Bitch!

Posted on 04/14/2011 by Tammy Vitale

 

Blood Sister, clay sculpture by Tammy Vitale (gifted to her Blood Sister, Linda)

Bitch:  “This became a naughty word in Christian Europe because it was one of the most sacred titles of the Goddess, Artemis-Diana, leader of the Scythian alani or ‘hunting dogs.’  The Bitch-goddess of antiquity was known in all Indo-European cultures, beginning with the Great Bitch Sarama who led the Vedic dogs of death.  The Old English word for a hunting dog, bawd, also became a naughty word because it applied to the divine Huntress’s promiscuous priestesses as well as her dogs.

“Harlots and ‘bitches’ were identified in the ancient Roman cult of the Goddess Lupa, the Wolf Bitch, whose priestesses the lupae gave their name to prostitutes in general.  Earthly representatives of the Wolf Bitch ruled the Roman town of Ira Flavia in Spain, as a queen or series of queens named Lupa.

“In Christian terms, ‘son of a bitch’ was considered insulting not because it meant a dog, but because it meant a devil – that is, a spiritual son of the pagan Goddess.”  Barbara G. Walker The Women’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets

Oh, my, the things they don’t teach you in school. 

This is all by way of saying that should someone honor your with the title “Bitch” you should smile and say:  “Why, thank you for acknowledging my divinity and power!” then sashay on down the road.

And don’t forget, as Clarissa Pinkola-Estes recommends for those living the way of the wolf: “Howl, often!”

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You Do NOT Have to Raise Your Hand!

Posted on 04/05/2011 by Tammy Vitale

Garden Goddess

 

Jonathan Kozol is one of my favorite writers.  I found him through his book “The Night Is Dark and I Am Far From Home” writing on schools.  In a later version he apologizes for the rant of this original work and says he would tame it down.

Personally, I like the first version just fine.

I do not wish to be toned down or civilized.

Paraphrasing him:  I do not wish to raise my hand and politely request if I may, please, start the revolution now.  Or wait until I get permission.

I did not spend the last 40 years of my life discovering the goddess in me only to bend my knee before someone else’s version of a male divinity.

I do not wish to beg to have the right to determine whether or not and how I choose to have, or not have children.

I do not intend to leave my granddaughter and grandson a world where women have the choice of being barefoot and pregnant or being barefoot and pregnant.

I will not apologize for being aggressive about this.

I will not ask permission, I will take it.

And I will not back down.

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Feminism at Forty

Posted on 03/10/2011 by Tammy Vitale
Article Author, Heather Bartlett

Tammy posed a question to me about the words “feminist” and “womens’ libber.”  She wondered what they meant to a woman born after the 60s.  Do they have any meaning to me at all?

Yes, hell yes, they do.  I consider myself a feminist.  I identify myself as a feminist.  Though I do not consider myself the type of feminist who doesn’t recognize the differences in men and women. In fact if anything I relish the differences in men and women.  As a sensualist I enjoy a multitude of life’s spices.

I would say that I stand up for womens’ rights and that I believe women are strong and capable.  The word “feminist” to me means anybody – male or female – who supports the idea that women are equal human beings in that they deserve the same rights as men.  I recognize the word may mean something to others.

I know the words “womens’ libber” and have not actually heard it in a very long time.  I would consider “womens’ libber” to be pejorative.  I have no idea if it is or was, but for whatever reason the term has a negative connotation to me.  I can conjure up men in thin ties and fedoras yelling it until their faces are red.  I can imagine women in neatly pressed dresses and pearls curling their lips up as they say it.  Not any time recently.  More of a historical perspective.

I believe it is possible that some women may not think I am a strong-willed feminist because I use the word chick.  I say, “Hey guys…” when addressing a crowd that includes females.  I like well made porn.  I don’t see anything wrong with women posing nude – as an idea.  In practice most nudes of women are of a very specific type of woman – young, large pert busted, tiny waist, round rear, slim long legs, long hair, no cellulite, scars , stretch-marks, acne and very little body hair.  This brings me to what I consider my special feminist niche.
 

