Claim Your Dark Side to Change Your Life for the Better | The Seven, Episode 15
In Episode 15 of The Seven: Living with the Planets, Lucy Baldwin explores shadow work, magic, unconscious patterns, human complexity, and the power that becomes available when you stop pretending you are only the parts of yourself you approve of.
Shadow work is not a side topic in magic.
It is essential.
Magic works through the unconscious. It communicates through symbol, ritual, image, desire, fear, embodiment, and hidden inner material.
So if there are parts of you that you refuse to see, those parts still participate in the magic.
They still shape your choices.
They still influence your relationships.
They still affect your money, your desires, your habits, your rituals, and your ability to receive what you want.
The shadow has power because it is hidden.
Shadow work begins when you become willing to look.
Watch or listen to Episode 15 of The Seven here:
Key Takeaways
In this episode, Lucy explores:
why shadow work is an essential part of magic
how the shadow gains power when we refuse to acknowledge it
why owning your rage, manipulation, pride, or darkness does not make you a monster
how unconscious patterns create repeated loops in relationships
why humans are animals with instincts, impulses, and contradictions
how social rules and identity rules create shadow material
why self-control is limited, not infinite
how shadow shows up around money, habits, receiving, and visibility
why responsibility is different from self-blame
the golden shadow: the good, loving, powerful parts we also refuse to own
a simple starting practice for finding your shadow
Magic and Shadow Work Belong Together
Magic is not separate from the unconscious.
It depends on the unconscious.
A ritual does not only speak to the rational mind. It speaks to the symbolic mind. The body. The hidden parts. The unspoken desires. The fear. The longing. The archetypal layer beneath ordinary thought.
That is why shadow work matters so much in magic.
If your conscious mind says one thing, but your unconscious is organized around something else, the ritual may reveal the conflict.
You may ask for love while hiding from intimacy.
You may ask for money while refusing to be seen.
You may ask for success while clinging to an identity built around struggle.
You may ask for freedom while staying loyal to the old rules.
Shadow work helps bring the hidden material into the light.
Not to punish it.
To integrate it.
What Is the Shadow?
The shadow is the part of you that you have made “not me.”
The part you refuse to identify with.
The part you hide from others.
The part you hide from yourself.
It can include qualities you judge as ugly:
rage
jealousy
manipulation
neediness
violence
laziness
pride
selfishness
cruelty
dependency
But the shadow is not only dark.
It can also include your golden qualities:
kindness
beauty
power
generosity
creativity
innocence
deep care
leadership
brilliance
Sometimes the most unacceptable thing is not your darkness.
Sometimes it is your light.
The shadow is whatever you cannot yet claim as part of you.
Why the Shadow Has So Much Power
The shadow becomes powerful because it is unconscious.
If you cannot see a pattern, you cannot work with it.
If you cannot admit a part exists, you cannot negotiate with it.
If you cannot acknowledge your rage, your rage may run you.
If you cannot acknowledge your manipulation, it may show up indirectly.
If you cannot acknowledge your pride, it may silently shape your choices.
Denial does not create purity.
It creates blindness.
And blindness gives the shadow room to act without your participation.
This is why shadow work is not dangerous in the way people fear.
Refusing shadow work is often more dangerous.
Owning the Shadow Does Not Make You Evil
Many people are afraid that if they admit to a shadow trait, they will become that thing.
If I admit I have rage, I will become rageful.
If I admit I can manipulate, I will become manipulative.
If I admit I have violent impulses, I will become dangerous.
But the opposite is often true.
When you refuse to acknowledge a part, you lose influence over it.
When you can name it, you can relate to it.
You can contain it.
You can redirect it.
You can ask what it is trying to do.
You can choose a different way.
Owning your monsters does not make you a monster.
It gives you a chance to stop being unconsciously run by them.
Humans Are Animals
Part of shadow work is remembering that human beings are animals.
We have instincts.
Bodies.
Threat responses.
Impulses.
Needs.
Dominance patterns.
Fear.
Territoriality.
Desire.
Aggression.
We also live in a society that insulates many people from the harsher parts of animal life: death, danger, violence, survival, bodily reality.
That insulation can be a blessing.
But it can also make us forget what we are.
We become shocked by our own instincts.
We imagine we are too civilized to have them.
Then those instincts go underground.
Shadow work brings us back into honesty.
Not to indulge every impulse.
