Ep 157: The Sexual Shadow, Self Discovery, Shame and Pleasure with Dr Joli Hamilton

artwork by the talented @muhammedsalah_

What is the sexual Shadow? How does it affect our individual and collective sexual expression? What are some of the ways we can get to know our Shadow material and work towards integrating it?

In this week’s episode Effy explores the crossroads of Jungian psychology and sex with Dr Joli Hamilton. They take a deep dive into the sexual Shadow, the repressed, the unwanted aspects of sexuality. They discuss how — if it goes unexplored and unprocessed — this material impacts our collective and individual thoughts and behaviors when it comes to sex, affecting anything from legislation to our self talk. Effy and Dr Hamilton also celebrate the potential richness of this exploration as a way to deeply get to know ourselves.     

More about Joli
Dr. Joli Hamilton is the relationship coach for couples who color outside the lines. She is a research psychologist, TEDx speaker, best-selling author, and AASECT (pronounced ay-sect) certified sex educator. Joli also co-hosts the Playing with Fire podcast with her anchor partner, Ken. Joli’s been featured in The New York Times, Vogue, NPR, and The Atlantic. 

She’s spent the past two decades studying and reimagining what love can be if we open our imaginations to possibility. Joli helps people create non-monogamous partnerships that are custom-built for their authentic selves, no more shrinking, pretending, or hiding required.

Instagram: @drjoli_hamilton
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YouTube: @drjoli_hamilton
LinkedIn: joli-hamilton-phd

Want the 5-step jealousy framework from Joli's research? Grab your e-book here. JoliQuiz is a great way to check in with how ready you are to explore opening up a previously closed relationship. 

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TRANSCRIPT:

Effy

Welcome to the curious Fox podcast for those challenging the status quo in love, sex, and relationships. My name is Effy Blue. Today, we're exploring the crossroads of youngin, psychology and sex. And for that, I've invited a fellow nerd an all around awesome human to the show.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

I'm Dr. Julie Hamilton, and I am a sex certified sex educator who loves to talk about sexual shadow, and all the things we can do when we play in it.

Effy

Before we start, here's a little bit of context. Carl, Gustav Jung is one of the most influential figures of modern psychology. He was influenced by the likes of Freud, Maslow spill reign, Kant, Nietzsche, you get the idea, among others, Carl Jung gave us some of the best known psychological concepts such as synchronicity, the notion of archetypes, the collective unconscious, the psychological complex, and extraversion and introversion. And most importantly, for the purpose of this conversation today, the idea of the shadow as a part of the human psyche, the shadow, often considered to be negative, is the repressed, therefore, unknown aspects of the personality. my conversation with Julie today was focused on sexual shadow, the aspects of sexuality, collective and individual that remains in the darkness.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

There is this sexual shadow, this area of our consciousness and on both a collective and individual level, all of the sexual thoughts, feelings, behaviors that have historically been highly policed, politicized, controlled, all the ones that then like go into hiding, right? When we police control, when we tighten up restrictions, and we repress that creates ideal ground for the effects of repression to like shove stuff on the ground, and then it be it starts to solidify, it starts to harden, right. And I think of that material as sexual shadow material. And when we think about this, on a collective level, it's really easy to be like, oh, yeah, we know it, when we see it, we know it when we hear it. So but it is culturally relevant to like, we have to take seriously that the sexual shadow is contextual to the culture you find yourself in and the micro culture you find yourself in. Beautiful. When I think about it, one of the things I think about is my individual shadow, but I always like to just, like, zoom out a little bit and take that broader lens to like, the sexual shadow is big and incorporates a lot of stuff for a lot of different people.

Effy

Yeah, no, absolutely. Like when I hear you say that the things that are coming up for me is, I'm sure culture, society, religion, politics, all of that has an impact on the cultural shadow of the community. And individual Is that Is that what you're saying?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Exactly, exactly. So if we think about the original definition that Jung put out around shadow, like the way he described it, the simplest way he described it lots of ways, the shadow is the thing a person has no wish to be. So if we take that from from the individual level, and we look at it as a cultural level, the sexual shadow holds, all that which we cannot tolerate, we cannot hold in our collective consciousness is what gets shoved into the shadow. So yeah, it's very contextual, and doing the work to integrate. It isn't just about ourselves. It's also about really working with the collective. And that's one of the reasons I think it's so important to talk about this. Even if you feel like you've done your shadow work, as we continue to do this and meet other people and we're dating people who are, are at their edges. We're also healing the collective

Effy

is this way shame lives? Like is that isn't. We get the shame feeling from from the shadow.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Yeah, absolutely. So and that's actually a simple way to put it. If you think about the shadow, the simplest way I can think of to talk about it is it's all the stuff that we cut off of ourselves, or we pushed away because either someone told us overtly that we shouldn't be So we shouldn't do this or we shouldn't have this, or the stuff that we just got the message that we shouldn't. It just didn't feel right. Right. So that makes sense. That's all the stuff we put into the shadow bag. And that's anything that we cut off from ourselves. Well, when it pops up, of course, the shame makes sense, right? That's what shame is for shames designed to make us aware that can No, no, no, no, no, that's a boundary. Don't cross it. Don't look at that. Don't have that. Don't be that. So yeah, it's this is deeply connected to shame.

