The Shadow of Shame: What Marvel’s Thunderbolts Teaches About Healing
Want to listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify? Click on the SHARE (next to more info) option below and Enjoy!
Are you secretly mad at yourself for not being "over it" yet?
You’ve done the therapy. You’ve left the toxic relationship. You’ve journaled, saged, meditated, screamed into a pillow... and yet there it is. That little voice that pops up in the middle of the night whispering, “You should be better by now.” Ugh. Shame is sneaky like that. And sometimes it takes a Marvel movie to show us just how loud it’s still living inside us.
Yep, I’m talking about Thunderbolts. And before you roll your eyes, hear me out. Beneath all the punchy-punchy superhero fun was a storyline that hit me straight in the nervous system. This one wasn’t just about villains vs. heroes... it was about shame, healing, and the power of community to pull us out of our own void.
The power of sitting with your shadow
One of the most jaw-dropping scenes in the movie showed a character reliving the most shameful moment of her life... over and over again. And no matter how hard she tried to rewrite it, she couldn’t. The only way forward was through. That scene wrecked me in the best way. Because the truth is, we don’t get to heal shame by pretending it didn’t happen or by mentally rewriting the past. We have to sit with it. See it. Hold it. And then find the courage to keep going anyway.
This is shadow work in action. Carl Jung (the psychologist who coined the term “shadow”) described it as integrating the hidden, rejected, or uncomfortable parts of ourselves. The ones we shoved down, ignored, or tried to outperform. But those parts don’t go away. They just wait. And when they finally surface, it’s not to ruin your life... it’s to invite you into wholeness.
Why this actually works (and why it’s not as scary as it sounds)
Shame is isolating. It tells you you're the only one who’s ever done something awful, felt this broken, or made a mess you can’t clean up. But when we face our shadow, we reclaim those parts of ourselves instead of letting them run the show from behind the scenes. And when we do that with others? Oh my god, that’s where the magic happens.
One of the best parts of the movie was when the lead character couldn’t save herself... but she could find the strength to save someone else. That moment? That’s the brilliance of co-regulation. Sometimes we can’t hold it all for ourselves, but we can let someone else hold it with us. This is why healing in community is so important. And no, that doesn’t mean trauma-dumping in a group chat. It means being seen... really seen... by people who aren’t trying to fix you but who love you anyway.
What it feels like to do shadow work in real life
I’m not gonna lie... it can feel like emotional hot yoga. Sticky. Exhausting. Sometimes you’re just sitting there wondering why you paid money to cry on the floor. But then something shifts. You start to see your story with fresh eyes. You realize that the version of you who messed up was doing the best she could with what she had. You stop punishing her. You stop ghosting yourself. And in that moment, something opens up.
Expect resistance. Expect discomfort. But also expect softness. Clarity. Maybe even a little unexpected joy when you realize you don’t have to keep running from yourself anymore. You get to come home.
The surprising upside of embracing your shame
When you finally stop hiding from your shadow, you get your power back. Not the fake kind of power that’s rooted in perfectionism or performance. The real kind. The grounded, quiet confidence that comes from knowing you can survive your own truth. That kind of self-acceptance is magnetic. It’s healing. It’s contagious.
And when you combine that with connection... oof. Game changer. One of the movie’s final moments showed the entire crew coming together to support the person who was literally being consumed by his own shame. They didn’t fix it for him. They didn’t yell affirmations at him. They simply showed up. That’s what healing looks like. Not doing it perfectly... but not doing it alone.
You don't have to punch your shadow to heal it
You just have to stop pretending it’s not there.
So if you’re holding something heavy right now, I want you to know... you’re not broken. You’re not behind. You’re just human. And you’re allowed to need support. Start with one thing: sit with your shame instead of shoving it away. Let yourself be seen. And if you need someone to believe in your healing when you can’t... come find us. We’ll hold it with you until you can hold it yourself 💛
