Facing and Embracing the Parts of Yourself You’d Rather Not See to Restore Wholeness, Confidence and Resilience
Naming the Shadow
Maybe you notice yourself cringing when someone struggles – a loved-one’s anxiety, a friend confessing struggle, even a stranger expressing need. Your face contorts. Your gut tightens. You want to fix it, solve it, or escape it.
And then there are aspects you hate seeing in yourself – parts you may label as messy, needy, or even ‘pathetic’ and you try to push them away as quickly as you can.
Perhaps you’ve been told to be more accepting and show some compassion, to yourself and others, but you can’t shake the ‘ick’ and you’re starting to wonder what all this means.
If this feels familiar, you’re not alone – and it’s exactly where the path to confidence, resilience, and wholeness begins.
Carl Jung called it the Shadow: the parts of ourselves we’d rather not see. Our hidden fears, flaws, impulses, needs, and shames. It’s what feels gross and pathetic to some – the feelings we push down, the weakness we can’t tolerate in others, the pain we rush to fix or cover up.
In Dark Side of the Light Chasers, Debbie Ford described it as the disowned self – the aspects we banish because they don’t match the image we want to project: competent, successful, flourishing.
Phil Stutz and Barry Michels (authors of The Tools) put it bluntly: the Shadow is “the version of yourself you hope nobody ever sees.”
But in Self Leadership Coaching and parts work, we know the Shadow by another name: the Exiles.
Exiles are the wounded inner parts we push out of awareness because their pain feels unbearable. They carry our deepest shame, loneliness, and neediness. They hold the moments we felt small, abandoned, humiliated, or “too much.” And because they’re so raw and vulnerable, we lock them away – creating protective parts, personas, and patterns to keep them hidden.
Overachieving, perfectionism, people-pleasing, self-criticism, even cynicism – these are not personality traits at the core. They are protectors, working overtime to keep the Exiles underground.
We don’t just hide it from others. We hide it from ourselves. And this hiding has consequences.
It explains why you can’t stop moving long enough to feel your own discomfort. Why you rush to rescue or solve other people’s problems, because their pain mirrors something in you.
Why weakness in others secretly irritates you, because it points to the shame or perceived brokenness you’ve buried in yourself.
This is why even high-achievers, perfectionists, and the so-called “strong ones” often feel disconnected. They’re running from what they’re unwilling to face: their Shadow.
But Shadows or Exiles don’t disappear. They leak through in boredom or burnout, irritability or anger, emptiness or restlessness.
They are the root of why even the “strong ones” often feel like impostors, why confidence feels shaky, why joy feels out of reach, and why achievement feels hollow.
And this is the paradox: the more we exile these parts, the more our personalities and behavior patterns are driven by them, and it drives our fate.
The Invitation
Beneath all the fear, shame, and resistance, something else lives there too. Something fragile but unbroken, and beautiful.
Something still hoping to be seen, welcomed, and accepted.
What if freedom isn’t found in escaping discomfort, but in turning toward it with gentleness?
What if the very places you most want to hide are the ones holding the seeds of your healing?
What if the Shadow you fear is also the doorway to your wholeness?
When you finally turn toward your Shadow – the Exiles within – you catalyze a process of reintegration.
- Your confidence stops being brittle, because it’s no longer built on denial and protection but truth and wholeness.
- Your resilience grows deeper, because you no longer shatter when pain comes.
- Your relationships deepen and become richer and more real, because you can sit with others’ humanity, and your own, without judgment.
- And your wholeness returns, because the parts you once abandoned are welcomed and fully accepted.
But how? How do you stay with the parts that make you cringe? The ones you’d never admit out loud, the ones you condemn in others, and have buried in yourself? How do you stop turning away from what feels weak, shameful, or “too much,” and instead turn toward it with even a trace of compassion?
This is where our story begins – with two characters, Coach and Lev, and a reluctant conversation about the parts of himself Lev most wanted to avoid.
(Coach and Lev are featured (made-up) characters in my Self Leadership Guide: How to Talk Amongst Your Selves).
The Sprout in the Ashes
Lev came into the session heavy. His voice was flat, his words slow, as though every sentence dragged a boulder behind it.
“Coach,” he said, “I don’t know how much longer I can do this. It’s like… I’m depressed, maybe? Or just defeated. There’s so much hate everywhere, the world’s turned upside down, I’m starting to unravel. I try and try, and nothing helps. It’s like I’m cursed. I feel… desperate.”
Coach leaned in, not with pity, but with presence. “Let’s just slow down. Right here. Right now. Notice your breath. Notice your body in the chair. You don’t have to perform for me. You don’t have to have it all together. Can we just stay here, with the part of you that feels desperate?”
Lev frowned. “That part is so ugly, Coach. It’s heavy, sad, injured. It feels like a third-class citizen. It’s ashamed of itself. It tries to hide, because it knows nobody wants desperate people around. But inside it’s screaming for a miracle, for someone to rescue him. It thinks: ‘You’ll never make it. No matter what you do, you’ll always get less than others who try half as hard. You’re too much. People don’t want to be seen with you. You’re embarrassing.’”
Coach let the silence breathe. Then said softly: “So this part is desperate… and it’s convinced it has no value. It just wants not to be ignored.”
Lev’s eyes welled. He swallowed hard. “Exactly. It wants someone to look at it and not be disgusted. To not treat it as gross, or weak, or hopeless. But I can barely do that myself. How could anyone else?”