Effy

Okay, wow, that's super fascinating. Okay, so how do we, where do we start? Like, how do we even become aware of our, our sort of sexual shadow and its impact on our sexuality? And I imagine also, like, just our life and the way that we view the world. Right.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Right, exactly. It does have a lot to do with how we view the world? Well, you know, I think one of the first things people tend to focus on is when they hear the phrase sexual shadow, they think well is, is working on sexual shadow, does that mean I have to do kink? Do I have to practice BDSM, you know, that that's automatically where a lot of people's imagination goes. But I like to just just maybe quell that fear a little bit, because the thing is, kink and BDSM might be part of what's in your sexual shadow. And certainly, they qualify as culturally, that's exactly where they live, right? They live at the edges of the periphery or out of sight, but kink, or is doing whatever you're doing when you're playing at your the edges of your personal taboos zone. So it's not like there's some sort of, like objective list of behaviors that are shadowy, it's really about is this something that lies outside of your awareness that you're starting to get a sense of, like, oh, I want this maybe it's material that comes up in your fantasies in your dreams and your daydreams. Maybe it's stuff that you masturbate to. And here's the key, it's the stuff that you would fantasize about, but you don't know what to do with you feel some, some concerns about what this what the role of this material is, or you're not sure how to play with it with a partner or partners. So when I first work with people along this line, I'm like, You're gonna need some methods to uncover this. It's no small feat to bring unconscious material into conscious awareness. Right. That's the individuation process. That's what we're doing. So we need some some methods, I like to teach actual methods for it. I also just think it's important to remember that your sexual shadow material and mine will be different. And that's, that's fine. That's the nature of it.

Effy

For sure. Yeah, I can totally see how that that's the case, also, just different upbringings. You know, one of the things I talk about on the show is that something happened during my developmental years, and I just didn't get the memo, about shame, sex and shame. It's just, it's one of those things, I got many memos about many things that I've had to work through with the rest of my life. But somewhere, that memo got got lost, and I never got it. So I have been, I've just this like lottery, this luck that I don't really associate shame with sex. But I do know, but what I have figured out quite early on in my life that other people do. So I've, I've held things in, I've didn't talk about things express things not because I feel shame. But I got the message that other people do. And I didn't want to impose that on other people. So I can completely understand how. And that doesn't mean to say I don't have shadow material, I'm for sure there's there's the shadows and shadow in there. But I can see how that's different than, you know, someone like Jackie, for example. And you know, it's a shame she's not here, because I know she has a lot to say about this. She grew up in a really religious household. And, you know, we've done many episodes where she's talking about how, like masturbation was a huge thing for her she she did it with guilt and shame and, and really deep seated fear that if she was, you know, that while she was masturbating, like God was gonna come and like, take her family away from her and punish them of what she's doing. So she's really hot. She's really on the other side of this. So we can compare our shadow material, it will be entirely different between between she and I. So I completely understand that. I'm curious. So we're saying, there's our sexuality in the light. And there's a bunch of things that we don't want, but it's coming up for us, right? We can't avoid it is that so but we don't want it for whatever reason we've learned. We've been totally got the message that it's bad, morally bad, wrong, shameful. And we shove that stuff into the shadow. But it doesn't stay in the shadow. Right? It kind of it wants to creep back into our lives. And we somehow have to have to make make peace with that. Yeah. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Yeah. So here's the image that that I use, that helps me remember that this is an ongoing iterative process, right. I like you. I actually didn't have a ton of shaming around sex when I was a kid. I didn't really get that memo either. But I totally resonate with what you said about it. But I knew other people did, including my parents like they had, they were doing a good job of like, trying to keep that off of me. But I could still see it in them. So yeah, it we're still in the we're still in this group of people called humans. But when I am trying to conceptualize the shadow, I think of oh, there's all this stuff that's like, directly behind my head, like, how would I see it? How would I visualize that? Right? That's, it's like back there, I can't, no matter how fast I turn around, I'm not gonna see it, then there's the stuff that starts to come into the peripherals, right? It's the stuff and the peripherals that I find the most advantageous to work with first, right? It's the stuff that when I'm fantasizing when I'm masturbating, or when I am going to search, I start typing into the porn search bar, like this is the stuff I'm looking for, right? Because it comes in when I either choose to or spontaneously feel aroused, right? It's all of a sudden, there's this stuff. And that stuff that creeps in the periphery, some people are like, Yes, I found it, and they move toward it. Some people that stuff creeps in, and they hit a big no, right? Like they, they feel the big reaction to push it away. And you can work with the shadow from either of those directions. If you're the kind of person who likes to go, bring that stuff that's in the periphery, you'd like to bring it really forward and not on it. And you're like, Yeah, I'm gonna go all into this, I'm going to have a wonderful, juicy sexual experience, well, then your work might be more along the lines of okay, cool. Do you want to look at the meaning behind this? Do you want to start discovering more parts of yourself that, that when you're done with that sexual experience, this sinks back into the periphery? Do you want to use this as a way to get to know yourself? That's for the people who are like, Yeah, I can pretty much handle my sexual shadow stuff in the in the sexual room, but then I put it away, right? It's almost like I have two sides of myself. But then there are folks who really struggle, because the stuff that comes up in the periphery feels absolutely, yes, maybe there's big shame attached to it, but they also just can't quite tolerate it yet. Right. But it comes unbidden. It just, it just appears, we might call this intrusive thoughts, we might talk about how this is when someone's experiencing arousal about something that they have a really deep moral judgment against the things. So a big one that comes up is non consensual acts, right? Like when somebody has this big arousal response to it. So they start creating the fantasy in their head playing it out. But they also have this big No, right? So when we have a big yes and a big no, at the same time, this is an opportunity to know ourselves better and to offer deep, reverential self acceptance. Without deciding that that means everything's okay. And we don't have you know, there are no boundaries and, and there's, there's no ethics. So it's a place of great tension, where we can learn a lot about ourselves.