Most of my efforts as a feminist artist confront the issues self esteem and body image of females of all ages.  I believe the subjugating of women is still alive and well in the beauty and diet industry.  Women are made to feel bad about everything from having pubic hair to pores and cellulite.  This is usually a daily assault in the forms of commercials, advertisements and commentary from peers.  Fates help you if you are fat like me.  Being a fat woman opens you up to all sorts of ridicule that seems to be socially acceptable.  Including and sometimes very cruelly, by other women.

The best way to be a feminist, I think, is to be supportive of other women.  Don’t tear them down.  Don’t use your money to commercially support businesses that objectify women.  It means different things to different people.  You have to decide what it means to you. 

About Heather:  Heather Bartlett is a multi-media artist and arts advocate.  Her accomplishments include works in sculpture, written media, painting and photography.  Her focus on themes such as self-image, beauty, feminine spirit and sexuality set her apart in her work.

She says:  I heart stripey socks, dark chocolate and love letters. I am lucky to have two beautiful daughters, who are patient models and have helped me evolve as a photographer. I also have Will by my side, who helped me begin my photo journey in earnest, convincing me that my work was worthy. 

I write creatively nearly every single day.  Besides my online journals I have paper journals and other private diaries.  I think I may have recorded every emotion and important moment since about 2002, when I started my first electronic journal – now known as blogs. 

See her work here.

***

Mo likes “Women’s Libber.”  Heather remembers that as a perjorative.  I hadn’t thought about it at all until these two women made me start thinking about finding a common language so that we can move forward together.  (And the rebel in me actually likes the perjorative – reclaiming what others perceive as negative and defining it for yourself as positive, i.e. as the word “crone” means for me an older woman who has come into her own wisdom and power).  Anne speaks to the importance of why we need that common language – women are under attack.  What do you think?

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The Way We Were: Women’s Liberation Part II

Posted on 03/05/2011 by Tammy Vitale

Guest author Mo Davies

See The Way We Were:  Women’s Liberation Part I here.

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Women’s strengths are often expressed through consensus, emotion, intuition, and co-operation.  But feminine attributes aren’t as respected or accepted, not then and not now.

Why not?  Bringing up children is a demanding, responsible position; yet, because it’s not in the paid workforce, it’s not considered work.  Yes, it’s great to see women in the top jobs like Hilary Clinton or Australia’s Julia Gillard, but they still operate on the old, male rules of combat and within the same combat paradigm.  They wage war not peace, just as male leaders do.  Consider the reaction if a woman in a leadership position started approaching conflict through peaceful methods instead of beating the war drums!  We all know they’d be criticized, denigrated and viciously attacked.

Consciousness Raising

The consciousness-raising groups of those times, which were treated with great derision by the generally hostile media and by many men [ed note:  and by many "traditional" women] were great because we operated on a non-hierarchical basis as much as possible.  We wanted to democratize discussion.  We empowered and supported each other instead of competing.  The movement started the  set up of women’s refuges, women’s health centres, rape crisis centres, support for women to enter parliament, access to free and safe abortion, equal pay, good affordable childcare, provision of family planning so that abortions were minimised as well as lobbying the media to stop trivializing women in sexist advertising. 

We pored over the magazines Spare Rib (UK) and Ms (US), absorbing the contents like sponges.  We inhaled the contents of books by Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Kate Millet, Susie Orbach, Germaine Greer, Shulamith Firestone, Betty Friedan and many others.  The Federal Labor government organized a national Women’s Conference, and we mixed with overseas women activists, forging international links.

Heady times.

