Healthy Aggression in Girls

Written by Tabby Biddle

My third grade teacher, Mrs. Gray, called my mom at home one day to tell her that she was worried about me playing soccer all of the time with the boys at recess. “She’s the only girl and I’m afraid it’s too rough for her. She might get hurt,” she said. Thankfully my mom just reported this call to me, and made no judgment or set any rules that forbade me from continuing my recess behavior. The next day, I was back out on the soccer field.

Last week I went to see Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut, “Whip It.” The story is about a teenage girl (played by Ellen Page) who has pretty much resigned her 17-year-old life to pleasing her mom through entering beauty pageants. She is suffering from boredom and self-esteem issues because she hasn’t found anything that really inspires her in her small Texas town. One day she tries out (in secret) for the roller derby and makes the team. She learns how to skate fast, weave in and out of other derby girls, do some tricks, and occasionally knock down some of her opponents. Ultimately she finds her power through the physical activity (and friendships) of the derby.

I am not advising knocking other girls down as a self-esteem tool, but I am suggesting that it is crucial for girls to have an outlet to express their physical drive and aggression.

Anger and physical aggression in girls and women are typically deemed inappropriate. We are taught to deny, suppress and hide these feelings. When they do show up, we tend to feel shame or guilt and try even harder to rein them in. This doesn’t always work out so well.

“Girls’ aggression comes out in other forms when it is reined in physically … Girls turn it against themselves: through eating disorders, self-mutilation, hypercriticism about their talents and bodies, and depression.” says Sharon Lamb, clinical psychologist and author of The Secret Lives of Girls. In other words, when not permitted to express their aggression outwardly, girls aggress against themselves.

The taboo of physical aggression for girls and women can show up in another form called “relational aggression.” You got it – The Mean Girls stuff. “This is not about guns. Rarely even about fists … the weapons are subtle and sophisticated — whispers, lies, the upward rolling of an eyeball, the kind of backstabbing that does not require a knife,” says Susan Wellman, national expert in the field of relational aggression and Founder of The Ophelia Project.

There is one place where aggression in girls is generally supported: sports. The roller derby is a fine example. The problem is that many schools across the country, in order to save money, have either eliminated their physical education programs or drastically cut them. Not only is this a physical health issue for girls (and boys), but a psychological one. “When we deny women aggressive possibilities, we potentially diminish their being,” says University of California anthropologist Victoria Burbank.

“Being a full human being means having the capacity for both compassion and anger and frustration. Along with the former comes the ability to care; with the latter the ability to act aggressively and be angry,” says Sharon Lamb.

What if girls could own their aggression and even felt entitled to it? What would that look like beyond the playing field? What would that feel like?

I don’t think I’ll be joining up with the roller derby anytime soon, but I am sure glad I played some soccer in my school days.

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

David Letterman

Written by Tabby Biddle

I’m a Dave Letterman fan. My husband and I TiVo his show and watch it a few nights a week. I happened to be watching last Thursday night when Dave announced that he had done some “very, very bad things.”

By now, most of you have heard the story. If not, the gist is that a CBS news producer, Robert Joel Halderman, asked Dave to pay him $2 million. The hush money was intended to keep Dave’s “very, very bad things” a secret. The secret involved Dave having sexual relationships with female members of his staff. If Dave did not pay up, Halderman was threatening to expose Dave’s forays in a screenplay. In other words, according to police reports, this was an extortion attempt.

Over the weekend, The New York Times followed up on Dave’s announcement with an article on blackmail, and there have been subsequent articles covering Dave’s apology and the possible aftermath. What I would like to follow up on is the topic of single women having affairs with married men. I don’t know all the details of David Letterman’s story, but his announcement awakened my curiosity about why women are dissing other women by having affairs with their husbands.

A search on Google for “why do single women have affairs with married men” results in 1.7 million hits. Guess it’s a hot topic.

Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton, Rielle Hunter and John Edwards, the Argentine woman and Mark Sanford. The story of the single woman having an affair with the married man. These are the stories of public figures, and the private stories are even greater in number.

In a discussion group on Oprah’s website, many women shared their experience of their husband having an affair with a single woman. One woman said that her husband had an affair with a co-worker and that woman knew he was married and had kids. Even though she had this information, she would text and call him at all times of the night wanting him to come over and be with her. “How can a woman do that to another woman?” she asked.

My question exactly. Why are women hurting other women? Why are they willfully stepping into a situation that can damage lives (their own included)?

One explanation might come from Susan Sheppard, founder of Getting What You Want, a life and relationship coaching organization with a mission of promoting sacred intimacy. She says: “ The woman who gets involved with a married man is … looking for attention and affection.”

I did some more research and other reasons I found are: Enhanced self-esteem, self-image and power; excitement, risk, and challenge; and sex.

