Listen to me read the post…
“Within each of us lives an Inner Patriarch that continues to carry the old patriarchal rules and values, many of which may have been taught us by our mothers. This Inner Patriarch controls us from the inside, not the outside. We do not necessarily know about him because he operates beyond the edges of our awareness. He rules from the shadows of our unconscious, which is why I sometimes call him the Shadow King. When we do not know about him, this Shadow King is our enemy.” ~ Sidra Stone, The Shadow King: The Invisible Force that Holds Women Back
The Inner Patriarch that Stone talks about in the above quote seems more evident than ever in these days after the U.S. election. When people vote for a self-professed pussy-grabber, who nominates a known abuser to the position of Attorney General, the Shadow King in them is choosing to accept the patriarchy’s control over their bodies.
But it’s the more subtle and yet insidious ways that the Shadow King shows up that I want to talk about in this post. When we (myself included) downplay our own abilities and authority, defer to patriarchal leadership, overlook the loss of body autonomy, and accept our roles within imbalanced households, the Shadow King is grateful for our compliance.
What caught me by surprise, several years ago when I first read The Shadow King, was what Stone says about how we learn many of the patriarchal rules from our mothers. I didn’t want to believe that was true because it felt like we were blaming the victims and not holding the right people accountable, but the more I sat with it, the more I recognized there was truth in her words. (To be clear, though, that’s only part of the story, and by talking about this aspect of it here, I’m not letting the more egregious upholders of the patriarchy off the hook for their part.)
Our mothers passed down these rules not because they believed the rules were just and fair, or because they enjoyed living with them, but because they wanted to keep us safe. If we follow the rules, we’ll be less likely to be punished by the patriarchy and more likely to be afforded the kind of safety, belonging, and status the patriarchy dangles in front of us like carrots. “Be good and stay safe,” the Shadow King in our mothers taught the Shadow King in us, and for most of us, that goodness equates to smallness, silence, compliance, and sacrifice.
Not only do we learn the rules from our mothers and pass them down to our children, but often, the Shadow King convinces us to be obedient foot-soldiers on patriarchy’s behalf. When someone takes up too much space, we cluck our tongues and shame them for being “too big for their britches”. When someone claims sovereignty over their own body and doesn’t behave in a way that the patriarchy (or purity culture – one of the patriarchy’s rule books) deems acceptable, we turn up our noses and shame them for being slutty or provocative.
It's taken me years to dethrone the Shadow King that tries to recruit me as patriarchy’s foot soldier, and I may never be finished with this work (especially since some of the unlearning includes the healing of religious and sexual trauma). More and more, as I wrote about in Where Tenderness Lives, I’ve learned to take up space in the world, to believe in my own value and the value of my work, and to give myself permission to honour my own body’s needs and desires. (I have the following line from Mary Oliver’s poem tattooed on my arm as a reminder: “let the soft animal of your body love what it loves”.)
AND YET... I still find myself occasionally triggered into the kind of shame and self-doubt that is fuel for the patriarchy’s fire. When one of those loyal foot soldiers accuses me of taking up too much space, claiming agency, or making choices about my body they don’t approve of, the Shadow King tries to take control again. I remember once, for example, when I’d just delivered the biggest keynote address of my career and shared my excitement about it on social media, I got a message from somebody who said she was unfollowing me because I was bragging too much. Shame swept over me instantly. Who was I to take up space like that?
Our life’s work is to learn to dismantle the old story so that we can embody a new one. That requires first bearing witness to the Shadow King in ourselves; then digging away at the nasty root system of what’s been planted in our heads, hearts, and minds; and finally planting the seeds of a new story in its place – a story of liberation, self-love, courage, and embodiment.
This isn’t easy or fast work – it took generations to plant the old story in us and it will probably take generations more for a new story to become fully embodied in those who come after us. Between an old story and a new story, there can be many years of liminality, a confusing and destabilizing time that can tempt us to run back to the safety of the Shadow King. If you’ve been working at it for decades, and you still find remnants of the old story in you, take heart – you’re doing the best you can, given the power the old story still has in our culture.
One of the many reasons why I love the work of Holding Space is that it allows us to catch glimpses of the new story in each other’s eyes. When someone holds space for me well, they mirror back to me what I’ve been unable to see in myself. They weaken the power of the Shadow King and help me hold the hope of the new story even when I don’t have the strength to hold it myself. They bear witness to the dismantling of beliefs that kept me small, compliant and afraid, and then they cheer on the claiming of agency and power. And when I have had space well held for me, I can turn to the next person and offer the same for them.
In order to hold space for each other’s evolution, we don’t have to have irradicated the Shadow King from our lives, we just have to believe in the possibility of a different story. And then we have to commit daily to bringing that story into fruition.
When we believe in a new story and practice that belief daily, we give the Shadow King less power. When we hold that belief collectively, and let it change our relationships and community spaces, we find ways of withstanding the power the Shadow King still holds in our culture and enduring the harm it causes, even in those discouraging moments when half the population chooses to elect the Shadow King into government.
p.s. We are working on a brand new offering that we believe will help with this ongoing work of dethroning the Shadow King. Stay tuned for our announcement, coming after Christmas.
Bravo! Great post! 🥰
Thank you for this clarity!
🙏