Our shadow parts are the parts of ourselves that we hide from the world that we deny or do not know are even there. These are the parts that we learned did not serve to help us survive, or that we believed were shameful. The shadow parts developed to protect us from psychological and physical threats.
Without these, we cannot be our authentic selves, but a divided facsimile of what we think we should be. To achieve liberation, all our parts need to be set free.
There are parts of ourselves we are proud to show the world, our acceptable aspirations, accomplishments, and strengths. We want people to hear our overcomer stories. The person we want other people to see, we show and share freely.
Sometimes these parts are more aspirational than true, but what we actually show is what we think other people want to see. We show them the bright side of our lives, while hiding other aspects in the shadows.
In the shadows, we hide the resentment, fear, desires that make us uncomfortable, disappointment, choices we regret, thoughts we do not like. We also tend to hide joyful parts that we believe are unacceptable, embarrassing desires, goals and dreams that outside sources have made us believe are unachievable or silly to even want.
To avoid shame, embarrassment, humiliation, and ridicule, we hide these parts of ourselves into our deepest shadows and often forget they even exist. Thus, the hardest person to be completely honest with is ourselves.
That's where Step 4 begins.
We commit to the fearless examination of ourselves, what we reveal and what we keep hidden, our strengths and weaknesses, our desires and disappointments, our accomplishments and resentments, and our ideas and fears. We shine a bright light into the shadow places and see what they reveal.
This is not a moral inventory. It is not about finding character defects or shortcomings. We begin a deeper, inner exploration of all our parts, to bring them into the light with compassion and curiosity.
A paraphrased quote of Carl Jung states, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” Our shadow parts have directed our lives, kept us stagnant, and continues to drive us to destruction. We have called it bad luck, fate, the universe, or the divine’s will.
This step is not to condemn or judge ourselves for past behaviors or mistakes. We are not trying to create another identity built around everything we have done wrong. We just need to look, to see, to tell the truth. We are looking for revelation, insight, and awareness.
There is no need for commentary, excuses, or punishment. Seeing ourselves honestly is liberation. We cannot intentionally embrace, change, or repair what we refuse to see.
Walking through a dark room, you might know there are things around you, but you do not know exactly where they are. You move cautiously, bump into things, and react to things you cannot see. Then the light comes on and illuminates the space.
The room has not changed. Your relationship to the room has changed. Looking at our shadow parts does not have to be scary or unnerving, especially if we approach it with curiosity rather than trepidation.
We start by accepting that we are not always the person we believed ourselves to be. But, honestly, we probably already knew that.
There is often resentment underneath anger. Resentment that builds up over a long period of time, but we say we are fine, no problem.
We feel fear, often of responsibility or loss; we are afraid of success. Success means we have more expectation, more responsibility, and it exposes our insecurities of being seen, known, and discovered for the fraud that we are
We feel the need to control our circumstances or our narrative, but we would rather outsource our control to the external because control is too much responsibility. So, we blame others. Responsibility means if something goes wrong, we are ridiculed, ashamed, and embarrassed, if not fully guilty of causing distress or pain in others.
We desperately want to connect, we feel lonely, but then actively isolate ourselves.
Often, we criticize others because we have a hidden insecurity about ourselves. We make fun of people who are doing what we want to be doing.
We have strengths we never recognize. We have courage, compassion, creativity, persistence, and the ability to love.
If we are not succeeding at our goals, it is often the result of our shadow parts.
Consider that whatever we say we want out of life, there is an opposite part that does not want it and will sabotage us from getting there.
We have to be willing to see the whole picture. We realize the power of liberation when we see things as they are, not as we wish they would be. Temporarily set the commentary aside, and think about your life, what you want, and how you want to proceed.
What is actually happening? What do you actually feel? What do you actually do to move in the direction you want to go?
What are you actually afraid of? What do you actually want? How do you plan to move in that direction?
We can only make wise decisions from reality. We are not trying to banish the shadow parts, only to bring them into the light. The shadow parts exist to protect us; they do not know they are hurting us.
There is tension between the shadow and the light, but we can learn to live in the space between the two. We can learn to pay mindful and compassionate attention to the shadow, thank it for the work it does, and reassure it that we are okay.
Our goal is integration of the shadow and the light. To bring them together will make us whole and complete. Even the parts of ourselves we have struggled to accept can become part of our authentic selves.
Shining a light into the shadows is about courage with compassion. We may not always like what we find, initially, but we can learn to accept it as it is.
The truth is often inconvenient, but hiding from the truth has a cost, too. There is something deeply freeing about finally being able to say: This is me, all of me.
The authentic self emerges, it reveals what was always there.
We shine a bright light into the shadowy places—not because we hate what we will find there, but because we are finally ready to know ourselves.
