I ask that you use your own personal discrimination when reading this article, and set aside any words, aspects or concepts that do not resonate with you. For I recognise your freedom to choose what is right for you, and would not wish to violate your freewill, but rather, I would act only as a resource for your seeking.
The following is an account of a recent encounter I had with a friend, whom I shall name Troy, who as a single parent who is struggling with the responsibilities of bringing up a sensitive child, effectively by himself. This post is about Awakening the King Within. We took a walk into the countryside, and discussed the influences that the four archetypal energies can have upon our human development. Amongst other things, Troy is a non- dual psychotherapist. He, like me, is deeply rooted in a non-dual awareness of what we call the ‘presence,’ or ‘awareness’ at the core of our being.
However, we are also equally aware that it is all too easy to forget or overlook our human self, when encountering and using pure, unadulterated, consciousness in our healing process. Enlightenment for us, is not escaping the suffering of living a relative human existence, to the higher planes of reality; Embodied liberation, as we call it, is about becoming our true Human selves, revealing our unique essence. This process is not about sitting on our mediation mats and disassociating ourselves into the void, totally avoiding what it is to live inside this skin-encapsulated ego, this physical feeling body, this heavy gloopy medium of frustrating ups and downs. To us, being Human is to be a dynamic combination of the subtle non-physical bodies of spirt, and the electrochemical, biodiverse, trillion-cell Earth-Suit, of the atomic domain. It's about reaching into the darkness of the unknown, searching for the shadow, loving the journey of feeling the full spectrum of the emotional scale. It's about facing our suffering consciously, knowing that it is just catalyst, arising again and again to teach us about the themes, lessons and opportunities, to grow as souls.
As we walked, we talked about the human journey of parenting, from a practical perspective. Troy had only recently setup house with his girlfriend, living as a cosy threesome with his child in the wilds of Wales. They were very much in love. He, for the first time in a while, after splitting with the mother of his child, felt safe enough to open his heart again to another, and enter into a sacred intimate relationship. He has been working assiduously upon himself for years. Through a contemplative self-study, he was slowly discovering the historical roots of his challenges, achieving a clearer sense of who he is. He had been gradually processing this information in the presence of pure awareness and had begun to let go of old habits and approaches to his life with greater creativity and flexibility.
Troy, who is principally a therapist, was clearly working and utilising his Magician powers. This archetypal energy at work in the psyche, is all about mental cognition, knowing, knowledge and understanding about the nature of reality. To be a therapist, one needs to be running Magician archetypal energy. He also has a great capacity to feel what is going on in his own body, with minute alacrity. He loves his boy; he loves his lady – he’s in touch with his emotions and sensations, which indicates that he is also running the archetypal energy of the Lover. He has maintained an extraordinarily strong Warrior practice for over the last 30 years. Therefore, He is running all three archetypal energies of the Lover, Magician and Warrior.
With Troy’s permission, which he gave, I asked him directly what is going on in his Royal sector, around his King? He asked me what the qualities of this archetype were. Well, I replied that the King in his fulness will be balancing any overt Magician tendency. He had already confided in me that he was a ‘bit of a lone wolf. ‘This alerted me to one of the main characteristics of the Magician, which is the trait of detachment. I know a lot about this particular archetypal challenge as I come from the Magician sector myself. Unlike the King, the Magician wants to pull away, hideout in his tower, mountaintop or forest, working with the esoteric, playing with the cosmic navel. The King on the other hand is diametrically the opposite; he’s all about community, generation, nurturing, decision making, pushing back the chaos and ordering his Kingdom. It’s about being in the world, acting in a balanced way. Effectively, it’s about becoming the Centre which blesses and regenerates the Kingdom, internally and externally. Being a good Father is just like being a balanced King and vice versa; To be a good Father, we have to bring our psychic domain into order. The outer world reflects the inner world. If we have disowned or abandoned our King, then we have lost connection with our capacity to be an effective father. Troy had already stated that he was finding it a challenge to meet the demands of his 8-year-old, especially since more of his attention was being directed towards his love life and his burgeoning therapeutic practice.
I pointed out that his son, in some sense, represents his own inner child, projected out onto his boy. If we don’t feel up to the task of fathering our children, then we have lost some sort of connection with our inner child. He stated that he was contemplating arranging for his boy to perhaps reside with his mother, who lived abroad, who could perhaps attend to his needs more effectively. This I pointed out is a form of abandonment of both his son and his inner child. He replied that he felt that he did not have the resources to meet the needs of the child. I told him that his boy needed him, that he looked to him as role-model, protector and teacher and primary caregiver.
