Woman or Girl? A Psychological Reverie
It doesn’t matter about our gender. Man, woman, gay, straight, trans, or cis, we all regress into maladaptive girlish behaviors, we all regress into the unstable psychologies of our less mature years, we all surrender power to the “other,” whoever he, she, or they is, when we feel scared or when things become uncertain and when the Unknown rises like a wave and threatens to swallow up our lives and mess up our carefully laid plans and schemes.
The subversive thought is this: is it possible that the remarkable fixation on gender is a magnificently elaborate cultural complex devised by the collective unconscious to avoid facing the reality that regardless of gender, we all participate in the painful psychological process of regression and giving our power away to whatever image or person represents for us the idea of authority? I’m inclined to say yes because the irony is that no matter what gender you identify with, you still revert to being a little girl when you get scared, you still embody and enact the psychology of a small girl when called upon to endure the psychological complexities of adulthood and the passage from child to adult, from girl to woman.
Yesterday at the gym, I realized that we seesaw between womanhood and girlhood depending on the circumstances. When we engage in activities and behaviors that empower us, when we follow the truth of our inner natures regardless of what anyone has to say about it, when we pursue the path that makes us happy and strong, when we refuse to involve ourselves in demeaning relationships or jobs, or even conversations, then we start to find our power and move into womanhood. But then someone says something to us that questions our convictions, say our dad, or our husband, or our brother, or the priest, or the older male teacher, or a TV commercial or social media post, and suddenly we are all a thither. We question the validity of our judgments, we question our convictions, and we get thrown back into the unstable psychological situation and adaptation of a previous era when receiving approval from the men in our lives (or from the domineering man-like women) was more important than being true to ourselves.
As my learned professor, Dr. Safron Rossi, indicates below, one area of consciousness is unto-itself through an inviolable and unbreakable bond, while the other is beset on all sides by the wolves of collective opinion. The key is to create this bond of inviolable selfhood within the deepest precincts of one’s soul and I feel that this bond can only be forged when there is a radical, and I mean RADICAL self-acceptance, self-love, and self-respect. And this is a slippery slope because, without enough consciousness, this kind of self-love can easily slide into narcissism and an over-inflated sense of self-importance.
That sense of solid, unshakable self-assurance and the calm unruffled peacefulness that comes with it simply cannot exist while one is dependent upon the opinions and approbation of others. It would seem that throughout human existence, there has been a phenomenon known as the hive mind which speaks and deals in groupthink. Humans are social creatures and life in this world is overwhelming, frightening, uncertain. It often feels like the right choice, therefore, to go with the herd and remain safe. But this safety is garnered at the expense of something far more precious and, in the end, far more substantial and everlasting, namely, the production of one’s authentic soul-being and the transformation of oneself from an uncertain, often vain, naïve, and churlish little girl, constantly simpering and cowering and asking for permission and approval, to a fully-fledged goddess woman, sovereign in the realm of her psychological dimensions, master of her affairs — practical, spiritual, and creative.
This kind of woman no longer asks anyone for permission or approval before she makes decisions and acts and she no longer second-guesses herself or keeps going back on her word to herself out of the twin fears of losing someone or something on one hand or finding herself on the disagreeable end of someone’s disapproval on the other. This type of woman communes deeply with her soul and is therefore in tune with the rhythms of her own life. She no longer allows outside influences to enter into her inner psychological domain and antagonize her there. She makes wise decisions from the start and is no longer in a hurry about anything, she has profound faith in herself and her abilities, which are directed toward the well-being of others as well as herself.
Dr. Rossi’s response to my question about these dynamics:
“You ask a tremendously important question about the passage from girl to woman, and in archetypal terms, this lies at the heart of my book on the Kore. As an archetypal figure, the Kore-Virgin personifies that quality of being wherein we are unto-ourselves which I believe is part of what it means to become a woman, what I call korehood. The Kore moves through us when we recognize that my inner voice, knowing, feeling, truth is more valid than your (the collective) opinion. I think that is fundamental to the passage from girl to woman.
Persephone is one of the main mythic figures by which I explore this archetype, though there are other figures. I also discuss the differences between the archetypal Daughter and Kore, for though they are so often uncritically discussed as synonymous, they are not. The Daughter draws her sense of self from her parents, those forces that created and shape her, which I would align with girlhood, whereas the Kore draws her essence from within herself, she gives birth to herself. [Emphasis mine]
I don’t think of korehood as a static state that we arrive at some day. Rather, we are always moving in and out of the virginal ground wherein our truth and strength are rooted. It’s our ever-renewing connection to that place that allows us to be in the world, actively contributing to it and building our life in accord with our nature.”
It occurs to me that the authority to trust one’s judgment comes from having overcome fear. Not so that we become just fearless in a foolhardy sense, but that we integrate the reality of the dark side of the psyche and no longer fear its expressions in ourselves or others. At the end of the day, I think it means we no longer fear death (and the grief and sorrow that comes with it) whether it comes to us in a literal or metaphorical form. But when we’re still girlish we’re constantly second-guessing our choices, our decisions, and the validity of our emotional life, and this process enacts a kind of dishonoring that has detrimental effects. We fear the death of approval and outside safety. We fear rejection and the death of ego. We fear the ferocity of our growing convictions.
