S2 Ep 63: Unleashing The Shadow Work with Melissa Kim Corter

Listen in as we explore what the shadow represents and how these aspects can manifest in our relationships and behaviors . If you are new here , you're listening to the how we Get Through podcast , a place for you to feel connected through deep and meaningful conversations with healers from all over the world .

I'm your host , jen , a licensed therapist and founder and CEO of the how we Get Through app , and my mission is to bring you affordable and diverse therapy resources to help you get through the hard stuff , all in one place and at your own pace . Welcome to the how we Get Through community . Hello , and welcome back to the how we Get Through podcast .

We have a magical one today . We have Melissa Kim Corder to the show . Welcome .

So depth psychology also kind of embraces this idea , and a lot of the roots of depth psychology come from the work of Carl Jung , a little bit of Freudian influence , a little bit of James Hillman . So there's lots of different influences , but Carl Jung was probably the most pivotal , especially when it comes to shadow work .

He was the one that actually coined the term the shadow self and essentially this hidden part of us that we explore .

We do this through dreams , we do this through the use of a story , storytelling , we do this through paying attention to synchronistic moments and events and basically tracing patterns within the psyche , through human behavior , through creativity , in order to understand that hidden part of us .

So we call it the shadow self , but essentially it's sort of like this field that is just beneath conscious awareness . So it it isn't inherently bad , it isn't inherently good , it's actually kind of a neutral . I think of it as like a containment , you know , a field that holds things for us , that's deeply connected to our psyche .

And so what happens in shadow work , through adept psychological perspective , is we access the shadow through moments of paying attention to behavior , to our triggers , our reactions , dreams again , synchronistic moments and the idea is that we can learn more about the hidden part of us , the unconscious side of the personality , through the shadow .

Shadow because it kind of sneaks through in moments that are surprising , shocking . You know , you might have had a moment where maybe you said something and you heard yourself say it , but you couldn't stop it and you're going . What is going on here ? Why did I just say this terrible thing or this amazing thing ? Right ?

So sometimes the shadow also works on our behalf .

What I love about depth psychology is we value the shadow as not just a negative thing or this part of us that we don't like , which is a part of what the experience is , but also parts of the unmet self , parts of us that we've yet to discover skills , gifts , talents that just yet haven't integrated or manifested through our wholeness of our being .

I was like a totally weird kid , like most of us , right Like weird stuff , weird movies I was watching like the most terrible things at a young age , like horror movies and like I remember my father even getting in trouble because the Shining was on TV . I think it was like five or six years old and he was just .

He wasn't like condoning my behavior , but he just happened to be in the room and my mother walks in , is like what is she watching ? And he was just a little like oh , like surprised , not really what you know , realizing what's on TV , but those kind of things , you know it's yeah , it was harmless , but it was still things that made other people uncomfortable .

I really think people thought this was going to be a phase for me . You know , like I was going to be drawn to these things and kind of grow out of it . Not necessarily make a career out of it , but really it was that curious nature , not necessarily make a career out of it , but really it was that curious nature . I like to describe it to people .

Like you know , I would play these games where you maybe relate to this too , where I just wanted to know , I wanted to expose the hidden side of things . So in the woods , I would like flip over stones . And I noticed at a young age this interesting thing that would happen .

There's this sense of anticipation that could have fear , like what's under there , right ? Am I going to see a snake ? Or like a cute little mouse ?

Now , at the same time , I detoured down this road for many years of getting involved in terrible things , all the wrong stuff , you know , addictions and substances and hanging out with people that were just I won't call them terrible or bad because we were all just misguided to a point but that created this detour , this escapism right , this disconnect from the self

. And when I trace it back now doing the work that I'm doing , I recognize that I had a hypervigilance , I had a deeply in tune sensitive nature , that I didn't know what to do with and other people around me didn't know what to do with . don't have to feel these things . I don't have to know these things .

I don't have to be this sensitive , this intuitive . None of this was conscious , yeah , but when I look back and I reflect , I can see where that curiosity has led me . Everywhere that I've gone , and also falling into those traps , getting involved in all the right , the wrong things , in a sense , was part of the path too .

So there's this um and there's other layers that come in to play with that story some very intense moments . I've had some really bizarre experiences around um , deaths and murder and and things I don't go super deep into . I'll spare all the graphicness of that wait wait , can you tell one ? story . Oh , I can tell all the stories .

I just don't know how sensitive people are to those kind of things , but I have lots of stories . There were multiple serial killers in the area where I grew up . And there were body parts and things that were in the area that left me Like here's the main story .

Yeah , when I was 14 years old , my mother sat me down and she totally could tell like I'm getting involved with just , I'm starting to party , I'm starting to sneak out of the house , I'm just , you know , I'm doing all the wrong stuff .

