Shadow Work
What exactly is Shadow work and how does it help us? Shadow work is a psychological technique wherein we increase our awareness of our “shadow” and reintegrate it into our self. The shadow according to Carl Jung is the part of the self that we have repressed or exiled. The shadow could be a multitude of things such as our feelings of unworthiness, our shame for our sexuality, our abandonment trauma, or feelings deemed wrong by society like anger, jealousy, fear or sadness. Often strict religious programming that condemns “wrong” feelings can create large shadow selves as they make us feel shameful of who we are, much like an authoritarian parent.
Through shadow work, we are able to curiously inspect aspects of ourselves, and our ego. We probe into our deepest fears, our traumas, our insecurities and even into our childhood where most of these traumas are stored. You might ask, why would I ever want to look into my traumas? That sounds unpleasant and scary. Yes, inner work is uncomfortable and can be like opening a Pandora’s box but a lot hidden gems lie in working with your shadow self. You will be able to discover aspects of yourself you never knew existed and you will find great strength in what you can achieve with this knowledge and through overcoming your own insecurities and fears. There’s a famous quote by Socrates that says “know thyself”. When you are able to throughly examine your true nature and weaknesses, you will be able to better excel in work, relationships, friendship and improve your Holistic Well being.
Early on in life, you already made preconceived judgments of yourself. You’re an introvert or extrovert, or an INTJ oe ENTJ on the Myer Briggs Personality Test, or a score on an aptitude test. But these only measure who you are to a certain extent, as they are standardized tests and not personal to your life experiences. Even some of the most brilliant people can fall short if they are not self aware of their emotional and psychological blind spots. Some can fall to the trap of their own ego and develop unhealthy ways of self medicating (alcohol or drug abuse, sex addictions, social media addictions etc.) as a coping mechanism. Some repeatedly fall in love with emotionally unavailable partners because they are also emotionally unavailable to an extent or are disillusioned about family or love. Shadow Work challenges you to go deeper within yourself and to heal your inner child rather than succumbing to addictions to numb yourself.
For example, a woman is judgmental on another woman who is liberated and self assured, this makes her angry and insecure. Through shadow work she might learn that she herself, was shamed for that aspect of herself that is sexual or liberated because of a strict Catholic upbringing. Sex in itself is not wrong as it is a primal need and people have varying values and belief systems around it. But when you waste time or energy judging, condemning or trying to change other people that’s just counterproductive and it might be a reflection of your own close minded-ness, limited belief system or personal insecurity.
The same goes for neglect trauma, if someone never had a stable family life and a father or mother figure it also shows up later in adult hood. The anxious attatchment type can produce someone who has a chronic fear of being left behind, of being unworthy of Love and can be overly attention seeking or needy. The inner child longs for the attention and love of a father or mother and thus, if unhealed they seek out “daddy or mommy types”. Shadow work helps you realize that and it addresses your trauma so you can do healing, inner work and break unhealthy patterns. It helps you to get to the core of who you really are, and unearth those painful experiences, face your demons and eventually make friends with them. Once you’ve done deep healing and inner work- which everyone will face in life at one point or another, you begin to be comfortable being in your own mind, and with spending time alone as well. Shadow work is healing your inner child and inviting him or her to a conversation on what he or she needs.
I recently got very interested in Shadow Work because I wanted to learn more about myself, and to improve myself. From my research you can choose to do Shadow work with a professional or on your own. On your own, one of the techniques you can choose to do on yourself is Shadow Work journalling. This differs from regular journalling because there are certain prompts which can be found on Shadow work videos, like what is your deepest fear? and why? or what is your relationship with your father? Though these seem like easy questions, shadow work challenges you to keep digging even digger than the surface through a Socratic method of sorts. The more you begin to question your fears, insecurities or feelings of unworthiness or abandonment, you’ll come to the root of your trauma and discover what your inner child needs. Often times, our ego has defense mechanisms to protect ourselves especially if we are fragile. Some could be projection, or outwardly blaming others for our own insecurity, regression (to childish behaviors), repression (hiding and denying our feelings) or sublimation. It can be difficult to spot our shadow when we shove it down into a dungeon. It’s much easier to blame other people for what we lack, or to hate and to bash others.
When uncomfortable feelings come up or something triggers us, its a good opportunity to note and ask ourselves “why does this bother me?” “does this make me insecure?” Keep asking why and be curious about your feelings. There’s often more than meets the eye. To me the opposite of Love isn’t Hate, it indifference. When you hate on someone, or something about them triggers you deeply, there is often underlying feelings. It could be envy, or insecurity for what they have and even under that is Love or a need to be loved. The more you do Shadow work, the more you become less bothered by others actions or lifestyle and become neutral and openminded. You understand most individuals are acting out of their own Shadow selves and their Ego.
Another good way to do Shadow work is Art therapy. Drawing and painting your emotions is a healthy way to acknowledge your feelings. Draw or paint your anger, fear, sadness, worry and hate or how you feel. All your feelings deserve a chance in the limelight- not just happiness. It isn’t fair to your other feelings that you only focus on happiness. Kind of like that movie, Inside out. Inside your mind there are many other emotions other than “Joy”. When you begin to acknowledge other feelings, you are less likely to get hijacked by them and the less other people’s actions will begin to affect you as well. You realize other people are often just acting on their insecurities, fears and emotions, it’s not about you, and it’s not personal. Learn to embrace your Shadow self and slowly find ways to bring your Shadow into the Light. We are Yin and Yang, Darkness and Light as people after all.
“There is no Light without Shadow, as there is no Light without Pain”