Probably most important is what showed up in the online discussion groups revealing that there are lots of women who feel they are gaining some kind of power from “taking a man away” from another woman.

It’s ironic to me that some women list “enhanced self-esteem and power” as their reason for having an affair, when it seems the exact opposite is true. By deceiving another woman, she is actually depleting her power. In other words, by deceiving another woman, she is causing more pain and damage to the feminine psyche and is perpetuating a pattern of mistrust among women.

“Many women cannot be trusted … they are gossipy, catty, and will stab you in the back,” wrote one woman in the discussion group on Oprah’s site.

“Women compete with each other … we live to tear each other apart,” said another.

Wow. Do we really need to continue this pattern? Is it possible to support each other as women? What would it be like if there was a sisterhood among women where if you knew a man was married, you would leave him alone? Hmmm….

In my opinion, the more we deceive each other, the more we will lose trust in our gender – and this REALLY ISN’T good for our self-esteem. If we want to be powerful, how about saying, “no”?

What do you think?

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

The Ambiguity in Women’s Lives

Written by Tabby Biddle

A good friend revealed to me recently that when she first got married, she found herself doing all sorts of “Little Miss Homemaker things.” She was ironing her husband’s shirts, making him lunch, and waiting for him to come home at the end of the day. “I have never ironed in my life!” she said. “I don’t know what came over me.” This was a woman who had been on her own for 15 years, was successful in her career, and was what most would call an “independent woman.”

Something shifted though when she got married. She began to lose her sense of independence and started to crave being protected and cared for by her husband. She started losing focus on her career, would often second-guess her decisions, and felt her ambition dwindling.

On September 17, Arianna Huffington wrote a blog in The Huffington Post entitled, “The Sad Shocking Truth About How Women Are Feeling.” She was responding to a series of studies conducted by The General Social Survey that showed women are becoming more and more unhappy.

Arianna asks: “When you think about all that has happened over the last four decades — with women securing greater opportunity, greater achievement, greater influence, and more money — the decline in our collective state of mind seems to defy logic, and raises the vexing question: What in the world is going on?”

Although there is some controversy over the studies, the issues being raised are important ones. For example, last week Maureen Dowd in The New York Times wrote a piece titled, “Blue Is the New Black.” In it she says: “When women stepped into male-dominated realms, they put more demands — and stress — on themselves. If they once judged themselves on looks, kids, hubbies, gardens and dinner parties, now they judge themselves on looks, kids, hubbies, gardens, dinner parties — and grad school, work, office deadlines and meshing a two-career marriage.”

I think it’s hard to argue against the idea that the expansion of women’s roles has brought on more stress for women due to the shear demand of responsibility. Add this to what Maureen Dowd talks about — a wider audience of judgment (women, don’t we all want to be perfect?). What’s missing here is a mention of perhaps a deeper stress that comes from an ambiguity that certain psychologists and sociologists believe lies within women. Hint: Think of my friend above.

Ever hear of the Cinderella Complex?

Colette Dowling, New York psychotherapist and author of The Cinderella Complex, says that women have a deeply embedded wish to be taken care of and “saved.” She says in her bestseller book: “We may not always recognize it … but it exists within us all, emerging when we least expect it, permeating our dreams, dampening our ambitions.” Ms. Dowling suggests that this wish goes back to the days of cave living, when man’s greater physical strength was needed to protect mothers and children from the wild – but, she says, such a wish is no longer appropriate or constructive.

Or is it?

Although Ms. Dowling published her book more than 25 years ago, these questions apply today. Is it possible for women today to be independent, ambitious, successful career women and at the same time still be taken care of and “protected” by a partner? Or is our secret need to be “saved and protected” sabotaging our ambitions and fulfillment as successful, career women?

What do you think?

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

Women as Peacemakers

Written by Tabby Biddle

Historically speaking, women have been left out of the most important conversations regarding war and peace until fairly recently.  (Only 17 percent of the seats in the US Congress are held by women – and that’s the most it’s ever been.) As more women are coming into positions of power around the world, I believe there is the strong potential that future conversations on the topic will be different.  Instead of the focus being on, “How do we gain power over a nation?” I think the conversations will more likely focus on, “How do we gain power with a nation?”

Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D., former clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco, has said:

“Women as a gender have an ability to physiologically be the more empathic gender. It has to do with when stress occurs. Men as a gender go to ‘fight or flight,’ and ever since the research was done at UCLA in 1991, we know that women tend, when stressed, to want to talk to other women closest to them, and that when they do, the stress level goes down, and the maternal bonding hormone – oxytocin –  goes up.” She concludes: “Essentially if there is ever going to be a peace negotiated well in this world, women have to be at the table.”

