Why, oh why… should we do shadow work? Shadow… Work… WHAT IS THAT?! To me, it is simply shining the light into the unconscious or on the shadow. The shadow itself is our darkness, the parts of us we have repressed or rejected. You can think of the repression/rejection as a protective mechanism. The shadow parts of us form when we put up a defense and use this protective mechanism.

Why would we need to use this protective mechanism? Well, there are tons of reasons we would repress or reject parts of ourselves…hide them and tuck them away! It could be shame, embarrassment, insecurities, pain from traumatic experiences, fears, and so on. It’s the very things that we don’t like about ourselves, pieces of us that we think society wouldn’t like, and the parts of us that our ego simply did not want to accept.

There are even wonderful parts of us repressed within the shadow self! Think about how a shadow is created in itself, by blocking light! Why in the world would we reject the “good”? Well, we might do it simply because someone said to (big shrug) … hey, it happens!

For example, a little girl has a big ol’ heart, very caring, and persistent in helping others. While this little girl is helping, she may also feel the frustration or pain of the person she is tending to. Maybe, this gets to her a bit, and she begins to cry. The next thing you know, someone says, ” Why do you always have to cry… you are way too sensitive!” In that moment, her loving nature, becomes something that is seen as a weakness… something that had just been unaccepted… something not right! So, her ego makes a choice- reject/deny this part, to protect her, or continue being “denied” by society.

“Shadow work is the path of the heart warrior.”- Carl Jung

If that ain’t the truth… I don’t know what is! Shadow work can be painful, intimidating, terrifying even. You certainly have to muster up some sort of courage to start digging into your psyche. To do shadow work, you have to be willing to be honest and face your own unconscious with introspection!

Time to Take a Journey Inwards!

Back to the big question here… Why, oh why should we do shadow work?

Enlightenment

Liberation

Emotional Freedom

Mental Peace and Clarity

Physical Healing

Wholeness

Happiness… Love… YOU!

We should do it because it flat out feels like a sweet breeze wrapping around you as the perfect amount of sunlight caresses your skin and the deepest, most soothing, cleansing breath of fresh air fills your lungs … after a storm comes to an end! It’s an incredible feeling to be able to accept the true you, the ALL of YOU! The wholeness you have within radiates out into your life, and that my friends, makes the journey into the shadow self- worth it!

This post was written in January of 2022… it’s now December of 2024. I reread it. It’s a pretty good post. Yet, I sit here wondering why in the world did I not post it?! I do that a lot actually. So how about we do some real life… live, but written, shadow work.

I’ll try to do it in a way that would be similar to how I use to do it when I would journal my responses. Rapid fire questions!

Question the Shadow

Why do I make videos and write blogs, but choose not to post them?

-I don’t feel like they are up to par, or maybe in that moment I want to add somethings and got swept away to do something else and just forgot about it. Also… sometimes, especially with videos it is fear.

What makes you afraid to actually post the content? Why the fear?

-Judgement, I suppose. Like, “What are they going to think?!” or really and trying my first thoughts before I post something or not… is about certain people that follow me. Usually, these people are ones that know me in real life. So, there is a reason as to why I think of them and why that bothers me that they will see what I post.

Why would that bother you?

– I guess I feel trapped by what they believe me to be. Hmm… maybe their perception of who they think I am. When I really think about that… wouldn’t that mean I am perceiving their perception of me. Like who in the world do I assume people think I am?! LOL! Do they even really care, you know!

Why would it matter what they thought anyhow?

-Ooohhh… I think maybe because in “real life” there is a distortion between who I truly am and who I am around certain people. I don’t let them know all of me. It’s like parts of me continue to stay hidden with most people.

Why do you keep parts of you hidden?

-I think I keep parts of me hidden because ( at this point, I’m getting a little resistant, so I remind myself to just allow whatever wants to come up… to come without judgement). I keep parts of me hidden because it is safer.

Why do I feel it is safer to hide parts of myself?

-I’m scared of me. (Now this answer should have been shocking, but keep in mind, I’ve done a tremendous amount of shadow work over the years. Alot of “other people” stuff has been revealed.)

Why are you scared of you?

-Buzzing in the ears, I’m taking note of any frequency changes and my body sensations. I don’t know what I’m capable of. I guess in a way the parts I really keep hidden, are known about, but not fully known by me. I’ve suppressed those for so long.

Tell me about the first time you suppressed a part of you that you keep hidden now.

• I was very young, I’m seeing what I think is my mom and “step-dad’s” wedding. I was around 2 when they got married. I’ve never thought of him as step-dad, just putting that out there. Anyways, it their wedding. I keep wanting to hide… or at least I get the feeling I want to. Something about it makes me feel like I don’t belong.

Why did I feel like I didn’t belong…?

-I keep seeing my brother. He’s 2 years older than me. I feel like everyone knew he wasn’t daddy’s kid, and maybe he was being treated different. I know he got treated like an outsider from that side of the family when he got older. I could feel the energy around him, and people’s disapproval. He was… is a part of me. If they felt that way about him, well, surely they didn’t like me either. I think to this day my grandma and my papa before he passed, thought I was his real child. They never treated me “different”, but still the energy of that wedding had an impact on me. It set the tone for how I felt in my family, social scenes, school, around friends, and in my own body.

I feel the unacceptance of someone who was different. That hurt my little heart for my brother to not be accepted as a part of my “new” dad, my mom, my family, and ME. It created a belief that people didn’t like different. (Also, my brother was literally a red headed stepchild.)

I was shown at a very young age and felt the energy of judgement and disapproval. Now that shadow has done what it thought was best to keep me safe. The little me inside doesn’t want to be judged for being different. The larger me, oh boy, knows just how different, odd, weird, and quirky I truly I am! Very few people would know that. Apparently, I don’t know all of me in my totality either though. I haven’t truly let my “freak flag” fly.

All these years, I’ve hidden those parts of me that I felt people would look at as different because I didn’t want to feel that same feeling I felt towards my brother so many years ago. Oddly enough though, it’s not protected me. If anything, it has further excluded me from social scenes and what could had been really great experiences. It has kept me from authentic connections and put out my fire time and time again.

I will do my best to work with this energy and mend the hurt and calm the fear around allowing myself to just be me. With this acknowledgement of this shadow, that is very much a part of me, I begin to heal, just a bit more than I had 30 minutes ago. There’s no telling where this newfound revelation will take me, and I just know it will open up gates within me to stand up and be seen-truly.