A deconstruction of masculine and feminine energy
A note before you begin reading: What I’m about to say is my personal opinion based on 13 years as a qualified sexologist, a certified sexological bodyworker and qualified counsellor. I’m making this as deep as I can for an email but this will not and cannot be a full deconstruction - more something to stroke your mind and move with if it feels aligned and better-than-good for you.. Permission to agree with all of this, some of it or none of it. You are the authority of your mind and energy – your energy which, as you’re about to read, I don’t classify or categorise but reference as purely human. Purely you…
It’s tempting, right?
To relegate entire feelings, energetic states and ways of being down to one of two categories. A binary of masculine or feminine. This or that. In or out. All or nothing. Our brains love a binary for good reason. It makes things seem easier. That sense of “easier” can have a cost though.
Truth be told, I know that you and your beautiful brain can handle a richer understanding of these energetics that are so widely misunderstood, misappropriated and misused and that this particular take will leave you with a clear knowledge of what works for you.
As with everything I do in this privileged state I call work, the intention to write this is in the name of acknowledging, integrating and experiencing your unique power frequencies that exist beyond and irrespective of the binary.
I believe we can be more specific, precise and present than binary concepts when it comes to self-intimacy.
And in case it wasn’t clear or you’re new here – the work I do always has and always will be self-intimacy first, whether in a sexual, somatic, speaking or business context, you knowing and embodying your power is the point of everything I do and every word I speak.
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The Why
I’m a bisexual woman and sexual expert that doesn’t identify as overtly, traditionally feminine. I love my short hair and I love wearing pants. Put me in a flowy dress and I’ll feel nauseous. I’m driven to write, speak and create to the point of tired satisfaction. I’m kind and I’ll be straight to the point without the fluff. I love getting dirty, free bleeding and forgoing bras. I have daughters but don’t identify as a mother first and foremost. I think yoga and pilates is boring and repressive in its need to control your body but ask me to dance and you’ll see my aliveness and a wave of calm wash over me. I don’t get obsessions with handbags or shoes and I will never call you babe or lovely.
Does any or all of this make me more masculine or feminine?
Because I see people on social media speaking specifically to smart, high-achieving women in business about being more “in their feminine” and less “in their masculine”, especially in the contexts of work and what happens in the bedroom.
They talk about being in flow and so in their feminine power they work a maximum of 4 hours a week while they wear florals and/or a fedora all while their manifestations and millions just roll in and…
…what they don’t do is reference the structures, systems and background work that is required to adequately execute, support and hold that. And all of that is collectively viewed as “the masculine”.
Hyper-femininty isn’t any better or superior to being all up in your masculine.
This hot take on modern femininity is often coming from someone who hasn’t been in the trenches of somatic work where, as practitioners, we don’t relegate movement, somatic experiencing or nervous system states as masculine or feminine.
When we guide learning and what we term as embodiment in true somatic work, we invite people to describe what is present for them. That’s it. We use feeling, questioning, sensing, breath, movement, sound and touch to reach the point of verbally describing what can and does occur in our human body, regardless of biological sex, gender identity or sexual preferences.
The Problem
When you’re not invited to describe what’s present and instead steered to relegate your experience into one category and not another, it only works to put you more in your head.
With each movement and action, you’re called to categorise:
Is this me in my masculine?
Is this me in my feminine?
Am I doing it right?
Does any smart, high-achieving woman need to ask themselves: ‘Am I doing it right?’ any more than she already has in this lifetime (and all the previous ones)?
Asking: am I doing it right? is not what being in your power is about – considering at every moment of your expression whether you’re in this or that. Whether you’re conforming to the non-existent energetic ratio that doesn’t even exist or more importantly, work for you and your design.
It also begs the question: With each swing to the supposedly feminine, are you denying an aspect of what’s categorised as the masculine that’s vital to your life-force and inherently who you are and what you value?
The Twist
Asking: am I in my masculine or feminine? doesn’t work because here’s what many fail to reference.
If you’re invested in and resonate deeply with masculine and feminine, it’s not actually two polarities – masculine at one end and feminine at the other.
It’s four polarities. A grid.
Masculine mature / masculine immature and feminine mature / feminine immature.
Four.
If you’re aiming to be “more feminine” you need to be aware that it comes with ALL of what is considered to be feminine.
The mature feminine has the immature shadow just like the mature masculine does (which is what most women are trying to extricate themselves from when they say they want to be less masculine).
As I’ve talked about on the White Hot Business podcast episode about shadow work, your shadow isn’t all bad. It isn’t even undesirable.
In my experience:
“Your shadow is a buried truth you hold that creates a charge, giving you a much needed sensation and an experience of aliveness that keeps you going back for more. It keeps you going back for more because you haven’t yet sourced or integrated what else could give you that sensation in a more balanced, nuanced or exalted version. ”
My shadow and your shadow are fascinating, data-rich terrain and it’s only when we go there and feed on all its wisdom that we can start course-correcting our journey towards what we say we want and desire.
While most women are still trying so hard to be good and light-filled, there are those of us that know your shadow is the fastest and most efficient pathway to make your mark and leave a legacy, simply because befriending it dissolves the roadblocks to getting there.
So, even if you opt to be all or more in your “feminine”, without recognising all of it’s variations, you’re also inadvertently subscribing to the shadow expression of it.
Some examples of the feminine shadow are: passive, gossipy, martyr mode, superficial/surface level and submissive. These traits are what most people indulge in reality TV to witness.
