Lifestyle
What is the 'shadow self' and why is everyone talking about their hidden desires?
Earlier this year, a spiritual coach and reiki healer who goes by the name Zen Oasis posted a video to TikTok explaining the idea of “the shadow self” to her 167,000 followers.
Sitting lotus-style in a yellow halter top with a stick of sage smoldering in one hand, the Atlanta native described an exercise she did to become acquainted with her own shadow — a term coined by the early 20th century psychologist Carl Jung to describe the parts of our psyches that we have buried deep in our subconscious.
“I sat down and wrote down all the things I can’t stand about people. The things that really got me like, yech, ick,” she said, one hand raised in disgust. “Then I looked at that really long list and took my top five, and I was just like, ‘You know what? This is me. This is me all day.’”
“It might sound a type of way,” she said. “But this was the best way for me to see the things I can’t see about myself.”
The video, which has been viewed more than 36,000 times, is just one of over 48 million on the social media platform that explores the topic of shadow, and one more piece of evidence of a wide-ranging resurgence of Jungian fascination.
“People are really uncertain about the world and where it’s going to go and they are coming to Jung because they want to find solutions,” said Christophe Le Mouel, director of the C.G. Jung Institute of Los Angeles.
At a time when conversations around self-discovery are surging, the analyst’s theories on the collective unconscious, archetypes and shadow are increasingly influencing the work of social media-savvy healers, therapists and life coaches. It’s also the inspiration for new tarot-like card decks, thought provoking Etsy prints and the recently published “The Shadow Work Journal” that sold more than a million copies thanks in part to a wildly successful TikTok marketing campaign.
Sixty-three years after his death, Jung’s ideas — especially the concept of the “shadow” — are having a moment.
“Reading his work, I was like man, this stuff is 100 years old, but it resonated so deeply,” Zen Oasis said in a phone call. “It helped me synthesize what I already knew intuitively.’”
How did Jung define the shadow? And why is the idea having a resurgence today? To learn more I called up Lisa Marchiano, a Jungian analyst from Philadelphia and co-host of the popular podcast “This Jungian Life,” which itself has more than 50,000 subscribers, and author of the new book “The Vital Spark.”
In an interview, Marchiano discusses how Jung defined shadow, why we all have one and the reasons behind people’s renewed interest in the concept.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What is the shadow self?
If it’s referring to Jung’s concept of the shadow, I will say that he didn’t use the term “shadow self.” He talked about the shadow.
The shadow is the part of ourselves that we’ve disowned. Jung once said the shadow is everything we don’t want to be. It’s something that we think that we’re not. “Oh, we’re not like that.” “I’m not like that.” Well, actually, we are like that, we just don’t have a conscious relationship with those parts of ourselves. But we could, and that’s the really constructive part about getting curious about shadow.
Is it a fundamental idea in Jungian psychology?
Jung had so many insights that have entered everyday parlance. Shadow is one of them but also synchronicity, introversion and extroversion, the collective unconscious. But shadow is certainly a fundamental idea of Jung’s. He felt that doing shadow work was really the first part of the work of analysis and the work of what he called individuation because it’s the entry point into the depths.
Does everyone have a shadow?
In Jungian theory we all have a shadow and it’s made up of two components. There’s a personal shadow and then there’s the collective shadow. To keep things simple I’ll talk mostly about the personal shadow.
Where do our shadows come from?
So, we’re born with all kinds of potential and in the course of growing up and developing a healthy, functioning ego, we find there are parts of ourselves that we have to push aside. This is normal. It’s necessary. It’s healthy. It happens to all of us. Some of what gets relegated to the shadow is stuff that really might cause a problem in a collective society like aggression or greed. But also a lot of what gets pushed into the shadow might be more constructive.
What are some ways to identify what’s in our shadow?
In every family there is usually something that you are not supposed to be. In some families you are absolutely not supposed to be lazy and if you wind up sitting around watching TV that is the worst thing and it means that you’re lazy. Other families you might not be allowed to be impractical or whimsical. In my family you were not allowed to be immodest or boastful. If you’re wondering about your shadow, it can be helpful to ask yourself what was the one thing you were not allowed to be in your family. That will often be a clue to what might be in your shadow.
Why is it useful to examine one’s shadow?
