How to use 5 tools to Work With & Activate Your Inner Shadow
How to Use 5 Tools to Work With & Activate Your Inner Shadow
Shadow work is not a buzzword. It’s a deeply personal process of meeting the parts of ourselves we’ve learned to suppress, reject, or exile. Sometimes these parts look like fear, envy, shame, control, or self-sabotage. Other times, they show up in patterns we can’t seem to break, no matter how much we journal, manifest, or meditate.
For me, the shadow didn’t come up during perfect quiet moments. It came up when I was triggered, when someone said something that felt like a tiny cut but bled for days. It surfaced in my defensiveness, in my people-pleasing, in my need to be seen as “good.”
I didn’t realize I was in a cycle until I stopped trying to be spiritual and started trying to be honest.
Here are five tools that helped me not just understand shadow work, but actually begin to live with it, and integrate it — one breath, one reaction at a time.
1. Mirror Journaling (Seeing What Hurts to See)
I started writing the things I didn’t want to admit. Not in a pretty journal. Just raw, often on a messy page. It usually started like this: “What am I avoiding right now?”
Sometimes it led to:
- “I’m still angry about that thing that happened two years ago.”
- “I say I want peace but keep going back to chaos.”
- “I envy people who seem effortlessly confident.”
The power of this tool wasn’t in solving the feelings — it was in letting them exist without editing them. I called it my shadow journal. It didn’t make me feel better immediately. But it made me feel real. And that was a start.
2. Somatic Tracking (Let the Body Speak First)
My therapist once asked me: “Where do you feel that in your body?”
I didn’t know how to answer. I had spent so long intellectualizing my pain that I forgot it lived in my chest, in my throat, in the way my shoulders clenched when I tried to smile.
Somatic tracking helped me stop performing healing and start embodying it. I would pause, close my eyes, and simply ask: Where is this living in me right now?
And then: What does it want to say?
Sometimes the answer was an image. Sometimes a sentence. Sometimes a memory. But it always felt more true than my thoughts alone.
Somatic experiencing, developed by Peter Levine, supports trauma healing by helping people reestablish a connection with their bodies. Learn more.
3. Dialogue with the Shadow (Give It a Voice)
I learned to write dialogues between me and the part I didn’t want to claim.
For example:
Me: Why do you keep showing up when I’m trying to be calm?
Shadow: Because you’re ignoring how angry you really are.
Me: But anger makes me feel like I’ve failed.
Shadow: You haven’t failed. You’re finally listening.
By personifying my shadow — whether it was a wounded child, a raging protector, or a scared teenager — I gave it permission to speak. And in doing so, I could begin to integrate instead of exile it.
This practice is rooted in Jungian psychology and parts work like Internal Family Systems (IFS). It reminds us we are not one self but many inner parts, all seeking safety and belonging. Explore more.
4. Talisman Jewellery (Wear What You Want to Remember)
During a particularly hard season, I stopped feeling safe in my own body. I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t sleep. I was always waiting for the next bad thing. That’s when I started wearing a small talisman necklace — not for fashion, but for anchoring.
Each morning, I would pause before putting it on. I’d hold it in my hands, breathe slowly, and whisper, “Today, I choose to return to myself.”
The weight of it against my chest reminded me throughout the day: I had chosen intention. I had chosen presence. And even if I forgot for hours at a time, I could return to that simple act.
Talisman jewellery, when worn with intention, becomes more than a symbol — it becomes a sensory cue. A psychological anchor. Like a thread you can touch when everything feels tangled.
Read more on how talismans support nervous system regulation.
5. Archetype Reflection (Shadow as a Role, Not a Defect)
One of the most liberating things I learned is this: The shadow isn’t a mistake. It’s part of a larger pattern. A story. An archetype.
Tarot cards helped me see this. When I pulled cards like The Devil, The Tower, or The Moon — I used to panic. But eventually, I started seeing them as invitations. The Devil wasn’t about punishment. It was about reclaiming power. The Tower wasn’t destruction. It was clearing what was never true.
So I started asking: What archetype am I living right now?
What lesson does this chapter hold?
Instead of saying, “I’m broken,” I began saying, “I’m in a Tower phase.” That shift gave me space to grow without shame.
You can explore archetype work through tarot, myth, astrology, or depth psychology. It helps contextualize what feels like chaos — and frames it as part of a larger transformation.
Final Thought
Shadow work isn’t a single ritual or revelation. It’s daily. It’s humbling. It requires tenderness and truth at the same time.
But when you stop trying to bypass your shadow and begin to befriend it, you’ll find a deeper kind of peace. Not the peace of perfection — but the peace of self-acceptance.
Let these tools guide you gently back to yourself. Not to fix you — but to meet you, fully.