The Moon Also Rises; Our Bodies, Our Cells; Mind Games

In 1987 when I was 25, I wrote a poem I titled “Centrifuge.”

                                                The centrifuge of modern day

                                                Has stirred and separated

                                                Woman.

                                                The force has thrust her apart,

                                                Leaving the feminine

                                                Dispensable and obsolete.

                                                It is time to be still,

                                                To gather together

                                                That which has been

                                                Flung aside.

                                                Without stillness,

                                                We cannot be whole.

                                                Without wholeness,

                                                We are doomed.

At the time, I thought I was the only one in the world reflecting (albeit rudimentarily) on the theme of feminine denigration and the need for its restoration in our world.

But almost 30 years later, it is abundantly clear that a very large human cohort of Mother Earth has been very much aware of this theme for a long while, and in the West, it is now being expressed in conversations, spiritual practices, books, literature, workshops, art, rituals, film, and through many other venues.

In addition to the repeated affirmation I have witnessed calling for the restoration of balance and integration of the masculine and feminine aspects in our lives and in our world in order to attain wholeness, I have been personally reflecting for a long while on the myriad ways that feminine marginalization has affected our world, our lives, and -- I have learned recently -- our bodies and health.

To begin, what is “the feminine”?  To me, the feminine is a conscious energy; an essence.  It is not “a woman,” just as the masculine is not “a man.”  All of nature, all humans -- men and women -- embody masculine and feminine essences in varying degrees.  Arguably, a woman is comprised of a preponderance of feminine, while a man of masculine.  But even that statement is fraught with potential inaccuracy.  But thank you for bearing with me for the sake of furthering my discussion.

“The feminine” is the world of the moon and shadow, cycles, nurturance, intuition, feeling, creativity, cooperation, flow, art, music, and more.  You get the idea.  The right side of our brain, it can be argued, is the domain of the feminine. And because the feminine is an essence of giving, to replenish, it must receive.

The following is a modest sampling (though significant) of the areas in our lives and world where the feminine has been dormant and suppressed and is pushing to rise once again.

1.      Economics – Capitalism is an economic system fashioned in a masculine, patriarchal paradigm that values hierarchy and personal profit.  Competition is idolized.  Cooperation is antithetical.  Yet cooperation, a feminine aspect, is critically essential if a society values social and humanitarian well-being.  A healthy society requires a hybrid of economic “essences” rooted in BOTH masculine and feminine for our world to have a hope of coming into economic/social balance and equilibrium.  Moreover, the marginalization of women in the modern workplace up until about 40 to 50 years ago is a fractal reflection of the exclusive force of capitalism.  As more women have achieved positions of influence in business and politics in recent years, it is my hope that feminine values will also gain a footing. Yet this is by no means guaranteed (or perhaps even possible) without a paradigmatic shift of the economic “end game.”

2.     Politics – Social and political parity of men and women addresses concrete issues of governance and legal rights.  Another issue entirely is the full engagement and integration of the feminine aspect of consensus-building and cooperation into the political realm, something we haven’t seen much of lately.

3.     Spirituality – Religion is a political structure, by and large, and is the domain of the masculine, with patriarchal prejudices and overtones.  We are now seeing a resurgence and renaissance of direct and personal spiritual experience and reflection, a realm of the feminine.

4.     Health – I have been fascinated in recent years by writings that correlate certain illness and disease with malfunction of feminine cellular function (i.e., the mitochondria).  In the 2011 book “Power Up Your Brain” by David Perlmutter, M.D. and Alberto Villoldo, Ph.D., the following took my breath away:  “Our mitochondria is inherited only from our mother’s lineage.  Here was the source, inside each cell of every living creature, of the feminine life force that sages speak about…these energy factories seemed to be breaking down under the continual barrage of stress in our fast-paced lives and from biochemical toxins including mercury, pesticides, and water and air pollution…ancient shamanic practices, including prayer, fasting, and meditation as well as dietary supplementation with special herbs, help restore mitochondrial function,” a function of feminine life force.  Literature has also suggested the need to engage both hemispheres of our brain (right-sided/feminine and left-sided/masculine) to achieve balance and health in our lives, our bodies, and our spirit.  So EQUAL parts working and playing, reasoning and wondering, writing and painting, running and dancing (or reasonable facsimiles thereof that resonate for every individual).  A world of balance (and therefore health) calls for an integrated feminine/masculine engagement of our minds and bodies.

  Personally, I have consciously aspired for the past 25 years or so to engage more fully with my feminine essence, which I had felt significantly out of touch with in the first half of my life.  This has been challenging in a mainstream world that  values achievement in masculine terms and objectifies the feminine.  Yet after much personal reflection, conscious lifestyle choices, determination, and energetic therapy, I finally feel healthfully integrated as a feminine/masculine vessel.  Yet this balance requires practice and conscious, constant vigilance, a never-ending dance.  And I LOVE to dance.