Effy

How do we go about doing that? Well,

Dr. Joli Hamilton

one of the first steps is to make space for it. I think a lot of people imagine that, like, maybe they block off time for sex, I'm all for scheduling time for pleasure, right. And this was a this is solo sacks partnered sex group sex, they are willing to block off some time for that. But a lot of times we block it off around the physical acts. And we forget to give ourselves margins to really allow ourselves to enter into our fantasy enter into our psyche, and really be with our sexual material and our arousal material. And we forget to allow ourselves to have a debrief period as well, right. So while everybody's calendar is limited, and I know that asking for time is actually like the biggest ask I could make, I think it is integral to buffer out some extra time. So if you let's say, I have a masturbatory practice, and I know how to bang it out in 10 minutes, and I'm good. If I can even just build five minutes in on either side of that. And really give some thoughts like what do I want to work on? What do I want? What do I want to play with? What material has been exciting, but maybe a little tender or scary to me? What Fantasy has come up but and it scares me? Can I hold that in a space of deep acceptance like radical acceptance, right? Can I maybe enter into a state of mindfulness and say, so for the next 10 minutes, I'm gonna play with this. And at the end, I will hold this for myself. It's okay. My imagination is mine. And I'm going to hold this for myself, like really create a container. Have your experience, enjoy the bodily pleasure that comes, let yourself go into it, and then maybe reach orgasm or you come to completion in some way. And after that, allow yourself to either journal or voice journal. Or if you're, if you're lucky, and you have access to this, share this with somebody else who's doing their sexual shadow work. Write it might be a partner, but it might also be a close friend, someone who's intimately connected with you in a different way. Share that with yourself or with another so that that material what comes up, let's say I fantasize about a non consensual act happening to me, right? Well, what was behind that? What did I feel? What did it bring up? Did it bring up fear? Did it did I actually get more and more aroused. And if so, do I want to explore what this what this has to teach me about control and where I might be feeling out of control, or I might be wanting more control or, and control is just one of the things that might be coming up for you there. So in other words, it's a place of great insight, but we need to build the space and the intentionality around it for it to actually offer insights. Otherwise, we run the risk of having sex be sex, and the rest of our life be separate from it. And this is really about building a bridge for your psychological material.

Effy

I love that I love that one of the things that we say on the show a lot is an a strongly, this is something that I truly believe that our sexual expression is a part of our self expression. And I can't say this enough, I, I want to make T shirts and wear this out out there. Because I think it's so important that we realize our sexual expression is a part of who we are, and the way we show up in in the bedroom. And, um, you know, just doing aircrew that day, we make jokes all the time, but how you show up in your sexual expression is how you show up in life. And I think if we separate ourselves, we cut that part off and somehow partition it away build walls around it with guilt and control or, or whatever it takes, I think we are cutting a part of that part of ourselves off. Like it's like cutting a limb off, it's like you wouldn't if you were if you were a passionate painter, you wouldn't suddenly stop painting, you know, you would feel you would feel the absence of that. And I think it's the same with our sexuality

Dr. Joli Hamilton

100% And in fact, you just described exactly the act that union psychology talks about is creating Shut up shadow material, right, we we cut off parts of ourselves. So the the counter to that the the counter move is to remember ourselves to literally like remember, as in this limb was a member of you, right? So it back on, right, you're. And so when you do that, yeah, you have access to more of yourself. The point for me, isn't to have better sex. In this case, I often find that that is the outcome as well. But the point is for me to remember myself, to really be able to fully express myself to myself as well as to the world. And then to allow myself to do that also creates a more receptive me, who can also like, bear witness to other people's full sexual expression, an honor, it is different from me, because I'm not now trapped. Once I've cut off parts of me, and my sexuality is so easy for me to want everybody else to do the same thing. And this is what we find. Like that's what fuels repression and suppression and awful legislature and all the things that we're seeing happen right now.

Effy

Yeah, no, that that makes that makes so much sense. I want to ask for just, I can imagine somebody listening to this and saying, either they're not ready to deal with their shadow material, or saying, Well, I see I see the periphery, the bisexual shadow. And I'm like, I don't really, I don't want to deal with it. Like, I don't want to deal with it. I can stay in the shadows, or I'm not ready. What happens then what if we're not ready? And what if we don't want to deal with it? What are the implications of that?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Yeah. So I like to remind people that you don't have to do all the things all the time, and you very much do not have to do them on my time frame. So this might be literally an episode that you bookmark, and you put a date on your calendar and come back to it. Because sometimes you really do, you're not in the right spot. So I went through a divorce when I put away a bunch of my sexual shadow work because I was literally just too busy going through a divorce. I also went through death, my brother lived here in my home while he was going through his death process, I have some of the gentlest, most non psychological, just pure, I'm going to be here in my body, and I'm barely even going to do that sort of sex during that time of my life. I did not have the bandwidth to go into my own shadow material right then. So that's completely valid, right? And yet, if we always say that it is a continual cycle of I'm going to put this off until some better time will you get to, you are empowered to never do your shadow work. And Shadow Work can also be thought of as the very first step of your individuation journey, right? Jung described it as this small crevice that you have to squeeze through, it's this small passageway, and it is uncomfortable. So it's okay to time it. But if you never pass through it, it's going to be hard to integrate your full self. And I think this is why very frequently in my life, I see a lot of people not showing up in my world. To do this kind of work or to do their, their explorations around non monogamy I see people a lot of times around 55. They're having like this last moment of like, oh, wait, if I don't do it now, oh, I'm actually going to run out of time. So it's never too late until it's too late. What I would say is you get to decide and don't put it off forever.

Effy

Yeah, no, I think I think that makes sense. And when you're describing, I am actually familiar with you're talking about as being a narrow this this narrow passage that you squeeze yourself through, and I can't help but think of like birth, coming out into the world through like a really narrow channel and you're in now you're in the world as a new human. And I think it's the same idea, right? As you kind of work through that stuff. It is rebirth over and over again. And is the trauma of birth is a renewal of worth at birth, it has the same qualities is you're just doing it psychologically and emotionally, technically over and over again, right? That's what he talks about.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Right? Exactly. It's not that's the the other really key piece, this isn't a one and done event, you you might do a piece of shadow work, right. But there is no, there is no event and there is no point at which we have like, brought all of our unconscious material into consciousness and been individuated. That doesn't happen. It's a process. The glorious thing that it is to be alive means Yeah, we're going to continually go through this rebirth cycle, and find more of ourselves. And as we interact with other humans, now we're also integrating their material like we're interacting, and now that has a chance to ping off of us and wake up new parts and bring up new stuff. And I love I love the metaphor of birth for this because the birthing parents body goes through a lot, but so does the infants, right, the infant is squeezed like their lungs are actually squeezed out and compressed. There's so much that happens. And it takes time. I mean, I pushed for babies out of me, it takes time to do that. And although it is like it is impressive to watch with this infant, this fragile, gentle thing goes through. And how it does that is by being flexible. It has softer bones, it has fontanelles it has flexible cartilage, it is able to be resilient because it's flexible. So that to me is a good marker of am I am I not going to spot to do some shadow work. How flexible Am I feeling? Am I feeling resilient? Because it might bring up stuff that is uncomfortable. And it's good to have some safety plans around that. And when I'm in a flexible, resilient state, that's a really good time to head on in and do the thing.

