The Confrontation with the Shadow
Art by Arthur Verona
The Cailleach, the Dark Night & The Process of Psychological Transformation
Here in the northern hemisphere, we are entering Cailleach’s time. The Cailleach, whose name means “the veiled one,” or old crone, is the Hag of Winter, the keeper of storms and stone, who dwells in the liminal spaces between worlds. She presides over endings and beginnings alike.
In Irish mythology, the Cailleach is one of the most ancient and formidable figures of creation—a primordial goddess older than time itself. She is the great earth mother and shaper of the land, whose very body forms the bones of Ireland and also Scotland. It is said that she carried stones in her apron and dropped them across the landscape to form the mountains, hills, and valleys we walk upon today.
The Cailleach is also the personification of nature’s enduring cycles: creation and destruction, growth and decay, life and death. As an ancient sovereignty figure, she stands beyond the boundaries of time, reminding us that the earth beneath our feet is sacred, alive, and shaped by forces older and wiser than human memory.
Photograph by Maja Larsson
Photograph by Maja Larsson
The Alchemy of Psychological Transformation
In the alchemical and psychological traditions, transformation begins in darkness. This is the essence of nigredo, the first stage of the magnum opus—the Great Work of inner change. In Jungian psychology, the magnum opus borrows its meaning from alchemy, which was never solely about turning lead into gold. Rather, it was a symbolic language for the transformation of the human soul. Jung saw in alchemy a mirror for the process of individuation—the journey toward wholeness through integrating the conscious and unconscious aspects of the psyche. The alchemical stages—nigredo, albedo, citrinitas, and rubedo—mark the soul’s path from dissolution to illumination, from fragmentation to unity.
It is within nigredo, the darkening, that the journey truly begins. This stage is the realm of dissolution, decay, and putrefaction—a necessary breaking down of what was once known. Psychologically, it is the confrontation with the shadow: the death of illusions, the surrender of false identities, and the humbling recognition of one’s inner darkness.
In Irish mythology, the Cailleach is both destroyer and midwife of renewal. She is the embodiment of the nigredo—the necessary darkness that precedes the return of light. Her presence demands surrender, humility, and truth. She teaches that grief, loss, and dissolution are not failures but initiations. In her realm, what dies is not punished but composted into the soil of becoming. The Cailleach’s wisdom is fierce yet life-giving: she strips away falsehood so that something true may emerge.
Art by Dale Bissland
Art by Lucy Campbell
The Alchemical Stages of Transformation
The Albedo follows the darkness—that is the whitening, the dawn after night. It is the stage of purification and illumination, when clarity begins to rise like moonlight after a storm. Here, unconscious material is integrated, and the psyche begins to heal. Then comes citrinitas, the yellowing, when the inner gold begins to dawn—the awakening of insight, discernment, and mature wisdom. Finally, rubedo, the reddening, marks completion and embodiment. It is the union of opposites—the marriage of shadow and light, feminine and masculine, spirit and matter. Through these stages, the Great Work unfolds as a cycle of death and rebirth, echoing the turning of the seasons and the rhythms of the earth. My course series, A Journey Inward, explores the various stages of the alchemical psychological process. The return of light at Imbolg with Brigid, the celebration of the Summer with Bealtaine, and the harvest at Lunasa, (the rubedo).
The Cailleach’s mythic presence reveals that transformation is inseparable from grief. Every threshold moment—the death of an old self, the shedding of an identity, the loss of what we once clung to—carries its own mourning. Yet she reminds us that this grief is fertile. Just as winter conceals the seeds of spring, endings hold the promise of renewal.
Meeting the Cailleach is to stand and meet the thresholds of life, meet the emotions of loss and grief at those liminal spaces, and to come to trust and to recognise that the same darkness that frightens us also holds the power to create. Transformation, in this light, is not about transcending sorrow but about allowing it to work upon us until it becomes wisdom.
COURSE FEATURE
Join me, Eileen Ní Shuilleabháin, where we travel together through the darkness to meet the Cailleach. In this course we will explore the Self Abandonment Wound and the grief that comes with transitions.
We will explore the grief we experience during transition periods. Grief is a constant companion with change. So, to heal the patterns that no longer serve us, we need to meet the grief inherent in that transition. We can acknowledge that those old patterns kept us safe when needed, but it is time to make space for a new way of life. We will cross the thresholds of change and learn, through the wisdom of the ancient Crone - The Cailleach, how we can support ourselves in the liminal places.
