The Hidden Archetypes Shaping Your Health and Healing

Did you know your thoughts, behaviors, and emotional patterns might be shaping your health? What if the key to healing lies in understanding your unique archetypal makeup? Clare Doherty, intuitive guide and transformational coach, will be giving us a masterclass on how our archetypes influence our well-being and even shape how we perceive and respond to a diagnosis. Welcome, Clare.

Hi, nice to be here.

It's lovely to have you. This is an interesting one. I don't think anybody really thinks about their archetypal type when they're thinking of their health or a diagnosis. So why don't we start with what is an archetype and how many different types are there?

So archetypes actually, you know, are a really old concept that they were first, um, introduced to us by Plato, and he described them as being these thought forms that exist in the collective unconscious. Um, and so, for example, the color red could be an archetype, but it presents in our world in different forms. So you can have a red balloon or a red bicycle or a red hat. Um, and likewise, a hat is also an archetype, and it presents in different, you know, forms.

Mm-hmm.

You could have a bucket hat or a baseball hat or, you know, whatever, straw hat. And so, um, Jung, um, Carl Jung, um, then took this, um, idea or this concept and kind of modernized it. And he introduced the 12 archetypes, which people are usually more aware of. And, and he had 12 archetypes that he thought were common to all people, like the caregiver and the sage. And, you know, there's, there's 12 of them. And then since then, they've actually been developed. So we know that, um, there are actually infinite archetypes. For example, I'm a mother. I'm also a teacher. I'm also a coach. Um, I'm also a daughter and a sister and a wife. Um, I'm a runner. Um, so we have lots and lots of archetypes that make up who we are. And so in, in kind of, uh, modern day speak, I would describe an archetype as being a set of patterns or, or, or actions that make up a behavior. So for example, if I am sitting predominantly in my mother archetype, then some of the qualities that I'm going to display are things like, um, being very loving and maternal and caring and wanting to take care of people. And, and, you know, just as a side note, you don't have to be an actual literal physical mother to have this pattern. We mother our pets, we mother our friends, we mother, you know, other people all the time. Um, and as we, as we progress through history, certain archetypes become more common and certain ones kind of fade into the background. So, you know, for example, we don't actually physically really have jesters anymore or knights anymore, um, because, you know, we're not, we're not in medieval times, but we still know what we mean when we say those things, you know. And, and back then we wouldn't have had things like, I don't know, a millennial or a yummy mummy or, you know, anything like that. They wouldn't have existed, but they do now. So as we evolve, we get more and more new archetypes that evolve with us.

That's a great explanation. It kind of like my mind was going to, it kind of sounded like identity, people's identity in a way.

Yeah. And that's the thing is that our archetypal makeup does become our identity. And sometimes that's really beneficial. So an archetype has a spectrum. Um, if I go back to the mother as an example, um, we have what's called a light side that we're aware of, we can see. And then we have a shadow side, which we're not aware of. And so on that spectrum, as a mother, for example, if I'm in the light side of it, you know, uh, mothering somebody, then I'm likely to be being kind and compassionate. And, um, have good boundaries, but in a very loving way. But if I slip into that shadow side, I might become a bit tyrannical or a bit of a bully mother. I might be quite manipulative. I might be, uh, mean to my, to my children. I want them to conform because it suits me rather than because it benefits them. And I'm trying to set healthy boundaries. And so we can move between the edges of this spectrum, the ends of this spectrum, and that's normal. You know, we, we all sometimes, you know, uh, have a moment, don't we, with, with people where we kind of become a bit reactive. Um, when that's happening, if we're not aware of it and we don't catch ourselves, then we can, we can slip into this sort of shadow behavior. Um, what, what's not beneficial for us is if we find ourselves in the—

Shadow.

shadow side of a behavior for a long period of time. Um, and this can happen with our health, actually.

