Let's Talk About "Bad" Ancestors 

also, sometimes the "bad ancestors" weren't great people or had bigoted beliefs in life, but after death they've seen enough to open their mind and change their own ways. of course this isn't always gonna be the case, but sometimes that can happen. my closest ancestor wouldn't have liked me much in life, but he's the head of my ancestors in death because he was able to deconstruct those limiting beliefs and behaviors after he died.

My family is mostly nameless and/or had abusive behaviors, so my ancestor work involves saints, an adoptive grandma and my late brother. Also Armenians have a myth about the first Armenian Hayk who is seen as our ancestor which is cool.

Wonderful information and guidance. It is so helpful to understand we don't need to invite abusive or toxic ancestors into our space / altar and that they need to abide by our boundaries as well. Beautiful video.

I appreciate how you refer to it as Turtle Island.

Huh, the concept of plant ancestors explains a lot. Me and my mom have talked about how I feel connected to willows and even felt like I was in a way a child of the willows that are abundant in the area we live in. My mom apparently felt the same (even though she's not really a witch though more recently she's been getting more witchy). Maybe that makes more sense than I thought.

Thank you for talking about this! In the past because you (understandably) dont get super specific, i always assumed when referring to ancestors it was always just your human relatives. This actually really resonates with me. I'm going to do some more research on ancestor work! Thank you as always for these thoughtful insights.

There is also ancestry of place. I think its incredibly important to honor the people/spirits who have inhabited your space in the world before you.

Honestly i needed someone to talk about for a while, im very disconnected from my family lineage mainly because not only do I have a lot of abusive family members some of them alive and some dead, i also have ones that upheld the stuff that continues to hurt people including myself to this day. I haven't touched ancestor veneratation because of this, as it feeds back into the cycle of trying to please the abusive people in my life. I'll definitely venerate those who share my experiences who are not related to me by blood now.

One of the things that has been really interesting and lovely to experience in my own practice is how understanding spirits/deities have been toward me. I recently had some really major health issues and a nasty break up, and I have taken a long break from my practice (among other things) as a result. I was honestly expecting my connection to my ancestors to weaken, and for other entities I venerated to ditch me because I couldn't be consistent for an extended period of time, but that hasn't happened. This may be slightly off topic, just wanted to share. Really enjoyed this one, Frankie.

Cant ever forget - one of the coolest OG ancestors, the mother/parent of us all, MYCELIUM 🍄🙏✨😃 anyone that feels like they don't have a lot of family, the mushies are always there physically and in spirit.

Great video! Yeah, nobody's lineage is perfect, especially those of us who are white on turtle island. Even the "bad" ancestors have lessons of what not to do moving forward to people. The cycles of harm that one does not want to perpetuate. Even if you dont work with/honor/venerate certain ancestors, they have lessons you can learn from how they conducted themselves.. Im trying to work with the first ancestor of mine to come to the Americas on my mom's maternal lineage. He was a Scottish indentured servant from The Battle of Dunbar 1650. I want to wok with his maternal lineage especially because they wete members of Scottish nobility (and royalty about 7 "great" grandparents past him). I want to learn from their experiences, and failures. They were nobility, and I want to learn about my own personal influence and power with some guidance from them. To learn how to stand in my power, in addition to what not to do with that power.

I have recently become aware of an ancestor that is an old Native American Medicine Man (I have Choctaw in me). He was clear as day when he appeared. White head dress with brown feather tips dressed in all white except a brown beaded belt. He also has white face markings. He's so bright he almost glows. I made a comment to my mom about this and she stops dead in her tracks and says "Is he dressed in all white?" I was kind of floored because she isn't magical or spiritual in any way. Apparently she's been seeing this man all of her life. Also her best friend is a medium and has spoken about him being around in the past which I did not know about.

