Trickster times

Recently I heard a story about an Old Wise Woman of the World whose task it was to weave a Carpet of the World, and a Trickster Crow. Every time the Woman of the World left her weaving to tend to the soup of all living things, Trickster would fly down and destroy the carpet. He knew that if the carpet was ever finished the world would end as well. You can listen to the full story here (6 min) https://soundcloud.com/sharon-blackie/when-things-fall-apart

Two things stood out for me in this story: the carpet should not get finished or the world would end, and whether Trickster chose it or not he was the one to do it. He was the one to unpick the carpet and destroy the masterpiece, lovingly created by his life long companion.

When I got past the initial blame and judgement of the Trickster for such a wicked act of destruction, when I stepped into a meta perspective of what happened, it occurred to me that his underlying purpose was care for life and the world. The Old Wise Woman of the World simply picked up a thread and started weaving again. For her the process was the goal. She was doing her very best every moment in time to create the most beautiful art work in the world, and when it got destroyed, it was a chance to start again and create an even better one.

For the world to keep going and for the patterns to keep changing, for the life to be, some of our ancestors had to take this role of a Trickster, had to step into the roles of perpetrators, destroyers, wrongdoers, or simply not conforming to what was, disrupting the status quo. Personal responsibility still applied, choices brought consequences, but as the story illustrates - things can’t be ‘perfect’ forever – the growth stops, the world ends. Somebody has to tip the balance for new ways to emerge.

Unlike the Old Wise Woman, we tend to be quite judgemental of the old ways of our ancestors, especially Tricksters. Those who brought difficulties, shame, even death to the family history. We have stories about them in our families that we tell to our children. We believe those stories, why wouldn’t we?

Systemic constellations give us a chance to look at the past under a different light, from a meta position, seeing what happened as simply that – something that happened. Seeing the true purpose of tricksters in the family – change and development. Even just seeing them through this lens will create change and shift your life in the present.

Zooming out to a global scale, it feels that the Trickster is at work right now, in this very moment. Patterns will change and I hope the new creation will be more beautiful authentic and real. To see it sooner we need to get past blaming and judging to the place of the wholeheartedness, being our own best every moment in time.

-A.S.

(Image: A Woman with a Crow, Pablo Picasso. pablopicasso.org)