These archetypes have 2 sides to them, like you were saying, the light and the dark, that all of them—

Yeah, but it's called like a spectrum. Yeah, spectrum in between. So, you know, you can be anywhere along that, you know. It's kind of like, you know, you can meet somebody that's really, really kind and, um, does, does things for everybody and, you know, always puts somebody first. And then you have something that's really, really selfish and never thinks of anybody else. And then you've got various people, you know, different points along that spectrum.

Ah, so it's quite broad. How would you identify a person, say, their dominant archetype, and how does this influence, like, their health and their healing process?

How do we identify an archetype? That, that's basically start to become aware of your patterns, your behaviors, your actions. So for example, if somebody is, uh, has the bully archetype, then they're going to be manipulative, they're going to be mean, they're gonna, you know, potentially use some sort of aggression to violate other people's boundaries in order to try and make them feel small. Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Um, caregiver archetype, for example, will be somebody that likes to take care of other people and make sure that they feel safe and they feel seen and tends to their needs.

Mm-hmm.

So it's really about trying to, uh, recognize what your own patterns are and what your own actions are. And then if you're not sure, do a bit of research, have a look at, you know, which different archetypes present in, in different ways. And so how they affect our health is, um, The archetype that we're in at that present moment in time affects how we perceive the world around us and what's going on. So for example, if I'm in my mother archetype and, you know, I'm perceiving the world around me as, right, I need to keep the people that I love safe, how can I do that? Um, how can I take care of my children or take care of my friends, um, in, in a way that helps them to feel supported and safe. And if I'm perceiving the world through the eyes of an optimist, I will be seeing things that, like, make me think, oh, the world's a really, you know, nice, exciting place, and things aren't too bad, and everything's gonna be okay. And even if I, you know, have a car crash, if somebody rams into me, potentially I'm gonna, you know, kind of try and find the Positive, if there is one in that, maybe, you know, maybe I'll say, oh, well, never mind. You know, I didn't need to go to the shops today anyway. I'll just, you know, I'll just do this instead and I'll go tomorrow and everything will be fine. It's only a car. Nobody was hurt. But if I'm seeing the same situation through the eyes of a pessimist, I'm going to be like, oh my God, can't get to the shops today. My day's ruined now. I haven't got a car. This is just like, you know, my life is over now. I don't know what I'm going to do. So I'm having, I've experienced the same incident, but because I'm seeing it through a different lens, a different archetype, my emotions, the way that I feel about it, and my thoughts and beliefs are very, very different. And this is what can happen with our health. So if we are in a pattern which feels that they've got control or some control over the direction of our lives and our health, Hmm. when we receive a diagnosis, we're much more likely to go away and do our own research, to sit back and try and make a decision about what might feel right for us to do and what might not feel right for us to do. We might even challenge the prognosis that we get by asking questions or thinking, well, is it true that this is going to happen? And, oh, I found cases of where people have done this and they've recovered much, you know, much faster than I've been told. Or, and if we're somebody that's viewing this through a pessimist, for example, or through the eyes of somebody that feels Very victimized, which I have to say, the victim is a normal, healthy archetype for us all to have. And, um, I get very passionate about people making the victim archetype wrong. Victim archetype, um, we all have it. It's what keeps us safe. It helps us to assess risks. If we didn't have it, we'd just run across the road. We'd just, you know, gamble all our money away because That, that victim archetype helps us to go, hang on a moment, is this dangerous? Are we, are we going to be safe doing this? So, um, it actually has a role. It lets us know when somebody's trying to violate our boundaries or abuse us or harm us. It's when it becomes out of balance that it can become, um, unbeneficial for us and unsupportive. So when it's out of balance, we can tend to feel stuck in a cycle of feeling bitter, um, helpless, looking outside of ourselves, wanting other people to heal us or to make us better. Because there's that spectrum of the victim. So it's not all bad, but it's not all good either. Like any of our patterns, any of our archetypes, that there's a, there's a spectrum to it. But if we get stuck in that shadow side of the victim And we get a diagnosis, if we're already potentially in that archetype, then we'll perceive what happens to us as not our fault, really, really bad news. We'll feel helpless. We'll feel very angry and very bitter. And, you know, we might get stuck in a cycle of grief. And to a certain extent, actually, that's normal at the beginning of any illness and diagnosis, any life challenge that we have.

