This week I’m feeling grounded and focused.
Inspired and informed by three seminal essays for women grappling with claiming personal and political power. Seminal because dating from the early days of second wave feminism in the late 1960s. And seminal because they name subtle and powerful ways of being for individual women, organisations and also the shadow of both.
The Bitch seems very like a PDA type – super sensitive to power inequality, and a powerhouse, finding her own way.
* The Tyranny of Structurelessness
Structureless names the challenge of transitioning from consciousness raising to focused activism, and the risks of resisting creating formal hierarchy.
* Trashing: the dark side of Sisterhood
Trashing speaks to the pain and bewilderment of social punishment for outstanding achievement.
All three essays named ways of being in the world just at the edge of my awareness. So, once described, I could recognize and perceive all three at different scales of organisation (and disorganization) and in my own life.
The existential angst of wondering “do i belong?” and “where do i belong?” Is energy sapping to the point of soul destroying.
I decided this week I am done with existential angst.
I belong here, for as long as I choose to stay. I have earned my place in the world.
This choice has freed me up to get on with affording staying.
LOL. More problems. That’s good. I’m alive.
A lucky break.
Let’s do this.
Thank you Kelly Diels for pointing me to these articles, through footnoting your brilliant Substack post Public Women; the Trashing Playbook and why “Harm” is usually a cover story.
