On Unintentional Misogynistic Language

Blessings, Courageous Ones!

It is International Women’s Day, and I wanted to share some thoughts about the language we hear, and some of us use, every day.

I have noticed a disturbing trend in the greater zeitgeist—unintentional misogynistic languaging.  I am currently noticing this in many places, and the most disturbing part is that I am hearing this from men who have shown me to be--and for many years have forcefully spoken of themselves as being—women-loving and women-respecting people.  These are men married to and/or partnered with women, who are raising children who were born girls, who speak of the women and girls in their lives with respect, love, and awe.

Recently, I pointed out an example of this language to a man I consider(ed) to be a very good man, and a friend—a teacher, a self-proclaimed lover of women, and a fantastic father to a young girl.  This was on a sports blog; and yes, I am very aware that these blogs are generally classified as places of great misogyny.  Yet, I have known this place to be different. Many of us know each other well and spend a great amount of time with one another “in real life,” cooking for one another, knowing one another’s families, inviting each other into our homes and into our personal lives.  This is a place where the participants are union workers, pro-bono lawyers, public radio producers, writers, teachers of all disciplines, nurses, doctors, people dedicated to all healing professions, sons and daughters raised in all sorts of “non-traditional” families, people who cover the full-spectrum of gender and expression, in all realms, we who I had thought intentionally engage with one another from a place of love and respect….we who often are seen as representing, or even are considered as “under privileged,” people in society.  We are a small community of all ages, all genders, all ethnicities, all spiritual practices, all backgrounds.  And I love us.  We are family.  I share this small snapshot of “who we are” because I had not expected this issue to arise in this place; I had always unconsciously thought of us as a “safe space,” a community devoted to equality and supportive expression.  This is why this feels so big to me.

So I was shocked I read a misogynistic comment here; it was a cringe-inducing, needle-scratching-the-record moment. 

I truly begin to feel and to really know, consciously, how insidious the patriarchy is in our language with one another.  When we use words like “pussy,” “pansy,” “girl,” “bitch,” etc. to disparage one another—and I am talking about people who love and respect one another, not adversaries of any kind—and it is somehow okay and unquestioned, I see how deeply the dominant culture pervades our relationships with one another in sneaky and divisive ways.  We unconsciously perpetuate those very things that we would never stand for if we were really aware of them.

When I shared that the use of the word “pussy” to describe a person who was wimpy or not tough was disrespectful to women I wanted to shed light on how painful the use of these words (especially in the unconscious, unnamed realm) are to me, to my Sisters, to all women and girls. I thought I would hear back, “Oh, wow, thanks for bringing this to me,”  “I hear what you are saying,”  “Yeah, wow, that’s really messed up.”  Instead I heard, “I was just being funny.  Can’t you take a joke?” 

This kind of languaging is not a joke. It might be funny to you when you are the joke-maker, because you sit in the place where, consciously or not, it is okay to place women as “less than.”  It sets woman apart and aside as the continual “joke” of society.  If we would all admit that this is exceptionally hurtful to women, therefore, to all of us…if we would acknowledge that it continues to place women as “less than” men and recognize that it continues to set “man” as the ideal…if we would own that it perpetuates separation, hatred, violence, murder, war, and ownership...  This is a place where true intersection and understanding could occur.

I’m tired of taking the joke, and you should be too, because the underlying, unexamined, societal “joke” is always on women.  Yet, all of us are born from women.   How is it “funny” to say hurtful and violent things about women?  “Oh, well I didn’t mean you…you are not like other women; I wasn’t talking about you.”  I hear this all the time.  I may not “be like other women” but I am a woman.  Saying hurtful things about any women is saying hurtful things about all women.  We are all One.

I invite you to truly think about what it feels like for the women and girls in your life to be constantly barraged by words used in this way—and we hear them practically every single day in every realm we walk within—how does it unintentionally shape our lives, all of our lives?  When you wonder why the women you care about are always carrying around emotional baggage, secretly thinking there is something deeply wrong with us, even when we have done and are doing our Shadow work: think about what it means for us to grow up in a culture where the sacred parts of our bodies, and who we are as people, are constantly referenced in derogatory ways, covertly being constantly told that we are “less than.”  How do we learn to see ourselves and our bodies as whole and holy in this culture? This is the essence of the healing work we do together in circles of women. 