When shadow is totally unconscious we tend to project it. When you feel really hot outrage at someone else, you need to ask yourself: “Where is that in me? What’s that about internally?”
The other reason that it’s helpful to do shadow work is that a lot of what is in the shadow is actually full of vitality and energy that we can use in service to life and growth. Jung reportedly said once that 99% of the shadow is pure gold.
To use myself as an example, I was like, “I can’t seek center stage, I can’t look for attention, I have to be very modest.” But when I got over myself a little bit and did my shadow work, my ability to put myself out there has proven to be very vivifying and enlivening and it has helped me in my career.
How does one embark on shadow work?
The first answer to that is to get curious about what’s in shadow. Notice what gets you really hot. When do you have an outsized reaction of outrage to someone or something? When do you notice that sense of self-righteousness and that huge inflation that comes with being just and on the right side of history? It might be good to say, “Hmm. Wait a second. Who am I hating on right now? And where might that be in me?”
And then just continuing to be open to that. Where might we be a little greedy, a little selfish? Where might we be behaving in shadowy ways?
Why do you think this idea is resonating so strongly right now?
I think that Jung’s ideas have a perennial quality. They always return and with renewed freshness and interest. I definitely think “The Shadow Work Journal” helped it initially, but why did it catch fire? Why did it explode in the public imagination?
I think people appreciate Jung’s ideas and return to them because they sense that there is just an inherent truth in it.
Jung said our ability to do this work could make the difference between whether or not the human race survives. And given how polarized we are, I don’t know that I disagree with that. So in a way, it’s very gratifying to hear that this kind of language is permeating social media.
But I know that things can get flattened and oversimplified and changed on social media so I’m not without some concern about it. One of my concerns is the idea that shadow work is something you can do and be done with. That’s not the way it works. You’re always working on shadow — you can’t make it go away. What you can do is strive to be more conscious of it.
Lifestyle
In ‘No Other Choice,’ a loyal worker gets the ax — and starts chopping
Lee Byung-hun stars in No Other Choice.
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In an old Kids in the Hall comedy sketch called “Crazy Love,” two bros throatily proclaim their “love of all women” and declare their incredulity that anyone could possibly take issue with it:
Bro 1: It is in our very makeup; we cannot change who we are!
Bro 2: No! To change would mean … (beat) … to make an effort.
I thought about that particular exchange a lot, watching Park Chan-wook’s latest movie, a niftily nasty piece of work called No Other Choice. The film isn’t about the toxic lecherousness of boy-men, the way that KITH sketch is. But it is very much about men, and that last bit: the annoyed astonishment of learning that you’re expected to change something about yourself that you consider essential, and the extreme lengths you’ll go to avoid doing that hard work.
Many critics have noted No Other Choice‘s satirical, up-the-minute universality, given that it involves a faceless company screwing over a hardworking, loyal employee. As the film opens, Man-su (Lee Byung-hun) has been working at a paper factory for 25 years; he’s got the perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect family — you see where this is going, right? (If you don’t, even after the end of the first scene, when Man-su calls his family over for a group hug while sighing, “I’ve got it all,” then I envy your blithe disinterest in how movies work. Never change, you beautiful blissful Pollyanna, you.)
He gets canned, and can’t seem to find another job in his beloved paper industry, despite going on a series of dehumanizing interviews. His resourceful wife Miri (Son Ye-jin) proves a hell of a lot more adaptable than he does, making practical changes to the family’s expenses to weather Man-su’s situation. But when foreclosure threatens, he resolves to eliminate the other candidates (Lee Sung-min, Cha Seung-won) for the job he wants at another paper factory — and, while he’s at it, maybe even the jerk (Park Hee-soon) to whom he’d be reporting.
So yes, No Other Choice is a scathing spoof of corporate culture. But the director’s true satirical eye is trained on the interpersonal — specifically the intractability of the male ego.
Again and again, the women in the film (both Son Ye-jin as Miri and the hilarious Yeom Hye-ran, who plays the wife of one of Man-su’s potential victims) entreat their husbands to think about doing something, anything else with their lives. But these men have come to equate their years of service with a pot-committed core identity as men and breadwinners; they cling to their old lives and seek only to claw their way back into them. Man-su, for example, unthinkingly channels the energy that he could devote to personal and professional growth into planning and executing a series of ludicrously sloppy murders.
