#MondayInsight:

One of the most mind-bending experiences in answering your calling is when you’re called to serve people who archetypally represent the type of people you’ve felt wounded by.

This is a decidedly second half of the hero’s journey experience…

Many of us are familiar with the first half of the journey – we get called to adventure, refuse the call, get mentors and supernatural aid as we face tests and challenges until we finally face our demons in the “innermost cave.”

Psychologically, that’s when we stop running from and reacting against our core internal wound beliefs – things like, “I’m a failure/loser/waste” from which we make up beliefs like, “I’m unworthy, unwanted, and unloved.” As that material gets metabolized, we get “the elixir” and start the second half of the journey, which is the call to bring the elixir back home – back to the very people who cast you out in the first place!

The challenge on the return journey home is that we don’t wanna go! It’s so good hanging out with our magic – our elixir. In fact, when we find other elixir holders, we just love spending time with them, swimming in each other’s magic. You know what I mean? 

But the real call is to be a master of two worlds – where you know both the ordinary world and magical world and can bring the elixir that’s hard-won from your journey to the people of your tribe for their healing and wholeness. 

It’s the definition of a full-circle moment.

Keep in mind, though, that this tribe we’re talking about is the tribe that CAST YOU OUT!

And now you bring the elixir to THEM?

Yep, that’s the gist of it.

So, if you’re getting bored with your old client base and can do your work blindfolded and with your hands behind your back…

You may be in this transition to bringing the elixir from your journey “back home.”

Years ago, while working with my old business partner, Suzanne Falter, we put ourselves on retreat because we felt like we were moving in different directions and needed space to see what that meant.  

I found this beautiful spot for us, called the Carmel Valley Ranch Inn and Spa, and we decided to go for it and splurge! It was lovely. Every suite was a private bungalow, deer walked around freely and the mountains around the valley were stunning.

On our second night, we were having dinner in the restaurant on site, and as I looked around I noticed the place was filled with wealthy, powerful baby boomer white men.

That wasn’t a surprise in a place like that, but I had this sneaking suspicion inside that there was a higher purpose for me to be in that place at that time.

The moment I tuned in and asked my guidance, the answer came: You’re here because this is your next client base, Jeffrey.

My immediate reaction was, “But I don’t like these people! Wealthy, straight baby boomer men in golf attire? No way!”

Then the next message came: “Jeffrey, when you serve those you’ve felt most victimized by, you complete your cycle of victimization.”

In other words, once you can bless those people, there’s nobody left out in the world to get you. That’s true freedom. It’s Karmic completion.

I was never overtly “wounded” by these guys, but as someone who grew up in a very conservative community and was never designed to fit into convention, I always felt massively judged and marginalized by them. 

What I’ve kind of learned in the intervening years, is that this is part of the return journey home – bringing the elixir home.

This isn’t about serving your actual wounders. If you were really hurt by someone, you don’t necessarily go and serve them. But there’s an archetype that they represent that you may have moved away from and fought against, that you may be called to serve now.

As a kid, I always felt really judged by the wealthy, white, straight, privileged conservative Christian people with power, which were a part of my upbringing. My sensitive inner self felt stepped on and my inner rebel welled up in response and said, “F-you! I don’t need you. I’ll go make a life of my own. I’m going to hightail it out of here.” And I did.

So, when I felt called to work with powerful Type-A drivers in more traditional industries, my innards got pretty damn queasy and my self-doubt went into overdrive.

“Will I have anything they want or need? Will they respect me? Will I have what it takes?”

I can really twist myself up into pretzels.

But here’s what I know…

While not all of them will want or need what I’ve got, some of them are desperately hungry for the elixir that I’ve fought tooth and nail for.

When they’ve exhausted all the traditional paths forward and are still out of solutions, they are hungry for someone who can guide them off the beaten path.

For me, that means they are at a turning point in their evolution, asking for and welcoming in someone with my unique design – a trailblazer who catalyzes quantum leaps for leaders who are at big turning points in their evolution. Someone who thinks outside the box, isn’t afraid of sacred cows and approaches problem-solving in a radically different manner than the norm. Someone who can help them access realms of higher guidance outside of their well-trained logical mind, so they can see new futures they’ve never imagined, and have the trust and power to create a new world.

So if you’re called to serve your archetypal wounders, know this…

You have a hard-won elixir that your people need… and that will include the archetypal wounders from your childhood. Not all of them – but some of them… and the ones who are asking are your only concern.

Remember that if they are showing up in your field you’ve got what they need and the time is now to step forward and serve them.

And while it can feel great to connect with other wizards and unicorns, your call – just like mine – is not to get stuck only hanging out with other elixir holders…

It’s to bring the elixir all the way back home – because that’s what will actually change the world.