My ancestors were racist so trying to get them to accept that I married my black husband would be more difficult than I care to take the time to get them to accept my choices. I still talk to my mom and Dad after they both passed. I believe they are still with me 😊

I'm a psychic medium and I truly thought my grandma would like being close to me during my readings so I had her altar set up like right on the table I use for readings. Turns out, she's not the biggest fan so I'll be moving her soon. Also, had to get rid of an altar of my great, great aunt because she straight up doesn't want to help me with anything.

Amazing! Thank you for making this. I’ve been wanting to get into my Appalachian roots, but I’ve admittedly been avoiding it because of the obvious racism 😓

at 15:00 I do the same thing! I have my general ancestor alter and my indigenous ancestor alter. The indigenous ancestors are welcome by me to be at the general ancestor alter but it doesn't mean the rest of my general ancestors will be as welcoming. So they get a safe place

When I call in my anscestora, or any spirits I work with I always state very powerfully 'Only those aligned with my highest good are welcome in this space'. I felt like this needed to be here juat incase it helps someone.

Frankie, I just want to say thank you for being so open about your journey with your practice. ❤❤ It has helped me so much on my own journey.

Dammit, every time i pull the ancestor card from my Oracle deck, I get one of your ancestor videos on my recommended a day or less later. This is like the 3rd time this has happened.. Guess that's a sign I should look into ancestry. Gotta find some childfree ancestors to bond with😅

You are always a compassionate, wise, and truly thoughtful voice on the Internet, and I am so grateful to all the gods that you are here. As an old lady, I really have hope for the future because of people like you, Please don't let anyone silence you, because you already know, they'll try. Love you.

dialecticals

There are older people who have learned better than how they were raised-And like Michelle said "When we know better, we do better." Sadly there are also older people who lean into ignorance and refuse to better themselves. While the second group is wrong, they also tend to be lonely-too bad, they could have had some amazing friendships. No room for group two on my ancestry table. edited to come back and say-thank you for making this, i can tell it was emotional for you and i relate. It's complicated.

this was such a good reminder to me that we can learn from our family's mistakes and do better(totally off topic, but the veil you're wearing is so pretty! it matches your eyes really well!)

i love this video so much!! i’m really excited to see how your content will shift with your new experiences, and as you acquire more wisdom.

Barely 5 minutes in and you have a viewer here who started "quietly" yelling at the TV saying "yes! Say it again!" -with love, An Elder Millennial who Consorts with Spirits 🖤

Well well, this video popped up right when I needed it. Thank you Frankie!

Lmao 'thank you so much for doing all the work to make me be born, I don't want to talk to you, see you later'. Sounds like good boundaries for living ancestors who are shite too 😂

The thing you said about your grandpa just like, hanging out is awesome, I relate. Ive been trying to find the words to describe my relationship with my own grandpa who died in 2019 and I think this is the perfect way to say it. Im not sure if I would say that I work with the ✨energy✨ of Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( i mean she has been like a major influence in my life experiences and around the entire globe so one could say she’s a bit of a community ancestor), but I have a backpatch of her on the jacket Ive worn everyday for the past few years, and my grandma does comment on it saying its a lucky charm. So maaybeeee??? Awesome video!❤

Great video! Both you and Warrior Witch Nike answered my question-I had a certain guilt not including certain ancestor but you are absolutely correct-why would honor/venerate a bad ancestor. Strange question but would you put close friends that passed away on your ancestral alter? I’m conflicted about it

This is something that kind of bothered me for awhile. I know next to nothing about my ancestors past 2 generations or so, but they’ve lived in the Deep South for a long time, so it’s likely they supported if not engaged in horrible stuff. Plus I’m trans…so that’s probably gonna be an issue.

Such an enlightening perspectives thank you for sharing ❤

I have problematic ancestors, as I'm related to a handful of pilgrims from the mayflower, plus I'm related to 12 U.S. president's. Edgar Alan Poe is a distant cousin, and William Shakespeare is an 11th great grand uncle.

Great video!

