Today we ask that you reclaim your power from Mother and Father Figures.
One of the most primal forms of conditioning all humans experience is around “Mother” and “Father.” It is only natural, since these figures are dominant in the consciousness of very young children. Humans imprint on Mother and Father Figures when their consciousness is first forming and very impressionable.
To very young children, Mother and Father Figures are like gods. Indeed, that is why early humans developed “Mother Gods” and “Father Gods” as part of their mythologies.
To this day, the deity that countless people worship as “God” is essentially a personification of “Father.” Not a Divine Father, but an all-too-human father, capable of rage and violence, and fickle and capricious behavior. Like human fathers who discipline and condition their children, this “Father” dominates his earthly children through a system of reward and punishment.
Even those who do not believe in this Father God are usually locked into their own individual Mother and Father mythology. Freud perceived this, and created a whole system predicated on common human behavioral patterns around “Mother” and “Father.”
Many people live out their whole lives in relation to Father and Mother Figures. They desperately crave the approval of such figures, and at the same time hate and despise them. Some may strive to be “Good Little Boys” and “Good Little Girls,” obedient to the demands and desires of Mother and Father. Others rebel. But even those who rebel are still living their lives in relation to their parents. Commonly, those who rebel against their parents in young adulthood wind up becoming the very thing they hate as they get older.
So long as you live out your life in relation to Mother and Father Figures, you will never truly be free. You will remain a child.
What does it mean to stop living your life in relation to Mother and Father?
It means freedom from living your life in fear of Mother and Father, of what they will say or do. Mother and Father do not have to be biological mother and father. Many people marry versions of Mother or Father. Many people work for bosses who are like Mother or Father. Others marry or work in direct rebellion against Mother and Father — but this, too, is still in relation to Mother and Father.
You cannot be free so long as you fear Mother and Father.
At the same time, living your life in rebellion against Mother and Father will not work, either. While most adolescents go through this phase, if you get stuck in it, you will never really be your own person.
Going through life hating your parents and doing the opposite of what they want is no less limiting than being a slave to your parents’ desires and trying to be a good boy or good girl.
Both ways are a trap. Both the path of the Obedient Child and the Angry Rebel are a trap.
In “The Wizard of Oz,” Dorothy relates to the Wizard the way many people — especially young girls — relate to their Father. He is larger than life, someone who can solve all your problems, someone you worship, someone you’re in awe of, someone whose approval you crave, someone you want to please, someone you fear.
Dorothy discovers that this is all just a projection. The Wizard is a fraud — just a human, nothing special. He deserves neither worship, nor fear.
All people must learn this about their own parents — including the Biblical concept of a wrathful Father God.
What most people think of Mother and Father, and even God, is nothing more than a projection, like the Wizard of Oz. There is nothing there but smoke and mirrors. Behind the projection is a flawed and fallible human being.
Behind the projection of the angry Biblical Father “God” are the flawed and fallible human beings who created that myth, and who perpetuate it to this day.
Behind every Mother and Father Figure you hand over your power to, whose approval you crave and whose disapproval you fear, who you rebel against but whose blessing you secretly desire more than anything…
… behind all that is a flawed and fallible human being. Just like you.
And if you stopped projecting so much mythology on that person, if you stopped living in fear of them, you might just be able to see them as they really are.
Your compassion would awaken.
You might even be able to relate to them as people, not projections.
Examine your relationships with Mother and Father Figures. Notice the ways in which you give away your power, either through slavish obedience or hostile rebellion.
Reclaim that power.
wordfromthewell 