To stop pretending we are made only of manners and ideals.
Social Rules Create Shadow
Every society has rules.
Some are useful.
Some are arbitrary.
Some are oppressive.
Some support social cohesion.
Some protect people.
Some simply teach us what must be hidden.
Then each person adds their own rules:
A good mother never loses patience.
A spiritual person is never petty.
A successful person always has it together.
A magical teacher must always be magical.
A good partner never resents anyone.
A disciplined person never breaks routine.
The more rigid the identity, the more shadow it creates.
Whatever does not fit the role gets pushed away.
But pushed away does not mean gone.
The Problem With “That’s Not Me”
The phrase “that’s not me” can be useful.
Sometimes it helps us clarify values.
But in shadow work, it is also a clue.
The things you are most certain you are not may be the exact places to investigate.
I am not manipulative.
I am not needy.
I am not selfish.
I am not angry.
I am not prideful.
I am not controlling.
I am not cruel.
Maybe.
But maybe those qualities exist in you in subtle, indirect, socially acceptable, or situational ways.
Shadow work asks:
Where might this be true?
How does this show up in me?
What would I see if I stopped defending my identity?
Shadow Patterns in Relationships
Relationships reveal shadow quickly because another person reflects your behavior back to you.
If you respond the same way every time, you tend to get the same loop.
The same argument.
The same resentment.
The same tone.
The same collapse.
The same fight.
The same withdrawal.
When you change your response, the entire dynamic can change.
But first, you have to see your part.
Not in a self-blaming way.
In a responsible way.
What tone do you use?
What energy do you bring?
What do you assume?
What role do you enter?
What do you refuse to hear?
What do you do when you feel talked down to, dismissed, criticized, ignored, or controlled?
Shadow work is how you begin seeing the pattern that has been seeing through you.
Shadow Patterns Around Money
Shadow also shows up around money.
Not only in obvious ways.
It can appear in:
spending patterns
avoidance
not checking accounts
not canceling subscriptions
not asking for raises
not applying for better work
not receiving help
not noticing opportunities
feeling too proud to accept support
feeling like a failure when you need help
feeling unable to handle being seen
Money is not only practical.
It is symbolic.
It touches worth, safety, power, receiving, responsibility, status, shame, and desire.
So of course money activates shadow.
If your financial magic is not working, it may not be a magical failure. It may be an invitation to look at the hidden beliefs, identities, habits, and avoidances around receiving, holding, and using money.
Responsibility Is Not Self-Blame
Shadow work can be misunderstood as:
Everything is my fault.
That is not the point.
Responsibility is not the same as blame.
You do not need to take on other people’s cruelty, dysfunction, or harm.
You do not need to excuse mistreatment.
You do not need to confess everything to everyone.
In fact, much of shadow work is best done privately at first.
The point is not to become a martyr.
The point is to become honest with yourself.
Where is my power?
Where is my participation?
Where am I repeating something unconsciously?
Where can I choose differently?
This is not self-attack.
It is self-reclamation.
The Golden Shadow
The shadow is not only made of monsters.
It also contains fairies and angels.
The golden shadow is made of qualities that are good, beautiful, powerful, loving, or luminous, but still disowned.
This can happen when someone is so self-deprecating that they cannot own their goodness.
They cannot own their beauty.
They cannot own their care.
They cannot own their power.
They cannot own the fact that they matter.
For some people, claiming the golden shadow is harder than claiming the dark shadow.
It can feel safer to be flawed than magnificent.
Shadow work includes both.
Your darkness.
Your light.
Your whole self.
A Simple Practice for Finding Your Shadow
Start with the qualities you are sure are not you.
Make a list.
For example:
I am not selfish.
I am not controlling.
I am not manipulative.
I am not needy.
I am not vain.
I am not cruel.
I am not weak.
I am not powerful.
I am not deeply loving.
I am not brilliant.
Then choose one and ask:
Where might this actually appear in me?
How do I do this subtly?
When have I done this before?
What do I get from pretending this is not mine?
What would change if I could own this without becoming it?
This practice is uncomfortable.
That is part of why it works.
It dissolves the false story of the self and makes more of you available.
Shadow Work Makes Magic Stronger
Magic is personal evolution.
Magic is not only getting a result.
It is becoming more conscious.
More whole.
More able to participate in reality.
If you keep falling into the same patterns, your magic will keep running into those patterns.
