HOW PATRIARCHY & GENDER ARE CONNECTED
The truth is over the past 4000 -6000 years, this is exactly what has happened when the division of labor of society became based on the seemingly “natural” laws of the sexes, that we now define as “gender”. Eventually, gender roles were defined for each sex…and eventually our identity was based on our gender which was associated with what you did – not who you are.
For women, our gender role was based on our sexual and reproductive abilities – and therefore we were disproportionately given the enormous task of keeping the species alive on a daily basis. Because our subordination was not based on our entire personhood, but on this one slice of it, it has been harder for us to realize that as a group – all of women from each race – we are subordinated. Because we have been conditioned to believe that the transcendent – or spiritual – activities that were reserved for those that were seen as transcendent (the elite men) were of more value then the imminent – or daily – activities, we some where along the line bought into the notion that our worth is only associated with our ability to do a good job with the daily activities of life.
Or at least that is what I have bought into for myself. And I am still buying into the idea at some level that the daily activities are menial, trivial compared to the spiritual…which has my embody going in all different directions!
For the past millennia, the roles that were to support and sustain life (initially women, but this grew to eventually include slaves) gave those few elite men the TIME & ENERGY to develop ideas into thoughts. These thoughts eventually formed our modern Western Operating System as they got written into laws, education and religious dogma…therefore cementing themselves into our subconscious minds.
WHERE AM I NOW?
By me hiring help to take care of the more daily activities of life and business – tasks traditionally taken on by women because that is what we are “made” for, I would be freeing up myself to do the things women for the past 4-6 millennia have not had the pleasure of doing – to develop new ideas and thoughts from their own reality – simply because their time and energy was consumed by taking care of the daily lives …in order to provide the elite with the time to develop ideas that drove the world “forward.”
I guess my mind and body feel at odds as I look at what has come out of me just now. That as I step out from the role that I had for so long held as a “woman’s role” and therefore associated that with “being a woman”, and as I step forward into the role of creating and developing ideas into thoughts I “feel” as if I am becoming the man in exchange for my womanhood (?). It also strikes me as sad for some reason to be hiring a woman to help me with this role – but it is a woman that I trust even though at the same time I do not want her to think that is all she can be….
Intellectually I know this is not true, and that women need to be stepping into this role more and more. I know I am spending a lot of time with this and that others might say I am over thinking this, but for me this is where my truth lies. I know that this feeling inside will not let me rest until I bring her the puzzle pieces to put this together for myself – and perhaps for others. I know from reading history that other brave women have made this step as well, that I am not alone.
Yet, as part of the doing of our patriarchal systems, I know that I do feel alone as I step out…I feel I am once again stepping out into “no woman’s land”, into a pregnant void where I can hear the drums beating for me of other women that are or have struggled with this as well. Into a land where we will meet in the darkness to first hug, laugh, cry and scream in anger for the pain we have helped to create in the world. Then, we will sit down around the fire, calm our hearts and our minds as we breath deep and allow the wisdom of our wombs to bring us forward from this point.
Does any of this make any sense to you? If so, or even if it does not, will you please leave your comments so our circle can start, and the fire of light can start to warm our beings?
