EP 3:15 Shadow Work for Chemsex Recovery with Jamie

Supplemental Study Guide: https://www.recoveryalchemy.org/newsletters/blog/posts/shadow

In this Season 3 episode of The AfterMeth Podcast, Dallas Bragg sits down with Jamie Willis — a Gestalt therapist, clinical specialist in chemsex, addiction, and LGBTQ+ mental health, and the former manager of London's Antidote service who was published in the British Medical Journal in 2015 calling for chemsex to be recognized as a public health issue. With 22 years of frontline practice spanning London, Northern Thailand, Uganda, and Malaysia, Jamie brings a rare depth of lived and clinical experience to a topic Dallas has been waiting to feature: Jungian shadow work. Together they cut through the TikTok-era misconceptions of shadow work as something "spooky" or "evil," reframing it instead as the internal repository where we exile the parts of ourselves — femininity, rage, neediness, masculinity, sexuality — that were shamed, invalidated, or forbidden as we grew up. As Jamie explains, those exiled parts don't disappear; they lead a semi-autonomous life of their own and quietly drive behavior, including the very patterns that show up inside chemsex.

The conversation moves through the practical mechanics of doing this work safely — why shadow exploration requires ritual, containment, and aftercare; how therapy, art, group work, and even structured kink communities can serve as containers; and why "shame dies on exposure" when these parts are finally met with curiosity instead of contempt. Dallas and Jamie examine how projection and projective identification reveal the shadow in everyday life, how emasculation and internalized rejection often hide beneath chemsex behavior, and why the goal is never to kill the shadow but to invite it back into relationship. The episode closes on one of the most powerful reframes Dallas offers on the show: that having lived through chemsex is not a sentence of brokenness but a rare starting point — an opportunity for self-knowledge that most people walk through life never accessing. For anyone curious about shadow work, this is an episode to rewind, slow down, and listen to twice.

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Jamie Willis

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Big aha moment in my own therapy when I realized actually I didn't actually think of myself as a man because I was gay. And I didn't realize I'd been walking around with this. That was in my shadow. Okay, so it was playing out in all sorts of like weird and wonderful ways. Yeah. Yeah, just just the notions like that, the emasculation that we sometimes feel. Yeah. Um, and again, I'm I'm massively joking.

SPEAKER_00 0:25

Chemsex. Sexualized drug use among men who have sex with men, typically involving methamphetamine, methadrone, and GHB, among others. Chemsex misuse is a worldwide epidemic that needs attention, dialogue, and hope for those lost in it, which is the purpose of the Aftermath Podcast. Please note the views expressed by the host and guest on this podcast are not to be taken as medical advice, and the content around sex and drug use can be triggering. Welcome back to the Aftermath Podcast. I am excited today because we're going to talk about a topic that I've been trying to get on the podcast for a while now. Couldn't find the right people, person, and I have found the right person now in my uh travels around the country. And um, we've we did we connected on LinkedIn, we've gotten to know each other. He's a delightful, delightful man named Jamie Willis. I'm going to introduce you, Jamie, and then I'll let you talk. Um But we're talking about oh we're oh I didn't say we're talking about shadow work, by the way. If you're listening, if you are interested in shadow work, always were intrigued by it, keep listening to the whole podcast because you're going to have uh a treat today. Because Jamie Willis is a therapist, he's a clinical specialist in chemsex addiction and LGBTQ mental health. He has 22 years of experience across service development and frontline practice. From 2009, Jamie found himself working with chemsex related issues as they began to emerge with increasingly increasing regularity. By 2014, he was a manager of Antidote. If you're from London, you I'm sure you've heard of Antidote. Um, it's a pan-London LGBTQ drug and alcohol support service, very much at the epicenter of the chemsex crisis. He developed services and group work programs aimed specifically at supporting clients struggling with problematic chemsex use and related harm. And then in 2015, he was published in the British Medical Journal calling for chemsex to be made a public health issue and subsequently bringing chemsex-related harm to much wider professional attention. Previous roles include addictions lead at a therapeutic community in Northern Thailand and developing alcohol support services for young LGBTQ people in South London. Jamie also worked as an AE substance misuse counsellor at a busy North London hospital, qualified as a just taught therapist. In 2007, Jamie has developed an integrative practice where, in addition to stabilization and harm reduction approaches, he also draws on influences from Jungian shadow work, attachment theory, internal family systems, and trauma-informed approaches. We could probably do three or more podcasts, Jamie, on other topics like that. Jamie believes effective therapy in his space requires not just technical knowledge, but a deep understanding of the shame, trauma, and community dynamics at play. He provides a highly professional, energetic, and affirming therapeutic space for clients and is committed to supporting fellow professionals through collegial discussion and service design. In recent years, Jamie has been based in Southeast Asia, continuing to work online with clients on chemsex recovery, addiction, and LGBTQ mental health issues. He also has provided consultancy and training internationally, including for services in Uganda and Malaysia. He is now based back in London, where he continues his private practice. We are having all the big names on season three on the podcast, and you are one of the biggest. Wow, what a resume. Welcome, Jamie.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

Thank you so much, Dallas. It's it's great to be here, and I'm I'm so glad we were able to finally link up and make this happen. So yeah, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 4:15

It's amazing to me how humble you are and just how what what a present you give. You know, because I I read your bio before the podcast and I was like, what the fuck? I was like, he's done all this stuff that you would never guess, the way that you are relatable and just so welcoming to me. You've just been so welcoming to me, and I just love talking with you. Um even through even through LinkedIn messages. I just I just think you're a great person.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

That that's amazing. Thank you, Dallas. I mean, I um I I don't quite know how to respond to that actually, but thank you. Thank you so much. Are you blush? Are you blushing? I am blushing. It's the heat, it's the heat. Yeah, it's the heat. It's actually hot in London, right? It is, it is actually. It's gone from um it's gone from kind of winter to high summer, and then it's been about 20, 24 hours we go from 14 degrees to 27 degrees. Anybody who's ever been to London knows that we don't have AC here either, so it is genuine hot here today.

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I was just learning that. Yeah, um, I'm gonna try to adjust this light. Here we go. As I was saying before the podcast, you gotta light me right. You gotta light me just right, or I'll look 80 years old.

