Honor your ancestors...?
Mulan (Disney Studios)
In my life, I have behaved in ways and made career choices that my ancestors would not have approved. And I am so grateful that I have had the possibility and courage to do so.
Today one of the topics that came up in meditation was this concept of being trapped in an imprisoning cycle of having to honor your ancestors / parents / family name, according to what they have decided was right or wrong, and of being shamed and sometimes banished if one doesn’t.
I feel as though Asian cultures are an embodiment of that concept, even though you do find it in all human cultures…my Jewish culture is certainly not exempt.
This is a very low frequency concept, a heaviness that is ready to be seen and transmuted.
"You owe me respect!" said the parent.
Firstly, the truth is, nobody actually owes any respect or any honor to their ancestors, or to their rules. Nobody has asked their parents to birth them in exchange for respect, honor and obedience of any kind. Parents do not “hire” children. (On a spiritual level, it would actually be more appropriate to say children “hire” the parents to bring them into this life. But let's not wander there...)
Anyhow, owing ? Think again.
Honor and respect are things that must arise on their own, if they are forced, how can one not see that they have absolutely no value? Forced respect is a form of abuse coming from a desire to control one's offspring, to repress the excruciating pain of guilt or failure that very few parents know how to feel in a healthy way.
The thing is, children will absolutely give you some respect if you give them some respect.
The frequency of owing belongs to shame and guilt. And because this quantum world is perfectly designed, a parent using shame and guilt will only reap shame and guilt: the parents who implement the owing concept harshly are the ones that receive the less respect. In fact, it inspires anything but respect. It might even create hatred towards the parent. A hatred that will, in one way or another, someday burst out.
It's a simple quantum law, when you already vibrate at the frequency of respect for yourself and others, you magnetize the respect of others, including that of your offspring.
Secondly, belonging to a community, a family, a cast, and ensuring the perennity of this belonging by behaving and acting in a way that honors the family name, is only useful if the community is going to nurture you, support you, and provide you with what you need for your expansion into your most blossoming and fulfilled self. If it’s hindering your growth and castrating your desires, absolutely nobody wins. What's the use of community then?
Yes, as humans, we need a tribe to survive and thrive, absolutely true.
But we are now awakening to the knowing that 1. there is a sense of inner safety, inner love, and inner belonging that are inherent and can be continuously tapped into, in anyone. And 2. this world is ruled by a quantum law according to which if you honor and respect yourself, and live from that tapped in state, you will magnetize the community of people who resonate with you and will provide you the love, safety, and sense of belonging that you need in a tangible way. Whether it's your actual blood family, or a chosen one.
Someone who becomes a parent has automatically been given the role of Creator Of The Space For A New Human To Grow In Its Own Absolutely Unique Way, whether they are conscious of it or not. It is their response-ability. (In a way, it’s their honor). They have the choice to fill that role in a conscious way by supporting their child into tapping in and becoming aware of that inner safety and love, or to perpetuate the trauma of dissociating from it. Unless the disconnection is healed, it is passed down. The great news is, there's nothing to feel guilty about here, no right, no wrong, every child who feels the weight of unprocessed generational trauma has the full capacity to heal it, and that's actually how they can become a super hero-in.
It's truly a gift: everyone has the capacity to feel grateful for their parents and ancestors, to feel a sense of respect and honor towards them, one that arises naturally – and that is true no matter what kind of upbringing/culture they were provided.
For some of us, it will take a lot of inner work, emotional release, reparenting of the inner child, and forgiveness/shedding light on wounds, to be able to see it, and feel it.
Part of the work is actually to have the courage to disrupt this outdated cycle. And so, it requires seeing through the fear-based choices that were made generation after generation, and understanding why they did that. It requires remembering the Love we are. It requires standing in the fire of maybe disappointing those who you’ve learned to never disappoint in order to survive. It requires knowing in your heart and core that what you are choosing is for the freedom and joy of All.
Once one has started doing this work, the forgiveness pours out so effortlessly, that the reverence to one’s elders comes naturally. And the gratitude, too.
To be the one breaking the cycle means to be the one setting everyone free. Ancestors included.
“Let my people go” also means that.
Rafaëlle Cohen