Las 5 FASES para integrar tu SOMBRA y recuperar tu PODER

Is it true that in the depths of your mind there is a hidden force that controls your decisions and your reactions without you realizing it? What exactly is the shadow and how does it integrate in a practical way in daily life? What did Carl Gustav Jung propose to be able to descend to that dark zone safely, dialogue with your unconscious and transform your worst defects into your greatest source of power?

Well, in this video we are going to explore the process of integration of the shadow step by step, understanding how to disarm your projections and how to channel all that energy in your favor to regain your absolute sovereignty.

Welcome everyone to this new video. I am Juana, this is Cachetada, a channel where we seek to expand consciousness, understanding better what this reality in which we live is about. We make content every week aligned to this search, so if this is something that interests you, I invite you to subscribe to the channel so you don't miss anything that we are going to be uploading. Today's topic is going to be one that you asked me, which is how to integrate the shadow according to Jung.

To understand Jung's concept of shadow, we must first get the idea out of our heads that shadow is something bad that we must discard. Jung had a much richer and deeper vision of this concept. For him, the psyche is a system of energy compensation and the shadow is a structural element necessary to our mind. His real theoretical breakthrough is precisely that this living force is not limited to individual baggage, but precisely operates

in two fundamental dimensions that we have to integrate. On the one hand, the personal shadow and on the other hand, the collective shadow. First of all, the personal shadow has to do with our repressed biography. What does this mean? That it is somehow the mental basement where we throw away all the qualities that do not fit with our personality or social mask. It contains the experimented but evicted from consciousness to survive and be loved. How does this work? Well,

Basically, since we are born, we select which parts are acceptable and which are not, depending on the environment in which we live. Like when we are babies, if they don't love us, we die, the rejection of the tribe is equivalent to death. That's where the great division begins. To be loved and therefore survive, the child is cut off, psychically speaking. Every aspect of oneself that puts at risk the love of their

"Cuidadores" is thrown into the basement in an unconscious pact: "I give up this part of me in exchange for being loved." Let's take an example to understand this: the example of the annulment of vulnerability. Imagine a 5-year-old boy who falls, cries, and his dad yells at him not to be a fag and that men don't cry. The boy learns that sensitivity causes rejection and then keeps him in the shade.

Another example could be the cancellation of aggressiveness.

Imagine a girl who gets angry because, I don't know, they broke her toy, and her mom challenges her saying that good women don't scream and that no one is going to love her like that. The message is basically, if you defend yourself, you're left alone. The defensive reaction, that sacred fire to set limits, is going to stop immediately.

the shadow. From an adult point of view, you will be a complacent person accumulating a silent resentment that will sooner or later explode. Another example could be that of the loss of sovereignty. If being outstanding generated envy in your environment, then you suppressed your ambition. Your shadow stays with that desire for success and recognition and you go for life asking for forgiveness for existing. What happens is that by closing these parts we take away the possibility of maturing from

In the second place, we have the collective shadow, which has to do with archetypal inheritance. I'll open a parenthesis here. For those who want to understand archetypes in depth, you can go watch the video I have on the channel, debunking this topic

in detail. But let's continue. The point is that for Jung, when we are born, we are not a blank sheet or an empty container. We already come to the world with a pre-installed operating system that becomes the collective unconscious. The collective shadow, then, is made up of the deep memory of our entire species. It is, so to speak, the archive of all the horrors, the predatory instincts and the cruelty capacity that humanity experienced throughout its evolution.

The real danger of this shadow is what Jung called "archetypical possession", which basically has to do with what is called "awakening of the horde". This force is dangerous because it is contagious and is infinitely superior to the ego of any individual. How does it work? Well, when a person dissolves into a mass, whether it's a political party, a religion, a football fan, even a group of friends,

his ego, conscious, turns off and the collective shadow takes full control. This is what somehow allows us to understand how a man who is a loving father at home on weekends is able to put on a uniform on Mondays and shoot innocent people at work.