SPEAKER_01 5:32

We distracted for the rest of the conversation, otherwise. Exactly I will, I will.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

I will. So before we get started talking about Jungian's shadow work, which I am fascinated by, um, my program Recovery Alchemy is kind of based on the Jungian's discussion on alchemy. And um, so I'm I'm really digging that subject. But do you have lived addiction experience of your own that you would feel comfortable sharing with us? Sure.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

It's it's something I don't share that often, actually. And I mean for no particular reason, it just doesn't feel but no, I mean my um my substance use misuse, uh we're back a long way. I mean, I'm 54 now. Um but I started using when I was uh 11 years old. Uh there's there there's a lot of addiction prevalent in the family. So, you know, it was it was already there and I was already familiar with it. So but I started using and using heavily from from that age. Uh like through my code teens or through my twenties. Uh I was using very, very kind of heavily and getting in a lot of trouble and quite leading quite a miserable existence, I have to say. Um, I mean I I I have to say it preceded the the the chemsex phenomenon, actually. By the time the chemsex phenomenon really started to evolve, I was had pretty much matured out of my own using. Um, because I didn't I didn't follow uh a formal recovery programme, I didn't go kind of 12-step or anything. I had a bit of a kind of aha moment as I hit 30. Um, and just kind of looking at the rest of my life and thinking, I'm gonna end up in jail or probably dead unless I do something you know pretty radical. Now, and and and that's what I did through a variety of different means, therapy being one of them. You know, I have a spiritual practice as well, which has really slowed me down through the years. So just just things like that, and some amazing people. I mean, you know, Dallas in this business, business of recovery, it's the people around you that really really, really matter. So I'm I'm very, very um grateful for and indebted to um you know a lot of people around me. But uh but yeah, it was um for for for about 20 about 20 years, it was uh very, very serious, quite chaotic using. So, you know, it's um a a lot a lot of lived lived experience and and and like a lot of people who've been involved in this kind of using, you know, you watch a lot of people around you fall by the wayside uh as well. So that that that that that 20 years. I don't I don't believe in in in in regrets. I think it's sort of made me into the person that I am today. Um but at the same time, you know, I'm I'm I'm pretty glad to be out of it, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:26

Yeah, and for anybody listening, I I hear people kind of um wailing about and and upset about the number of years they've used. You know, like I've I've been doing this for ten years, right? And listen, that's really a drop in the bucket. Because people like Jamie you had a 20-year history with addiction, and now look what you've done. You've turned that all around and you've made meaning out of it. Such important meaning because you're doing big work. I I I love that you're working in Uganda and Malaysia as well, because I get a lot of DMs from them and no services whatsoever. Yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_01 9:10

Yeah. It's um I th I think it's it's it's times like that that it really does make everything worthwhile. And I mean you were very kind in what you said earlier about being humble or whatever, but you know, being a dad is I I I I think when you work with those guys in those, particularly in those countries, in those contexts, you know, you get you really get a a powerful sense of what dedication means, right? So you know, I mean you've got work with people that working in incredibly hostile conditions, you know, but nonetheless super, super committed. And and and and I think, you know, I was asked to um you backtrack, so I was asked to do some consultancy for a service in Uganda. And I'm not gonna name services, those because it's still quite sensitive in those countries, you know. So uh, you know, I I I I I was approached to do some consultancy uh around kind of LGBTQ plus kind of stuff. Wasn't sure what kind of reception I was gonna get actually with the Ugandan team, you know, because you only ever hear negative things. And look, I've been around for long enough to know it doesn't represent a whole country or a whole people, but nonetheless, you know, there was a little bit of trepidation. It's like, how is this gonna land? And you know, those guys were amazing. You know, they they were so committed. I mean, just even doing training with me could have got them into serious trouble, you know. But they were just so committed to providing that support and that help anyway. And you know, I think when you when you encounter people like that along the way, yeah, you know, it's just there's no place for ego in any of that kind of stuff. And so the same in Malaysia, you know, I spent quite a lot of time Kuala Lumpur. Um people doing chemsex work there. Again, very difficult for them to do so uh for various different reasons. It's not the most LGBTQ friendly environment. Um, but nonetheless, they're in there and they're doing the work as well. You know, it's it's it's incredible what people do, it really, really is. So I think I'm always grateful to be a kind of a part of that that world, that field, if you like, you know. So and as you said, you know, it's this is what we do, we make meaning, you know, if we've been through these um situations, these environments, these difficult, easy trials and tribulations, if you will, you know, then uh a big part of recovery is meaning making. I think we'll we'll be talking about this today, actually, in terms of shadow work, right? You know, when we talk about kind of a classic therapeutic pathway, you know, particularly saying in trauma or something, you know, we talk about kind of stabilization, processing, and and meaning making and integration, you know. So I think that's a that's a really good kind of framework for for recovery, basically, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

Yeah, it is, yeah. So you are are undoubtedly an expert in chemsex. I mean, let's let's go ahead and say that and establish that. Um, and I I love your your writing. Um if you want to find Jamie's writing and his work, uh the best place I think is LinkedIn, unless you think there's a better, is there a website or repository?

SPEAKER_01 12:09

Yeah, that's that's definitely the best place, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Um yeah, Jamie Willis, we'll put his link, we'll put your link, can we put your LinkedIn link in the show notes? Um But he he writes lots of articles. Um it looks like he's on YouTube. I haven't even looked at that yet. Um but the the articles are just fascinating and very informative. And so with that said, we we could tackle all sorts of chemsex issues, but what we haven't talked about on this podcast yet is shadow work. Um and shadow work is one of those buzzwords that I think has been passed around a lot. You know, there was this on TikTok, there was this shadow work journal that just blew up. You know, like this girl made millions off of this shadow work journal. Um people are making millions off TikTok on anything, but um, I don't I think it's passed around a lot. And I do my version of shadow work in my program, you know, I I don't dabble too deep into it because it's a coaching program and I'm not a specialist. Um, but I think it is misunderstood. And it's just one of those things where what I find is that when you mention shadow work, most people equate it to their bad side, like their negative side. And you I'm gonna let you correct me here if I'm wrong, but I say it's a blind spot. It doesn't have to be bad, it's just something about yourself you don't see or don't really you're not aware of. It's like in your peripheral, is more to me, is is a better explanation than saying the shadow of me is this this bad part of me, like this negative side of me, right? So can you tell us like 101? What is what is shadow work?

SPEAKER_01 14:01

So I I think look, I I'm I'm really glad we're we're clarifying this today. You know, as you said, Dallas, there are a lot of misconceptions. And I think just the name, right? Shadow sounds a little bit right, a little bit spooky, a little bit woo-woo, doesn't it? It's like woo, shadows, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Look, I it might it might be worth just maybe getting a little bit of history. I don't want to get too kind of in the weeds as far as history of the. Take us in the weeds. Take us in the weeds.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

Okay, we're we weed friendly here, are we? Yes, we are. We're we friendly. California sober.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

