“There is a very hidden aspect to most collectives that encourages oppression of women’s wild, soulful and creative lives, and that is the encouragement within the culture for women to tell on one another and to sacrifice their sisters… to strictures that do not reflect the relatedness found in the familial values of the feminine nature. These include not only the encouraging of one woman to inform on another and therefore expose her to punishment for behaving in a feminine and integral manner, for registering appropriate horror or dissension to injustice, but also the encouraging of older women to collude in the physical, mental, and spiritual abuse of women who are younger, less powerful, or helpless, and the encouraging of young women to dismiss and neglect the needs of women who are far older than they…”
“we also learn that the wild, because of its energy and beauty, is always eyed by somebody or other, something or other, some group or other, for trophy purposes or as something to be reduced, altered, ruled on, murdered, redesigned, or controlled. The wild always needs a guardian at the gate, or it will be misused…”
“When the collective is hostile to a woman’s natural life, rather than accept the derogatory or disrespectful labels that are placed upon her, she can and must… hold on, hold out, and search for that which she belongs to– and preferably outlive, out-thrive, and out-create those who vilified her…
“The trap within the trap is thinking that everything is solved by dissolving the projection and finding consciousness in ourselves. This is sometimes true and sometimes not. Rather than this either/or paradigm — it’s either something amiss out there or something awry within us — it’s more useful to use an and/and model. This paradigm allows a whole inquiry and far more healing in all directions. This paradigm allows women to question the status quo with confidence, and to not only look at themselves but also the world that is accidentally, unconsciously, or maliciously pressuring them….”
“If you are striving to do something you value, it is so important to surround yourself with people who unequivocally support your work…”
“Creating one thing at a certain point in the river feeds those who come to the river, feeds creatures far downstream, yet others in the deep. Creativity is not a solitary movement. That is its power. Whatever is touched by it, whoever hears it, sees it, senses it, knows it, is fed. That is why beholding someone else’s creative word, image, idea, fills us up, inspires us to our own creative work. A single creative act has the potential to feed a continent. One creative act can cause a torrent to break through stone.
— Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run with the Wolves
Don’t let them control you, Ronni – out-create them.
I also found out Clarissa blogs at The Moderate Voice.
One Response
Thank you, Donna. Beautiful.