And I think she thought she was going to sit me down and tell me a story that was going to set me straight , but instead it just opened this door . Oh my God . She tells me this story . It says listen , I need you to be be careful . There's bad people in the world right there's not so good things happening .

They found body parts down the road you know from this murderer , this serial killer , and instead of being terrified and being like , oh my gosh , you know I'm never gonna leave the house or I'm gonna be careful , I'm like serial killer . What happened ?

like what would set somebody on that path and then I became obsessed with wanting to understand the dark side of the mind .

So that weird situation it turned out it's this famous serial killer called the Iceman I grew up in on the east coast and this guy was convicted of five murders but responsible for over 200 deaths , and he just happened to have this one victim placed miles from where my home is .

I was the last house on this dirt road and so that whole experience along with I would see sense and feel energy and things in my home I couldn't explain , else could , and so I sometimes felt like I was conversing with people that had passed . I had weird experiences so there was a natural curiosity already .

But then she tells me this story and now I'm like , because I here's the other weird thing about this I played another game , told you , the one game like flipping over the stones , but the other game is detective , and I started really young with this . I pretended I was a detective and I was convinced I was going to find a dead body at a young age .

And um , so when she tells me this story , that was one of the first flashes I had , like this is your chance right , like why was I playing that game ? is it because I was tuning into something was ? it a natural curiosity , and I still don't know the answer .

But the idea is , all of these things fed this curiosity and helped me gain interest in this hidden part of things that makes people uncomfortable . But I didn't have that same discomfort for the same reasons . In fact , it led me to want to believe the personality , the persona that we see .

But if we trust our instincts , so we really sink into our knowing , our intuitive nature , there's other things that's trying to alert us to say , hey , something's off here .

And so that's kind of been the background or the backbone of my story and my experience in wanting to help support other people , whether it's recovering from moments where they did fall for an experience , a person , a situation , especially narcissistic individuals . I talk a lot about psychopathy for that reason too .

It's not about shaming ourselves for getting it wrong , but how can we cultivate a sense of self ? So we start listening to those signs , to those feelings , instead of deciding to make our decisions off what we see , if we can shift a little bit more into what do we really feel beneath the surface .

So that's where depth , psychology and the hidden parts of things really comes alive , in a way to teach us in symbolic forms , in intuition , sensations and things of that nature .

But do you think at that age it was like I have to kind of this feels so big , I have to keep trusting it , or I'm like so excited like you have to keep going down this road , like it doesn't sound like you ever strayed from it , no matter what was happening .

it ? My mother . She's been gone for a long time now , but when I was young she knew she saw it in me .

She also had her own deep feeling empathic nature super sensitive , so she saw it in me and she would always kind of use it against me , like it's the worst thing ever when you're a teenager and you're sneaking out and you're doing things and your mother knows .

They really did an amazing job and they weren't necessarily connected to their unique individual , what I would call soul or deeper self , I feel like there was a lot of avoidance of emotion or the extreme of completely overwhelmed by it . So there was a lot of mental illness .

There was a lot of like bipolar disorder and all these different things around growing up like and layers of this . It wasn't just like one relative , Right , it's all these different figures , that kind of was in a family that make this up . And so me , I would go to the woods to escape all of it . I felt things so deeply that you know some people .

They can be in a space , in a room and right , there's an argument or something going on and you feel that tension , you feel that stress and you're overwhelmed . Your nervous system is just . You go into fight or flight . You don't know how to process these moments ? Mine was like that , but in stillness , in silence , no fighting , no fighting , no communication .

So everything . I felt was reading between the lines of what wasn't being said , what wasn't being expressed and that to me , felt just as big and loud as outbursts of anger . Or , you know , different things that clients have shared with me , that they've experienced and so I would retreat to the woods . So , there's something about being in the woods .

That was sort of a training ground for me to hone in on that sensitivity . So , even though it wasn't necessarily nurtured in the household , do a little bit . Little bit of that . But more of that training started with being in the natural world , like just having more premonitions , more moments .

There's something about just leaning against a tree , sitting on the earth , the smell of pine trees , deer , animals there were so many animals around . And there's something about that environment that I felt so at home and at peace with that .

It fed me , it nurtured me and somehow simultaneously opened me up , because in the same woods where I'm connecting , I'm developing .

Well , because we were the last house on this road and they've made movies about this road too , by way . So the road is called clinton road . It's in new jersey , it's . It's in all of these weird new jersey magazines and all this stuff .

There's so many folklore , ghost stories and tales and real things that happened , yeah , but because we were that last house before , like almost I think it's like 30 miles of woods . If there was an accident and if they were on you know a certain side of town , they'd come to our house . So there's tons of people that would show up at the front door .