Shadow work changes the person doing the magic.
That is why it matters.
You are not only trying to cast better spells.
You are becoming someone who can receive, hold, and live the thing you are asking for.
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Lucy Baldwin (00:02.702)
Hello and welcome to another episode of The Seven Living with the Planets. I am Lucy Baldwin and today's episode is all about shadow work. So the truth is that when I teach magic, I always incorporate what I'm talking about today, shadow work. I always incorporate it into all of my programs because I actually think that this is an essential piece of the puzzle. Also, arguably, arguably...
Magic is shadow work. Magic is arguably a form of shadow work because shadow work is all about working with the unconscious, though specifically the part of our unconscious that we are ashamed of, the part that we are hiding from ourselves, really. And the thing is with the shadow that it's called the shadow because we can't see it.
Right? We can't, we are, it is the part of us that we other to such an extreme degree that we essentially refuse to acknowledge its existence. And this is why the shadow has undue power over us. And this is where with magic, we can use magic to unravel the shadow. We can use magic to reclaim parts of ourselves. I wouldn't say that all magic is shadow work, but certainly it can be.
shadow work and I like to explicitly use magic to do shadow work and use ritual to communicate with that part of ourselves and unlock pieces of ourselves. So let's get into it. The first thing I want to talk about is why it is that the shadow is so powerful. Why it is that this part of ourselves has undue
consequences if we don't resolve it. Because I've been in this world for a long time and what I've seen is that people always are scared that if they own their shadows, if they own and accept the parts of themselves that they've been ashamed of, the parts of themselves that they don't want to be parts of themselves,
Lucy Baldwin (02:28.332)
that they will become those things, right? It's like we're afraid that if we acknowledge, if we admit, if we own our rage, that we will become a rageaholic. You know, we're concerned that if we admit to ourselves that we can be manipulative, for example, that we will become a manipulator. And so I think one of the most important things that I want to convey here is that it is actually by not admitting those things,
that you lose power, you lose the ability to have any say in it whatsoever, right? It's like if you just deny the existence of something, that does not make it go away and it actually puts you in a position to have no negotiating power, let's say. Like you can't negotiate with that part. You can't...
If you can't even see it, if you can't even admit to it, if you can't even acknowledge its existence, you have absolutely no ability to contain it, moderate it, stop it, slow it down, interfere with those patterns. So when you fly into a rage and you start kicking things, if you believe yourself that you're like a nonviolent person, then
you have no control in that situation because there is a part of you that's violent. And I think there's a big piece here, which is that we live a very cushy life in a very cushy society where we are insulated from some of the darker pieces of the human experience. We are insulated from death. I think about death. I studied to be an EMT because I was fascinated with...
just like the world of emergency medicine, but also just like clean up. Like, you know, somebody gets into a car accident and you could drive by that same place on that road 10 minutes later and you will have no idea that anything other ever happened. It's like a whole crew of people just come in and make it disappear and you never have to see it. And so we are insulated from these truths, you know, and in a way we're very lucky.
Lucy Baldwin (04:48.395)
because we don't have to face death. Like we don't have to see it all the time. We don't have to face our own darkness. We're not asked to, you know, have to kill other people to protect ourselves for the most part. Like we just, we get, we have the luxury of not ever having to fear for our lives for the most part and defend ourselves from like true, like life-threatening danger for the most part.
I keep hedging because I don't know what your lived experience is. I know that I personally have never actually that's not true. I've been in a few situations that were scary and I know a lot of people who've been in situations where they feel like their life was being threatened but like you in general we're mostly insulated from that most of us have never been in a situation where we had to kill someone and so we don't even realize
We don't know if we're capable of that. We don't know what we're capable of because we haven't, most of us, been pushed to the limits of having to protect ourselves, the limits of our own fear, our own discomfort, our own... We're relatively safe in the culture and society that we live in and we're relatively comfortable.
So it's easy for us to kind of like shun the idea that we don't have those human animal instincts. We are animals, like we are animals and we forget that. We forget that we are animals. We are such weird pampered animals. And so I just want to remind you of that. And this is where, you know, obviously,
It makes sense that we have these sort of like cultural norms and cultural expectations and we hold ourselves and each other to certain standards of behavior. And we kind of go around and we do, you know, just there's so many things that we do for show as like showing that we're safe, that we're like not going to harm you.
