Here’s some posts I’ve made over the past year about ARCHETYPES:
What are archetypes and why work with them?
I see archetypes as doorways to energies that we may not otherwise have access to, but want to develop. Maybe you didn’t have anyone in your life who modelled full-bodied eroticism to you, or fierce loving boundaries. We learn through imitation and it's hard to develop something you haven't seen enacted in another.
Archetypes - imbued with the collective energy of stories, songs and mystical traditions - can become this 'role model' for us. They are a living thing that you can track from one place to another. You may glimpse an archetype in a novel you love, then again in a film character, then in the lyrics of a song. In this way we piece ourselves together.
Any one archetype is out of balance on their own. We can access wholeness by seeking out the full circle of archetypes. Some fire to balance your water, some earth to ground your air. If I'm only a witch I might miss out on deepening my earthly relationships. If I'm only a warrior I might not enjoy my surrender.
We are CHANGEABLE creatures. We do not remain the same, day to day or week to week. This is especially true if you have a cycle (I think all humans do regardless of whether you menstruate, different people’s cycles will follow different patterns). At one part of the cycle we might be full of ideas, multi-tasking, on top of the world, and a few days later we might be overwhelmed by the smallest task, extremely sensitive and highly intuitive. There is so much value in all of these different faces. There's no need to have a limited or fixed identity. There's no need to apologise for the fact that you change.
SOUL ARCHETYPE
What is the life that you long for, the potential that you feel you are? What is the feeling of being in love for you, who is the beloved within you?
Recently I was listening to a Jungian Analyst talk about Jung's concept of the Self (another term for the soul), and he said that "the ego always experiences the Self as a stranger." From the ego's point of view, the soul is a kind of 'other,' a mysterious being that we get to know only through the things and people we are drawn to (or repelled from). Potentially, throughout our life, we could transition our identity from our ego self to our soul self - we might become this mysterious other.
In this way the soul is something (or someone) who is revealed throughout our lives, someone we long for, dance with, glimpse, someone we are, but cannot always find.
Image from: 'Tarot of the Cat People' by Karen Kuykendall. The Empress card (which happens to be my soul card :))
LOVER ARCHETYPE
In a culture of hyper-sexualisation it's weirdly difficult to speak about our real sexual experiences. I only recently found out that a female body has 'vestibular bulbs' - two big teardrop shaped structures of erectile tissue nestled around the labia, which, at the top, connect directly to the shaft of the clitoris. Thus when the bulbs are stimulated, so is the clitoris and vice versa.
I found this out in 'Women's Anatomy of Arousal' by Sheri Winston. She writes, "When a female body gets aroused the bulbs puff up and make the vaginal opening more expandable and intercourse more pleasurable...If you're having vaginal penetration without puffy bulbs, you're doing it before your body is really ready."
How is it that I'm only reading this after twenty years of sex?!
'Not really being ready' is a big theme in sexual interactions as far as I can see. Our sexual education has consisted mainly of performativity information, which we pick up from the undercurrents in all kinds of advertising, films, porn, magazines, gender stereotypes, heteronorms. There is very little or no discussion of what arousal really is, what pleasure really is and how we bring any of this into the realm of relationship and communication.
It's pretty taboo to have desire, to speak it, be seen in it, and be fulfilled in it. It's incredibly vulnerable.
The relationship between vulnerability and sex often gets missed in our cultural glamorisation of sex. Somehow we manage to gloss over the very thing that makes sex erotic - deep feeling, immensity, intimacy. As such we miss the 'Lover Archetype' completely. The Lover cannot be separated from the poetry and romance of every day life. And yet sex and eroticism gets cordoned off into a genital arena.
Eroticism pervades all of life, in fact it is our very life force. To live with deep sensitivity, or incredible fragility, are part of the Lover Archetype. To be impacted by life, to be open to it, and opened by it makes one a true lover - there is no performance necessary - only the truth of one's innate vulnerabilities.
In sex, this is written on the body - the body opens, is aroused, bulbs puffy. There is also an existential version of this - the soul opens, is aroused, bulbs puffy. To walk through the world as a Lover is a glorious thing, it's also a delicate thing, a deep feeling thing ~ where no feeling goes by unnoticed.
LOVER ARCHETYPE
The witch burnings in Britain may have been the point at which our indigenous connection to the land and nature was severed. Others date the loss of British indigenous practices with the Roman invasion - I highly recommend the Boudica novels by Manda Scott as a portrayal of Indigenous Britain (https://mandascott.co.uk/boudica-dreaming-the-eagle/).
Whenever it happened, we have certainly lost a sense of 'belonging to the land' which is one way to define indigeneity. What is it like to be in relationship with the land, not as a concept but as a reality?
