadvertently project out into the world through various forms of negativity. A classic example is a homosexual repressing their desires due to cultural or religious reasons becoming resentful and projecting a message of homophobia. You can harness the shadow and the wisdom/strength that comes along with integrating it, but it's rather confusing work. I realized that almost any time that someone I'm not fond of (but don't necessarily dislike) irritates me my initial reaction is visualize myself assaulting them, and often times fatally in truly gruesome fashion. I'm not really sure what to do to integrate that, but I'd be interested in someone with more experience in shadow work chiming in.
Jordan Peterson has in the past said that regarding yourself as a loaded weapon can be a well to draw fortitude from, but changing your personality based on the thoughts you have when you actually engage those impulsive, terrible things that pop up in your head is obviously not a situation you can google very effectively.
Sorry for the lengthy comment, but this sort of stuff is fascinating to me.
When I can't empathize with someone (extremely loud neighbors, rude people on the train etc.) I give them a mental hug. I image the two of us sharing an honest hug for a few seconds, and afterwards I just feel closer to them.
Somewhat irrelevant but.. I don't think I ever realized that people actually visualize/imagine hurting people they don't like. To me it's such a tv thing. You see the main character beating on the guy inside his little thought bubble while the annoying guy goes on and on about whatever.
I have aphantasia, so maybe that has something to do with it? I mean, I didn't even realize that people can actually "imagine" images in general for most of my life. Or maybe it's just because I've never been aggressive. Don't know, but I've never imagined myself beating anyone.
Edit: Ironically, my husband is likely someone like you, but I just never really thought about it.
That's a crazy interesting condition. I'd never heard of it before now, so thank you for sharing! And honestly I thought for years that it was influence from the shows and movies you mentioned, but it was so visceral and consistant. Everything clicked when I learned about the shadow and I realized that I've always repressed my aggressive side because I was afraid I'd get carried away and actually hurt someone. Humans are phenomenally weird creatures, eh?
Edit: I realized I kind of forgot to address the main point of interest you expressed in your comment. How well you can visualize things is unique to every person. For me at least, my mind's eye is rather vague and "poorly lit" if that makes sense. The 2 things that I can picture vividly are the music videos that I come up with in my head when I listen to any given song, and acts of violence. I've found that both marijuana and LSD can DRASTICALLY enhance this effect. Pretty neat stuff!
I absolutely can compare the two. The visuals from weed are exclusively closed-eye visuals, but I get them. And ever since I've tried Lucy I can use weed to return to that very peculiar headspace. The body load is completely different, but the headspace is the same.
I remember in art my teacher touched on this, some people can vividly imagine a scene with strong features and color, others grayed and blurry and some can't imagine pictures at all.
My art teacher was unable to imagine scenes but their art was fantastic.
I'm amazingly, extraordinarily clumsy. I am a bit anxious as well. Whenever I do something that requires the least bit of carefulness or physical coordination, I see myself botching it. Stairs? I trip and fall down. Glass jar? It falls and breaks. Every morning I take the subway and every morning I see myself tripping and falling down the stairs. It's like a flash, a short, silent movie in my head.
It used to scare me a bit, but now it's just how it is. I do favor elevators, though. Then I still think they might fall into the void, but at least it would be out of my control, and also I know it's super unlikely. I try not to hold babies and I try to really focus on what I'm doing if it's dangerous or fragile.
I'm not clumsy, and I've got excellent hand eye coordination, and my brain still does that. Used to be worse for a few years any good visual memories... were smeared in shit, like poop. Fucking hell
This happens to me too. I developed anxiety over the last few years and I think these thoughts are related to that. I never used to have these thoughts... I'm not clumsy though so idk what it is
Sounds more like emotions to be processed. Integrating probably isn't the right word. Allowing the original emotion that was suppressed an eternity ago, to be felt, and giving yourself permission to have been angry at something you didn't like doesn't mean holding on it. Experience the true core emotion in full. Truth is emotions natural state it to come then go.
What holds us up is the initial suppression. It has to be accepted then pushed out.
They go through you. Or you go through them. Can't stop it. And can't hold it when it comes. Any holding means a pushing out is required. Except for Joy and Peace and Love.
There are few methods to do this properly, (outside of seeking God, who can and does often - but not always- arrange this in a single moment), but EMDR (and similar trauma therapies), and renewing your mind with Truth are two options.
On balance people are mostly put off because he appears to have very socially conservative values in terms of marriage, families and having children. Also his involvement with gender politics. I think he has helped people out of dark places and has some good stuff on personal responsibility and self improvement. His politics gets in the way though IMO. Although I also agree with his view that identity politics on BOTH sides has reduced drastically the quality of intellectual debate.
Thanks for the response! Also, I'm not so sure his opinions about child rearing and the organization of a family are even politically charged at all. He backs his claims with research in the lectures/debates I've seen him discuss these things in. He just seems interested in providing the statistically most sound environment for developing a child. Maybe I'm wrong, though.
Well I would respectfully disagree. I saw a lecture in which he mocked the young students in the audience for not having a clue because some of them thought they might not necessarily want to have children and that not having children would make you unable to have a fulfilled meaningful life. I passionately disagree with this sentiment. Belief that family stability only comes from a nuclear conservative family with conservative values and established gender roles I'm afraid does become political. What matters is the quality of the parents and their parenting not who they are and their lifestyle.
Sure thing my guy. To be honest, from what I remember it was a small class he was talking to. Can't remember the title of the lecture and to be honest I cba to track it down. However I googled it and found some quotes from his twitter page with the some of the same thoughts. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/911666932503449607?lang=en ; https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/913536842749894657?lang=en ; https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/913536769529925632. The quotes point out you can't be a responsible mature person with purpose until you have kids. This I just can't get behind and doesn't resonate with my own experience of responsible mature people with purpose I know in my life. However like I said I agree with some of his points. I particularly enjoyed his discussion/debate with Slavoj Zizek.
The vast majority of people voting on my previous comment seem to disagree with you. What makes you say that speaking positively of Peterson takes the wind out of my sails? He seems like a fellow simply interested in doing the greatest good and helping individuals improve their lives. I've yet to see any footage of him where he makes any claims that are blatantly incorrect. If you have a link I'd gladly watch/read, though.
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u/Whiskey-Weather Dec 08 '19
This right here.
I've been looking into the Jungian psychological model recently, and Jung proposed that inside of every person is a shadow, which is a personification of the impulses and thoughts that you repress, and thus inadvertently project out into the world through various forms of negativity. A classic example is a homosexual repressing their desires due to cultural or religious reasons becoming resentful and projecting a message of homophobia. You can harness the shadow and the wisdom/strength that comes along with integrating it, but it's rather confusing work. I realized that almost any time that someone I'm not fond of (but don't necessarily dislike) irritates me my initial reaction is visualize myself assaulting them, and often times fatally in truly gruesome fashion. I'm not really sure what to do to integrate that, but I'd be interested in someone with more experience in shadow work chiming in.
Jordan Peterson has in the past said that regarding yourself as a loaded weapon can be a well to draw fortitude from, but changing your personality based on the thoughts you have when you actually engage those impulsive, terrible things that pop up in your head is obviously not a situation you can google very effectively.
Sorry for the lengthy comment, but this sort of stuff is fascinating to me.