5 Shadow Work Mistakes to Avoid

Shadow work is the practice of making the unconscious conscious.

This means, becoming aware of our negative habits and how they are limiting us, but also our positive aspects that we’re not appreciating or expressing enough.

A lot of people forget that shadow work involves the latter, and that is where they tend to make the most ‘mistakes’ with it.

In this article I want to go over mistakes we make while practicing shadow work that can be easily remedied, and how to go about it in the most balanced way possible.

What is shadow work?

First a little introduction before we get to the main part. What exactly is shadow work?

Shadow work is a term coined by psychoanalyst Carl Jung, it describes working with the subconscious mind to uncover hidden aspects of our psyche.

Why might we want to do this?

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it fate”

-Carl Jung

This is the quote that I feel best describes the point of shadow work. If we are not aware of something important in our psyche, it will rule our lives without our knowledge.

As humans we are incredibly resilient, we can go through trauma, heartbreak, grief and come out the end in one piece. However, not all negative experience leave us unscarred, and often when we have been hurt, we want to pretend it hasn’t happened.

There are also wounds that we genuinely forget about – they get so pushed back into the subconscious mind, that we have no recollection of why we feel a certain way, but we certainly see the effects of it.

For me, a big shadow recently (in the last few years) has been anger. I’ve never been known as an angry person, but more and more I found myself getting incredibly frustrated and that would manifest as anger.

I would express this in my words; I have had a very critical inner-dialogue and would push that outwards.

At first I didn’t want to confront this, I even pretended it wasn’t happening. However, I realized that not being known as the angry person was one of the reasons this emotion was coming up now.

There were so many years where I was, and then allowed myself to be, a complete push-over. I had no boundaries, and would just follow instructions to a ‘T’.

A lot of people saw this a good thing. Essentially, pushing certain emotions in me down.

As an adult I can understand this anger in the context of boundaries I didn’t know/weren’t allowed to set, and I can do that now with a lot of wisdom.

When we do shadow work we improve our own wellbeing, but also cause less harm to those around us.

Shadow work pitfalls

Shadow work is a great tool for learning to appreciate and understand our ‘dark side’ but it does have its pitfalls – as do most things.

1. A hyper-negative focus

I have been doing shadow work for the last few years, and at first it was incredibly heavy…no real surprise there.

But the more I’ve gotten into it, the more I have been able to maintain a positive focus too. Shadow work creates balance, and eventually we’re no longer doing shadow work as a separate ‘thing’ but as a part of our day to day life.

When shadows come up organically, we accept them and work with them. But we’re no longer focused on just the shadow.

At the beginning of your journey you can expect quite a negative focus, so tread lightly and bring focus to others things when you need to.

Just make sure you don’t sit with just the negativity over the long-term or become too fixated on it.

2. ‘Everything is a shadow’

The first pitfall of shadow work is the tendency to view every negative thing in our life as a deeper, insidious shadow.

We start to over-analyze every little thing we do, think, say and it really just creates more confusion.

The point of shadow work isn’t to go on a hunt for our shadow (for the most part) but to honestly face the shadow as it comes up in day to day life and consistent introspection.

Online we see this on social media where almost everything is being labelled a ‘trauma response’. Well-meaning information from therapists, psychologists etc. ending up watered down for likes. Context is important.

There’s a funny paradox here where we have to take things seriously, but at the same time allow ourselves to lighten up – try to find a happy medium.

3. Isolating yourself

There is a time for isolation, especially during a spiritual awakening or healing journey. However, a lot of the time we revert to isolation as a defence mechanism.

When we start shadow work, really any practice that makes us more self-aware, we are more likely to be triggered. We’re aggravating so many heavy memories, emotions and energies in the body for the first time.

We start to get more sensitive to our own shadow and other peoples’ as an extension. It’s a good idea to take some time away so that we do no project this onto others.

However, over the long term, finding community is incredibly important. It’s not helpful to retreat into a hermit mode everytime we are triggered or everytime someone annoys us.

Isolation is part of this journey but it is not the default. Don’t fall into the trap of believing you have to be perfectly healed or balanced to have community.

4. Superiority complex

Yes, shadow work can create a superiority complex. Similar to what happens after a spiritual awakening, when we come to new awareness it can feel imperative to let everyone in on it too!

When we see people acting in ways that are obviously influenced by their shadow, it’s difficult not to immediately point this out – but remember, everyone is here to learn their own lessons.

In order to keep our shadow work balanced, it’s important to realize that we’re not trying to eradicate all of our shadows (that’s not possible) or get rid of every human fault, inclination and mechanism.

We’re going to have defence mechanisms because we are human, we feel – that’s what we’re here to do. We’re also not here to heal every single thing that happened to us.

Shadow work allows us to find acceptance and balance amongst the negative experiences, and appreciate our positive experiences more. But it is not as an escape from our human condition.

5. Not seeking support

Not every shadow we hold is our own.

We develop shadow through conditioning, we take on shadows from friends & family, we also have the collective shadow.

Shadow work can become something we do in order to prove we can ‘do it all’. We can confront it all, face it all, heal it all. However one of the biggest shadows we might face is being receptive to help, guidance, support!

Receiving help from others simply means we understand our capacity, and make good use of the tools we have. A lot of shadow work practices are individual, and no one can heal or save us, but they can certainly provide a non-judgemental space for us to do so.

In conclusion

The word ‘mistakes’ here is just an easy way to translate this idea, it’s important to take these ideas in with discernment and apply your own intuition to them.

Approach shadow work with awareness, that yes you can make ‘mistakes’ but this isn’t something to be hyper-focused on either, just gently aware of. Striking this balance is difficult at times!

Allow your shadow work to be a reminder of where you require more love, rather than another way to be heavy on yourself.

What has your experience doing shadow work been like?