Demons and the Shadow Aspect

This is the most bizarre of all my stories. 

I had a friend whose company bothered me intensely and I could never work out why. I felt tired when she was around. I felt that I couldn't trust her. I felt confused. I felt drained. I felt... something was wrong. 

She always claimed to be a close friend, loyal and supportive, loving, caring. She would call me when she needed support though I would rarely see her in person. She would be heavily involved in my personal affairs and invite herself into the intricacies of my mind and emotions. She wanted to know how I felt, how I would solve issues, my history, and I shared everything with her believing in her generosity.

But I always had this eerie, haunting feeling that there was something else going on behind the scenes, this strange sense that she wasn't really a friend despite everything she said. It didn't make sense: the words coming out of her mouth and the feeling I got being near her did not cohere. I felt ashamed of my suspicions and ignored them. 

In time, though, her emotional demands were too much for me and I started to feel exhausted. Once she demanded that I nurse her through another of her "episodes" and I ended up having to leave my dinner date just so I could calm her down for two hours over the phone. It became apparent that she was highly unstable. At this point, I starting thinking there really was something wrong. 

My reaction was to close the door on her; it was all too bizarre and disturbing. It was at a time when I was struggling in my own life and sometimes I wonder if she preyed on that vulnerability.

Horrifyingly, the baddie ended up being - me. I was the one with the issues, it was my fault. My punishment was that I should continue being friends with her which I felt obliged to do. 

Finally, I came across the Shadow Aspect in Jung. This is where we suppress our dark desires for the sake of abiding by moral norms of society. Importantly, people are not aware of it in themselves: the shadow operates in darkness, in the shadows of your mind, it's sub-, even un-concious. This was the only way that I could make sense of the oddity of this situation - I'd never been in any situation like it and it was quite rattling. I thought I was losing my mind. 

I heard once "in life, there are fountains and drains, stick with the fountains". Yes. Simple really. And I said goodbye forever. 

Needless to say, it's always those weird things in life that make songwriters write. So, here is Demons. 


DEMONS (live vocals) 
 

 

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