Passion Struck with John R. Miles
From Shadow Work to Light Work: How to Actually Heal | Keila Shaheen - EP 754
14 Apr 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is shadow work and why is it important?
Coming up next on Passion Struck.
Becoming aware of the inner voices within you and what they're doing and what function they have in yourself. And then striving for wholeness, which is found in the present moment. If you're aware of all your senses here and now, then you can show up more presently and consciously versus if you're not
feeling your senses and your mind is somewhere else and you're striving for perfection, then that really takes you outside and into a liminal place that doesn't exist, but we're creating in our minds.
Welcome to Passion Struck. I'm your host, John Myles. This is the show where we explore the art of human flourishing and what it truly means to live like it matters.
Each week, I sit down with changemakers, creators, scientists, and everyday heroes to decode the human experience and uncover the tools that help us lead with meaning, heal what hurts, and pursue the fullest expression of who we're capable of becoming.
Whether you're designing your future, developing as a leader, or seeking deeper alignment in your life, this show is your invitation to grow with purpose and act with intention. Because the secret to a life of deep purpose, connection, and impact is choosing to live like you matter. Hey friends, and welcome back to episode 754 of Passion Struck.
Over the past few weeks, we've been building something intentionally together in this April series, Purpose by Design. We began with Arthur Brooks, exploring the growing crisis of meaning. Then with Corinne Lowe, we looked at how the systems around us quietly shape our lives. Last week with Claude Steele, we examined how identity and perception influence how we show up.
And in our last episode with Angela Myers, we went even deeper to the fundamental human need to feel like we matter. But today we turn inward because if you don't feel like you matter, there's often a deeper reason why. And that reason isn't always visible on the surface. It lives in the parts of you that you've ignored, suppressed, or never fully understood.
The parts of you that were shaped long before you had a choice. And that's where today's guest comes in. My guest who's returning for the second time is Kayla Shaheen, creator of the best-selling Shadow Work Journal and her latest work, The Light Work Journal. In this conversation, we explore something essential, the relationship between your shadow and your light.
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Chapter 2: How does light work complement shadow work?
and it allowed me to really seek some help that i had been putting on the wayside have you heard other readers of your work tell you stories like this absolutely there's so many and when i think about putting down daily intentions i think about the 369 journal which is another book that i've released and this has been a daily ritual for me
For years and years, so it looks like this and you basically write your intention three six and nine times and then you also write down the inspired actions that you're going to take throughout the day to honor that intention. I think.
The way we wanna show up during the day is productive and optimized, but there's other ways to show up too, like being inspired, fulfilling what matters to you that day. So it's all great examples.
One of the things I want to talk about is You mentioned Robert Bly in the book, and he wrote about shadow and light this way. When we were young, we had a 360 degree personality, energy rated out from all parts of us like a living glow of energy. But one day we noticed that our parents didn't like certain parts of that ball. And they said, can't you be still?
The reason I bring this up is I just wrote a children's book and this poem by Robert Bly really sits at the heart of it. I think, and the statistics are alarming, so many of us when we're children, lose our sense of mattering through small statements like that, that our parents make.
And I think sometimes our parents don't even realize the implications because most of them don't understand effective neuroscience and that our sense of worth is formed by the adults and the projection that they mirror onto us. So what do you think about this invisible bag that so many of us carry? Is that what you mean when you talk about the shadow in our life?
Absolutely. And that's a great example. So much of shadow work is looking at your past and doing inner work. And when we are small and children, something seemingly minuscule might happen, whether it's a parent telling you to put your pen and colors away or being quiet, that all gets stuffed in.
in the shadow and even though it seemed like a small event the feelings there were very big for the child and those feelings we carry throughout our lives and they get stuffed in this bag baggage and that becomes the weight that we sometimes feel and can't explain so it's really part of this investigation pinpointing Where does this come from? It's a good example.
And I'm just going to hit on Bly again, since, because you do as well. And later on you say he wrote, we spent our life until we're 20 deciding what parts of ourselves to put in the bag. And we spend the rest of our lives trying to get them out again. And I think what he says is really profound here because I've experienced this myself.
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Chapter 3: What are the risks of staying too long in shadow work?
It's always a good sign to pay attention to your body. You can feel the aliveness, the sparks, the inner fire when you're following the right path of growth and becoming. So yeah, I think that's an important aspect.
So something in the journal that caught my eye was you described consciousness is not about harnessing control in your life, but about surrendering into awareness, which you were in part just discussing. But when I started to think more deeply about this and this concept, because of my first book, Passion Struck, I have a chapter about becoming a conscious engager.
