Where the Light Touches Down
Thirty Days of Radical Acceptance & Reclamation
Over the next thirty days, I’ll be revisiting the story of how I made my way through the long dark. Through shame, shadow, and silence, toward something resembling wholeness. This isn’t a how-to. It’s a recognition and recollection. A reclaiming. A quiet, defiant act of telling the truth in my own voice. I’ll be walking alongside the work of Michael A. Singer, Debbie Ford, Carl Jung, and other unlikely mentors who lit the lamp when I didn’t think I could make it another step. I’m not finished, but I’m here. That fact and I remain something sacred and true.
Before we go on…
Disclaimer & Terms of Use
Last Updated: June 30, 2025
By accessing or using any content I share, including writings, personal reflections, guided prompts, resources, or commentary, you agree to the following terms and conditions.
1. Not Medical or Psychological Advice
I am not a licensed therapist, counselor, psychiatrist, psychologist, or medical professional. All content shared here is based on personal experience, study, and reflection. It is not intended to be a substitute for professional advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
If you are in crisis, or are experiencing mental, emotional, or psychological distress, please seek support from a qualified professional, licensed therapist, or mental health service provider.
2. Personal Insight and Spiritual Commentary
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Final Word
Shadow work and spiritual reflection can be powerful, transformative, and deeply healing; but they are not a replacement for trauma-informed, professional care.
Please take good care of yourself. If anything you read here resonates in a way that feels overwhelming or destabilizing, pause and seek appropriate support. You are not alone.
With respect and care,
Terrance LaCrosse
Day 1
My Shadow Journey with Debbie Ford and Other Greats
I’m late again this morning. Mostly because I’ve been second guessing myself about even opening this particular Pandora’s box, which is more of a Pandora’s blackhole, where antimatter meets All that mattered… at least from my experience.
A couple weeks ago, I was asked to share the story of how I made it through the long, tangled years of shame and self-abuse into something a little more whole, a bit more honest, and a lot more loving toward myself.
It wasn’t a straight path (giggle). It wound through breakdowns and reckonings, raw surrenders and quiet labor, the work of learning how to stay. What I’ve found isn’t perfection, but integration. I’m still a work in progress. But these days, I’m not at war with myself. Not daily, at least. Let’s just say my shadow and I have reached a kind of ceasefire. Though, truth be told, there are still days I stumble over the landmines I laid years ago.
Jung and the Young
I blame C.G. Jung.
I honestly can’t remember which book it was that cracked me open first, but I do remember being about twelve, trying to figure out my mother’s manic depression like it was a solvable mystery. I was fascinated by Joseph Campbell which brought me to Jung’s doorstep.
Somewhere along the way, I became a library cat, and Jung fed me. His writing was dense and wildly over my head, full of talk about “individuation” and “the transformational power of the inner darkness.” But the seed was planted. That part of me that sensed that there was something sacred in the shadows, that healing might mean turning toward what hurt, started to grow.
But I wasn’t ready.
Again!
To be clear: I’m not a therapist. I’m not offering advice or diagnosis. I’m simply telling you my story. If you’re in need of help, I urge you to seek out a professional who can support your healing.
This is just what I’ve lived and what I’ve learned when I finally stopped running from myself.
Like I said, I “blame” C.G. Jung. I’ll try to find the previous journal entries and notes, there’s some rich soil there, but that may merely end up just becoming activity avoidance.
How’s Your Mama and Them
To be honest, I probably “played” at integration for thirty years. I read the latest books. I went to therapy. I tried to work the steps. But it was a virus that locked me away long enough for me to start dealing with the real me. It was the aftermath of the COVID lockdowns that broke me.
I lost my health. I lost my job. I lost my mind.
Once again, I was facing the end of the world… well, mine at least. And in that darkness, I could no longer ignore my memories, my thoughts, or shortcomings. I stood face-to-face with every fear and disgust, every pain and disappointment, that I has still been holding on to for decades.