It was our collective, not individual, stand that made the difference.  I’ve heard women say:  “Change your thoughts, and your change your reality.  You don’t need feminism or women’s liberation.”  All I can say to that is:  “Bollocks, sister.”  Because women on their own, divided from others sisters and played off against one another, got nowhere,  It was when we got impolite, rowdy, feisty, hollering, rollicking, rocking the boat, loud, raucous, marching, holding demonstrations, standing together in large numbers that change happened.

Same Old, Same Old

I said at the beginning, and it remains true, that nothing was ever handed to us women on a plate.  And it’s never remained with us as a right; we’ve had to hang on grimly with our fingertips. 

So now we still see the same old, same old:  vilification of a US reporter brutally raped in Egypt; attacks on women’s right to abortion and free, safe contraception; calls for abortion providers to be murdered; undermining of equal pay [ed note:  according to a just released report, women are more educated as a whole than men, but still only earn 75% of men's salary.  Let's see:  it used to be 69%.  Long way to go, Baby]; women still being called “chicks,” girls,” hos, when we are WOMEN.

The Republican leader, John Boehner gets teary when he becomes House Leader (you’ll pardon my cynicism if I say it’s my belief it’s tears of gratitude because he’s got his greedy paws on the spoils of office) and that’s considered okay and normal.  Hilary Clinton gets teary during the Presidential campaign and she’s a wet/manipulative/cynical/typical female.  Australia’s Prime Minister Julia Gillard chokes up over the human losses in the recent Queensland floods and analysis focuses on whether she’s real/cynical/manipulative (common for all women in office, obviously).  And because she hasn’t had children, Ms. Gillard gets assailed for being unfeminine, barren, unable to understand the needs of “real families.”  And don’t get me started on the public, venal chatter about the dress sense of women leaders and politicians.  Appalling stuff.

I Am A Women’s Libber

So that’s why I remain a Women’s Libber.  I refuse to get co-opted into that nice, safe word “feminism” because I don’t want to be seen as nice or safe.  And if you’re wondering:  along the way, the secretarial job got dumped. I’ve been a union organizer, a political activist, a peace activist, an environmental activist, and now I’m a writer, artist, Tarot reader, teacher, aspiring astrologer, Reiki Master and continue being a social rights activist.  And when I married my partner of 27 years back in 2004, I acquired an instant family:  stepdaughter, stepgranddaughters, step-greatgrandkids – who love me as much as I love and adore them, without all the hard hakka in between, LOL!

I sincerely hope young women also choose to be passionate, step outside the Good Girl cage and punch the air as they enjoy the freedom to be whoever they are, to do whatever they choose, to listen to their heart and souls, and to stay true to themselves in all their glory.

I would recommend three books to support women’s getting to know themselves:

Women Who Run with the Wolves

Goddesses in Everywoman: Powerful Archetypes in Women’s Lives

Goddesses in Older Women: Archetypes in Women over Fifty

Check out Mo’s blog, Wild Woman Crazy Crone here.

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The Way We Were: Women’s Liberation Part I

Posted on 03/04/2011 by Tammy Vitale

The author, Mo Davis, in the 60s

“Don’t be too polite, girls, don’t be too polite,
Show a little fight girls, show a little fight,
Don’t be fearful of offending, in case you get the sack
Just recognize your value and we won’t look back.

All among the bull, girls, all among the bull,
Keep your hearts full, girls, keep your hearts full
What good is a man as doormat, or following at heel?
It’s not their balls we’re after, it’s a fair square deal.”

This is a fighting song from the history of working women in Australia.  I use the term “fighting” deliberately, because we women have never been handed our gains on our plate.  We’ve had to organize, fight and stand together as sisters to achieve anything.  I don’t ever want young women to forget that because, as a young woman myself, I stood on the shoulders of the mothers, sisters, grandmothers and great-grandmothers before me who took action, in big and small ways, to advance women’s interests. including the right to vote.  And I honour and remember them with pride!

