I don’t know what is going to happen this year. We can assume it will be big, based on events that last time we were in the Year of the Fire Horse. But what I do KNOW is that we will see a rise of the feminine.
This doesn’t mean women will “take over”, but there will be a surge of women and the those of the LGBTQIA+ community taking on more leadership positions, as we are underrepresented in our current world dynamics, from politics to sports. And I’ll always be a feminist, at least until we all have equitable and equal standing. But what I really mean is a rise in feminine energy, feminine power.
It’s been repressed for too long. Perhaps back to the beginning.
And with it will come a sacred rage. Anger at have been held down, assaulted, and minimized throughout history. But that anger is just the fuel for the fire- to burn down the structures that can no longer hold us. It’s not hate. It’s not geared toward singular people, but at the systems that enslave us.
Yet the sacred rage is just a small part of the feminine energy. There’s also a softness. The ability to forgive the unforgivable. Gratitude. Serenity. Even play.
Most of all, the Love that can embrace and heal all.
When the feminine rise, she gathers all around. She doesn’t rise alone. She gathers, pulls out of the weeds. We all rise.
(A client of mine recently told me that “L” was put at the front of “LGBTQIA” to honor the lesbians who sat with and held the hands of so many people who had HIV/AIDs, making sure they felt loved.)
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I’ve been in pain nearly my whole life. A playful, silly, mischievous, and creative child turned shy and soft spoken.
I developed an eating disorder by 7th grade. A way too numb what I was feeling. Everyone wanted to know why, what was wrong with me. I said I didn’t know. They assumed divorce. And while this is partially true (research shows that unaimable divorces, especially when the kids emotion’s are ignored, has a prominently negative affect on kids, even in shaping a child’s brain), my parents divorce was messy, this was only a small piece. I wasn’t allowed to have emotions. I needed to be tough. The critical voice of my mom and paternal grandmother became my own, amplified. I grew up in a church with no women as prominent leaders- in 8th grade, I was usually the sole girl wearing pants to school, as ugly as they were, just to make a point. But I was also ashamed of my breasts and my femininity. I was repressed. Of course I was in pain.
I gained weight so I could play basketball- and I’ve experienced episodes of anxiety and depression ever since. Like the doctors and my family, I didn’t know what was wrong with me. Yet their question became my own, “What the fuck is wrong with me?”.
I knew I wanted to be great. But I always played it small. My inner critic made sure of that.Still, while I can be angry, I can’t blame my mom or grandma- or the other women in my life- for that. For them, playing it small, following the rules, and being tough is what kept them safe. It kept them alive. It kept them from being burned at the stake. Shunned from their communities. Cast away like Mary Magdalene for their wisdom and “gnosis”, who surely would have been persecuted after Jesus’ crucifixion had she not escaped to France.
The “freeze” survival response isn’t just a learned response… for many women, it kept them alive from rape and persecution. Hiding was safe. While ancestral trauma has deep energetic roots, who we know about genetics now is that it can also be passed down. There’s no shame in it. It kept us alive.
But now, being alive isn’t enough. Freedom is the only choice.
Yet the first step is not freedom from men that are, biologically, bigger than me. Men that hold earthly power, as I know my power I much greater.
The first step is…
…releasing the trauma in my body that I’ve held not just for nearly 4 decades, but generations. To breathe deep into my belly. To shake. To cry. And remove myself from the critical voices of my my mind. To go back to living from the heart.
It’s not easy work. Anyone else on this path knows this. Has endured with me. Has fought to keep going. Thank the Divine.
Freedom, then, is from our own bondage, what used to keep us safe. The external, hopefully, will come for all women. But first, at least for me, it’s from the chains of my mind. Forgiving myself. Loving myself in a way only the feminine can.
Edith Ever said it most beautifully, “We cannot choose to have a life free of hurt. But we can choose to be free, to escape the past, no matter what befalls us, and to embrace the possible.”
And then, with the past not forgotten but the pain released…
It’s time to rise.
And the best thing about when the Feminine rises- She brings everyone else up with Her.
A Dog and Her Girl 