One small way in which I have invited my 'lover archetype' to come alive in my life, is to become really interested in textures. What do certain things feel like against my skin? What is it to come to know the experience of the world through touch, and taste, and sound, as babies do? In the attention of this, there is a kind of communion, a meeting.
I am currently sitting overlooking the sea as it pounds against a cliff face. Slowly the rock is being etched into by the ocean, and the sea carries it, grain by grain, into itself. It's a kind of making love, both powerful and tender. The best kind of meetings are like this, both tenderising and impactful - seeing into the other, and being changed.
For me the Lover archetype is the one who is brave enough to really look, and also to be really seen.
The picture is my cat trying to fathom the ocean.
LOVER ARCHETYPE
It's relatively recently in this country that people assigned female at birth are able to choose the life they wish for themselves. Duty, prescribed roles, and laws have limited the kinds of choices women of the past have been able to make, and often still do. I don't believe we're yet at a point where women feel totally comfortable to be exactly however they are. There are still so many internalised (and externalised) ideals. One might feel disconnected from one's own talents, cravings and emotions. Or have no clear idea of the depth of one's power. There can be a gnawing fear about what might happen if we actually let go, into our true self. If we were to do what we wanted, to express our frustration, or embrace our desires, to love with intensity, to enact whatever is really true, what might happen? Is it possible to live so? I can't say I'm totally there myself, but I am apprenticing to the Lover archetypes, who encompass this kind of authentic wildness and depth of communion with the self.
WITCH ARCHETYPE
*Why are witches associated with cats?*
Witches were thought to have 'familiars' - most often in cat form, who assisted them in their magic.
Cats are nocturnal creatures, who move under the cover of dark, and supposedly did their mistresses bidding at night. They are ambush hunters, making sudden, startling movements. Exquisitely sensitive, cats seem to commune with the invisible, precisely because they can see and hear things that humans cannot.
They are fiercely independent, refusing to follow anyone else's authority except their own. They move with pride and dignity.
Their eyes are incredibly spooky, with pupils that move from fully dilated to vertically slit - similar to those of snakes. And who made his first biblical appearance as a snake?
That’s right: Satan.
Everything that's threatening about cats, was similarly threatening about witches. Independent in nature, comfortable in the dark (the descent part of life), seeing the invisible (the unconscious), authoritative and dignified (wise one), witches had a kind of sight that was extraordinary, like a cat's - and terrifying to those whose actions were exploitative.
There's also a very non-spooky explanation for the relationship between cats and witches...
Much of the costume we now associate with witches comes from a time when women used to brew beer. Before modern systems, beer was safer to drink than water. Women, tasked with domestic work, did the vast majority of the brewing.
Hops are a relatively new ingredient in beer, replacing the medicinal and psychotropic herbs once used. These beers were healing, and produced psychedelic states, often making women brewers the village healer.
Beer was made of grain, so mice were an issue, and cats were a must for brewing women.
A hat called 'the henin,' in the shape of a cone or steeple, was a popular item at the time. 'Alewives' - women who brewed beer commercially - had taken a taller version of the hat as a symbol of their trade, allowing them to easily stand out on street corners, markets, or festivals.
Most peasants were illiterate so worded signage wasn't used, instead an alewife would shove a broomstick in the ground by her gate or suspend it above her front door.
With a large cauldron of boiling wort outside her home, a broom stick over the door to mark herself open for business, cats to chase away mice, and a tall pointed hat to distinguish herself at the marketplace, Alewives began to catch the attention of the ruling class.
There was obviously money to be made in the increasingly profitable fields of brewing and medicine, and a move was made to take this power out of the decentralized hands of the innumerable women scattered across hills and glens who’d passed these arts down for generations.
They were declared heretics, tortured, and burnt alive. Their symbols were demonised and their motives questioned.
Both witches and cats became associated with the devil.
Pope Gregory IX accused witches of canoodling with black cats who were actually Lucifer in disguise. Cats were burned and hurled from bell towers.
Things got reversed - acts of evil were committed in the name of purity, hero(ine)s became villains and vice versa. We still live with this heritage - where darkness became synonymous with the devil.
A cat is a symbol of the night, of descent, of all the things we fear to face. It's also a symbol of the seer that can make sense of that darkness, and the eyes that reflect light back to itself.
I'm indebted to Karen Stallard for alerting me to the connection between Alewives and Cats
WITCH ARCHETYPE
I live in a culture that doesn't value 'descent.' We are constantly trying to ascend, without recognising that descent is where dismantling takes place - necessary for transformation, depth and maturity. Without this we stay stuck as a surface, unexamined culture. This creates harm, and is a major tool in the maintenance of white supremacy and oppressive systems.
