Archetypes

An archetype serves as a prototype for other things. In Jungian psychology, they describe archetypes as patterns in the collective we can draw from. For example, the hero, the maiden, or the wizard.

Many personality tests are based on archetypes, like Enneagram, Myers Briggs, and even Astrology signs. People seek to find out who they are. But it’s useful to recognize we’re not one archetype (sign/type/etc.) but play various roles in different circumstances, shifting throughout the day. Most people are not the same person with their boss as they are with their lover, for example, or their children or their parents.

I see archetypes as collective programs we can run to help structure roles we play, such as parent, worker, boss, or lover. We pick them up through examples around us. Each of us then expresses those patterns somewhat uniquely, leading to nearly infinite variations. It’s common for us to tap into these unconsciously when facing a new role or circumstance, but some are mavericks who forge their own path (although the maverick itself is also an archetype).

Archetypes often come with symbology. For example, many classic paintings feature archetypal images: the virgin, the lover, the angel, the thinker, etc. Memes also use symbology.

Some of this aligns with our actual traits. But some may be to adapt to circumstances. Perhaps we adopt models we see expressed by others, like what we see a partner is supposed to be like. But it will create dissonance, gaps, and inconsistencies when that’s not aligned with our natural traits. Others may not trust us because of this.

As always, it’s better to work with archetypes consciously. That means making our existing ones conscious. This typically happens during healing or purification processes, when they surface. But it’s also common to recognize ones we picked up from out parents.

Often, we expect certain things of our behaviour. We believe in various shoulds or musts, self-expectations. These come with the roles we adopt.

For example, we get a job as a firefighter. Do we adopt a hero archetype? A service archetype? A macho archetype? A blend?

The issue when we’re identified is we get identified with our roles too. What we adopt becomes part of our identity.

I AM this kind of of firefighter.

The messy bit is with trauma. We may cope by adopting identity strategies or traits when we have unresolved parts of ourselves that we once found overwhelming. For example, if we’re bullied, we may adapt by becoming an appeaser (or inversely, a bully ourselves). And then that becomes part of our trauma-based identity. We think it’s who we are when it was just a work-around. That expression then limits what we think we’re capable of, masks who we are and what we love, and so forth.

Similarly, archetypes can be used to avoid what we don’t want to see in ourselves. Like adopting a macho persona to avoid feeling vulnerable. These can lead to making bad choices, as we view life through a role rather than who we really are.

Further, we can adopt them in unhealthy ways, like trying to be the hero unsafely, rushing into a burning building without safety gear.

On the awakening side of the picture, our body often feels it’s unsafe to step out of these strategies and resists those trends. Entangled with the identity, it gets protected and shielded from release. For example, expansiveness triggers fear, causing us to shut it down.

The point of these adaptions was for a specific time in our life that may long be over. Spiritual practice may have prepared the ground and healed, leading the body to return to being a safe space. Yet old habits keep us in avoidance. The body feels this avoidance and responds as if it’s still true now. Time to show the body that it is safe now.

The key is becoming more conscious of our personas and see how we adopt them according to circumstances. As we become more conscious, and our attachments soften, some of these patterns will be seen through and fade. Our expression of self will simplify and more deeply reflect our nature. And our limitations will fall away, allowing a fuller expression of who we are beneath all the roles.

But again, the key is making it conscious. Then we can live an embodied life, in our true, full nature.
Davidya