The pertinent question that I posed him was, from which particular psychic sector does this observation and decision arise from. If you are coming from the Magician sector, who does not want to take responsibility for others, then one's perspective is going to be skewed towards detachment and hiding out. If it is coming solely from the Lover sector, then a similar distortion will take place, where freedom in the form of less boundaries and less order is more highly privileged. Anything that is stopping or inhibiting us from savouring our pleasures is seen as a distraction. It also prevents us from entering into the great Lover aligned with the King. It seems that we adopt archetypal configurations which in general keep us safe, which observe and align with our deep trauma patterns. We believe that our archetypal organisation to be our fallible human self (the Ego), but its highly likely that it's an adopted approach that maximises our ability to resist reordering our psychic space towards fully owning our Royal sector. I’ve noticed this pattern in myself. The most potent Archetypal energy in my opinion is the Royal sector of the King and Queen. If we become inflated in this area, as active and passive independents, then grandiose flooding can lead to narcissistic tendencies, of entitlement, superiority, denial and subjugation of others. Something perhaps he, and I, had been unconsciously avoiding.
I asked Troy if I could speak frankly about my observations, which because of his openness and willing to grow, he graciously agreed to. I told him that he had been privileging his Lover, Magician and Warrior, whilst neglecting his King. Individuation is about balancing the opposites, which builds a stronger human Ego System-self, capable of consciously handling the potent power of the archetypal energies. If we don’t do this, then the archetypal energies run us! It’s a question of being more conscious in our relating to them. I advised him that perhaps it is time to allow the King to step forward and reorder his Kingdom. As with the case with me, the Magician can sometimes act as regent, running the Kingdom whilst the King is abroad on holiday or pilgrimage (see Return of the King article). When the King returns and takes up residence once again in the throne room, in the royal palace, then the Magician can step back into the role as councillor.
Sooner or later, within the maturing process, the Royal sector has to come online, containing and regulating the other three archetypal energies. They in turn contain and regulate the Royal sectors tendencies to dominate. Somehow, we need to find the courage to step up to this mark and sacrifice (to make sacred) the archetypal energies we have been privileging or identifying with. Troy loved to exercise, to go to festivals and retreats, developing his therapy practice. As we walked, Troy began to realise what he needed to do, which he’d been unconsciously putting off for some time. The loving King, when properly counselled by the Magician, reorders the Kingdom through the action of his Warrior, coming into direct and conscious relationship with the centre, the Archetype of the Great Self, forming an Ego access with it. Instead of being run by our conditioning, we take our lead from the Presence within, as our guide and healer. The King then becomes the generative balanced, nurturing centre himself, actively blessing all those around him, with love, kindness and clear seeing.
Troy began to see the efficacy of this movement towards Kingship, how it might restore a balance in his life, which he knew deep down was missing. I stated that when the King is in, then we can choose and decide how to order our day, with specific time spent in each sector, without allowing their individual energies to dominate and inadvertently take control. Love then becomes continually present in all the activities. Warriorship rises to its highest presentation, by maintaining and executing without fail the decisions of the King, arising from the clear council of the Magician.
The penny fully dropped in Troy, landing in him like a stone. I get it he said. Wow this is powerful indeed. He was visibly lifted, as the gravity of the situation shifted in him. I introduced him to the notion of the Puer Aeternus (eternal youth), or Peter Pan syndrome, which is the young man or woman who refuses to grow up and take responsibility for their life. They persistently leave their options open, not wishing to sacrifice anything, because they refuse to make their mind up to grow, to mature, by allowing the ageing process to take place. If we just take our pleasure, working to perfect the shape of our body, ensuring that we are always safe, trying to fathom our true nature, we miss the opportunity to fully become what we were destined to be.
I told Troy that becoming the true King, is a tough decision and action to execute. However, the Magician within us knows it needs to be undertaken. Troy realised he was at the watershed (the place where we slough of any excess emotion or Lover energy, expressed metaphorically as water); this is the turning point, where we step up to the plate of our human existence, and hit the ball of indecision, appeasement, and playing small, right out of the park! As we came to the end of our walk, Troy turned to me and said that the route we had taken through the forest shall forevermore be called by him as the ‘King’s path.’
He asked me how he should move forward with this knowledge. Well, I explained that it would be beneficial to enter into some kind of ritual to enact and mark a change within his psychic space, indicating a great conscious evolution. Inadvertently, we all ritualise our lives without even knowing it. If we want to make a real change, then we need to use active imagination and create a mythological ritual, which signifies within our Ego structure that an archetypal rebalancing is going to take place. In this instance, it is about welcoming the King back from self-imposed exile. I had recently done an exercise with my Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapist, where I visualised my own internal King and Queen, coming back from their crusades in the Holy Land. They arrived back at the palace, greeted by the Magician and the other court members (my unintegrated shadow parts), for a ceremony which took place in the throne room, where the Magician formally passed his regency (power) back to the King. Since that time, I consciously call in the King archetypal energy on a frequent basis, to offset any grandiose Magician, Warrior or addicted Lover energies which unconsciously spring up in me, pulling me off course.
