You might have heard of the expression deep process psychotherapy and be wondering what that means. In essence, deep process psychotherapy is just a complicated name for a process that’s been around for a long time: the exploration of what’s hidden in the unconscious mind.

Those are the memories, suppressed or not, that actually control our behaviour, our thoughts, and our feelings in everyday life. Any kind of therapy must involve in some way working on those unconscious issues. This is the only way to become more whole, more of who we really are, in our everyday lives. So “deep process” simply refers to the accessing of the unconscious, and the word “psychotherapy” refers to any form of therapy which makes your everyday life more wholesome, fulfilling, and satisfying to you.

Where does counselling fit into this?

Counselling tends to be a rather more superficial approach to dealing with emotional distress,  one which tends to focus on symptoms in everyday life and find ways around them. And while sharing your difficulties with a sympathetic listener can certainly  be an effective approach to gaining temporary relief, it’s not the same as deep process psychotherapy. Counselling may or may not affect the fundamentals of who you are and how you present in the world, but deep process psychotherapy is aimed at making long lasting changes in your thoughts, feelings and behaviour.

In Healing the Shadow, we train our practitioners in the art of deep process psychotherapy using the techniques of shadow work. Yet, if we compare deep process psychotherapy and shadow work, we find they’re actually very similar. Shadow work is only one aspect of a whole range of therapies that will come under the umbrella term of “deep process psychotherapy”. And, like all therapies that involve accessing the unconscious mind, shadow work certainly aims to uncover unconscious motivations, resolve issues that have arisen from long ago in childhood, and open up access to suppressed or repressed energy. In doing this, the therapist or the shadow work practitioner can identify patterns of behaviour and thoughts and feelings that have their origin early in life and continue to influence behaviour in the present time.

Deep process psychotherapy and shadow work

Another parallel between deep process psychotherapy and shadow work is that both draw on Jungian concepts and ideas. The primary concept here is the idea of uncovering repression, of exploring the unconscious. In fact, both deep process psychotherapy and shadow work would regard the exploration of historical memories and thoughts and feelings that have been repressed into the unconscious as essential to gaining any kind of insight into one’s behaviour, and of course, changing it forever.

Is deep process psychotherapy in the form of shadow work a spiritual process?

Many people believe that it is, because it’s accessing layers of ourselves that lie close to the core of who we are. Let’s assume that wounding takes place early in life, in childhood and adolescence but not so much in adult life. The reason that there’s a spiritual aspect to this work is because when you explore what’s been repressed into your unconscious mind (such as the “shadows” and hidden feelings that control your behaviour and your way of being in the world), you  move towards becoming “the person you were always meant to be before the world got in the way”.

There are many parallels in the methodology of deep process psychotherapy and shadow work. For example, both disciplines  involve exploring transference and countertransference and considering the relationship between the therapist and the client in the moment. Also, they do not aim to simply alleviate symptoms; they aim to restore humanity to its fullest, most gracious form.

In the Healing the Shadow organisation we aim to bring about deep, profound transformation in the way that a man or woman relates to themselves and the world around them. So you could say that both deep process psychotherapy and shadow work are aiming to help men and women access a much more authentic self, one that is not determined and controlled by what happened to a person in their early life.

Both shadow work and deep process psychotherapy are suitable for people who are seeking the truth about who they really are and who wish to move beyond the emotional woundings that caused them to become who they currently are.

We’ve established that both deep process psychotherapy and shadow work focus on the deeper levels of the psyche. They both access unconscious material and they both aim to produce profound personal transformation. In essence, the core of this work is to bring what’s in the unconscious mind into conscious awareness so that you can actually choose to do things differently or to change the way that these unconscious drivers are controlling you at present.

Needless to say, both deep process psychotherapy and shadow work involve the expression of profound emotions. These may include anger, grief, loss, anxiety, shame, and (eventually) joy. Importantly, the expression of these emotions in a facilitated healing shadow work session allows not just verbal but also physical expression of the emotions. This is both an important aspect of the journey towards wholeness as well as an important aspect of coming to understand how these emotional woundings and suppressed emotions have affected your thinking, feeling, behaviour over the years.

Naturally enough, the relationship between client and therapist is crucial to success in all therapy. Indeed, we know that the relationship between the therapist and client is the single most important factor in determining the outcome of therapy. All Healing The Shadow practitioners are trained to ensure that they are adept at maintaining connection with the client. And if connection is broken, they  know how to enquire about what the break is, establish its significance, and then re-establish connection with the client in a way that will allow the therapeutic process to continue.

Hopefully, you can see how deep process psychotherapy and shadow work are both committed to exploring the deeper levels of the psyche. They are both committed to working with emotional and unconscious material, and they’re both aimed at facilitating personal growth and development. The only differences lie in the way that the therapy and techniques are applied and the closer relationship between the therapist and client in shadow work.