Shadow work: unstuck your life
Let’s face it. Life is an amalgamation of ebbs and flows. It’s a never-ending circus that we thought we never signed up for. It can be easy to get swallowed up by all the inevitable frustrations of life and to find ourselves lost in them.
If you’ve hit this point in life, you’re about to have a breakthrough. However... there is a catch.
You have to face everything you’ve been avoiding.
Introduction to Shadow Work
Introduced by Carl Jung, shadow work evolved into a type of psychotherapy to reveal deep-seated traumas and resentments for healing. Shadow work gives us the opportunity to face what we're hiding, denying, or unaware of. When we're at "rock bottom" we have nothing to lose and no other option but to change; this is where shadow work is potent.
Shadow work’s essence is about embracing your lesser self, acceptance, and understanding. It’s radically accepting yourself to the point where you feel prepared to change.
Our shadows actually “protect” us from dangers we’ve already experienced. They serve us to cope with threats, but become dated ways of behavior that don’t work. They keep us away from our desired outcomes or behaviors. Because of this protective element shadows provide, it can be scary to evolve and change.
Emotions: Facing Ourselves Means Not Being Afraid to Feel “bad”
When we’re drowning in emotions, the sensation of it can be so smothering that we want nothing more than to escape it. We look to drugs, dissociation, alcohol, screens, sex–any sensation that helps us escape. Society tells us 'fake it till you make it!’ and amplifies our vices to smother our sorrows.
The only way past sadness is going through it rather than trying to avoid it. Heavy emotions are a cry from our bodies that it needs attention and care. They are data points leading us to healing; making us more authentic and light.
This doesn’t mean you have to act on the emotion or believe it’s right, but there must be acceptance of it. Respond to the emotions through validation, acceptance, and self-care to release it.
Have a dialogue with your emotions, as if you’re someone with an outside perspective. Be your own best friend. What would someone who loves you fiercely say? Would they shame you for feeling that way? Or would they look at you with loving eyes and validate you? You might be surprised where this dialogue leads you.
thoughts: releasing limiting beliefs
“beliefs are practiced thoughts”
— Dr. Nicole LePera a.k.a. the Holistic Psychologist
Our brain not only holds information, but dispenses it 24/7 through our thoughts. Training our brain to dispense healthier thoughts can raise our vibration. This is where shadow work can help. We can start this process through awareness and mindfulness.
Meditation and Cultivating Awareness
Meditation is crucial as it helps you to observe what thoughts are coming and going. Notice that when emotions are heightened, they're paired along with certain thoughts. Cultivate the awareness of your thoughts and notice the negative thoughts. Do any of them create negative emotions? Take note with a notebook or your notes app along the day.
At the end of your day, focus on one or two of the thoughts. Start with emotionally charged thoughts or ones that popped up more than once.
2. Questioning Your Thoughts
Try to understand why the thoughts you chose have anchored into your mind one at a time.
Questions to ask your thoughts to write down for more insights:
What are they trying to make you aware of?
Are they attached to a memory or a person?
How do they make you feel?
Is your thought even correct? Is there a way you can disprove the thought (where in your life has the thought been wrong)?
Follow your intuition or use these prompts to dig deeper on why the thought or belief is present. Follow the thread and dig as deep as you can until you reach a “eureka!” moment. The more information you can grab about the thought the better. Don't worry about doing this wrong, it is an intimate and intuitive process.
3. Completion and Replacement
Once you have a sense on why these thoughts and beliefs are in your field, it’s time to rewrite the story. Accept the thoughts and the old story that you've already experienced. Feel the emotions that come along with it to release and understand it.
This doesn’t mean you’re subjected to drowning in your emotions and negativity. Shadow work helps free yourself of limitations to embrace self-acceptance and love. Accepting your imperfect humanity is key to embracing your perfect light.
Next, write a new, powerful, and positive affirmation that counteracts the old story. Affirm your new story aloud with conviction. If you feel called, make it a habit to chant it to yourself routinely. This will help highlight when this old story pops up again. It will also help you understand it in new and deeper ways. (Dr. LePera, 2021)
Remember that shadow work is a continuous process. It’s very likely that what you’re working on will re-emerge, but in a new way. This is so that you can heal a different dimension of your wound and see it from a different perspective.
It’s also important to work on cleaning up your thoughts at the very least, weekly. Yes, it’s a lot of work, but it's so worth it. It blossoms a relationship with yourself and helps manifest with integrity. This also clears karma.
Adding mysticism
When you're used to the processes above, deepen the practices with mystical elements.
Amplify the process of shadow work through the full moon. The full moon strengthens intuition, emotions, and visualizations. This makes it easier to detect patterns to clear and identify emotions. It also heightens intuition so you know how to clear the pattern a bit better. Mix in shadow work with your full moon ritual--it'll be transformational.
Work with your chakras using the processes above. This ensures you're covering all bases when it comes to your healing. Once you're in a space of receptivity, tune into your root chakra and notice how it feels. Notice what comes up (emotions, thoughts, memories) and respond to it. Go through all the chakras and notice the difference of how you felt before you started vs. after.
You’re free now.
This article does not represent the end all, be all for doing shadow work. It can go deeper and there's so much more to learn about it, so don't let your learning stop here. However, if at the end of this process you're still feeling off, speak to a professional that can assist you (therapy, psychics, or healers).
Shadow work makes you your own best friend, strengthening your relationship to yourself. It's easy to surf through life ungrounded. Shadow work allows us to witness and learn more about who we are. Many blessings come with doing this inner work, so hang in there! The goal is to open yourself up to more opportunities, learn more about what's right for you, handling your triggers, and putting yourself in situations and environments that help you thrive. Most of all, building love and peace within yourself.
You deserve that more than anything <3
With Love and Faith in You,
Zamira
The thoughts work portion of this article was sourced from the book “How to Do the Work” by Dr. Nicole LePera with my own twist on what’s worked for me.
This chakra exercise was sourced from James Van Praagh.
Everything else has come from my own experience on getting unstuck from a 4 year-long rut. ;D
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