What I was really trying to talk about without making it too sciency is this whole concept. Psychologists have been talking about this since William James. And I look at the work of Nobel Laureate Danny Kahneman when he wrote the book, Thinking Fast and Slow. And when I think about system one, That's what I think is the state that people find themselves in about 90 to 95% of the time.
It's when we're in this unconsciousness type of living. I describe it like we're living like a pinball. And to me, consciousness, which is really about being meta aware, is really how do you hone in on that system too? Like how do you get better at that crystalline like clarity that moves you from disorientation to direction? Do you see it the same way? looking at it from that type of lens?
Yeah, absolutely. And I don't think it's possible to be aware of everything all at once, but internally having that awareness first before diving into reactivity is a very important aspect of building your,
increasing your state of consciousness in the moment and our conscious awareness is composed of our ego and our persona which aren't necessarily bad so it's also being becoming aware of the inner voices within you and what they're doing you know what function they have in yourself and then striving for wholeness which is found in the present moment
If you're aware of all your senses here and now, then you can show up more presently and consciously versus if you're not feeling your senses and your mind is somewhere else and you're striving for perfection, then that really takes you outside and into a liminal place that doesn't exist, but we're creating in our minds.
You frame, as we've been talking, that light work is tending to that part of us that's meeting the world that we live in.
Yes.
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Chapter 4: How can integrating your shadow lead to personal growth?
So a combination of those, there's the expression, which is an important part of light work. It's the doing, it's the being, it's the actions that cultivates. And then who you truly are, because we are constantly evolving. So who you were in the past may not necessarily be who you truly are today. And you can tap into who you truly are in the present moment.
So I think that is what feels most right for me at least.
Kayla, one of the things I know about myself is I'm very introspective and I tend to like ponder things a lot, especially if I find something that's bothering me about myself. And oftentimes what that has caused in the past is I spend too much time spending thoughts in the shadow work. What happens when a listener, let's say stays too long in the shadow work?
And what I mean by this is they're constantly analyzing, processing and revisiting their pain instead of doing those intentional moves into their light.
That's a great question. And I had to learn this the hard way through my own experiences. especially because a lot of my work does center around the shadow archetype. And I spent years and years studying the shadow, writing about it, diving into my own shadows. And there are some risks of diving too deeply into this work and staying there.
Looking within yourself is so important and beautiful, and it's such a hard step to take. And because you can find so much truth there, You'll want to continue digging and searching, but that can easily turn into self-absorption and you can endlessly circle your pains and your wounds. And because of that, you'll miss opportunities where you can show up and shine your light and your wisdom.
So I think there's no end to healing. It's an ongoing process. Shadow work is an ongoing process. And cultivating ongoing shadow awareness is important throughout all of life. But we need to balance this awareness and this practice and work with the light, which is the other side of the coin.
To continue evolving and showing up as a more expanded version of yourself and really being embodied versus just staying internal. Shadow work definitely humbles you and At the same time, it can be draining for people. And that's why grounding is such an important part of doing the inner work.
And then light work comes in to mobilize you, to help you build again, once you've deconstructed and picked things apart. And it also helps you energize yourself where shadow work can drain, light work can energize. And that's really important for us to continue moving
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Chapter 5: What practices can help protect your energy?
So I bring this example up because you challenge in the book the idea that the ego is something we need to eliminate. What does a healthy aligned ego actually look like in someone's life?
There's a visual. So right now I'm getting my master's at Pacifica Graduate Institute. And this reminded me during one of the residentials, one of the first classes in person that we took together, the professor drew a circle and she drew a straw going through the circle and then
she drew little tiny holes in the straw everything that was in the circle represents the unconscious the straw represents the ego and what happens when the straw is raptured or ripped or broken it becomes overwhelming for the psyche to contain all that resides in the ego.
So that's why I emphasize that the ego has a purpose and the goal of inner work is not to eliminate the ego that can be self-destructive, but to allow the ego to contain in a healthy way, all that resides in the unconscious. If you don't, then it'll just completely corrupt this, the stability there and the purpose of the ego.
So if you're a listener, I mean, imagine you're staring at a, at a target to shoot bone arrow at, and in the bullseye is the self and radiating from that is light.
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Chapter 6: What does it mean to hold light in your life?
And then around that self is your ego. And on either side of it is your persona, which I'll let you discuss or your shadow and then consciousness or unconsciousness in this ecosystem. So how did the persona and shadow work with each other or against each other?
persona is like the ego's helper the persona helps shape the mask the roles that we show up in society as so the persona and the ego go very hand in hand and the shadow is everything that we're not aware of so part of light work is understanding these aspects of the psyche and realigning them so that they represent your whole truth and they're not
representing external things or influences, things that are not aligned with who you are and what you value.
