The mystics of many traditions celebrate the sunrise as symbolic of the moment of awakening, when idealism and morality awaken from their slumber of unconsciousness as the heart stirs and the Self remembers itself. There is an initiation, a threshold that is crossed in the path of inner development, that is described as the sun of your heart rising over the flat horizon of your mind, and it will never set.

Some people don't see the difference as clearly as you do between the mishaps of their actual behavior and the ideal of their desired behavior. You see "shadows" because your inner landscape is illuminated by the light of your heart. The whole concept of "ideal" is a product of the heart.

Naturally, these shadows are repugnant to our sight. We are dismayed by our own capability for harm. It's more than a capability -- we actually do harm people, everyday. And while the ordinary person is aware of the harm they do when they intend to do it, the mystic tries to become aware even of the harm they do when they don't intend it.

Out of this repugnance comes a very clear sense of discrimination: what is light and what is dark. It's not so simple as a code of morality, because "There is neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so." [Shakespeare] Light means awareness, dark means unawareness. So by becoming aware of your shadow, you bring it into the light and the shadow is annihilated; unawareness cannot exist in awareness.

"What say you, Sun," the Judge inquired, "regarding this charge by the Shadow?" "What Shadow?" cried the Sun, "I've never seen this Shadow."

This story was told to me by a Hindu Guru to describe the goal of full awareness. I left the male pronoun in it because it's a classic male idea, that we could possibly have full awareness, and that it's even desirable. The path of the heart embraces both the conscious and the unconscious. While we strive for awareness, we accept that we will always have unawareness. There are things that happen too fast for the mind to direct them.

When Ghandi was shot by his assassin, he immediately, reflexively, responded as his body was crumbling to the ground, by joining his hands together in a prayer for blessing for the assassin. That's the shadow, unconscious behavior too, and it can be beautiful, maybe more beautiful than the behavior we control and intend. That's the real test, the real proof of spirituality.

So how can we improve our unconscious behavior? The mind can't do it, but the heart can. When you identify with your heart, the struggle with the shadow ends. Light and dark, conscious and unconscious, cooperate in painting a beautiful picture of the heart.