Shadow Work: How I Made Peace With Myself - E11

Embracing our shadow is key to making peace with ourselves. In this episode, you'll get a brief guide to shadow work and 3 essential tips that helped me on my own journey. You’ll learn why it’s vital to embrace our negative thoughts and feelings, observe recurring themes, contemplate annoying people and find the gift of our past wounds—and how all of this can actually help us move forward.

Transcript

Hello,

I'm Annie Moussou,

A certified EFT tapping master practitioner.

I help women build confidence,

Set boundaries,

And enjoy healthy relationships.

Welcome to my podcast,

Hush Your Mind,

Building a better relationship with yourself.

On this show,

I offer practical wisdom to help you clear fears,

Limiting beliefs,

And trauma,

So that you can gracefully create a life you love.

Welcome to episode number 11.

Today,

I'll be giving you a brief guide to shadow work and three essential tips that helped me make peace with myself.

You'll learn about my initial hesitant steps into shadow work and what motivated me to explore my shadow,

A term coined by psychologist Carl Jung that refers to shunned aspects of ourselves,

Like shame or even joy.

You'll also learn why it's vital to embrace our negative thoughts and feelings,

Observe recurring themes,

Contemplate annoying people,

And find the gift of our past wounds,

And how all of this can actually help us move forward,

Mend relationships,

And calm our mind.

So let's get started.

I didn't know about shadow work.

The gray morning light seeped through the window,

Waking me from my blissful slumber.

Then the dread of facing another day.

Why can't I just stay under the covers?

All I knew was that if I could,

I would have disappeared.

I feared getting into another raging dispute with my partner.

I cringed at colleagues' rude remarks and the immense workload.

Living abroad severed me from friends and family.

I felt lonely,

Depressed,

And helpless.

Somehow I managed to get by until one day I stumbled on some articles about mindfulness.

I couldn't believe it.

The author wrote about the importance of embracing negative thoughts,

Of shining a light on what psychologist Carl Jung called our personal shadow or any unacceptable aspects of ourselves.

Could that really stop my despair?

It seemed counterintuitive.

No one wants to pay attention to their bad traits.

Strangely enough,

The more I delved into shadow work,

The better I felt.

Not initially,

Though.

It took a massive amount of time,

Energy,

And patience.

But allowing buried thoughts to crack through the soil eventually helps me heal past hurts,

Mend my relationships,

And make peace with myself.

So one thing I want to ask you is,

Are you fueling your negative thoughts?

I used to think my negative thoughts won't bother me if I ignore them.

Throwing away my self-doubt as if it were an albacore or old receipt made sense.

I was good at it.

But when my head hit the pillow at night,

Those repressed thoughts came to taunt me.

What an awful job you did.

You should be ashamed of yourself.

Good for nothing.

Unknowingly,

I was fueling my negative thoughts.

We sustain a negative mindset when we fear negative thoughts and emotions and repress them,

When we believe negative thoughts to be true,

When we ignore negative thoughts,

Hoping they vanish,

When we react to them,

For example,

Snapping at loved ones and perfectionism,

And when we avoid negative thoughts via inactivity like drinking alcohol,

Scrolling social media,

Even overthinking.

Furthermore,

When we reject any part of ourselves,

We can't fully experience love,

Belonging,

And connection.

We all have the seeds of yin,

Yang,

Joy,

Misery,

Love,

Fear within.

So when we stuff our negative emotions into our unconscious,

They eventually buoy up to the surface and can ravage our self-esteem,

Relationships,

And health.

That's why the goal in shadow work is to embrace everything about ourselves.

Once we do,

We feel more balanced and whole.

I love this quote by poet Robert Bly,

If any help was going to arrive to lift me out of my misery,

It would come from the dark side of my personality.

So how do we free ourselves from this vicious cycle?

First thing,

Observe recurring themes.

Studies show that mindfulness helps us experience difficult emotions without getting caught up in them.

Instead of avoiding or escaping our emotions,

We can learn how to accept them.

When I first discovered this concept,

I had to reread the text a few times.

Wouldn't accepting negative emotions strengthen them?

Would that mean that I am a good for nothing?

Whatever criticism the voice in my head uttered seemed definitive and true,

What if that voice took over my life?

I didn't feel capable of listening more intently,

Yet I tried anyway.

At first it was like I was policing my mind.

I struggled with accepting my thoughts and often categorized them as positive or negative,

But I kept going.

One thing I noticed was that I hated any form of criticism about my character.

Even constructive criticism from a loved one tensed my chest and shoulders.

I'd feel angry and ashamed.

Evidently,

I believe that mistakes and failures are bad.

If I didn't do things perfectly,

I felt like an incurable loser,

But that just led me to crippling perfectionism and burnout.

Do you have any rigid thoughts or stories that circle your mind over and over?

You might have a recurring theme of fear of abandonment,

Disappointments,

Regrets,

Disrespect,

Or betrayal.

That's a sign that you have some shadow work to do.

Use EFT tapping to reduce the emotional intensity.

