Stage 1: Observe
I can’t pinpoint when I started to experience and resonate with Feminine Power. However I can remember observing it in my grandmother as a young girl.
My grandmother has a 10th grade education and never held a formal job title. I used to think she was stern and uncompromising, with little tolerance for nonsense. I was too young to recognize the various forms of furious love.
She exhibited this love by feeding the bellies of hungry strangers and giving away her possessions. She maintained strict order at the house because she wanted to create a clean and safe environment for her family to live in.
I didn’t know what Feminine Power was as a young girl. But I did see it in my grandmother. She taught me that education, academia and a six-figure job did not exemplify power. True and beautiful power comes from the kind of love that aims to protect, nurture and bless everyone.
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Stage 2: Awaken
I became more aware of Feminine Power when I started calling God “Mother” and using feminine pronouns.
I thought using “she” or “her” for God was a non-issue. But it took me a while to realize that calling the divine “Mother” or “Sister” is an act of resistance.
At the Rise Up, Sister retreat, I was surprised to find a community of women who were also in their process of awakening to this new language. We sang “God’s Got The Whole World In Her Hands” together and it felt like liberation.
In this collective awakening, we were restoring our broken ideas of God, the broken identities we held in our bodies, and the broken structures we had submitted to. We were reclaiming the feminine strength we were taught to ignore and refusing to let that strength slumber again.
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Stage 3: Participate
In 2017, I joined 170,000 others in the Womxn’s March in Seattle. We were mourning the U.S. presidential election results that came out a few months prior.
Enough was enough. Our anger and anguish had to be channeled, and our voices could no longer be silenced. So we took to the streets with posters, pussy hats and a burning conviction. We sang, laughed, grieved, chanted and dreamed together.
In a season where I thought all hope was lost, a spark was lit. A vision was planted. A path was forged.
The collective Feminine Power I felt marching that day fueled my work and passion during a dark season, and continues to sustain me today. It was then I learned that I have a responsibility to create a better way forward for the next generation. It was then that I learned that I cannot do it alone.
Feminine Power can heal, restore and energize. It reminds us that this is not solo work. This is work we do in community.
Together.
Ubuntu, always.
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Stage 4: Share
Feminine Power is the posture of a woman who knows her worth and is committed to never shrink herself.
Feminine Power is the collective song of a community that is committed to educate and feed every single kid in the neighborhood .
It is the mercy the clergy experience when they bless the sacraments, and the redemption congregants taste when they partake in communion.
It is the strength Wet’suwet’en land defenders tap into, the solidarity women find when they march together, and the vibration Generation Z climate activists feel in their bones.
Feminine Power is soft, but also firm. It is kind and protective. It nurtures and it releases.
It is circular. It amplifies when it is shared.
I see it in all the women in my life.
I see it in my mother who insists on always stopping to smell the roses and to show gratitude to the natural world.
I see in in my aunt who, despite her health issues, insists on creating breathtaking paintings and crafts.
I see it in my friend Madeline* who found the courage to leave her abusive partner and is fighting to gain custody of her children.
I see it in my friend Velynn who is committed to the work of faith & equity, and in my friend Rebecca who is committed to the work of disrupting white dominance.
I see it in the young student activists who are learning to roar and use their voice in the college campus that I work at. I see in the Dangerous Women community. And I see it here, at SheLoves Magazine, in every bold and courageous story we publish.
I see it in you, beloved.
May you continue to observe Feminine Power everywhere around you. May it awaken in you. May you learn to play with it and use it to create a beautiful world for the next generation. May you share it with your neighbor and experience the fullness of its power. May it grow you, sustain you, and propel you always.
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*Name changed to protect the privacy of the individual.
Feminine Power breeds when it is shared. We would love for you to share with us where in your life you see Feminine Power! Share your thoughts in the comment section below or on Facebook / Twitter / Instagram.
Leah is a storyteller + writer + journalist + creative + empathizing romantic + pessimistic realist + millennial + immigrant + ISFP + Enneagram type 2 + she/her + much more. She grew up in India and relocated to the U.S. in her teens.
Leah used to be a community newspaper journalist who covered local government, schools, crime and business news (but NEVER sports). Currently she lives in Virginia and works at a university. Her life’s calling is to be a cat mom and decolonize the world around her.