Yeah.

But what hopefully will happen is we then move through it and we become the survivor and we go, do you know what? I survived that. And I'm going to take what I have learned to help other people, or I'm going to take what I've learned to help myself going forwards. And being a survivor doesn't necessarily mean that we're cured or that we're symptom-free. It means that we don't sink so far into the challenge in front of us that it overwhelms us and, uh, we become helpless.

Right, that's a fantastic explanation. We spoke about the victim, as in how they look at their diagnosis, or, you know, if they've had a long-term chronic condition. Is that the main one that would look at it in that way, or Is there another type of archetype someone can have where they're really struggling to look beyond the negative of their condition?

So there is the pessimist as well, but, but, you know, the victim is probably the predominant one because when we're ill or when we become injured, something has happened that has violated our health and violated our energetic boundaries, our physical boundaries. And so It's normal to feel anxious and to feel worried because we have uncertainty about what's going to happen to us. Am I going to actually be okay again? Is this, is this treatment, is this help that I'm getting, is it actually going to work for me? And that's normal to question all of that.

Mm-hmm.

Because, you know, as humans, we don't like uncertainty. We, we want to feel safe. Um, those hardwired patterns within us that want us to feel safe and secure and loved, they kind of never go away. And so all of our behavior serves to help to protect us and, and so that we do feel safe. And so I would say, yeah, the victim is one of the, one of the main ones, definitely. Yeah. But as I said, it's on that spectrum, so it's not a bad thing. You know, if somebody comes and hits you over the head with a piece of wood and you're bleeding, You've been victimized and, you know, you want, you want to know that. You want to be able to report that person, that, you know, you want to be able to make them accountable. We don't want to go, oh, it's fine, don't worry, yeah, it's not a problem. You know, that's as unhealthy as getting stuck in, in a cycle of helplessness.

With the archetypes, in developing, say for example, developing a chronic illness or any kind of a health condition. So the victim, if you stay in it for too long, obviously you've got them, and that sort of— you've gone down the negative mindset when we know mind-body plays such an important role. But can that also be for, like, you know, the mother or the caregiver who maybe is out of balance and is giving and is going into burnout, for example?

The people pleaser is a really, really common archetype born from, you know, The society we live in, the patriarchal capitalist society, which conditions us to believe that being busy and being productive is the only way we can succeed. And, you know, if we don't put other people first, then we're very selfish and nobody will like us and nobody will accept us. For women in particular, we tend to overgive and people please in order to feel liked and accepted. And of course we can. You know, we can overgive to the extent that we give all of our energy away and we don't tend to our own needs. And it's a really, really common pattern in illness. And I see it a lot. So, um, I see a lot of, and, and it's, and it reflects in our physical symptoms. So for example, if you are in the shadow side of the people pleaser or erring in and out of it, you will tend to have not very good boundaries. You'll be somebody that says yes automatically, and then you'll go away and think, Did I say yes to that? I don't really want to do it. Or, you know, but rather than go back and say, actually, I've changed my mind, I'm not going to do that, you'll just do it. And then you'll begin to feel a bit like a martyr. And it's also common for us to, um, agree to do things and, um, want to put a boundary in place and then feel guilty. Oh, well, I can't because I've done it up to now. And now if I don't do it, it's, I'll feel really bad. And That's the typical pattern that's actually inviting you to question, but why do you feel bad? Why aren't you putting your own needs first? How can you even help other people if you don't meet your own needs first? If you haven't refueled yourself, if you haven't rested for yourself, if you haven't, if your own health isn't, you know, at least 90%. How are you going to actually take care of other people? Well, you can't. And so over time, our bodies try and show us this because they slow us down and our symptoms get louder and louder and louder. So when we've got poor boundaries, when we do something like people pleasing, or maybe we're in the shadow side of the empath as well, somebody that's very empathetic tends to have poor boundaries unless they're very aware of that. Um, it shows up physically. So we'll have, we might have things like issues with our skin, eczema, psoriasis, rashes, because the skin is the biggest boundary that separates the physical body from the environment and other people. We might have issues with internal boundaries such as, um, leaky gut or, you know, other IBS, other gut issues because Again, your gut is a big boundary that separates what you eat from the rest of your body. And so it's really interesting, you know, working with people and finding out about their personality and their traits, and then looking at their physical symptoms and what they're battling with. Um, you know, and digestive issues with people pleasing and overgiving are huge because, you know, um, we find there's more and more things that we react to that are causing us an issue, um, the, the longer the symptoms go on for. Of course, we can't, you know, we, I'm not saying that we can just make everything better by having boundaries, but that's part of the process. It's part of the pulling back so that we can physically heal ourselves and give the time and attention and rest so that we can heal combined with the other approaches, which might be diet and might be, you know, medication or might be, I don't know, some other therapy.