Effy

Yeah, no, I love that. I love that. I want to bring it home for a second just so like really help people understand. So for example, something that I would pick up as my shadow work. It's something that you mentioned also. So the by the way, I'm going to bring this up because I know this is so common. It's both so common. And it's also one of the most shameful fantasies and I know this because I've like you have spoken to I'm sure that you know this. Dozens of dozens of people rate fantasy, right? Fantasy is like, I think Prime shadow material, right? Yes. And it's genderless. Like I've heard it from across the board with and I've heard most of the shame coming from women. Because you know, and these women are they're like, I'm feminist. I'm a strong woman. Like, it's kind of crazy. Like, I'm, I don't understand why I fantasize about this. And you know, I've heard this, and I'm very happy to like I have great fantasies. When I first sort of came to them. I was like, Whoa, really, this is coming up for me. As I said, I don't necessarily go to shame I do. I'm fortunate that I go to curiosity. And I'm like, this, like, of all the things this right read fantasy, and I've sat with women who like spend an entire session just squirming and in place eventually in the, like 40 minute mark going and like I think about rape as a you know, as a fantasy. And I'm like, Okay, this is where we are. So let's say that that's coming up for somebody. What does that look like? So I'm listening to the show, and I'm like, I've been holding this in for years. And I know this is happening to people who are listening, by the way. So I hear you, I see you. And you're like yes. Like the idea of like being raped is somehow turning me on. And I'm not okay with that. Because I know that rape is wrong. I don't actually everyone experienced that ever. But somehow the thought of it is like arousing me. What now?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Oh, well first, let's all just give a breath for the patients we have to show ourselves when we're when we're doing this so you might have to slow way down. I love that you will give somebody that 40 minutes to be like I might have to share with you many things before I ready to admit to rape fantasy. And yeah, I have my own experience with this. And honestly so many of my lovers have so yeah, it's it is entirely typical. And that's because it's not about sex. It's about power and humans love playing with power right? If you're struggling with it Yes, I think that there are two things that can really help. One is, again, creating time with safe parameters to explore it outside the sexual container, right? Can I explore this with someone who can validate for me that these fantasies are typical and then trying to rid myself of them will only make them stronger, and will only disempower me from working with them and accepting that part of myself. The other thing I do is I mean, I like to use I'm a bit I'm a bibliophile. I like to use words to help me remember, like, what something is for, like, what an experience is for. And what's coming up for me is around rape fantasy is perverted, right? Like this idea. Like, this is so perverted this I feel perverse, right? And as soon as we enter that word, we're like, oh my gosh, now it's even worse. But the word perverted is from the Latin perv attire, which which I don't know how to pronounce Latin words. But there it is, it means to turn upside down to turn completely. So the the idea of it is that it's, you know, it's that scene in all the movies that do that beautiful cinematic shift, right? Where they flip the whole world and you know, everything has changed,

Effy

right? Being upside down from the nipple.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Exactly, exactly. So if when you're in that, and you can remember, this is me looking at the world upside down. This is this is my soul, my psyche, my, my inner self, looking at the world from this perverted this perverse inverse upside down position. What can I see about the world from here? What can I see, for instance, and this is one of the ways I've been working with it, everybody, take it or leave it? What can this tell me about rape culture? What can this help me understand about what's going on? under the surface? We're beyond the part where we say, of course, we don't want this to happen. Of course, it's negative. But beyond that, what's going on? What's happening for the people who want to enact this? Can I enter into the imagination of it enough to say, Oh, this is a cultural phenomenon that has happened forever. And so if I can bear it, and I can tolerate it, and I can look at it this way, can I now stop adding to the pushing away? Right, like, like, we push it away, we don't look at it, which also makes it hard for people to talk about. It's hard to talk about right when it happens in real life, right? So what if it were normal to talk about rape? What if we, what if it were normal to say, yes, I've been raped? Yes, I have been sexually assaulted. Because it happens so frequently, what if we normalized it, one of the ways we can do that is by normalizing the fact that we do have these fantasies, and we don't want them to happen. People also have murder fantasies, they don't want them to happen. This is what this is what our imagination does, we have this drive toward destruction, right? It's it's perverse and weird, but it's part of being alive. And I think that just holding that tension is incredibly powerful work for all of humanity to just hold it and be like, Wow, this is a lot. And it's part of me, too. I am not actually separate and distinct and different from humanity in which rape happens.

