Inner Child Shadow Work Exercise
Everyone has a shadow. It automatically develops as your mind associates all the good things about yourself into your ego, and relegates all the not-so-great things into your unconscious. The majority of shadow material develops while we’re children, as we internalize what our parents, teachers, or peers teach us is right and good, or wrong and bad.
Because the shadow is unconscious, we cannot directly see what’s in our shadow. But we can start paying attention to the times our shadow pops up. It does so in various ways, e.g. emotions we’d rather not have like jealousy or rage, character traits we’d rather not have like laziness or procrastination, dreams we’d rather not have like hurting our colleagues or cheating on our spouses, and projections we don’t realize we’re making like judging other people’s life choices.
These instances can really derail our life and lead us to say and do things we later regret. If they go unchecked, we can even develop neuroses, clinical depression, or anxiety disorders. To get back conscious control over ourselves, we have to become aware of and ideally integrate that shadow material, so our unconscious doesn’t take over.
Last week, I posted a detailed video about the background, explaining Jung’s map of the psyche, how to find your shadow, and how to make your unconscious conscious:
Today, I’d like to share a specific exercise protocol that I learned from Dr. Connie Zweig. Let me know how it works for you.
Spend a few minutes in a mindfulness practice, e.g. meditation, breath work, or journaling, to arrive in the present moment.
Practice self-observation
become aware of the times you’re in the grip of a feeling, or not acting like yourself, or are triggered by someone else’s behavior
ask yourself, is this my shadow?
notice your thoughts in those moments
notice your feelings in those moments
notice your physical sensations in those moments
Personify your shadow
imagine your shadow as a being comprised of your thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations
give it a name and an image
notice what it is saying - how do you feel when you agree with it?
notice what it is urging you to do - how do you feel when you obey it?
Acknowledge and address it
gaining that little distance will help you realize that you are not that thought, feeling, or physical sensation.
gaining that little distance will help you realize that the shadow character is a part of you, but it is not all of you. It is not your true self.
Try this out with your inner child character.
The inner child is a powerful shadow figure, because its beliefs have been with us literally all our lives, so they can be extremely stubborn and difficult to shake. Not that our parents wounded us on purpose; if they didn’t do their own shadow work, they more than likely simply passed on what they received from their parents.
Let’s say Lisa grew up with overly critical parents. Over time, Lisa internalized their words and actions, and pushed her innocent child into the shadow, hiding it under a blanket of loneliness, fear, shame, and helplessness.
As an adult, these same feelings can be triggered by a thoughtless remark or during a conversation with her lover.
Lover: “Hey, can we make sure to stack the dishwasher from the back?”
Lisa: “Now what, you’re saying I can’t even stack the dishwasher? I can never do anything right for you, just do it yourself then!” (and slam the door for good measure.)
Something happens that unconsciously reminds her of her childhood experience, she then gets mad at her partner and blames them, although it’s her own wound that’s lashing out.
What are the repetitive thoughts here?
For someone with an overly critical parent, the thoughts might say “I’m not good enough. I’m sure they’ll leave me. I can’t do anything right. I’m so useless, I’ll die alone.”
What are the intrusive feelings? Can you name them?
How about feeling attacked in the first instance, but then scared, hurt, angry, and ashamed.
What are the physical sensations?
Lisa probably felt her cheeks flushed, a tight chest, and her neck hairs stand up in panic.
How is this for you?
Take another deep breath, and see if you can meet your own inner child.
Can you identify it, give it a face? Who does it look like?
Is it a lonely child, abandoned child, criticized child…?
When you find it, address it, out loud if possible.
Tell it, “I see you (name), I hear you, I love you, what do you need?”
In that way, you recognize it as a character and a part of you, but your consciousness is clear that your inner child is not your whole self.
Observe it and address it in the third person as though it was a separate being. Talk with it, get to know it, and trace back all its experiences over the years.
Go as far back as you can, and figure out what the needs were at the times this shadow character was created. Did it need to be held, heard, complimented, or shown love in a particular way?
How can you meet those needs now?
Addressing your inner child in the third person allows you to bring in a conscious aspect to it.
Meeting your inner childs’ needs in this way will stop it hijacking your mood, and you’ll be much better able to manage relationship conflicts without feeling attacked, and without lashing out in tantrums and outbursts.