I have memories of people covered in glass and blood and just coming to the front door to use the phone , some of them freaking out in shock , some people yelling , some like wandering in shock in the front yard , like it's very disorienting to think about these things .

Yeah , so part of this , though now what I know to be true is some of us are like these little beams of light . I think we all are actually we're all beams of light . Beams of light , I think we all are .

Actually we're all beams of light , but some of us have , for whatever reason , a stronger beam , let's say in appearance , just how it looks , how it attracts . And I really feel like there's something about that house , my growing up there , those weird influences and the tensions and the different gradients of life that were going on .

That kind of made it like a little beacon of light Plus proximity of where it's located . Right , it's the only thing there . That's where people have to go . But it happened with the living and it happened with people that had passed , so there's this strange thing with that . But all of this is so . It's interesting , right .

For some it's a very like dark , sort of like freaky , eerie thing , but there's so much beauty in this , there's so much compassion that was developed . I now recognize .

Somebody asked me my definition of success last year and I would have answered this , like with some measurable thing in the past , I would have been like oh it's , you know , we've made this much money or we've done this much these many achievements . And now my definition of success is that people , how safe people , feel in your presence .

And so those of us that have experienced these different types of darkness and shadow and intensity , even things that come off like really twisted and weird . We have a choice we can let those things consume us and become more of that in the world , or we can let it birth this deep compassion and sensitivity to hold safe , sacred space for others .

That's how I see it .

I see all of the tragedy , all of the trauma , all the difficult things as intuitively developing skills , gifts and talents within me to help situate me in other people's lives , not in a guru way , but just more of like guiding , I can recognize this , I can resonate with that , I can relate , I can understand , and that's helped me be more efficient and effective

in communicating and listening to people when it comes to the work , so there's always a way to .

I don't think it's about making something positive , but I do think that we can find meaning which feels a little different .

It's just sometimes I talk about like the thread , you know , that pulls through to here and it's what you're doing right now .

You know , and I and I think it's very important , especially now where there's a lot of fear , there's a lot of dumb shit online , there's a whole lot of like negative things , and so , again , what your work is is just this beautiful , like neutralizing the scary things that we can make up or that we can co-create . Right , and how can it be helpful for us ?

How can it be healing ? Because there is no light without dark .

And he's like you need to , you need to get into that kind of a thing , and we had this beautiful conversation . What it came down to was saying light is born out of darkness , and darkness isn't negative , bad or evil . Think of it as a blank canvas . Right , it's an incubator . It's a space that can be profound beauty , like , I think , of the night sky .

There's still stars sometimes right or like when we have the presence of a new moon versus a full moon . Full moon's beautiful , it's vibrant , it lights the way it illuminates everything . And then the new moon .

We can't see anything , we don't see this vibrant presence , but we know it's there , we feel it , we sense it and we're still guided by it and I think it gives us the opportunity to cultivate an inner sight versus the full moon . We're sort of captivated by its beauty externally .

So I think there's this dualistic nature in darkness in itself , that can be beautiful and powerful and potent in a space of incubation and healing and depth . And at the same time , if we're avoiding things , if we're not feeling them , if we're not dealing with them , I do think those things can start to fill in that space .

Similar to if we're only focused on the light , if we're only looking at or we're trying to force , let's say , positive things into being , we're suppressing on some other level , and it's a powerful thing to consider that what we suppress only gains more power , power .

So if we can take things that make us uncomfortable and make them conscious , they have less power over us , and that's part of what I feel . Like you're speaking to this transmutation , this shift , this transformative act , and often what I find is even some of the most terrible , frightening things are often a lack of information .

Right , we might not be well-versed in that area , it might be new or different for us . Most of the time when we get a little bit of information , we start to feel safer . So this is another weird thing about studying terrible things that people have done . I started to see patterns , and I know I'm not the only one .

I've researched a lot of what other patterns have already been made , connected right to others . In fact , I wanted to be a criminal profiler with the FBI from like I didn't know what it was . But that's what I wanted to do at a young age .

But what I've learned from all of that is things that on the surface and don't get me wrong , not saying they're not terrible or horrific , and we shouldn't glorify the people that have done these things and we can learn from what has been done to see why we go off the rails . What is it about that ?

And something interesting about depth psychology is we sort of educate and inform around the different parts of the psyche , so we also will help people recognize , like okay , you have a persona , that's what this means . We have an ego , that's what this means . And the ego always catches this like it gets this bad reputation for being this terrible part of us .

When , really , if we don't have a healthy sense of ego , we can be deflated , we can be fragile , we can crumble right . If somebody looks at us the wrong way , it's like oh my gosh . Or who we are , our identity , not to the like in a , when we have too much of that , we become narcissistic and what they call is inflated .