Lucy Baldwin (07:11.137)
that we're participating in society. These are signals, we're constantly signaling. Other animals do this too. There's a term called costly signal. And that's a great example of that. The classic example of that is like a peacock's feathers. The male peacocks have these huge feather displays and it's a costly signal. So they're trying to get a mate and the mates are like, wow, that peacock must be really like...
strong and capable of survival if it can grow such beautiful feathers and still survive. It must just be doing so well to be able to do that. And we do the same thing. And it's not necessarily just for reproduction, obviously. It's for fitting into the society. And we do it for ourselves. We do it for our families. We do it for our friends. We do it for our kids. so,
I guess where I'm going with this is just to say that it makes sense that we have these standards, standards of behavior, standards of how to be. I mean, in some societies, a woman showing her hands is extremely taboo or showing her wrists is extremely taboo. And for us, showing boobs is taboo, right? But if you go to France, it's not as taboo. And so,
we sort of follow these rules in society. And we do that because it helps with like social cohesion, right? That's how everybody kind of gets along and plays by the rules. And then you can be like a crazy adventurer and like break the rules. And I'm certainly a rule breaker. Anyways, what I'm saying is
And by the way, there are obviously societies and cultures where breaking the rules can cost you your life. So that's a totally different game. And we are actually lucky enough here where I am and where you probably are if you're watching this, that we can break the rules and we don't generally have to worry about like our lives being threatened or major consequences because these rules are made up, right? We are just animals. And what I'm getting at is that we have a lot
Lucy Baldwin (09:36.587)
rules that we follow. And some of those are culturally imposed and some of them suck and we don't like them and we don't agree with them and some of them we do agree with and we do go along with and we like them. And whatever you feel about the rules, we all have also a whole individual set of rules that we follow, a whole individualized set of beliefs about who we are, about what it means to be what we are. So like
I'm a successful, you know, magic teacher. So I believe, you know, the rules that I have to follow is like, I have to live a magical life. I have to do my offerings every day. I have to do regular rituals. Otherwise, I'm not being that identity of like a good magical teacher, right? I have to show up and do the work. I have to work through my shit.
and apply the tools that I teach. I'm just sharing kind of, otherwise I think that I'm a fake or something. Or if you're like a financial coach, it's like, have to have a lot of money in order to be a successful financial coach. I have to... If you're like a trainer, it's like, I have to be skinny and fit and hot, or I have to be strong and able to lift more than whatever.
We create these rules for ourselves. And sometimes the rules are just like, what it looks like to be a mom. I have to throw extravagant birthday parties. I have to make sure my child never experiences discomfort. I have to make sure my child is safe all the time. I have to make sure my child gets perfect grades. I have to make sure that my child, like, whatever. By the way, I follow most of those rules that I just mentioned. I definitely try to keep my kids safe. And I do not throw them extravagant birthday parties.
at all. Okay. So, and I also don't, I think that it is really crucial that we allow our kids to feel discomfort, otherwise they'll never learn how to cope with discomfort. So that's my two cents on that. Okay. So,
Lucy Baldwin (11:51.297)
We have a lot of rules and basically the shadow, what is the shadow? Yeah, it's the part of us that we shun. It's the part of us that we don't accept, don't acknowledge, like refuse to, like we push it away, we hide it from ourselves, we pretend it doesn't exist. We other it. That's the best way. We other it. That's not me. I don't do that. I don't feel that. I don't have that. That's not me.
And these rules that we have, these ideas that we have about how we should be and who we should be and what we should do. First of all, they often contradict each other. like, you know, we also learn, we learn implicitly through witnessing our parents, but we also learn explicitly through what they tell us to do. So like most of us, you know, say one thing, do another, right? As parents, that's what our parents did. That's what we do as parents do, right?
this is why I make so much effort to not be on my phone around my kids. Like I can't, like I will not, I will just, I just leave it like in the other room. Like I don't want my kids seeing me just like on my phone. I never want my kids to see me scrolling Instagram basically, because then I'm demonstrating that habit for them. They're learning to do that by being around me doing it. So
This is an important thing and this is why being a mom is great because it forces me to be better than I think I would be. I think if I didn't have kids and I wasn't trying to not look at my phone around them, I would spend way more time on my phone. And by the way, I'm not perfect at this. There are plenty of things that I do in front of my kids that I wish I didn't like. Eat chocolate. There are so many things that we all do.