I’m examining this crucial question in response to all the recent fears I’ve been encountering. It all started after the excitement of my first couple of weeks in Prague settled down and the fear of whether or not I could accomplish what I had set out to do here set in. Weirdly, this time coincided with a brief and ill-advised reconnect with my father, who, as usual, quickly morphed into the unreliable person he is in his heart of hearts. Again, as usual, he started sending me inappropriate verbiage via Whatsapp and, when I sternly rejected the receipt of such materials, he began attacking and belittling me as he always does, all while blaming me for the walking psychological catastrophe that is Himself, and all while exonerating himself in the most ridiculous fashion.
So what happened?
I blocked him, as I always must. But this time it’s forever and I’ll tell you why and I’ll tell you why it’s connected with the question (which I realize now I haven’t posed yet in full) “What does it mean to be a woman versus a girl?” For me, this question is personal because I believe that I am still a little girl even though I’m fifty years old. And I believe still being a girl, psychologically and emotionally speaking, while being fifty, or forty, or even thirty, is an epidemic in many places in the world and I think it’s crucial for the psychological well-being of the world at large that we little girls become women and fast.
Being a girl psychologically and emotionally while inhabiting the body of (and therefore expected to behave like) a fully grown woman is degrading not just for one’s personal reality, but also for one’s role in the larger picture. By failing to adapt to our appropriate age group correctly, we inadvertently contribute to a whole host of imbalances and iniquities across multiple dimensions of personal and social complexity. And we live out our days in a perpetual state of fear and insecurity because little girls are not psychologically equipped to handle the responsibilities of adulthood.
This recurring and regressive psychological kerfuffle with my father set me off into fear and anxiety. I had become attached once again to the idea that he would help and support me in my endeavors and I felt scared to let that go, no matter how big of an abusive and amoral liar he is. So, for a time, I sacrificed my integrity to alleviate nebulous and nameless fears. I’ve managed to dig deep the last several days, and this very discussion about womanhood versus girlhood has arisen out of this hateful conflict. Allowing my father into my life again, letting him in far enough to where he started abusing me again was such a blow to my self-confidence that I had to look at myself and ask tough questions.
Who am I, actually? All these years later, at this highly advanced age of fifty when I have repeatedly seen who and what he is, how on earth could I have opened the door again and expected something different to enter into my domain, something altered and modified into a human who is awake? It made me realize that I am still a girl because I am not sure that I can take care of myself, and even though I am managing my affairs, even though I am pursuing a Ph.D., and even though to the outside observer it may look as though I really have my s**t together, I still feel unhinged and unsafe internally.
More than that, more than the fear that I will unconsciously sabotage myself by making the wrong decisions since my consciousness is obviously in a neurotically childish state and can’t be responsible for itself, more than that, I began to understand that my dissertation work involves uncovering or revealing a modern-day goddess reclamation project and esoteric underground religion whose goal it is to bring harmony and balance to the divergent elements of a misgendered psyche, and for me to be a devout follower of this mystery tradition, I must know, must understand what it means to be a woman and not a girl!
So for the last few days, nonstop, I am wondering what it means, psychologically, and imaginally, to really and truly be a woman. And I decided that it means being without fear. Without fear of Loss, Grief, Death, Sorrow, Anger, Hatred, Jealousy, Betrayal, Low Self-Worth, Being Fat, Weakness, Being Unsuccessful, Imperfect, the list goes on and on.
To be a woman means being super-sovereign and powerful not because you are above pain, but because you embrace it completely and no longer fear experiencing it. You are also powerful because you no longer judge others for causing pain, you no longer judge yourself for being incomplete and imperfect. You no longer even strive for perfection because you have already achieved it in your perfect and radical acceptance of imperfection.
What does it mean to be a woman versus a girl?
What do little girls do? We put ourselves in harm’s way, we fail to protect ourselves. We fail to speak our truth, letting others speak for us because we’re too afraid of the shame of rejection. We bat our eyelashes and wiggle our asses, we use sexuality as a coping mechanism or a barrier, or both, we subvert our authenticity and we betray ourselves all the time. We let evil men and she-men tell us that our hearts are lying, that the powerful expressions of our souls are superstitious fantasies, and we make shallow decisions based more on how we will be perceived by total strangers and less on how we will see ourselves in the mirror at home later on. A girl is continually giving her power away, while a woman is continually adding to her storehouse of power by integrating all the feared and rejected dimensions of herself. As Dr. Rossi observed, this process is an ongoing one, but with enough consciousness, it can become a daily reminder that we must regard the inner domain of our psyches as inviolable sacred precincts that must be defended against intruders. No matter whose stuff it is — boss, partner, child, colleague, or friend — they may not cross the threshold into the inner sanctum. Once this inner domain is established, all things can be seen, experienced, and considered but now, they no longer have the power to disrupt the stability of hard-gained and authentic self-assurance.
