In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness upon the face of deep and the Spirit of God glided upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness.
Genesis 1:1-4
Binary thinking – nature and properties
From the beginning of its existence, humanity experiences the world through dual vision. The primordial Garden of Eden and oneness with the creator give way to Good and Evil, Heaven and Earth, Life and Death...
Some may view this dual vision as a liability due to its inherent limitations, but in reality it’s simply a necessity of life; The ability of living beings to discern between this and that is key to their survival, and humans are no different. In fact, we are a prime example of a species which makes use of binary thought structure to improve and insure survival odds by constantly altering and modifying the alignments of our basic code. The majority of this “modification”, this “programming” of our mind, is achieved though stories.
Stories - creation and transformation
Humans are storytellers. From the simple description of mundane events to the big cultural myths which give our life meaning – stories are our way of understanding things and attaining order where Chaos used to be. Stories tell us of dilemmas and struggles, then also of potential solutions and tools. They give rise to moral conflicts, as well as offer us the value systems to cope with them.
Stories get passed on from generation to generation, changing with time and space like cultural DNA, mutating and evolving under environmental and social pressures. Some get lost, while those that “work” survive and continue to serve us on our journeys. They are the glasses we wear on top of our binary vision, through which a uniform world becomes dual – exactly the thing we need to be able to make choices.
And here, within their very essence, lies their one great weakness: Their weakness is that they’re stories… partial perceptions of a whole, uniform reality. The images they describe and maintain can be right under certain circumstances, but false in a different time, space or social context. We must remember that stories are our tools. Their purpose is to help us cope with our environment and maintain our existence – not the other way around. Stories can be changed. Stories should be changed. And stories will change whether we like it or not. Sticking to a story gone irrelevant is as bad as never coming up with a good one.
So how can we tell if a story’s time to change has come? We can only do so if we are aware of Nature as it is, of the context of our existence within it and of the mechanisms through which we interpret it and transform it into our life-leading theme. Perhaps it can’t be done. Perhaps these limitations are embedded too deeply into our mode of being, but there’s much to gain from the human effort to try.
That is the way of the Shadow.
The Shadow – striving to know
As Shadow, we are merely striving to earn a better understanding of our binary nature, while aligning ourselves with a non-polar essence. We do not denounce Light and Dark, but acknowledge them for what they are – relative aspects, due to change and shift according to context. Being Shadow, it is definitely possible for us to identify ourselves with a certain construct. We simply put our emphasis on the uncovering and examining of the infrastructure, making sure it still suits its purpose.
I remember many asking what the Shadow is. Is it both Light and Dark? Is it neither? The question itself is binary, and therefore can never have a finite answer. I guess it’s a mater of balance and context... Light and Dark seem to indicate a certain type of motivation and decision making tendency. Being Shadow means that you try to look beyond these motivations and decisions and figure where they originate. Then, out of connection not only to society or to one’s self, but also to Nature and the universe around us – we can make decisions with the understanding of “why” and the full knowing of how they are our own.
Could the sky get any darker
than the blackness of night
Is it not my own stain
that which blots out my sight
And my own inner spark
which then lights all with light?