Some would disagree with the thesis that women are better peacemakers than men. In fact, I have been challenged on this subject by several men who insist that women are more jealous than men, bear grudges longer, and can be “vicious psychological warriors” – meaning they have long memories for perceived slights and don’t give up a fight. One male friend said: “Women are more territorial than men, particularly when it comes to protecting their children. I mean, look at a New York mom trying to get her kid into preschool. She’ll kill to do that!”

While I do agree that women, like men, are competitive and have a strong warrior spirit, I do think there is a difference in how those characteristics get played out. As brought out by the research project mentioned above it seems that men go to “fight or fight” and women talk.

For example, in 1994 in Rwanda 800,000 people were massacred.  There were orphanages filled with children. Women got together to talk about how to reconcile the situation. They decided that they needed to adopt these orphaned children whether they were Tutsi or Hutu – in other words, no matter what side they were on. Women played a pivotal role in reconstructing Rwanda.  And in that country, they now make up the largest percentage of women in government leadership compared to anywhere else in the world  — 56 percent in the parliament and one third of all the cabinet positions including foreign minister, education minister, Supreme Court chief and police commissioner general.

And what about a woman’s ability to hold a grudge?  How does that contribute to peace?  Some may think it doesn’t – at least not directly — but things get interesting when we examine this grudge-holding ability.  One explanation for it comes from Christiane Northrup, M.D., women’s health expert and author of Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom: “Men compartmentalize their feelings, but women remember everything,” she says. Research has also shown us that women’s brains are more wired for communication and interconnection.

This could mean there’s a greater capacity for empathy in women as compared to men.  Although holding a grudge isn’t a good thing, seeing things long-term and as interrelated can be positive traits for peacemaking. When we can see the bigger picture, we see that every child is in fact our child. As a result, the borders of fear and hatred dissolve, and we move toward power with all nations.

“We have been training for this job all our lives, negotiating home and community with empathy and a willingness to compromise,” says Marie Wilson, Founder of The White House Project, a non-profit organization that aims to advance women’s leadership.

I think it’s important to mention that I am not promoting the idea that men are the war-makers and women are the peacemakers and that men should cede their power so women can be the leaders and rule the world. Frankly, I think anyone who is thinking along those lines is repeating a non-supportive divisive pattern. I am suggesting that with more women at the table of diplomatic, economic, and political leadership — who take with them their natural feminine strengths of compassion, empathy, and unconditional love – we will see some great changes taking place.

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

Women: Changing the Fate of Our Global Future

Written by Tabby Biddle

I have always felt deep in my bones that peace in our world is possible. I have been doubted, challenged, laughed at and ridiculed for this belief.

There will always be wars, it’s human nature. I have heard this comment over and over through the years – most often from men. I have asked myself more often than not: “Is it really our nature to disregard and disrespect human life?”

I don’t believe it is.

History shows us that wars have been fought over religion, land, natural resources, and differing belief systems. Basically, a win/lose mindset that seems to stem from a fear-based, scarcity mentality. “If they have this, we won’t have this.” ‘If they win, we will lose.”

I wonder if today it is possible for us to shift our global attitude to a win/win?

I think it is.

In order to rise to leadership positions, women used to think that they needed to emulate men. They used to think that they needed to deny their feminine nature in order to make it in a “man’s world.” Today, thank goodness, this old way of seeing things is changing.

This past weekend The New York Times dedicated its Magazine to look at how the liberation of women could help solve many of the world’s problems, including poverty, child mortality, and terrorism.

“In many parts of the world, women are routinely beaten, raped or sold into prostitution. They are denied access to medical care, education and economic and political power. Changing that could change everything.” – New York Times Magazine

One major way women are being liberated is through the assistance of microfinance organizations. These organizations lend tiny amounts of money to poor women around the world to help them start businesses.

Once such organization is Kashf Foundation in Pakistan. Saima Muhammad, a Pakistani woman frequently beaten by her husband and brother-in-law and a mother of three daughters, took out a $65 loan from Kashf. She used the money to buy beads and cloth, which she transformed into embroidery that she then sold to merchants. She used the profits to buy more beads and cloth, and soon was running an embroidery business and earning a solid income. When merchants requested more embroidery than Saima could produce, she hired neighbors. Eventually she had 30 families working for her – providing income and opportunity for them, and is now planning on sending all three of her daughters to high school and maybe even college. The beatings by her husband have also been reduced.

The question has been asked — why do microfinance organizations usually focus their assistance on women?

“One reason involves the dirty little secret of global poverty: some of the most wretched suffering is caused not just by low incomes but also unwise spending by the poor – especially by men. Surprisingly frequently, we’ve come across a mother mourning a child who has just dies of malaria for want of a $5 mosquito bed net; the mother says that the family couldn’t afford a bed net and she means it, but then we find the father at a nearby bar. He goes three evenings a week to the bar, spending $5 each week.” –  Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, authors of Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women Worldwide.