But when we have a healthy ego that we've worked on , we've developed it , we've cultivated it , we have better boundaries you know the ego is so important in all of this . You know , the ego is so important in all of this when it is sensitive and fragile .

We're actually under greater influence of the hidden parts of the unconscious , which is more compulsion , so we might react a lot of what we're seeing in the world right now playing out .

So , studying some of these terrible people I don't want to call them terrible people , but just say , let's just say , individuals that have done unfathomable acts we start to connect the dots and see that the role that trauma plays brain development , all these different things , the role that trauma plays brain development , all these different things , and it can give

us insight into what happens when we are not developing the self and the ego and the persona and we're not trusting that intuition and that instinct . And there's so much we can learn about things , and I don't think we all have to study these intense figures in order to get it , but I think we can study ourselves .

Something else that Carl Jung said and I deeply resonate , is studying your own darkness helps you understand the darkness of other people , and so we're willing to look a little closer at our own behaviors , patterns , habits . We all have blind spots .

There's going to be things within us we can all see , but it can give us this sense of compassion and empathy that I think we've been struggling to find and I say we , I just social media world you know the online world , all the things I'm experiencing . I think we're losing a little of that and I think we have to reclaim some of that , our tolerance .

We become very polarizing and on one hand it's like a messy toddler . Right , it's like a little kid , that's like I'm going to use my voice now and it's like , ok , that's good . And next level is like let's rein that in a little and remember that our feelings aren't the only ones . How do we all kind of like you know ?

So I think there's a lot that we can learn from the shadow side , the darker side , for doing difficult , dark , unsettling things . It's more about what can we learn from the way energy flows within us , how these intra-psychic parts of us engage ?

In fact , your shadow is also the part of you that will sometimes step in when you haven't had the courage to do something yet so you'll almost find yourself saying or do something that seems out of character in that way and you'll go like where did that come from ?

where did that random courage or you know whatever , come from and it's almost unsettling , a little bit like I don't recognize that part of myself . It's there , it's just so deeply buried right within the psyche that we're learning to draw these things forward , to access them more and more .

I was like , I trust my light and I'm grounded in my dark , like and just this kind of like this up , I'm going up , I trust my light and I'm grounded in my dark and again beautiful this holding both and being able to see the whole picture .

And I think when you talk about like serial killers and and even just people on social media and all the things like people with power , there tends to be a part of them that they hate so much right that then they ridicule or murder or right , you know , trying to kill off and someone else yes , exactly , and so that again is like that .

that dangerous part of not acknowledging our own shadow is where are these parts of ourselves that we are seeing in other people that we are ostracizing or that we are criticizing or that we are envious of ?

And this could be like from somebody I don't know having a really good body and exercising and like really good with their health , or somebody who is murdering gay people . Because , like Dahmer , exactly , exactly . It's a spectrum around that .

And again , it might be around the spectrum of how much can you love yourself or how much can you love these parts of yourself to then love other people .

It's difficult to know what's happening , but when it comes to the shadow and working on these parts of us by looking at what we avoid , there's a medicine there , right there's some type of something for us there and I'm actually writing about this right now , but in in watching some of the footage on the Dahmer situation , one of the reasons it's so gripping and

it really gets to us is , beyond the obvious things that have occurred . We want to understand , and we can't always understand why something happens , but I do think where our point of power is in moments like that or experiences like that are in those small details that are right in front of us .

Who's to say that if law enforcement and this has already been proven in public and came out around the time , but let's just say individuals in law enforcement had a better relationship with themselves ? they likely then wouldn't have fallen for some of the things that really triggered and activated them .

So their fear of otherness , we can call it , whether someone is , you know , their sexual preference or orientation , whatever it is . When it's not of what we identify with , we might consider it otherness , something outside of right . It's not good or bad inherently , but some people are activated around that process and that was huge .

And so then what happens is the perpetrator exploits that quality . So then we get away with things now , because we know they're not going to look here , they're not going to do this , they're not going to touch this with a 10 foot pole . They want no part of this .

So if we can even just take that idea and if it makes you uncomfortable to think about you know the reference to the murderer , serial killer take that away and just think about things in life where we're avoidant and the damage that can cause .

I do believe these things happen , not that situation , I'm not speaking to that , but more in general these patterns appear so we can catch ourselves in these moments

. In depth psychology , the other thing that we tend to believe is that the psyche is self-regulating . The psyche is self-regulating . And just like the nervous system is self-regulating . In the right conditions we can harmonize . We can have a sense of we might call it emotional intelligence .

