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Many artists today are cathartically healing through creative expression. Taylor Swift often talks about the necessity of writing and producing an album to help her emotionally express her experiences, and Ariana Grande speaks about how having a sound booth has helped her through her darkest moments of loss and love. For some, it’s not difficult to find an outlet in creative expression. Take Kesha, for example, in her recent TED Talk “The Alchemy of Pop,” where she describes how she alchemized the pain of having her musical voice taken and facing public scrutiny amongst legal troubles led into a healing experience not just for herself, but for others as well. Others might not find expression so easy.

In this article, we will uncover the following key points::

• The use of creative expression to heal

• Embracing your parts to express them

• What real shadow work looks like for the celebrity Kesha today

If you haven’t already seen Kesha’s recent release of her new song ‘Cathedral’, I suggest you watch the video above, and then refer back to the rest of this article. I will be using many references from this video to help prove my point. If you want to just raw dog it and see what is said, let’s go for a journey.

Using Creative Expression to Practice Shadow Work

It is not uncommon today to find individuals resorting to creative expressions as a form of healing. Take myself, for example. I find writing to be an outlet that helps me express some of my deepest thoughts and truths. In many ways, it is my form of therapy. To write, to provide value, to take my experience and find a way to express it so that you may make use of it to find help in it some way. Many artists turn to music, writers turn to writing, filmmakers turn to filming and so on and so forth. You don’t need to be labeled as any one of these things to use creative expression to practice shadow work. All you need to do is find an outlet in whatever form of medium you choose.

Kesha says, “You can create art out of emotion … to not only heal yourself, but to help heal others. The truth in this statement is inherent. Whether it be sharing a few journal prompts that helped you, or picking up a paint brush like Bob Ross to find happiness amongst the little trees or happy accidents. The act of expressing your darkness gives it an outlet to heal. Each form of creative expression, of art is valid to help mend your scars, and before you know it, you’re doing shadow work. You’re expressing the parts of yourself that you might otherwise refuse to identify with. Kesha says, “Not to be afraid of the intensity inside of you… the anger, the darkness, all of it.” She talks about embracing it and truly digging deep into yourself to feel the emotions you have trapped inside. Without repressing them, you move through these feelings and give them a light, a gift for the world to find.

Creative expression is only one form of shadow work. There are many other ways; this one just happens to be a very socially acceptable one.

Embracing your Parts for Authentic Expression of Self

In modern psychology, therapist Richard C. Schwartz has developed a therapy method called Internal Family Systems. This method of therapy is amazing, and really allows an individual to dive deep into the various versions of themselves that may have been held back by some sort of trauma. In his book, No Bad Parts, Schwartz describes a meditation style technique where you invite your parts to sit in a waiting room area or therapist office, and conduct a conversation with them. The act of doing this is meant to build a trusting relationship with your shadows.

The brain of the individual that has experienced childhood trauma, or any trauma for that matter, is no longer “normal” so to speak. New neuropathways for survival are formed, and reactions get set into memory. The trauma acts as a computer virus, implementing these sometimes automatic reactions and unwanted expressions, causing them to bleed into your everyday experience. Much of the mental health field today is designed around addressing this very problem, yet it doesn’t always provide the tools to fix it. It takes a lot of unwiring to change these behaviors, and without assistance, these “protective” parts can do more harm than good. Think the binge eater that “doesn’t eat too much” when they are in front of people but goes home to eat 4 cheeseburgers and 2 large fries. Or the chronic workaholic. Maybe you;’ll recognize the drug addict. The part of them driving the ship is likely the little one that didn’t get fed enough or looking for approval/validation, the perfectionist, and the addict, each a shadow that may go unrecognized for much of your life. I’m in no way accounting all maladaptive behaviors to trauma of sort, environmental conditioning and genetics also play a HUGE factor into the behavior of the individual.

My naturally curious brain dabbled with Schwartz’s idea for a while and further took it to another level: Life Audit Part Mapping. Part of this technique may be used when therapists are working with dissociative patients. It takes the individual on an identification process through visually mapping each part. Each part gets identified, named, and a job. After my diagnosis with C-PTSD, I couldn’t stop, and needed to know why I struggled sometimes, but other times I was “fine”. Like a pendulum swing, my life would oscillate back and forth between the two, before I began this process.

Part Mapping helps the individual identify potential saboteurs. I coupled this with Julien Blanc’s Life Audit to truly anchor into intentional action, and it is now a process I’ve continued to perfect over the last 7 or so years. I’ve uncovered countless techniques to get parts to come forward and build a bond of trust. I’ve learned to help with identification, job reallocation, and fusion, and even developed a profound level of self-awareness through this process. I am aware that not every individual has the same perspective as I, but I do see many that have experienced trauma, that do.

Like Kesha, I also identify with the parts of myself that make up my unique self and authentic expression. She talks about how “songwriting has become her therapist, her lover, her drinking buddy, and her higher power”; further describing all the parts of herself that her songwriting embodies. This in itself is amazingly profound and a very vulnerable expression of self to be willing to share publicly.

What a real expression of shadow work looks like

Kesha goes on to talk about how she took the pain of one of her most tragic moments—the act of her musical voice being ripped away by the very person she trusted—and led her to write the song ‘Praying,’ in which she won her first Grammy. The sequence of events that played out here seems simply divine. The physical expression of her shadow work—the act of embracing her pain and cathartically expressing it through music and singing—gave her the strength to then win the legal battle that plagued her musical expression. This led her to write 'Cathedral,' a song that talks about the power of finding the light within. A song that literally encompases the art of shadow work as I know it. Kesha has not only helped heal others with her voice, but she is also helping me teach you the power of embracing your shadow to express your true authentic self. Without your experiences, you wouldn’t be shaped the way you are. They make up the very mold that defines you. They make up the very mold that is you. That brought you into this world to live in this time, with these people. To heal, to shine. No more “just surviving” be in the era of thriving.

If you’ve been looking for a little boost on your journey, we just put a few services up in the shop, and we will have a few digital products releasing soon. Don’t forget to stop by on your way out the door.