I love that so much. So look, I think that the the shadow or the concept of the shadow was um formulated by a psychiatrist called Carl Jung. And you don't have to know huge amounts about him, but he has been hugely influential. So even if you don't know the guy, you'll be familiar with some of his work. So he was born uh sort of uh late 19th century, very prominent in the early 20th century. He was a contemporary of Freud, uh, etc. etc. So um, but if people have heard the terms things like kind of introvert and extrovert, you know, that was those are uh terms that were coined by him. Um also, if anyone's ever done one of those Myers Briggs personality testings, that's all based on on Jungian personality type. So even if you don't know him, you will have encountered his work and his influence somewhere, it's very much kind of absorbed into uh the mainstream. But I think when we're talking shadow work, I'm I'm really glad you said what you said there, Dallas, about one of the misconceptions misconceptions is that it's kind of evil or bad or or whatever, because it's it's absolutely not the case. I mean, put really simply, you know, shadow the shadow is where is kind of the repository where we push all the stuff that we don't want to deal with. Yeah. So the things that we don't like about ourselves maybe, but the things that have been uh invalidated by the people around us, you know, so it may be things like you know, classic ones that come up a lot of things like neediness, um, things like kind of rage, power, masculinity and femininity, even, or these kinds of things, you know. So um what happens is that as we grow up, we have these notions, these attributes, um, these traits, if you like. But because they are frowned upon or stopped or prohibited, forbidden perhaps, then we we push them to one side, you know, we put them down. So it's a little bit like having the kind of the attic or or the basement in your home. You know, it's where we put all the stuff that we don't want or that we're not going to use or don't want to use. The but the the issue with the shadow is that it doesn't just go away. You know, it might be, as you said, I mean you use the term blind spot, it it might be out of sight and out of mind, but it hasn't gone away. Okay, so what it sort of does, it kind of sort of sits there and leads almost like a semi-autonomous life of its own. Okay, because it holds a lot of energy, you know, and it takes a lot of energy to keep these things in the shadow as well. So, I mean, to give a classic one, if we're talking, you know, uh for say the gay man, femininity, you know, it's been forbidden, it's been frowned on, it's been all those kinds of things. So you might push it away and try and sort of, you know, act more masculine or whatever. So your femininity gets pushed into the shadow, but there it becomes somewhat distorted. And so when it's there, then it can start to take on maybe some toxic traits or whatever, or come out in different ways. Because although although we've put it there, it still has the energy and kind of comes forth at times when we don't expect it, which is very much fits in with what you were saying about the blind spot. So we might find ourselves, you know, kind of self-sabotaging, we might find ourselves being kind of mean or bullying, you know, when we actually don't mean to be, it might be out of our awareness. You know, that happens quite a lot. If we think about in um a chemsex context, you know, actually, what one of the manifestations there can be things like sort of needing intimacy, you know, being vulnerable, those things, particularly for a man. I'm I'm massively generalizing here, but particularly for a man, those things can get pushed into the shadow because it's not allowed. You know, men aren't vulnerable. Intimacy is wrong to need, to need intimacy, to need sex, even it's wrong. So it's all bad, it gets banished. Okay, so what happens there is because the the repression holds a lot of energy. Okay, so it's all there sort of fermenting in the background. Now, the the price that we pay for doing that is a sense of not really feeling fulfilled in life, you know, because it takes a lot of like the life force, if you want to put it in that context, away. So we feel that our lives can be a little bit kind of grayed out in a sense. You know, we're not we're not able to ask for what we need. And so classic ones are, you know, we might want to be wanted, but because that's not acceptable, we'll settle for being desired, you know, which doesn't quite hit the same spot. And so it will manifest in different ways like that. Now, in a in a in what happens is where it becomes so repressed, it it's kind of builds up a head of steam. Okay. So if we are in a chemsex context, what then happens? All that stuff comes out within a chemsex context because it's almost like you know, the um the guards have gone away. Yeah. You know, so then it all comes forth, you know, and what then happens is we end up having a confrontation with some of our shadow elements, you know, but we're not prepared to do it. We're not psychologically, emotionally, spiritually, if you like, prepared to be able to have that confrontation. You know, there's a lot of power there. So we end up be gett becoming flooded by it. So rather than these kind of elements being our possession, they kind of flood us, they kind of move in and sort of take over. So we um when we're doing, I mean, when we're doing shadow work, what we're actually doing is really trying to formulate a relationship with these aspects, you know, because they're essentially they're disowned aspects, you know, put puts in view. So does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 20:34

Love it. Love all of it. Let me can I can I take a minute and review what you said? Absolutely. Yeah. Um and I and I um I'm also reflecting on how similar this is to uh uh internal family systems. Right? Isn't it similar in terms of yeah, yeah, these exiled parts of ourselves? Right. So with with those listening, one like you said, a a common part that we reject is our our gay part or our feminine part. You know, the the part of us that's identified by the outside by somebody else, invalidated by others, as you said, as gay. So for me, I like to make everything about me on the podcast, but for for me, being caught acting like I was on a stage performing on my tiptoes as I like I was in high heels, right, by a parent and ridiculed for that. Right. At that moment, that was that part of me was invalidated by my parent. And so you're saying when those parts maybe maybe you're told you're too loud, like you said, you're too needy, you're you're too much, you're too something, you're too fat. Right. Um or neglected. And so the Spoken messages, you're not important enough. Right. Something like that. So we take that part of ourselves and we shove it into an I like a basement instead of an attic for some reason. But we we shove it, we shove it in the basement. And that's where it gets repressed. And I love that you said the word fermenting. Because there's that I love that word. I use that word too. Um is it ferments in there? But and that also takes a lot of energy to we we shoved it to the side. And so when we shove it in there, I I love that you say it gets distorted, it takes on a life of its own, it gets it, it takes on these these um traits. So it's a real part of us with its own personality, right? You you could just tell me if I'm not if I'm off track here.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

You're well on track there, Dallas, actually. Um and I'm really glad you brought in the the IFS the internal family systems thing, because it's it's very, very closely linked with that exiled parts, you know, absolutely, but the energy it takes to keep those parts exiled as well. You know, so in IFS internal family systems, we'll talk about protector parts, we'll talk about managers and firefighters, you know, keeping those wounds from being activated, right? So it's it's exactly the same thing. And I and I think it's worth mentioning. I mean, we're talking about shadow work in the Jungian context, you know, but there's lots of different languages and lots of different frameworks. This is it's not new, and Carl Jung never claimed that it was. I mean, one of the things I really love about him is that he draws on so many different influences. So he draws on kind of spirituality and kind of archaeological archaeology and anthropology, and I mean all of these kinds of things, you know. So what he actually did was took his learning from there, as well as his own learning. I mean, he's a very accomplished psychotherapist and psychiatrist, um, and really kind of formulated this into the concept of the shadow, right?

SPEAKER_00 23:56

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so when we engage in chemsex, it's like the basement door is swung open.

SPEAKER_03 24:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:06

And all the parts come running out. Right. We talked about this in another episode with a psych a psychotherapist about shoving your parts you're like kids, shoving them in the closet, right? And then when you get you know when you do chemsex, they all they all come out. But you're you use the word flooded, um, and we're confronted by the parts that we've been repressing this whole time. And that confront that it is it is confronting, but it and it's something we're not ready for either at all. Right? And so in shadow work, the goal from what you said is to get to know this part and assess what it needs and to kind of negotiate and create a relationship with with these parts that we have rejected in ourselves. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 25:00