Oh God, that is really— I love the whole thing about the gut and the, the leaky gut and the leaky boundaries, you know. Not— who would think of it like that?

Yeah, you know, it's so common.

Yes. And you sometimes, you have to really sit back and reflect, don't you, on your own behavior around that sort of thing and say, how am I? Am I— no wonder why I've got stomachache or intestinal problems. When you actually reflect on your behavior and the way that you interact with people and the needs that you're needing, or the emotion that you're needing from that interaction. It's incredible once you start going down.

Yeah, it really is. So, and, and the thing with boundaries is it's every time we, um, don't have a boundary with somebody else, so every time we say yes when we want to say no, we're actually disempowering ourselves. Because if, if we constantly say yes, then how You know, and we can't say no, then how powerful is our yes? Do we really mean it? And every time we do that, we're actually abandoning ourselves because we're going, actually, I don't matter. I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know, say yes to this person first.

I love that. Yeah, it is, it is, it's kind of betraying yourself. Yeah. And your own needs. And I know betray is quite a strong word, but it is a bit like betraying yourself to put someone else first, and you're sort of subconsciously telling yourself that you don't matter. We all have what I assume a dominant archetype and then maybe sub-archetypes. So does shifting into another type of archetype— would that help promote healing and more resilience?

Yes, yes. So we can't ever get rid of an archetype, and we don't want to because they've all got a purpose. So even our most unbeneficial behaviors, like addiction for example, all serve a purpose. They're trying to keep us safe by, you know, helping us feel good or, uh, not experiencing reality. Um, so even, even those patterns serve a purpose. When we try and get rid of something I don't know, like, I see a lot of women particularly who don't want to feel anger because maybe they've grown up in a household where one of the parents has been particularly angry. And so they see this as very negative. So they said, I'm never going to be angry with my children. I'm never going to be angry with my partner. But they are angry. They're just not expressing it. And then their body expresses it. And so we want, what we want to do is to get people to be Aware of their pattern, so aware of oh yes I do have an addiction, but I'm not going to shame myself for it. I'm not going to demonize myself for it. Instead, I'm going to try and understand what it's showing me, and I'm not addicted to sugar or alcohol or cigarettes, whatever it is, because I'm a bad person. I'm addicted to that because actually this is what's helped me survive, and I've needed that. thing to help me to navigate all this trauma that's happened to me, but I can see now how it's also not supporting me at the moment. And so I'm going to work with it to try and shift out of it. And actually, the, you know, the opposite side of the addict— most people that have got really strong addictions are very empathic and very intuitive, and the opposite archetype to that is actually the mystic. because they feel a lot. And that, that's part of addiction. It's why we comfort eat. It's why we reach for the glass of wine when we're stressed. It's why we smoke the cigarette, because we need something to distract us from what we're feeling. Um, and so, yeah, we, we, we try and accept the pattern that we're in, get curious about it, meet it with compassion and understand it. And then we try and figure out, well, where do I want to go? You know, if I, if I'm very unwell and I'm unwell because I've got an addiction, then what I want to do is move into maybe the survivor, maybe the mystic, maybe, you know, whatever it is. And then we think, well, what, what would that look like? Oh, it would look like somebody that, you know, recognized what that behavior was doing to them, but decided to not do it anymore and to take everything that they've learned to help themselves in the future or to share with other people, for example. You're, you're kind of, um, accepting without shame, and then you're trying to gently move away from that pattern. And it can take a lot of time, and it can take, you know, you— people can need a lot of support with that.

