In his brilliant book "The Way Of The Superior Man", David Deida refers to the different properties of what he calls Masculine and Feminine energies, two forces that craft the universe around us and our experiences within them. The best description that I have ever heard of these are that the Masculine is the deep, unmoving waters, witnessing all that is and changes, while the Feminine is the change. It is the dance of the light on the waves, the change of the seasons, the arc of day and night.
Deida makes a point of saying that we each possess these energies and that our unique relationships to them change over the course of our lives. He also believes that in each relationship, there is usually an imbalance of these energies, which keeps it magnetic. One partner must be centering more in the feminine, while the other would be exhibiting the traits of the masculine. The polarity that this creates is at the center of attraction and desire. It's not just about romantic or sexual desire either. That polarity can be created when we see a wonderful opportunity of somehow feel the call of an adventure, begging us to take it. But, let's not get ahead of ourselves. A few years ago, a friend of mine sent me the link to a video wherein an expert in human body language threw a huge singles event and then, with cameras planted in dozens of places, watched and provided insight on the body language that took place between the men and the women. As you can imagine, the results were both funny, interesting, and a bit grotesque. The most fascinating part to me however, were the cues that the women in the room gave to the men before the men "had the idea" to approach them. They were very subtle, but happened across the board within every interaction in the room. It's not just in this special situation. I've seen it happen over and over again, involuntarily most of the time, blatantly voluntary in others. The expert said something interesting "In the vast amount of cases, women will initiate the interaction by signaling to the man that they are open to him. When the man sees these signals, he then convinces himself that it's his own idea and engages her." This led me back to thinking about life and the various journeys that we take. Even though this might be a bit dense, I promise that it will be worth it in the end. Many of the goals and crusades we embark on in life seem to go nowhere, don't they? The start strong and then vanish into the air like vapor, or they meet struggle after struggle, taking immense amounts of mental, emotional, and physical labor to try to realize. But have you ever noticed that when something's time has arrived, almost nothing can stop it? It's as if God, or the Universe, or whatever you believe in, has mandated and conspired to create this set of events to take place. The force seems to move through these set of events and while it might not be easy, things seem to fall together in ways that leave your world completely different from the way it was before. As someone who centers more in Masculine energy, I tend to be a person who more often watches and thinks about things, rather than metaphorically dancing in the starlight. I have nothing against being the water sparkling on the waves, I just don't tend towards that type of behavior myself. One of the drawbacks to thinking from this Masculine place is that I perceive the world as I think it is and then feel the need to change things or craft them into something new, using my mind and physical labor. In a way, it's almost as if the err of the Masculine is that it acts as if nothing greater than itself exists and that it's responsibility is total. Whereas the pure Feminine is God is motion, all that changes and lives. When the Feminine changes, it's because all of the strands of the Universe conspire to clear the path. Now, none of us are all Feminine or Masculine. Life would be very hard indeed without us being able to access both sides as needed. But, as we struggle to meet our goals and create things in the world. I'd like to invite you to reflect more on the Feminine nature of the world. Stop. Listen. Pray. Meditate. Deeply relax. Feel the world. What do you feel? What do you glimpse inside? What whispers are sounding in your spirit and in your heart? I ask you to consider what the Feminine is saying to you. What is the Universe being rearranged for? What adventure is being subtly cued to you from across the room? Could it be love? An adventure? A journey? If we listen deeply enough, you'll find that every adventure worth taking chooses you long before you decide to take it.
0 Comments
One of my favorite thing about the new year is that people think, for just a little while, about the future. They set goals and figure out what they'd like to accomplish in the next twelve months. A lot of these goals tend to be centered around health and fitness, while others might be about finally starting a company, socializing more, etc.
But one of my least favorite times is around the end of January, when a vast majority of people have either forgotten or given up on their goals. It's too hard to break out of their comfort zone and daily repeated behaviors, so they just decide to keep doing what they have been doing. To them, the perceived pain of change is more intense the pain of where they are in life. By the way, I'm definitely not immune to such things. On New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, I spent hours developing goals, setting plans, and working out how to make this next year the absolute best that it could be. But then, on the second, something funny happened. I woke up, crushed my morning routine, did my work..and nothing. I felt a surge of exhaustion. Sitting down in a quiet room to rest, my inner voice asked an interesting question. "What would happen if I did nothing?" At first, the thought appeared to be absurd. But then, sensing the value that was coming with this line of questioning, I decided to ask again. "What would happen if I did absolutely nothing this year?" The answer that came back surprised me. "Probably what happened in 2017." That shocked me. How was that possible? I busted my ass in 2017..how could doing nothing produce the same results? The answer came back "Because you didn't see things through until the end. You didn't continue to work down the path to build momentum." This was, while painful to hear, undoubtedly true. I have been guilty of deserving the phrase "ADD AF" in the past. Occasionally, I remind myself of a dog, jumping from one awesome thing to the other, never truly completing it before moving on the next thing. This is how, at the end of a year filled with work and effort, not much has been released. Oh sure I've had radio shows, podcasts, and so forth come out, but compared to the amount of work that I create, it's truly nothing. So, I asked myself "Why do I hesitate to finish? Why do I hesitate to release things?" As I sat and thought about it, it became obvious. Each time a project ends, it feels like a death, not the wonderful thing we assume that it should be. Each time I finish a book or an album, I begin to exhibit the emotional states of a manic depressive and am, I'm sure, very unpleasant to be around. For me, finishing things is not enjoyable. Finishing things hurts. Therefore, I avoid it, even by using subconscious behaviors. Looking at 2018 now, armed with this knowledge, my mission becomes clear. It is to complete and experience the "little deaths" of the creative process. It's about courage and persistence when the going gets tough. Often, I have waged war against the concept of inspiration, finding it to be unreliable. But, looking at my past, I can't say that I truly had pushed it out of my own life. I shall endeavor to do much, much better in the coming days. |