When it came to the pandemic and the lockdowns, getting my team through to the other side of it was my most important task. I didn’t think about bringing me along with them. After losing my job, and thinking my days were numbered, there were weeks, I sat out in the garden and just cried. Even in the rain.
Then one day, while deciding what to give away in case I didn’t make it and so my James wouldn’t have to, I found the lot.
Over the years of reading self-help books, both discovered on my own or offered up by therapists along the way, I used so many resources, but the following dog-eared books still sat together on the shelf. They were probably the four books that aided me most in my quest. So I started thumbing through the PostIt notes inside.
I picked up a pad of paper and started writing again. It was sloppy and gross. A myriad of thoughts poured out. What started out as brainstorming became… and not to be crass, but… soul-vomiting.
Every vile thing I had thought or said or done became a written confession. Now, I’m not a felon or even a horrible person, but I wasn’t a Boy Scout either. I had hurt others and myself along the way. I knew that much. But it wasn’t until the dreams that I began to do the deeper dive.
I started having dreams about a train, and its passengers. My mother in particular.
Three(?) days after the dreams started, I found out my mother had been hospitalized for complications due to coronavirus. She was in a medically induced coma with little expectancy of recovery. I wrote a whole book, that sits unpublished, about the experience of her death and my reconciliation with her in the spiritual realm.
Not sure why this old southern storyteller has to fill in the background every time, but you see… the blackhole has a thousand paths in. I’ve gotten off track. The books!
The Four Horsemen
Like I said, until the pandemic, the field of my being wasn’t ready to grow anything; I was still composting. So, after I wrote the book, yet to be published, I decided to continue the work, which lead me here. To Substack.
My point…
The following four books when reread, allowed me to further work the fallow fields of my soul. The last one,The Untethered Soul, I’ve read at least six times in the past few years. I get something new every reread.
So here’s the list I was asked to discuss:
Debbie Ford’s The Dark Side of the Light Chasers is a modern classic that invites one to recognize the hidden self before claiming the gifts it offers.
Robert A. Johnson’s Owning Your Own Shadow is a concise and poetic introduction to shadow integration from a Jungian perspective.
In Romancing the Shadow, Connie Zweig & Steve Wolf provide more practical… soulful, step‑by‑step processes for engaging with one’s hidden parts.
Finally, and probably my favorite, Michael A. Singer’s The Untethered Soul, was a habit-buster. While broader than shadow work, it directly addresses recognizing and releasing internal patterns.
Over the next thirty days, I’ll be retracing the arc of my journey by describing what I got out of each book, one a week.
Guided by the wisdom of my four horsemen, this series will be a recollection of the inner work I’ve done to reclaim the parts of myself I once rejected, out of fear, out of shame, out of the belief that they made me unworthy of love or belonging. These reflections are pieces of that past work, gathered here now with gentler eyes and deeper understanding.
This isn’t a blueprint for healing. It’s a recollection. It’s me walking back through my inner terrain where I first met my shadow, and where, over time, I learned to meet it with grace.
There was a time when I thought I had to outrun my darkness to be good. But the truth is, what I once called broken was just exiled. And healing meant not erasing the shadow but holding it close enough to hear what it had to say.
So this is a return. A soft summoning of memory. A testimony to what happens when we stop running from ourselves.
I won’t be able to capture everything in this timeframe. I’ll just try to highlight the big stuff that pushed me forward and further than I had before. I’ll try not to vomit on your floor.
I’m still a wreck some days. I’m a work in progress, but I will offer these stories in the hope that they’ll resonate, provoke, comfort, or companion you through your own remembering. Let them witness the oldest truth that we keep forgetting:
The light does not banish the shadow; it claims it and calls it holy.
TW
P.S. If you’ve found something meaningful here. Maybe, it’s a spark, a mirror, or a bit of grace… and you’d like to support the journey, you can do that right here by buying me a coffee or by subscribing. Every bit helps me keep going, keep creating, and keep sharing.