Trade Unions
Well, right from the start let me warn you this is not about what you think it’s about. And, its a difficult entry to write because I have to walk a fine line between what I believe to be true for all and what will surely offend some. This is about relationships, primarily relationships between women and men, although in the end it pertains to all relationships.
It’s my contention that “trade unions”, as that phrase applies to relationships, is an oxymoron. When “trade” is the basis for any relationship what you have is an exchange. You each have something the other wants, needs or lacks and so you trade or exchange that which you have for that which you desire. What you cannot have when you trade or exchange is Union. And so we come to the fundamental flaw that can be found in most male-female relationships…and what I think is the cause for divorce.
Women trade wisdom for protection. Men trade autonomy for power.
This is where I begin to offend.
Women are inherently more wise than men. Now don’t get all huffy…yet. I didn’t say they were more intelligent or smarter. I said they were wiser. By that I mean that women, being inherently more comfortable and connected to their intuitive selves and the rhythms of the natural world, have a heightened ability to know… by way of their innate sensitivity… some of the essential truths of Life. But we have been conditioned and frightened for thousands of years (and perhaps longer) into believing the illusion that success in the material world is governed by physical prowess rather than knowing. Men are, generally speaking, physically stronger. So, we trade our sensitivity,our inherent knowing, for protection. This started as physical protection from the elements and enemies but over time has evolved (or de-volved) to become, sadly, the way women routinely abdicate our true power in every area of our lives to men who have all too willingly taken it up and misused it.
Men are beings who inherently crave autonomy. They want to “be their own person”…make their own decisions…succeed at and acquire whatever they desire. But their ability to do this is, generally speaking, somewhat limited to the more basic aspects of physical reality. They build, they compete, they battle…they are consummately “physical” beings. What they ultimately aspire to, however, is prevailing…winning…being the “top dog”…having power over others so as to answer to no one but themselves. In a word, autonomy. Long ago men looked at women and saw the true power that men desired. So, they set out to acquire it by making the physical world a scary and dangerous place to reside…a place where protection is required.
So, women traded their wisdom (true power) in the hope of obtaining protection while men traded their autonomy in the hope of obtaining power. Hence, an exchange but not a union. And when you trade something in the belief that you are getting what it is you want by that trade, and over time it turns out that you don’t get it…well, you feel cheated and oftentimes very hostile towards the other trader.
The irony is that women wind up feeling imprisoned, not safe at all. They become emotionally enslaved to a system that devalues and denies the existence of their greatest gift…the gift of knowing. And men wind up giving up their autonomy to become enslaved to women who promised to exchange their power for protection, when what was really exchanged was the cessation of using their knowing for the promise of protection. Men only think that by such a deal can they obtain true power. What they actually end up with is trying to replicate true power through force which has gotten us where we are today…socially and globally speaking.
Both men and women eventually end up disappointed and betrayed in such a bargain.
The answer to this age-old problem is rather simple…although it will take great courage to move beyond where we are at this moment.
Women must reclaim their Creator-given gift of wisdom by valuing and exercising the intuitive aspect of themselves rather than entering into an artificial bargain whereby they relinquish it. Connecting to natural wisdom is the greatest protection known.
Men must be willing to take on all of the responsibilities of autonomy, including compassion, respect and equality in relation to all forms of life…so that they can experience and know true power by so doing.
Only when women own their power and men own their autonomy can the two consciously and willingly give up trading “need for need” and instead enter into Union, the desire that beats endlessly in the hearts of each of them.
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