Effy

Yeah, no, that's very profound. I mean, it's incredibly profound. I think that that shadow work in general, I think, has that power. And I think when you bring it down to like, six, specifically sexual shadow deswik, some of our darkest stuff lives, right. And if we can just come to terms with that darker stuff, then we can pull it out into into the light out there in the world is what I'm hearing. And it's It feels very profound. It feels very empowering, actually. So suddenly, something that you feel very shameful about something that scares you, confuses you, suddenly becomes insights, kind of something powerful, something empowering. So I can like, totally see how Shadow Work can unlock a bunch of things.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Unlock. Yeah, yeah. So more access to self is what I'm generally going for here. And, you know, another way that shadow comes up is we project our shadow material onto others, right? This is in fact, that's the first method I teach people when I'm when I'm working through a process like tell me what you hate about your mother in law. Tell me what you hate about that high school bully who just drove you crazy, right? Tell me what you hate about them. Because if we look, they're into that projective material, we can find our own shadow. And in doing so, again, we humanize and we start to come back into relationship with that part of ourselves. At which point, we may be able to interact with these other people in life in a more productive way. Which doesn't mean we have to accept all their behavior. Good gracious, no. But it absolutely means that if I am able to interact to some degree because I feel empowered, and I feel grounded, and I have not shamed or cut off from myself, now I'm going to be more productive in the conversations I have with these people. So just working with your projective material, like what am I projecting onto others that I can Find and myself reclaim and the sexual shadow like you said, it's a super powerful it's like a subset of shadow material. And yeah, it is where the gnarly stuff goes to hide out. I mean, Freud got a lot of stuff wrong, but I don't think he got that wrong. Yeah. Do this repetition compulsions of thing? Yeah. So let's just keep an eye on it.

Effy

Yes, for sure. Like darkest corner of the like matte dark, that soloing blackness, that just like solos everything. That's where that stuff lives for sure. Yeah. You know, the thing that comes up for me also how we beat ourselves up about our thoughts, because these are essentially all thoughts, right imagination and thoughts that are coming up in our brains. And I am currently so I was living in the US for 12 years, where freedom of speech is, is in the Constitution. It's an important part of the American life. And now I'm currently living in a country that actually has thought crime. So you can go to prison for thinking thoughts, and writing, like, if you think them out loud, you write them out loud, you draw them, right in in any way. So thought crime is a thing in the country that I live in. So you get jailed for thinking thoughts, which, you know, to the Americans or Europeans, you're just like, Wow, that's crazy. But hearing you talk about shadow work, it actually makes me think we kind of do that to ourselves, we punish ourselves for the thoughts that we're having, because we're not dealing with the shadow stuff. Okay, we're not explicitly putting people in prison, but we kind of putting ourselves in prison, and we kind of punishing ourselves for some of those thoughts. Right?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Absolutely. And I think this is an important part to point out is, from a depth psychological perspective, the imagination is real, it is entirely real. And so of course, we we do put ourselves in prisons, we do constrain our lives, we curtail our behavior, and not just in the US don't rape people, but also in all sorts of pleasure based ways, right, like, so there's the the ways that we curtail our behavior that are helpful. And then there are billions of ways that we make our lives smaller and porters imprison ourselves. And it makes sense to some degree because the imagination is so entirely powerful. If there's some part of us that's aware, like thoughts become repetitive, repetitive thoughts can kind of sink in. And now what if I act on them? So like, I get why people do it. But the trick isn't to stop thinking them. The trick is to look directly at it. And there's a big difference. There's a big difference between letting something just continually burst through from the unconscious to conscious, right, like just it just pops through like the Kool Aid man, bursting through a brick wall. And we just keep letting that happen. There's a big difference between that and sitting and holding sacred space for these perverse, ugly, tentative, like, oh, I don't know whether I want to sit with it sort of thoughts. Those are two very different actions, one leads to empowerment, the other does lead to continual re imprisonment. Sure, sure.

Effy

I can imagine that the way that even you're describing is to feels very intrusive. Yeah, it's very, you know, like the, the stores like popping out at me that I don't get control over, I don't have any power over. And they feel like the idea is so intrusive. But when I think about them as like, you sort of I love the way you put it like sacred space, you just sit there and you're ready for it, and you just like, let it unfold in front of you and you bear witness to it, then it's flowing through you, you're not constantly like holding it, trying to hold it back and hoping that it's not going to burst through and, you know, just ruin your day or even like, how you feel about yourself Your internal internal chorus, you know, so yeah, all of this, all of this is making making so much sense. So for those who are listening, how would you know that you are not dealing with your shadow work? What are some of the ways that I'm like, Oh, I'm ignoring a bunch of shellac out there stuff. I'm not even looking over that. I don't like how do I What are the signs? Yeah.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Okay. So the first is, am I in the habit of shaming other people for their sexual proclivities, their likes their wants their desires? Am I overtly shaming them? So, you know, we can just call a spade a spade, we have all of this anti trans legislation going on. All the people enacting that need to deal with their own sexual and gendered shadow work, like they need to do that work, do that work, if you are punishing others for their self expression for their expression, not their behavior, their expression, their being right, great. That's awesome. Now you know where your work lies. So take all that energy that you are currently pointing outward and turn it toward yourself. You actually have that energy, awesome. That's a great sign because you have all that energy, you're going to be able to do this work but you're going to need help to keep you from continually projecting it and call it back to you because it's inside here like that is a that is the call coming from deep within the house that needs to be addressed. So that's one. And that can be on a small scale too. Like if there's just if you find yourself making snide comments or looking at a certain segment of the population in a certain way, if you are not able to be in a genuinely accepting mode, or you find it really hard to, to accept new things, when they're presented to you, cool, that's, that's a sign, look inside, that's probably a shadow work piece. And it might even be a small one, they, they aren't all going to be things that take you years and years to integrate. Sometimes it's really just facing it. And doing a session or two of intention with it. You're like, oh, actually, I don't need to be upset about this out in the world. Because now I've refound this part of me. And that doesn't mean that you want to enact it the same way you're seeing it out there, it means that you're not accepting this part of you. Another way that I see this turn up is I see a lot of people who were really raised in religious household or sexually repressive households, where they've got to say midlife somewhere between 35 and 60. Say, and they report to me that they don't really think about sex. They don't have any sexual thoughts, but they don't consider themselves asexual. They're just like, I don't know, I don't know what I want. I don't know what I don't know what I desire. I don't know, I don't, I don't really want anything. And we go through some, you know, questionnaires thinking like so are you asexual, they're like, No, I mean, I, because I can get there. And I do want to and I want to want, but it just doesn't happen. Oftentimes, a couple layers down, we find, yep, what there is, is this, this really beautifully. Mosaic like this is Art covering up what they have created such a bubble around all of that material, all of their want, and desire and shadow stuff, that it looks beautiful. And they're like, No, there's nothing to see there. They're just they just look at the bubble, and they never look past it. So we have to burst it. And it's hard at first they they finally they go out into the world. And they're like, I don't want to look at all this icky stuff, I want to just have sex be like this thing that I do in the bedroom and in the dark. And then it just happens sort of magically, and I have an orgasm, and I'm done. When we burst that bubble, out comes a lot of stuff that isn't fun. Doing that kind of shadow work usually means dealing with how we interact with our parents, our community, when we were children, what we put into there, like really dealing with it and coming to grips with the fact that we've lost time, people often put off doing the shadow work, because when they finally do it and realize that they have more access to themselves. And my own anchor partner is struggling with this right now. They're integrating this material, and they're like, I 56 Why did I wait so long? I've wasted time. Of course, if that doesn't help anything, we have to go forward, we can't try to get that time back. But I find that if people are saying like, I'm just not going to do it, often there is this lack this resistance to facing the fact that there is something there, there is more of them that they want to have. And some people will sort of will themselves to continue sleeping, and just not deal with it. Because it's painful to imagine. Yeah, it's an existential crisis to face.