I love that you’re talking about bad ancestors, when I found out today my current living bad ancestors have been keeping a half sister from me 🙃 gotta love 23 and me. I always appreciate your wisdom, and truly the timing is just impeccable 😂

Celebrate our Spiritual Ancestors.. Those that Hold and Share our STORIES ... Passing the Words through the Generations.. . ❤

I stayed in my aunt's house who passed. And I felt her protection & no bs type of personality.

Love this!

I've been really interested in doing spiritual work and ancestral work and I don't know where to start! It's an exciting journey that I'm starting. Learning about my ancestors has been quite emotional, as many of them passed quite early. I take great comfort in knowing that despite having no memories of my grandmother, my mother was taught how to hug like her, so that I hug like her. Something else I'm thinking on being more intentional with is working with my rhubarb plant. It was planted at least five generations ago, and has travelled around Ireland as we've moved from the west to the east of the country, and now back again as I'm moving back onto the ancestral land. I'm unsure about my far-back lineage and exactly where they came from. Ireland has been colonised so many times that I'm sure most people here have some bad people in their past. With that, the Great Famine, and the atrocities that the Irish Catholic Church committed here, I'd say there is a lot of hurt. I hope to keep most of my work as Gaeilge (in Irish language). I'm excited about the journey ahead!

I did not know the real history of turtle island until later in life. I wonder if that could’ve been the same for my ancestors who immigrated here.

How do you know that she doesn’t like your clothes or that they don’t like your house??? I set up an altar and weird things happened at home. I had a full box of scalpels that Id just bought go missing and show BACK UP right where I had left them about 2 weeks later. And another time I came home and 2 of my 3 paintings had fallen off the wall. Nothing attacked me or anything but I felt like a weird game was happening and it scared me so much to see my scalpels back where I’d left them so I took the entire altar down… idk if they didn’t like the paintings, or that I had the scalpels out in the opening. My sister tells me that the ancestors probably don’t like me because I’m mixed (mom is half indigenous Oglala/Half Norwegian) and my dad is Black. I can imagine a lot of them helped me and my siblings coming into the world so I don’t think they ALL hate me - kinda ridiculous . I want another altar but want to know what is threatening or not if you can help me!!! ❤️❤️❤️

i absolutely love this... i have been going waaaayyyyyyyy back due to what some of my ancestors were involved in and i've been trying to kind of work with them in a way for the world to heal. so like i will talk to some of the "bad" ones in order to well i guess they have started to refer to me as "the reconciler" but thats kind of like some extensive side quest in life but ye know my boundary and cut offf game is hella strong as well lmao

Does anyone know the best way to "practice" connecting with ancestors/spirits? I've never been able to connect with or sense spirits. I come from a Christian background. I used to think I could sense God, but looking back, I was just trying to fit in... I don't worship Yahweh, currently, and am not looking to connect with Him.

This is very timely for me. I have been thinking of setting up an ancestor altar. My main question is can a child or grand-child be included on an ancestor altar? Thanks for the info.

You talked about communicating with your ancestors and how your great-great-grandmother was difficult to work with. I was wondering how this communication works? Not necessarily just how it works for you, but what are some ways it can look like. For instance, are you hearing their voice in your head, is it a gut feeling, is it through divination, is it deep meditation or trance work? All of the above?

I have most of my ancestors altar dedicated to my Italian grandparents who basically raised me. However I never met my Egyptian grandmother and only met my Egyptian grandfather once when I was about 3... I am no longer in touch with either of my parents because... Bad ancestors eh? But I have had this drive recently to try an get "in touch" with my Egyptian grandmother and. Keep wondering, given sociocultural history of FGM in Egypt... Was she part of that? Did she do that to her daughters and granddaughters? Would she had done that to me had I been born there rather than Italy? I think before watching this I had the impression everyone in a way "ascends" and becomes the best version of themselves after passing, it never occurred to me that bad traits could just stick with them? 😔