Women’s Liberation

But here’s something which occurs to me whenever I see that word “feminism.”  How did the bright, sparkling rocket take-off to Women’s Liberation in the ‘Sixties somehow morph back to earth as a damp squib?  Heck – where’s the passion in this sanitized version of Women’s Liberation?  It’s unchallenging, safe, respectable, accepted by the system because it’s non-threatening.  And looking back, I somehow see the vitality of the ‘Sixties and ‘Seventies and our history gradually being airbrushed out of existence – gentrified.

So I want to recall the history of Women’s Liberation and release it from being nice-ified.  Because trust me, Women’s Liberation was threatening.  We rocked the boat because women:

  • were denied equal pay
  • were clustered in low paying work
  • were paid less for the same work done by men
  • weren’t allowed to open their own bank accounts without permission from their husband, boyfriend or father.
  • couldn’t get a mortgage as a single woman
  • were victimized if they were raped or labeled as the “temptress,” “seductress,” because rape wasn’t recognized as an act of violence
  • had to leave the public service when they married
  • had to leave the workforce when they had children
  • had to leave the workforce when menfolk cam back from war and wanted the jobs
  • were invisible in history, the media and film.  Apart from a few odd exceptions like Katherine Hapburn, women were pretty much bitches (Betty Davis) or goddesses up on a pedestal (June Allyson)
  • were sex objects
  • were forced to resort to illegal abortions because of unwanted pregnancies, often dying dreadful deaths from scepticaemia
  • were vilified if they chose to have an abortion despite the vast majority of women agonizing over such a choice
  • were denied free, safe contraception and planned parenthood
  • had enormous difficulties accessing advanced education, and
  • were going off their rocker in the suburbs with frustration and boredom.

I’m still a good old women’ libber.  I don’t bother with “women’s liberationist” as it’s so long and I like to get from A to B as fast as possible.  but I won’t accept the niceness of feminism.  I refuse to allow my passion for women’s equality to be co-opted into such a wimpy phrase!

How I Became a Women’s Libber

Mo Davis looking like the modern day goddess she is!

When I graduated from University in the UK with Upper Second joint Honours in German and French interpreting, translating, economics and politics, I was advised by the career counselor to look for secretarial work, as were my women friends, most of whom had similar qualifications.  Many of the young men in our year had been offered employment in a wide variety of good, high-paying jobs.  I accepted this because I was young and a giddy dolly bird in those days who lacked self-confidence.

Then I landed in Australia in 1972 and I morphed from Good Girl to Women’s Libber within the space of two years.  What got me started?  Being called “a girl” at work; being turned down for a job because I was a woman; being sent to join the women at a party because men talked about real stuff in one half of the room while women stayed in the other half to run the buffet (I went and joined the men’s conversation); having to get my partner’s permission when I wanted to get my tubes tied once I’d decided I didn’t want children and didn’t want to stay on the pill for the rest of my life; making a comment in a meeting which was ignored only to hear the same comment being repeated shortly afterwards by a man and given enthusiastic approval.  Once you start noticing one facet of sexism, you become aware of other manifestations.

Serendipity-wise I came into contact with gen-u-wine Women’s Liberation activists and I was off and running with the WL movement.  We were not the hairy-legged, bra-burning, men-hating, humourless ball-breakers depicted in the media.  Yes, we were a varied lot, just as any movement is.  But we wanted to improve women’s lives in society and address the very fundamental question of what it means to honour women’s qualities as terrific in themselves, not to compete to become sort of honorary men.  Yes, women ARE different than men, but we need to celebrate those difference and honour them, not put down the qualities of either sex.  Women’s strengths are often expressed through consensus, emotions, intuition and co-operation. 

(to be continued)

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The “Good Ole Days”: And Why We Won’t Go Back!