Journal about the pattern.

Ask yourself,

What did I make that event mean about me?

Once we pinpoint our unhelpful attitude,

We can heal and move on.

Okay,

Now for my second shadow work tip that's quite jarring.

Contemplate annoying people.

I've been watching reruns of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Will Smith plays himself as a street smart guy who cracks jokes and gets in trouble.

He even tricked Jeffrey,

The butler,

Into believing Jeffrey had won $26 million with a fake lottery ticket.

Though Will entertains me,

Something about him bothers me.

Thanks to his rich uncle Phil,

He has a chance to attend top-notch schools,

But he doesn't care.

He just loves to horse around and chase girls.

Maybe I'm taking it a little too seriously,

But my opinion of Will dropped.

When he praised Malcolm X without really knowing why,

I rolled my eyes.

Will seemed stupid and irresponsible.

Little did I know that my irritation with Will was teaching me about my shadow,

A rejected part of myself.

My parents told me that succeeding in school was my priority as a child.

High grades gained their approval.

As a 10-year-old,

I slaved away at my homework on weekday evenings.

Classmates didn't admire me for my looks,

Humor,

Or football skills.

My book smarts wowed them.

Being intelligent made life easier.

It became a dependable trait to win praise.

So to avoid mockery,

I shunned stupidity and made it a point to never do or say anything ridiculous.

But at the same time,

That wiped out the spontaneity,

Silliness,

And fun in my life.

Psychologists Hal and Sidra Stone would refer to my silly side as a disowned self and encourage me to let it out to play.

Which people annoy you the most?

What about them irritates you?

Those are most likely disowned parts of yourself.

If ignored or denied,

They could run your life.

Reflect on how you may have these traits too,

But avoid judging yourself.

Be gentle.

It takes time and courage to integrate your shadow.

And finally,

Shadow work tip number three,

Find the gift.

Some life experiences left indelible marks on us.

It seems impossible to let go of the past until one day we can't do it anymore.

Lugging around our pain robs us of the present.

That's when we take responsibility of healing ourselves.

Only we can soothe our own wounds.

Though it's scary and agonizing,

We must draw from the well of courage we didn't even know we had.

My most tumultuous shadow work had to do with the codependent relationship I had with my husband the week.

Day in,

Day out,

We tumbled in a hellish nightmare for 10 years.

Each inner child feared abandonment so fiercely,

Yet our pain seemed to command us to lash out at each other.

In The Secret of the Shadow,

Debbie Ford invites us to do this exercise to heal painful experiences.

Breathe deeply and reflect in your journal.

1.

What incident from my present or past is still causing me pain,

Anger,

Or regret?

2.

When have I had these same feelings before?

3.

What did I make this event mean about me?

4.

How has this decision negatively affected my life?

5.

Whom do I blame for the decision I made and for everything that has happened to me as a result of that decision?

6.

To heal this incident,

What needs to happen?

7.

What have I gained,

What have I learned,

And what do I now know as a result of having this experience?

8.

What wisdom can I now contribute to the world as a result of what I have gone through?

Uncovering the gifts or the positive insights,

Skills,

And abilities that your painful past gave you is key to moving on and integrating your shadow.

If your parents put you down,

Your blessing might be the ability to empathize with others.

The gift of a financial loss could be your newfound resiliency and resourcefulness.

Over time,

Louie and I learned how to show compassion to ourselves and each other.

Thanks to our perseverance,

Our mutual suffering taught us how to overcome our worst fears and love courageously.

Today,

I'm so grateful to be able to empower other women via my EFT tapping services.

So when the dust settles,

Shadow work brings peace.

It's not easy to confront our flaws,

But acknowledging difficult emotions like anger,

Fear,

And shame,

Not avoiding or reacting to them,

Heals us.

When we observe recurring negative thoughts,

Ponder our judgments of others,

And find the gift behind our troubles,

We take the reins back.

Repressed emotions and old stories can't hijack our lives anymore.

We learn to accept ourselves and feel whole and joyful.

We gain energy to bless our dreams and loved ones.

That's freedom,

The most splendid gift of all.

Thank you so much for joining me in this episode of Hush Your Mind.

If you enjoyed it,

Please feel free to visit my about page on my InsightTimer profile for my website,

And follow me for new content and live EFT tapping sessions.

May you have the courage to love and accept yourself.

Be well,

And take care.

Reviews

Just what I needed to hear. I will listen again and take notes, I just wanted to take it in the first time. I know some parts of my shadow which are repressed, it's keeping me from living the life I deserve and it's all based around money and how I view people who have it and make it ... I was taught to work hard to make money and be someone who has the house, job and car as a child, although I was very playful, expressive and a deep thinker with a creative nature and spiritual connection. That artist and thinker was supressed, told she was not good enough, that art will never make me money, now any success that I have as a filmmaker and writer I feel I don't deserve. I struggle to find work and I get angry at myself for this, but I know I'm self sabotaging because I fear obtaining money and security it will bring me. I have a lot of work to do!