Embracing My Shadow
Have you ever heard someone say, “what you hate most about your friends is what you actually hate about yourself.” Well, I heard that over ten years ago and found myself face to face with my shadow when a friend unleashed a judging rage on another yoga teacher. It was the thing I hated most about myself. I judged everyone. But who doesn’t? The media teaches us to do it from a terribly young age. The point I am making here is I am going to bring up some stuff you don’t want to address; the things we suppress and ignore, and turn our backs on because they create uncomfortable feelings. In my experience, this has been one of the deepest obstacles to loving myself. So let’s talk about the shadow.
What is the shadow
It’s the far side of the moon. An idea brought to light by Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung, the shadow is the side of ourselves that we don’t show to the world, or even ourselves. Most likely, we aren’t even aware that we have a shadow. It’s the parts of ourselves that we hate to see whether it be anger or rage, jealousy or envy, greed, selfishness, sexual desires, desire for power; it’s whatever we perceive to be inferior, wrong, immoral, or unacceptable. This includes feelings and behaviors that are not in alignment with societal views such as loneliness, vulnerability, fear and self-doubt, messing up, sadness, or grief.
These behaviors or emotions are not in alignment with who we think we are, who we want to become, or who we think we should be. These are the parts of ourselves that we have disowned, ignored, or cast aside because of some childhood conditioning. Behaviors that, as children, the influential adults in our lives did not respond positively to or negatively influenced how we got our basic needs met.
Where the shadow comes from
The beauty and magic of being a child is you get to know and experience the full range of emotions and emotional expression. That is until someone or something intervenes. As we express emotions and behaviors as children, negative and positive response cues go into our subconscious and frame who we become. This comes down to survival and getting our basic needs met, which include physiological needs, feelings of safety and security, and belonging.
For example, let’s say, as a child, I loved to sing and use my voice loudly, but my father thought it was annoying because my voice was far from angelic. One of my basic needs, the need for belonging, was being threatened, so my subconscious would respond to protect me, and I would stop singing. Into the shadow box you go voice. This could affect more than my joy in singing, but how I present myself to the world, how I communicate, how I view my voice in terms of my importance and validity; how I view other women who love to sing but have a voice that is incomparable to Aretha Franklin.
This is a completely normal coping response and behavior. It is all part of being human. This doesn’t just happen at home, it happens at school, with friends, teachers, society, and the media. We are surrounded by shoulds, have to’s, this is what ‘normal’ looks like, so how could we not have a shadow side? In a society that is ruled by patriotism and capitalism, we are forced to elevate our egos and throw our shadow into a box.
Ignoring the shadow
In my journey of self-love, I learned that I can run from the shadow all I want, but it will still show its deprived face when I get triggered. I thought that if I loved myself fully, then I would be happy and a perfectly compassionate buddha. This is not what unconditional self-love is or feels like. Unconditional love requires understanding and compassion for myself and others, rather than judgment of what I perceive to be wrong.
When we ignore our shadow side, emotional triggers unleash the shadow to have a mind of its own and it goes into autopilot. Without our awareness, it enters through the subconscious, acting out in various ways, harming our relationships, interfering with our deepest desires, and inhibiting our personal growth. This is how someone’s repressed creative passion can torpedo into a destructive rage, or a person’s beautiful ambition can evolve into crippling perfectionism. The shadow shows up in many tricky ways, but I have found that when she goes back into the box, I am left with feelings of guilt, shame, and regret.
The shadow is not just what we perceive to be dark or wrong, it also encompasses some of our positive aspects. Even the best parts. When I started doing intentional shadow work I was so lost. Friends kept suggesting I acknowledge my shadow. My Goddess cards were telling me to look at my shadow. All signs pointed to my shadow. But the entire time I was thinking, I have lived in my shadow for years, I have been beating myself up on a regular basis because I am all too familiar with my dark side. I hated myself for every imperfection. So what was left, what was I missing? Well, for one, that!