Thank you for touching on non blood ancestors 🤗 I've always tried to connect with my family friend, teacher, etc ancestors just as much as those who's DNA brought me here. Especially those who's charge I carry in this world, my tattoo ancestors, in ritual of creating/giving and receiving. 🙏✨ I didn't know if many other peeps had the bobby singer mindset with it ☺️

Very thought provoking video. I am finding as someone who is part Metis things can get complicated real fast with ancestors...or the human ones anyway. Kind of interesting that I have started on this part of my journey when my family finds itself back in the Red River valley ancestral homeland for the first time in about 100 years,

Very good video thank you

Yeaaahhh one ancestor was literally a horse thief, but otherwise was a pretty cool dude, and another ancestor (whom I have no reason to ever call on) told all three of his daughters that they were allowed to leave the farm any time they wanted... but they would have to dodge his gunshots the entire time it took them to get from the front porch to the property line.

The less moral the ancestor the moral immortal work they are willing to take on. Like a wild spirit they might be willing to do some stuff higher elevated stuff might not want to hear for food, alcohol tobacco or even just relief from suffering this is big with anima Sola work.

As a new witch finding my path, thank you.

a little two cents I kinda wanna add is that veneration and honoring ancestors can also look like, looking at your bad ancestors and seeing the bigoted things they've done and use it as a form of self reflection like "my great grandfather had these racist beliefs, do I hold some of these prejudice too?" and if you notice patterns of abuse in your ancestry you can ask yourself "what can I do to break the cycle within my family?" and you don't have to put them on your alter to do that

I think I'm seeing a parallel between the ideas of *verbalizing boundaries with ancestors being something that works* and *verbalizing which ancestors you want to connect to being something that works* I think selectively connecting with well ancestors as opposed to those who are not yet well and spiritually vibrant is possible (in my gnosis it is) and I heard the idea in Daniel Foor's Ancestral Medicine videos.

What are ancestral plants and animals?

Interesting video, though I always assumed that our ancestors, having transcended, were more … mature and more of a consciousness that is higher and universal. Aware of the lack of concept of time and space.

I do believe people do change on the other side especially with complicated ancestors. It’s tricky especially with Christian ancestors who even if folk witches won’t necessarily agree with the idea of paganism. For instance my grandfather and he was very religious in his lifetime especially when my mom was growing up. He never pushed it onto me however when he passed, my mother got so worried when she started her practice he would be upset but when she did a spiritual session he had a huge change of heart and wants my mom and me to fulfill our journey of being witches. I tend to stay away from my Christian ancestors that most likely oppose the idea of witchcraft but focus on the folk traditional side.

I’m not really sure if this counts but I have alters for my past pets. I venerate them occasionally when I have time. I haven’t started working with my families ancestors yet.

Hi Frankie, sorry for the question but can I consider my late mum my ancestor?

Something I’ve been struggling with is like… I’ve been doing lots of ancestry research.. And now I have this huge tree of ancestors that i have basic information about, but don’t know anything about them as people. It’s easy to spot like, oh these are ancestors who did terrible things that I don’t want to communicate with. But then the rest I’m like, do I call them by name when I don’t know anything except how far back we’re related, where they came from, and their name - maybe their face? Like, I guess. In this instance I just need to invite them in and get to know them to see if I want to work with them? I just put so much time and energy into my ancestral family tree and now I don’t know what to do with the information I have haha.

Hope things are well for you and yours

I have Mayflower lineage, and this was quite helpful for me to reconcile some of the colonizing, racist, and highly conservative ancestors. I know there's good in my ancestry, it just may not be in a single individual that I can point to knowing that they are for sure a familial connection.