That's that's 100% right. And because I think if you look at any kind of cultural background, you know, they they will have kind of rituals and containers and things like ways of meeting the shadow, because we all have shadow parts. You know, I mentioned things like you know, power, violence, aggression, you know, we all have the capacity to manifest those things, you know. So if you look at sort of other cultures, other frameworks, you know, a big part of that, whether it's kind of spiritual recovery, even actually, a lot of that is about building a relationship with the shadow. Now, I mean, you can kind of use maybe uh an example there, which is it's it's a difference between building a relationship relationship with it and getting to know it, taming it if you like. There's a lovely metaphor I can use in just a moment, but um but kind of taming it, but but but also ensuring that you are strong enough to withstand that confront that confrontation. And that's what a lot of the work is around, again, whether it's spiritual recovery, whatever it is, okay. Because if you're not, then what happens is the shadow consumes you. You know, if you try and confront the shadow uh before you're either strong enough or it's not within a framework, it's not within a ritualized kind of way or whatever. That's what we mean by flooding. Okay, now I think you know, I I've said this to people many times. One way of maybe thinking about that is like nuclear energy, often liken it to nuclear energy, in that the shadow can be an amazing resource. You know, we don't have to fear it, we really don't have to fear it. It can be a fantastic resource, but it has to be respected. So if you think about nuclear energy, okay, so um treat it in the right way, you know, with the right container, the right protocols, the right, you know, lots of sort of safety stuff and everything like that. You harness that and it's it's an incredibly powerful source of energy. No? If you just went in there and just goes, right, we're gonna do nuclear energy and the the container's weak and the protocols aren't observed, whatever, what happens? Bless you. What happens? You end up with you end up with Chernobyl, right? You end up with meltdown. And and and that's what happens when we try to do that. So kind of bringing it into the kind of chemsex context, and I guess I'm referring more to problematic chemsex. We know it sits on a continuum here, but yeah. Yes. Um what happens is that we confront those shadow elements within the chemsex context, which isn't ritualized, usually, is a very poor container if there is any container there at all. And we're exposed to all of our kind of more shadowy elements. Now, because they have been in the shadow, they've been in the basement, as you put it, they can be distorted. If we develop a relationship, what we do is that we kind of um undistort that, if that's even a word, okay. We we transform that, we transform it into something, and it becomes in the service of us. Okay, we're in relationship, we integrate it. Okay. So what happens if we do it in something like a chem sex context? We meet all these shadow shadowy elements in their distorted forms, and then that can consume us and and in some cases even destroy us. Yeah. Does that make sense? Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:18

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. We could also say that we alchemize that part, couldn't we? We do. Loving that. Loving that link in the recovery alchemy.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it is. I mean, look, yeah, I mean, you laugh and and everything, but that's that's exactly what we're talking about. There are lots of ways of doing it. I mean, I often um draw on the example of the BDSM King Confetish community, actually, um, as as a framework, you know, because they do deal with arguably shadow shadowy elements, you know. If you go into a BDSM scene, if it's done properly, you know, and then you'll go into that, you'll talk about what your desires are or aren't, as the case may be. You know, so you'll be talking about things like power and control and wanting wanting to um experience pain or inflict pain, and you know, it's all negotiated, you know. Now, if you if you think about it in that context, there will there's the ritual, there's a negotiation, there's the ritual, okay, there's there are safe words, um, everything is contained, yeah. Again, if it's done properly. All right. So you're able to explore all of these elements in a way which is ritualized. Okay, there's negotiation, there's respect, there's consent, there's um, as I said, the safe words, all of this kind of stuff. And really, really importantly, there's the aftercare. Yeah? Right. Yeah. So, you know, you finish the scene, whatever, and then the aftercare, whatever you've negotiated, whatever you need around that might be you know, somebody holding you, just people giving you water, the kind of the gentle grounding. You know, so there's a coming back from. So if you think about confrontation with shadow, there's the negotiation, there's the building of the relationship, there's the ritualization, and there's the coming back from it. You know, so there's actually a lot of learning and a lot of kind of technology, if you like, that can be taken from the kind of BDSM kink fetish scene, you know, as an example. So I think you know, sometimes when I'm sort of talking about that with people, it makes a little bit more sense, you know, because actually a lot of clients that I have seen down through the years end up traumatized. I mean, let's just call it what it is, right? Because you know, they go into a chemsex scene, they explore extreme BDSM sometimes scenes, you know, right. And they might have gone from like you know, vanilla right to extreme practices, okay, under the influences of various different substances, no safe words, no regard, and there's no um no real ritual, usually, maybe some in there, you know, but it's the coming back as well, you know, because if you think about if you've been through um a BDSM scene, okay, the aftercare ritual and all that kind of stuff, and you're with other people, and it's it's very much held, you know, metaphorically and you know, uh physically. At the end of a chemsex scene, if there hasn't been all the ritual negotiation and all that kind of stuff, it's just at the end, it's just you on your own, twitchy, paranoid, yeah, ashamed for what you've of what you've of what you've just done in many cases. Yep. You know, so that's that's what we're talking about. You've confronted your shadowy elements or shadow side if you want and you weren't ready for it, it's consumed you, and now you're just feeling well. I mean, basically, basic you know, shadow work, shadow work without containers is is just re-traumatization. That's essentially what it is. Re-traumatization, yeah. So this is why it's so important because when clients come in, in a in a sense, what we're doing is reverse engineering a little bit. Yeah? Because they've already exposed themselves to the shadow. Ah. All right. So what we can do with that is, and why it's so important to do the shadow work, is that actually it's like, okay, look, because it's not, it doesn't have to be all bad. Okay, it's like, look, you've been exposed to stuff, you did it in a way which was unboundaried and uncontained, and it's kind of consumed you, nearly destroyed you. But there was there is some stuff in there that you can take from it. It's uh it has allowed you to explore some elements of yourself. Okay, now we are reverse engineering in that we now might have to do some trauma work or something around that, and then we talk about okay, how do you now integrate this experience? You know, but this is this is why it is so incredibly important.

SPEAKER_03 32:53

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 32:54

So thinking about what you said was for someone who's not Ray, or if they don't have if it's okay, number one, respect the shadow. So I I want their listeners to hear this is that no matter what that shadow is, respecting it and having compassion for it is basically respecting and having compassion for yourself because it's an aspect of you. And what I see often is we're so used to uh rejecting ourselves as gay men and hating ourselves is that uh we hate those parts. Um and I in my program we talk about the part that wants to use. There there is an aspect of me that wants to use meth. But so so often we reject it, we hate it, we ridicule it, we isolate it, we put it down, right? We we we say it's the it's the demon on my back, you know, we fight it. It we're only saying that about ourselves. And and I feel like it doesn't get you anywhere. But we're but we want to be so negative about addiction, right? That it's bad, bad, bad, it's crystal meth. But this is a part of you, it's an aspect of you. So I I I I love that you said to respect that shadow first. Yeah. And and you said that if you're not if you don't approach this uh shadow work with ritual and container and protocol and aftercare, and if you're if you aren't equipped with all that, it could destroy you. Could could you talk a little more about that?

