Tooth Archetypes: The Secret Lives Of Teeth

Have you ever wondered why one tooth gets cavities and not another? Why you see gum disease in one part of your mouth and not somewhere else? Have you ever been curious about the energetic effects of a root canal, tooth extraction, implant or orthodontic treatment? This lecture helps to answer these kinds of questions with a succinct introduction to some of the key concepts in 'The Secret Lives of Teeth' by Meliors Simms. At the heart of the book is Meliors' own Tooth Archetype framework, which recognises that each adult tooth represents a metaphysical theme with its own strengths and vulnerabilities. Listen now to learn how this unique archetypal approach to oral health can help you more effectively prevent and relieve many kinds of tooth and gum problems.

Transcript

I'm a natural oral health coach,

And a few years ago,

I worked with a client I'll call Lizzie.

She was in her 70s when she came to me with infected root-canaled incisors that she wanted to be replaced with implants,

But she was filled with fear about proceeding with such a complex dental treatment plan.

As we worked together to release decades of dental trauma,

Lizzie shared the story of her top front teeth.

A couple of years after her parents had divorced because of her mother's affair with the man who would become Lizzie's stepfather,

Six-year-old Lizzie tripped and smashed her new front teeth into their flagstone floor.

Looking back,

She can see that she was trying to make herself a less attractive target of abuse by her mother and stepfather.

As is common with episodes like this,

One tooth showed the long-term damage before the other.

Lizzie's upper left incisor died after a few months,

Turning grey as it lost its connection with blood flow and nerves.

That's the tooth I call the nurturer archetype,

Which commonly represents your early relationship with your mother or a mother figure.

This tooth was embodying the emotional burden of Lizzie's mother's physical and psychological abuse at the time.

Her upper right incisor died a few years later,

Around the time her father remarried,

And Lizzie lost all hope that his benign neglect would ever provide escape from the abuse she was experiencing in her mother's household.

The upper right incisor is the leader archetype and commonly represents your early relationship with your father or a father figure.

For Lizzie,

It embodied her disappointment in her father and the abuse inflicted by her stepfather.

With an understanding of this history,

Lizzie and I worked with the metaphysical influences on her teeth to heal not only the infection in her oral cavity,

But also the years of silence about her traumatic childhood abuse.

Responding to her teeth's symptoms as though they were messages from her wounded inner child helped her to have very positive experiences and outcomes with her dental treatment.

At the end of our work together,

She told me that having the front teeth extracted had felt like removing her childhood abusers from her mouth,

Opening a door to a new life.

The mouth is the primary means of expression,

So that when expression is inhibited as part of a chronic or acute trauma,

Teeth and gums can end up holding on to the energy of the trauma.

Almost every person I've ever worked with can trace their symptoms back to some kind of traumatic secret,

Silence or suppressed emotions.

When emotional trauma and psychological patterns involve secret silences or suppressed emotions,

They potentially influence the health of teeth and gums through several different physical pathways.

Hormones such as cortisol produced by stress can obstruct the body's natural processes of remineralising teeth or cause jaw tension leading to tooth and gum damage.

The mouth is part of the digestive system with its own unique microbiome which is influenced by genetic,

Behavioural and environmental factors including trauma and trauma responses.

The jaws contain one of the most dense networks of nerve endings in the whole body,

So teeth and gums are integrated with the health of your nervous system.

This talk is an introduction to my ongoing Tooth Archetype series which will eventually be complete with 32 lectures that dive deep into the meaning of each tooth,

One at a time.

Today I'll summarise some key points from my book The Secret Lives of Teeth Understanding Emotional Influences on Oral Health which I consider useful background information to understand the Tooth Archetypes framework especially if you aren't familiar with metaphysical approaches to physical oral health.

In this talk I'll explain how tracing the location of your own symptoms onto a metaphysical map of the mouth can help you to understand underlying emotional,

Energetic,

Psychological,

Ancestral or environmental influences.

Think about your own dental history and current oral health concerns.

Where are the cavities or fillings,

The root canals,

The crowns,

The gaps,

The implants or bridges?

Where are gums receding or bone density being lost?

Your personal mouth map can provide a starting point for incorporating metaphysical healing into your approach to oral health making it more holistic and,

In my experience,

More effective.

I'll also briefly describe the specific meaning of each tooth's archetype and then give you some ideas for how to work with tooth archetypes to help you maintain healthy teeth,

Heal existing problems and prevent future issues.

Before I introduce my unique system of tooth archetypes,

A disclaimer.

I'm not a dentist and a metaphysical approach to oral health is no substitute for necessary dental interventions or consistent home care practices.

Use your common sense and be pragmatic because metaphysical oral health needs to be seen as complementary,

Not alternative,

To physical oral health care.

