It's been said that every individual is made up of three different people:
- how you see yourself,
- how other people see you
- and how you really are
There is also the Shadow Self. This is the part of our self that we don't like others to see and that we like to pretend isn't really there.
The Shadow is a composite of our flaws, mistakes, fears, bad memories and 'sins'.
The Shadow Self is usually lurking behind a socially acceptable mask that is a paragon of conventional beauty.
It is often characterised in fiction as the 'mad woman in the attic' or the 'psycho behind the shower curtain'.
A lot of the time we see these parts of ourselves that we have rejected, reflected back to us in the behaviour of people we dislike or who irritate us, or in other social groups.
Sometimes other people in our lives or on our screens play out the fears and sins that we repress or are afraid of.
The Beast we fear is reproduced not only in the popular imagination but in the political arena and in society at large. For example, the so-called hoodies are like the new bogeymen.
The more that the dark side of our human nature is feared and repressed, the more it grows and is in some way expressed.
Jung, and other experts of the mind, advocate accepting the dark side of the personality in order to transform it for the better and to integrate it with our whole self.
If we are completely cut off from our dark side, a split occurs and the Shadow escapes from behind the prison of the beautiful mask and takes on a life of its own.
Jung said, "...when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside as fate... when the individual remains undivided and does not become conscious of his inner opposite, the world must perforce act out the conflict and be torn into opposing halves.”
Every character that appears in a person's dreams can be interpreted as being a part of the dreamer's own personality.
If fiction, movies, stories etc. are interpreted in the same way, then Beauty may be seen as the Beast, Marion Crane can be seen as another alter ego of Norman Bates and Christine, the "Angel of Music", can be seen as the Phantom.
Related Posts:
Portraits of the Beast
The Curse of the Divided Self
The Phantom of the Opera