It's not that he went crazy, it's that his individuality was devoured by the collective shadow, by the group. As if it were just a little above, this shows us the tremendous illusion of civilization. We believe that we are advanced beings because we have technology or laws, but below that intellectual lacquer, the archaic predator remains intact. That sadistic impulse comes from the factory. That's why, when the individual conscience is diluted, a group of peaceful neighbors can become a

horde of lynchers in a matter of seconds. This whole phenomenon leads us directly to the mechanism of collective expiatory chivo. As a society, in order not to take charge of our own corruption and darkness, we grab all that evil and project it on others, which can be the neighboring country, the immigrants or the opposite political party. The system is perversely perfect. If evil is out there, embodied in that group, then

perseguirlos o destruirlos se convierte casi que en un deber moral. Así es como la sombra colectiva nos hace cometer los peores actos de crueldad en nombre del bien común. Si quieren y les interesa este tema igual me lo dejan en comentarios y lo abordo en otro video porque es bastante complejo y es muy interesante.

What I don't want to leave out here is that what for Jung is the shadow, for Hellinger, for example, who is the creator of the family constellations, comes to be repressed or excluded in the clan, because he sees it from the perspective of the family transgenerational. Both somehow talk about the same thing. But let's continue. How does the shadow operate? Basically through dynamics of psychic compensation. The first mechanism is projection. It works like this: when we are unable to assimilate our own shadowy contents due to the threat that

present for our moral identity, we transfer them to the outside. Jung explains that projection is not something we do on purpose, but it happens to us. The unconscious content detaches from us, adheres to another person, and we end up seeing in that person an exact reflection of our own darkness. To identify this

this mechanism we have to first identify the overflowing emotion. When the behavior of a third party generates visceral indignation or obsessive judgment, we are clearly facing a projection. We attack outside what we should actually solve inside. The second mechanism is what we call a "burst" in Creole. Basically it is an automatic and unconscious reaction. These hidden parts have their own strength and when we are

For example, it could be the

Well, I'm sorry to say that if it were you...

Now, what happens if the content of the shadow

Well, they can't not come out. What they do is fall into somatization. Basically, the energy of the shadows is expressed in the body, in the organ that best represents the conflict. For example, if you feel that you are worthless or that you cannot sustain your life, the blow goes directly to the bones or joints, which are the ones that hold you standing. If you feel that they are invading your place or that they are stealing your space, the conflict will probably jump into your lungs, which is where the body defends its territory.

Why does it need to come out? Because the psychic energy, which Jung called "libido", responds to the law of conservation. In other words, it does not disappear, but it transforms. When you suppress the anger, for example, you are using your willpower to keep the lid of the basement closed.

This generates the effect of pressure and activates the law of discharge. If you cover a water line with cement, it will look for the cracks in the ground. Well, with the mind exactly the same thing happens. Why does the shadow then choose the physical symptom? Well, when our mind is rigid and we shield ourselves with justifications like "I have to be strong",

For example, we block all the ways of psychological exit. As energy cannot be expressed with words or reflections or personal work, the shadow makes a direct jump to your body for three fundamental reasons. The first and most obvious is that the body does not know how to lie.

Your mind can fool you a thousand times if necessary to protect your social mask or look good. But your body is pure biology. It registers the real impact of the conflict and expresses your truth in live flesh. The second is because of organic symbolism. The symptom works as an exact physical metaphor

of the emotion that was denied. For example, if you have something in your throat that gives you disgust or anger and you don't dare to say it, the shadow will probably close your throat. And the third is because it is the last resource to stop you. When you live ignoring what happens to you to comply with the character, the shadow throws you to a bed with a gastritis or with a panic attack to basically force you to stop and look at you. We get to the big question, how to integrate the shadow?

Well, Jung argued that this is not achieved by an act of intellectual will. Before initiating any descent into the unconscious, a mature, structured and firm ego is needed that works as a container. Lacking this stability exposes you to

Three risks. The first is the psychic flood, which is a collapse where the self drowns in its own darkness. The second is the exclusion of personality, which makes us live divided. You convince yourself that you are perfect, but your shadow acts cruelly without the conscious registering it, somehow living a double psychological and blind life. What in Creole for me we know as psychopaths.

The third is inflation, which means becoming defective. The ego is fascinated by the force of the shadow and the subject justifies his worst behavior under the premise that he is now free. The monster takes control. It is something like what happened, according to me, to Aleister Crowley, who went from being a very counter-Orthodox Christian to going to the extreme of doing only his will and believing that he was the shadow.

For those who are even more interested in Aleister Crowley's topic, I have a whole video on the channel where I develop his whole biography deeply. A mini interruption to tell you that every week we upload exclusive content to the members section within the channel. What is that? Well, it's basically a channel inside the channel. A monthly subscription where you will find my reflections, without filter, the behind the scenes of what happens in cachetada, the backstage of the interviews, exclusive chats, surveys and videos where I respond to your

Thank you.

