The intensity of
shadow energies is a way of getting noticed: Hiding something is not
the same as killing it. Shadow energies remain alive. Even though you
refuse to look at them, they aren’t extinguished–in fact, their desire
for life becomes all the more desperate.

To catch your attention as a parent, a child who is overlooked will
become more and more extreme in its behavior: first a call for
attention, then a cry, then a tantrum. Shadow energies follow much the
same pattern.
It seems only reasonable to see panic attacks, for example, as a
hidden fear throwing a tantrum. That same fear first called out to be
noticed in a normal way, but when the person refused to notice it, a
call turned into a cry and finally ended up as a full-blown attack.
Fear and anger are especially adept at increasing the voltage to the
point where we feel that they are alien, evil, demonic forces acting
without our will. They are actually just aspects of consciousness
forced into inhuman intensity by repression. Repression says, “If I
don’t look at you, you will leave me alone.” To which the shadow
answers, “I can do things that will make you look at me.”
Bringing consciousness to any energy diffuses it: This follows
naturally from the last statement. If an energy demands your attention,
then paying attention will begin to satisfy it. An overlooked child
isn’t placated by only one glance. It takes time to change any behavior
for good or ill and, like children, our shadow energies get stuck in
patterns and habits.
But this doesn’t alter the general truth that if you bring light
into the shadow, its distortions start to lessen and eventually are
healed. Is there time enough and patience to do the whole job
thoroughly? There’s no fixed answer to that.
Adapted from The Book of Secrets, by Deepak Chopra (Harmony Books, 2004).

Shadow Energies