"You can't choose both, Andy." My tantra teacher said.
"Unfortunately, there comes a time when you have to choose between doing things that will make you happy now and doing things that will make you happy later."
On the surface, it was a no-brainer. Of course, I wanted to do things that were good for me in the long run. It's one of the reasons why I gave up smoking cigarettes. And eating gluten. And watching porn. The only thing that was scary about choosing a better future for myself was that it meant creating a more unpleasant present, and that involved confronting things I had long ignored.
"There are no guarantees here, and you're going to have to face up to a few hard truths." He continued. "We'll take away some of your comforts and ask you to do things that are safe, but scary. If you trust me, this will stand you in good stead for the future. But you have to trust me."
I had signed up for his retreat because I was desperate. It was the last roll of the dice. "I'm in," I said, hesitantly.
I needed peace in my life at whatever cost. I had spent years running around ignoring the fact that I was confused, hurt, and angry, and I was sick of playing the Nice Guy because he was beginning to feel like a fraud. I couldn't look people in the eye anymore.
What I had been doing wasn't working, so as scary as it was, I was open to change.
According to Carl Jung, happiness is not associated with things or the result of blind luck; it's more a process built on intentional living, psychological balance, and the acceptance of life's paradoxes. He believed that happiness is a byproduct of a meaningful life rather than a goal to be pursued directly. "The more you deliberately seek happiness," He famously said, "the more sure you are not to find it."
It was Carl Jung's next line that really pushed me over the edge. "Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness."
This was something my tantra teacher reiterated again and again while I was with him. "To be truly happy in life, you have to go into your sadness. The deeper you understand your sadness, the more you can express your joy. If you deny one, you deny the other."
For Carl Jung, this meant integrating the darker, hidden, or more repressed parts of self —the shadow — rather than pretending they do not exist.
I had been pretending large parts of myself didn't exist for so long that the first half of the retreat was terrifying. I was being asked to study myself, understand why certain things happened in the past, why I reacted to certain things the way I did in the present, and forgive myself and others for the role they played in my life.
At times, it was excruciating. However, the more I stuck at it, the less scary it became. And the less scary it became, the more objectively I could look at myself.
"A memory without the emotional charge is called wisdom," is a line I have come to cherish from Dr. Joe Dispenza. During that retreat, I was turning my pain into something valuable. I was learning from it. Carl Jung would have said I was "integrating my opposites." I was a long way from becoming wise, but I was also a long way from being broken. Instead of trying to overcome parts of myself, I was being asked to welcome them into my heart. I can't begin tell you how big that moment was for me and my life.
"The road is long, and in the end, it's only with yourself." — Baz Lurhmann
Pleasure is fun in the short term, but long-term happiness requires the integration of the full human experience. (Un)fortunately, that includes the emotions of grief, anger, fear, and sadness just as much as it does joy, appreciation, peace, and love.
My shadow is that I suppress those harder emotions, so that's where my work lies.
I didn't know that in my early twenties. I'm still learning to accept it now.
However, if there's one thing I've learned from Carl Jung, it is that there is only so long I can ignore, deny, or suppress my unwanted feelings. Sooner or later, with or without my permission, they'll find a way to express themselves.
The best decision I ever made was to jump into the fire and see what (and who) came out.
It's something I've been dedicated to doing every single day since.
Thanks for reading!
Much love!
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