Embrace the Shadow Aspects of Self for Transformational Healing

To live fully we must commit to truly knowing ourselves. It's not difficult to remain aware of the parts of ourselves we feel good about but that results in knowing a mere fraction of ourselves. Truly knowing ourselves follows our willingness to come to know the parts of ourselves we have stowed deeply away and our commitment to reintegrating those shadow parts into the conscience Self. 

Harnessing our Wholeness

Integrating and accepting our shadow parts into the self is a powerful step toward harnessing our wholeness, an essential stepping stone toward self love and transformational healing.

Deeper self-awareness arises when we shine a light upon our shadow self and courageously observe and account for what and who we find within our depths. 

What Are Our Shadow Qualities?

Shadow qualities are characteristics of ourselves or behaviors that we have come to disown or reject.

 

How do aspects of ourselves become shadow parts?

In childhood, we may have been ignored, belittled, abandoned or had other negative experiences. Not only were these experiences impossible for you, as a child, to understand but they caused you to have feelings of fear and shame. Children attempt to manage their feelings of fear and shame by establishing beliefs and stories that they perceive will help them to make sense of events.  These experiences taught you that to be loved you must hide the part or parts of yourself that you perceived caused you to be ignored, ridiculed, laughed at or abandoned. The painful experiences were lessons that served to instill within you who you can and cannot be, what roles you may and may not adopt and what you can and cannot do if you want to be accepted and loved.

Shadow beliefs are stories we tell ourselves over and over again, committing them to unchanging truths.

Examples of shadow beliefs are:

I'm not good enough.

I'm not enough.

I don't deserve to be taken care of.

I'm unlovable.

I'm unworthy.

 

These beliefs hold immense power over us until we reject and eliminate them.