We might feel balanced , we might feel that we're not in control but able we have a different capacity to be with experiences , so the psyche is self-regulating too , and what happens that we misidentify when it comes to the shadow in this part of us is we feel discomfort or tension and instead of recognizing this is part of the psyche , introducing something to say

we need this tension this tension , this resistance , whatever this is , is going to create growth and expansion . Here we're conditioning ourselves to get out of tension , to run away from it , to escape it , to avoid it , to reject it , to deny it , and then we place it on other people . We don't do this consciously . This is why it's called projection .

We will place this on a canvas outside of ourselves . And so if we look at these individuals that have done these things , sometimes it helps us , because they're exaggerated forms of a pattern . You know , we may not be dealing with Dahmers in our household , in our community , in our neighborhoods thankfully , right , that's an anomaly situation .

It's not as common , but we do have these micro patterns that can be related to , which is when we are not willing to confront our darkness .

It will be placed on a figure , it will be projected on a figure , and then that figure will become a scapegoat , holding all the things we're not holding for ourselves , all the things we don't want to see in ourselves , all the things we don't want to feel . And we're not saying that the scapegoat is a hero or , yeah , a positive figure .

They're unlucky right . It's like they're the containment of something . Now , for a lot of us , the healthy , the fun version of the scapegoat is the black sheep right .

They step out of a framework that's no longer suitable for the family or the situation , the community , the government , whatever it is . They start breaking down those things and unconsciously this is my favorite part of this they've been chosen by the family itself .

The family or the entity right , the body of people , whatever it is , might be shaming them , casting them out , saying they're terrible , they're evil , they're wrong . They might be projecting all the heavy , intense , terrible things on this figure , but on a deep level , on a soul level , they're like thank God you're here , this has to end .

I tell people I'm adopted . I'm just kidding .

Only because I feel like and this is just a personal preference , it's nothing against the work there are so many people that don't yet have the discernment within them to recognize that what's happening is still of this lifetime , and once they can be with that , then I feel like past life regression is it's , it's more helpful , but there's a lot of people that

want a reason to not feel that are trying to escape this life and I noticed this pattern with some people I was working with and I've done some past life regressions where I was like oh my gosh , that was just amazing . And I , just everything in my fiber of my being , was like that was real .

That was a real experience and I started to notice people would come in and say things like I can't figure out the source of this . It must be a past life to notice people would come in and say things like I can't figure out the source of this . It must be a past life , I'm like sure that's , of course , a viable possibility .

And is it also possible that you push this material back down into the unconscious because it was too much too big ? Right ? Trauma is too much too soon , right ? The nervous system is overwhelmed by whatever material experience is happening , and we can then push that back down .

And so what I found is that some people it actually was enabling this escapism kind of thing they had going on , and I don't always feel it has to be like okay , you know , something terrible happened to you , that you just haven't you know , there are moments , for sure , where that happens , but I started to kind of not really step away from it but gravitate

more toward how can I keep bringing people to the here and now ? and I think that's part of what shadow , what is so appealing to me about shadow work ? Because sometimes there may be regression happening of other lifetimes for sure , but if I can keep them anchored in this one , that will unravel itself through process .

Because sometimes giving someone too much of a new story or more information for the mind , too much of a new story or more information for the mind , back to that fragile ego , they may hold on to that as a sacred truth and then start living from that place and being like , well , I was the queen of whatever .

You know , why do I have to go work at Target or whatever ? It is like ? You know what I mean ? I'm kidding , of course , but there is some thing like that going on where I started to get really frustrated , not with the client , I don't blame them .

I think these industries personal development , spiritual , like I'm deeply embedded in all these different industries and I think sometimes we unknowingly nurture some of that . We pitch it as connection with an angel or a guide or some other divine being , and I do believe in all that too . But I think that's healthy when we've already developed a sense of self .

Otherwise it's just a means to not be here , to not feel the difficult thing . So I'll just admit I have a little bit of a uncertain relationship when it comes to that at the moment .

I'm not against it and I'm not saying I won't come back around and revisit that work again but during this season of life , I just feel like my emphasis has moved to how do I help people be here when they just want to be anywhere else because they don't know what to do with it all .

really too . It's just too ungrounding and then you've lost the plot , you've lost what you're supposed to be working on .

I was just so curious because when you were talking about , like the family and the scapegoat and black sheep and sheep , not sheep this idea of like this past life or that we have been doing this before or in this life , this is what we came to do and so again , like kind of allowing yourself , it's for me , my past life regression was like adding things to

who I already was , and then there were some confirmations of some things and then you know , I was like a fairy and then there were some confirmations of some things , and then you know , I was like a fairy , you know , like well , Maybe .

And at the same time , if it's drawing you a place where where you are avoiding things and that's hard , I think for any it depends , I mean , therapist is a little bit different you'd be like I think you're avoiding this or let's look at this . You know , yeah , but in a past life regression it's like you're , it's just a different tool .