The person I originally spoke my truth to asked, “God, I hope you’re joking…how about we let this go, okay?”   Well, I am not ready to “let this go.”  I cannot laugh or let these “jokes” continue to slide by.  When any woman is disparaged, we are all disparaged.  We are all One—all genders, all beings, are One.  Let’s get this together.  Let’s all think about the words we use—and goodness, I know there are words and expressions that need to be eradicated from my vocabulary as well!  We are all perfectly imperfect, striving to re-member our Divinity.

Maybe we can make “jokes” about anything and everything when we are all equal.  Probably not, because we will not need or want to!  Let’s now choose to bring great mindfulness and intention to the words we use.  Do they really do our thoughts and feelings justice?  Is it really what we mean to say?  Do the words bring forth collaboration and cooperation?  Do they show respect for all beings? 

And yes—let us always make jokes!  I love to laugh, and I spend as many hours possible every day doing so.  Let’s laugh without hurting others. Let’s laugh in integrity.  Let’s laugh as the Divine Beings I know us all to be.

Blessings,

Lady Jesamyn Angelica

HP, Sisterhood of the Moon

Sitting in the Center

Blessings, Courageous Ones,

Tricky, tricky lessons!  I have been in the dark depths of heaviness and beauty, and I begin to make my spiral back into the light.  It has not been easy.  At times, when I am so, so honest with my sweet Self, I admit that it has felt thisclose to unbearably difficult.  So many of those layers I thought I had peeled back, examined, and dealt with in the past have shown themselves yet again, and have offered up layers and layers…and layers more.  Blessed be perseverance!

I am beyond amazed at what I am, and what we all are, capable of when we have an abiding commitment to engaging in this deep Shadow work.

What is flowing forth for me now is a personal, deep, unshakeable Truth—my Truth that I don’t always need to choose.  I don’t always need to take a “side.” I know what I know, and each of us knows what we know.  This is not static. We are all ever-changing, ever transforming, for that is life.  It is not necessary for me to explain what is true for me at this moment for it may not even be true for me when I take my next breath.

I am who I am, and I honor who I am in this. exact. moment.  I honor you in this exact moment, too.  Our lessons may not be the same.  Our truths may not be the same.  Yet I know that we are each a unique, living, authentic expression of Divinity and I honor that in you as I do in me.  It is an act of trust, and an act of devotion.  I release, I let go, I surrender to the flow.

More and more I realize that my job in this lifetime—the intentional contract I chose and made before rebirth—is to sit at the Center of the Wheel.  What does this mean?  My job is to sit within the Center of the Wheel, in that place of non-judgment, realizing that my Truths are my Truths, and your Truths are your Truths.  This is not an easy or restful place to be.

Know that when I speak of Truths, I am speaking of the Big Truths.  What I am talking about are all of those things open, connective, loving, and kind; never divisive, hateful, hurtful, or discriminatory—for those are not Truths.  Truths are eternal, honorable, and filled with integrity.  There is a line somewhere here, and though I cannot yet fully articulate exactly how to draw it, I certainly know what it feels like and I know you do, too.  These are the Truths that help us to sleep restfully and awake invigorated.

As a human being, it can be painful and uncomfortable when I know that others may not be in agreement with my Truth, may not share in my Truth, may not even honor my Truth for being My Personal Truth.  That others may wish my Truth to be theirs, and that their Truth to be mine.  That this causes pain and separation between us because we forget that our own personal life-missions are not the same as those we deeply respect or care about.

It can often be easier to choose a “side” and to feel supported and part of something bigger than ourselves by sharing in what seems to be a Truth with others.  I am not speaking of our sharing actual Truth, and the active finding of places of harmonious intersection of our own personal Truths with those of others, which can be a truly honorable and right place.  Often, this is what changes the world!