Posted on 02/24/2011 by Tammy Vitale

The author, Anne Rutherford, back in "the good ole days"[Rather than just my stories on this blog, I am inviting guest writers to speak of their memories of the 60s.  I'm starting to believe it is we Boomer women who lived through the sixties who need to be telling the stories about women's rights and the ones we didn't have to the younger generations who don't remember and can't imagine.    Readers are invited to tell their stories.  The only requirement is at least one picture.  More is better! tv]

Guest Blog by Anne Rutherford

            It’s time to tell my story because I don’t want my granddaughters lives harmed by the political lunacy that confronts my nation.  Never mind the discussion about abortion – I am more concerned about the active push to eliminate a woman’s access to birth control.  That single issue shapes a woman’s destiny most of all.  If your access to family planning is non-existent, your options for your life become severely limited, if not non-existent.

            Let me say right here that I support a woman’s right to chose to be religious, to have a family and be a stay at home mother.  Parenting is the most challenging and rewarding job I’ve ever had. 

            All that being said, I am viscerally concerned about the movement within this country to deny that a woman’s equality is guaranteed under the constitution.  Justice Scalia believes that it isn’t illegal to discriminate against women based on gender under the Constitution and that if states find that egregious, they should pass laws to make their position clear.  In September Justice Scalia spoke with UC Hastings law professor Calvin Massey in an that interview appeared in the California Lawyer in January 2011.  Justice Scalia said; “Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn’t. Nobody ever thought that that’s what it meant. Nobody ever voted for that,” said the famously conservative justice, adding, “If the current society wants to outlaw discrimination by sex, hey we have things called legislatures, and they enact things called laws.”

            I remember well when women had to take pregnancy tests and physicals as a requirement to be hired, even for office work.  I remember when women were barred from working past their fifth month of pregnancy and there was no getting your job back after the baby was born.  I know, it doesn’t seem that this could possible happen now, but it could – depending on how the laws are interpreted and written. 

            Never again should women have to sign statements about family planning before having their income count when a married couple is trying to purchase a home.  Never again should women be denied credit simply because they are married and all the credit information is the property of the husband.  These practices didn’t take place in the 1800’s or earlier – this was in the 1970’s and our country thought of itself as progressive at that time. 

            Women should never be told that they can’t be hired for a position because of their gender after they have been performing that job on a temporary basis.  That happened to a friend of mine who worked in manufacturing.  The man who held the job became ill, and she filled in for him on a temporary basis.  He subsequently couldn’t return to work, and when she applied, she was told that she couldn’t be hired because she was a woman. 

            In an age when pharmacists and physicians can decide whether or not to fill a prescription for birth control or “plan B” medication and may elect not to give you the prescription back, we have something to worry about.  At risk is our fundamental right to determine our family size, to make decisions relating to our health and to protect ourselves from harm. 

            After my son’s birth, I had health issues.  I had two children and I wanted to have a tubal ligation to prevent any additional pregnancies.  I was a military wife who already had two children and was married to someone who turned out not to like parenthood much.  Finally it was decided that the health risks were significant enough, that my uterus should be removed.  That didn’t require my husband’s signature and approval, but have a tubal ligation would have required his approval for my surgery (1975).  In today’s climate, they would have refused the surgery because I was “too young” to have that done.  I was 28 when the surgery took place.  I say this to illustrate that while times seems to have changed, perhaps they haven’t changed that much.  Too young – to know my own mind, to make a decision about my own health?  The reason most often given, (as in the case of my foster daughter), is “What if you change your mind, or something happens to one of your children?”  I take specific umbrage to the second part of the question.  Children aren’t widgets that can be replaced by another one.  As for what if you change your mind, your husband dies and you remarry?  There are adult men who are willing to be a step-parent without being a biological parent.  To suggest otherwise is to say that we really haven’t crawled out of the cave very much. 

            I don’t want to see maternity homes come back into vogue – I know too many women who carry life-long shame from having had a child and surrendered it.  No, you will never forget the experience and it will haunt you according to some women I know. 

            I just don’t want my granddaughters to have to overcome excessive obstacles just because they happen to be girls. 