I just really appreciate that perspective of like what are , what is this for for you right now .

It's another perspective around this that I , that I tend to really believe , which is when people think that they're experiencing something , whether we believe in it or not , on some level it is real to that person so that's a very sacred sort of approach also which is like , even if someone doesn't believe in past life regression , that doesn't make it less real

for the individual . So there is this sort of like way of approaching it where , even if someone is avoiding or even if someone is really struggling to deal with something in the present moment , it doesn't mean to dismiss the past life potential . Deal with something in the present moment . It doesn't mean to dismiss the past life potential .

But I often will try to see where are they really solid in their belief of this , because I don't have to agree but it makes it real for them . And that perception is influencing and affecting that person . So if we can work on that perception we can unwind all sorts of things , not change it but just sort of unwind it .

Yeah , a great example of this , even just outside of past life regression , is the work with individuals who believe they have , they have curses or they believe right in demons and things of that nature . I personally , have not experienced that and I don't want to .

It's not something I'm excited to like venture into , and I have worked with clients that have believed that they've had these things placed on them or they're dealing with this kind of a thing , and what I learned is like the greatest thing I could do for that person wasn't to question their judgment . Of course you make sure .

Does this person need some type of support ? That's outside my expertise , you know . Are they schizophrenic , Are they whatever ? Of course you want to eliminate those kind of things , but most of the time it isn't those kind of things .

It's something very real that that person is experiencing , and so one of the greatest gifts we can give them is to believe them and we don't have to believe in the reality of those things to help someone feel heard .

Because , sometimes that opens the door to wherever the healing can come about or the shift , and sometimes it's not healing but maybe just a process is unfolding , yeah . I feel like a person can kind of like drop down of like okay , I don't have to convince someone right , less defense maybe , or you know , yeah , yeah , something like that .

It's , that's important . So that is something I try to do too . So , even if I like , but I have to be careful because I'm very expressive . So part of me is like , did I just roll my eyes ? Like you know I have to do too , so , even if I like , but I have to be careful because I'm very expressive . So part of me is like , did I just roll my eyes ?

You know , I have to be careful , like some of that , some of the stuff I've heard , I'm like really , but then I'm kind of like you know who am I to say there's a lot of people who also would not believe the things that were very real to me , that were happening , that were very real to me that they couldn't fathom or didn't see or didn't experience .

So I tried to remind myself of that in these topics that are a little edgy for some , to to kind of venture into to say I don't know . I don't know if it's real or it's not real . But what I do know is I know human behavior and I know that't know if it's real or it's not real .

But what I do know is I know human behavior and I know that when somebody believes it's real , it is .

I've worked with people who are more academic or scientific , or you know like just different , different types of individuals and their unique approach to healing and altered states of consciousness , and I really think that also helped me to say I don't really know anything about anything .

And I think curiosity again is such an important element that can help us , and if we approach somebody else's dilemma or situation with curiosity , they feel that it's like you just said that drop , like the drop of the defenses they settle in , and we don't know how important that part of the process is for them .

That could be doing so much more of the work than whatever we end end up saying to the person , right ? Just by letting them feel safe , letting them begin to have this space where they kind of start to unfurl in their own way . And there's so much going on beyond what we see , what ?

We sense what we feel that I trust , which is kind of funny because it's less tangible but , but I trust it .

So that's just the first thing to know , because sometimes , even though it can feel overwhelming , if you're feeling that overwhelmed because you have the capacity for it in this , in this type of way . So the first thing I recommend to people is to create something called the darkness journal .

I used to have this closet that I would go into and there was clothing everywhere so it but was a sound buffer and . I would write in or record in that space . But I would also go write in my journal because sometimes when you're writing , you're expressing and you don't realize like your vocal everything wants to open up .

Um , so as you're writing , you might're expressing , and you don't realize . Like your vocal , everything wants to open up . So as you're writing , you might start saying things . You might have emotion coming through . You might find yourself ranting and raving . The idea is to not censor , and people are afraid of this .

They're not just afraid to see what's in them that spills out on the page , but they've also been conditioned . Some people have been conditioned I was one of them to think that you only need to focus on the positive well , you know , they start thinking about law of attraction .

They start thinking about all of these different things like , oh , I mustn't go there because then I'm creating that . You're liberating yourself from it , you're not creating it when you have a space that you can put all of this stuff in .

You're actually going to redistribute that energy in healthy ways , because you're no longer pushing it down takes so much energy to push all of that down . So the darkness journal is just a great way . There's no agenda . You can just write your mood at the top of the page , the date , whatever it is um you don't ever have to show someone .