Coach’s voice was steady, heartful. “Let me tell you something. There is nothing shameful about wanting to be rescued. That’s not weakness. That’s what pain longs for – witness, care, presence. What this part wants isn’t a miracle. It wants you. Your Self. To sit beside it, not abandon it. To say, ‘I see you. You matter. I’m here with you and I’ll stay here with you.’”
Lev shook his head. “But how? How do you look at something like this and not see it as gross or pathetic? How do you stay with it?”
Coach paused, and then shared a story.
“Imagine a forest after a wildfire. The trees are blackened, the ground covered in ash. Everything looks ruined. The silence feels hollow.
Now imagine a gentle, sensitive person walking into that space. Not with judgment, or fear, or shame. But with deep reverence.
As they look upon the devastation with a sense of sadness and compassion, they kneel down and notice a fragile sprout pushing up through the charred earth.
They don’t say, “You’re pathetic. Why aren’t you a full tree yet?”
They simply say:
“You survived.”
“You’re growing. Look at you.”
“You are still here.”
And they stay.
They don’t rush it.
They don’t uproot it.
They stay.
They watch.
They water.
They nurture.
They witness.
That’s how compassion looks at pain. It sees the sacred in the scorched. It honors the life force even in devastation. It sees dignity even in dependency. It trusts that what’s tender doesn’t need to be hardened, just held. And it trusts – not that everything will be instantly better but that even here, life is finding its way.”
Lev sat back. He was quiet a long time. His breath slowed. His face softened, a tear rolled down his cheek, and he simply said, “I’m hurting.”
Coach said, “You’re not weak because there’s pain within. You’re human.
And if no one ever taught you how to stay with pain lovingly,
You’re learning it now…by staying here. By asking. By not abandoning yourself.
“Sprout,” he whispered. “That’s what I’ll call it. This part of me I never wanted to look at.”
Coach smiled. “Yes. And for the next while, every time that seemingly desperate, lonely part shows up, you can remember: this is Sprout. He’s not pathetic. He isn’t here to disgust you. He’s here to remind you that life is still in you, even when the forest feels burned down. You don’t have to fix it. You just have to see it, acknowledge it, and if you can, tend to it with heart, and let it grow.”
Lev’s eyes filled again but this time, with something gentler.
“I think… I can do that. Maybe not all the time. But I can try.”
Coach nodded. “That’s all it takes. Not forever. Just today. Just one moment at a time. Healing isn’t measured in days or months. It’s measured in your willingness to keep showing up. Every time you sit with Sprout instead of abandoning it, you’re healing. You’re proving to yourself: I can be with what hurts, without losing myself. And, in time, the devastated forest will be regrown, full, majestic, beautiful.”
Lev placed a hand on his chest. He closed his eyes. “Sprout. I see you. I’m with you. You’re incredible.”
The room was still and full of light. Something had shifted.
And in the silence, Lev felt it: a tenderness toward himself he’d never quite known before.
What Sprout Teaches Us
Here’s what Sprout represents for all of us:
- The life-force within us that transcends devastation and despair; the reason for hope.
- The part that longs not to be fixed or improved, but simply seen and included.
- The tender beginning of self-compassion – the moment we stop turning away from our pain and start turning toward it, with heart.
- The seed of resilience – not being unbreakable, but growing again after the fire.
- The foundation of true confidence – not the brittle confidence of perfection or performance, but the deep assurance that you can meet life as you are.
- The root of authentic leadership – the kind that connects, inspires, and steadies others, because you’ve learned to stay steady with yourself.
So often, we mistake suffering for weakness. But when you choose to stay with what hurts – to witness it instead of abandoning it, you are already beginning to heal. You are already practicing courage. You are already becoming more whole.
Practice: How to Be With Your Sprout
Here’s a simple practice you can try when heaviness and self-judgment arise:
- Pause. Breathe. Find a quiet moment, even just 60 seconds.
- Notice the part of you that feels most unseen or unwanted. Maybe it shows up as heaviness in your chest, a pit in your stomach, or a voice that says, You’re not enough.
- Picture it as a sprout – fragile, green, pushing through ashes. Not broken. Not shameful. Alive.
- Offer words of witnessing. You might say quietly to yourself:
- “I see you.”
- “You’re alive.”
- “You’re trying.”
- “I’m with you and will never abandon you.”
- No fixing, no timeline. The sprout doesn’t need to be rushed into a tree. It just needs light, air, and your gentle presence.
The more you practice, the more natural it becomes. Each time you sit with your Sprout instead of pushing it away, you’re strengthening a new habit: the habit of compassion.
Carrying This Forward
If you can learn to see the sprout in yourself, you can also begin to see it in others.
You may notice it in a friend who seems irritable but is really aching to be understood. Or in a colleague who hides behind busyness but is secretly exhausted. Or in the stranger whose eyes hold a quiet sadness you can now recognize.
This is how compassion deepens, and how trust, connection, and leadership are built: not by being flawless, but by being human, and making space for others to be human too.
So, the next time you cringe at someone’s flaws and imperfections, judge them as broken, too much, or not enough, pause. Put your hand on your heart. And remember:
Sprout is within them, and also within you.
And if you can love it – gently and patiently, you will be amazed at what grows – resilience, clarity, peace, strength, and the kind of freedom no perfectionism can give you.
Curious to Learn More?
Lev is one of the inner characters I write about in How to Talk Amongst Your Selves: A Beginner’s Guide to Self Leadership. If you want to learn more about meeting your inner characters — with compassion, curiosity, and courage — please click here.
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