Chances are, we’ve been carrying them around with us regardless of whether they are still in our lives or not… This isn’t a horror story, but it is a scary thought!

I was recently introduced to the idea of the “dungeon” as part of the inner castle of our mind (or soul) – and even at a surface level, this metaphor can be incredibly powerful!

What if we lock every person who’s ever hurt us (or whom we’ve ever been angry with) in a deep, dark, damp cell in the dungeon of our mind? What if we did that, and threw away the keys, forgetting that we’d locked them in there at all?

The weight and pain of such a thing would be more than we might think we could bear, but people end up in our dungeons because we haven’t forgiven or released the perceived wrong that they did. The idea that we might all secretly be dungeon-masters, dishing out punishment and neglect is not a comfortable one… and we might try to trick ourselves at first thought – and decide we’ve not got anyone locked in any dungeon – thank you very much!

But if we did, what is it costing us to keep those people, events and hurts locked away inside us?

It is worth playing with this idea, even just briefly. So I encourage you to entertain the concept for a few minutes, and ask yourself:

“Who or what might be locked away in my dungeon?”

Some of the hurts might go back to our childhood, and others may be more recent additions to the dark cohort. Once I started playing with this, I had one particularly person spring very vehemently to mind! Others were slower to reveal themselves, and I’m sure there are even more waiting in the wings (aka the cells!).

Releasing anyone from our inner dungeon might seem like a tall order, particularly as we probably still feel they deserve to be there! But by allowing ourselves to recognise who and how many people we are dragging around after us – sustaining them in their dungeon home – can be quite an enlightening experience.

We might find it liberating to consider letting someone go. Not to condone what they did, but simply to break the hold it had over us in that deep inner place.

… It might even be like shucking off a ball and chain!

Do you bottle them up? Do you cry them out?
If you’ve ever felt blindsided by strong emotions that you couldn’t express, then there is a good chance they have been lurking in the shadows waiting for the opportunity to jump out when your guard is down.

Paul and Sam talk about how their own frustrations reached boiling points recently, and that in the process of trying to understand what they were feeling, they discovered what was hidden in the causal blind-spots that then allowed them to acknowledge and release their pent-up emotions!

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