SHADOW GUILT
Related to religious guilt, but somewhat different, is shadow guilt. According to psychologist Carl Jung, the human personality has many parts. One part of our personality -- the person we present to the world -- is called "the persona." The person has learned socially acceptable traits and knows how to modify certain instincts and desires in order to fit into society and not be punished for breaking societal rules.
Another part of the personality, however, is called the shadow. The shadow is the reservoir of many of our desires and feelings that we, or society, feel are unacceptable. Hence the shadow contains our lust, greed, vanity, aggressiveness, pettiness, selfishness, capacity for violence and evil and all those parts of that are "bad" and should definitely not be acted upon. Also contained in the shadow are qualities that are not considered "evil" but are socially undesirable, for example, vulnerability and emotionality in men and aggressiveness in women.
Some people are relatively unaware of their shadow. They don’t even know it exists. If you ask the average person if he or she has ever lied, cheated, wanted to kill someone, or lusted for someone who was not their mate, most likely that person would say "no." That might not be the actual truth, but to that person, most of the time, it is the truth because he or she is not aware of his or her shadow. It is too horrible to contemplate. The idea of being murderous or lustful is so unacceptable, the shadow is suppressed out of awareness.
However, according to Tournier (1977), even though our shadow is usually repressed and even if we do not act on the impulses and desires in the shadow, we are aware that we have secret desires and temptations which we, or others, judge to be immoral. Our awareness of our shadow, however vague, unclear or confused, breeds a sense of guilt. "In an existential sense....man feels guilt with regard to himself... because there are within him obscure forces, impulses, and inhibitions which neither his will nor his intelligence or his knowledge can master" (Tournier 1977, 48).
In addition, no matter how much we suppress our shadows, the primitive urges and feelings contained in it continue to emerge. They are very powerful.
One way to handle the shadow is to deny it exists, but to satisfy it by watching other people act as if motivated by their shadow. That’s one reason why movies with lots of sex, killing and other socially unacceptable behavior are so popular -- people release their shadow urges by watching others act out those urges.
The average person wouldn’t dream of robbing a bank, plotting a financial swindle, killing, raping, or wishing someone in their family dead. But people spend time and money to watch television programs and movies where such things are commonplace. In other words, one way to handle the shadow is to allow it to live vicariously through reading books or watching dramas where people act in ways we wouldn’t dare for fear of being condemned by society. Another way is to admire people who act out or who are thought to act out their shadow. For example, a recent study concluded that voters "secretly" want presidents and elected officials to be adulterous and have sexual escapes (Morin 1998).
However, people who have been in stressful life circumstances leading to the death, injury, or debasement of others have often encountered the shadow not in movies or in distant political figures, but in real life. They may have seen people act out their shadows and may have been in situations where they were forced to act out their shadow or where their shadow urges were activated.
Anyone who has been the victim of sexual assault, war or other forms of violence has seen people who are acting out shadow urges. Anyone who has been exposed to injustices based on prejudice due to race, gender, sexual orientation, religion or disability and anyone who has grown up in a home where there is emotional or other types or where one or more family members suffer from an alcohol, drug, or food addiction has seen people whose shadow selves are damaging not only their own lives, but the lives of others. Those who have been forced to abuse another person, lie, steal, or cheat or go against their own moral standards in order to save their own lives or the lives of others were forced to act out parts of their shadow.
Even if you were not forced to betray your values during your stressful experiences, if you have ever felt vengeful or murderous towards those who hurt you or someone you loved, you have met your shadow. Having self-destructive thoughts is also a part of the shadow personality and persons coping with survivor guilt frequently have thoughts of suicide, self-mutilation, and self-abasement.
To go through a stressful life event and not encounter the shadow in oneself or another person is impossible. In fact, it is encountering the shadow in others and oneself that makes these types of life situations so stressful, if not traumatizing. Your experience has taught you the capacity of others for evil, deceit, or negligence. You have seen these qualities in others and, in one way or another, whether you have had to act on them or not, you may have seen them in yourself. If you are the survivor of a man-made trauma, you are probably acutely aware of the possibility of human evil. However, even those of you who have suffered as the result of the expected loss or illness of a love one, an unjust personal or job-related situation, or an act of nature may have been exposed to human error and malice.
Even if you have never acted on a shadow impulse, you may experience shadow guilt because when you are honest with yourself, you realize that no matter how hard you try you can not eliminate the shadow part from your being and because you sense that the shadow, although repressed, has the potential to erupt and cause havoc in our lives. The fantasies and desires of our shadow, whether they be of sloth, murder, greed, lust, or self-aggrandizement, "defy the censorship of our will. It is another self which is in us, which we cannot stifle, and which we fear will be discovered" (Tournier 1977, 47-48).