What If We Were Patient with Our Shadow Side?

What if we were truly patient with our shadow side?

What if we believed—deep down—that we could be seen fully, flaws and all, and still be loved? How might that shift our experience of guilt and shame? I think… a lot.

When I say “shadow side,” I’m talking about the parts of our personality we tend to hide—the fears, insecurities, unhealthy patterns, and raw emotions we’re not proud of. It’s the stuff we’d rather keep buried, yet it still shows up in how we live, love, and lead.

I grew up with guilt. Not because of my parents or any outside force, but because of my own internal battles. There was a persistent fear that the things I had already done had somehow disqualified me in the eyes of the divine. That’s heavy. So I kept trying—trying to be “okay,” to feel acceptable, to find peace.

The guilt lingered. It made it hard for me to believe I was fully loved. I knew my family loved me—my parents, without question—but my deeper struggle was spiritual. As early as three years old, I remember feeling the weight of not measuring up. That was my shadow side, and it was very real.

Some of my earliest conversations were about right and wrong, heaven and hell. They planted a seed of fear—one that shaped how I viewed myself and how I viewed God. My shadow side pushed me in two directions: either striving to be good or swinging hard in the opposite direction, where I stopped caring altogether.

There were seasons I didn’t care what God thought. Or maybe more truthfully, I just didn’t know how to think about what God thought—especially about me.

And then there’s this line from Psalm 103:

“The Lord is compassionate and gracious,
slow to anger, abounding in love…
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

Whether or not those words land with you in a spiritual sense, there’s something powerful about being reminded: we are more than our shadow. We are more than our worst thoughts, habits, or fears.

When we begin to believe that—we start to live differently. With more kindness. More openness. More peace.

So what if we were patient with the parts of ourselves we typically avoid?

What about you?