Yeah.

It's a bit like deciding that you're going to run a marathon when you've never run one before. You're, you're not just going to jump off the couch and go and run it. It's going to take time.

I'm kind of thinking, I'm, I'm thinking from the audience perspective here. When you say, say for example, you have the archetype of addiction, you have that type of archetype, and you go, I'm learning my lessons here and now I want to move out of that into another. If someone Googled online and looked up how many archetypes there are. There's like, what did you say, 12 or 14?

Infinite number.

Or infinite number.

Yeah, yeah.

How would someone in that situation work out, well, what is the archetype I want to move to?

Yeah, so you would think, where do I want to be? Well, at the moment I'm not happy, I feel trapped. I don't know, you know, I am— most people with addictions are ashamed of them. And so where you want to be is somewhere where you feel free, where you don't feel you need to engage in that habit every day, uh, where you don't feel ashamed anymore. And so you don't even have to particularly name your archetype. You just have to have a bit of clarity about, well, this is what I don't want. If I don't want that, maybe I want the opposite, or, you know, maybe I want something else. And so you think about that. Um, and then you think, well, what's it going to take for me to get there? Oh, I can't do this on my own, so I'm going to have to reach out and get some help. Maybe I'll go to a support group, maybe I'll work with a therapist or a coach or whatever. That person can help you to, to move along. I mean, the, the, the most simple, um, way to portray this is somebody who wants to run a marathon, you know, that they're gonna— first thing they're gonna do is, oh, I need to buy a pair of Running shoes, and then they might decide they're gonna walk the dog in the running shoes, and then they might buy, you know, the t-shirt and the shorts, and they might start to do a run-walk, and then they might, you know, download an app that kind of teaches them how to run 5K, and they gradually, gradually build it up. But within that, it's also knowing that our healing And our, um, growth is never linear. So it's always up and down, up and down, up and down, like life. It ebbs and flows. And so when we're trying to accept parts of ourselves, we're always going to have a pushback where we go, oh no, actually I can't look at myself. I can't believe that I do that. I'm, I'm going to pretend it doesn't happen. Or we're going to find that, oh my God, I've done that thing again that I said I wasn't going to do. Well, you are going to do that thing again because you've done it for years and it's hardwired, and that's okay. But you're recognizing now that you're doing it, and that recognition, conscious awareness, is, is like the first piece of, um, solving that puzzle or change. It's the most important piece because if we're not aware we're doing something, how do we even change it?

Exactly, exactly. So it sounds like lots of behavior modification and change. I don't understand, would we have all the archetypes in us, or we only have a certain amount?

