The Places I Didn’t Want To Look

There’s a moment in any deep inner work—especially shadow work—where the question shifts from “Why is this happening to me?” to “What part of me is participating in this pattern?”

It’s not an easy question.
It’s not meant to blame or shame.
But it is meant to interrupt the cycle that says all our pain is coming from the outside.

Shadow work asks us to look gently, but honestly, at the ways we’ve contributed to our own suffering.

Not because we deserved it.
Not because we caused it all.
But because somewhere along the way, we internalised strategies, beliefs, and ways of being that now keep us stuck—and hurt.

For me, this inquiry has looked like noticing the part of me that overextends and then resents it.
The part that says yes when I mean no.
The part that abandons my needs because I’m scared of being too much, or not enough.

And when I stay with those parts—when I breathe with them, listen to them, even speak with them—they don’t ask to be fixed.
They ask to be seen.
To be understood.
To be brought back into relationship with the whole of me.

That’s the heart of shadow work.
It’s not just about uncovering what’s hidden.
It’s about welcoming it home.

This isn’t the same as self-blame.
This is self-responsibility with softness.
It’s holding the complexity that yes—hard things happened to you, and yes—parts of you responded in ways that made it harder.

And those parts were trying to protect you.
They were doing their best.
The work is in seeing those strategies for what they are: learned survival patterns.
And slowly, over time, choosing something different.
Not from force—but from awareness. From compassion.

This is the deeper layer of healing most people skip.
It’s less glamorous. It’s harder to explain.
But it’s where the real shift happens.

When we stop only looking outward.
And start asking: How have I related to my pain? How have I participated in this loop?
And what would it look like to meet that part of me with something new?

Sometimes healing looks like crying on the mat.
Other times, it looks like quietly admitting, I’ve kept myself here.
And then choosing to soften.
To forgive.
To begin again.