Page 11 - My Indigo Sun July - August
P. 11
From the 7th House to the Heart:
Finding the Self in the Other
When we find ourselves disliking someone, it’s Him sharing his story with me touched me
often because they’re expressing a quality deeply. It echoes a truth I’ve lived: if we don’t
we’ve disowned in ourselves. They may act it forgive our parents, we’ll likely marry them — or
out more overtly, which is why we notice it — at least attract their energy in our partners and
sometimes dramatically so. These traits can work through it there. I married both of mine, in
even echo those of our parents, whose different ways. But I’ve come to believe that at
energies live on inside us as unconscious the soul level, we want to forgive them, no
complexes. matter how difficult that process may be. I was
fortunate to make peace with both of mine
A client once shared this: before they died — and perhaps even more
“I always had a hard time with my mother. important, to forgive myself for being like them.
Though she was brilliant — she graduated from
Rice with a math degree — she was childlike When I first began teaching Shadow Work, I
and naive. She was often taken advantage of, made a VHS recording of a class and sent it to
and I found it excruciating. To cope, I my parents. They watched it together. Later, my
overcompensated by developing a persona of father called and said, “I’m an extrovert — Leo
sophistication and intellectualism. I buried — and your mom’s an introvert — Scorpio.” I
myself in academia, avoiding anything or laughed. In my chart, I have Leo rising and Pluto
anyone that seemed simple, gullible, or (ruler of Scorpio) in the first house and ruler of
th
emotionally transparent. the 4 house (origin/home/Mother). They are in
me. It’s remarkable how we inherit not only our
But after hearing you speak and working parents’ DNA but their energies.
through your Shadow workbook, I realized I
was furious whenever I got conned or made a Shadow work isn’t always heavy or painful — it
poor judgment. That same naivety lived in me. can also reveal our shared humanity and even
I had just buried it. The only way I could stop bring out our humor. Toward the end of their
resenting my mother — and myself — was to lives, my parents showed me what real love can
accept that quality and learn to love it as part look like. When my dad was dying and didn’t
of who I am. When I did, it opened the door to want to eat, my mom would make him laugh —
healing our relationship. I was lucky enough to and then sneak a spoonful of food into his
reconcile with her before she passed. Now, mouth. He’d grin, chew, then take out an
when I encounter someone like her, I try to go imaginary gun and pretend to shoot her. They’d
within and ask, ‘Can I just allow this part of life both laugh. That’s love. Playful, enduring love.
to be, even if I don’t like it?’ Because resisting
is what makes it persist.”
My Indigo Sun -11