What you can do instead
The other reason why I don’t use binary terms is – I don’t have to – which means you don’t have to either. You and I have more options than this or that.
I have the power of precision and that precision informs my next move.
If I’m passive, I’m being passive. If I become aware I’m being passive, I then get to ask: Do I want to be passive right now? Am I getting off on being passive?
If I’m intensely driven to build or create something, I’m intensely driven. I then get to ask: Am I driven from a place of lack to prove something? Or am I compelled in this drive to be in do mode because it’s an extension of my aliveness and purpose?
If I’m surrendering, I’m surrendering. If I become aware I’m in surrender, I then get to ask: Does this feel like the powerful state I know surrender to be? Am I truly surrendering or did I accidentally confuse it for submitting?
I don’t see any of these states as me being in my masculine or feminine, shadow or illuminated. I see these examples as a present expression of being in my whole humanness.
And if they are the shadow expression and I identify it, I get to course correct IF I choose to (because I may not. Again, human).
I view states like: drive, passion, holding, receptivity and generosity as reflections of my physical and energetic state at that moment.
I look over and witness my cisgendered husband in a biologically male body vacillate between the same states and I see them as reflections of his physical and energetic state at that moment. He isn’t masculine or feminine, he’s purely Ed being a human.
We always say to each other: we're a partnership. A team. Taking masculine and feminine out of it releases me from being bound and it releases him from being bound.
You don’t need to be MORE feminine…
In the context of work and leadership, more women don’t necessarily need to be more in our feminine – in some ways, conditioned expressions of femininity are what got us into deep-rooted problems in the first place.
Many of the women I work with are so in their exalted feminine – soft, flexible/malleable, giving and operating from its shadow “nice” that they need or want to fold in more of what people categorise as masculine – being boundaried, contained, structured and authoritative.
Telling an overly-generous woman to be “more in her feminine” isn’t what a lot of women in business or leadership need. At all.
Most of the clients I work with are overly-generous and are tirelessly cleaning up the fallout of being too nice AND over-compensating for what they feel as lacking by operating from their heads (seen as a “masculine” trait).
Trying to be more feminine won’t be what gets you out of your head or finally has you feeling enough.
How you can course correct where you feel an imbalance
The way I work is, I don’t label anything as masculine or feminine. It just is. It’s a feeling or a state or an expression. It’s non-gendered.
As a five placement Libra (represented by the scales), finding balance is my forte but what few don’t know about those with a lot of Libran power is we don’t just want balance and evenness – that’s no better than the polarities of this or that.
What we want and get to play with is contrast between different states and the truth that you get to embody and be BOTH.
The light and the shadow.
Life and death.
Justice and injustice.
The excited sympathetic and the surrendered parasympathetic.
The highs and the lows…
…and the truth that it’s in embracing and alchemising the seemingly oppositional states that we get to drop into the frequency that we’re all looking for which is:
The powerful frequency of aliveness.
You don’t have to choose.
BOTH and ALL is where your freedom and liberation are.
I’m not going to tell you to be more feminine.
You are so powerful and your nervous system so supple that you can learn to switch between different states and feel two supposedly oppositional states at once.
When I work with a woman who is running a business and leading a movement, I don’t categorise her feelings and states into binaries or even the four polarities.
What I am doing is reading her body, listening to her story, observing the contextual factors, and looking for congruence. Congruence shows me where her desire and aliveness is or isn’t.
Congruence is one of my favourite concepts for my body, bedroom, voice and business.
Some say authenticity or alignment but those words for me have been spun so hard by IG influencers who are anything but the embodiment of authenticity or alignment that I find them disingenuous.
It’s being congruent that counts in this lifetime. Thinking the thing, feeling the thing and expressing the thing in line with the thinking and the feeling.
If you say integrity is one of your values, congruence is the bridge to being in your integrity.
And to the best of my knowledge, congruence and integrity aren’t gendered.
Permission
In life and business and your bedroom, there’s nothing that you HAVE to be. There’s not even anything you HAVE to do.
The line of self-enquiry that will take you back your power each and every time is: I’m in this state right now, is it congruent for me to express it in this way?
Will this state move the needle for the legacy I’m here to leave?
Do I want to be in this state right now?
If I don’t, do I have the power to change or alchemise it?
Whatever the state, I guarantee it isn’t definitively masculine or feminine, just human. Just you.
You have the power to be both and all and you don’t have to choose.
You can be fierce and soft and graceful and powerful and exacting and authoritative and nurturing and generous and penetrative and and…
In fact, I recommend you dance between all those states and more. The full spectrum.
It’s there that you’re going to finally experience the power that felt elusive to you - the power that couldn’t be felt due to the denial of your humanness – your sexuality, sensuality, your magnetism, your anger, your sovereignty, your shadow, your fear, your drive, your pain, your desire, your hunger. All of it.
Where to now?
Play, explore and experiment with de-categorising your feelings and sensations. Stop chasing balance and instead look for how you can create contrast in your life. Contrast makes life infinitely more interesting and it’s a key to taking the pressure off perfectionism.
The next time you feel something uncomfortable, name it, express it congruently and resist the urge to label it as good or bad, masculine or feminine or that you’re too much of something and not enough of the other. Call it what it is and feel the power of that action alone.
Finally, you are a beautiful blend of it all and you get to have your version of it all when you stop being so self-critical and instead make infinitely more space for your humanness and all its variations.
No conforming. No settling. No repressing.
Just you in your power.
Lauren xo