Ancestral Archetypes

Archetypes are collective ideals based on standard patterns in the collective consciousness.  They have been used for centuries in the areas of psychology, marketing, art and literature.    The power of archetypes is that they transcend the individual experience creating an unconscious connection, unity and activation around standard personalities, behaviours, and roles. Understanding your archetypical make-up can bring a deeper understanding of self and greater empowerment by supporting the structure or essence of who you are.

Knowing your archetypes can help you to understand and see yourself with a broader perspective and with greater compassion.  Understanding ancestral archetypes allow for deeper personal growth opportunities to emerge by bringing subconscious patterning into conscious awareness.  This helps direct your healing intentions to bring forward the illuminated characteristics of your archetypical make-up and release the shadow characteristics aligned with ancestral suffering.  

This then allows deep and lasting personal growth to support the revision of the limiting beliefs needed to stay in a personally empowered and ancestrally supported place.

In this blog:

+ You’ll explore your ancestral soul and the archetypical characteristics that shape your life and experiences.

+ You’ll learn about the shadow and illuminated ancestral archetype characteristics associated with belonging and responsibility.

+ Identify limiting beliefs and empowering beliefs associated with these archetypes.

+ You’ll learn the most important movements of the family soul needed for ancestral healing: The Orders of Love and the Big /Little Dynamic

My perspective on ancestral archetypes is largely informed by my many years of facilitating and teaching Hellinger Family Constellation Work.  Family Constellation work allows for ancestral healing by bringing inclusion, respect and completeness to the collective energy of the Family Soul, the family collective energy of which your soul is part. 

The primary idea is that we all belong to our family soul in the same way we are genetically related to our ancestors.  We have inherited genetic material that creates the molecular structures of who we are on the physical planes.  The family soul energies are ones we embody through our emotional, energetic and spiritual aspects of being.  Our soul is part of the greater collective of the family soul and creates unconscious patterning that shapes our behaviours, interactions and life experiences.

If there are a lot of exclusions, secrets guilt, shame or traumas in our ancestral past, the flow of life through the family soul will repeat these same sufferings so that we may stay innocent, belonging and alive.  Our primal survival instincts are interwoven with our deep need to belong to our family by becoming entangled with our ancestral pain. 

When ancestral entanglements are present, the ancestral archetypes we run will be more of the shadow aspects trying to create conflict, drama, tragedy and failure.  When we release the ancestral entanglements we can access the illuminated characteristics of the ancestral archetypes such as abundance, joy, harmony, support, connection and love.

In the companion podcast to this blog, you can experience a guided meditation to help release your entanglements and create a desired state outcome for life that you may embrace fully.  But first, let’s talk about the different characteristics of the ancestral soul archetypes using the style I’ve developed called Movements of the Family Soul.

There are 6 main movements that, when applied in a specific order, allow for an entire soul transformation for you to release your entanglements, embody yourself, be able to receive, be grounded, be connected, be aligned and create the life that you want.

Let’s begin with the first 2 movements of the family soul that are underneath every ancestral entanglement.  The orders of love and the big/little dynamic. 

The Orders of Love is the ancestral archetype associated with belonging. 

This movement is based on the principle that everybody in the system has their place in the family soul, which belongs only to us and is granted to us upon birth.    All members of the family must be acknowledged in equanimity with full respect for full life force energy to be available to everyone in the system.  Anyone cast out, died young, forgotten, or became a secret because of guilt and shame will cause holes in the structure of the family soul that leaks life force energy.

When we are not able to stand in our appropriate place within our system, then we will tend to run the shadow ancestral archetypes characteristics such as feeling lost, feeling excluded, the feeling of not belonging, difficulty finding direction, difficulty accessing the fullness of life in health, finances and emotions.  Associated limiting beliefs are not enough, not loveable, and not deserving of.

Working with the Orders of Love movement allows for the inclusion of all members of the family soul, including lost children, past relationships and estranged parents we can acknowledge and stand in our appropriate place in the family soul. 

This plugs the holes, or leaks in the family soul that help restore the flow of life in the entire system.  It also allows access to a deep knowing that your belonging to the system is a certainty.  This fact allows you to accept your life from your parents as pure potential prana which is free of their pain, story or trauma.  This allows through the illuminated archetype characteristics of feeling fully embodied, supported,  and allows the abundance of life to connect directly with us in our appropriate place.  It brings forward self-esteem, self-confidence and vibrance.  Empowering beliefs associated with this are I am a good person and deserve to have what I want.  I am loved loving and loveable.  I am enough.  I am worthy of success.

The next movement of the family soul is the big/little dynamic. This is the ancestral archetype associated with responsibility.  The idea with this movement is that the parents are the big ones, the children are the little ones it’s the order we arrive on the planet. When we get entangled with these ancestral sufferings we step out of our little place and we’re running around in somebody else’s place who is bigger than us trying to take on suffering.  The big-little dynamic must be restored to a healthy dynamic where the parents are the big ones and the children are the little ones. That is the main piece of this work when you take your place as the little one within your system you free yourself up from these ancestral entanglements.  We must to the orders of love to include everyone before the appropriate littleness will be available to you. 

When we are not in our appropriate little place the shadow characteristics of this ancestral archetype include being over-responsible for others and situations, the need to control, and emotional distress synonymous with your family soul’s pain. The limiting beliefs that generally run with these shadow characteristics of the ancestral archetype are that The world is not a safe place, emotional overwhelm lets me feel alive, I am loyal to my family and will help carry their burden, I will give my life’s happiness to try to heal the family no matter what the cost to me or my children.

There are several ways as a facilitator we can work to restore the parent to their appropriate bigness so that the children can be in their appropriate littleness including words, physical movements and exercises to help restore the appropriate perspectives.

When you can take your place in the system and be in your appropriate littleness then the illuminated characteristics of the ancestral archetype will shine through including joy, harmony, flow, freedom, empowerment and ease in life.  It allows us to take responsibility for our own lives, stay in our lane and take care of others by first taking full care of ourselves.  The empowering beliefs associated with the illuminated characteristics of this ancestral archetype are:  I am worthy of my life, I choose love over suffering, Through taking care of myself I best care for others, and I am safe supported and loved simply by being me.  It is safe to be an empowered present person in the world. 

In next week’s blog, I’ll continue through the other movements that are needed to optimize the system, after having released the ancestral burden by taking your appropriate place in the system in your appropriate littleness.

But let’s skip ahead to prime your system for Life’s Embrace by allowing you to think about and sense into the aspects of the desired state you want to create in life.  When you have integrated completely the first two movements you are now aligned in a place where you are free to create the life you want, not the life that keeps you loyal to repeating ancestral suffering.

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