Here, under the video, there is the button that says "join". You click on it, follow the steps and that's it. Now, yes, we continue with the video. Why is so much solidity required? Well, because the work of the shadow requires that you have a deep moral honesty and that you have the resilience to endure the humiliation of losing the idealized image that we have of ourselves. It requires accepting

que también albergamos egoísmo y cobardía. Una estructura fuerte resiste el impacto de la verdad, sostiene la tensión del conflicto y dialoga con el inconsciente. La conciencia existe porque es nuestra herramienta para sobrevivir. Su función es permitirnos tener una identidad, entender la realidad y tomar decisiones voluntarias.

Without it, we would be handled only by the animal instinct, unable to reason or live with society. And on the other hand, we must understand that the mechanism of sending things to the shadow is not a mistake that our mind has, it is a necessary defense. When we are young, we do not have emotional maturity to solve complex conflicts or to drive impulses that our environment rejects. If a child expresses a behavior that his parents or school punish, his survival is in danger.

So, the mind makes an emergency discard. It hides in the unconscious everything that puts in risk the love and acceptance of others, working as a protection system so that we can grow without destabilizing ourselves. That is why, in summary, the true function of consciousness is not to eliminate the unconscious, but to see it, take charge of it and integrate it.

Let's now get into the process of integrating step by step. As the shadow is unconscious, you can't find it by looking directly at yourself. The first step consists of tracking its effects in the environment through your reactions to others.

Here you have to realize that the answer is usually measured. The problem is that many people react without registering that disproportion. As your ego cannot see what it itself has hidden, the starting point is always indirect. You have to learn to read your effects reflected in the world.

or the others. Jung discovered that the main mechanism of the shadow is projection, an automatic process through which you transfer your own traits, desires or fears, unrecognized, to other people. The first indicator then that something in the shadow is coming out is the disproportionate emotional impact, a visceral reaction that alters your internal balance. For example:

Irritation, extreme rejection, judgments, fascination, obsession, even envy. Once you detect that emotion, you have to stop the reaction outward and redirect the gaze inward. In that pause, you do an self-examination. You ask yourself: "What specific quality of this person is bothering me at a level that I cannot control?" It could be, for example, their ego, vulnerability or ambition. That disturbance tells me that a specific content was projected

Jung explained that if an alien defect generates a calm criticism, you are facing an objective observation. Now, if that same defect causes me anger, an unmeasured reaction or an obsession to criticize it, the problem is no longer the other, it is mine. That is where we enter the second step, which is the withdrawal of projection and assimilation from honesty.

It's the most difficult phase because it demands to dismantle one's own moral superiority and accept the humiliation that this darkness is ours. It consists basically in disarming the court with which you judge the world and recognize that the accused, in any case, you have him inside. Let's think, for example, of a person who lives postponing himself to please and sacrifice himself for the rest. This person will probably be greatly resentful.

It's tremendous to come across people who know how to set firm limits, who say no, or who basically prioritize their own projects or their own person. Their automatic reaction, then, is going to be to judge this type of people and label them as egocentric or heartless.

This is where Jung's real ethical challenge comes in. This martyr, this person, has to stop the accusing finger and accept that his supposed generosity does not come from pure love, but is an unconscious control strategy. He lives off others to make them dependents and ensure

for fear that they will never abandon him. Integrating the shadow in this case means looking at the mirror and assuming with total honesty that he actually hates the ego of the other because he envies his freedom and his ability to take care of himself. He attacks his posture because he is not encouraged to do the same. The other type of projection, and this is very interesting, has to do with the luminous shadow. This happens when, instead of seeing a defect, what you project out is a virtue. For example, it is what you do when you say:

"Hey, how good is Mother Teresa, who could have that heart?" What you don't realize is that if you're able to see that light in the other, it's because you have that same potential inside. No one can recognize something that doesn't have, at least, potential. But the danger of leaving your luminous shadow out there, projected in a third person, is that it leaves you living in a kind of false humility. You become an eternal passive admirer.

You give your power and you end up idealizing leaders, couples or gurus who sooner or later will fall off the pedestal. Removing that projection is accepting that it gives you panic to assume your own talent and your own greatness for fear of

the responsibility that implies taking charge and acting in consequence to that. By accepting all this, your self-image breaks and we move on to the third step, which is the one of the support of internal tension, or better called confrontation. When a crisis followed by guilt and shame is generated, the natural reaction of your ego is going to be wanting to escape, it wants to run away.