Yet, I am finding that it is possible and right for me to sometimes hold a Truth that no one else believes in, and still maintain honorable and deep relations with others.  Loving, sweet, honorable, authentic, TRUTHful relationships. 

The Center of the Wheel honors all honorable Truths.  All. 

The Center of the Wheel is the place that, in this moment, I am choosing to mindfully sit inside of—the place of non-judgment; where there is no good or evil, no right or wrong, no yin or yang, no black or white, no male or female, no this or that, no either or, no yes or no—there are no “sides” to take here. Polarity is what divides us, and here I choose not to participate in anything but the spectrum of All.

I sit in the Center, the Luminous Void, and see ALL.  All that was, all that is, all that will be.  The place of connection, the place where we all intersect, all love.  The place of shared goals and beliefs and thoughts and actions.  The place of unbridled potential.   The place where we come together and intentionally choose what our present , our future, looks like.  A mindful place, where there are no bandwagons to ride upon, no assuming what others think or mean or feel, a place where I know the only heart and mind I can truly know is my own.  Owning my own beautiful and sweet naiveté, I maintain that this is my place of trust and joy and hope.

Will you join me here, at the Center?

Blessings,

Lady Jesamyn Angelica

HP, Sisterhood of the Moon

Nobody is Coming to Save Us

Blessings, Courageous Ones!

Can you feel the transformation in the air?  Here, the air is fairly crackling with the energies of change and growth.

Along with my Dark Moon students and Sisters, I am still deep within the exploration of my Shadow-Self.  The unexpectedly chilly Bay Area weather has assisted me in going into that dark place, that inner realm, the place of the Hermit.  Here inside, is it warm, sometimes hot!  This is tricky, difficult work and I sometimes feel the need to surface, thanking those parts of myself that no longer fit, gently allowing the release and surrender that is needed.

At our last class, I shared the idea that nobody is coming to save us.  What does this mean?  So many of us who are now women were unconsciously raised to believe (in the heterosexual myth) that if we waited, our prince—or someone, or something--was going to come and rescue us.  That knight in shining armor would arrive on a white steed to bear us away from our wretched lives and give us everything we ever wanted or needed.  And we would live happily ever after.  Whether or not we are aware of it, this Princess Complex haunts us.

Even more prevalent than I remember it being as a child, this Princess Complex is nurtured.  Gowns, crowns, scepters, wands, princess parties, it goes on and on.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with our girls playing dress-up and creating fantasy worlds—this type of free, unstructured, unscripted play should certainly be encouraged.  But when a girl believes in the fairy tale that someday “he” will come to whisk her away and make everything okay, then we are raising girls that will stay girls.  We unwittingly raise generations of women who will remain children.  We unintentionally create women without the ability or knowledge of how to rely on themselves.  Here are women who will look outside of themselves for the answers, a prince, a father-figure, a savior…anyone and anything but looking within to themselves. Women without the knowledge that, “if that which you seek you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.”  Many of us secretly think that if we wait long enough, someone or something will show up to save us.

Accepting that no one is coming to save me places responsibility upon me take responsibility for my own self.  No one can walk my path for me!  Yes, there are those who may walk next to me for a time, those who may sometimes hold my hand, and those who have previously walked where I am now walking, but I am truly the only one who can travel this road.  I am the only one who can do my Shadow work.  I am the only one who can change my perceptions, thoughts, feelings.  I am the only one who can take responsibility for my happiness and my life.

This year feels big to me.  I have set new intentions and have committed to following my dreams in an even bigger way than I ever have before.  I search for what is my truth now, in the present moment, and discard those things that may once have been truth for me, but no longer serve.  This is a time for courage, and allowing bravery to overcome fear.

As Debbie Ford asks in her book, The Secret of the Shadow:  “If there was no hope of a miracle happening, what changes would you make in your life today?”  I spend a lot of time contemplating this.  What changes would I make?  What changes am I making?  In which parts of my life am waiting around for someone to step in to save me? What changes would you make, Courageous One? 

Blessed be,

Lady Jesamyn Angelica

HP, Sisterhood of the Moon