The Shadow: Become Who You're Afraid To Be

In this short fiction story, a young man moves away from his home city of Edinburgh into the Scottish countryside. Now, completely alone and isolated from the world, he hopes he will finally find peace, quiet, and the space to be himself. He quickly discovers this won't be as easy as he hoped.

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[edefedd]

Before he changes the title, the current title is: Sympathy for Monsters

[_uncredited]

I suspect the shopkeeper and the monster are in cahoots. Those elixirs won't sell themselves.

[JustHarrison]

In case you didn't get it: the monster was the repressed parts of Bertrand that he had to suppress in order to be accepted into his family/society when he was young. Because he wasn't allowed to be his authentic self as a child, when he grew up he worked a job he didn't care about while letting himself be abused, the way his family/school abused him as a boy. This is why he didn't like being around people. He didn't have a good relationship with the adults in his life when he was young.

A good example would be if you were gay and living in a society that says you can't be gay because it's a sin. You don't stop being gay, you just drive that part of yourself into the unconscious where it stays until it reappears later in life as "the monster." Jung actually says the shadow contains the gold of your soul. It's the parts of you that are valuable but you weren't allowed to acknowledge in youth because of judgements, criticisms, and the small-mindedness of the people that raised you. Repression requires large amounts of energy which a young person has. That's why you tend to meet your shadow during mid-life, sometimes known as the mid-life crisis. Your youthful energies are failing which brings you face-to-face with the parts of yourself you were taught were "bad" (thus they appear as monsters). But when you accept those parts, you find that they're sources of rejuvenation, which leads to a kind of "second birth", giving the second half of your life new meaning. Another famous Jung quote is "Life begins at 40. Everything before that is just research." :)

[ayyyyyu]

"Would you come upstairs?" is a symbol of bringing the unconsciousness to become conscious. "Yes. Thank you" symbolized the understanding that finally it got, and a chance to have dialogue with its owner

[SpeedUpThatComputer]

The "monster" is basically a shadow of ourselves. We cannot destroy it but we can acknowledge it and try to understand it. Through learning about it we can develop into a better and more whole person.

[ansh]

Carl Jung philosophy of confronting our shadow is the message accordng to me. The more we try to hide monsters inside us the more we become like it, unfortunately the world does not give us the privilege to reveal our monsters. The ones who don't find an outlet succumb to their inner monsters before the world can understand or help them.

[burstingolem]

That "thank you" hit much harder than expected

[DiegoMarchi]

As someone who grew in a abusive home very similar to the one described in this video, the struggle to accept this monster that was nourished with rejection and violence is very real. It takes a lot to face your traumas and break the cycle. Bertrand shows this by trying to fight it head on or by numbing himself. But ultimately it would always lead back to the hatch in the basement, what I envision as the unconscious. In other words, the monster will remain there until you are able to embrace it without judgment, letting yourself feel accepted as you are, because the monster itself is literally a part of you.

[fatherburning]

After almost 40yrs of weaponry and elixir I now talk with my monster. It's hard work for us both. Little by little we understand each other. We no longer need weapons and elixir, but sometimes we get triggered by the outside world and need to retreat to the basement. Sometimes we have a really good day together, those are nice.

[Kadood]

I think the message you aim to portray is pretty simple yet immense in its application. I feel like the audience is Bert and the weapons he uses are self-help videos, we try over and over again to use things or excuses we think might help instead of trying to confront our problems.

[GloryBlazer]

the shopkeeper is an absolute chad for keeping it real.

[OpheliaOnFireNoMore]

Sometimes, the biggest monsters are ones that live inside us... They have names. Regret, what could have been, what should have been, If only I had the right people around me, I could have been who I was meant to be. Those are the worst kinds of monsters...

[Zazabazaa]

I remember my mom once saying "when I grew up, I was under the impression that everybody understood that we need to learn from the mistakes of our parents and do better than them. Turns out I was so very wrong!" When we were talking about the fathers of me and my sister.

She feels she failed us through her choices, as they all held similarities to her mother when she was abusive. Making it so that even though my mom didn’t become what she hated, her choice in partners did that for her.

[vanessahollenbach]

Your monster will appear just as youve made a safe space for yourself

[ellie]

Accept the "monster", it's part of you.

Listen to it, make friends with it, accept it, parent it, show it love and compassion

It's not your enemy, it's just the part of you that got suppressed and shut away, the part of you that wasn't accepted and embraced.

It just needs you to see it, accept it, embrace it

It's not a monster, it's the part of you that you weren't allowed to be.

It's yearning to be held but doesn't know how else to express itself.

It's hurting. It's you.

[captindo]

I had that experience two years and have been great since. I’m a veteran that felt guilty over my roll in being part of a military, and that soldier side of me, it ain’t evil, it’s just part of me that can be used for good or evil. Once you win against that inner darkness, and accept it, you can grow.

[DOCTOROFTT]

There is an african proverb, when there is no enemy within the outside enemy can do you no harm.❤

[psychedelicartistry]

Yung said there is gold in the shadows. One time, when I took LSD, I was sitting there in my dark room, and saw evil looking shadowy faces that were smiling menacingly at me. I thought to myself "Here it is, the darkness, here's the gold" and sat there and watched and observed them without judgement. I felt so great afterwards.

[hansgunnoo]

Thats true for me. Over 2 months ive become a person my old self would have hated. Hope i can still change myself

[frostyrohit]

This story feels like a metaphor for how complex trauma manifests. Like a monster living in our own basement. And we’re still fighting it like it’s the enemy. But it’s just a part of ourself that’s left behind, angry, and wounded. And we have to stop fighting it in order to heal it.

That’s how I experienced this story. 🖤