Yes, it does change over time because as we evolve, you know, when I was 10, I wasn't a mother, I was a child, but I'm a mother now. Um, I didn't used to teach, but I teach now. So yes, we Some archetypes become sort of more redundant and others become more active. And different teachers have different philosophies. So some kind of believe in the more the Carl Jung style that we have 12 archetypes working with us at any one time. Um, other people believe that we have many more than that. I don't, I, I personally think that we have a lot of archetypes and I liked what you said at the beginning about, you know, when we're in a certain situation, we have a predominant archetype and then we have subarchetypes helping us. So, you know, when I'm in my role as a teacher, that's my predominant archetype, but I have subarchetypes helping me that are maybe like the sage or the seeker that helps me to find the knowledge and find the information. And they're both helping me to broaden my perspective so that I can then share information with, with people. And when we're unwell, You know, we might have that archetype of the victim, but we'll have other archetypes that are also working with that. And one, one of those might be the seeker because we might be seeking alternatives to what we've been told. We might be looking for other, you know, advice, other, other, um, modalities and therapies that, that can help us.

I love that. I love, because that's what this podcast is about, is that if you've been given a diagnosis that you're not happy with, or you're wondering It's about being that seeker.

Absolutely. Yeah. And not being afraid to question as well. Um, and I think that's really, really important because a diagnosis— I see a diagnosis as a label that is a construct that we have created for simplicity and that is often associated with a prognosis, but actually the two don't necessarily always go together. But if we accept that as our truth, that's when we're in danger of just accepting what we've been told and never seeking outside of that.

Yeah, absolutely. So how does, in your work with a client, how does understanding or really getting to know those— that person's archetypes or main archetype influence the work that you do with them? You know, because it would be all very personalized, I would imagine.

So I, um, basically can read people's archetypes. So they come to me and they'll say, I'm struggling with X or Y, and then I can, um, read the archetypes and tell them, well, this is going on for you, and this, you know, maybe you're struggling with this, and blah blah blah. And then we have this conversation where they're saying either, uh, yep, that, that's right, this is what's happening, and then I'm helping them to understand why that behavior might be present. Or maybe I will reframe things for them and say, have you thought about looking at it from this perspective instead? You don't see this as a really bad thing, or you do see that you've got a choice here, or there is some control that you've got. You're not totally helpless. And so when I work one-to-one with somebody, it's always very individual and specific to that person because everybody's got a different Uh, archetypal makeup, and everybody's got a different life challenge. And even 2 people with the same health condition are totally different people. They've got different things going on. And, and then I, I also teach what I do. So I teach, train people to be able to recognize archetypes and to read them, and then to use different techniques and modalities to be able to, um, you know, either support themselves or, or clients.

Fantastic. Also, have you seen a dramatic shift in somebody's health due to them changing or shifting or integrating a different archetype?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What sort of change have you seen?

All the time. So I've seen literally somebody that I was working with maybe about 3 months ago who was highly anxious, really, um, chronic pain, body pain, back pain, um, leg pain, really poor sleep. And in our session together, we identified that one of his predominant archetypes since he'd been quite small was the perfectionist. And it was actually really controlling and limiting his ability to kind of go with the flow and to rest and to even how he perceived himself. He, you know, he had this really harsh inner critic that was working with this perfectionist. to always, um, really tell him that he wasn't doing enough, that he wasn't good enough, that people didn't like him. People were talking about him all the time. And during our session, as he began to see this and question it and relax into it, he just said, all my pain in my body is gone. This is the first time I've had no pain since I can remember.

Wow.

And we, yeah, we, we agreed on some action plans, some things for him to do. And he emailed me about a month ago to say that he was still really well and that, you know, his pain hadn't come back and he was sleeping better. So that's, that's one example. Um, and I've had other people with gut issues, um, who, I mean, it's not instantaneous with a physical issue, but that have shifted very, very quickly once they've understood that, oh, actually the reason that I'm not getting better despite All my dietary changes and all of these changes is that I'm still pushing myself. I'm still overgiving. I'm still not resting enough. I'm still not actually saying no when I want to say no. Those changes happen, but they're probably not instantaneous within a session. Um, so it really depends what the person comes with. To, to the extent that, um, we actually get a big shift within the session, or it happens outside of the session. The often the longer somebody's been in a pattern that's not helping them, um, and, and the stronger their protective armor is. So, um, in parts work, which is also a form of archetype work, we talk about having protectors. And if somebody's protectors are really, really, really strong, then it can take time to actually get them to feel safe enough to let their defenses down a little bit so that person can start to, um, put changes in place.

