I’ve been hanging out in my masculine for too long. That’s the realisation I came to when traveling through Europe last week. All the telltale signs of being in the thick of it were there: short, shallow breaths, tension in my chest, in my throat, in my abdomen. Being ‘in the head’ and in my thoughts to the point where my intuition sadly took the backseat.
I’ve been tossing around the idea of delving more into this “masculine/feminine energy” topic for a while now but have held back, in part because the scope is so huge. This is also a bit of a hot button issue, as I know some people are quick to take offense at the very suggestion that there are differences between the sexes. We’re all just people and we’re all the same, right? My personal belief is that of course we’re all people but we all have a dominant energy within us. This is an instinctive concept, not an intellectual one.
I’ve learned so much about masculine/feminine energy that’s truly helped me and as you know, we can only write on what we have experienced and can speak to… so I’m going for it and maybe some of this will resonate with others as well.
The price of living too much in your polar opposite energy
Earlier this year I wrote about my workaholic past – about my tendency to kick into overdrive and work myself into (literally) exhaustion if I’m not being aware enough to catch it. Being a super-focused workaholic has been my “auto-pilot” way of being in the world for much of my life. However, I’ve come to realise that this intense energy is really not the best feeling state for me, nor my true core energy. It’s just been how I’ve adapted myself to fit what I believed others most wanted in the work world. This has served me so well career-wise… but have paid a hefty price with a drop in my physical, mental, and emotional states in the past.
The thing is, I’ve realised that a lot of the core qualities of being in a workaholic state are typically very masculine qualities: being focused, driven, goal-oriented. Some of this does feel good to me to an extent. But becoming more and more sensitive to the energy of it all, I’ve noticed that I can’t sustain these qualities for very long in a way that makes me feel like I’m thriving. Blocks start to build up, my whole body tightens, I deplete myself and my vibrancy. I just don’t FEEL my best when I have to be the one to hold it all together. This is in such contrast to the softness, flow, and surrender that feels so incredibly delicious to live in.
It’s been said that the masculine energy thrives on challenge and the more testosterone a guy has, the better they can actually handle tension and stress in a way that makes them thrive and is even attractive. With women though, it’s different. The more stress and tension they build up, the more they usually begin to break down (though of course there are exceptions to everything.)
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Lately I’ve had such polar opposite travel experiences pop up to further illustrate the energetic contrast for me. I was in Prague recently and although I was so excited to see & experience the “Paris of the East,” I have to admit that I did not have the best time.
Don’t get me wrong, Prague is a beautiful city.. probably the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. But the combination of being surrounded by endless buildings, in the cold, lugging around a heavy backpack, spending my days having to be direction-oriented and focused, navigating a map (or at least trying to hah!), having to stay on top of everything, rigidly enduring long flights for 10+ hours straight, staying in a hostel that was great but a bit too stark and impersonal for me… the energetic feeling of all these things culminated into what felt like massive blocks of stress and tension in my body. I felt literally starved for feminine energy by the time I got home – colour, softness, flow, beauty, flowers, lace, warmth, sensuality… I wanted to bathe in this energy, it felt so good to be back in it.
This was the energy of Bali that I fell so in love with a few months ago, that resonated so deeply. Such polar opposite areas of the world, two totally different trips, but I’m grateful to have experienced both extremes and the clarity which came from it all.
(I should note that this overwhelm of masculine energy hasn’t ONLY been felt when I travel… I feel it when I’ve worked too much, when I’m on a crowded subway, often when I’m walking the streets of midtown Manhattan, when I’ve spent too much time in front of a computer screen, etc…)
Still, I’m truly grateful to have made this trip happen…. ♥
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All of this has got me thinking though…
This isn’t the first time I’ve traveled solo in a major European city (in the winter no less!). Nothing I did on this trip hugely differed from a lot of my past ones – in fact, many aspects of this trip came together WAY easier than prior adventures. Yet I felt so much more… affected by everything around me. So out of alignment with my surroundings.
So what changed? I believe it’s that I’ve gotten more sensitive to different kinds of energy and how they feel in my body. Every day I’m becoming more in tune with myself and consequently it’s becoming much harder to ignore what’s no longer aligned. Much harder to operate in my ‘auto-pilot’ ways that were the norm for me in the past. This is ultimately a good (though very bizarre!) thing that I’m still coming to terms with.
I’m so grateful for travel and the endless amounts of learning and life revelations that come with it.
It’s because of Prague that I feel like I’m really understanding the things I want, how I want to live (and similarly how I want to travel). Something is majorly shifting in me and there’s so much more to write on that in time. Mostly what I’m realising is that whilst I’m ok with utilizing my masculine energy at work (I definitely would not be able to do the job I have without it!)… and whilst there are other situations in life that call for an abundance of this energy occasionally as well, I’m feeling more than ready to move on from hanging out here. It doesn’t feel the best to me – functional for sure, but just not where I thrive. And what are we if we are not aiming to thrive in this world?
I don’t have to do it all nor do I want to.
This was a bit of a ramble of a blog post but right now I’m loving the openness of this all – I know I don’t have all the answers yet, I don’t have it all figured out but I do have some ideas about where to go from here. I feel way more clear on my travels and some things that need to change. And really, it’s all one big learning process, yeah? I look forward to seeing what comes next ♥
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