What Is Shadow Work?

Hi everybody,

I'm Catherine Liggett,

And I facilitate a lot of shadow work meditations here on Insight Timer,

So I'd love to tell you how I understand shadow work.

The shadow is a concept that we know in the Western world from Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung.

The shadow,

However,

Comes from mythology and from ancient wisdom since time immemorial.

As this knowing that This pattern we see in a lot of myths,

Like the myth of Inanna,

For example,

Where she has to descend into darkness,

Into the unknown,

In order to retrieve,

In the myth it was her sister,

But truly it's a part of herself.

And for Carl Jung.

The shadow is all of the aspects of ourselves.

That lie below the surface of conscious awareness and yet are the hidden drivers of our conscious behaviors.

And so shadow work is any kind of internal process,

Any inner work that we do in order to make those unconscious drivers conscious.

So in my meditations on insight timer and in my course called how to just hold yourself with radical love.

Doesn't say it's a shadow work course,

But it is a shadow work course.

Hold yourself with radical love.

We go into exactly how we do this.

What are the processes like I have a four-step process called FACE,

F-A-C-E.

It stands for feel,

Amplify,

Connect,

And embrace.

What are the processes for that?

Where we can very easily and powerfully connect with The aspects of our shadow that are often young,

Tender,

Vulnerable parts of ourselves from childhood that weren't seen with love,

That weren't witnessed.

These are parts of ourselves that just need our loving attention.

Our loving witnessing,

Our empathic witnessing,

As I say.

So I hope that helps and I wish all of you beautiful journeys into your shadows because for me,

Shadow work,

It's not dark,

It's not scary,

It's really just connecting with the hidden beauty.

That we had to repress,

Deny,

Censor in our young life.

And we get to integrate it now and fully live it out.

Sending you so much love.

Take care.