Why would a seemingly well balanced, top performing student from a solid background start taking drugs? Why would a wife, a mother risk her marriage by having an affair? Perceptions encompass a range of complex web of thoughts in the mind. Sometimes what one may see as wrong, another may casually partake. The heart’s innate wickedness comes with special emphasis, meaning and knowledge that we are all capable of falling just as much as the next person. Comprehension of what we can or cannot do may be beyond our grasp but there exists the knowledge in most cases and given the right circumstances, each and everyone is capable of doing just about anything. The secret lies in control; a function of socialization, this too only helpful if we discipline ourselves in submitting to our rational selves.

The selfish shadow prowls within us in a restless time lag. Some of us may already be acquainted with these side of ourselves and are therefore aware of the potential harm we can wreck on ourselves in the way that we are unable to control our tempers or in uncaring way we might carry on in ignorance of the fact that we are appendaged to the rest of the world in decisions as well as in consequences. We may then spend the better part of lives tightening a leash around this shadowy part of ourselves in the hope of taming it. There remain, of course, those that operate under the influence of the shadow in wild abandon and supposed bliss. These unfortunately include those who show no remorse for crimes committed with impunity.

A dog that is kept in chains is bound to turn wild when released. A train hoots and bellows out energy; rain lets out a clap of thunder before the torrents follow and sooner or later, all is quiet in the aftermath of a downpour. A fire needs an outlet for the heat and smoke to escape through; how much more for the things that define us yet mutate to other ominous, unmanageable versions of ourselves because of our refusal to acknowledge them? We all need some release of sorts. If it is that we should go to the open fields and scream our lungs out, then this therapeutic direction is where we should be headed. However what happens to a shadow that refuses to seep out in small proportions but instead chooses to make its presence felt by completely taking over the familiar self?

We have all done things we might want to forget about. We might even rationalize that we had to, yet in the depths of our thoughts is the realization that we too can be as wicked as the next person. There does seem to be the existence of a self-destruct mode that exists purely to counter our efforts at perfection or idealism. Overly successful, admired, people will spring a surprise on us of an affair or a visit to some undisclosed, dingy dens of shame. Once again we will forget that we too are as capable as the next culprit of the exact same thing unless we have tamed our shadow to be released in socially acceptable proportions.

In the book Pilgrim by Timothy Findley, the writer observes that everyone is a liar-one way or the other, and to one degree or the other. None can tell the truth about themselves. Something must always be justified. He concludes by saying that we do each other dreadful harm because we refuse to justify the foibles of others-only our own. And this too is sad.