The Wounded Healer

Is it possible to heal the mortal wound?

The Wounded Healer

The Wounded Healer archetype is found in those whose pain becomes so unbearable that they must use the force of their suffering to help others. It is said the wound carried is unhealable, but the beautiful burden brings them both a purpose and an obligation. To refuse to help others heal means the denial of the call of Soul, and once Soul calls you must listen less you become possessed by the refusal. On the other hand, leaning into this purpose means you must continually reopen wounds and heal yourself from multiple angles, so that when you encounter something wounded in others it is not foreign.

This is not an easy path…

The wounded healer uses their own personal pain and struggles to catalyse the growth and development of the people they work with, often working through something simultaneously with their patients with an anchoring so deep in the world of suffering that they know they can pull themselves out of the wound while offering a helping hand to their patient.

As a side note: I am speaking about this in the context of a healer such as a Shaman or a good Therapist, but this can be true for anyone turning pain into a healing experience - for example a musician, artist or parent.

Shamanic and healing work has been glorified in Western culture, as alongside our Wildness this is a hugely repressed part of the collective psyche. 2000 years ago in the UK (which was then known as Albion) we had our sacred ceremonies with the Druids gathering in the ancient oak groves drinking mistletoe tea, swigging mead out of a horn and singing to the Solstice sun. The Druids were massacred in their stronghold on the Isle of Anglesey in 60AD by Roman armies led by General Suetonius Paulinus. There was a revolt led by Boudica, Queen of the ancient British Iceni tribe, but the Romans were too strong in force and by 79AD The remaining local tribes and communities were under Roman occupation with the majority of the oak groves being burnt to the ground. This was 80 generations ago, but it remains in my bones, in our bones and continues to be re-lived. 300 years ago we had the witch trials, burning anyone who practiced Earth based spirituality, this spread the globe with the distorted version of Christianity enforced by the people that crucified Christ, and continues psychologically into the modern day under the banner of scientific materialism.

So when a mysterious person with feathers in their hair shows up saying they will introduce you to a magical and mysterious world, Westerners tend to either reject or glorify it. This is often without a true understanding of what it takes to earn those feathers. Hint: you have to go deep into the underworld to collect them.

There are good wounded healers who are able to maintain their resilience and hold the space of the person suffering, there are also bad ones who get sucked into the void and create co-dependency with their students. The job of a good healer is to teach the person in front of them that they are already whole. The paradox is they don’t actually heal anything, they create the right circumstances so their students can heal themselves… a big responsibility.

Only the Fool Can Heal Us

Parzival is a young Foolish boy on a grail quest seeking to become a Knight of the Round Table in King Arthur's court. He is tasked with healing a wounded king, which will in turn heal the kingdom. When we look at Parzival as part of the Wounded King’s psyche, he is the immature part. This says that only the part of us that receives the wound can heal it, because in this foolishness we were already whole. Meaning if we spend time in our heads pathologizing and psychologising the wound like an adult, the cycle continues. But if we can meet it with the youthful consciousness in which it was created - in the liminal space, then we can ask the rights question and offer healing to those we serve.

The Fisher wound can come through a meeting with God that was either unexpected or willed without an understanding of what this meeting can bring to a person's life. God is complete, undivided and not able to be named. Touching this can terrify a person to death, it can also leave them wanting to live in this space, a space which has not been earned, nor can be handled. Everyone wants the lamp, the genie and three wishes in Adolescence, but who has the maturity to accept the responsibility of such power?

The wound can also come from a fall from grace, a betrayal or something that places us in new waters. Initially we think we are dipping our toe into something warm and comforting, only to realise we are being boiled alive.

The Cultural Wound

This wound is so ingrained in the Western psyche that most cannot imagine people without it, hence the wound becomes invisible and it appears to most that there is no wound. But it is felt. It takes us to leave the confines of our culture and meet people who walk around unwounded to see that we are carrying this ill. This is the forest Pazival lived in before his hero's adventure, the thing that shields us from the outside world, for better or for worse. This is the handicap we have in most western households - most are too shielded to even start the adventure.

