I May Be the Black Sheep of the Family but
Source: Andy Campbell/Stocksy
1 of the hardest realizations that many of the states confront on our healing journeys is the thought—and all the feelings that come with it—in which we come to realize that nosotros're the black sheep of our family of origin, or of our peers, babyhood religious institution, or early community.
Perhaps there's always been a nagging sense of feeling like the odd i out—like the proverbial ugly stepsister. Or a sense of feeling a chip orphaned. Feeling like the lonely wolf. Or a sense of existence the scapegoat.
Maybe it'southward considering you felt, understood, and responded to things differently than other members of your family/peer group/community.
Possibly it's considering you looked or sounded different.
Mayhap your life choices went confronting the grain of what was "normal" where you grew up—whether it'due south because you spoke up when others didn't, moved away from your hometown, or chose to honey, and work, differently.
And then possibly your sense of feeling like the black sheep was subtle and implicit—goose egg directly said out loud simply rather ever a slight sense of the back of your heed and heart.
Or maybe your feeling of beingness the black sheep was more explicit and you lot were physically and relationally rejected past your family unit of origin, church, or early community, for who you lot are and how you lot move through the world.
Maybe you were disowned, emotionally cutting off, kicked out of your house, or treated visibly differently.
Notwithstanding and for any reasons this may have manifested for you, many of usa can identify with "the black sheep" archetype and, while this is predominantly a pejorative term in our commonage dictionary, this mail service is all near reclaiming the power of that archetype—diving deep into what it may mean to be the and so-chosen "black sheep" from both a cultural and psychological lens, exploring the pain of what it can hateful to embody this archetype, but also the ability, gifts, and opportunities it offers.
Allow's be clear: "Black sheep" isn't a term listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the bedrock diagnostic book for mental health clinicians. And there isn't one single, universally-agreed-upon definition of the term, either— certainly non a clinical one—but information technology's withal a phrase that infuses our collective cultural lexicon.
The phrase originally and objectively described what happened when a recessive gene resulted in the birth of a sheep with blackness rather than white coloring. Obviously, these black sheep stood out from the flock, and, apparently, their wool was traditionally considered less valuable. (The not-then-subtle devaluation begins…) Around the 18th century, some propose, is when the pejorative nature of the term equally we take come to understand it today came near: It became an idiom meant to imply waywardness. These days, "black sheep" is a term that may be used by others to describe usa (or for united states to cocky-draw) if we seem like the odd ane out in any way from our family unit of origin or early community.
And all the same, there are many different definitions for this phrase depending on the school of thought 1 consults. From a Family Systems Theory perspective—introduced past Murray Bowen in the mid-20th-century—the family unit is an emotional unit and a organisation within which one could say that the proverbial black sheep (non Bowen'southward term) is analogous to the "identified patient."
The identified patient is part of a family's commonage, unconscious psychological projection process in which they essentially defer and outsource the pain, tension, and anxiety felt inside their dysfunctional system onto 1 person who then psychologically, and sometimes physically, "holds" the emotional energy of the family, manifesting it in symptoms and behaviors that the other members of the group can signal to and say, "There'south the problem! It's her, not united states!"
In this mode, the identified patient could be seen as the family scapegoat, serving as a "protective function" for its larger dysfunctional patterning.
From an archetypal psychological perspective, "the black sheep" may most closely resemble "the orphan" archetype, or that of "the abandoned child." These archetypes are, in essence, recurring symbols or motifs that describe someone, or an aspect of someone, who doesn't experience like they fit in with their family unit or community of origin, physically or spiritually, and perchance because they do not seem to fit, the group'due south "shadow" is projected onto them. Showing up across myths, legends, and fairy tales since time immemorial, "the orphan" and "abased child" archetypes are so prevalent that I believe we all embody this archetype, at to the lowest degree in some pocket-sized way.
And, in a playful but also psychological way, Jungian analyst and author Clarissa Pinkola Esté's archetype story of the Mistaken Zygote Syndrome elaborates further on the archetype of the "orphan" or "abandoned child" past explaining how some of us may have mistakenly ended upwardly (metaphorically) in the "wrong" families. (The full story tin can be institute in her book Women Who Run with the Wolves.)
Whether you nearly closely resonate with the description of the identified patient, the orphan or abandoned child archetype, the Mistaken Zygote, or all of these descriptions, you lot're likely seeing that within each is laced the theme of being misunderstood or rejected, and the feeling of beingness misplaced or displaced. This is the essence, to me, of what "The black sheep" archetype is all about.
Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/making-the-whole-beautiful/202201/the-power-being-the-black-sheep-the-family
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