A reflection on the shadow work, stillness, and truth that rose in Port Ludlow.
Author Note:
This piece came out of a week on the shores of Port Ludlow where my body stopped whispering and started demanding the truth. It’s the beginning of Harvesting the Raw — a series shaped by shadow work, ritual, and the parts of me I exiled to survive.
My week of deep shadow work began on the shores of Port Ludlow Bay.
Surrounded by pristine waters, ancient forests, and small-town charm.
A place I feel deeply connected to.
Safe.
Exactly what I needed to dive into the depths of my shadow.
🎧 Spotify Playlist: Forest Dwelling — Let the weight fall off your shoulders — literally. Begin the descent into your body as you walk through the forest.
There’s something about that place — the water, the stillness, the way the morning light hits the mountain peaks — that feels ancient enough to hold the things I’m not brave enough to hold alone. I didn’t go there to create anything. I didn’t go to “heal.” I went because my body stopped whispering and started screaming.
The kind of internal scream you can’t outrun anymore. You stop and listen.
I think that’s the thing people misunderstand about shadow work.
They think it’s optional. A hobby. Something you do on Sundays with a journal and a matcha latte.
Don’t get me wrong. I love a good matcha latte!
But shadow work isn’t a vibe.
It’s not romantic.
It’s not soft.
Shadow work is the moment your forgotten parts — the ones you shoved down to protect the people yourself — finally claw their way to the surface and say:
“It’s my turn now.”
These forgotten parts aren’t the past.
They’re the unlived versions of you.
The ones you exiled because someone told you they were too loud, too sensitive, too queer, too angry, too inconvenient, too wild, too emotional, too… you.
And for me, 2025 made sure they couldn’t stay silent anymore.
There’s a bigger energetic story unfolding this year — and my body has been responding to it whether I “believed” in it or not. In Chinese Astrology, this is the Year of the Snake, which is all about shedding.
Skin. Identity. Expectations.
Not gently — but completely.
It’s also a 9 year in numerology, the final breath of a long cycle.
A year that forces endings.
Completion.
Truth you can’t swallow anymore.
And astrologically, this is the end of a 7-year cycle — meaning everything buried since 2018 has been clawing its way up to be witnessed.
And yes.
It did.
Memories I forgot I had.
Emotions I convinced myself I “worked through.”
The kind of anger you spend a lifetime learning to shrink because someone taught you it was ugly.
So when I got to Port Ludlow, I didn’t try to be noble.
I didn’t try to be poetic.
I didn’t try to be digestible.
I let the forgotten parts speak.
Not in a tidy, therapeutic way.
But in the kind of way that cracks something in your rib cage.
The kind that shakes loose old identities you didn’t realize were still glued to your bones.
I didn’t write from the pain — I wrote from the truth underneath the pain.
The part that finally had room to breathe.
I welcomed the anger I was taught to fear.
Grief I was taught to minimize.
Desires I was taught to hide.
Inner versions of me I left behind because I thought shrinking made me safe.
And no — I’m not sharing the visceral bloodbath here.
Those stay mine.
Here’s what you get instead:
You get the realization that shadow work isn’t about some cute IG post or something you can do halfway if you want to come home to yourself.
It’s about telling yourself the truth — the truth you avoid because you’re afraid of what it might destroy.
You get the reminder that your shadow isn’t here to shame you.
It’s here to restore you.
It’s here to give you back the parts of yourself you silenced to survive.
You get the invitation to stop performing who you think you should be — and come home to who you actually are.
Because here’s the part that surprised me the most:
When the forgotten parts speak, they’re honest.
They’re tired.
They’re ancient.
They’re yours.
And they’re asking for your attention — not your punishment.
Your forgotten parts aren’t cruel.
They aren’t chaotic.
They aren’t dangerous.
Except to those who benefited from you hiding them.
Forgotten parts show up differently for each of us, but the themes are universal.
Maybe your forgotten part is the small you — the child who was scared, confused, overwhelmed, and told to “buck up” instead of being held.
Maybe it’s the part of you that learned early on that the safest place to put your pain was inside yourself — the part that thought the only way to survive was to destroy yourself quietly, from the inside out.
Maybe it’s the part of you that is still angry — not because you’re dramatic, but because you weren’t seen, or heard, or believed when it mattered.
Maybe it’s the part that had to deal with things no child or teenager or young adult should ever have had to navigate — the things the adults in your life dismissed, minimized, or told you to “get over.”
Maybe it’s the part of you that stayed small to keep the peace.
The part that learned to perform.
The part that learned to disappear.
The part that still wonders if your real self is “too much.”
Or maybe the forgotten part is the one who always knew the truth… but didn’t have permission, power, or safety to say it out loud.
Shadow work is where all of those parts — the silenced, the exiled, the ashamed, the wild, the hurting, the wise — finally get to speak.
Not to embarrass you.
Not to haunt you.
But to free you.
If something in this stirs something in you — a memory, a tightening, a spark, a resistance — that’s your shadow speaking.
Not to hurt you.
To free you.
What part of you has been waiting to be heard?
What truth have you avoided because you thought it might cost you something?
Shadow work isn’t about dragging the past into the light.
It’s about reclaiming the pieces of yourself you abandoned along the way.
When the forgotten parts speak… it’s not the end of something.
It’s the beginning.
In the next unraveling, the body begins to speak the truth I couldn’t yet name.
Join the experiment by subscribing below to get more raw truth, ritual, and reflection straight to your inbox.