I also advised Troy that to become the true King, we need to attract and be in relationship with a true Queen of equal stature, power and archetypal organisation. Queen in this sense, means running predominately the feminine skill-set or energy. I told him that when I met my Queen, she had two children from her previous relationship. I was not just falling in love with her, but I also had to fully accept and love her children and take up the responsibility of fathering them too. This was my decision, not a demand from my wife-to-be, to do so. They were a beautiful family already, which could not be separated, nor did I want to do so. It was all or nothing! A decision that I have never regretted for a single moment. It has been an honour and a privilege to learn to stepfather these two beautiful human beings to adulthood.
If Troy was to become a King, then he would need a Queen, who would fully meet him and his boy, offering herself up as partner and mother, not just lover. This observation dawned upon my friend. Your primary responsibly here I believe is to your boy, not to your romantic need for a lover. The King always looks to the stability, efficacy and harmony of his Kingdom, not privileging pleasure, knowledge or self-image, above that responsibility. If your present lover is not prepared to become a full mother to your boy, ardently and seriously taking up emotional and practical responsibility to learn to mother him, then maybe you need to reconsider your approach with her. For her to become your Queen, she will need to trust you and your relationship, knowing that your King is coming online, holding the space required for wounded hearts to heal, in the strong containment field of a committed and sacred relationship. Again, the gravity of the situation, hit Troy hard. He thanked me for being so direct with him, stating that very few of his friends would have been so kind-heartedly frank.
After we had parted, Troy reported to me that he had gone up on the moors, found a stone throne and in the voice and energy of the King, enacted a ritual inviting in his King, which hopefully precipitated spending more time in the Royal sector. He stated that he will repeat these two or three more times to fully ground it into his life and experience.
After a week or so, I asked Troy to provide me with some feedback, concerning his experience of the King coming online since we had last met, as he as integrated the talk and subsequent ritual that he had undertaken. He stated that the most potent quality that he had experienced of the King is loving, caring, benevolence. He was embodying all the Kingly qualities that he might associate with this energy, such as structure, clear knowing, decisiveness, accompanied by this incredible, warmth, benevolence, and acceptance. What this allowed him to do was include every aspect of his kingdom. He elaborated on this by saying that in his own inner kingdom, all of the parts that he might be or might have been, ashamed of, scared of, or felt to be unpalatable, or in some way he did not want the world to see, such as the angry, scared, greedy and jealous parts, the King is now sitting on his throne and seeing these parts, these aspects, and he fully welcomes them into his Kingdom. He allows them to take up their space, their residence in the Kingdom, because he sees the potential in all of these parts, and he is an inclusive King. In this process, there is of course some aspect of the queen also sitting at the King’s side.
In my experience, Troy’s tale has some similarities to my own. I was an addicted Lover type, gorging myself upon sex, drugs, food, entertainment and music – I loved life, in all its multifariousness. I was always falling in and out love, but could not hold down a relationship, because of my broken heartedness. I was sinking under the oppression of the addicted and lonely Lover archetypal energy, lost in its un- bounded spaces of woe and despair. It was only through the power of the Warrior, setting boundaries and enforcing ridged exercise routines, was I able to apprehend my addictions, enabling me to regulate, and meet my unruly emotional and addled states. My Magician also began to develop at the same time. I got married, became a technician, manager and commercial expert in the corporate world, making money, keeping me safe, enabling me to open to the true Lover energy of having children and the unconditionality of loving and caring for them. It was only in my late forties, did my Magician take me in a new direction of acknowledging and beginning to heal my woundedness, my trauma, my limiting patterns. When I met my Queen and second wife to be, after parting with the mother of my children, my true Lover began to come online. She fully met me, challenging me to become the best that I could possibly be. My loving Magician worked its magic upon me, healing me further, ensuring that my grandiose King energy, supported by the inflated Warrior did not rage too much, as my Lover heart began slowly healing, through intimate relationship. Now, my Magician knows that it is time that my sovereign Royal energy comes online. This will enable my Individuation to begin to power up, so I can hold and run more numinal energy consciously, with loving intent, knowing and enacting my purpose, without cracking and fragmenting under the pressure of aligning to the Centre, the Divine, the Presence.
Should you have a situation in your life, where you feel that one or more of the archetypal energies are unconsciously dominating you, please contact me and I will offer guidance and advice, on how to move forward and rebalance your life. Alternatively, please visit my Patreon account, and select one of the tiers at the following link Patreon.
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