Effect of the missing archetype in the growing up process.

"I always end up loving the wrong guy" Rachel said.

Now as said this, she wore a playful smile and then she looked down and stayed there for some time. I stayed with her and waited for her to come back from that exploration.

From here on the matrix transformed and she jumped right into the problem state.

She was in search of the missing masculine, and the effect of 'that' missing archetype kept interfering in her day-to-day life.

She then shared how she was easily 'intimidated' or 'in love' with men (older to her) and how easy it was for her to swing form one of these polarity to another most of the time.

In a trance state, during therapy on the chair, when she was asked to model a behaviour she'd like to have instead of the current one - she described her model to be having 'assertiveness, ease around men, no need to impress and live up to their expectation'. As she shared that, there was a settled breath, and calm in visualising that state. and sure it was, she had more abdomen breathing and a flushed face.

Her problem state was something that was bordering over self esteem and diminished concept of self. And it was, in her case, the absence of her father and she being the only child growing up with her mother.

This was a classic study of the 'father archetype in feminine psychology' - as much as it was painful and a pattern repetition for the client, it was a rich case study for all the interns who was in room with me.

“ Because our culture is a patriarchy the very air she breathes, the boundaries of her consciousness, the contents of her personal unconscious psyche, and the complete cast of the collective psyche, are full of The Man: his image, his history, his definitions, his requirements, his expectations, his needs, his desires, his threats, his power, his laws, his religions, his gods, his money, and his ambivalent, unrealistic image of her” [Cowan, 2004, p. 12]

The line of work that evening with my client:

{Theory} : Archetypes form the basis of all unlearned, instinctive patterns of behaviour, it is a reservoir of human experience, the collective unconscious looms over the individual psyche, like a shadow, slowly influencing our thoughts and behaviours (both implicit and explicit). when we tap into the defining archetype (either the one that is dominant or the missing one), you connect with the essential truth of 'who am I'. "Rather it is in the intensity of affective response to any given image or situation that we find what is archetypal. This can be something very small scale, not coming in a pre-packaged archetypal or mythic form. What stirs you at an archetypal level depends on you and where you sit and how you look at things and on your personal history. The archetypal therefore can be relative, contextual and personal. This reframing of archetypal theory as a theory of affects is something that has not yet reached conservative academic Jungians.” [Andrew Samuels]

{Line of Work}

1. Awareness of the current pattern and how it was not helpful.

2. Awakening the masculinity within, and then integration with the child and the femininity.

3. Fathering the child

4. Saying goodbye to the physical father, with gratitude for the gift of life.

#psychology #therapy