12 Questions — Takes about 3 minutes
Inner work is a pilgrimage into the mysterious dark forests of the body, mind, heart, and soul.
It’s a path for the sage, mystic, and philosopher within all of us – a path that often begins as a solitary, lone wolf quest for healing and evolves as a spiritual path of love, devotion, and freedom.
Of all the paths available to us in life, the journey of inner work is the richest, most rewarding, and transformative. It takes us to the root of our traumas, heals our buried wounds, and liberates us to live a life aligned with our Soul’s truth.
So where do you start? What kind of inner work do you need to focus on within your life’s journey right now? This test will help you to find out.
Remember that you can bookmark this page and come back to it every now and then. Test yourself again in 6-12 months and see what has shifted.
What result did you get, and did it resonate? Share below. Your experience helps others recognize themselves.
What is the Purpose of Inner Work?
At its core, inner work – true inner work – is a path of Soul recovery. Beyond healing our psychological blockages, inner work’s greater goal is to reclaim the Deeper Self within us that was lost, buried, or erased throughout the course of our lives.
It is a sacred, life-long commitment to finding more PEACE in our lives, an acronym for:
- playfulness,
- energy,
- authenticity,
- centeredness, and
- empowerment.
Internally, inner work is a path of embodying our Soul’s essence: the wise, wild, warm, welcoming, and whole presence at our core.
These gifts are open to us when we commit to this path, not just as a hobby, but as a way of life.
What Inner Work Paths Are There?
Like any journey, there are many routes and paths we can take to get us through that subterranean world of our deep psyches and toward our inner Center.
We have defined four ‘pillars’ of inner work as follows:
- Embodiment,
- Self-love,
- Inner child work,
- Shadow work.
You can read more about these inner work pillars here. Keep in mind that we move in a spiral when it comes to inner work, so you can and will revisit these four pillars repeatedly on your path.
Frequently Asked Questions
The four inner work types represent four distinct internal dimensions of the healing journey. Each addresses a different layer of who you are and where you carry pain, blockages, or trauma.
– Embodiment is the foundation. This path focuses on exploring the disconnection between mind and body – the numbness, chronic tension, or sense of watching your life from a dissociated distance rather than living within it. Before deeper psychological work can truly take root, the nervous system needs to feel safe enough to be present.
– Self-Love is the next phase, and it helps you to explore your relationship with yourself, specifically the inner critic, the many worthiness wounds, and the deep-seated core beliefs you may carry that result in self-sabotage or self-loathing. This work is less about positive thinking and more about understanding where your negative inner dialogue originated and dismantling it slowly.
– Inner Child Work goes to the heart of why you may still be anxious, overwhelmed, or disconnected in daily life. It helps you to explore the dynamics of your childhood, and how your ancestors, parents, or caretakers influenced you, for better or worse.
– Shadow Work is the final stage of inner work, and it helps you to explore the ‘dark side’ of your psyche and integrate the parts of yourself that you’ve kept suppressed. This work dives into topics such as shame, rage, jealousy, and other uncomfortable emotions and habits, while also helping you to reclaim the buried “gold” within (your disowned gifts and positive qualities like creativity or playfulness).
Yes, absolutely. Inner work moves in a spiral, not a linear straight line. You may revisit the same layer multiple times throughout your life in different ways, or find that completing one layer of work reveals another beneath it. This is normal and healthy.
Someone who begins with self-love work may find that, for instance, as their relationship with themselves improves, their deeper inner child wounds start surfacing that were once too tender to address. Another example is someone who has done significant shadow work who may reach a point where embodiment – or learning to get grounded in their body, rather than just living in the mind – becomes the most essential layer to their healing.
Your result reflects where you are right now, not where you will always be. We recommend retaking this assessment every 6 to 12 months and noting what has shifted.
Trust that instinct, it’s worth paying attention to. Ultimately, you know what your heart and soul resonate with the most.
There are a few possible explanations. The first is that you may have answered based on what feels most familiar rather than what is most active right now. Our oldest wounds can feel so constant that we stop noticing how they’re impacting our choices, which means a deeper layer of pain sometimes hides beneath the one we’re most aware of.
The second is that more than one result may genuinely apply to you. Most people carry wounds across multiple dimensions simultaneously. The test identifies the most dominant form of inner work you need right now, but it isn’t necessarily the only one you need. If a different result resonated almost as strongly, that dimension is likely part of your work too.
The third is simply that the test, like any assessment, has limits. If a different result speaks to you more clearly or authentically than the one you received, trust your own recognition. You know yourself better than any quiz does.
“Inner work is the effort by which we gain awareness of the deeper layers of consciousness within us and move toward integration of the total self.” – Robert A. Johnson
😇
Re: Psychospiritual Maintenance from the Newsletter.
We often find ourselves in challenging situations where we cannot use win-win solutions, insightful perspectives, previous experiences, or life lessons to confront the darker aspects of our existence. It is at these moments that we must face the things we prefer to avoid or cannot comprehend, and work towards resolving them if possible.
In the realm of what is considered normal, it can feel like a fair game. So, what should we do? Should we shut down and hope for a miracle, or accept that some things must simply be embraced as part of our journey, serving as vehicles for spiritual learning? As we dig deeper and uncover more, we become increasingly responsible for our learning, healing, and the quest for new meaning and balance in life.
Indeed, we may become stuck in repetitive cycles, trapped in a never-ending loop as thoughts swirl in our minds, blurring our feelings and emotions. The search for deeper purpose and direction often brings with it frustration or indifference, as we grapple with what is achievable within the bounds of acceptability.