The descent half of any cycle is likely to be messy and uncomfortable - this is something to embrace and get used to.
I have used the menstrual cycle as a way to experience this dismantling in my own life - to let this uncomfortable time, associated with being pre-menstrual - show me everything that isn't aligned within myself and my life. It is often a painful process.
People with menstrual cycles have been demonised for being pre-menstrual - it's associated with being outspoken, moody or unreasonable - when it may actually be a moment of finding the courage to express something that needs to change. The way I understand the pre-menstrual time is that a certain kind of 'fuck it' mentality arises, that isn't always there the rest of the time.
It isn't just about communicating that to others, it's more often about experiencing that in the self - being more honest with yourself and having deep, uncomfortable insights. None of that is easy - especially for the ego that likes to keep everything safe and the same, and has a strong need to identify in triumphant ways.
Archetypally, this pre-menstrual flex is the Witch - the one who has matured to the extent that her sense of self doesn't depend on the opinion of others. A witch can look death, decay and discomfort in the eye because they have a depth of self that runs deeper than the grasping identities of ego. They know that whatever survives the storm of dismantling is what is true, and that's what they’re interested in. As such they are an alchemist.
They have the potential to bring about the best self - individually and collectively. They will take on oppressive systems with that 'fuck it' attitude, bringing about necessary dismantling. As such they have been wiped out repeatedly.
Can we now apprentice to the witch, in order to find the courage we need to look at all the uncomfortable stuff within and without, so that we can bring about a life (and world) that is brave, honest and mature?
PICTURE BY LILA, AGE 7
"If I put my mind to it I can be a cat lady"
This song is about a love affair between a witch and a witchhunter. Many of us have felt betrayed by the person we love the most, and the pain of that is perhaps the hardest to come to terms with. Ultimately though love belongs to the lover and cannot be destroyed, regardless of what the other does - and perhaps this is what makes it so poignant. It makes love a form of magic. A spell of being forever one with your own heart. In my song, both the love and the witch rise again, in this life or another.
Buy the song here: https://www.patreon.com/boehuntress
WITCH ARCHETYPE
It's probably hard for white Europeans to imagine how terrifying the witch hunts were. You could be accused by anyone, arrested without warning and were considered guilty until proven innocent.
Striped naked, shaved, pricked all over with sharp needles (spots the Devil had touched were said to feel no pain), deprived of sleep, and slowly starved. The Rack, the thumbscrew, boots that broke the legs were all used as methods of torture until you signed a confession prepared by the Inquisitors admitting to consorting with Satan and obscene practices that were never part of witchcraft. You also had to name others until a full coven quota of thirteen were taken (Thirteen - the number of full moons in a year - has always been associated with witchcraft). Confession earned you a merciful death - strangulation before the stake - rather than being burned alive.
Witchhunters and informers were paid and made a profitable career. Midwives and village herbalists were stamped out - profiting the new business of the male medical establishment. At times hundreds of 'witches' were put to death in a day. In one part of germany two villages were left with only a single female inhabitant apiece after the trials of 1585.
The witch trials were a way to wipe out and vilify femaleness, which due to menstruation and childbirth was linked to sexuality, the body and evil. Misogyny - the hatred of women - had become a strong element in medieval Christianity. "All witchcraft stems from carnal lust, which is in women, insatiable" (from the Malleus Maleficarum - the official, legal document of the day). It was also a way to cull queerness, freethinkers and those that threatened the establishment in any way.
True witchcraft went underground and parts of the tradition became lost or forgotten, which, along with a very effective smear campaign, has resulted in a suspicion and loss of knowledge of what true witchcraft was.
The word 'Wicca' comes from the anglo-saxon root word meaning 'to bend or shape' - it suggests that 'witch' was a word used to describe healers, teachers, poets and midwives. "A witch is a 'shaper'" writes Starhawk, "a creator who bends the unseen into form, and so becomes one of the wise, one whose life is infused with magic" (Spiral Dance, p32).
Starhawk suggests that witchcraft is a religion of poetry, not theology - using myths, legends and metaphors for 'That-which-cannot-be-told.' Symbols and rituals are used to trigger altered states of awareness in which insights that go beyond words are revealed. They point to something that can only be experienced, not merely spoken of.
It's only in recent decades that we're free again to explore the witch archetype - beyond the caricatures, fear and misperceptions. What is it to be a 'shaper,' to experience 'magic' on a day to day basis, and to go beyond words?
(The information in this post is sourced from the book *Spiral Dance* by Starhawk)
CREATRIX ARCHETYPE
I am coming to terms with the fact that trauma is such a big part of my/our lives and our world. We do not live and thrive in the ways that we could - or perhaps I should say, I have not thrived (and I am someone with a lot of privileges in this current system). I am learning what it might look and feel like to return to life as the gift it’s intended to be. I do not feel that culture at large supports a thriving life, nor do I trust the overarching narratives and systems, which must, surely crumble and give way to something else. But I do believe in healing, I do believe that I am healing, and that healing is a must for justice on this planet for all, and that we can help each other heal in various and varied ways.
