Allowing the Feminine to Flower
“If the feminine does not become alive in you, whether you are a man or a woman, the finer things in life will never happen to you.”
—Sadhguru
On March 8, International Women’s Day, Sadhguru looks at why it is important that every society allow space for the feminine to flower.
Sadhguru: For a long time, humanity has given too much significance to the masculine because survival has been the dominant factor. Masculine will naturally be the dominant force when survival is a dominant aspect. It is only when societies handle their survival well and reach a certain level of stabilized culture and civilization, that the feminine can come to its proper place. Today, societies are coming to that phase but economics has become the main force in the world.
When economics is the dominant factor, once again we will bring everything down to the level of survival. It may look a little different, but it is still all about survival. The law of the jungle – survival of the fittest. Once you do that, the masculine will dominate.
It is only in a certain situation of relaxation that the feminine can flower. And if feminine does not flower, you will have everything in your life and you will have nothing in your life. Consciously nurturing the feminine in a society is very essential because without that, you will have full grown trees which will never flower. That is like living half a life. Half a life is not a good life.
By masculine and feminine, I do not mean male and female. The feminine can be as alive in a man as it is in a woman. It is not about being physically male or female. The feminine is a certain quality. The masculine also is a certain quality. Only when these two qualities happen in balance within a human being, can a human being live a life of fulfillment.
Today, there is a danger that the female is giving up the feminine because survival has once again become a very dominant factor, and survival has been pushed up to a very demanding scale like never before. Earlier, survival meant just gathering the day’s food. Today, survival means a Mercedes or a BMW; that is very challenging. If this continues, there will be no room for the feminine in society.
Ensuring that there is place for the feminine needs to be nurtured right from school. Children should go into music, art, philosophy or literature as much as they go into science and technology. If this does not happen, there is no room for the feminine in the world. Female you may be, but masculine you will become.
So, it is very essential that we celebrate the feminine. This is not about woman, this is about the feminine. If you want to use an analogy, if you call the root the masculine, the flower and the fruit is feminine. The very purpose of the root is to bring the flower and the fruit. If that does not happen, the root will go waste. Survival by itself does not take care of everything. After that, the finer things in life have to happen to you.
If the feminine does not become alive in you, whether you are a man or a woman, the finer things in life will never happen to you. All your life, you will only think survival – endlessly survival. You will only make survival increasingly difficult. This is the very nature of the masculine. The masculine is always about conquering something. The feminine is not about conquest. The feminine is about flowering, relaxing, and living, not about getting. This shift has to happen.