I think you have a quote in here that kind of does a good job expressing this. You have the Lotus flower grows in muddy, murky water yet rises above the surface to bloom and pristine beauty. Shadow work is the mud light work is the bloom and one can't exist without the other. I think that's a great metaphor to see how this works.
love metaphors and especially now that it's spring it's very much alive in me and it has been studying shadow and light seeing our inner selves as like this landscape that we're gardening shadow work is picking the weeds out pruning what is complete and finished
then digging through all that dirt and then light work is that bloom it's tending to the garden and also planting new seeds of belief as well it's like inner spiritual hygiene so it's honoring what's to come and what's to bloom i've also just gardening a lot here with my husband so it's Well, like the physical intentional practices can mean so much and reflect so much inside.
I think that's also something I'd love to share with people is find something simple to nurture outside of you and let that represent something bigger in your own internal life.
One of the things that I didn't think about, probably because I wasn't trying to wrap my head around it, but is how much this idea of light work goes across different traditions and spiritual beliefs. Like being a Christian, I think what I always think of is let there be light.
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Chapter 7: How do glimmers help rewire your mindset?
But my sister was a Buddhist, and it's also very prevalent in Buddhism and Hinduism. And just look at, I work with a lot of people in India, just look at the festival of light that they have with Diwali. So it's amazing, even to the point of thinking of our North Star is a form of light.
Absolutely. Yeah, this archetype has been universal and expressed in so many different traditions and languages and metaphors. And in psychology, light represents consciousness. In mythology, it represents return. And there's so many other ways that we can see this archetype reflected in the world. So it's important to Learn how to understand it yourself.
How do you incorporate it best in your life?
So one of the helpful things I thought you did in the book is to try to help the reader discern whether an emotion that they're feeling calls for shadow work or light work. And I thought maybe we could just go through one or two of these. So I know something that plagues a lot of us is we have anger that just keeps resurfacing.
So if you're feeling like powerless or your boundaries are being violated, how do you know whether you should work shadow work or whether you should lean into light work to solve it?
I want to talk about this scale right here. It's a scale of conscious awareness. And this is a scale that I developed from reviewing over 148,000 anonymous emotional check-ins in the Zenfulno app, which is an app that I created to help people track their emotions and do inner work. And out of all of that anonymous data, the common emotions were tired, chill,
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Chapter 8: How can you cultivate light work in your daily routine?
good, lethargic, indifferent, neutral, calm. And then the top emotion that people chose was tired. And this showed me that a lot of us are living in the gray areas. We're disconnected from what matters, what's meaning. So here you can see from shadow to light. And these were the most common checking emotions.
And this is a great tool for you to use during these moments of, should I do shadow work? Should I do the inner work or should I do light work? Do I need motivation? Do I need movement here? Am I stagnant? And if you're in that state of anger, then you can pinpoint it's over here. It's one of the dense emotions and anger is often hiding something deeper that needs to be met.
that is a time for shadow work. And if you're feeling disconnected or unmotivated, that can often feel like sadness on the surface, but that's a great sign that it's time to do light work. You need to tap into the spark. You need to cultivate or do some activities to help nurture that spark and help you reach higher, lighter states of emotions.
So I hope that context gives help for this practice.
I think it definitely does. And I think it's a cornerstone of the book before you really start going into the practices that people can do to start practicing more light work in their lives. So. Is there an area, given the time we have left, that if we were going to start going through some of these tools to give the listener a sense of these, where you would like to go?
I think just considering the possibility of what it looks like to become your light self. We talk about our shadow self, I've done so many guided meditations on how to access and visualize and dialogue with the shadow aspect of ourself. And I'd love to encourage people to explore their light self. We often tend to be so hard on ourselves and pick our own selves apart.
So it's time to rebuild and re-envision and use the beautiful power of our imagination to consider what the most empowered, embodied, the wisest, most expressive, creative version of ourselves could look like. And then when you have that image in your mind, it's something that you can step into in your daily practice. And that's just such a beautiful opportunity for us all, especially today when
We can get so bogged down and there's so many pressures and anxieties know that it's always an option to take a step back and focus on cultivating this self.
And to give listeners an example of kind of the pattern that you have in the book, I'll just pick one release fear. The way you do this is you start out with an exercise and this one, it was you release trap fear by choosing one of the activities that you have in the next page. And then you go into a section of why should you do this?
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