Shadow Work Guide
How to Navigate the Unconscious
“In Jungian psychology, we generally define the shadow as the personification of certain aspects of the unconscious personality, which could be added to the ego complex but which, for various reasons, are not. We might therefore say that the shadow is the dark, unlived, and repressed side of the ego complex, but this is only partly true. Jung, who hated it when his pupils were too literal-minded and clung to his concepts and made a system out of them and quoted him without knowing exactly what they were saying, once in a discussion threw all this over and said, “This is all nonsense! The shadow is simply the whole unconscious.”
- Marie Louise von Franz “Shadow and Evil in Fairy Tales”
During a recent Q&A on my Instagram, I was asked “What are the steps to integrating the shadow or a particular archetype?”
Admittedly, I was a bit reluctant to answer this question. Working with the unconscious is rarely formulaic. Further, as with many of Jung’s concepts, we’ve gotten into a habit of overly concretizing and simplifying the ideas for the sake of brevity and accessibility. This in part may be due to the lack of clear instruction from Jung himself. Rather than provide practical how-to guides, he offers us a framing by which we can begin to understand the nature of the psyche.
So we are able to read his ideas about the unconscious and the shadow. We see how he tracks these phenomena through the personal and collective spheres. How it is present in works of alchemy, mythology and dreams. We are given examples from his own clinical practice. We have a theoretical framework, but it begs the question —How can I actually integrate my shadow?
I shared the quote above from von Franz to highlight a few points:
The shadow is much more than the hidden or repressed parts of ourself that have yet to be integrated into consciousness. The entirety of the unconscious is itself shadow. The archetypes, our psychological instincts, are, at their core, inaccessible and unknowable. The images of our dreams are constructed in the underworld of psyche. Our emotions and beliefs are influenced by parts of ourself that we cannot seem to access.
This means that we must tread carefully. We may be unable to see the voracious energy of an archetype constellated in our life. We have a blindspot when it comes to accessing our dreams. We are likely to reject any assertion that we have projected something unowned in ourselves onto another. Our shadow is dancing behind us constantly, evading capture.
Thus, we must resist the desire to make a system out of this work. It is deeply nuanced and manifests uniquely for each person. What works for one individual may not for another. What is constellated in your life may never be constellated in another’s.
And yet, I find this question (that of how to integrate the shadow) an important and challenging one. To make this work real, we need some form of structure. So rather than offer, “10 steps to integrate your shadow!”, I offer this instead.
Four guiding principles by which to approach and work with the unconscious.
Confront the Shadow
“It is a therapeutic necessity, indeed, the first requisite of any thorough psychological method, for consciousness to confront its shadow.”
- C.G. Jung, “Rex and Regina” CW 14
After a long period of unconsciousness, the confrontation heralds the promise of change. It often comes in a simple form: awareness of the shadow’s presence. We begin to notice our repetitive patterns and the compulsions we can not seem to break. We have an inkling that something is not quite right, that our attention is being called to someplace that is hard to grasp. We may notice how our conscious will becomes hijacked by something more powerful.
Parts deep within the psyche begin to break through. And possibly, for the first time, we are able to catch a glimpse of the shadow. At this stage, we are often woefully unprepared to handle working with the unconscious material. Rather than springing into action, we can focus on naming and being present with the experience. Mere acknowledgement is the first small step in gaining a steady foothold.
To locate shadow in your life: Look to behavioral patterns, somatic dysregulation, restrictive narratives, compulsive actions, etc that seem to undermine and overwhelm you.
Ask those you trust: Where do I seem to struggle most? What is something that you have observed about me that I am struggling to overcome?