One of those ways is by moving from the mind into the body, by returning to sensation, and finding a kind of every day joy and simplicity in the gifts and beauty of this life. I cannot always find this way, not every day, but I am learning. One of the ways I learn is from nature. Another of the ways is from archetypes - of pleasure, joy, creativity, nourishment.
CREATRIX ARCHETYPE
The ground and foundation for everything else in our lives, the earth, the anchor, the nourishment. How well we grow depends on the quality of the soil. We may know how to nurture others, but have trouble turning love in towards ourselves.
The Creatrix Archetype is the antidote to the inner critic, they help us to relax, to receive, to accept ourselves, and to CREATE. Their work has both sacred and worldly dimensions, transforming themselves and those they touch. They are a force of nature in love with life, bringing warmth into our darkest places.
The archetype this song comes from is Cliea, the truthspeaker (a warrior archetype). They come from the idea that when you embody truth you become a kind of mirror, showing up what is not innately true, or out of integrity, in others or yourself.
It's dangerous for a person who challenges the status quo just to exist (for example being black, queer or trans), because your existence reveals the violence that's inherent in the status quo. It's time now for the powers to be dismantled by what they see in the mirror, and to stop trying to destroy the mirror. This needs to happen on both a personal and a collective level. It involves a great deal of humility, trust and maturity. I hope we each find those things within ourselves and as a whole.
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it" ~ Rumi.
WARRIOR ARCHETYPE
What parts of the status quo or socially sanctioned ways of behaving are you cutting ties with?
I am no longer loyal to the value of endless productivity - or the notion that anything which prevents production must be minimised (such as dreaming, grief, slowness, meandering, incubating).
I am no longer loyal to the dictate to prove my worth, or slave for perfection, whether physical, material or psychological.
I am no longer loyal to the seduction of glamourised distraction, both consumerist and workist, which feed and eat each other, nor the drive to endless romantic obsession, as a means to avoid the absolute life that is wishing to be lived through me.
I am no longer loyal to substituting the drama of relating, nor the simulacrum of intimacy it creates, for real, in the moment, sensational and embodied presence with everything, which cannot be fabricated.
Standby for the release of my new song Oceta, a warrior archetype who is all about cutting ties with the things that keep one small. Available exclusively on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/boehuntress
Where does fire come from and where does it go? You can't imitate a candle with light because fire is dimensional ~ it brings another world into the room. Somehow I know this dimension. It's the place that I also come from and go to, although I can't speak of it.
This song is written from the point of view of Sunhar, a warrior archetype who knows what it is to live from fire. They have united their will and use it to bring visions into the world. They are taking responsibility for their life-force. I am apprenticing to them.
You can buy the song here https://www.patreon.com/boehuntress. Eventually it will be available on all the usual channels but for now this is the medium I am choosing because the revenue will come to me instead of evil apple, spotify or amazon!
WARRIOR ARCHETYPE
What dampens fire isn't tears, but numbness and suppression. All feeling creates fire (life-force, voltage) - not the stories that go with the feelings, but the sensation of the feelings in the body. If you want to receive the fire of your feelings, drop the story, come into the body and feel the pleasure of the energy/sensation (even if your mind is telling you it isn't pleasurable). Giving it sound and movement can help with this.
Change does happen. Often we live out habitual patterns and it can feel like we'll never escape our conditioning. But we can call on the change of the warrior archetype, we can look for and invite it. There will always be a part of our ego that resists change, especially good change because it threatens our identity (even if that identity is miserable). Things that support change are: practices, a supportive community, constant reminders of what is true.
WARRIOR ARCHETYPE
We never had warrior training. We had the opposite of warrior training. In the words of Clarissa Pinkola Estes, "This early training to 'be nice' causes women to override their intuitions. In that sense, they are actually purposefully taught to submit to the predator. Imagine a wolf mother teaching her young to 'be nice' in the face of an angry ferret or a wily diamondback rattler” (from Women Who Run With The Wolves).
The predator energy must be met with a power that is equal to it. Internally and externally. How do we summon this energy when all our conditioning has habitually suppressed it?
Here are some aspects of the warrior archetype ~ cultivating boundaries, birthing a vision; uniting your will; taking responsibility for your life-force; how to feel fear; devoting yourself to your path; commitment (issues anyone?); truth-speaking; communicating your clear seeing; and being a mistress of energy.
I'm apprenticing to my warrior cat, Momo.