***

When I was in my early 20s and trying to buy a house in Florida, I was required to write a letter and swear that I wouldn’t get pregnant for at least 6 years in order for us to get a mortgage.  Did I lie to get the house?  Yes.

When I was 32 and in a battering marriage, after the birth of my 2nd child I wanted a tubal ligation.  Like Anne, I endured questions along the line of:  what happens if something happens to your children?  I was aghast!  Did he think having more would replace ones lost?  And said so.  He wouldn’t do it – against his religion.  Had to find another doctor who would, and THEN had to get husband’s consent.  And here I thought I was being personally responsible about deciding the number of children I wanted to bring into the world!

Wylde Women’s Wisdom

When one woman puts her experiences into words, another woman who has kept silent, afraid of what others will think, can find validation.  And when the second woman says aloud, “yes, that was my experience too,” the first woman loses some of her fear.  Carol Christ

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Rivers, Rain and Waterbeds

Posted on 02/10/2011 by Tammy Vitale

(WyldeWoman) Crone: 6", ceramic and sheeps wool by Tammy Vitale $47

 

I had a dream this morning.  I can only remember snippets of it but it was rather unusual so I made an effort to hang on to pieces I could remember as I awoke.

Part one I was in a boat on a River confidently moving toward a destination (I distinctly remember “Annapolis”).  At first I was in a river with wilderness on both sides then suddenly there was a city on one side and I became disoriented because it wasn’t what I had anticipated and I didn’t remember ever having seen it before.  I leaned over and the boat began to take on water and go under.  I remember grabbing my purse, and calling to a woman (who had a child with her) on the nearby shore for help.  I rarely if ever call for help in my dreams.  She came over and helped me ashore and I told her I was on my way to Annapolis and had gotten lost and she smiled as if speaking to a child and gently said, “This is Annapolis.”  Should I mention that the boat I was in looked much like a a Corning Ware Blue Cornflower 9 x 12 baking pan I got for my first marriage at 19 (1967)?

Then I am in a rented room with my husband, or perhaps a rented apartment, and it is raining (I guess) because the roof is leaking and a cascade of clear water is coming in at the seams.  I point it out to my husband who says:  “That’s just the way it is.”   I accepted that and the dream went on but I don’t remember much of it.

I’ve almost completely lost the waterbed part – I only know it at all because I put this title together as I was waking up to hold onto the dream.  Hubby and I used to have a waterbed but haven’t for years now.  I was on the waterbed and spilled coffee in the covers.  That’s all I can remember.

To see a waterbed in our dream, suggests that you are slowly acknowledging aspects of your unconscious. You are recognizing certain unexpressed energy, particularly issues dealing with sexuality, fear, aggression, etc.

Well, I’ve been afraid for over a year to update my WordPress site by myself because I was afraid I would lose it.  But I did it anyways today and it took all of about 5 seconds. 

I did a bit of on-line research to see if I could come up with meanings – not much out there.  But I ran across an article that said (not in a dream context):  “uncharted waters” and that resonated.  I’ve been in the flow (the river), now am moving into new territory but only on the surface of my emotions.  The leaky roof is the unconscious breaking through as well as some concern about material welfare. 

I may just have to do a dialogue (interpretation) with the pieces that I remember – the first two scenes are the strongest because I actually remembered the dialogue.

Why remember dreams?

Have any dreams you’d like to share?

Wylde Women’s Wisdom

From Whence Dreams Come
     by Tammy Vitale

First a dark man on the broad back
of a blue bear surrounded
with lightening that writes a name
across its bold thigh.
Then, a woman with red hair
that turns into a lizard tangled
in the horns of a green dragon
who glows.  In the sky, a
butterfly, a spider’s web and
a parrot with purple eyes.
I pull them from my pocket
throw them into the night’s air
where they fall like small stars
into a black lake.  I take
some, place them
on the smoky altar
in a broken yellow bowl to pray
beneath gray clouds that rain
white stones
covering the ground like snow.

