Femininity (Not Just For The Ladiez)

You know God is trying to draw your attention to something when it starts popping up in random daily conversation, in the lives of your friends, in excerpts from books...
My current one: femininity. Not only is that a hard word to spell, it's also a hard word to say (fem-in-in-ity). Whenever I think consider writing about or contemplating femininity, I automatically feel like one of two things: a lesbian feminist or a textbook 'lonely girl' from He's Just Not That Into You.

Femininity is a touchy subject, especially from the mouths of women. People say masculinity is getting lost, but true femininity has been lost for just as long, if you ask me.

So obviously, just with what was mentioned above, there's a fear in even talking about the subject. What if  diving into it causes us women to become one of those two things? Most of us fear both just as equally. But we have to start talking about it. And rewiring our perspectives on it. Because something I've noticed lately, too, in my own heart, is a buried hostility towards the feminine, which I find odd.  Because mostly you hear of women harboring hostility towards the masculine, but hardly the feminine. And I don't just mean things like dresses and flowers, I mean women authors, leaders, thinkers, and the like. Example: I'm reading a book right now called Pilgrimage Of A Soul  by Phileena Heuertz. I've known about this book for probably a year. And as most of you know, I'm enamored and wooed by contemplative living, and eat up any and all books written on the subject. But for some reason, I avoided buying this book like I avoid talking on the phone (I HATE talking on the phone and will avoid it for weeks. Sorry.) I would see it pop up everywhere online, in my Amazon recommendations, Twitter, personal emails...and I would find myself irritated by everything about it, down to the stupid butterfly on the cover. I just didn't want anything to do with this book. I didn't want to even hear what this woman had to say. I labeled it sappy and void of substance, just because (and I didn't realize it at the time) it was written by a girl. But, because it wouldn't get out of my life, I figured God was trying to tell me something. So I bought it. Shock surprise, it's INCREDIBLE. Blowing my mind. This woman is brilliant.

So at this point I'm just convicted. I don't feel like Phileena's book has proven to me that I should respect and embrace the feminine (although I understand that I should). I just feel like it's humbled me. It's humbled me to respect my own gender. And not only that, but honor it. And maybe, it's causing me to look at my own inferiority complex. Because obviously if I don't respect and honor my own gender, what does that say about how I view myself? If I think women authors have books that are void of intellectual substance, what do I think of my own mind? (stupid.) If I think women leaders don't know what they're doing, how do I view my own leadership? (incapable). What I'm getting at, what the bottom line is, is that I, personally, think women are inferior. It's hard for me to admit that, but I'm not drawing any other conclusions from what I'm writing, other then that fact. Women aren't as good as men. I know that's not true. But it's obviously what my heart thinks.

This is a surprising theme for me to be learning right now, really. But, I think God is opening my eyes to this more and more because, I, as a woman, as a privileged Western woman, need to fight for my gender.  This mindset that I'm carrying, whether I like to admit it or not is contributing to sexism and gendercide around the world. Because all injustices start within the heart. Issues of the heart create ripple effects that create devastation around the world. No one just wakes up and wants to traffick someone. No one wakes up and wants to drive a country into ruin. It's all issues of the heart that grow and morph into monsters when they're left undealt with. And who knows if my negligence of valuing females could be robbing someone of their worth and perpetuating this terrible cycle that women are second to men.

It's a lot to think about.