Carl Gustav Jung, father of analytical psychology, which is a branch of psychology that tries to understand the human psyche by exploring the elements between the conscious and unconscious mind. It emphasizes the need to integrate part of the self especially the hidden part to achieve balance and wholeness. 

Jung in the book "Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self" does a deep analysis of the importance of doing our “Shadow Work” to really discover who we are. 

‘Shadow Work’ is a practice that focuses on exploring and then integrating parts of ourselves that we have repressed or denied that now are hidden in the shadows. The shadow of our psyche is considered the ‘dark side’ of our personality. It is formed by the negative emotions or things that we reject of ourselves such as rage, desire, fear, anger, and other feelings and thoughts, that we have repressed, or found unacceptable or embarrassing. 

Although shadow doesn’t necessarily mean bad or negative things actually can be gifts, potential and talents as well. Is it simply a way to describe whatever is not conscious, is not seen or known, but hidden in the deepest part of our mind. Once we bring these hidden aspects into conscious awareness, we allow ourselves to grow, to accept ourselves and to live in balance within. 

Shadow work can be done in multiple ways. You can use tools like journaling and when you write about your thoughts or feelings you can pay attention to what might be a recurring pattern or strong emotional responses. You can practice meditation and therefore observe and identify your thoughts especially the hidden type. Another one is to recognize triggers, therefore when a situation, person or behaviour stimulates a strong emotional response you can see what has triggered you and explore that thought more and more. Another important one is to analyze what you dream, especially for recurrent dreams. Another element to explore more your shadow personality is to identify what you project, whenever there is something that you criticize or dislike in others it might be something that you don’t like about yourself. 

Remember the external reality is a mirror of our internal state. 

Another exercise to integrate the shadow is done by imagining that you are engaging in a dialogue with parts of yourself that you consider hidden or negative. Will be like having a family conversation within you, within all the aspects of your personality, and trying to communicate and reason among all of you.

This specific technique in therapy is called the ‘Internal Family System’ (IFS). Once we can see that our mind has multiple parts and voices, personalities and roles, we can see it as a family system and once we start to understand how to communicate within us we can heal our wounded inner part. Have you ever noticed that your personality might be divided into small, different ones, an emotional one, a strong one, an extroverted or introverted one, a lazy one and so on? This is all part of you and yourself. The way to go is to listen to each single part of you, to accept them all and to integrate them into your awareness. The secret is to not judge, to not repress or block those parts of you, let yourself be honest and vulnerable and part of your development.

Think of yourself like a prism with a full spectrum of personality that needs to be integrated in harmony and balance to finally fall in love with ourselves. 

“A man who is unconscious of himself acts in a blind, instinctive way and is in addition fooled by all the illusions that arise when he sees everything that he is not conscious of in himself coming to meet him from outside as projections upon his neighbour.”

Carl Jung

Once we understand the power of the subconscious mind we can focus on exploring these hidden depths. By bringing unconscious material to consciousness, we can uncover the root causes of our behaviours and emotions, allowing us to break free from the repetitive cycles of the past and create more intentional, present-focused lives.