How to cultivate emotional safety as a woman in the modern world.
We live in a hyper masculine culture that requires us to achieve as much as men in a short period. This, of course, leads to increased cases of anxiety in women. However, it all boils down to our cyclical nature.
In a world where you have to embody both masculine ideals and feminine ideals, things can get overwhelming. You have to gain respect by being a boss, having it all, and constantly achieving/ climbing and improving. But then socially, you find other standards and shoes that you must fill.
Escapist methods have become popular with young women, i.e.- drinking, sexual relations, gossiping, shopping, materialism, excessive consumerism etc. All these are ways for us not to feel a little bit of control.
As we get older as a generation, I predict that these methods will implode and be the very cause of further unsafety. These coping mechanisms are widespread.
To juggle everything in this world, to be everything, achieve it all, and be constantly perfect, never making any mistakes, makes living volatile for the modern-day woman.
Femininity and volatility do not mix well. In the modern world, I must be a woman, but I must uphold masculine ideals. I often wish that I was a man. I often feel as though I hate my own gender. I loathe being a woman. Its inconveniencing. I want to constanty be on the grind, but then the moon cycles come in. The motherly instincts, the hormones, the intuitive feelings. They feel like a burden, unneeded in the world. I really wish I was born a man. It would just be me, testosterone, and consistent work.
The paragraph above explains why the western world has a lot of gender ideology discourse. We lie to ourselves that femininity is a valuable thing, but deep down, we judge others by masculine ideals. Deep down, we all wish we were more masculine than feminine.
This further enunciates the emotional unsafety felt. For if I as a woman, carry certain traits and have monthly cycles, does that make me weak? As soon as that question is asked, the anxiety ensues. Here we go again: nervous system roller coaster.
How can we garner a piece of mind and break free?
According to a video on the same topic, the answer lies in our nervous system. The data from the mental, emotional, physical, and energy body can be felt. Feelings and sensations are an inner world that exist for us to move past the numbness and contact our life force energy.
When we feel the feeling, address it, journal and ask for help, we begin to feel emotionally safer.
Take care, and be well.
Keren Obara 2023.