Effy

Because, like we said earlier, we saying that our sexual expression is a part of our self expression, which means a part of our identity and anything that changes that is changing our identity, which is major, right? A lot of the reasons why people will stick to the crazy stuff like the flat earth stuff, or, you know, like some of the most obvious stuff you're like, why would you stick to that, and you listen to that, you listen to what they're saying, and you understand their life. And soon you realize, oh, this is not about the shape of the Earth is about your identity, like you've identified with something so deeply. Any change in this in this idea is going to have an effect on your identity. And that's why you're holding on to it. So, so hard. On some level intellectually, you know, the world is round, and you're like, we can show you all the pictures in the world, we can take you up on you know, a spaceship and show you the planet until you deal with the fact that it's a part of your identity, and you have to let go of that part. It's not going to integrate. And I think it's a similar idea. I think sex is still part of our identity, whether we like it or not dealing with that stuff is going to cause internal shifts of like, cataclysmic internal shifts most of the time to our identity to who we think we are. So of course, it's hard work, you know, like bursting that bubble, even when you're describing it. Like, I felt for some people like I felt it, I felt tension in my stomach like woof that would shake someone's inner world, you know?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Yes, yeah, it does. I love that you brought up identity because I've seen people go in and embrace something that looks ostensibly shadowy, right? Like they go into the kink world, but they never actually deal with their deep inner stuff. They just put on all the pretty packaging. So they start wearing the leather corsets or you know, buying the impact tools, but they never really We go inside. Instead, they just sort of take the persona they try it on, they're like, see, look, I've integrated this. I'm part of the cool kids club. And they forget that there are these deeper layers that have nothing to do with the regalia, nothing to do with that they're in your really deeply felt personal identity. And knowing yourself that way. I mean, clothes might help you get there, but they aren't going to be the end. If the if the last step was buying the paddle, you missed the point, you missed the point, which is awesome, because it means there's more of you to know right now. And creating community can really help you make space for a new identity. So that's where I think like even so listening to a podcast like this, and then involving yourself in sex positive communities where it's natural to talk about this stuff becomes part of that shift, I can shift my identity by shifting who I spend time with.

Effy

Absolutely. And I think it's just work worth exploring period to grow to really be fully you, I think it's worth exploring, for sure. I want to talk about exploring, I want to explore something quickly. So you said this at the beginning as well, you said a lot of the time when we talk about sexual shadow, and people understand what we're talking about immediately, immediately, they go to kink, they go to BDSM, because they go to that place. My guess is that also we were saying, you know, it's different for everyone, I just want to kind of expand that view a little bit, I can see how something like very intimate, slow, connected, you know, sex being shadow material for somebody, because the idea of that kind of intimacy, we write the being like so much that it kind of gets pushed into the shadows. Or I can see like, I just want to expand that idea of shadow work so people can really dig in. It's easy to say, oh, it's kink. It's BDSM. It's a spanking, it's read fantasy, like that's easy to figure out. But I think there is like stuff that you wouldn't necessarily think immediately would be in the shadow work. Can we name a few of those things?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Yeah. Well, you named one of my favorites. Let's I call it the candle, the candle at sex fantasy, right? Because I this is this was my big, like my big first piece that I was like, That can't be a thing. It's literally not shadow work. And I'm talking about wanting lights and positivity and wanting connection and wanting to look in someone's eyes. How could that be shadow work, but I spent all of the time up until my mid 30s all the time. So when I started having sex at 16 Till my mid 30s. So about 20 years thinking I didn't like kissing. And I didn't ever want to have touchy feely, like gentle fun, like I'm connecting to you on the deepest possible making love. That's that even phrase, oh, the phrase, I was like, nothing will turn me off more. And it's because it was in my shadow areas, I had cut that stuff off. It wasn't accessible to me, I didn't find access early on in life. And so I just decided to say, that's not me. That's not me. I don't like that stuff. Fast forward to my mid 30s, and a different partner and a different relationship structure. And I found that part of myself and I was so profoundly ashamed of it, that I couldn't admit it for two years. For two years. I wrote about it in my journal, and couldn't bring it to my partner, because the partner who I was like repeatedly having sex with and could have potentially note two years. And even then once I did, I still felt this profound shame around wanting to try making love. And so I laugh even now, but I know that I'm not the only person who deals with this, whatever you've cut off fits into this category. And when we reintegrate it, it doesn't mean like my primary persona is not now as a person who wanders through candle lights, love story, sex, that is not it. But I do have the capacity now because I've remembered it. Another thing that I see people do is put on this idea that they don't want gentle touch, like right, like they're really into spanking or smacking or like, like hard touch or hard thrusting right. And I've seen this for across genders like I only like powerful stuff. Now I'm a high sensation person myself, but to not be able to tolerate gentleness points to unreflected material. Also unreflected nervous system material, right? So there's the bodily piece we have to deal with to like there is embodied shadow work as well as the stuff that lives in our neuro synaptic connections. So any place that you are finding yourself cut off from or you if you make a face about it when you see it in a movie. Awesome. Write that one down if you face about it, it's worth exploring.

