Shadow work is life transforming. When you know what you did not know before and when you see what you did not see before, it changes your entire perspective. And this influences the decisions you make and the actions you take. But you can fall into the trap of thinking that doing shadow work in and of itself changes your life FOR you. And by falling into this trap, you may fail to go beyond the step of gaining awareness and doing mental processes. It is so essential for shadow work to be followed by decisions and especially by actions.
Years ago, the revolutionary psychologist Carl Jung (while studying with Freud), observed the fact that there were parts of his patients that they, themselves were aware of and to the contrary, there were parts that they, themselves were unaware of. This observation is not particularly revolutionary because it takes zero effort for everyone to notice this about the people around them. But stick with me. Consciousness has long been referred to as a light. To become conscious of something is to be able to see it in the same way that we see something that is exposed to light. When something is unconscious, we cannot see it. It is as if we are trying to see it in the dark. And so, Carl Jung began to refer to the unconscious aspects within a person that they, themselves are unaware of, or could not see, as their ‘shadow’. The human shadow is any aspect of a person that is not exposed to the light of consciousness. Fast forward to today, shadow work is now a term used often in spiritual and psychology circles to describe any process (of which there are thousands) that makes the subconscious conscious and that is designed to resolve subconscious issues.
Some people genuinely expect that by doing shadow work in and of itself, their life will magically transform for them and for the better. And they feel like if this isn’t happening, something must be wrong. But here is the reality, while there can be exceptions, the vast majority of shadow work is meant to be acted upon. The content of the subconscious and even any processes done with this subconscious content is meant to inform your decisions and inform your actions. In fact, the vast majority of the time, without this follow through on the shadow work you have done, nothing improves. No pattern actually changes and in fact, things can get a lot worse.
So that you can understand this as a concept, let’s look at a side-by-side example of two women, both of whom are facing a similar situation and whom have attended a seminar to do shadow work on the issue they are facing. Meet Bianca and Rina.
Bianca and Rina both live with roommates that they don’t get along with at all. They are both lost as to what their purpose is and are lost in overall life. And they are both dating men that they have been with for several years now, but neither are happy in those relationships because according to them, the men in their life are just really not emotionally available.
Bianca and Rina both do the completion process, parts work, breath work and belief work over the course of a weekend. As a result, Bianca has discovered that she is lost because she was so busy trying to please her mother for her whole life that she has no firm grasp on her own identity, what she really wants and what she really likes. She sees that she goes for relationships where the other person knows exactly what they want and need and she just becomes that for them. She sees that she duped her own boyfriend into thinking she was the perfect girl for him, when really, she was just being what she thought would make him like her. And now, she’s unhappy. She sees that she keeps herself in situations that feel wrong for her, but that other people like; and around people who have no interest in changing things. My way or the highway people. Because she believes “To be loved, you’ve got to please others.”
Rina discovers that she too spent her life catering to pleasing others. But for her, it was making sure to be the one in the family that was always easy and always good because her mom and dad were so stressed out with a brother who had a lot of behavioral problems. Life has never been about her. From her perspective, life always revolved around her brother’s needs and her parent’s need for her to not be any more of a burden than her brother already was. Her wants and needs did not exist. She sees that she has adapted to this situation by conforming to what other people want and need. She is really good at it. She realized that in relationships, she figures out what people want and need and just conforms to that. This way, she feels closer to them. But then, inevitably feels lonely, because there is no “her” in the relationship. She sees that she is in this situation with her boyfriend. That there is no her in the relationship because she left herself in the dust to become what her boyfriend wants and needs. And now, she hates him for it, when it isn’t even his fault. She sees that she can’t keep living this life where she keeps herself in situations that feel wrong for her, just because other people are fine with them. And that she does this because she holds the belief that “To be loved, you need to become what other people want and need.”
Bianca, having gained the awareness from her shadow work, sees that she needs to make different decisions and take different actions. She sets out an action plan and follows through on it. First, she decides that she needs to move out of the place where she lives with roommates and that she wants to live on her own for a while and create a home environment that is truly reflective of her own preferences. This will force her to figure out her own preferences because she will not have anyone to conform to. Bianca does this. During this process she does figure out her own preferences, but she admits that she caught herself trying to conform to a home style guru she follows on Instagram for a bit. Bianca also decided to have a rough conversation with her boyfriend about the fact that she acted in a way that would make him like her, and that she really doesn’t know herself well enough to know whether they will be a good fit long term. He was very hurt by this. As she started changing to be more in-alignment with who she really is and what her actual interests are, they started fighting more and more and they eventually decided to break up.
Bianca decided to become really clear on what she wants and what she likes and dislikes and what her interests are and on what she wants in a partner before starting to date again. When she finally did start dating again, she had to fight the urge to just act in a way that was pleasing as opposed to authentic. But she did it. She got rejected pretty hard a couple of times because of it. But she is now in a new relationship with a man and she feels good in this new relationship. It is a very different relationship than any of the ones she had before. It is way more about intellectual connection and quality time activities than it is about her doing acts of service and looking as good as she can every day in order to get the security that a man likes her. She now realizes that to be loved, you have to be real, otherwise what the other person is loving a character you are playing. Bianca doesn’t know her purpose yet. But she has admitted to herself that what is most important to her is children, specifically giving children the best start possible. So, she has changed course and is now training to be a Montessori teacher. She is way happier in her life now. She no longer feels lost.
