Embody the Soulful Chain Breaker:
Explore the ingredients of transformation and what it takes to commit to change beyond the urgency of now
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In joining Rooted on this journey you are invited to step away from a structured “fix-it” mindset. Some of our struggles are well supported through linear processes; chainbreaking, however, is iterative, it spirals, and invites coming back time and again. Returning is not about failure. It is about the deep presence-ing that is required to reweave the vast interconnectedness that is our birthright.
Consider joining us for this week-long journey if…
- You are on a journey to break with negative patterns and have the desire to recognize and change the patterns that have shaped you personally
- You're curious about how to interrupt generational cycles of trauma and oppression and what it means to embody this change in person and position.
- You wonder about the connections between desire + compassion + resistance and how it can lead us past fear to a point of creative ignition.
- The thought of uncovering the purpose of disruption and disorientation makes you EXCITED (or at least, curious).
- You find yourself asking: Can I influence culture? And if so, how?
- You would like to discover ways beyond direct political action to influence culture and create change.
- You want to find inspiration and purpose in your personal journey as part of a larger collective effort.
How might the archetypal energy of the chainbreaker be helpful to you?
An archetype is:
- An image or motif with which cultures and collectives loosely frame a shared human experience; (think rebel or witch or hero).
- Archetypes do not produce a singular narrative that has at its foundation a set of definitive characteristics. Rather archetypal images/narratives evoke and the evocations emerge along cultural+collective lines as well as very individual ones.
- Archetypes are an invitation to encounter a psychic energy (Chainbreaker) and be lured, intrigued, and drawn into a journey that supports transformations with Big and little T/t’s.
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This is an invitation to not follow...
Transmutation invites a different embodiment of transformation. One in which, like the ancient alchemists, we commit to the lead believing that, with the right accompaniment, it will become gold.
The lead rather than being thrown out is thrown right into the center of the crucible and through the element of fire becomes that which we never believed it could be - the vital ingredient of our healing.
What’s on the Journey?
Who is the Soulful Chainbreaker? Transmuting Intergenerational Trauma Through The Creative Principles of Fire
This is a story about what it means to be the one who steps out of line. The one willing to be the weak link in the chain. The one willing to disrupt and disobey; to embrace disruption as a portal and disappoint some of the expectations held for us (and the people associated with them) in the service of another future. And how a shift in imagination turns our deviance into a dedication to life, love, and liberation. This requires courage, fierce love and a fire (in the belly) that sustains our commitment.
In this email, we’ll include reflections on becoming the soulful chainbreaker, and what it might mean to and for you.
Unlocked: When We Access a Desire Greater than Fear
The Chainbreaker as archetype invites critical questioning and reclaiming. We are invited to consider disappointing our families of origin, and the cultural influences at large by rejecting narratives and dictates that reproduce harms. It’s risky, even, for those most marginalized in these narratives. Yet in this risk we open to a vital rebirth: the opportunity to access desire long hidden or dampened by chains and obstacles.
If we imagine our inner and outer worlds as a map; not one shaped by imposed borders but rather a map that authentically reveals the contours we trace in our daily living and loving. What would we see? What is shaped by inheritance? How does desire move in this geography? Where are you located in this story of change that is both personal and collective?
Black queer scholar, M. Jacqui Alexander, in her work on the cultivation of ‘sacred interior’ compels us when she says that “our first task is to become attentive to the desire of the Soul and to place ourselves in its service.” Is there anything more counter-to-culture than that?
Metamorphosis, alchemicalization require an energetic event, like a spark, that opens and sustains a process.
Desire, creative impulse roots in the energy and action of fire: warming, illuminating, consuming, and transforming. There is a font of desire - distinguished from forms of desire shaped by culture - rooted in a deeper order of life, residing within each of us, that is the fire that propels deeper-level transformation.
It is the fire of the chainbreaker - come and discover it with us as we partner with the Chainbreaker to kindle revolutionary fires and desires.
In this email, we’ll discuss this and share a guided practice to help you identify your own moment or experience of a desire greater than fear.
Living From Desire: Confronting A Failure to Belong. The Spirit and Science of Change Work & What our bodies have to do with generational chain breaking.
Many experiences of trauma/oppression reveal where we’ve failed to belong. The ways in which, as we navigate our social worlds, we come up against blocks and barriers to birthright dignity, authenticity, acceptance and belonging. That is, where we disappoint and fail to conform to the expectations of dominant cultural narratives. This rejection dampens our inner spark, disorients our desire, and erects borders and checkpoints in our interior world that prevents the wild rambling and roving that is our birthright and is necessary for wellbeing. This non-belonging is also a portal to a re/imagination of how else we might live.
Often unconscious to us, our experiences within culture shape the ways we’re oriented in the world; influencing the neurophysiology of our bodies, our emotions, perceptions, and beliefs about ourselves, others, and the world.
On this shared journey the Chainbreaker illuminates the borders and checkpoints - the chains - that limit the free expression of our own unique hearts. The Chainbreaker archetype offers a way to embody fire-based courage so that we may see clearly the impacts of dominant familial and cultural narratives and a path to liberate ourselves and the generations that will come after us.
What appears to us as evident in a field of infinite possibility is influenced by our early experiences embedded within family systems and culture.
This email explores the spirit and science behind change-making and chain-breaking. And it asks the question: What can we learn from our bodies that the broader culture tries to bury?
In this email, we’ll also offer guided reflection practice on what trauma has made way for in your life.
Cycles of Fire: The Spark that Ignites the Flame! Imagination and our Maps.
On our own, the desire born from the challenges we’ve faced can be a powerfully transformative force in our lives. Yet, there’s so much more to this story. Even within the boundaries of our own skin, we are not singular entities. We are multiplicitous, entangled with the world in ways we cannot fully know. The reach towards this orientation opens up possibilities we may never have imagined.
Our personal embrace of the Soulful Chainbreaker becomes a cultural force when we gather together, commune, share stories, and support each other to commit to and sustain the journey. We do not disrupt and re/orient within a vacuum, other beings dedicated to this process become our co-conspirators and co-creators of new experiences and new future(s).
Rooted in the experience of our non-separation we might find greater access to our creative life energy and imagination to become newly oriented in the world, to create new maps and pathways of belonging.
We all have an inheritance from our ancestors.
Some of that inheritance is a gift and it is ours to honor and cherish. Some of that inheritance is rooted in intergenerational trauma. We have the choice of being either the generation that repeats it or the generation that breaks with it.
Register today and join us in this inquiry.