Divine and Sacred Feminine Resources - Permission to Embrace Our Full Humanity 💃
As the Solstice approaches and the season here in the northern hemisphere invites us to get quiet and cosy, and maybe curl up with an incredible book, a journal or some oracle cards, or all of the above, I'd love to share a list of resources with you - Divine and Sacred Feminine Resources.
This list is personal to me - over many, many years, I have steeped myself in every book, deck of cards, podcast, presentation, body of work and whatever else I’ve listed here. (The resources are presented roughly in the order in which I first experienced them and it’s a work in progress that I keep adding to.) There is so much support for us to grow and learn and Make Room For Ourselves. This list is just a small sampling of the resources available to us.
Recently as part of a recommitment process in Coralus (which I write about in my newsletters) I had the opportunity to share what it is I’m here to transform.. It’s not the first time I’ve written a statement like this; however, I felt it especially clearly this time. Here's what I wrote:
I'm here to guide highly intellectual and entrepreneurial-minded women who are successful on the "outside" to transform their experience of their lives so that they feel more successful on the "inside" - grounded, growing and blooming into the next season of their leadership with fuller presence and greater fulfillment.
In addition to being a potential support for you, this list gives you a sense of some of the ideas, thinking and practices that I offer to my clients when we work together in service of their version of the transformation as described above. My friend and colleague Barbara Frensel and I draw on these resources in our Making Room For You Salons and in our law firm and corporate work. We're also exploring these issues in the Coralus Pod (small group) I co-catalyzed this Fall called Inviting in the Wisdom and Power of the Feminine.
A stand for the rise of the Feminine
As I've developed the list, it's become clearer and clearer to me how my stand for the rise of the Feminine has been at the heart of my work and, indeed, my life. I feel like it’s time to make this stand even more overt and embodied, to bring it to the surface, rather than have it only be an undercurrent. The list represents a quest I've been on to understand for myself why things are the way they are in the world.
Why so much misogyny?
Why are women subjugated all over the world?
Why are so many of us exhausted and resentful?
Like many of you, I'm sure, I've been questioning things ever since I was a young girl. For example, I remember as a girl going to the United Church and feeling ambivalent, wondering where all the women were in the Bible - I wondered what Noah's wife's name was. Why wasn't she mentioned???
The Feminine - Weak, yet dangerous?
For millennia, in many of the world's dominant cultures, Feminine qualities have been considered weak, and yet dangerous. The Feminine is seen as something to be controlled. Something to be diminished and hidden. And this has been true for me in my life for a good chunk of it. I learned to value the Masculine energy in me and play down the Feminine.
We all have Masculine and Feminine qualities within us, no matter who we are. (So this isn't about gender, though of course women have been associated with the Feminine and men with the Masculine.) Feminine qualities include those associated with the body, emotions, intuition, wholeness, organic nature, desire, being, stillness. Masculine qualities include the head/mind, the intellect, logic, parts, order, drive, doing, busy-ness. I’ve come to realize that a rebalancing of the Feminine and Masculine, both within each of us and in the world, will be instrumental in creating a world of greater harmony and wellbeing. We all get to be a blend, an integration of these opposites, a synergy - we are greater than the sum of our parts.
My wish for us - Permission!
My wish for all of us humans and, especially women, is that we feel permission to be our own unique and dynamic synergy of these qualities. That we feel permission to reclaim parts of ourselves that we may have “exiled” as we “grew up” in service of being “stronger” and more “effective” in the world. That we feel permission to be complex and paradoxical. That we feel permission to practice embracing our full humanity and our full power.
The Bird of Humanity Prophecy
The best metaphor I've heard to describe this transformation is from a Prophecy - here shared by Lynn Twist in an interview with Tami Simon of Sounds True:
The bird of humanity comes from the Baha’i people and it’s also been validated and affirmed and comes through the Cherokee people as well. It says that the bird of humanity has two great wings, a male wing and a female wing. The male wing has been fully extended and fully fleshed out and fully strong and fully expressed for hundreds and hundreds of years. But the female wing of the bird of humanity has been folded in, not quite fully extended, not quite fully expressed for hundreds of years.
The male wing of the bird of humanity has had to become over muscular, overdeveloped, and ultimately, has had to become violent to keep the bird of humanity afloat. And therefore we’ve been flying in circles for hundreds and hundreds of years. This is the century, the first century of the third millennium, when the feminine wing, the female wing in all of us will fully extend itself, fully express itself in women and men, and the male wing will begin to relax and the bird of humanity, for the first time, will soar. I love that prophecy. It’s very, very hopeful.
Feminine First, Masculine Second
I've learned that in many contexts, if not all, the Masculine is meant to serve the Feminine, not the other way around like we've been taught. For example, my clients and I practice connecting with our deepest desires and yearnings (embodied Feminine), sensing into a vision (embodied Feminine), crafting an intention (a way of being, still Feminine) and only then moving into actions connected to and inspired by the desire/vision/intention - "inspired actions" (Masculine). When our actions are not connected back to our desires and yearnings we eventually burn out and feel a sense of emptiness.
My focus on the positive psychology intervention of savouring is another example of valuing the Feminine. To savour is to be embodied and receptive to our feelings and experiences. Receptivity is the ultimate Feminine quality. Receptivity is also required for us to “co-create with life” rather than being a victim of our circumstances. The upcoming Solstice event is primarily focused on reflection (Feminine) and only at the end do we consider actions (Masculine) that we’ll take as a result of all the reflection and learning. Adults learn through a cycle of reflection and action.
Developing habits, practices and rituals
These resources are continuing to help me, my clients and our Salon and workshop participants develop habits, practices, rituals and mindsets to bring more of the Feminine into our lives, work and community. The result? Greater fulfilment, deeply meaningful relationships, more powerful leadership, more energy and an experience of being successful from the inside out.
I hope these resources will be helpful to you too, if you seek to cultivate more of the Feminine in you - to Make Room For You in this way. To spread both of your wings and fly. And of course please reach out to explore working together if this all sounds appealing to you. You can book a Discovery Session here.