SPEAKER_01 34:41

I I absolutely can. I mean, because when we're talking about ritual uh and containment, and maybe I can give some examples of of what that might might look like. You know, we've just been talking about the BDSM Kingfetch team because I think it's such a a concrete example of quite sophisticated shadow work actually and done well, okay. Um, but if you if you think about what a what a container is, okay, so a container might be the therapy hour. Okay, it's doing therapy. Um people explore shadows through art a lot of the time. Art is a wonderful, wonderful medium, and uh a lot of clients that I've worked with will do that. They will express themselves through art, whether that's poetry or drawing or whatever it is, you know. So um there are there are ways that we do this, okay, which is about getting to know those parts, as you quite rightly said, that we might be feeling shame around. Okay, so you're you're you're 100% spot on there, to be honest with you, Dallas. Dallas, when you talk about you know the the meth using part. So actually, we you know, we we look at what its function is, what does it allow you to what does it allow you to do or what does it allow you to stop feeling? And that there's a question sometimes, it's like that I get that I give to clients, which is if how would you express yourself sexually if you were completely unashamed? You know, so actually getting to know that and and look for some people they might continue to explore kink or fetish or whatever. Some people it's like, look, I've already done that in chem sex, and okay, I've ticked that boxes it where I don't want to do that. Okay. But uh what we what what is really, really important is the building of the relationship with the client, first of all. They have to kind they have to trust you as a therapist. But actually, what we do is that we look at elements in their life where they've already got containers. Everybody will, you know, examples of that, okay, things that are contained. So when we start exploring this with people, they they recognize actually that that the chemsex situation is very, very uncontained sometimes. And so what we then start doing, I mean, chemsex, we're talking about sex mostly, okay. So it's like, well, look, what what's what is what is it giving you? You know, so quite often it's not it's not even about the sex. Exactly, right? Yes, the drugs are driving that and everything like that. But I'll I'll I'll give you I'm sort of wandering out about a little bit here. But I know when I was running the group work program, something really, really stood out for me. And we all noticed this, me and a couple of colleagues doing these uh these programs. Chemsex structured day program. And over that, over the weeks when we did that, the amount of people we said actually, what they're really looking for is a relationship, they're looking for intimacy. But it's but it's coming out in in in the chemsex context. So it's like, right, okay. So when I said earlier about kind of reverse engineering, it's like, okay, well, what what what might that look like? Intimacy, relationships, you know, but also looking at what's been put in the shadow in the first place. I mean, we're talking about anger, people might be angry even at the community and themselves for kind of you know, body fascism or people being mean or just not feeling accepted within the community. So that might be in the shadow as well. So we have to explore all of these kinds of elements. You know, it's really important. When we when we put the program together, we were very, very mindful of that process. I mean, the first weekend, we didn't go straight in with like the really heavy stuff on the first weekend. It ran over four weekends, by the way. Um, first weekend um things like maybe kind of more behavioral stuff, you know, classic addiction um therapy stuff. And then over the weeks, as they built the container, which was the group, you know, they felt far more able to start exploring some of these um more difficult elements, you know. So actually being able to ask for what they want in a group, you know, for some people that's absolutely massive. Yeah, for some people they're like that, well, that's that's easy, but other for a lot of people actually it's not, you know. But also people just talking about some of the things that they've been doing within the chem sex field. So they'd be talking about things like you know, blood play and all that kind of stuff, you know. So really, really like talking about some of this. And look, I know I know it sounds almost cliche, but it's true nonetheless, which is shame dies on exposure, right? So people kind of getting to know this. And once once things have been exposed, once you know the shadow, we're not looking to kill the shadow. All right, we're not looking to get rid of it, you know. What we're actually doing is kind of inviting it in and getting to know it a little bit more. You know, and you'll know from the internal family systems work that's that's what we do. What's your role? You know, what what what are you doing here? Oh, okay. So you're that part which has been protecting against rejection, you know, or um or against you know anger or neediness or you know um effeminacy or even masculinity sometimes. You know, some some people feel very emasculated, you know, simply by sheer dint of being a gay man. That I mean that was part of my own journey, actually. That was a big aha moment in my own therapy when I realized actually I didn't actually think of myself as a man because I was gay. And I didn't realize I'd been walking around with this. That was in my shadow. Okay, so it was playing out in all sorts of like weird and wonderful ways. Yeah. You know, just just think notions like that, the emasculation that we sometimes feel. Yeah. Um, and again, I'm I'm massively generalizing here, but it comes up a lot, you know. So this all gets put in the shadow as well sometimes. And so part of that is about bringing that back out into the light and using it as a resource. Okay, well, what does that mean? What does it mean to be a man and gay? Right? So um, so it's incredibly important that we do this in a way which is respectful, which is, as I said, ritualized, that there is meaning making afterwards. I mean, I can give lots and lots of examples if you look at you know, kind of indigenous cultures, okay. So the a a young man bec a uh a boy becoming a man, rather, you know, and he will be required to go off into the wilderness, you know, where he'll encounter fear, hunger, loneliness, all of that kind of stuff, you know. But then when he comes back to the village, he's welcomed with open arms. And it it enables him to make meaning. He goes from being a boy to a man, it's held by the community. So going off into the wilderness, if you like, is him meeting the shadow elements. And so there are so many examples of this, and so it's not so different for us sometimes. And I think, particularly, dare I say, for LGBTQ plus people, what we don't often have are like rites of passage. You know, we a lot of us, myself included, you know, we kind of burst onto the scene and it's just like, yeah, everything and now, you know, and there isn't there isn't necessarily a kind of um um a graduated program for us to become healthy LGBTQ plus people, you know. So more and more so now there are lots of programs and things happening, thankfully. But that happens quite a lot, you know. We're just left to sort of fend for ourselves a little bit, you know, and that comes out a lot as well. You know, people talk about coming out on the scene, you know, feeling quite lonely and afraid actually, but not feeling that they're they were able to express that, you know. So does that make sense? I feel like I'm kind of going off on a bit of a tangent here, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:20

Well, I'm picking up what you're laying down. I don't know about anybody else, but but yes, it makes sense to me. And you know, I think the meaning making is important. And we had a I had a client on uh one of the podcasts here, and it was the the name of it is the gifts of chemsex, like the gifts you get from it. Yeah. And as gay men, going through the chemsex experience, oftentimes is that is that rite of passage? It's it's something that gets your attention to to m force you to, like you're saying, to look at your shadow parts. And then the recovery is not quitting the substance, it's the integration of these parts and beginning to be whole again or whole for the first time in your life, right? And you're before I feel like we're walking around fragmented, and and meth may have blown that up, but recovery is bringing it all back here together, you know. That's so in a container therapy, maybe art, support groups. Absolutely, right?

