Our Shadow, Our Light

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"To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering." 
- Friedrich Nietzsche

As humans, we tend to run away from pain rather than learn from it. Often times, it's when we have a hard time forgiving ourselves that we try to avoid who we are at our worst. We are reminded of how we fall prey to insecurity, vanity, narcissism. The pain that comes from our own actions haunts us because we allow it to. We aim for a sort of moral perfectionism, agonizing over every personal flaw in the process. We are afraid of what Carl Jung called, "the shadow self". It is the avoidance of this dark side that limits us from becoming our ideal self.

Becoming your ideal self requires for one to embrace the shadow self. We call this conflict between the two sides, "optimism". People often mistake the word for delusion. This tends to occur when conflating "optimism" with "idealism". Idealism is nothing more but a coping mechanism. Optimism is a powerful statement that switches the power dynamic between your perceptions and the hardships of life.

Forgiving yourself is the stepping stone in standing up to pain. You must accept the fact that this battle between the two selves will go on until you die, and that conflict defines you.

"An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life:
“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.
”It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil – he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.”
He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf will win?”
The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

Now the question becomes, why make the right choice? Because the choice you make can create an ideal for the world to strive towards. "Optimism IS possible, but at a cost. I will fight for the best in everything and everyone, no matter what that choice entails."

With that being said, create lasting change requires one to go beyond a simple choice. One has to permanently embody that choice in everything he or she does. In other words, you have to become the wolf that you feed.
And no one can tell you which wolf to become.

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