With former clients I often paired coaching with Jungian shadow work to explore
their relationships in work, in friendships, and in romantic pairings Here, I offer insight from my own first marriage at age 22--
before I had any in-depth self-knowledge--illuminated by what I've learned since.
Now I can see I'd married my father, but I thought I'd found his
opposite in my husband, Dave. My father was a military officer and stern
disciplinarian. I always felt an emotional distance from him, though he and my mother
were responsible parents and he drove me wherever I needed to go as a
teenager. Those rides were agonizing for me, because neither of us could
think of a word to say to the other.
Dad wore his toughness on the outside, however, so when I met Dave (deceased long ago), I
fell immediately in love with his sweet, quiet demeanor and our in-depth
conversations. Soon into our marriage, however, his unwillingness to explore emotional depths was a huge disappointment to me, and before very long our relationship felt very much like interacting with my father
Unfortunately, I was young and naive, hadn't yet studied Jungian
psychology, and was years away from learning the Enneagram, so I saw
Dave as "the problem," having no notion that projections of my own
shadow were keeping me from seeing our relationship as an opportunity for consciousness.
In their analysis of one couple cited in their book, Romancing the Shadow,
Connie Zweig and Steven Wolf suggest "The couple's parental complexes are
shadow-boxing with each other . . . they can put on the brakes only by
taking responsibility for their own feelings, romancing their
projections, and moving out of the past into present time."
As we do our shadow work, waking up to unconscious drives, we can
acknowledge that no one person is "the problem;" both contribute to the
interaction dynamics that feed a self-fulfilling downward spiral. We
learn to look differently at feeling hooked and--instead of reacting as usual--we
romance the shadow, describing to ourselves, our mate, partner,
or friend what's happening inside, and asking for space or support or
conversation to help us move through it in a way that doesn't perpetuate
the cycle.
I don't take these suggestions lightly, nor do I expect anyone else to
do so. But what relationship have you ever had that was easy, day after
day, year after year? You know the pain of compromise; you know the
depression of defeat. Romancing your own shadow will help you engage in the disquieting and lifelong task of being truly open and authentic in relationships:
No more blaming, manipulation, false diplomacy, retreating into melancholy, withholding emotions, casting worst-case scenarios, skating away from personal responsibility, shutting people down, or passive-aggressiveness.