The point is that
Lucy Baldwin (13:53.049)
We're not perfect. But our parents taught us these ideals, like, don't do this, don't do that, but do this and do that. And then they did whatever they did. And we saw them doing whatever they were doing. And some of our parents were functional in some ways, and some of them were very dysfunctional. And that's just their experience.
And that's, you know, they're doing their best. We're all doing our best for the most part. And so I think that what happens is that I think that I know that what happens is we have these contradictory beliefs and behaviors. So we act in ways that contradict how we think we should act, of course.
We're so, you know, we're hypocritical. We're contradictory. We are complex creatures. We don't have perfect self-control. Ain't nobody have perfect self-control. Like truly, we just don't. It's not part of the human package. Okay, we weren't born with that. We don't have it. It's never gonna happen. Let it go. Okay? We don't have super good self-control. My self-control is lit. And also there have been studies. There are studies that have shown that you can actually wear down your self-control. It's like a...
It's like a muscle that gets tired. So if you use your self-control a whole bunch, it literally like wears down and then you have less self-control. It's actually really cool. The research on this is truly fascinating. But the point is that there ends up being a lot of stuff that we do that we don't even realize we do because it doesn't follow our neat
clean rules for how we think we're supposed to act. So we're just like, nope, that's not me. I'm not doing that. we have, you people talk about time blindness. We have habit blindness. We have behavior blindness. We have like major blindness to the ways that we are, the ways that we communicate. This is so big in relationships, you know, because
Lucy Baldwin (16:08.034)
with relationships, there's other people there to witness us. you know, within relationships, it's like something comes back to you. So like you put something out and then something comes back and, you know, what you receive is going to be directly related to what you put out. So, and, you know, it depends on the person that you're communicating with. But what I'm saying is like, if you respond the same way always to people doing similar things,
you're always gonna get the same response. If you change how you respond to things, you're gonna get a different, it's gonna be a completely different scenario. So like in relationships, when you get stuck in those loops of like having the same argument over and over, the same fight over and over, having the same conversation over and over, having the same like meltdown or feeling the same way again and again, if you can change the way you respond in that relationship, it will change everything. The whole dynamic will shift.
But in order to do that, have to see, you have to become open to seeing your shadow, really. But what are you doing? How are you behaving? How are you showing up? How are you responding? What's your tone? What are you saying? What's the energy that you're holding? How are you receiving that? Are you receiving it? Whatever it is, you know?
And so, you know, are you taking it on? There's just, there's so many ways that we can show up to any given thing. But what happens is we have these shadowy patterns, behaviors, ways of being, ways of responding, habits that can take over when we get triggered, right? When we get, when we're in uncomfortable situations, when
certain patterns start to emerge. So it's like that thing happens, you know, for me, it's like old men telling me, talking down to me. I perceive it as them talking down to me. And then I get like...
Lucy Baldwin (18:25.634)
I don't know the word, I guess I just become a bitch. It brings up my sort of like, know, and then that brings out this part that I don't have control over. I'm just giving this as an example. You know, it's like that part, that behavior pattern that I'm not seeing, you know, that I'm not acknowledging.
So it perpetuates the pattern, right? Because if I don't like being talked down to by old men and then they talk down to me and then it makes me behave like a little brat, well, they're going to keep talking down to me, aren't they? Because I'm acting like a child. And so I have to be able to see that. Like, I'm creating that. I'm creating that by acting like a brat in that situation. I'm not saying I do that. I'm just using it as an example.
There's so many of these and...
So shadow work is big because this also applies in a financial relationship, let's say, like our financial scenario. we might have the same spending habits where, or cycles. So there's receiving money and there's spending money and there's like budgeting money and planning. There's so much like that happens.
with money that we do where we can have certain behaviors that are unconscious, shadowy behaviors. you know, a lot of times if we have this like shadowy part of us that maybe like can't handle being seen, doesn't feel comfortable receiving help, know, pride.
Lucy Baldwin (20:23.919)
feels like a failure, like if we have insecure, like there's so many things that we could have going on in our shadow that totally normal things, nothing wrong with those things. It's not like who you are. It's just these like shadowy parts, but that could be preventing you from being able to like find a better job, be open to job opportunities that come to you, ask for a raise.
do the work that you actually want to be doing. Getting help in your job or getting the promotion or going after the promotion or playing the game to get the, like whatever it is. There's infinite ways that we can expand our financial situation in terms of receiving money. But then there's also spending money. we like, where is your money going? Some of us, have so-or-so...
gunked up around money that we can't even bring ourselves to. Somebody was telling me recently that they just realized that they had like 10 memberships that they were just paying for every month. That they had just joined years earlier and they were just like paying every month for these things that they weren't using. And I was just like, oh my God. That's the shadow. That's like there's something in the...
