How to do Shadow Work
What is Shadow Work?
Shadow work is a form of inner healing work that involves becoming aware of and accepting the parts of oneself that you had ignored, repressed, or denied throughout your life.
For example, many of us do not love the part of us that is unloved, unworthy, angry, a bit controlling or manipulative… so on and so forth.
This is because we deem these traits as negative in some way from a societal sense. And this belief becomes a part of our inner programing.
However, judging these traits as negative or trying to avoid facing these parts of oneself causes one to live in a world in which they do not learn the skills to unconditionally love themselves.
Shadow work is essential to learn unconditional love.
When you unconditionally love yourself, even the shadow aspects of oneself – You learn what true love is.
You naturally become aligned to a world that you love and a world that loves you back. And you are able to embody your highest potential and live a life in which you have less fears.
This is because you no longer fear your shadows… because you know how to hold them in love.
Here are some of the benefits to learning shadow work:
- You become able to process your own feelings (including your negative feelings) and learn to be with and nurture others through their emotional landscape as well.
- You experience more stability in life. This is because your inner state manifests into the outer reality. When your inner state is at peace, you experience more peace in your outer world.
- Relationships flourish and you become able to nurture them for the long-run.
- You are able to embody the highest version of yourself. And thus, you naturally find your happiness in life because you are able to truly be yourself.
- Because you have embodied your true self, you will have found your perfect place within the Universe. You may experience this as knowing you are needed simply for existing, you realizing you are irreplaceable, and you are loved simply for being you.
The moment I learned how to actually do shadow work and started to process for my own shadows, my whole identity changed.
My entire life literally changed.
Things I thought I couldn’t do before or thought weren’t for me – I suddenly overnight became able to do it.
I kind of wish I had learned to do shadow work earlier… but you know, everything in life is meant to be and everyone goes through their life changes at the perfect time. I believe this, truly.
How to Do Shadow Work
I do shadow work a very specific way that works for me.
It may not be the way others do shadow work, but I like this method so this is the method I will be sharing with you in this blog post. Keep this in mind.
Here’s my Youtube video in which I explain the exact process I use to do shadow work.
1. Identify your Shadow
Your shadow lives in your subconscious.
Most people are not aware of their shadow, and that is why it is a “shadow”.
It is when you finally become aware of your shadow, that it no longer is a shadow and it healthily becomes integrated. Eventually, it no longer controls your life and the shadow aspect grows smaller and smaller. Or it disappears.
The shadow is the unloved, ignored, repressed part of yourself. Many people try to run away from their shadow subconsciously, but they can’t outrun it because it is a part of themselves.
And thus, it pops up in their life as negative patterns that keep happening over and over again.
This is the tell-tale way to identify your shadow.
Identify what negative patterns you keep experiencing in your life.
An example of this pattern is perhaps no matter where you go in life, you keep attracting people who have anger issues.
This oftentimes happens because you judge, repress, or ignore the anger within you. Once you see this and accept that you can feel angry sometimes, this loop will stop occurring.
This is because you have learned to see your anger and thus, it no longer needs to manifest in the outer reality as people with anger-issues.
You can also do this work by yourself through these prompts:
- What parts of yourself do you hide from others?
- Who am I when no one else is around?
- What makes me feel defensive or insecure?
- What emotion do I avoid most?
- What makes me feel triggered?
- What roles do I tend to play in relationships (fixer, people-pleaser, avoider, etc)
- Do I push others away?
- What do I truly want but feel like I can’t have in life?
- What do I try to control the most in life?
- What do I fear in life?
2. Accept Your Shadow
Once you have identified your shadow… Accept it.
Instead of denying it or ignoring it… Accept it.
Accept that it is a part of you and give it a hug. Accept it as if you are accepting your inner child that you’ve left behind.
At first, you may feel some negative push back. As if you shouldn’t accept your shadow.
This is how to identify that the negative program is running within you.
Someone who unconditionally loves themselves does not feel the negative pushback from “negative” experiences or feelings. They don’t feel the need to judge themselves or if someone tries to trigger them in some way, they don’t feel negativity from it.
On the highest end, you feel love and care for the person lashing out trying to trigger others around them. And they are able to hold themselves and others in love.
This is who you will gradually become as you do this shadow work.
You will be triggered less and less and just naturally move into a new world in which you unconditionally love yourself, others and life.
Common Shadows
- Anger (can show up passive-agressiveness, resentment, sudden outbursts)
- Envy or Jealousy (self-comparison, negativity towards others)
- Fear
- Vulnerability (block intimacy, inauthenticity)
- Need for Control (rigidity, perfectionism, difficulty trusting others)
- Judgment or Criticism (harsh inner critic, judgmental towards others)
- Neediness or Dependency (clinginess, codependence)
- Laziness or Avoidance (procrastination, self sabotage)
- Power (hide or avoid ambition, lack leadership)
If you identify these shadows within you… you’ve already done half the work of seeing your shadow! Congratulate yourself!
Accept this aspect of yourself within you and give that wound a little hug.
For instance, if there is a you that is clingy and dependent upon others, recognize it. And tell yourself… I accept myself, even the clingy and dependent me. The me that is afraid of being abandoned. The me that fears being alone.
See yourself and commit to being with this aspect of you.
Eventually over time, this wound will heal as you accept yourself more and more. Over time, the you that was abandoned or alone will heal and be less and less needy.
This is because you have learned how to unconditionally love yourself… and unconditional love heals all wounds.
The Shadow Work Aftermath
Shadow work will change your life… however, the aftermath can be quite overwhelming to say the least.
Many of you may experience an ego death depending on the depth of shadow work you do.
This can feel existential, you may feel overly negative, lost, very sad etc.
This is also part of the process. Sit with your feelings and accept them too. You are not doing anything wrong if you experience this.
The best remedy I have found when facing ego death is to focus on yourself. Focus on being human… do what you want to do. Do what brings you joy. Even doing simple errands and chores.
Focus on yourself and forget about others for just this period of time. Nurture yourself.
And in case there are those of you who like doing energy work, I would describe this process as defocusing from the void energy and focusing back onto yourself.
I believe when one does shadow work, you expand your vessel. And this expanded vessel manifests as void energy. This energy can feel empty, overwhelming and scary. This is because your focus is on the void. Focus instead on you… the human. And the feelings will calm.
After things stabilize, be aware of what changes you experience in your life. You may notice new patterns happening in your external world. People around you changing. You may notice new experiences start happening to you.
This is because the program is being integrated.
Be You!
After doing shadow work… take a break!
Return to having fun in life and relax.
Shadow work is work. We cannot be in work-mode all the time. It takes up a lot of energy, awareness, and focus.
So make sure to decompress after your shadow work. Do what makes you happy in life. Do things that are calming and relaxing for you.
This will naturally help to integrate the shadow work into your life too.
I do not aim for perfection when it comes to inner healing work. I aim to simply return to being myself.
I think this mindset helps a lot when you really love self-growth and inner healing work. We have to enjoy the fruits of our labor after all!
Thank you so much for stumbling upon this blog post and I hope you found it helpful!
Feel free to share your own experiences with doing shadow work in the comment section down below!
Do you think shadow work has changed your life? I’m really curious to know what you think of shadow work!
I am wishing you all a wonderful day or night, and until next time!
Sending you much love!
