Feminine energy is forever in flux, shifting, mutating, transforming. And it begins at a very early age, as mom-in-progress Kagiso Msimango is discovering…
A lot of my time is devoted to getting people to appreciate the value of the feminine. This is so thoroughly a man’s world that even women don’t notice a lot of the anti-feminine bias.
Check your reaction to these two scenarios. A mother buys her toddler daughter toy cars and action figures. Another gets her son dolls and make-up sets. I bet you felt that Mom 1 is smart and progressive, while the actions of Mom 2 are at least weird and at most downright irresponsible.
After all, the right way to do things in this world is to do them like a man. Amazon.com has over 180 books dedicated to teaching women how to do things like a man – think, negotiate, lift, eat, date – while the market to learn how to do things like a woman is pretty small.
I am just as much a product of this society as everyone else. Thankfully, children are less tainted than adults, so my daughter is a great guide in my personal journey to embrace and appreciate femininity. She has taught me about power-dressing and change.
Thing 1 is extremely picky about what she wears. She is also incredibly stubborn. I quickly learned not to buy her clothing in her absence. If she disapproves, the clothes languish in her closet.
Once, while shopping for a theme-party costume, she bombed every outfit I brought her. Finally, I demanded to know, “What is wrong with this one?” “I don’t feel fun in it, mommy,” she replied.
The one she felt fun in, had nothing to do with the theme. She dresses to evoke a certain feeling, a feminine inclination. The practical purpose of the outfit – the more rational, masculine way – is secondary. Try it yourself. Just for a week, only wear clothes you feel good in. You’ll be amazed by the reaction. The world rewards people who enjoy themselves as they are a rare sight.
Women are significantly more changeable than men. Our constantly fluctuating hormones lead to changes in our thoughts, emotions, actions and bodies. Feminine energy is mutable by nature. We’ve been socialised to think this is bad, so we strive to be a lot more constant than we innately are.
Thing 1 has no such problem. She acts how she feels in the moment. She will attach herself to her dad’s leg with a heartfelt “I love you, daddy”, barely half an hour after she declared that she’d hate him forever.
I used to think I needed to protect him from our fluctuating moods, until I noticed he actually loved the honesty in how she shows up. I realised that women value constancy and reliability because of our changeable nature, whereas men need the variability we bring. If the feminine were constant, the masculine would have no impetus to transform.
We serve the world better when we resist this pressure to be constant.
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