shadow work 🖤
in this post, i mentioned shadow work, and i’ve had a lot of interest expressed in a post about it – so here you go!
what is shadow work?
shadow work is when you face the side of yourself you don’t want to acknowledge – your fears, your hatred, your self that feels wrong or bad. your shadow is comprised of the qualities within yourself that you project onto others when you feel that burning dissonance of hating someone but relating to them. with shadow work, you confront that self, and you become a whole person by integrating it into you and dealing with those aspects in a healthy way.
how do you practice shadow work?
it’s, obviously, a deeply personal process and lots of witches have different methods! i’ll tag some resources below, but i’ll describe my work as well.
personally, i use therapy, mindfulness, tarot, and journaling in my shadow work. 🖤 i’ll go in-depth on these:
💀therapy. i can’t describe how helpful therapy has been in handling my shadow self. i’m a survivor of trauma and having PTSD makes shadow work very hard, but therapy gives me a safe place to confront issues that i can manage in therapy until they become smaller and less rough and i can do work with them by myself.
💀mindfulness. mindfulness is practicing being in the now. take a deep breath, now release it. feel each part of your body. do you feel your feet on the floor, your hand on your blanket, or the wind tousling your hair? feel all the things around you. notice their physical sensation. notice the smells, the sounds. take in all the sensory information at your disposal. practice this constantly and see what you’re feeling emotionally in conjunction. for example, i know i carry a lot of my emotions in my belly. when i’m frustrated, it feels like a knot; when i’ve made a hard decision and i’m afraid to say it, it feels like it’s swooping out of me. when you’re noticing your emotions, you notice your triggers, and you notice those sides of you that are embarrassing to share – which is part of doing shadow work.
💀tarot. tarot is a great way to practice shadow work! i’ve linked a few of my favorite spreads below. using tarot to divine things about your situation probably comes natural if you’re a tarot reader, so using it to divine things about your own reactions is helpful, too!
💀journaling. journaling is up there with therapy for me. sometimes i don’t even write it down, i just think about it. if you can identify those moments when you feel anger, jealousy, or some discomforting emotion, confront it. what is at the root of your emotion? are you aware of what’s causing it?
💀using all four. i honestly mix these up a lot! i incorporate journaling into my tarot practice, i journal about therapy sessions, mindfulness is a technique that my counselor taught me, etc. try to incorporate them into your life and see how they feel!
yay resources!