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Tell Me a Story

Posted on 02/02/2011 by Tammy Vitale

Me and my Dad“Tell me a story, Daddy!” I’d say as I climbed into his lap.  And not just any story.  I wanted the story of me.

When I was little he would spin a delightful story about this little girl with long dark hair who was always going on adventures and was always rescued by a handsome prince when she got in trouble.

Later the story changed to one that said big girls married a doctor or lawyer and stayed home and had babies – but by then I wasn’t asking for stories anymore.

Our stories no longer meshed.  A teen of the ’60s and a feminist as soon as the word was invented, I found myself floundering for a story that felt right. 

Eventually that floundering led me, in the mid ’90s to creating an individualized master’s degree in story and social change where I tracked how the pieces of our lives that we choose to see create our story.  That holds for individuals, families, communities, states, countries, the world, and our businesses.

I could tell you of the baby who was abandoned by her mother and adopted into a house where”being blood” mattered to the extended family, of always feeling like an outcast.

Or I could tell you of the baby who went from her birth mother’s arms, to a social worker’s arms to her adoptive parents’ arms who much loved her (I didn’t know that all of that story until I was 57).

Same story, different strands.  You can see how one’s world view might be affected by which strands one chooses to follow.

Dad and me in 73Our choice of the strands of our own story which we choose to tell again and again out loud creates our own self-image and our image of the world.  Our subconscious is always happy to see only that which fits with our story.  The human species does not like discomfort.  The subconscious therefore rules out anything that creates cognitive dissonance  (i.e., uncomforatble feeling when trying to hold two contradictory ideas at one time).

Molly Gordon says, in her newsletter article, Do you every get cranky? The high-cost of pooh-poohing the success industry

When you realize you’re in a sad story, take a moment to acknowledge it. Pushing it away just gives it power. Consciously inhabit it and let yourself notice what kind of world emerges when you live there. As best you can, don’t berate yourself for what you find. Just notice.

Then ask yourself what world would emerge if you dropped your sad story. See if that world could be as legitimate as the one you’re in now. You won’t need to force a choice, just allow yourself to see the alternatives.

If you are human, you can always find a story that will make you feel disempowered which will, in turn, make you angry.  But that doesn’t help you grow into your own power.

What are you missing because you’re so focusing on what you don’t have instead of on what you do have?  What grace are you leaving on the side of the road because you are rushing so quickly to the next proof of how bad things are and how you can’t possibly succeed because [fill in the blank]?

Once upon a time there was a little girl who was raised to live in a gilded cage.  It was a lovely cage but a cage nonetheless.  One day the little girl found herself growing larger and larger.  Suddenly the lovely cage pinched and squeezed and hurt.  She noticed a thing called a door, which she realized had always been there.  She never knew what it was for and hadn’t much thought about it.  Now she thought she remembered a story about how the door opened out into something bigger called the world out there.  For a while the little girl, who was no longer little and getting bigger every day, sat and looked at the door.  What was the world out there?  To her it was unknown and therefore very scarey.  She shifted her weight, curled in on herself and ignored the pinching and pulling until the cage’s bars cut bloody swatchs in her arm.  She reconsidered the door and the world out there.  Tentatively she pushed at the door and it swung open.  She recognized that the only thing that kept her in the once comfortable cage was that she had memories of when it fit and she knew where everything was.  And she realized that the only thing keeping her where it was hurting was her fear of the unknown.  She had a choice.  What do you think she did?

What is your story? 

Wylde Women’s Wisdom

A woman must become capable of telling the story of her life in a way that literally puts the pieces together, that discloses and creates meaning, that constructs the possiblity of a real future in which she, and all women, will be free.  Bonnie Mann

The essence of our story lies not in the events of our life in and of themselves, not in the things that have happened to us, but in the inner relationship we have with these events.  Ira Progoff

In probing the experience and asking basic questions, a woman may begin to wonder whether she has ever chosen anything she has done.  Carol Christ

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