It’s all satisfyingly pulpy stuff, loaded with showy, cinematic homages to old-school suspense cinematography and editing — cross-fades, reverse-angles and jump cuts that are deliberately and unapologetically Hitchcockian. That deliberateness turns out to be reassuring and crowd-pleasing; if you’re tired of tidy visual austerity, of films that look like TV, the lushness on display here will have you leaning back in your seat thinking, “This right here is cinema, goddammit.”
Narratively, the film is loaded with winking jokes and callbacks that reward repeat viewing. Count the number of times that various characters attempt to dodge personal responsibility by sprinkling the movie’s title into their dialogue. Wonder why one character invokes the peculiar image of a madwoman screaming in the woods and then, only a few scenes later, finds herself chasing someone through the woods, screaming. Marvel at Man-su’s family home, a beautifully ugly blend of traditional French-style architecture with lumpy Brutalist touches like exposed concrete balconies jutting out from every wall.
There’s a lot that’s charming about No Other Choice, which might seem an odd thing to note about such a blistering anti-capitalist screed. But the director is careful to remind us at all turns where the responsibility truly lies; say what you will about systemic economic pressure, the blood stays resolutely on Man-su’s hands (and face, and shirt, and pants, and shoes). The film repeatedly offers him the ability to opt out of the system, to abandon his resolve that he must return to the life he once knew, exactly as he knew it.
Man-su could do that, but he won’t, because to change would mean to make an effort — and ultimately men would rather embark upon a bloody murder spree than go to therapy.
Lifestyle
Austin airport to nearly double in size over next decade
AUSTIN, Texas – Austin-Bergstrom International Airport will nearly double in size over the next decade.
The airport currently has 34 gates. With the expansion projects, it will increase by another 32 gates.
What they’re saying:
Southwest, Delta, United, American, Alaska, FedEx, and UPS have signed 10-year use-and lease agreements, which outline how they operate at the airport, including with the expansion.
“This provides the financial foundation that will support our day-to-day operations and help us fund the expansion program that will reshape how millions of travelers experience AUS for decades to come,” Ghizlane Badawi, CEO of Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, said.
Concourse B, which is in the design phase, will have 26 gates, estimated to open in the 2030s. Southwest Airlines will be the main tenant with 18 gates, United Airlines will have five gates, and three gates will be for common use. There will be a tunnel that connects to Concourse B.
“If you give us the gates, we will bring the planes,” Adam Decaire, senior VP of Network Planning & Network Operations Control at Southwest Airlines said.
“As part of growing the airport, you see that it’s not just us that’s bragging about the success we’re having. It’s the airlines that want to use this airport, and they see advantage in their business model of being part of this airport, and that’s why they’re growing the number of gates they’re using,” Mayor Kirk Watson said.
Dig deeper:
The airport will also redevelop the existing Barbara Jordan Terminal, including the ticket counters, security checkpoints, and baggage claim. Concourse A will be home to Delta Air Lines with 15 gates. American Airlines will have nine gates, and Alaska Airlines will have one gate. There will be eight common-use gates.
“Delta is making a long-term investment in Austin-Bergstrom that will transform travel for years to come,” Holden Shannon, senior VP for Corporate Real Estate at Delta Air Lines said.
The airport will also build Concourse M — six additional gates to increase capacity as early as 2027. There will be a shuttle between that and the Barbara Jordan Terminal. Concourse M will help with capacity during phases of construction.
There will also be a new Arrivals and Departures Hall, with more concessions and amenities. They’re also working to bring rideshare pickup closer to the terminal.
City officials say these projects will bring more jobs.
The expansion is estimated to cost $5 billion — none of which comes from taxpayer dollars. This comes from airport revenue, possible proceeds, and FAA grants.
“We’re seeing airlines really step up to ensure they are sharing in the infrastructure costs at no cost to Austin taxpayers, and so we’re very excited about that as well,” Council Member Vanessa Fuentes (District 2) said.
The Source: Information from interviews conducted by FOX 7 Austin’s Angela Shen
Lifestyle
After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
Wyle, who spent 11 seasons on ER, returns to the hospital in The Pitt. Now in Season 2, the HBO series has earned praise for its depiction of the medical field. Originally broadcast April 21, 2025.
Hear The Original Interview
Television
After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
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