Metaphysical approaches to oral health are safest and most helpful when symptoms are ambiguous and or minor.

Symptoms that are seriously risky or have an obvious physical explanation definitely need you to respond physically with dental or home remedies.

That said,

Dental interventions can be more reliable,

Effective,

Uncomplicated and fast acting when you also work with a potentially powerful metaphysical mapping system for oral health.

Mapping systems include traditional Chinese medicine's meridian system,

Which can be understood as a mystical landscape of energy channels that extend through the whole body,

Including the mouth.

There's a system of quadrants from Dr.

Michelle Kafan,

Which refers to the right side and the left side,

The upper jaw and the lower jaw,

Sections of the mouth which can be understood as equivalent to neighborhoods with different cultures.

Or the system of teeth types from Dr.

Christiane Bayer,

Which includes different meanings or interpretations associated with types of teeth such as molars,

Canines,

Incisors and so on.

And these can be thought of like styles of houses,

Which are recognizably similar even in different neighborhoods.

All these different ways of mapping the location of symptoms within the mouth allocate specific interpretations by placement.

Over many years as a holistic oral health coach working with these frameworks,

I also started to develop my own,

I think more user-friendly system of tooth archetypes,

Where the archetypes are like job descriptions encompassing the way you uniquely occupy the tooth type houses,

Quadrant neighborhoods and meridian landscapes.

The tooth archetypes encompass specific qualities,

Themes,

Strengths,

Vulnerabilities,

Significant relationships,

Life stages or ancestral influences.

Your teeth embody the archetypes most fully when you experience symptoms in those teeth.

Archetypes are signposts which raise questions,

Open doors or signal possibilities without offering definitive or rigid explanations.

Archetypes are broad generalizations and any connection to your unique situation in life can help you to create what I call a healing story that is particular to you.

Your version of the archetype is the correct one for you and may be very different to anyone else's.

For example,

The upper left first molar is represented by the Earth Mother archetype,

Which I've seen show up in different people as symptoms which embody transgenerational trauma from a mid-20th century famine.

In several clients I've seen it be connected to a history of eating disorders.

For someone it was a power struggle between them and their mother who punished them for not eating everything on the plate.

Another client wasn't breastfed and she was jealous of a slightly younger sibling who did get nursed.

If you've had problems with your upper left first molar,

Think about how you may have experienced some form of trauma around getting nourishment.

Now please note that when I describe teeth as right or left,

I'm referring to your right side and your left side,

Not how someone else sees you.

Now I'm going to briefly describe each of the archetypes and the individual adult teeth they represent.

As I introduce each archetype,

I'll mention just one aspect of its multifaceted meanings to give you a little taste,

And you can learn more about each archetype in the Secret Lives of Teeth or by listening to the in-depth exploration of each tooth in my ongoing lecture series.

The wisdom teeth,

Or third molars,

Represent ancient ancestors and collective wisdom.

Wisdom teeth are at the very back,

And whether you have teeth or not,

The archetype can still be relevant and have an influence.

The upper right wisdom tooth is the law archetype,

And that relates to external governance through laws,

Rules,

Policies,

And so on.

The upper left wisdom is the virtues archetype,

And that's about intuition,

Inner conformity,

And morality.

The lower right wisdom tooth archetype is the mystic,

And that relates to the material aspects of your spiritual life.

The lower left wisdom tooth is the honour archetype,

Which relates to cultural transmission and continuity.

The central incisors,

That's your very front teeth,

Embody issues around your experiences as an infant and with your parents when you were very young.

So these are the front and centre teeth.

They're the first teeth that most people ever grow in as baby teeth and get replaced as adult teeth.

And they're also the most visible teeth,

So we're very self-conscious about them.

The upper right central incisor is the leader archetype,

That relates to your father and to being able to act with competence.

The upper left central incisor is the nurturer,

And that can relate to your mother and how and where you feel nourished in your life.

The lower right central incisor is the beast archetype,

And that relates to the ways in which you can have impulsiveness and momentum in your life.

The lower left central incisor is the dull archetype,

And that kind of embodies passive compliance.

The lateral incisors make up the rest of what orthodontists call the social eight.

It's one out from the centre,

So the lateral incisors are on either side of your central incisors.

And they relate to how you were socialised in your infancy.

It might be how you took on board ideas about gender and culture within your family.

The upper right lateral incisor is the inner critic archetype,

And it's a judgmental inner voice.

The upper left lateral incisor is the priestess,

Relating to your body image and ways of self-care.

The lower right lateral incisor is the guardian tooth archetype,

Relating to defensive boundaries.

The lower left lateral incisor is the martyr archetype,

And that can relate to ways of sacrificing yourself.

Your canine teeth,

Known as the eye teeth or cuspid teeth,

Sometimes as vampire teeth,

Relate to power dynamics.

