By Adreanna

I like to think of myself as a pretty chill person these days. That hasn’t always been the case. Back in my heyday—when youth, alcohol, and the crowd I ran with fueled me—I was a menace. Quick with the tongue, quicker with the hands. I didn’t think twice about the consequences of what I said or did.

Looking back, I can admit I was wrong more times than I care to count. I said things that didn’t need to be said, did things that didn’t need to be done. I’ve tried to make amends where I could, and I truly hope I’ve apologized to anyone I hurt in those years.

From about thirty onward, I made a real effort to clean up my act. I worked hard on my mouth, my thoughts, and my tone. I taught myself to pause before speaking, to resist letting anger sharpen my words into weapons. Because the truth is: words, once spoken, cannot be taken back.

And I did a damn good job of it. For years, I held my tongue. I stopped using my words as tools for harm and learned how to channel them into something more constructive.

But lately, I’ve noticed cracks in the dam.

Part of it is the exhaustion of managing a chronic illness for the last year and a half. Part of it is the hormonal storm of perimenopause. And part of it is just plain being fed up—with the state of the world, with the stress of keeping up, with the grind of daily life. Whatever the cocktail, the effect has been the same: thoughts I used to keep private have started slipping out.

Here’s the thing though: I don’t believe suppressing the shadow is healthy. Denial doesn’t erase it; it just lets it fester. The shadow needs somewhere to go. Sometimes that looks like a long walk, sometimes it looks like a workout, and sometimes it looks like saying the sharp, petty, ruthless thing out loud—just not to the person it was meant for.

Because here’s the truth: letting your shadow speak outside of the moment can be healing too.

We’ve been conditioned to think that if you’re on a healing journey, you’re supposed to stay calm, centered, loving, and wise at all times. But real healing doesn’t look like that. Real healing is messy. It makes room for the anger, the frustration, the irritation, the words that should never actually hit their target but still need to be released somewhere.

Venting is not failing. Releasing is not regression. It’s self-expression. It’s giving the shadow space to breathe so it doesn’t choke you from the inside.

The lesson I keep coming back to is this: being in a place of healing doesn’t mean your anger or frustration makes you unlovable. You are not “less spiritual,” “less evolved,” or “less worthy” because you had a moment where your shadow wanted to fly free. Healing isn’t about never having those moments—it’s about knowing how to move through them without destroying yourself or someone else.

Here are a few questions to sit with as you consider your own shadow side:

• Where in your life do you feel the pressure to always “be good,” and what would it look like to give yourself permission to be honest instead?
• When was the last time you let your shadow speak safely—through venting, journaling, art, or movement—and how did your body feel afterward?
• How can you create space to honor your anger, frustration, or grief without turning it against yourself or others?
• What does full acceptance of your “good, bad, and ugly” look like for you right now?

Sometimes the most loving thing you can do for yourself is to let the shadow side of your tongue speak, get it out, and then come back to center. That release is part of the work.

So if you’re on your healing journey and you find yourself needing to let loose—vent, rage, say the wild thing you’d never say to someone’s face—know this: it doesn’t undo your progress. It doesn’t make you unworthy of love. It makes you human.

And maybe the truest kind of healing isn’t about silencing your shadow. Maybe it’s about giving it just enough space to exist—without letting it take over the room.