Shadow Work Exercise
Shadow work may be a familiar concept to you. If it is, this will be a welcome challenge.
If you’re new to shadow work, I invite you to see this exercise as a meet and greet with the parts of yourself you’ve cast away. A dinner party where you’ve invited your personality traits that irritate you, body parts that feel foreign to you, thought patterns that scare you, or behaviors that bother you.
What is Shadow Work?
Carl Jung describes the shadow as the repressed desires of the unconscious mind—parts of self we’ve shoved away for fear they won’t be accepted, or worse, deemed evil or bad by our communities. These parts of self might arise in our dreams and be unknown to us in waking hours, or perhaps we are all too familiar with these parts as they have come out to play in drunken stupors or lashed out in fits of fury when we’ve “lost control” of our emotional world.
Why do Shadow Work?
How can naming all that I don’t love help me love myself?
I'm not sure. Why would I want to learn to love tomatoes when they make my mouth curl up in disgust? Why would I want to find the fleshy parts of my belly lovely when I've been told I need to hide them all my life? Why bother trying to like something I've spent so much time hating?
What if this wasn't about liking tomatoes or delighting in the folds of my belly? What if, instead, it was about appreciating tomatoes? Being ok with them slipping into a sandwich instead of it ruining my day? Finding a gentle curiosity and knowing that flesh isn't evil, and a soft belly doesn't make me a different kind of person.
Shadow work isn't about needing to love the parts we do not like. It's about lessening the distain or judgment or attachment to parts of ourselves that really, at the end of the day, are only demons if we demonize them.
Shadow work comes in many forms, and if this feels important for you to investigate further, I invite you to look deeper into ways you can meet, greet, and learn to accept (and maybe even love) all that you are.
SHADOW WORK EXERCISE
for integration, self-acceptance, & identity freedom.
The following is a sample prompt from my 30-Day Workbook, Write to Heal.
This is one of 30 unique prompts I’ve compiled to help you work through limiting beliefs, self-acceptance, & finding creative purpose.
I hope you enjoy this free prompt, and if you feel called to dive deeper, Write to Heal is always there.
I’ve made the prompts from this exercise into a downloadable PDF, so you can fill out the prompts on your device or print it out at home:
If you’d rather just follow the prompts here, keep reading! I like to offer digital downloads alongside the prompts here so you have options. Do whatever feels best!
Shadow Work Exercise:
Invite your shadow parts to dinner.
(this exercise is pulled from “day 12” of Write to Heal.)
For this exercise, I’d like you to make an invitation list for a dinner party, and the list includes your shadow selves. Your shadow selves are parts of yourself that you repress, feel ashamed of, or don’t like.
The idea is to make an invitation list and name these parts of self. You’ll first identify the part, then give it an actual, human name. You’ll follow a set of prompts that will move you through the process of identifying, understanding, and hopefully, learning to accept and possibly love.
Tips + Suggestions:
You can take this in any direction that feels helpful—whether that means your parts of self are personality traits (like always making jokes in serious moments), emotions (like jealousy or rage), or behaviors (like getting too drunk at parties). *keep in mind, if you identify with any of the examples I just gave, I have zero judgment about you—these are examples of my own shadow self that I am practicing accepting and loving*
Try to stay present with each question before making judgments or questioning the exercise. It may feel strange to write out things you don’t like about yourself. How can naming all that I don’t love help me love myself? Trust the process, and allow yourself to be as honest and truthful as you can until the end.
There is no right way to do this, nor is there a minimum or maximum number of parts to identify. You can repeat this exercise any time in your life—in fact I encourage you to. There are parts of myself I am just now identifying as “shadow” parts that I never even knew existed several years ago. Focus on what is in your field of view today, and trust that these are the parts of you that need the most attention now.
Part One: The Invite List.
Make a list of all your “shadow selves.” To get you in the headspace, think about this question: If I were to attend a dinner party, what parts of myself would I like to leave at home? What parts of myself would I be embarrassed to bring with me?
Your list can be written as “the part of me that…” or “my tendency to…” or “my…” or whatever feels right. I’ve made space for five parts, but you can do more or less.
Extra invitation: Give your part of self a name. See how that shifts your perception, and how.
Part Two: Working with Parts
For each part of self, you’ll follow the prompts. If you’re wondering how many parts to work with, there is no right or wrong. You can work closely with one part of self today and another later, or work through 3-5 at once. You can do more, or you can do less.
(If you’d rather fill out the questions on your device or print them out to answer at home, I made a free downloadable PDF with all the prompts and instructions!
Otherwise, scroll down for the prompts!
Use the prompts below for each part of self that you identified.
Part of Self: __________________________Name it: _______________
What I don’t like about this part of me:
How this part of me hurts myself:
How this part of me hurts others:
How this part of me helps me:
How this part of me helps others:
Why I need this part of me:
Why I love this part of me:
Be sure to take some time to reflect and decompress. There is no need to suddenly embrace and love all of these parts—this is just one stepping stone of many steps along the journey to finding peace with our humanity. The jagged, rugged, weird and wonderfulness of it all.
Well done, you.
Shadow work is hard shit.
I avoid it at all costs—it’s easier to just ignore/suppress/project the parts of myself I don’t like. And, ultimately that ends in more destruction and harm, both to me and the people around me. So congratulate yourself for taking the time to answer these questions.
Even if you don’t believe what comes of the answers today, in time, you will start to accept and even come to love these parts of you. We are full, whole spectrum humans, and finding wellness isn’t about ridding ourselves of the dark. Its about getting familiar, comfortable, and understanding with it so we don’t fear or shame it.
Loved this writing exercise?
This prompt is one of thirty prompts I’ve carefully compiled in my latest workbook,
Write to Heal.
Write to Heal is a 30 Day Guided workbook designed for those with a longing to know themselves better, release old beliefs, & re-discover themselves. Write to Heal is also a beautiful way to unlock purpose, remove mental blocks, & get out of creative ruts.
Write to Heal takes you on a four-week process of:
WEEK ONE: sowing seeds and setting intentions
Clarify your why, reset your vision, and meet yourself where you are at
WEEK TWO: shedding and unlearning what no longer serves
Let go of mental blocks, integrate shadow parts, investigate and process old trauma, connect with your inner child, and cleanse beliefs that are not yours
WEEK THREE: meeting yourself and finding safety in the present
Align with your value system, define your role as a leader, cultivate healthy entrepreneurial boundaries, and set up systems and plans for maintaining stability as you engage with healing work
WEEK FOUR: growing into your purpose as part of the collective
Draft stories and outlines of potential creative work, familiarize yourself with the communities you’d like to impact, and finalize a solid mission for book, art, or presence you plan to create.
>Learn more about Rachel’s journey with Eating Disorder recovery, depression, divorce, & finding comfort in the discomfort of living in her memoir, Where the River Flows.
>>Dive into more journaling with the Free 7 Day Inner Child Journal & Free Keeping Promises Journal.
>>Follow Rachel’s daily life on instagram, and get inspired daily with reminders to dance & embrace being a messy human.