SPEAKER_01 43:28

Yeah. I mean, it's it's like a anything like that. I mean, because again, this is what I was saying at the beginning about kind of shadow when shadow work sounding a little bit kind of esoteric or whatever. We do it all the time. You know, we do it all the time. Recovery groups. I mean, you know, I mean, you you probably know in in in in 12 step groups, if you think about some of the steps, then there's the um making amends, right? That's confronting shadow stuff. You know, it's confronting your past and the things that you've done, perhaps to hurt other people. There's the uh the moral. Which is which is really hard work for a lot of people. But it's really looking, but again, it's it's a way of really, really um confronting, coming to terms with and meaning making of of a lot of these shadow elements, you know. So, you know, and and and again, I mean, this it it it it it goes back hundreds of years, hundreds and hundreds of hundreds of years, rites of passage. There's then Buddhist tradition, they talk about the ox herding pictures, which is a very long, long drawn-out kind of metaphor, but basically, series of pictures, 10 pictures, very beautiful if anyone's interested. But it's about the 12th century, I think, in Japan. But um, you know, they talk about okay, you go off into the forest, different pictures, you can't find the ox. The ox in this metaphor being the wild, untamed kind of mind, all that energy that that holds. Um, then you find the ox. Well, you see the tracks, and then you find the ox, and then you build the relationship with the ox, and then you put a rope on it, and then you tame it, and then you climb on its back, and then you come back. Importantly, actually, to what we were saying, is you then come back on the back of the ox. There's a wonderful picture of somebody playing a flute on the back of an ox. So, but you know, but importantly, you come back, okay, and then the last kind of picture: the ox has disappeared and the man is entering the marketplace. Okay, so in this metaphor, like the ox has been integrated, and so you've forgotten about it. And so, right there, you've got a really classic in pictorial form, a confrontation with shadow, yeah, which is you know, because there's enormous, enormous power and energy in in an ox, right? When we do that through chemsex, essentially what we do is that we find an ox, any ox, we leap on its back, shout, yeehaw, try and do a rodeo. And then wonder why we've been trampled into the dust and we're being dragged through the mud, right? So that's the difference between doing it in in a ritualized, contained way and doing it in a way which is very, very uncontained, which is what can happen. I'm stressing can happen through chemsex.

SPEAKER_03 46:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:13

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you know, you you talked about the meth using, we're talking about the meth-using part and what the meth-using part it did serve you for a reason. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was giving you something. Like you said, how would you express yourself sexually without shame? Well, you got a taste of that. You know, I call it like when you do chem sex, it's like uh Adam and Eve taking a bite of the forbidden fruit. All of a sudden they see good and evil, right? It's like we instantly cross over into, and so many men say this This is what I've been looking for my entire life. I said it. Right. It was like this this weight of the world is lifted. Right. And all this shame and all this rejection and all the stuff that we were living with is instantly gone. We feel like we think. Um, and so there are states of consciousness that I think we get in chemsex that gives us to me an incentive of wow, if I can feel that way, chemically induced, imagine what it would be like if I actually worked for it and found it naturally and it lasted, it's sustainable. You know, I don't get slammed back in reality. Like you said, there's no aftercare in chemsex. You're just kicked, your ass is kicked out the door, pretty much. You're not held or transitioned out of, you just slam back into, then you're in despair and you're spiraling, and no, I missed work, and you know, my mom's trying to get a hold of me. And you know, all the stuff like all of a sudden, there's there is no, there is no aftercare with it. Um, just like you said. Um, but one thing I want to point out, and if you're listening, I want you to really, really, really listen to this is that Jamie says, inviting it in, inviting your shadow in. And I'll give you an example of for me is rejection, exclusion is always a schema of mine. And I say schema because I read this, I don't know if you read this book, Emotional Alchemy. I haven't read that one. I I know the schema thing, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, I learned the word is schema. But anyway, basically, you know, that I I have this filter, this belief that I'm always excluded. Right. And there's this part of me that thinks that for whatever reason. And I can track it back and all this kind of stuff. The most I have searched and searched and read and tried to find these methods and this, you know, like even shamanic practices of like soul fragmentation, you know, like soul retrieval, like something help me, you know, get rid of it. But the the best and most effective thing I did was just invite this feeling of rejection in. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sit with it and just be with it.

SPEAKER_03 49:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:19

That's it. Yeah. And just say, you know what? I feel I I s I feel rejection right now in my body. It's not the first time. And guess what? It's not going to be the last time. I'll probably feel like this on and off for the rest of my life. But every time I invite it in, it gets softer. And it's around it's not around as long either. Like I I've tamed the ox. Well yeah. Right? Where I'm taming the this ox that was like trampling me before. Because this rejection, this exclusion would take me down out of out of everything. Out of, I mean, as a 40, late 40s year old man, you know, I would just I my whole day would be re-derailed, but inviting it in, so simple, but so powerful, but the heart but so hard to.

SPEAKER_01 50:18

Well, it's it's it's counterintuitive, isn't it? I mean, and and and I just want to acknowledge what what a wonderful example that was, actually. I mean, because you know, you're your rejection comes up so much. It really, really does, you know, in in the work that I do, particularly around chemsex, it's a word that crops up time and time and time again. And I really love what you were saying there, actually. And if we're gonna stay with our ox metaphor here, you know, because what you didn't do there um is kill the ox or try and kill the ox. You know, what you have been doing for a long time is fighting with the ox. Yeah. Which if anyone ever tries to fight an ox, I don't I don't recommend it. It's it's not a good idea, right? So, and as you said, I mean you're only gonna get only ever going to come off second best in in that particular fight. So, but but I think I think in all seriousness, I mean, and and thank you for sharing your own kind of personal experience there, you know, because I think what you're talking about is is fighting the ox. You know, we we we throw all of these techniques and these tools and these resources, and as therapists, we do it as well, you know. So, and it's like let's let's get rid of this, let's do something with it, let's change it, let's uh all of this kind of stuff, which is which is the fighting with it, you know, the either kind of the annihilation or the fighting with. Okay, so and and and what you're talking about there is a complete pivot, you know. If we're talking shadow work here, that's precisely what we're talking about. You know, if we might do that through therapy or through one of the other means that we were just talking about, but the end result is the same. We you know, when you actually stop fighting and you just invite it to say, okay, you know, look, come in, sit down. But you know, surrender. I surrender. That's it. Look, it looks like we're stuck with each other for the rest of our we might as well be friends, right? So, but like in in all seriousness, I mean, you know, you were talking about internal family systems earlier, we keep referencing it. Uh I'm I'm really, really interested in that particular technique at the moment, still finding out more about it. But I but I just I love the premise there, which is precisely what you were just saying, which is you you invite it in rejection. Okay, come in. What is it you want me to know? You know, how old do you think I am? Actually, because these parts usually start, you know, when we're much younger and come into being, as it were. You know, so you you know, updating the part to say, you know, I don't want to get rid of you, I don't want to fight you. You're very welcome, please don't overwhelm me. You know, the important mantra there, you're very welcome, please don't overwhelm me, but I do want to get to know you. You know, what happens from that in in most cases, I would say, is that a story will come up around that. You know, that rejection part feels that it's protecting you and it feels that it has to protect you, you know. So, you know, I actually so by say so so saying to something that's trying to protect you, I don't want you and I'm gonna fight you, is completely doesn't make any sense, right? Right. So we might not like it, but as you said, when you actually develop that relationship with it, it starts to transform. And it's it's quite a beautiful moment, actually, when that happens. You know, you as you said, you just you notice it starts to soften just a little bit. There's a little bit of flexibility. We might invite it to take another role, uh, whatever it is. But it's certainly it's certainly kind of counterintuitive, I think, for a lot of people to lean into those parts of ourselves that we don't like. We are hardwired to move away from pain, but it's physical, it's emotional pain. You put your hand in the flame, you pull it out, don't you? I mean, this is what we do. We do it emotionally as well. So there's nothing, even that, there's there's nothing wrong with that. We're just doing what comes naturally. So in therapy or in a confrontation with shadow, you know, like we're just talking, indigenous cultures, if you're doing it that way, whatever it is. So if you're a Zen practitioner sat there for 12 hours on a cushion in the day, you know, um, actually, what we're doing is that we're moving towards it. You know, when you're inviting injection in, you're leaning into it and you're moving towards it, which will feel counterintuitive, but nonetheless, this is exactly what we need to be doing, you know. Because what happens, you know, I I I I go back to what I was saying earlier as well, which is these parts are an amazing resource, they carry so much for us, whether it's you know the gifts of chem sex you were talking about. Yep, I was alright with that. But also, you know, if we don't, if we split those parts up, if we exile them, as you quite rightly said, they are parts of us. We lose something, we lose some essence of work with vitality or whatever. Um, I heard a wonderful phrase, I I can't remember who used it actually. It's quite a long time ago. Someone talked about the graying out of parts of our personality. Another way of describing this process, we we grey it out, and I just thought that's a really great descriptive way of explaining what goes on, you know, whether we're talking about exiling or splitting off or repressing or whatever, the graying out process, because then we gray out a part of ourselves, and if we gray out a part of ourselves, then we're losing some of that kind of vitality and vibrancy that we might need to live, you know, a satisfying whole life, right?

