How the Collective Victim Shadow Archetype Affects Our Finances

My core archetype or shadow archetype has always been the victim.

An archetype is a symbol that we can all relate to, for example, a mother is an archetype. It doesn’t matter what country I land in - Thailand, South Africa or the US - if someone tells me they are a mother, there's something in me that automatically makes an assumption about what that means - loving, nurturing, supportive etc.

A shadow is the dark side of the archetype - the things we don’t want to acknowledge, so the shadow side of the mother archetype would be someone spiteful, cold, uncaring etc.

So when we talk of someone who operates from their victim shadow we talk of someone who behaves like a victim, someone who feels powerless, like life is happening to them.

People who have a collective history of oppression are more likely to struggle with a collective victim shadow archetype

It’s completely possible for a people or a country to have a collective shadow.

Oppressors get their power by convincing the oppressed that, the oppressed, are powerless and that the oppressor is more powerful.

The oppressor changes the narrative in order to rob the oppressed of their sense of power so they can convince them that they (oppressor) are superior, which automatically means that there's a sense of self power that is taken from those that have been oppressed.

When the oppressed start to feel like they have lost personal power, they start to feel victimized and they adopt the victim shadow.

I can see how my history of oppression as a South African has led to a collective victim shadow in my maternal family and how this victim shadow has affected our relationship with money:

• We feel powerless with money - we never feel like we can master money. It feels like financial events just happen to us. My maternal family has this belief that money is something mystical that only the lucky few can ever master it.

• We're always operating from a sense of blame - it's never our fault, our financial mishaps are witchcraft or someone’s fault. I spent years blaming my childhood for my debt. I’d convince myself that my relationship with money would’ve been great if I had a better childhood or if I'd been loved better as a child.

How to identify when you’re operating from the victim shadow

Feeling powerless and being unable to take responsibility for your actions, are key signs that you’re operating from your victim shadow.

To maintain the victim shadow, the subconscious mind has to create situations that make you feel powerless so that you can constantly confirm that you’re the victim.

I would subconsciously self-sabotage and get into more and more debt so I could feel powerless with money and be reminded that I was the victim.

I’d get into relationships and instantly give up my power, so the men I was with, had more control in terms of when they got to see me, what they got to do in my life because I needed to feel out of control.

I needed to attract people and things in my life that always reflected that sense of powerlessness and always reminded me that I was powerless so that I could keep feeding into the victim shadow.

Watch the video below to learn more:

What are your thoughts on collective archetypes? Does it resonate with you?

Let me know if any of this is resonating with you in the comments section.