Rina, having gained the awareness from her shadow work, feels like her whole perspective has shifted. She is blown away to really realize how much of a non-existent person she becomes in relationships. She no longer feels like to be loved you have to become what other people want and need because thanks to working on her belief, she can clearly see that some people are loved, despite having extremely unpleasant personalities. She now wants to be loved for who she really is. Rina has learned that when you improve your vibration, without doing anything at all, your life just changes. The things you want simply appear in your reality. So, when Rina goes back to her life and she discovers that she still has no idea what her purpose is and still hates her roommates and she is still surrounded by people who expect her to please them and who don’t seem to care what she wants and needs, she feels angry. She starts to feel like shadow work doesn’t work. From Rina’s perspective, by doing the completion process and breathwork and belief work, she is fixing stuff from the past and that should change her vibration so it should all just get better. New opportunities should just happen. She should just know who she is and what to do with her life. Situations should fix themselves and just be less complicated. Her boyfriend should just start acting differently and most especially, he should react well to her finally being honest with him about who she really is. Or even better, the universe should have just make it so that her real soul mate just crosses her path. For Rina, shadow work IS the effort she is putting into things getting better in her life. That should be enough. She feels like “what’s the point of shadow work if you do all that hard work of looking at hard truths and fixing your vibration and then you have to go do all the other, tangible hard work anyway”. For example, Rina thinks: Why would she have to do all that hard work of looking at hard truths and fixing her vibration relative to money if she just has to go get a job and work to improve her financial situation anyway? Rina did not do the “hard work” of dealing with her roommate problem or boyfriend problem because having to confront any of them or do the work of changing things or leaving situations or ending relationships feels too hard. And Rina thinks it defeats the point of doing shadow work. Because Rina is not actually making the decisions and taking the actions that her shadow work pointed to her having to make and take, she is even more unhappy than she was before. And she really wonders why shadow work isn’t working for her.
Your life will not improve unless your decisions and actions align with the shadow work you do. Some people forget that life not only includes, but implies action. Pattern changes include action changes. And action is a part of the picture of manifestation. And the reality is, your actions must be in alignment with what you see, know and transform using shadow work. Otherwise, you are out of alignment with the shadow work you are doing. You are out of alignment with the truths you are becoming aware of. You are out of alignment with the positive changes taking place on a mental and emotional level. For example, if Rina saw using shadow work that she makes herself non-existent in her relationships and yet, she continues to not bring herself forward in her relationship with her boyfriend for fear of conflict, hoping that the relationship will just magically get better, then her actions (or in this case lack thereof) are out of alignment with her own path of progression and therefore, she will not experience improvement.
The reality is actually worse than this. The reality is that if you do shadow work and fail to make changes, this implies making different decisions and taking different actions, your life experience will actually get worse. First, when what you are becoming aware of with shadow work is dysfunction, it becomes harder and more painful to stay in that dysfunction. Second, it is an invitation for an escalation. Think of Rina, let’s say that what is in her best interests and what is in alignment with her growth path is to really develop autonomy and bring herself into relationships. If she does the shadow work and becomes aware and still won’t make the necessary changes, she is stuck still. So, the pressure must increase in some way for her to get un-stuck. Without realizing it, Rina is inviting an escalation. She is inviting a situation which will put more pressure on her to get into alignment. And the reality is, it’s got to be a situation where she exercises her free will to decide to act in alignment with her personal truth in a situation where she would normally not do so. Remember that she abandons her personal truth to self-preserve. Therefore, this implies that it is not going to be a feel-good situation. It will be a situation where the fear and pain involved in acting in alignment with her personal truth are preferable to the fear and pain involved in abandoning her personal truth. Basically, it will be a worse feeling situation than the one she is already in. So, remember this… To do shadow work and not make decisions and not take actions in alignment with what you became aware of (or transformed) is to ask for a painful escalation of the situation you are already in.
It is perfectly understandable if you are afraid of making changes. Some changes are scary and painful, no matter if you know that they are the necessary precursor to having the life you want. They are even more scary and painful if you aren’t sure if the changes you are being pointed towards by your shadow work will make things better or worse. But caretake that fear, rather than let it make you passive. Because for the vast majority of shadow work, different decisions and different actions must be taken as a result of doing it. The shadow work will not change your life for you.
So, you may be wondering, why is it worth it to do shadow work, if I have to follow it up with action in order to experience improvement? Let me give you just a few reasons. First and most importantly, if you were to make decisions and take any action before becoming aware, you are doing so without necessary information. This means, you would be making different decisions and taking different actions. And not conscious ones. And that would lead to results you do not want. The second is, shadow work changes your perspective. And a different perspective equates to a different life experience, so shadow work can change your life experience in and of itself. The third is, you can heal things within yourself. But your outer life must not be a contradiction to those things you internally heal. Basically, your outer life needs to reflect the changes you make internally for you to be in-alignment. The fourth is, doing shadow work does change your energetic vibration. And this means, it does make you a match to different people, places, circumstances and things. But alignment is a big part of vibration and action is a part of the picture of alignment or lack thereof and therefore vibration.
Shadow work and action based on the shadow work you do go hand in hand. They are a married pair. So, make sure that your shadow work is followed by congruent action. And watch your life experience truly shift.
