Everyone has a dark side…..
Shadow work connects you with your inner-self to transform your shadows into strength and wholeness. Here on Earth you cannot travel back in time and undo what has happened to you but you can work through your experiences to deal with it appropriately. A lot of Shadow Work tasks ask you to reflect and question the darker parts of yourself. Depending on how you learn, answering these questions in a journal might be more beneficial.
Having a more pessimist mindset can impact you in ways that you are not consciously aware of. Something as ordinary as getting ready for the day ahead of you, then thinking about how badly the day can go can set you up for having a bad day. Or if something happened to you as a child and you did not how to handle it, it can come back up as an adult with a vengeance.
Shadow work is something that everyone could try in addition to personal counseling. There are a lot of questions answered online as well as in multiple books. The books are often available anywhere and tend to be reasonable priced. You also could do shadow work on your free time. Perhaps a question a day or if that is too much even one question a week. Along with answering these questions you should reflect upon your answer as well as how there may be similarities elsewhere. Shadow work is something that everyone can try. If someone finds that shadow work is not enough, or not working for them I also would try Breathwork, meditation exercise, setting boundaries, therapy, elimination of toxic behaviors and people in your life. Resentment release is my all time favorite.
Keep in mind that healing is not really a linear process. Any type of Shadow Work or therapy can bring up things that you were not aware of that need to be examined and healed. Expect the unexpected. Shadow Work is essentially the process of dealing with aspects of yourself that you have repressed. Your Shadow is every part of yourself that you ignore, that you are ashamed of and that you tend to project onto other people. Shadow Work is recognizing that you do this, and coming to terms with it. It’s a lot more complicated than it sounds but it will eventually help you become a more whole person because you will be more self aware and have truth and charity.
To a certain extent Shadow Work can’t really began intentionally on its own. Instead, something has to trigger it. The way to begin Shadow work is to recognize those moments in yourself and your life and be willing to move into the events with introspection and strength rather than projecting and being defensive. Introspection is quite difficult and most people would rather do anything else than look at the things they are hiding. The hardest questions you have to ask yourself are the ones about yourself. Shadows also seem particularly painful and disturbing at first as they distort your values. Your Shadow is you in a dark mirror — you, but backwards. No one wants to admit to being the opposite of what they present themselves as but they are.
Things to consider when working with your Shadow
You have reached their first Saturn return, which is between age 26–29. Until that age a person is not fully their adult self and while shadow work could still be useful at a younger age honestly it will be more difficult than it would be if you’re pre-Saturn return. You don’t have to follow this advice per se but don’t say I didn’t warn you.
You are reasonably stable in their life. They are not in school, juggling two toddlers and a new job, buying and selling a home, or dealing with a death in the family. That sort of thing. Be settled. Don’t be in transition.
You have stable mental health. If the person has, say depression, it is managed well. Person does not have serious and persistent mental illness. Person is not in active addiction.
You are ready to deal with some very dark shite. This is not fun mostly. It’s not pretty. You will not enjoy this ride. This is HARD WORK. Be ready. Be certain of it.
You have a support network and at least one person they can talk to for advice when stuff gets hard, and it will.
The important thing here is to let the real answers come to you and to accept them without judgement. You may have a lot of psychological defense mechanisms in place to keep your from feeling the full emotional force of the answers, just let things flow in. Shadow work requires you to break through those defensive barriers to discover your real truth. It is not an easy thing to do. Shadow Work is all about asking why, really getting to the bottom of why you feel and react the way you do and why all of your paradigms exist. Once you’ve discovered the essence of your Shadow you can begin to tame it and integrate and be empowered by it. Consider this work a wonderful opportunity for growth.
Through all of this remember you are not a bad person. Not at all. You are a beautiful person. Everything you have hidden about yourself is an important part of who you are and you can integrate it no matter how hard it may be. You have to control your Shadow or it will control you. Shadow Work is a huge part of my life, and I don’t regret a moment of it. Once you’ve worked through your accumulations and you’re more affiliated with your Shadow Shadows can actually be fun and fears will recede and You can begin to safely express your darker nature without causing harm to you or anyone else. Journaling, meditation, art, etc. Find outlets for your Shadow so that you can engage with it in a healthy way.
Grounding is my favorite companion to Shadow Work. It helps anchor you and discharge and integrate the very powerful energies you are dealing with and looking to discharge.
Shadow work is like cleaning out a closet within your soul. You are revisiting different events from your past, different dimensions that you have inhabited as a child or an adult and accepting that you were human and were unable or incapable of taking action that could have helped you at the time. One example would be the way your parents treated you. If it was abusive then it would still be very much with you. Yes, it hurt, sometimes like a MF and it changed the way you viewed yourself but as an adult you can and will figuratively take your own hand and tell your past self that you’re safe and that you’re strong and capable and protected. You are okay.
Rather than leaving the darker experiences to fester inside you can help yourself move on from imprinted experiences that could be holding you back in life. As with anyone who does this type of inner healing (be it by therapy or soul work or any other type of healing your past traumas) it will help you usher your soul into a certain defined lightness.
