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When I was four years old, my father would entertain me with The Blue Feather Trick. As a magic trick, it wasn't particularly tricky; in fact, it consisted solely of hiding a blue feather in the folds of a newspaper, mumbling a secret spell, and poof! the feather would disappear.
I watched him like a hawk--or as much of a "hawk" as my four-year-old self could muster--but the sleight of hand worked every time.
How'd you do that? I'd ask spellbound, as the feather would reappear seconds later in some unlikely spot: under the sofa cushions, even grasped from my ear!
My dad's magic trick became a family favorite after dinner, as my mother washed dishes and my baby brother gurgled from his high chair. Looking back, I see that it wasn't the trick that made this time special. What was important was that it was something we experienced together, as family, during those years we lived as soul cluster and orbited around each other.
The seven shadows
The Blue Feather Trick is a lovely, joyous remembrance in my family's past.
But every family--including mine--also has its challenges, its secrets, its failings, its shadows. In most cases, these karmic challenges center around seven key issues:
* Abuse
* Addiction
* Violence
* Poverty
* Illness
* Abandonment
* Betrayal
Revealing the family
For our first step, we will simply determine who's in your family--in other words, the members in your particular soul cluster. This seems simplistic, but sometimes the karma of the family rests in the experience of one person; or sometimes this person or shadow is secret, hidden or unknown. In order to find out, we need to call in all the members involved.
In this case, we will determine family or soul cluster to include:
* Family relationships you have now, in this generation.
* Family relationships that existed one generation past.
* Family relationships that existed two or more generations past.
* The cultural karma of your family lineage or ancestry.
Remember, souls who bring shadows into a family are not "bad", and souls who release shadows are not "good". Everyone in your soul cluster has agreed to come into this lifetime, or into the lineage, in order to learn soul lessons together.
Beyond blood ties
It's also important to understand that karmic family extends beyond blood ties and biology. Thus, your family includes:
* Those you're related to biologically, such as children, parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents and so on; everyone with whom you have blood ties.
* Those you're related to by law or marriage, such as spouses, guardians, adoptive parents, adopted children, step parents, step siblings, half siblings and so forth.
* Significant friends or lovers to family members.
* Significant companions, helpers, staff, servants, indentured servants or slaves to family members.
* Hidden relationships such as secret lover, mistress, secret families, illegitimate child, child abandoned or child given up for adoption and so forth.
Just a few generations ago, families were extended, and often lived in large collectives, such as a tribe, or as a landholder with many people living in one home or place. Thus, many of these above styles of relationship may be in your ancestral karma.
Exercise: Revealing the family, claiming the shadows
The only work we're going to do right now is to establish who's involved; who the souls are in your cluster. To do this, we're going to work with paper and pencil. Please gather those now.
For this exercise, you'll want to give yourself enough time to sit, think, wonder and doodle as you do this work.
Also, you may need to come back to it tomorrow, or the day, as you gather more information. It can be good to talk to family members, or even look up your family history.
1. First, make a list of every person you can think of you might consider "family". Use the sorting questions below, to help you do this. If you answer most of these questions "yes," then it's likely that the relationship you are in is family.
Sorting questions
* Are you blood related?
* Are you related by marriage?
* Do you or have you ever lived together?
* Do you have custody, power of attorney, guardianship or other legal relationship?
* Do you spend holidays together?
* Would you loan this person money?
* Would you let this person live with you?
* Would you give this person a kidney?
* Would you visit this person in jail?
* Would you go to their 80th birthday party?
* Would you be their child's guardian?
* Would you go to their birthday party? Graduation? Wedding?
* Would you go to their funeral?
* Would you help them die?
* Would you arrange their funeral?
* Would you clean out their house and get rid of their effects, after they died?
2. Now, go back one more generation, and make a list of who is in that family, to the best of your knowledge.
3. Go back one more generation, if possible.
4. Consider your family's cultural heritages: what country are your parents or grandparents from? What is the identity with that country or culture? What is the karmic lesson from that culture? If you have a variety of cultures in your family, what are they? Do these cultures blend easily, or are they in conflict?
5. Add in anything else that seems significant. For example, if your family was Japanese, and was incarcerated during WWII, this is very important karmically. If your family immigrated from another country, this is also important. If your family was affected by violence, poverty or war because of the time and place they lived, this is also significant to the karma.
Claiming the shadows
6. If any of the seven shadows are affecting your current family, please write these down, and who the members are affected. For now, I want you to just have an intuitive reaction...what your gut tells you.
Again, for easy reference, the shadows are:
* Abuse
* Addiction
* Violence
* Poverty
* Illness
* Abandonment
* Betrayal
7. If you're not sure what shadows your family may be dealing with, simply notice which resonate with you the most--which you are repelled by, or have a reaction to.
8. If you are able to identify shadows in past generations, do so now, to the best of your knowledge, going back as far as you can.
Remember, we're taking this healing process in steps, because the work can be intense. For the rest of the week, please hold these ideas in your mind. Feel free to journal on them, and invite your dreaming life to reveal more.
Do not be surprised if you find yourself contacting or contacted by family members, and new "stories" or information about the past, about family secrets, shadows and more is suddenly revealed during this week.
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