There's some gunk in the gears there that's not letting them turn. And when you think about the opportunity cost of that, it's like, don't even want, I don't even want to, right? I don't even want to talk about it because it's like, how many months were you paying? How much money? And how much money would you have now if that had instead gone into like a savings account, for example? And so there's just a lot.
There's just a lot that can be in our shadow and it really behooves us to investigate it. It really behooves us to bring it into the light. And I know I did an episode about if your magic's not working and it's like, well, if your magic's not working is probably one of these like, there's probably some shadowy thing going on here. And I'm going to do more episodes on this because I want to talk about existential kink, which is great practice, a great shadow work practice.
Lucy Baldwin (22:46.947)
I want to talk about being embodied. That's whole world of somatic work. I do want to mention that I have another podcast called Penetrate Radio, which you should totally check out if you're really into this shadow work side of things and if you don't already know about it. The thing is that shadow work is a big part of magic. And I did the alchemy episode a few weeks ago and I talked about solve and coagula.
Solve is like the breaking down and coagula is the building something new, right? Shadow work is kind of like breaking apart what's already there. And a lot of times that just means very simply like shining a light on ourselves. just sort of being open.
to the reality that we are capable of all kinds of weird stuff. Like we're weird and we have weird kinks and weird desires and weird impulses and we can have temper tantrums and we can fly into a rage and we can break stuff and we just don't even, know, it's okay. Like I think that the biggest thing I'm trying to convey here
just circling back to what I was saying earlier is like, when you own your whole self, you don't become evil. You're not gonna become a monster. Like you can own your monsters without becoming a monster. You just acknowledge that part and you can accept that you have that there. And from there, it's a negotiation, okay? Because now it's like, I see that I have this.
And now I can kind of take the reins. It was just running amok before. It's like there's a squirrel in your house and it's running around shitting everywhere. Well, if you see that it's, you know, until you know that it's a squirrel, there's nothing you can do about it. It's just running around shitting in your house, right? Once you know it's a squirrel, you can trap it. You can like build it a little squirrel house and keep it contained. You can catch it and send it outside. I mean, you could shoot the fucking thing. I don't know, but like...
Lucy Baldwin (25:09.955)
Generally with ourselves, we don't wanna like shoot it. We wanna just like be like, cute little squirrel, I see you. You just wanna live here too, that's okay. Let's build you a cage so that you can do it in a way that's not destructive to the rest of the house, right? That's kind of what we're going for with shadow work. It's bringing it into the light, acknowledging that all of our parts, all of our parts, this is crucial. All of our parts want what's best for us. That's just like the true fact of it, it's you.
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things and have certain responses to things that don't serve you. And that's okay. Because once you know that, once you see that, once you acknowledge that that's there, you can look at it and say, well, I see you. And I want to let's try doing it a different way. Let's try like not doing that. Let's try a different approach.
and maybe that will be better at helping us get what we want. And so the shadow is actually, you know, it's capable of causing great chaos in our lives if we don't confront it, you know, and that's just the reality of it. And so a big part of this is taking responsibility for our true role in things, taking responsibility for how much power we could have
if we allowed ourselves, if we were willing to go there, if we're willing to be that thing that we thought we were better than. It's a humbling experience. It's a humiliation. It hurts the ego because the ego, we wanna feel like we're better than that. We wanna feel like we're better than this, that we aren't that. And part of this work is just like accepting that, we're like some parts of us might be a little dysfunctional, might be a little fucked up, might be a little like...