Effy

Yes, yes, for sure. Yes. And exploring doesn't mean that you now do it. Right. I think that's something else is clarify that as well. It doesn't mean you now go into you know, an X everything that you've thought about or you know, About every single fantasy, that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about processing it, we're talking about facing it, sitting with it, letting it come through us, let it like, diffuse its power and kind of move on. Right?

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Right. Well, this is where again, the imagination is real. So you can use that power, the realness of your imaginal aspect, your imaginal capacity to process to work through. You don't have to liberalize in fact, liberalizing a lot of shadow material actually just kills it, it didn't like it were like, Oh, I don't even want that. And I also don't necessarily want to move on from all of it. Let's all take myself for example, here, I actually now entertain my my rape fantasies and my non consensual fantasies in a very different way than I used to. So they used to be repressed, I didn't want to deal with them. Now I have processed them, so that I can play at the edge of that, right. If I want to the same with the making love fantasies, I can play at the edge of it. I can play with it. But I don't have to liberalize it, right. Like I don't have to go to a BDSM campground and actually literalized it for myself to play with it in my fantasy and in my sexual experience, or my mass masturbation. And then there are other pieces of shadow work that I might want to process and truly work to let go of and say I don't, I don't actually think this is part of my innate being, I think I've been holding it, carrying it because I've been pushing against it so hard. And some of that stuff just releases. And this is again, though, now we have to be willing to process something, not experience it and let it go. And a lot of people find that to be the most complicated piece. How do I let it go? What is that, that makes me want to make air quotes to like, how do I let it go? It might keep coming back. Right? I might have to continually practice entertaining, and then letting go,

Effy

you know, something that comes up for me with a lot of this work. When I start working with a client, one of the things that I I asked him to do just during the period that we working together, I asked him to meditate. And we can it could be the most simple meditation, we can find a YouTube, you know, if they want guided YouTube, the guidance meditation thing or an app, like it doesn't have to be complicated. It's just like, sit your ass down for 10 minutes. Every day, while we're doing the work like six weeks, 10 weeks, whatever we decided we're going to do. And then journal the evening. So like morning and evening, this is just a practice as a part of the work that we're doing together. And one of the reasons why I say meditation, it's not spiritual. It's not anything other than it's like wax on wax off. It's this, watching your thoughts, letting them pass, watching your thoughts, letting them pass, it is the foundation for so much work that you do in personal development, healing is self knowledge. Anything that you do in the world, this idea of just sitting, watching your thoughts, bear witness and letting go is such an important muscle. And that's why meditation kind of makes sense. Like I'm the most pragmatic scientific person, my meditation, I have to admit, like it definitely has evolved into more of a spiritual practice. But when it started, I was like, this is wax on wax off. That's like if I just like gym, just like take myself to the gym every day. Sit down and I like is a thought gym is a mental gym, you know. And when I hear you talk about that stuff, it's that it's sick. It's that muscle that we use to like, watch it come up, honor it, acknowledge it, letting go. And it's the same thing over and over again.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Right, and simply having the awareness that this is a thing that's going to come up for me it like, yeah, it is, over time you practice that you have you do that muscle training, that mental muscle training. And then you make yourself aware of one of these little seed like seeds of something, it's like it's that grain of sand, right? You let it be really in your awareness. And those two things in tandem like that is that is the core of basic, everyday mundane shadow work. I make myself aware of what is in the periphery coming out of the unconscious, and then I allow it to pass through pass by because I am not my thoughts. But we do have to practice I love that you have people make this a clear practice because it's not easy. And I find people often around sexual issues especially like they'll only work on them when they want to have sex. And that's not enough, we actually need to take this out of the like you said air quotes bedroom and bring this into your integrating more of yourself. This is about your full self expression, capital S self. And if you do that, then you can also practice letting go on a level where maybe we can even get to that that detached from it so much that it just doesn't hurt anymore. So not so much that it goes away. It just doesn't. It's not really ours anymore. Let it re enter this, this collective realm where we don't have to hold it like it's a personal failing.

Effy

Sure. Yeah, I love that. I love that. I have a question for you. Last one, I am sorry, I can I can talk to you forever. This this kind of stuff. Time. Yeah, um, I do want to just explore one other aspect of this, which so far we've kind of talked about this work is the work that you do on your own. And I'm curious whether there is some room for connection for sort of deeper understanding of you know, each other. If we were to do some of that work with a partner to kind of, say, have a dialogue and place a method and methodology in place where we kind of do shadow work together? Or if kind of a mutual experience? Is that a thing? Is that a good idea? Or do we just do all of this on our own,

Dr. Joli Hamilton

I am a huge fan of doing partner Shadow Work, a huge fan I think being witnessed is one of the most powerful medicines humans can have. Now, does that mean that you can do it with just anyone, I would not necessarily say so. Because that's what we get into like projection and projective identification, it gets kind of messy. However, if you have some processes, if you have if you can create a container with someone where you can create the beginning of an experience and the end of an experience, and you can process with them both psychologically and sexually, or you can like process this material with them in a non sexual atmosphere. Awesome. Yes, I actually saw I taught methods. So I have a masterclass where I teach, like seven methods like here are ways you could look for this. And one of the best places I have seen people apply this is okay, now I have this particular method, I'm going to go do some inner digging, and then I'm going to bring this to a partner and ask them do you want to participate in this, we could, we could make this a thing. Sometimes I'll go away with a partner for a weekend and say, like, this weekend, let's work on this particular piece, it's been coming up for me a lot, and they'll hold space for me, there may be sex involved in that, or there might not it might just be I want to hold space around a campfire for telling this processing this material and letting it be out in the world again. And that is so powerful, and not everybody has it. So I do tend to when I'm teaching methods, I never require people to have a partner, because it's as some people who are partner to lovely humans just aren't yet in a psychological relationship. And if you're not there, you're not at a loss, right? Like you can do all this work. But if you do have someone Yes, dig in, do that. It's so juicy and make sure that you're offering them space to do their work to right, this isn't this isn't one sided. I've even seen this done in groups. And that's, that's amazing as well, if you happen to have that container. Awesome. We can go for it.

