The Mother Archetype and how to reclaim the sexuality inherent to her

When I was doing my training in Astrology, one of my teachers always told us that Cancer, aka The Mother, is one of the astrological archetypes accepted by society. That others are more difficult--which is undoubtedly true. Try being a Warrior Woman or Courtesan, for example.

And I see what she was saying, no one says out loud that they think The Mother archetype is awful. (Except for those of us who carry it and know that it's seen as super white bread, mamby pamby, weak, over-giving, neutered, sexless, and without a backbone.) Everyone is supposed to love their mama, get her name "Mom" tattooed on their biceps...but they don't.

The awful truth is that Mothers are the projection targets of the World.

We are blamed for everything and are responsible for everything.

When a kid does something wrong, even as an adult, it's the fault of the mama. When does Dad get some negative credit around here?

We are the reasons why men can continue to be Peter Pans well into adulthood--because moms (and wives) are seen and told to be responsible for everyone. When a man gets cancer or has a heart attack it is probably because his wife did something wrong--was too bitchy or didn't prepare the proper foods, because she didn't have him going to the gym 5x per week or walking 1 mile a day. As if we are in charge of what other, grown-ass adults do!

When we are triggered or enraged we blame our mothers for not being the perfect parents. We just wouldn't be so mad if Mom had protected us, bought us more stuff, listened more, supported with more passion, been a better cook, hadn't had a career, had had a career instead of staying home and taking care of the kids...the list is endless. Endless and ridiculous.

I'm all done now pretending like the Cancer archetype is easy.

I'm also all done pretending like The Mother is not sexual or sensual.

The Mother *is* a deeply sensual, sexual being. Like, HOW DO YOU THINK SHE MANAGED TO GET PREGNANT? And if you manage to get past that part, the idea is that she probably just lay there and took it. Maybe she thought of England while her husband did his (very fast) thing up on top of her.

Well, I'm calling bullshit.

I know a LOT of mamas and very, very few of them are thinking of England. More than a few are thinking of Jason Momoa, but that's another story for another time.

I always had strife with my own mama. She and my Dad split when I was small. I was 6, I think, the first time, and maybe 8 when she was committed to a mental institution. I was told that she had just left, moved, without telling me goodbye, and had gone to work for a plastic surgeon in Richmond, 2 hours away.

Then one day she was back, living with my dad's cousin a few blocks away.

I was not allowed to see her.

One of my clearest memories of that time of my life was standing in what is now my back yard looking for a kite stuck in a tree. She was living on the other side of the marsh and had bought me a kite but she tried to fly in the front yard and it caught in a tree and she left it there. Told me about it over the phone, which was our only contact other than letter sent by actual mail because this was in the 1970's. I couldn't see the kite. I couldn't see my mama.

My heart breaks for that small, abandoned girl.

And I think about my own kids and how unprepared I was to mother at 22.

I had never changed a diaper.

I was filled with rage.

I was deeply, madly, wildly connected to my son and loved him beyond all reason and still I fucked it up in so many ways that it would be impossible to name them all.

I guess we all do that, screw parenting up and hopefully we learn from it and do better. It's hard to blame your Mother when you've become one.

My big parenting success story is that all of my kids still speak to me. There are five of them, all grown now.

Okay, that's just one of my parenting success stories but it is actually a pretty big one!

I have a LOT of Cancer in my chart and I'm okay with that. I'm just not okay with this story that moms are the villains in everyone's lives. I'm not okay with this idea that Moms are only around to fix things: lives; food; laundry; hearts, while we ignore our own needs and humanity. What kind of sick story line are we following here? One that we need to shift, that's for sure.

The Illuminated Priestess Path cured my own mother wound. I felt nothing other than love and compassion for my Mama for the last few years of her life.

Kids are so narcissistic and until we break out of those patterns of selfishness and see our mothers as human, and ourselves-as-mothers as human, and until we forgive the inevitable, deeply human flaws in those people who Mother, we will remain narcissistic infants on the inside.

Here's your Call to Action. It's about you taking a step in the direction of claiming your own healing power around this.

Write down 5 ways you're still pissed off at your mother. Now...find the 5 ways for you to solve these problems yourself and take action toward that end.

And stop blaming your mother for not being perfect. Of course she wasn't. And you aren't either. And that's okay. Actually, it's perfect.