SPEAKER_03 55:31

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 55:32

Yes, right. Yes. And uh also in this is this is self-love. Right. So like when you push things away, you're rejecting them. But what do you do with something you love? You pull it close, you invite it in. And you know, I see this, oh self-love, I'm taking a bubble bath or I'm getting my nails done, or you know, I was like, that's so not self-like let's do some self-cap-care, but self-love. Yeah, like let's get deep into this. You know, what are you what do you not like about yourself and pull it in and what and and just leaning into that, those uncomfortable emotions. Like on a Friday night, when you're all by yourself and you're having FOMO and you f and you're lonely and you're you know, you're you're shaking because you you you you you just the first thing you want to do is react. What can I do to get rid of this as fast as I can? And a lot of times it's get on the grinder and go have chem sex. Right. Or if you're if it's not, it's something else. If if you're in recovery, you might be deflecting by saying, Well, I gotta get out to friends, I gotta do this, I gotta watch, I gotta do this, I gotta get out, put myself out there. Like you're running from this part that is asking to be held.

SPEAKER_01 57:01

Exactly. I mean you're you you you you quite rightly said earlier, actually, you're you know, you're running away from yourself. If anyone's ever tried to run away from their shadow physically, by the way, you'll see how impossible that is, right. But yeah, but yeah, I mean you are absolutely right in terms of what you're saying about self-love, and that is also learning to love those parts of you which might not be quite so attractive for whatever reason. Um, and look, you know, some of those parts might always be problematic. We don't we don't necessarily, I mean, even if we do shadow work, we don't suddenly kind of get all these parts, and all of a sudden it's one great big loving. Some of these, some of these parts might always be difficult, they might always be practical, but they might be holding something for you as well. You know, I keep coming back to energy. But what are they holding for you? You know, some of them don't need your approval, actually, to be honest with you, you know, but nonetheless, they are there anyway, you know, and I think we all have to face just some of the difficult things in ourselves. We're not angels all of the time. You know, we're not, unless you know you're a saint or something like that, you know, most of us do have have these elements, and and and as you quite rightly said, learning to love those elements of yourself as well is really the best route towards kind of transformation, you know. So again, we're not trying to kill the ox, you know, we're not trying to break the ox. Actually, we have a rope, we're just trying to tame it a little bit so it's not so out of control, you know. And of course, in the chem sex arena, sometimes well, quite often, things do get very, very out of control. And I think yeah, this is a message that I really want to get across to people, and you know, particularly my clients, which is you know, don't you don't need to be destroyed by this thing, and you don't need to be afraid of it because that's what we were saying earlier. The respect, the self-love that you were talking about, you know, and love, as we always say, love is a verb, right? It's it's a doing verb, you know, it's what you do to form a relationship with these parts as well. Also, we've been talking about kind of ritual and kind of working. It takes discipline. It takes a level of discipline, and something my clients were always quite surprised to hear actually about discipline. Some of them have got quite a uh difficult relationship with discipline for various different reasons. But discipline, discipline, healthy discipline is is is a form of of love as well, you know, and that's what people forget sometimes. We tend to think of discipline as you know the big stick, and oh, I've got to do this. And yeah, it can feel difficult sometimes, but it's just as much an act of self-love as anything else.

SPEAKER_03 59:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:44

It sounds like it sounds like boundaries too. Boundaries. Absolutely right. Yeah. Boundaries can container, absolutely. You know, that's essentially what it what it is, right? You know, yeah. This is why, I mean, in in in in therapy, we have confidentiality, that's why it's at the same time every week, you know, we'll try to be, you know, it's the same amount of time every week. We have a bit of a structure, we'll kind of open it up, but we make sure that there is time towards the end of the session to um kind of debrief a little bit, do any work that we need to do about kind of coming back, and that goes back to that coming back thing as well. Boundaries, very much so. Boundaries, discipline, containment. Because again, I mean, what we're talking about is the channeling of it of energy, channeling of parts sometimes, you know, and that's that's that's so important.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:35

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's I I think it's so healthy to say right now I'm channeling this part of me. I I'm aware that that part of me is is now talking, is now responding, you know, and knowing that I'm gonna back away from the situation.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:53

Right. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:55

Yeah, because that part of me is not going to respond to this in the way that's true to me. Like I know, I can I'm always, not always, I I can be well aware of when certain elements have stepped up and taken over. And and I I I'm out of character. Not not out of character, out of alignment with what I truly want, I guess. You know, I'm not we're not integrated at the moment, right? He's in he stepped up here. Um yeah, so just to review negotiation, relationship, ritual, container, aftercare. And a good example of that is looking at the BDSM and kink community. They do it really well. They do it really well, yeah.

unknown 1:01:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:39

If it's done properly, they do it really, really well, yeah. If it's done properly.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:42