And is there a particular archetype that— is it the protector archetype that does that?

Yeah, so, but, uh, so the protector is kind of a generic term, um, but any of our archetypes can protect us. So the, you know, the, the addict is trying to protect us Oh yes. The victim is trying to protect us by saying, oh no, my God, don't do that. It's dangerous. Or, you know, I don't want that person near me. Um, so it's our protector is different for each of us.

What do you call the archetype? It's not archetypal therapy or—

I call it archetypal alchemy. So it's basically you're alchemizing, you're transforming your archetypal patterns. Yes.

What I love about it is sometimes, you know, you go to therapy or you see a counselor and they say your behavior is XYZ, and you walk out, but it just feels so broad and empty. It's like you can't kind of put your hands around it and identify with it that well. But having an archetype saying your behavior is this type of archetype and you have these other archetypes and this is why It gives you such a better understanding, I think, of yourself. But also, when you're in the light, like you said, the, the shadow and the light— when you're more in the light, it also gives you— you think, oh wow, I have this amazing quality, I have this amazing, you know, 5 archetypes that make up me. It feels wholesome almost.

And you know that actually, because there's more than one You don't have to stay in that particular archetype.

You've got choices.

Exactly.

You've got choices and you understand yourself better, you know. And having, you know, we don't like labels, but archetypes seem— they're not really like a label. They're just a way of understanding ourselves and going, oh, I am like that. I see my pattern in that. You know, absolutely. I think it's easier for reflection than just being told you're XYZ.

Yeah, and, and that understanding of why we do things is so important because, you know, for example, when you do get a diagnosis, there's nothing wrong with accepting it and not doing anything for a while because you might be in shock. You, you might have been told Well, you know, whatever the doctor tells you, that's what you've got to accept. And that's, that's the truth. And, and that might be how you've been brought up. And so it might take you a while to go, oh, I wonder if there's a different way for me to look at this, a different therapy, or, you know, and it's so for me, not making ourselves wrong is very, very important because once we start to make ourselves wrong, we shame ourselves. And when we shame ourselves, We feel powerless. And when we've— when, when we're ill, when we've been given a diagnosis, we don't want to feel powerless. We want to step into our power.

Yes, absolutely. Claire, this has been an absolutely amazing episode on archetypes and how people can view their behavior. And I think it gives a lot of people a lot of hope that they can even— they can just Google archetypes and start understanding where they fit in and have a little bit preliminary understanding before they even see somebody. So what is one tip that you can leave our audience with today?

So my, my tip would be to, um, never make one of your behaviors, one of your archetypes or patterns wrong. Um, they all serve a purpose, even the ones that might be a little bit out of balance, like I mentioned. Like, you know, if you, if you Do have the addict archetype. Um, they're all there to serve a purpose, and their fundamental role is to actually protect you and keep you safe, even if it doesn't feel like that. And so if we can begin to notice our patterns and begin to be conscious of them and meet them with curiosity and compassion rather than making them wrong or trying to reject them, then we're much more likely to accept them. And when we accept them, we start to heal those parts of ourselves, which then basically opens the door for, um, our healing in general and the way that we approach our health.

Beautiful. Well, I really think that you had the teacher and sage archetype on this episode, and thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing Thank you so much, Claire.

Thank you.

For all your knowledge about archetypes. I think it's been absolutely fascinating. And for everyone who's listening and watching this, Claire's details will be in the show notes. So please, if you've liked what Claire's got to say about it and you would like to go further and deeper into this, do contact her because it is a fascinating field.