Vertical Growth

9See and resolve the shadow

‘It is only through shadows that one comes to know the light.’

St. Catherine of Siena

Carl Jung famously said, ‘Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.’ Mindfulness, supported by the Mindful Leader Matrix, is how we ‘make the unconscious conscious’.

The impact our unconscious programming has on our behaviour cannot be overestimated. According to Harvard professor Gerald Zaltman, 95 per cent of our thoughts, emotions and learning occur without our conscious awareness. Most cognitive neuroscientists concur. NeuroFocus founder A. K. Pradeep goes even further and puts the figure at 99.999 per cent. Our subconscious thoughts and assumptions are like algorithms, programmed by our past traumas, reinforcements, punishments and cultural influences. Without the deep work linked to mindfulness and shadow work, this programming will continue to shape our lives, holding us back from the growth we are trying to cultivate.

Dan Ariely, professor of psychology and behavioural economics at Duke University and author of Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions, concludes from years of empirical research that ‘we are pawns in a game whose forces we largely fail to comprehend’. David Eagleman, a neuroscientist at Baylor College of Medicine and author of Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain, writes, ‘[C]onsciousness is the smallest player in the operations of the brain. Our brains run ...