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A Woman's Experience of Seeking Womanhood

As a child I was aware of sex differences, though without knowing what they might imply. I was happiest playing with boys, and though I had ‘close’ girl friends, they were not easy or satisfying friendships in the same way. Piggy-in-the-middle between two other girls, sometimes ‘best friend’ of one or the other, and sometimes ignored, depending on how their relationship was going, Sadly from the view of an eight year old it appeared to me that females – my peers at least - could be devious, spiteful, physically cruel and jealous.

As I grew into my teens it also seemed to me that most other girls were shallow, so real friendship with women was undesirable as well as impossible, and I didn’t change that view for over ten years. Besides, in my teen years my easy friendships with boys had developed into a keen interest in the attraction between the sexes – boys were much more interesting!

My mother reinforced this view, a strong, sexy, beautiful and highly intelligent woman, deeply in love with my father and loving her children, yet with a firm feminist outlook. Although she had plenty of female friends, she seemed to be most herself when with men, most alive, most joyful – she became all of one piece, glowing, self-contained yet dancing in relationship. She taught me that flirtation – the real thing, conducted with honour, the recognition and celebration of the energy between man and woman – was a source of life and satisfaction.

Men might have clubs where they herded together to give each other power – but real women somehow stood alone, their power elicited and manifest in the effect they had on men.

On entering my twenties I felt that to be a woman was to be alone, certainly in relation to other women, to be self-sufficient and free – yet somehow always facing towards, seeking, the masculine. Seeking validation, courting adoration, wanting secretly to be supported and cared for whilst overtly independent, ‘no lover’s fool’, and above all seeing my own power reflected in men’s eyes, as that’s where it seemed to lie.

I knew enough of the world’s sacred traditions to understand that there is a deep and sacred union and synergy between the masculine and feminine, but had no experience of it. So I used sex and a compromise of my true power to gain an illusion of that power. It felt very fragile, and in it I felt weak and always vulnerable. I did not feel like ‘a woman’ – sometimes a goddess, sometimes a slut, sometimes just a shy girl – and I knew that ‘womanhood’ was not what I had. And there weren’t any men out there, seemingly, man enough, to see me as Woman.

Woman's power scared me. I had my first ‘Kali experience’ at eighteen, unheralded, a rush of energy and power in which I knew I embodied the feminine principle, the divine destroyer and bringer of life. No wonder men were scared of women – I was scared of myself in that guise and terrified of the sheer unstoppability of it. What I willed, would happen, I could kill or bless with a thought. The experience lasted a few minutes, but I could not doubt it. Consciously I turned my back on it, owning it as part of my heritage if I wished to accept it, and yet unready to work with such power in myself.

I was not shown womanhood, and nor were those girls I couldn’t get on with. We had to discover and claim it for ourselves. Some took feminism literally and claimed economic independence and freedom from housewifery. Some denied men completely, while others seemed to turn into copies of so-called men. Some looked further.

My own path? I was sick of pandering to grown-up boys for a glimpse of ‘power’. So I had to turn my head away from the masculine at first, own that whatever fleeting comfort or security I got there were counterfeit. Not that I eschewed masculine company, or lovers, or love, just that I had to teach myself not to look there for power any more.

I worked, oh how I worked, on self-esteem, my giftedness and ability to love, a true spirituality, an understanding of opposites, of paradox, of society, compassion. I listened to men in their struggle. I listened – at last - to women in theirs.

I found my sisters – or rather, they found me, offering and asking friendship. I learned to love women, to confide and trust, to weep and laugh, howl and sing, learn and teach, and above all give and receive in woundedness and strength.

I searched for men who could see Woman in glory and freedom, and found them. I owned my need of Man in his magnificence and strength, for he complements me. In the glorious dance of wholeness and surrender. I found the true expression of Womanhood. I may be Kali – I am also Shakti. Exquisite mystery!

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