the irish viking bear

The Irish Viking Bear Clan left unwillingly for the new world. They were already renowned for their barbarism, looting, trading, and their uncanny ability to write poetry before they landed abroad. They took little with them save their frustration that marked their status and fame.
Once they landed by boat they did not travel far by paw, remaining near the shore and finding refuge in the swamps and wetlands. The whole clan came together, which meant there were many mouths to feed.
Now, the Viking warrior bear has many strengths such as toughness, courage, heightened intuitive abilities, discipline, determination, skill, and invincibility. These attributes were so needed to survive in their new home range. But their shadow side weaknesses include brutality, ruthlessness, fear of impotence, arrogance, and mostly, dominance. In the Bear Clan the warrior had become the villain using their skill for personal gain, without a thought for morality, ethics, or the good of the whole group. They loved to get their way, maintaining control, and responding to each other as if they were a threat.
This devastated the baby bear Viking who grew up with extreme violence and soul crushing manipulation. Learning to normalize her bear clans’ ways, she too became a mama bear with three male cubs to raise. All three babies carried the old traits in their blood fortified by their papa bears ways which led to increased chaos and inexcusable behavior.
The mama bear was blindsided by the juxtaposition of the villain in her and the need to give care and nurture. She found herself saying things to make her big, male cubs feel guilty using her care taking to control or smother her sons. The guilt was unbearable. Literally. She felt broken, hopelessly funneling her ancestry through her words and actions, a victim of the shadow side from the lineages of her own mama and papa.
The mama bear began to give up. You could see it in her eyes. Absolute helplessness and hatred for the shadow in her family, she hid in her silence, aggressively lashing out at her sons in the most innocent of moments. And this would only position her sons more perfectly as villains too. And she knew it.
Now, I am a mama bear too. I came from the next range over and one day dared to enter her territory. Mama bear to mama bear I asked her to call her entire clan to a meeting. They agreed, with a lot of sotto voce grumbling. She stood next to me as I requested, in front of all the bears and we looked them in the eye, warrior to warrior. We honored their virtues for skill and care, letting them know that we see their pitfalls too. We know because we carry them. We looked kindly upon them in their ways and asked for permission to live life differently, an Irish blessing for a new way in a new world.
Every bear looked at us with incredulous eyes. How dare we leave their world of violence and cruelty. Nonetheless we waited and finally one clan member, a great grandmother, slowly stepped forward on all fours. She bowed her head to us and muttered, “Do it for me. Do it for us. Do what we could not and look forward with my blessing.” My friend the mama bear fell to all fours and walked up to her grandmother, forehead to forehead and cried. They stayed in this auspicious position long enough for mama bear to receive a true transmission of love and care.
Grandmother and mama bear stood up on hind legs facing their clan. Grandmother walked back to her big family and left mama to see. Really see that her clan had lost meaning fighting battles unwisely. That they had lost compassion and generosity, harming each other in the wake of their selfishness. And, somehow, she loved them, recognizing their hidden strengths and disguised care.
Her heart ached knowing that she might have to leave her sons with their clans shadowed ways as she made her way out of the family code into a different way of being in this new, new world. I promised her that doing what she needed to do came first and the rest we leave to mystery and faith, her sons securely in her heart. She agreed, emboldened by the blessing she received and ready to proclaim, “I am new, I am, a warrior and a lover!”