However, the method requires you to stay there and withstand the tension without repressing the impulse, but also acting on it in reality, that is, without reacting. It consists of consciously observing how your ego or your mask interacts on one side and the force of your shadow on the other. You have to remain like a lucid witness, experimenting

I said "Jungi Yamaba"

what Jung called maintaining the attention of opposites. When you managed to hold the pressure, comes the fourth step, which is the dialogue with the unconscious content through active imagination. Jung explained this procedure through the theory that the shadow is composed of autonomous parts that have their own voice. To integrate them, you withdraw to a space of quiet, close your eyes and allow the unconscious to project a spontaneous image.

a character, an animal, whatever comes to your mind. Once you identify this figure, this entity, you establish a real verbal conversation with it and you ask it three questions. What do you seek to do by acting like this? Why do you sabotage me? And what are you protecting me from? By doing this and listening to the answer, we will see that behind destructive behavior there is always a legitimate vital force that has deformed because it remains hidden and repressed. For example, if you run into

So, the rage, when it's hidden, it rots and comes out like a destructive burst.

Understanding it allows you to regain that strength of personal sovereignty and take it in a profound and lucid way. We arrive at the fifth step, which is the ethical negotiation and the conscious channeling. This requires that your ego exerts its authority by taking that energy to give it a mature exit in the real world. Basically, give that energy a framework so that it comes out in a mature way.

It's something like raising a child. I'm not a mother, but when a child tells you they want to eat ice cream, you give them the frame, the place and the amount they can eat. To integrate the shadow, it's more or less the same. But for this, you have to assume the social cost of starting to be coherent with who you really are. Why? Because if you don't change your behavior, the process is over.

trunk. So it's about making a responsible pact. The ego assimilates the vital force of that repressed part and uses it voluntarily, which completely alters the general energy dynamics of your mind. If your shadow kept aggressiveness, your ego absorbs that force and uses it consciously to defend your space firmly. The energy then no longer shoots itself because now it has a conscious channel where to go. To close, I also want to add that

"It is necessary to register that the unintegrated shadow is retained energy in the body, in addition to the psyche or in the mind. The one who burned himself with milk sees a cow and cries," my friend Klau would say. Therefore, beyond mental integration, it is necessary to release the load that was anchored in the body. But for this, everyone can find the best way to do it.

In this last block I want to talk about the result that the integration of the shadow brings and what you gain by embracing your darkness. When this process is completed, three fundamental changes occur in your structure that return sovereignty to you over yourself. The first is the most obvious and it is the dissolution of the compulsive impulse. By transferring that repressed trait

from the dark basement to the light of consciousness, that part loses its brute and unmeasured strength and leaves the ability to want to dominate you in automatic. As it no longer needs to manifest itself in secret so that you can see it, the constant self-sabotages in your projects, links, in your day to day life, like those diseases caused by somatization, end. The second change is the release of vital energy. Having to keep the lid

of the closed pressure pot requires an immense and constant energy expenditure, even if we don't realize it. Living by suppressing essential aspects of ourselves generates chronic exhaustion. On the other hand, when your ego finally accepts and integrates the elements stored in its shadow, all that force you used to spend on watching and censoring your interior is released. This makes you experience a remarkable increase in your vitality, a

renewed, that now you can channel voluntarily towards your creativity, your goals and your relationships. The third is the passage from innocence to conscience, which for me is the most transcendental ethical change. You stop being a good person for simple naivety, submission or fear of conflict, because by integrating the shadow

You become fully aware of your destructive potential and your own demons, let's say it like that, but precisely because you know them and you govern them. So your decision to act in a coherent, straight, empathic way, let's say it as you want, becomes a choice.

Your morality is no longer a mask imposed by the fear that you will be rejected, but it transforms into an authentic, solid and truly free quality of who you are. So in summary, what do you gain at the end of the day? You gain absolute awareness and sovereignty over yourself. You regain your power and strength to manage your energy, direct it where you want it and thus direct your life.

That is what the true sense of personal work is about, to regain your power to be the sole owner of what happens to you. So, that said, I'm going to end this chronicle. If you liked it and you are not yet subscribed, I invite you to do so to help the algorithm show you our next videos that are coming

many very interesting topics. I also read them in comments if you want to recommend me some to do in the future and I thank you for joining me again. I send you a huge kiss. Bye Bye!