Yeah , you just let it out , curse . I say curse , spill the tea let it go just whatever it is and let it get dark and ugly say the things that are just . Here's the thing that the ego's role is is um mitigating our personality in a sense where it's it's the acceptable things of how we can fit in society .

Right the things that we should say the roles we have how we should be , so your darkness journal is the opposite of that it's like no , it's not appropriate to just walk up to the mailman and punch him in the face for getting your stuff wrong every day . But that doesn't mean you can't put it in your journal and go full force into it .

Yeah it's like , and I'm not condoning violence , but I'm just saying we all have the potential for violence and violence usually is misdirected rage . So if we can take our rage , our anger , the pent up emotions , whatever it is , we give it a space , it no longer rules us in energy and body and mind . So that's the first thing .

Second thing this is really intimidating and difficult , but it's quick and it works . And it's not actually difficult . It's a challenge . What you need and this might be the hardest part of the process is you need to find someone , and it's got to be somebody who already knows you , A friend , a trusted friend . I wouldn't do this with a parent .

I wouldn't do this with a child . You can do this with a spouse or partner . Yeah , you just have to have a really solid relationship to do this practice . I did this with a friend and it was extremely liberating , but you have to have a relationship with this person where they know that you have no question , they have your best interest .

And it's amazing because the good friend will be honest and they're likely slipping something positive .

Might make me uncomfortable , but that's the point I need to see what I can't see . And the first thing she said was I don't think you recognize your value charge and you really want to be liked and loved and appreciated and yet you don't value yourself .

You've worked really hard , you've done whatever she said , you've done the things , you've done all of this and that blah , blah , blah , and yet you still seem to not quite value yourself . And it hit me like a ton of bricks because I knew it in my bones .

So , when we have things in the shadow , we may not know it logically , but when somebody reflects it to us , oh man , we feel it . There's a resonance . Sometimes that's the trigger . Sometimes it triggers us because we know it so deeply and don't want to don't want to see it .

But there's also a beauty in that , because I was able to go oh my gosh , this person saw that so clearly , which means everybody else can too . And there's this moment where you feel extremely vulnerable and you go oh , I thought it was hiding this right , or I didn't really , and they can all see it .

It's the same way we can watch a celebrity who we've never met , we don't know their life , we're not in their business , and we can watch them repeat the same crappy behavior from a distance and go oh my gosh , they're in another bad relationship with another person doing the same thing of the thing they just got out of and millions of miles apart and you can

see it so clearly . So it's the same kind of thing that our shadow is something that we can not see , we can only feel , we can experience in moments . But if we go to a friend and have that kind of a dialogue and you don't have to say three things , you might just say tell me one thing to break the ice , tell me 10 , 10 things , yeah .

And if you really want it , if you're nervous , you can do the same thing with a positive quality . You know , tell me something about myself that you see in me that maybe I don't appreciate in myself is another approach and you'll be surprised . I've shared this with clients .

I've given it to them as homework , yeah , and I mean they've hated me for it when I assigned it . But then what came back was just like really profound emotional realizations , and it's the simplest thing we can do . We ask about what's right in front of us .

So , those are two different ways to work with the shadow , very different approaches that really still kind of get into that territory where we have those blind spots .

But do you think it's also beneficial to get a perspective , even if you kind of have an angling because there might be something else ?

It was like I feel that too , thank god , and it's almost like there's some settling of emotion or the perception and hearing that but yeah and I think that the more we work on ourselves and we develop that healthy sense of ego , the more we are in touch with deeper parts of our being .

So it can feel less mysterious , for sure , to have that sort of feeling like , yeah , I do have an inkling of what I think they might say it's likely from the growth , the work you've done , the you do right your life and all of that . So it's a beautiful thing .

And another way to go about it is just look at the stuff that activates you for no reason . It's like I know people who are like the most incredible people and then all of a sudden you get in the car with them and I'm like who are you ? Where did you come from ? Who is driving this beast ? Because you are not the same person that I recognize .

Right , like we all have , like we don't all have to have that dynamic , but there's things or there's parts of us . Sometimes it's the subject matter .

I know some people that are the most courageous , just confident , amazing , but then you ask them about some taboo subject or something and you see them almost kind of collapse or shrink within themselves and it's like , oh wow , that's I didn't expect . Then that can be shadow too . The that we can feel , small we can feel , you know .

The word that comes to me a lot when I describe these kind of things is inadequacy it's such a difficult thing to feel . We just had a really great conversation with some family members and while I was talking to my son and I think I can say this , he'll be okay with it how old is he ? You know , we've told him his whole life and it's so true .

He's brilliant , he is a brilliant child , he's gifted , he's always been in gifted programs and things and just always stood out to his peers and teachers , and that wasn't always easy , though that came with a lot of other things .