Exploring these shadow areas can be both terrifying and exhilarating. While it may evoke fear, the potential for clarity and healing is profoundly rewarding. Oh, how I yearn for maturity and the integration of my being.
Regards,
John
It’s a gradual process! The very fact that you long for this is already a sign of maturing.
Re: Psychospiritual Maintenance from the Newsletter.
We often find ourselves in challenging situations where we cannot use win-win solutions, insightful perspectives, previous experiences, or life lessons to confront the darker aspects of our existence. It is at these moments that we must face the things we prefer to avoid or cannot comprehend, and work towards resolving them if possible.
In the realm of what is considered normal, it can feel like a fair game. So, what should we do? Should we shut down and hope for a miracle, or accept that some things must simply be embraced as part of our journey, serving as vehicles for spiritual learning? As we dig deeper and uncover more, we become increasingly responsible for our learning, healing, and the quest for new meaning and balance in life.
Indeed, we may become stuck in repetitive cycles, trapped in a never-ending loop as thoughts swirl in our minds, blurring our feelings and emotions. The search for deeper purpose and direction often brings with it frustration or indifference, as we grapple with what is achievable within the bounds of acceptability.
Exploring these shadow areas can be both terrifying and exhilarating. While it may evoke fear, the potential for clarity and healing is profoundly rewarding. Oh, how I yearn for maturity and the integration of my being.
Regards,
John
Dear Altheia and Mateo,
Re:- Psychospiritual Maintenance from the Newsletter.
It is only when we are backed into a corner and cannot use win-win situations, nor smart insight, nor perception, nor previous history, or life experience, to deal with the Shadow Side of our existence that we come face to face with the things we do not wish to face or cannot understand. Then we face resolving them if possible!
It’s fair game in the outer spheres of so-called normality. So what do we do? Close down and pray for a miracle, or just know some things just need acceptance, to be lived with, and used as vehicles for Spiritual learning. But the more we uncover and the deeper we tread, the more responsible we become to learning, healing, and finding new meaning and balance in life as a human being.
Yes! We become stuck and stagnant, repeating the same old things, or as I put it, on a never-ending loop, as things swirl into a vortex in the mind, which blurs the feelings and emotions. Finding deeper purpose and direction carries with it WTF or as you say “Meh” which parries with what can be achieved out of what is acceptable and possible.
To discover, learn, and explore these Shadow areas is both frightening to the core yet wonderful if they can be cleared. And oh, how I long for maturity and integration of being.
Regards John 💗
Thanks for sharing these reflections John :)
Spot-on with self love! I’ve been in a narcissist relationship off & on for 9 years. This last Go round has totally depleted me and I know I need to fill myself back up with love along with therapeutic services and self-help. I got this email at the perfect time, thank you so much! 💕
P.S. I’m so over & done, only took 97 tries🤣no seriously I have absolutely reached the end & claiming my way of of this pit to regrow & be healthy
Sounds like this email was a clear sign! Take the very best care of yourself.
Self love
Thanks for sharing this.
I should work on self love
I started the test but most of it just didn’t seem applicable. I don’t think of “me” much, not having a lot of faith in self-examination. When I make a mistake or react poorly to some situation, I review it, think of what I might do to do better the next time, and then let it go. Past is past. Can’t change it. Can’t fix it. This moment is were we live. When I look in the mirror I see a (near) 70 year old white guy that has been around the patch a few times, and has some scars to show for it. Nothing special. Colors? Red is wonderful when it is on a flower, not so much when it flows from a cut on my finger. Blue, orange, and green are fine. I like dolphins. They were regular companions during the years my wife and I lived full time on our sailboat. I suspect they are far more advanced in their inner journey as a species than are humans. I also suspect that is true of many species. But such thoughts have little impact on my own inner journey. I guess, in a way, I just don’t take myself or this experience of life all that seriously. But I appreciate the thought you put into the test and the help it might offer to others.
Good for you Tj :)
mine was self love, but i think you expect too much.
i believe we absolutely should judge ourselves when we are doing things we probably shouldn’t be doing.
i love myself, but i also regret not treating others better, and i call myself out when i’m being weak
i treat myself the way i treat others, the way it would like to be treated, with compassion but also with honesty, and i will call people out when they are harming themselves or others
maybe i am harder on myself than i am on others, but that’s because i expect more from myself, because i am the only one i am truly responsible for.
Self-judgment is needed if it is constructive and not destructive (there’s a difference).
Treating others the way you want to be treated is the wrong perspective. There is no empathy as the “other” is being subjected to your perspective, your view. A better approach is…Do, (or don’t do) unto others as they would, (or would not) have us do unto them. It leaves room for the other person’s perspective to be an integral part of our interaction. It is called the “Copper Rule”. It grew out of a Taoist/eastern perspective rather than a Christian/ western one. To me western perspectives are often “me” oriented while eastern perspectives are more along the line of “us” or “we’. “I” may be the only person I am responsible for, but I am the last person I am responsible to. Seeing another person’s needs as at least as important as mine is something very often missing in western culture. It is certainly something missing that is crippling American culture.
Thank you
Thanks gene :)
The answer today is, shadowwork. The previous time, or a smilar test was self love. But i feel that i have developed some solid baseline when it comes to selflove. Which i am also using on the daily to decide whats next. Not that long ago I did some healing work via insight timer, which actually gave me some serious results. I “stole” my inner child. I just took her with me, instead of leaving her in the guided meditation as you usual have to. I feel very creative eversince, and you know how those things go, 1 thing leads to another and another 😅 So its getting a bit messy in here. I am currently working on about 4 projects.🤭 It feels really good to experience this type of flow again and still be able to practice selfcare when needed.
I’m so glad to hear this, Evelien ☺️