Shadow Work is Critical for Our Future

Uncover and transform through the power of shadow work

I'll concede that even in the field of psychology shadow work isn't exactly a mainstream idea, so then why write about it?

I think the key to better mental health, both within an individual and in the larger collective society, is about practicing greater self-awareness and making the unconscious conscious. With so much chaos in our world today, I think it’s more important than ever to examine how our hidden desires and motivations impact our mental health and drive our choices.

How are accountability and transformation possible otherwise?

Making the unconscious conscious is at the root of shadow work. What does that mean exactly?

Making the unconscious conscious means having the courage to look into the depths of psyche, beyond the everyday thoughts and feelings most of us willingly notice. Shadow work is predicated on the belief that every person has a shadow, a less than savory part of the personality and psyche, from which we hide. The work recognizes that shadow is normal and deserves acceptance, just like the more palatable parts of the human mind.

The shadow, as conceived by Carl Gustav (C.G.) Jung, represents the often hidden (and almost always undesired) parts of ourselves that we regularly have a hard time accessing. As we go about our daily lives, tending to our regular tasks, we all carry within us a shadow self.

For many folks, the shadow may manifest in the following ways:

• Troubling self-critical thought patterns and low self-esteem

• Confusion and disorientation regarding life’s purpose and goals

• Unsatisfying and harmful patterns in relationships

• Self-sabotage

• Passive-aggressiveness

• Difficulty acknowledging and owning your gifts, talents, etc.

• Envy and jealousy towards others

• Consistent perfectionism and difficulty accepting mistakes

• Overreactions when exposed to personal triggers for trauma

The shadow is a mirror in which our depths reveal themselves if we are brave enough to hold its gaze.

The closest concept to the shadow I can think of is the Japanese philosophy of the three faces (particularly the third, core face).

Our deepest motivations, our hidden gifts, and our most profound traumas are found in the shadow, just out of daily consciousness. Shadow work theorizes that if we work to cast a light on this shadow, we can work towards a fuller acknowledgement of ourselves, and ultimately work towards deep self-acceptance. It’s a lofty premise, yes, but one I still relish as a mental health professional who shepherds people through their hurt and pain, and as someone who has, and continues to, look beyond what cursory perspectives I hold for, and about, myself.

Shadow work gives us a pathway towards integration (Jung used the language of individuation) of it all, ensuring that we learn to live alongside our shadow selves with a greater sense of awareness and compassion. With that awareness comes greater sense of personal ease and peace, as well as diminished likelihood the shadow will run amok, covertly working behind the scenes as it complicates our relationships, career and mental health.

In the past few years, we've seen a huge cultural shift in how greater society and politics shape our lives. This is abundantly true for the United States, but you may have noticed that white supremacy and white nationalism are up all around the world.

There is also an increase in violent, hateful rhetoric online and it's hard to escape the depth of pain that we're all experiencing. It's clear to me that struggles for power, deep-seated feelings of envy and hatred, as well as catastrophic self-loathing are more present than they have been in the past couple of decades. And, we have a mechanism (the internet) to spew our filth, and project our unconscious feelings, onto others in wanton manner. These are dangerous times, no doubt.

As a therapist and healer I believe this moment marks a significant cultural and global shift. There is an incredible amount of pain and grief in the world. I spend most of my days helping clients sift through that pain and make their way to fuller lives whether we're exploring career changes or relationship concerns. The context in which we live is challenging for all of us.

On top of that, the pandemic, while years ago now, lingers in its impact. It seems to have presented a mental health reckoning of sorts for so many people. Many people began to have some awareness of just how unsatisfied they are with their lives. What they chose to do with those feelings is of great concern to me, especially as we face punitive and righteous extremism in politics. Just observe how quickly diversity, equity, and inclusion swelled and then extinguished in just a few years.

As a young child, I was a fan of Greek mythology (and still am) and it's almost as if Pandora recently opened her box, allowing many collective shadows to swirl around us in almost every aspect of our lives, wreaking considerable havoc. We're faced with an insurmountable amount of anger, grief, sadness, and loss all while navigating the challenges in our own personal corners of the world.

There is no doubt in my mind that the past few years have opened us all up in ways that we couldn’t have anticipated. As all those darker sides of humanity (bigotry, violence, selfishness, narcissism, etc.) find more ways to rear their ugly heads, I can't help but wonder how much better, and healthier, we could all be if we spent more time understanding ourselves in the deepest of ways; we must do the work to encounter and accept our shadows. We must free ourselves from the burden of unknowing.

How might we be able to feel better, be more connected, and more secure if we found ways to really be with ourselves and accept ourselves...even the darker parts, more fully? How differently could the world look if we each did our own work to understand our rich, internal lives, so we didn't leak on others, or feel the impulse to project our psychic gunk (our deepest insecurities and fears) onto others?

This is why shadow work is so important right now.

While I don't claim to have all the answers (in fact, I think any wise person knows that they, in fact, know very little) I know through simple observation that as a collective, things really need to change in order for our world to sustain itself.

Before we can learn to take care of society's most vulnerable, before we can build families with a legacy of fulfillment and kindness, we all have to do our part, our own internal work, to be the best versions of ourselves that we can be. This moment calls for a true reckoning within, and between all of us, allowing ourselves to harness all our ugliness, maybe even in ways we haven’t been tasked before.

If you know that you are doing that work, that you are embodying this best version of yourself right now, then I wholeheartedly commend you. As the world continues to spin, let us all make a concerted effort to create a world where we feel at peace internally, and feel enthused by the prospect of extending that peace outward.

We desperately need it.

If you'd like to take the next step in your own deep exploration, you can order my book The Shadow Work Workbook.

---