Effy

Yeah, no, I mean, that would be amazing to have a group of people that you trust, and that you that you feel connected to that you can do that work, because it's coming. We know it, we understand the power of community, right? So I think to be able to do that stuff in community, I can see how it's like, extra powerful with the right community with the right people with the right vibe, of course, but ya know, super interesting. So before we transition, Julie, I want to ask, is there anything that we haven't covered that you think it's absolutely essential that we mentioned? Well, I guess

Dr. Joli Hamilton

there are two little things, which is that there are parts of our life where shadowy material comes up. And two of them that I see happen a lot for people in my world, and I guess I'm guessing they wouldn't yours are jealousy and new relationship energy. Oh, yeah, I treat both jealousy. I treat both jealousy and new relationship energy as specifically opportunities for shadow work. That's how I teach about them. That's how we talk about them. Because these are aspects of being a human that show us the shadow even though we don't necessarily want to see it. Right. So when jealousy comes up, that is an indicator, right? That I have unreflected material, I'm not yet fully aware of everything that I need and want or haven't been able to create safety for my for my parks, there's, we could go so deep into that new relationship energy too, though, like this is a place where we can start to look at where do I lose myself? Where do I fall away from myself? Where do I start creating fantasies. And this is another aspect of, oh, I may be creating fantasies that allow me to touch my sexual shadow without really being deeply in touch with it. So those are big topics. I cover them when I'm working with people in like full year programs. But it's important to notice, like, it's not all about sex. And it's not all about the obvious places where you'd be like, that's going to be sexual shadow material. It's also in all of these twisty dark alleys where we're like, we don't necessarily deal with these topics. Well, if we don't deal with a particular topic or phenomenon, well, it probably has a shadow element to it.

Effy

Hmm yeah, that's super fascinating. I kind of my mind is just bounced in all the different directions. Jealousy I get right jealousy is kind of almost obvious why that would live in the shadow and how it's activated by shadow material that I can We get also, we know that Josie occurs when we perceive a significant threat to a significant relationship, right. So the significant threat piece threat stuff and lives in the shadows anyway, so I completely get that part. And I had never thought about new relationship energy containing shadow material. But I also I totally get it now you put it in that way. It's also an amazing distraction. It's amazing. That is like a middle ground for fantasy and escapism and avoidance like it, I can totally now see how that shadow material like is seeps in there. And you don't even realize

Dr. Joli Hamilton

eggs. That is exactly it. And when I frame it this way for people and I say, oh, it's an opportunity to look at shadow material from both sides. Also, when my partner is in and sorry, my shadow material may become very obvious right then Right, like all of these ways that I have not communicated my needs, or that I am not able to hold space for my partner. There's just so much juiciness in that. And we tend not to think about those. Those aspects of NRA, we tend to think about the like the the highs, like the big piece for sure. But it has a shadow side as anything to tie will have its low.

Effy

For sure. Absolutely. Absolutely. I love that. That's so fascinating. So, Dr. Hamilton, thank you so much for coming on the show once again. I already can't wait to have you back. And I really, really appreciate your time and your insight.

Dr. Joli Hamilton

Thank you so much for having me if it was a genuine pleasure, so exciting.

Jacqueline

For more information on Dr. Julie Hamilton and to get free ebooks on jealousy, reigniting your sex life, getting what you need from your relationships and more, visit her website. Listen to Joe lee.com. You can hear her and her anchor partner can on their podcast playing with fire, or you can visit her on Instagram and Twitter at Dr. joley underscore Hamilton. If you want to share your experience with jealousy, ask for resources and connect with other foxy listeners. Head to facebook and join our Facebook group at we are curious foxes. You can also jump onto Patreon at weird curious foxes. To hear the embarrassing jealousy story that I share in a previous episode about an instance that left me creeping outside the window of a restaurant while my wife was on a date. To hear that Patreon extra and to find many episodes. And after our conversations over 50 videos from educator led workshops you had to go to Patreon. At we are curious foxes. And did you know that we have a jealousy and conversion section on our website? Visit us at we're curious foxes.com to find podcast episodes, blog posts, book recommendations that give you the resources that you need to navigate through jealousy and find the lessons that can help you get to know yourself and your partners better. If you enjoy our episodes, we would love for you to subscribe to the show on Apple podcast or to follow us on Spotify and Stitcher. This tells the podcast Gods this content matters. An extra bonus points if you read the show and leave a comment so that others know the kind of impact that the show has had on you and your relationships. And finally, let us know that you're listening by sharing a comment, story or question. You can email us or send us a voice memo to listening@werecuriousfoxes.com

Effy

This episode is produced by Effy Blue and Jacqueline Misla with help from Yağmur Erkişi. Our editor is Nina Pollock, with whom we have the most significant relationship. Our intro music is composed by Dev Sahar. We are so grateful for their work, and we're grateful to you for listening. As always, stay curious friends. Curious Fox podcast is not and will never be the final word on any topic. We solely aim to encourage curiosity and provide a space for exploration through connection and story. We encourage you to listen with an open and curious mind and we'll look forward to your feedback. Stay curious friends.

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