Lucy Baldwin (27:32.494)
need some help. And that's okay. Like we're not perfect when we hold ourselves to the expectation of being perfect all the time. Like that is just a recipe for like crazy being overtaken by monsters. Right? So it's hard. It's hard to own our shit. And I'm not even saying that you need to go out and like do this in all your relationships. What I don't want is for you to be like, everything is my fault. And like, go take on other people's shit and be like,
when you treated me like shit and I was mad about it, gosh, I was such an asshole. Like, that's not what I'm saying. That's not what I'm saying. And in fact, you don't have to share this with anybody else. Like, you don't have to bring this into your relationships at all. And certainly, I don't recommend it until you've done some of the internal stuff yourself. So, it's not about other people. Like, we're not thinking about, you know, we don't have to own anything for anyone else. It's really for you. It's for you.
to see yourself, investigate yourself, and go about, because you can't change other people. And it honestly doesn't really matter. I mean, obviously there are relationships that we care about, but I guess what I'm trying to say is like the first step is not to like apply this to your relationships. The first step is to look at yourself and be like, okay, yep, I see that I did that. And maybe there will be things in relationships where you're like, wow.
I didn't even realize that that's how I was doing things. And sometimes it is helpful to have other people point stuff out to us. And sometimes we can't hear it from other people. Sometimes we have to see it for ourselves. So this was a lot. I'm saying a lot about shadow work here. I'm saying a lot about being a human. I hope that this was helpful. If you are new to shadow work, then definitely check out my
other podcast, Penetrate Radio. And I do incorporate it into all of my programs because I think it is an essential piece of magic because magic is a personal evolution. Magic is about growing as a person and shadow work is just a one, a really key piece of that. It's really hard to create major change in your life without addressing the shadow because you'll just keep...
Lucy Baldwin (29:58.203)
doing the same things. You'll just keep falling into the same patterns, the same habits. So it's just really good to be willing to look at yourself. And I would say, just to give you a little something to start with,
The best way, because the thing is if you can see it, it's not your shadow, right? If you know that you have that trait, it's not your shadow. So what I find really helpful is to actually list out all of the traits that you are like, that's not me. Like, you know, whatever those qualities are, whatever those behaviors are that like really you're like, that's not me. That will never be me. I don't do that.
That's the first place to start. That's probably the things that are worth looking at. Like I would make that list and then I would look at it and be like, okay, how do I do this? Where have I done this? How has this actually shown up? And it's not, it's like uncomfortable, but it is so liberating. And then you can start to kind of like unravel the, because we all create this like story of ourselves.
where we think we're, you know, yeah. And if you're somebody who's really self-deprecating and you're somebody who like takes on a lot, I also want to just throw out there that there's a golden shadow, right? There's like the part of us that we won't accept that is kind and caring and loving and like deeply invested in the wellbeing of others and humanity and the people around us and our communities. And that can also be a piece of it. So,
you know, the shadow isn't only like monsters. There's also fairies and angels in your shadow. So I'll just leave it at that and say that, you know, whatever your tendency is to like lean into, like if you're somebody who just takes on everybody else's shit and you just always blame yourself for everything, maybe look at the gold, maybe like seek your like what's in your golden shadow. but also
Lucy Baldwin (32:10.84)
It's sort of like, why are you doing that? Is that like a form of martyrdom? Is that a way that you're kind of... There's usually something there. So I just want to put this out for you and see where it goes. Let me know if you want more of this. I definitely will be doing an episode about existential kink and somatics. So I'll see you in the next one. Thank you so much for...
listening.
New to Lucy’s work?
Start with Lucy Baldwin’s complete overview of planetary magic here
This episode is part of The Seven: Living with the Planets, a podcast exploring planetary magic as a path of self-growth, ritual practice, desire, embodiment, and spiritual transformation.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is shadow work?
Shadow work is the practice of bringing unconscious or disowned parts of yourself into awareness so they can be integrated instead of secretly running your life.
How does shadow work relate to magic?
Magic works through the unconscious, symbols, ritual, desire, and identity. Shadow work helps reveal the hidden material that may be shaping or blocking your magic.
Does owning my dark side make me a bad person?
No. Owning the shadow does not mean acting it out. It means becoming honest enough to contain, redirect, and integrate parts that were previously unconscious.
What is the golden shadow?
The golden shadow is the disowned light: your goodness, beauty, power, care, creativity, brilliance, or love that you have not allowed yourself to claim.
How do I start shadow work?
Start by listing traits you insist are “not me,” then gently ask where those traits may actually appear in your behavior, relationships, money patterns, or self-image.
Next Steps
If this episode resonated with you, continue exploring Lucy Baldwin’s work here:
You’ll find current offerings, free practices, podcast links, and ways to go deeper.
A good next step is the free guided Existential Kink practice available there, especially if you want to explore shadow, desire, resistance, receiving, and radical approval in a more embodied way.