I am not at the point where i am contacting spefic ancestors as I dont have photos yet. I did recently set the no bigots allowed boundary. Im in college so i don't have time to do a lot of specific resching out. I will however be doing that this summer. Contacting specific ancestors from the photos I do have. My spirit communcarion ablitys are wee bit under developed so reaching out is a whole thing. I'm working on it. 🤷‍♀️

Love the video ♥️ music was a lilttle bit too loud 😅xxx

My interpretation of bad ancestors was that you should reach out to them to learn from their mistakes. Sometimes you need to reach out to "Bad" ancestors to decolonize yourself and work through generational trauma cycles. Also, I thought that ancestors after they died were in an enlightened state where their bad behavior is put into perspective and they have to reflect on what they did, and for that reason, they reach out to you to have you learn from their mistakes: that could have been an interpretation influenced by different things I've seen so I could be mistaken.

Please talk about spiritual psychosis!

I struggle w ancestor work bc 1. I haven’t found any physical evidence or documentation of owning slaves (like if they did they’d probably mention it in the Will saying that they’re giving the slave to this person when they die ((gross))), but considering I’m a white American and my father’s family is from South Carolina and they owned land, it’s very possible they owned slaves and I don’t see how they didn’t, and they even fought for the goddamn Confederacy. I do know that on my mother’s side though, we were very poor and my great grandma’s family is part of a culture that faced a tiny small bit of discrimination and oppression (not racism, more so like “ew they’re all poor and uneducated and Catholic and they’re dialect is silly”). I do know my great grandmother’s father worked for a sharecropper and she was raised there and the reason I’m not connected to that culture is bc the American government started a campaign to assimilate all the children of that culture into the mainstream American culture and it was successful with her, it put a barrier between her and her family because she wasn’t speaking the same language as them and refused to speak her language even at home because she would get beaten at school for it and she is much less racist than her son (I genuinely don’t know how that happened) and when he’s being racist she’s always telling him to “stop being ignorant” although shes not perfect, interracial marriage weirds her out a bit and she uses archaic words that were once socially acceptable but now are not. (Also she’s still very much so alive if you couldn’t tell) 2. However other lines of the family while I’ve found no evidence of slave ownership, mostly just bc we were in poverty, abuse runs in my family. And I don’t know how far back some of the worst things are. CSA, drugs, even murder, all have been done in the current generation of my family. I have an uncle in prison for shooting someone while he was on meth (guy is still alive tho) and my mom’s first cousin shot her daughter (she did not live). My grandfather was 21 when he married my 17 year old at the time grandmother (i told them to their face that that was wrong and they just laughed and said “it was a different time” but my grandfather… I won’t get into it on a comment but he’s a bad, bad man). And it’s like, if that’s the current generation of my family, I’m very scared of what my ancestors were like generations ago. On the other hand, I’ve done genealogy work and uncovered stories about my ancestors that I’ve fallen in love with and can’t stop thinking about. A first generation Scottish immigrant in America fought in the revolutionary war and was impaled with a sword, held as a prisoner of war, his early life was miserable and dangerous, and yet he died of old age. He married an Irish immigrant whose family was loyalist, he actually directly fought against her brother in the battle of cowpens, and they got married and had nine surviving children together, including my ancestor who they named after the guy’s older brother he seemed to heavily admire. I can also see the family drama-it’s well documented that his family didn’t approve of his wife, and when he bought land from his brother for an expensive price but when he moved he had to sell it back to him for a huge loss, so he made sure to get his wife to sign the deed. My great grandmother’s great grandmother married an Englishman and her brothers in law basically persecuted her for her accent when she spoke English, so she just stopped. She never spoke English, only her native language and specific dialect of French. Another from my great grandmother’s line was widowed three times and had to keep remarrying when her husbands died to support herself, but they kept dying. So she became a midwife instead to feed her children (I have a picture of her in her old age holding a beautiful baby, I love it) I can feel their emotions, and I connect with them, but all I can think is “did you beat your children and is that why my dad beats me?” and “did you look the other way when you knew your husband was doing things like my grandmother did/did you also do those things and is that why he did them to me?” It’s just very complicated. I feel conflicted in my soul.

