The Original Tribe.
Our inner child is defined as “a person's supposed original or true self’.
Fortunately or otherwise (depending on your perspective) our inner child finds itself born into a tribe. This tribe provides the answer to the child’s fundamental questions of life, ‘self’ and ‘other’ and becomes our inner child’s reference for how and what to ‘be’ and ‘become’.
The Original Tribe, I am focusing on in this article refers not to a specific national or community identity nor does it denote a peer group, epochal or relational context.
The inner child’s original tribe is its archetypal family. The inner child first interacts with its Original Tribe – mother energy, father energy and child energy - to discover how and what to be and become.
The healed original tribe – our maternal energy, paternal energy and energy of youth – is the constant that all people seek in their own lives and interactions with others.
Our original tribe, governs our explorations of self, our sense of purpose, what motivates us to pursue specific careers or relationships, the development of our fundamental beliefs about life, ‘self’ and ‘other’. The original tribe and the wounds and healing found therein, shape our politics, our religious beliefs, our dreams, ambitions and longings.
The Child asks The Maternal:
Can you see and know me? – learning unconditional love.
The Child asks The Paternal:
Am I safe? – learning unconditional peace.
The child asks itself:
Am I enough? – learning unconditional joy.
These are archetypal energies and exist for everyone’s inner child – the figures and people our inner child use as a reference for each archetype are the ones to whom we ask these original questions. These archetypal energies manifest contextually for the individual.
The answer to these questions teach us about Unconditional Love, Unconditional Peace and Unconditional Joy, respectively. They form our relationship with these concepts. When our questions go unanswered or are answered in the negative or as unknown, we develop a conditional relationship with Love, Peace and Joy.
Conditional Love produces Existential Shame
(the feeling that we are inherently unworthy or incapable),
Conditional Peace produces Existential Fear
(the belief that we are innately and perpetually at-risk, endangered, or subjugated),
Conditional Joy produces Existential Lack
(the constant state of being fundamentally incomplete, missing or empty).
The process of asking our original tribal questions and having them answered (or not) can create cycles of recurring trauma and wounding.
For the inner child, discovering unconditional Love, Peace and Joy are the motivating forces behind every action. In the healthy original tribe – the child learns through growth and ultimately maturation to be solely and independently responsible for their unconditional relationship with these concepts.
Unfortunately, beyond childhood, we have not only externalised our responsibility for discovering these unconditional concepts within ourselves, we have also normalised attachment, dependency and desire as the sole routes to realising these unconditional concepts.
Our society has embraced and accepted that love, peace and joy are exclusively conditional - and has classified these as ‘needs’ which can go contextually or even perpetually unmet. We are encouraged to dedicate our lives to indirectly pursuing love, peace and joy as outcomes or consequences of action taken, effort made or what we possess. It has become assumed fact and a social concession that unconditional love, peace and joy are non-existent or to be sought externally. There is even a tacit implication that if all of these ‘needs’ were unconditionally met within us - there would be no motivation for action, effort or engagement within society.
Essentially, we have accepted a reality in which these ideas are both (1) exclusively found outside of us and (2) are fleeting, transitory, non-existent or impossible to maintain.
The wounds are not our fault, but the healing is our responsibility.
The road to healing, recognises that unconditional love, unconditional peace and unconditional joy are within our reach and possible.
Everything sought outside of ourselves can be found within – we just have to make room.