Shadow work prompts How Do Shadow Work Prompts Help? However, if you’re ready to dive in, that’s fine, too! It’s worth checking out before starting your prompts so that you are clear about the terms and definitions within the prompts.
If you’re brand new to shadow work, my shadow work beginners’ guide can help you learn more. It all goes back to projection and how we often view the world through the lens of our own negativity. This makes it hard for us to see the world as it is because we constantly see it through the veil of our own darker attributes. Jung argues that the more the Shadow archetype is hidden from our consciousness, the denser it gets. “The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself” and represents “a tight passage, a narrow door, whose painful constriction no one is spared who goes down to the deep well.” -Carl Jung It helps us heal and stop projecting these things we don’t like about ourselves onto others. The process of unveiling and accepting our shadow parts is meant to be liberating. It helps us get a complete picture of who we are so that we can be more present and content in our daily lives without wasting time wishing we could be different. The Case for Starting Shadow WorkĪccording to Jung, this is how we can stop living as fractured beings and become psychologically whole. Shadow work is an excellent way to do this. Instead, the best thing to do is to confront your Shadow head-on. Still, others try to suppress them, hoping they’ll go away. Some people avoid dealing with their Shadows altogether. They fear that they’ll end up feeling worse rather than better. Why do people hide from their Shadow?įor many people, facing their Shadow isn’t easy. Sometimes you act on those feelings sometimes, you deny them.Įither way, you keep running into problems because you haven’t dealt with your Shadow properly. Your feelings toward this person come up again and again in your life. You might think about him or her every day without realizing it. If you’ve ever had a dream where something terrible happens to someone close to you, chances are that person represents your Shadow. But we must face it because it contains the part of ourselves that needs healing.
We don’t always like what we see there sometimes, it scares us and makes us want to run away. Interestingly enough, one place Carl Jung believed that we encounter our dark side in our dreams.
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Shadow work prompts for beginners How to Meet Your Shadow Our shadow selves are the things we’d rather forget about.Įngaging in shadow work can help us understand and better manage the parts of ourselves we tend to hide from. Because we’re taught to be good people, we end up suppressing anything that doesn’t fit within certain boundaries. These messages shape our identity over time. And if someone criticizes our greed, we’ll try to hide our desire for money. If someone says we shouldn’t be jealous, we won’t allow jealousy to enter our thoughts. If someone tells us we shouldn’t be aggressive, we’ll likely suppress our anger. The shadow self represents everything we’ve learned about how to behave in a particular context. They teach us how to behave and become the person we think we should be. These lessons come from parents, teachers, friends, siblings, and society at large. Where did we learn our shadow behavior?Īs a child grows into adulthood, he or she learns what behaviors are considered acceptable and unacceptable. When we fail to meet those expectations, we experience guilt or shame. We use the ego to act according to social norms. The shadow self is often associated with the ego-the part of ourselves that makes decisions, controls impulses, and acts in socially appropriate ways. You might even deny having those feelings altogether. He defined it as “the part of ourselves we are ashamed of.” In psychology, the shadow self refers to our personality’s darker, less acceptable aspects.įor example, you might feel guilty about being angry, greedy, jealous, or selfish. What is the “shadow” in shadow work?Ĭarl Jung coined the term shadow self in his book Psychological Types. It involves getting to know your shadow self and all the baggage that comes with it, such as repressed feelings, thoughts, and memories.ĭoing this helps jumpstart the healing process, particularly for people wrestling with past trauma. Put simply, shadow work is a type of personal development that allows you to dig deep into your subconscious mind and find any issues you may have.
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