It was when I found myself in a feminine embodiment class, working with the shadow, that I broke open. We were doing a practice to embody our shadow. But I couldn’t go into the pain that I had lived with for all these years, I wanted to embody something else, I wanted to embody this Divine Feminine that I kept hearing about. I wanted light! As my teacher was talking us through the exercise I began to cry. The practice was about 30 minutes and I cried on my floor for the entire period. I cried all day. I realized that all I wanted was to be held and to be seen in this vulnerability. I wanted to feel it all, let it be there, and know that it was welcome.
That is when it came to me. I had thrown the soft, vulnerable beautiful parts of myself into the shadow box and forgot about them. I was hardened as a child, I was armored and tough, and that free-spirited fairie was locked away. My shadow was calling me to set her free. So for me, my shadow work was unlocking the cage to my playful, creative, and courageous inner child. Now, as beautiful and sweet as this may sound, it has been hard work! It has been terrifying, uncomfortable, and incredibly painful.
Once I had opened to this work, I realized that I had been dwelling in the dark shadows that were, unknowingly, my greatest attributes. What I learned from doing the work is the goal is not to escape from the dark shadow, that is impossible. But to embrace the shadow and bring it into the light; to honor all parts of yourself as you would honor your own child. This is honoring your inner child.
Working with the Shadow
So, going back to that statement I made in the beginning, “the things you hate about your friends are the things you hate about yourself.” This is how we can begin to work with our shadow. When you find yourself running from feelings or judging yourself or someone you love, stop. Pause and ask yourself what is going on, why am I judging or what am I running from? Why is that behavior uncomfortable or judge-worthy?
When we can accept others we can accept ourselves, and vice versa. There’s more room for error and messiness on everyone’s part. When we can begin to see our shadow, our false sense of happiness, comfort, and success begin to fade away and we can open to the unknown, to the possibilities of our deepest desires and dreams that we thought could never be.
Benefits of Shadow Work
When we embrace our shadow (also known as doing shadow work), we own our flaws and confront our fears. We become more grounded and whole. Our relationship with ourselves improves because we are more accepting, allowing, and compassionate with ourselves. As a result, our relationships with others improve because we become more accepting and less triggered by people’s behaviors. Therefore, we become more understanding. Our communication eases because we have less fear of messing up or saying the wrong thing. We bring ease to the people around us because our willingness to be messy and vulnerable gives them permission to do the same.
We transform our inner voice and make compadres with our inner critic. This is because we learn to integrate all parts of our authentic selves. We are more accepting of our behaviors and moods, allowing moods and emotions to be there and to flow. We develop an awareness of our projections while understanding that everything we do is a projection of our own internal world.
We build self-confidence (Latin for “with trust”), and we allow ourselves to take more risks. Because of this confidence and risk-taking, we open our creative centers allowing all parts of ourselves to contribute. In developing my creativity, I have learned that it takes spontaneity, risk, trust, and playfulness. We are opening and allowing more depth. And with that, we begin to manifest our dreams and our deepest desires. Lastly, we gain increased clarity into our life, who we are, and who we surround ourselves with.
Let’s jump in!
Now, looking at all of these benefits, does it seem worth it to jump into the discomfort of the shadow? Don’t worry, the light is always there to comfort you. There is no light without the dark, and light must be present in order to cast a shadow. They work together.
So what do you think? Are you ready? For now, start small. Ease into the discomfort by noticing and inquiring. Build your self awareness by meditating or taking a pause when you feel discomfort arise. Take small risks and when you have a judgment about yourself or someone else, like the Great Byron Katie, ask yourself, is this true? How do I know that this is true? And keep asking.
One more thing, when we jump into hard work like this we have to know how to talk to ourselves. No shoulds, blame, or shaming aloud. Only love, compassion, and understanding. Make excuses for yourself if you have to. That’s what I did and it worked like a charm. Know your heart is good. Know that your intentions are pure. You are love. Know that you are here to shine the light of your beautiful soul. Let it shine as bright as a star. I’ll even hold your hand while you walk this path if you would like.
If you are ready to take the plunge into a deeper love for yourself and you need support, contact me about feminine embodiment coaching by clicking below
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elatedwoman
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elated.woman/