Hi! Do you ship to Canada? **Smile**

I don't know much about my mom's side of the family. She's Portuguese, so I wouldn't be surprised if there are any colonist ancestors there. :/ On my dad's side, it is steeped in the deep south (My great-grandfather was very racist,a womanizer, and southern baptist) I have very mixed feelings about him. Right now, I'm just focusing on my Portuguese grandma and going from there.

Allways love your content! ❤❤❤ Just want to say the piano was a bit to loud, beautiful, but load.

As someone who like knows that my bio dad is probably the self-loathing side of me... Nah, I don't need to talk to him. Thanks for having me and my siblings but peace out. I don't need to give more space to that kind of thing. lol as I was about to post this the webpage went black. I feel like he didn't want my brother and I to be known and is a bit pissed. Bro it isn't about you... -_-

it is hard because i look very white (half dutch) but also half balkan which had been under ottoman occupation for 5 centuries

What is Turtle Island?

World ancestors of humanity, Ancient trees, etc.

Mhm my heritage on both sides are German......n I'm related to a great grandfather that was a slave bounty hunter. When they ran he would go find them bring them back punish them. My grandmother that raised me would sneak food out t them after being punished. And I supposedly have Indian blood. B/c of the German heritage...I can suspect that was forced. I've always been at peace with nature.

I'm German, i can basically throw out the whole last 200 years lmfao

17 seconds ago ❤

You beateful

I am going to totally counter this idea that there are any ancestors that are "bad" now that they are on the other side. I have worked with a few mediums. And, what most if not all of them have told me is this. Each person comes into a life to learn. After that life, the soul does their own evaluation of the life. They experience all the paid and joy they caused for others. They actually feel it. After that is done, it is done. That soul is not the "person" they were when they were on earth in a previous body. They understand the pain they caused and are most likely using it to plan for their next life and how to progress further. So, while humans judge and believe that the soul is "bad" still, it is not. In fact, they may be able to teach us even better than a "good" soul. It is my understanding that we need to drop our judgement about these souls and accept them in grace. Even if our parents abused us, for example, they have now come to an understanding of what that life was and how to make better choices in the next life. Now, one may be still carrying the pain from the abuse. But, that is no longer on the ancestor. That is something that we need to learn to realize how it affects us. And, we may not actually get there until we do our own life review. Different life actions/experiences are not really reflections on souls as whole beings. This is just something I wanted to share so people can think about.

I do know people who do call on negative ancestors on purpose but they are mostly atr people.

I im stupid 😭

Iim Lowe You

you can go back as far as u like. They're all just as dead XD

I dont think that if your r white you have bad ancestors. I guess u r saying it because of slavery colonisation or things like that, but I mean, if a person is good or bad has nothing to do with their skin color. I'm not gonna say I have bad ancestors bcs I am white, maybe I have but I don't know 100%. I love your videos btw hahaha

I have/had some bad ones. My mother is the worst being a narcissist.

You beste6

Sometimes we can forgive people's actions if they did it out of survivalism. Sometimes... Only sometimes. And maybe when we can't forgive we can try to understand, so that we can be better, and fully condem and reprimand their actions. There's also lots of instances of white people being enslaved and dehumanized, and lots of non-white slave owners, so everyone can experience this. We can remove the "white" part because it applies to almost all people beyond the constituent of race.

less than a minute in and you're already ignoring the existence of immigrants... im white, live on turtle island, and my ancestors have absolutely nothing to do with turtle island or its colonization because i am an immigrant. not all immigrants are POC

Hiii I’ve watched your content for a while and I really love it and appreciate the effort you put into it

Thank you, this was one of your greatest Videos I've watched from you. So sweet polite and truthfully. 🫰🏼✨️🌙

turkish people also do ancestor veneration by visiting their graves at least twice a year, keeping their pictures, and trying to never say bad things about them. we also give their names to our newborns and tell good stories of them to our young. these are of course seen in many more cultures but i wanted to share.