“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
— Carl Jung 

Welcome to The Soul Podcast. I’m Stacey Wheeler. One ordinary afternoon, while putting dishes away with a friend, something small caught my attention. I set a glass face-up in the cupboard. She stopped me: “Oh, no—face down.” I’d always done it face-up. So we asked each other why. My mother taught me face-up so they’d dry completely—no mold on the shelf liner.
Her mother taught her face-down to keep spiders and bugs out. I’d never once worried about bugs in the cupboard. Had she ever found a spider in a cup? She said no. Curiosity led her to ask her mother the same question. The answer? “That’s how my mom taught me… because of spiders.” But she’d never had spiders either—the cups were always face-down. Her grandmother was gone, so the trail ended there. Two simple habits. Two different directions. Both born from fears we’d never experienced ourselves, likely handed down from ancestors we’d never met, who lived in a time when mold and spiders were real threats. Long dead, yet still shaping our hands. We like to believe our actions spring from our own choices, that we alone steer our lives. But that’s only partly true. So much is programming—quiet, early, inherited. The cupboard example is tiny. Does it matter how we store cups? On its own, maybe not. But pause here: both habits were rooted in fear. Hers: spiders. Mine: mold. And neither fear was ours. We were acting on someone else’s caution, someone who likely never knew us. Was this fear three generations old... four... maybe even five? If small, inherited fears can guide our hands, what else are they guiding? When you hear “inheritance,” you might picture a watch, a house, a cherished antique—something chosen, wrapped, passed with love. But not all inheritance is intentional. Some is accidental. Some is invisible. And some can quietly harm. The beautiful truth? When we see it, it becomes a tool for growth. The cupboard? That’s accidental inheritance—tangible, traceable, even if dimly. But there’s a deeper layer: emotional inheritance. This is the idea that we don’t just inherit eye color or height—we inherit emotional patterns, reactions, even traumas that shape how we feel, love, fear, and move through the world. The cup story proves it’s possible. Science says it’s real. Research in epigenetics and family systems shows emotions travel in two main ways: 

 First, there's modeling – Children absorb how parents handle anger, joy, silence. Most of us can name a habit we “learned” or “caught” from a parent. Those patterns stick. 

Next, there's biology – Stress and trauma can alter gene expression, influencing descendants generations later. Exactly how many generation, we don't yet know... but researchers say it may be a great many. 

I have a friend—a great-great-grandson of the painter Renoir. There’s a self-portrait of Renoir that looks so much like my friend that you could swear it was him. Four generations later, the face endures. That’s genetics in plain sight. 

Emotional inheritance? It’s the invisible twin. And this idea isn’t new. Carl Jung was writing about it nearly a hundred years ago—before we mapped the human genome. He called it the collective unconscious: a shared reservoir of archetypes, instincts, and primal emotions we all tap into. Deeper than family. Older than memory. It’s why every culture tells stories of heroes, shadows, and quests. It’s humanity’s emotional hard drive. Ever had a dream or gut feeling that felt ancient—not yours, but older? Jung would say: that’s the collective whispering through your inheritance. Others have carried the work forward. Today, psychoanalyst Galit Atlas explores how parents’ unspoken pain becomes ours—even if we never heard the story. Born in Israel, she grew up under the weight of regional conflict. She knows trauma personally. In her practice, she’s seen something profound. She says;

“The people we love and those who raised us live inside us; we experience their emotional pain, we dream their memories, we know what was not explicitly conveyed to us, and these things shape our lives in ways we don’t always understand.” 

This transfer happens through nurture and nature. Nurture: A parent survives loss, war, abuse—their way of being shifts. They raise children in that altered light. A small fear (like spiders) becomes a habit. A large wound becomes a worldview. A child forbidden to fly after a parent’s plane crash? That’s one life reshaped. And that’s just the seeds of fear. Nature: Epigenetics. Experiences don’t just change behavior—they can toggle genes. Trauma in one generation echoes in the cells of the next. Slavery. The Holocaust. War. Childhood abuse. Entire lineages carry the imprint. But there’s hope—and it’s big: it’s not permanent. Galit Atlas says the same environment that turned genes one way can turn them back. The psychological environment—our thoughts, emotions, healing—matters. If fear rewires DNA, so can love. So can awareness. So can intention. Research is unfolding now. It sounds like science fiction, but it’s the frontier of the mind-body connection: we may learn to guide our gene expression through conscious emotion. Jean-Paul Sartre (Sahr-truh) said: 

“We only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us.” 

And: 

“Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.” 

Galit Atlas adds: 

“We carry emotional material that belongs to our parents and grandparents… When we are ready to unpack our inheritance, we are able to confront the ghosts we carry within.” 

So how do we begin? The research says it begins with awareness.
Have curiosity. Notice when you do something differently than others. Ask: Why? Like I did with the cups. Trace the thread.
Journal recurring emotions, family stories. No judgment—just curiosity. Release with ritual.
Speak it aloud. Write a letter and burn it. Breathe it out. Rewrite with intention.

The way you place cups may have little effect on your destiny. The way you navigate the world through inherited fears will – keeping you from experiencing the full scope of this life's adventure. Be curious, be aware. When you notice a hidden fear driving you're choices, this simple habit will allow new options in your life -as you leave your old emotional inheritance behind. 
Replace old fear with chosen joy—dance, create, connect. Make it a lifelong adventure. The power is ours. Through awareness and diligence, we can start to clear ourselves of unwanted fears and anxieties. Each dropped fear—no matter how small—frees a little more of you. You won’t lose your story. You’ll reclaim your authorship. 

Start today. What have you got to lose? Maybe some of your fears and useless programming… Thank you for walking this with me. If something stirred, share it. Subscribe. Leave a note below—I’d love to hear your inheritance story. Until next time—may you keep only what serves your soul.