Shadow work may sound woo woo, but it is actually a recognized mental health practice that can help you to better understand yourself, process trauma, improve relationships and communication, and acknowledge and meet your own needs.
According to Carl Jung, the founder of analytical psychology, the shadow self is a metaphor for our unconscious or subconscious thought processes. These thoughts, traits, and behaviors may not be easily recognized by our conscious awareness. If you took an introductory psychology class, you likely recognize this part of your identity by the term Freud used for it: the id.
Sometimes we intentionally suppress these parts of ourselves because we find them scary, uncomfortable, or undesirable. Often we suppress them unintentionally to protect ourselves due to shame or rejection.
This lack of awareness may help us to avoid consciously coping with the negative emotions our shadows trigger, but the problem is that these parts of us want to be heard, and they will assert themselves in ways that feel out of our control if we don’t acknowledge and deal with them.
This may look like suppressing your true self to avoid rejection — for example, suppressing gender dysphoria because your family may reject you if you come out as transgender.
Your shadow self can also create behaviors that sabotage your relationships or goals. For example, you may treat someone unkindly if your subconscious recognizes a trait in them that you are trying to suppress in yourself.
It can also create abusive behavior, negative self image, substance use disorders, internal shame, and mistrust in relationships.
Shadow work allows you to recognize and acknowledge these shadowy parts of yourself, process the thoughts that accompany them in healthy ways, and identify the underlying needs or strengths they represent. When we are able to see our shadow selves without shame or judgment, we are less likely to hurt ourselves or other people to keep these shadowy parts of us quiet.
Sometimes this looks like releasing shame and fear of rejection and allowing ourselves to embrace the parts of us that felt rejected in childhood. Sometimes it allows us to acknowledge and heal parts of ourselves that may be sabotaging our relationships and self image.
Here are some easy ways to explore your shadow self:
Try free-association journaling. Set a timer and write whatever comes to your mind until the alarm rings. Some people find it easier to access their subconscious by writing with their non-dominant hand.
Keep a dream journal. This can either be long narrative descriptions of the events you remember in your dreams, or it can be a list of bullet points with major images or themes you recall. The sooner you write them down after waking, the more clearly you will remember. Look for themes or images that recur or elicit a strong emotional response. Explore what these dreams may be trying to tell you.
Acknowledge and feel uncomfortable emotions. Our impulse is to repress uncomfortable emotions. Try leaning into them, acknowledging the feelings underneath, and identifying any unmet needs they represent. Anger may be telling you that you feel hurt, rejected, or frustrated. Jealousy or envy may be telling you that you feel insecure. Resentment may be telling you that you need to set boundaries.
Pay attention to judgment and shame. We often reject our shadowy traits when we recognize them in other people. If you have a strong negative reaction to another person that you can’t understand or explain, ask yourself why. Children are particularly potent mirrors for our shadow selves. The traits and behaviors that drive you crazy and create conflict with your kids are likely triggering shadowy traits in yourself. If you feel ashamed about your own thoughts, behaviors, or desires, they are likely part of your shadow self.
Explore recurring problems, worries, or conflicts. Most of us can identify problems or conflicts that seem to come up over and over again — sometimes even in multiple relationships. For example, your jealousy and controlling behavior has sabotaged multiple relationships. You’ve quit multiple jobs because you felt unappreciated. Maybe you frequently feel that people are lying to you or taking advantage of you even though you have no evidence. Or you feel enraged when your child wants to quit something or your partner looks at his phone when you’re talking. If these problems arise repeatedly, they can serve as an alarm bell for complicated emotions that you need to work through.
Greet yourself with compassion and acceptance. The reason we avoid these parts of us is because we feel fear or shame. We mistakenly believe that suppressing them can make them go away. The problem is that just like children, when we ignore our shadowy parts, they can become even louder in ways that ultimately hurt us and the people we love — self sabotage, abusive behavior, anger, jealousy, resentment, judgment. They can even lead us to self harm, suicidal ideation, and substance use. When we acknowledge and greet these shadowy parts of us with compassion and acceptance, we can learn from them and respond in healthier ways that meet our own needs without harming other people.
Nurture your inner child. Our shadow selves develop in childhood when we feel hurt, rejected, or neglected by caregivers or people close to us. We learn to separate and repress these thoughts and traits to protect ourselves from abuse or rejection. Identify and explore any trauma or unmet needs from your childhood. Did you feel unloved, shamed, rejected? What did you most need from your caregivers and didn’t get? What did you enjoy in your childhood that you’ve abandoned? Your inner child often represents a version of yourself that better integrated your shadow self. Connecting with and nurturing this version of yourself can help you identify the parts you learned to suppress, the reasons you needed to suppress them, and the needs you can address now to heal them.