Which is something else is that if you're listening and you're you're in this uh state of beginning to sexually reintegrate, often you guys will think that you cannot be involved in the BDSM kink community. And and sometimes you can get triggered in the beginning. You you can do all of that sober. In fact, you know, without that. In fact, we I suggest it based and this confirms is that consent, trust, negotiation, safety, I mean, all uh boundaries, all of those good stuff. This that is what BDSM and Kink is all about. So you can have sex without myth and be it, you're actually you're more apt to be under all of that and experience all of that without myth. So you can have sober sex and it doesn't have to be missionary vanilla, five-minute fucking, okay? Like it doesn't have to be that. Um and I know that from experience. So um, okay, I think we're we're taking up a lot of your time, but I just want to say one um not one last thing, but I also want to go back to something you said about making amends in terms of shadow work. And one thing for you listeners, and and I'm gonna say this and I want you to tell me how what you think of it, Jamie, or how it resonates with you. One thing I do in my program is I have next level amends, which is you look at a um disagreement you have or someone you complain about, and I I bring in Byron Cady's work, if you're if you're familiar with with her, in terms of you say, okay, he is arrogant, right? This person I had a fight with is arrogant. I know every time when somebody says he is arrogant, their shadow is is them being is their arrogant. So I just want to say, like, one quick way to identify shadow is you you pay attention to what you say other people are. And and my guess is that's a reflection of your shadow right there. They are they're triggering you, and it's a gift for you to know what to to what to pay attention to. And so Byron Cady will give you the turnaround. Like if you say uh he is, let's let's say his name is Marcus, Marcus is arrogant. Well, then you turn that around to say Marcus is not arrogant. Is that true? But then you say, I am arrogant. And all of a sudden you're looking in all the ways you're arrogant. And you're like, oh, Marcus is showing, Marcus is only triggering this part of me because it's something that I need to look at in me.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:32

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's doubtless I mean a w wonderful example because it's classic shadow work. I mean, you're talking about projective identification, right? Yeah. We're we're projecting those parts that we don't want to own, which is classic 100% textbook shadow work. You know, which is, as you said, uh, to use your example, arrogance, you know, we project that onto onto somebody else, you know, with with the aim of then attacking, because it's something that we don't like in in ourselves. We we might not be completely arrogant, but we may contain arrogance. I work with it in a slightly different way. I trained in in gestalt therapy, so we use the two-chair technique. So, what what I will then do sometimes is is ask somebody to dialogue with that. So, okay, so um speak from from yourself, first of all, and then I want you to speak, uh go to the other chair, and then speak from the perspective of the other person. So be the arrogant person or the person that you think is arrogant, and then they have to speak from that perspective, and you can almost hear pennies dropping all over the place, you know. It's like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But again, a wonderful way dialoguing. I mean, it's a similar thing to you know, we're saying about parts, dialoguing with those those those parts that you split off that you're projecting onto other people, you know, is is is classic shadow work as well. So yeah, I really like that.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:57

Great example. Yeah. Thank you. I i I'm using myself because it was the first time I learned I was um working at a restaurant and I was bitching about a manager. You know, he's so arrogant, right? And then somebody introduced me to or I watched or something by Red Katie and and I did this turnaround and I said, I am arrogant. And I was like, This is bullshit. You know, and then I was like, Oh my god, I am arrogant. I started thinking about all the ways that I was being an arrogant asshole at this restaurant. And I was like, that's why he's bothering me. This is and so when I started working on my own, something happened between us and we became friends. Like I just saw him under this whole different light, and I was like, wow, this is shadow work. Like I put light on something about myself that I didn't know was controlling me. You know, and so yeah, it was that was a big light bulb moment for me. Yeah. Um Is there anything that we uh have left out today? Anything that I have forgotten? I I would have loved to take a deeper dive into certain things, but is there anything you wish we would have talked about or mentioned?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:14

I I I think we've covered most things. Uh and and I mean what I've really appreciated about today, uh Dallas, is it in my mind is the way my mind works, like, okay, we'll do this and then we'll do that, and then we'll do that, and then we'll do that. But you know, it's one of my parts getting involved there, you know. So um, but I I really appreciate just the kind of more conversational style that that that that we've used today. So I will probably go away from this and think, oh, I should have said that, oh, we should have covered. But I think that the the main messages I think um are there, which is you know, just to reiterate exactly what we've both said, which is uh don't be afraid of the shadow, you know. And if you have been engaged in chemsex um and it's kind of consumed you, destroyed you, or whatever, it's really not the end of the world. What you've actually got is a starting point. Yes, it takes work, yeah, but you've actually got a starting point there to kind of really, really face some of those elements within yourself, you know. And some people in life never ever do that work at all, you know. So the fact that that you have done that, don't don't hate yourself, you're not broken, you know, there isn't something wrong with you. It's just you know, your your shadow's just been out there running a mock, basically. Okay, so it's time to, if you feel ready to, you know, or when you're ready to, there's there's some work that can be done around that. But there can be a lot of really, really useful information in there to to really, really not forget that we're not in the business of pathologizing people or pathologizing identities, and that's not what what this is about.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:43

That's right. I I want you all to really hear that because hearing it from somebody else might really make it stick, right? But oftentimes, I know it's counterintuitive, but we are privileged to have had a chem sex experience, to have a starting point, to be enlightened about ourselves. Like like you said, some people never some people are walking through life totally lost and asleep. Go to work, watch Netflix, go to sleep, go to work, not you know, and never become aware of themselves. We have the distinct opportunity. Our life has been turned upside down, and we've we've we've the basement has been been opened where most people are are kept locked. This is a special opportunity. So get out of this despair and and agony about yourself and self-loathing and hating everything about it, and say, This is I'm a chosen per I am a chosen one. I have been chosen to be enlightened. Take shift the perspective of this experience and make a new meaning out of it. If you take anything away from this podcast, from this episode, that is the number one message I want people to hear. That's so box. Oh Jamie, I just love you. I just would sit down and talk with you for hours and hours and hours. And I am so glad you're here.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:18

I would love the opportunity to do that, Dallas. I really would. And likewise, I'm kind of sitting here going, no, hang on a minute, Ren it. It's like maybe it's a conversation for another time because there are just so many directions that that that we can go. And I just really I really kind of want to keep it on point today because we said people work, but like, oh, we can talk about this, and oh, we can talk about that. You know, no, thank you so much. I I really really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:43

Well, I'd love to have you back. And I want to ask too, did I interrupt you today? Because for those listening before the podcast, before we started, um Jamie said sometimes Americans like to interrupt. That sounds I I did. I just want to make sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:07

I just want to say to all your American listeners there, that was very much taken out of context. Dallas, I will get you back for that one, I promise you. So uh now I feel like I want to quickly justify myself. A part of mine is kicking in already. I really want to justify it.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:28

So uh, yes. Well, I made sure I did not, although I try not to on here, you know, I really do. And like I said, uh but I I was hanging on every word you said anyway, so I didn't want to interrupt.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:40

Um I I I I I think it look, it's just indicative of the conversation. It's a very stimulating conversation. Yeah, there's so much I really enjoyed, you know, what what what what you shared about yourself and your work as well. So, and you know, I mean what I said, I mean it could have gone in a thousand different directions, but that's absolutely fine. I think we covered the basics and most of it. And if not, we'll have to do shadows through the crystal lens sequel, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:12:06

Yeah, yeah. Well, we want to know when your book's coming out. Well, that's a good question. Actually, maybe I should maybe I should make a start on that, right? Yeah, I think you should. I think you should. Um, okay. Thank you, Jamie, for being here. Appreciate you. Appreciate you so much, and for you listening. This may be one you're gonna have to rewind and listen to again. And um, you can do you can do 2x speed when I'm talking if you want, but just listen to to Jamie when he's talking because it's very important stuff. So all right, thank you very much, and we'll see you guys next week.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:40

Thank you.