VALUING THE FEMININE

     In our fast-paced, achievement-driven culture, I think we regularly undervalue the feminine. We're all about the masculine virtues of action and pride, of pushing and striving and manifesting, and not so much about the soft and quiet, the under-spoken and gentle, the compassionate and intuitive. When considering these attributes, I am not thinking about men and women, per se, but more about the combination of masculine and feminine energy that resides in each of us. As a culture, we are more about the masculine, for both sexes, and I believe that our devaluation of the feminine is a great loss for us all.
     Let's lose our hard edges and allow ourselves to be gentle, both with ourselves, and others. Let's be nurturing. Let's wrap ourselves up with love and good mothering and the wisdom of the crone. Let's give birth to ourselves fresh in the coming new year and encourage our own stumbling first steps. Let's embrace feminine fortitude, for there is something strong and resilient in us that is different from our active, masculine strength if we will only call upon it. It is deep and quiet and life-sustaining. Let's be balanced and whole and remember that we are all made beautifully of both yin and yang. We are not one or the other exclusively. We are illumined and shadowy, active and receptive,  male and female. We are the perfect combination, and the perfect mix.

I value the quiet and enduring feminine energy in me, and in the world. I slow down and embrace what is soft in me, and gentle, what is intuitive, and endlessly compassionate.