The challenge with intelligence at that age , for that kind of chunk of your life , is when something comes into your life and you don't get the answer right away or you don't know how to reason or analyze your way through quickly , and that can be really difficult for people that consider themselves highly intelligent or a high achiever or whatever it might be .

It's almost like a kryptonite for them . It's the shadow part of inadequacy where you're so used to having this pattern of I can figure that out . People come to me to answer the thing , or I always know the solution .

And then all of a sudden , if you don't , instead of somebody else maybe , who not even lesser intelligence but just has a different relationship and maybe it isn't as focused on the mental realm of their life , might just be like oh , I've got to sit with that . You know , I've got to figure that out , I'll let it come to me or somebody else .

It takes them out , it cripples them , it paralyzes them , they can go into a freeze response , and so it's interesting to think about how shadow also affects us through our senses , through our personality traits .

In Jungian psychology we work with typology that's rooted in these four senses , which are intuition , feeling , sensation and thinking , and so we're usually hardwired for one of those dominant sensation or senses , and then we have a secondary that's also usually pretty powerful for us , and then there's the others that can be an influence , but we sometimes have to work

on them , so someone who's very active in mind might not trust their intuition . Someone that trusts their intuition might struggle to think through a specific detail , so there's often things like that , but what I found is the shadow . For people that rely on thought , rely on thinking strategy , their shadow is going to be an intuitive feeling or a sensation .

That could actually trigger . What is that ? I don't feel right , I don't have feelings or I'm not in touch with my emotions , that can be their shadow side . Where they're out of touch with that , it's almost like it's split off . So we also can fragment within ourselves . We can have these divides , these gaps , and so part of shadow .

The self-regulating aspect of the psyche is healing and mending that fragmentation within us by looking at these things , adjusting these things . So we had that conversation with our son about you're smart and you're this and you're that , and it's probably really uncomfortable when you're faced with something that you can't immediately figure out .

Yeah , and I love about him because he's also developing intuition , as he recognized it and so I was like . It isn't always . It doesn't have to be something that takes you out in shadow . It can be something that emerges to help you . So it's sort of like a sense that comes out of shadow . It's like being born .

We would also call this like integration of a part of us that comes from that dark , unknown space . We can attune ourselves to the unknown and find , not always comfort , but at least acceptance of the unknown , and not try to push through it , not try to force our way out , but to see what is this incubation space got for us , what is it offering us ?

There's usually something incredible that wants to happen , that's outside of the mind , that needs to come in . But if the ego is trying to dominate and control everything , it can push away these opportunities , push away the solutions that actually want to rise up from deeper within us , beyond what the ego can even see .

So the shadow is a beautiful way of accessing those different parts and yeah , as you mentioned , it isn't always shameful , hateful , disgraceful things . That can be part of the process . But it's also when you see someone and you go oh my gosh , they just I love how they speak .

It's so effortless and they articulate these things so beautifully and I just wish I could do that . That's your shadow saying you're . You're drawn to those qualities because you have them within you . You just maybe need to accept them , develop them , hone them .

So our projections aren't just what we aren't willing to see in ourself in a negative way , but also who are we becoming . You know what is possible , what can we start to believe and allow that to flourish and develop through shadow also ?

So when you talked about the like fragmentation , I was like , oh my gosh , that feels like me right now . It's like I'm aware of that and I'm just going to put it here or it's going to . It just leaks out sideways because I'm not putting it in front of me and saying what does this have to offer for me ? Yeah , outside of those times .

You know I can't , I can't do that in the , in the moment , but outside of those times . And so I love the idea about the journaling . I love the idea about asking someone . When you were saying that , my friend that I would ask texted me . I was like okay , perfect synchronicity right the moment's alignment exactly , melissa .

Okay , I need to have you on because I need to talk about dreams and fantasy stuff um , yes , I know we just like went on all these beautiful tangents and we love it , it goes everywhere , but there's so much to talk about yes , because I feel like this is like step one . it like , okay , what is this ? Um ?

But for people listening , can you tell them where to find you , how to work with you , what you got going on ? Sure ?

I just started a new podcast and I've been working on a sub stack , which is for those of you that are new to that . It's a writing blog kind of a platform , and so the sub stack is my favorite thing . For all of these parts we're talking about my favorite thing for all of these parts .

we're talking about , like , yeah , even parts of myself that I'm learning to embrace and acknowledge are going in there sharing these darker stories and experiences and all of that um . So it's really the thing that just lit up my world right now is writing on that platform and I do have a free um option , you know , for subscribers .

You can get , I think it's like the first 200 something words , and then there are some free articles .

You can dip your toe into some of the weird , interesting , dark stuff without a huge commitment .