So the upper right canine is the commander archetype,

And that can embody issues to do with hierarchy and your relationship with authority.

The upper left canine is the submission archetype,

And that can embody issues to do with obedience and compliance.

Your lower right canine is the collaborator archetype,

And that can embody issues to do with participating in collective effort.

It's the group project tooth,

If you like.

The lower left canine is the servant archetype,

And that's really vulnerable to feeling exploited.

And I see that tooth causing problems often for mothers and big families.

Premolar teeth,

Also known as bicuspids,

Relate to pleasure,

Preferences,

Childhood and play.

The first premolars are the ones just behind the canines,

And they're specifically about intimate relationships in your life.

The upper right first premolar is the daddy archetype,

And that is where you feel affection and support.

The upper left first premolar is the forgiveness archetype,

And that is a relationship where you feel you receive unconditional love,

Where you feel the lack of that unconditional love.

The lower right first premolar is the friend archetype,

And it can be about your youthful peers,

But also about adult friendships.

The lower left first premolar is the lover archetype,

And that,

Of course,

Can embody issues to do with romantic partners and romantic love.

Your second premolars sit behind the first premolars and in front of your molars,

And they relate to your creativity,

Your preferences.

The upper right second premolar is the alliance archetype,

And that can embody social dynamics of loss.

The upper left second premolar is the harvest archetype,

And that is a karmic tooth that can embody your innate abilities or struggles around natural talents.

Your lower right second premolar is the rival archetype.

That can be tension with your siblings or other people who you're in a peer relationship with,

Like fellow students if you're at school or coworkers in your workplace.

The lower left second premolar is the trust archetype,

And that is relationships that really ground you or the lack of grounding relationships in your life.

Your molars,

Of course,

Are the big teeth at the back of your mouth,

And they represent your teenage years and adulthood.

I call them the adulting teeth,

And they're very concerned with issues of identity.

The first molars behind the second premolar relate to issues of status.

The upper right first molar,

The son archetype,

Is your place in the family,

Particularly the family business or your sense of public status and public purpose and how that's perceived within the family.

Your upper left first molar is the earth mother archetype,

Which we talked about earlier.

That's about your relationship with the natural world and how well you feel nourished by that.

The lower right first molar is the professional archetype,

And just like it says on the tin,

It's about career and purpose.

The lower left first molar is the home archetype,

And that's about having a private space that you can be authentic.

The second molars are really concerned with authenticity.

The upper right second molar is the name archetype,

And that is about reputation and your relationships with people who share your name.

It might be your father's family,

For example.

The upper left second molar is the knight archetype,

And that is concerned with feelings of exclusion and belonging or a longing for belonging.

The lower right second molar is the goal archetype,

And that can embody issues around your youthful idealism,

Perhaps that gap between what you wanted for yourself when you were a young person and how your life's turned out now that you're older.

Your lower left second molar is the conception archetype,

And that can embody issues that arose prenatally.

So what your mother was going through while she was pregnant with you can really affect this tooth.

That was the speed version of the archetypes.

When I'm coaching one-on-one,

We can easily spend the better part of an hour discussing just one tooth archetype,

And sometimes return to it week after week.

So remember that there's lots more to say on each archetype.

If this list of hints didn't resonate for you,

There may be something else in the longer description that really makes more sense in terms of your personal story.

Ultimately,

Tooth archetypes bring the power of imagination into the realm of your physical body and support your healing to be a creative,

Expressive and spiritual process.

I'll always encourage you to develop your unique healing story rather than relying on the archetype descriptions.

It's like the difference between reading a novel versus a summary of that book.

I've seen how tooth archetypes can have broad application,

Especially when symptoms or sensations in your mouth draw your attention.

Referring to archetypes can help you understand yourself better.

And if you know what's going on with someone else's teeth,

Like a patient or a client,

It can give you insight into parts of their lives that they don't share easily.

Remember that connection with secret silences and suppressed emotions.

There are so many ways to work with tooth archetypes to support your oral health.

You can meditate on their themes or journal about the relationships they represent.

You can bring tooth archetypes into different therapies.

You might discuss their vulnerabilities with a counsellor or in a support group.

You could try somatic therapies in response to sensations in your mouth.

Or you could explore the archetypes within your inner child,

Internal family systems or ancestor work.

Archetypes can help make more sense of the origins of teeth and gum symptoms when conventional explanations about oral hygiene or diet don't resonate.

Awareness of the archetypes can change how you relate to your teeth with more compassion,

Curiosity,

Confidence,

Gratitude and generosity.

To learn more about each individual tooth archetype,

Look out for my in-depth resources in my ongoing Tooth Archetype series.

Reviews

Very interesting could not finish right now - will need to return later 🦷