When Parzival rides off into mysterious lands, this is the journey we must take, breaking away from our normality and seeking new things. This does not necessarily mean going abroad, but to break the everyday ingrained habits and create new paths. In new territory it can be hard to imagine a community existing around new found ideas, but they are always there, awaiting you to knock on the door and join the conversation.

Failing to Ask the Question

Parzival receives his wound when he first enters the Grail Castle and fails to ask the Fisher King “the question”. He leaves the castle befuddled by the situation, it is only when he goes away and is feasting at King Arthur's court that he is humbled. Cundrie, a forest hag, gate-crashes King Arthur’s party scolding Parzival for his failure. It is in this moment he falls from his graceful knowing, and sets out to refind the Grail Castle. Last time it was an unexpected accident, given by the grace of the creator, but now he must go on an arduous adventure and will his way back in.

Humbled, he finds a mentor and is eventually able to return with the blessing of Cundrie, and he asks the question. The King wounded Parzival with his wound the first time, and sent Parzival on a quest to gain the experience he needed to be able to return wiser. Parzival carried that wound until it became his gift. Parzival in this sense is the wounded healer, although you could also see the Wounded King as the healer, as he catalysed the experience and also in his healing, his kingdom became well.

Holy Wound

It can be easy to bastardise the wound, and hold it as an unholy and unfair burden. More than not perish to their wounds and are never able to recover, but some are able to look inside and bring forth the gold that lays within. Everyone who holds a wound is the wounded healer in potential, but the quantum leap takes place when we can hold that pain as sacred - that is when we become the wounded healer. The paradox of the wound is, does it ever heal? This is the liminal space where some questions are best unanswered.

When we read a myth, poetry or art which helps to make spirit visible, part of it remains impossible to grasp. It is pointing to something, but that thing is not of this world so cannot be written down, spoken or intellectualised. It is not to be dissected and understood, but to be contemplated, felt and brought to life inside of the person who hears it.

Masculine Psychology

Parzival is generally regarded as the exploration of masculine psychology, this does not make it exclusive to male bodied people, but it speaks to the part of us that wants to know Who We Are and set out to achieve the purpose we have been tasked with. It is about the deconstruction of who we thought we were, and the resurrection of who we truly are. This is shown in all the battles which take place representing the trials and tribulations of adult life, with all the knights slain representing fragmented parts of our psyche. These are then sent back to the whole Psyche, which is King Arthur's court.

To engage in this journey is not a passive experience, which does make it masculine. But if we engage it like a man trying to conquer a kingdom we will obliterate ourselves in the process, as does Parzval, and maybe we need to to learn this lesson. Paradox strikes again. This to me says that a healthy masculine psychology cannot exist without the feminine part working as a counter - you could say the journey is the masculine finding the feminine part of himself/herself so they can actually engage their task. The journey itself is masculine, but the unknown space is feminine - the commitment to search and unturn every stone is masculine, the acceptance of what you find is feminine.

This story however helps us to find a third unifying principle, that which sits between the two. When we find the Grail, this is where we can live from - our centre, which gives us the ability to lean into all the different facets of ourselves, knowing a return to the once elusive centre is within our grasp.

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Thanks for reading! Please join me for a live class on Tuesday February 18th 6:30PM-8:30PM BST to answer some of the questions posed in this article, and dive deeper into these concepts. This class will be interactive with the intention to help you nurture a relationship with your own wounded healer. The world is currently passing through an upheaval. Economies are threatening to collapse. People are becoming tired of the deception, and are looking for alternatives to the old paradigm. The solution is inside of you, it is just a matter of drawing out the gifts you have for the world and offering the uniqueness only you can offer in service to the planet. This is the seed we will be planting on this call, and I would love to see you there.

JOIN THE CALL HERE

P.S. I have decided not to record the call this time. So we can drop in without any concerns of being seen outside of the group. So if you are interested please join live.