The point here is that when a woman is offered the possibility of running a business and making money, the income goes back into the well-being of the family and the community.

“Seventy percent of people living in poverty around the world are women and children. If women have a roof over their heads and a home free of violence, and good and affordable health care, then so do children … Women are the conduits through which change is made,” says Christine Grumm, president and CEO of the Women’s Funding Network.

So how does this all fit into my peace plan?

As more and more women and girls are given opportunity and respect — as opposed to being killed for being born a daughter (China and India), burned for not providing a large enough dowry (India), raped (everywhere), trafficked (Asia), and genitally mutilated (Africa), there is real possibility for bringing balance back to our world.

Although I would agree that humans are competitive by nature, I do not believe that we will always have to live with war. A new attention and respect for girls and women around the world will wake up what I believe is our ultimate human nature … that’s love.

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

Healthcare: It’s a You-and-Me World

A line started forming just after midnight Tuesday at the Los Angeles Forum in Inglewood, California by thousands of people hoping to get free medical, dental and vision services being offered courtesy of the non-profit group Remote Area Medical. The people in line were not just the uninsured, but also the insured whose deductibles and co-payments are too high for them to handle.

Whether we are one of the insured or uninsured, the debate over the American health care bill affects us.

I have been listening to the debate astounded by those who are opposing the possibility of health care for all of our citizens. Those who are opposing the bill seem to think that if we provide services for the uninsured, that we will somehow be taking away from them – or, as a number of the protesters have argued, “taking away their America.”  I find some irony in that argument. Isn’t America a country that built itself on this premise: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teaming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” (Quoted on the Statue of Liberty).

I wonder if this you-or-me mentality is something that we are going to have to contend with for the upcoming decades, or if we can consider a shift in perspective to a you-and-me nation, and ultimately a you-and-me world?

“Just as blood in the body must flow to all parts of the body for health to be maintained, money is useful when it is moving and flowing, contributed and shared, directed and invested in that which is life affirming. When blood slows down and begins to stop or clot, the body becomes sick. When water slows down and becomes stagnant, it becomes toxic. Accumulating and holding large quantities of money can have the same toxic effect on our life.”

– Lynne Twist, The Soul of Money

I mention this quote because it seems to speak to the toxic meltdowns we have seen recently – Bernie Madoff, AIG, Lehman Brothers – and in particular the situation with the health insurance companies.

We’ve heard about those Americans rejected by health insurance companies for having a “pre-existing condition.” I have been one of them. Getting that letter in the mail (twice) stung with a feeling that the insurance company’s choice was never really about the well-being of people, but rather it was about more money in their pockets.

Well now the money has clotted in their bank accounts, and the toxicity has grown to infect our whole country. If things continue to go in the direction they have been, our “health care” system will turn into a “health chaos” system.

Luckily, there are companies like Remote Area Medical who believe in sharing time, talents, and resources to help those in need. “An infected tooth can’t wait while Congress debates healthcare reform. We’re taking care of people who need help now,” says Don Manelli, Executive Producer of the week-long LA event.

I am not saying that doctors, health organizations, or health insurance companies should be offering their services for free. Of course not. What I am looking at is where the money is getting caught up, where it is losing its flow, and what can we do to change this?

As we continue in this health care debate, I wonder if it is possible to shift the very basis of the way we think – from one where we compete and fight for what seem like “scarce” resources, to one where we realize that there actually are enough resources and that we just need to look at how we allocate them so we can help one another.

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

The Zen of “Yes” or “No”

Written by Tabby Biddle

Are you a “Yes” person or a “No” person, and is one better than the other?

Movies like The Yes Man starring Jim Carrey would have you believe that saying “no” leads to a boring life and a host of unexplored possibilities. After saying “no” to just about everything, Carrey’s character is depressed, disconnected and on the verge of missing out on life altogether. As an antidote, he attends a self-help seminar that advocates saying “YES” to EVERYTHING. His life totally turns around: he goes bungee jumping, takes guitar lessons, learns Korean, flies an airplane, and finds love.

All good things.

But what really happens to people who go through life saying “yes” (note the lower case) to every request made of them without a “no” in sight?

Louise Hay, teacher, author and expert in looking at the emotional causes of disease, says in her book Empowering Women that there is a consistent pattern that she has noticed with almost every woman she knows who has breast cancer. She says that they usually have a tremendous inability to say “no.” “Breasts represent nourishment, and people with breast cancer seem to nourish everybody in their world but themselves,” she says. “They give and they give until there is no nourishment left for them.”

True or not, there seems to be a fine line between moments when we say “yes” to  open up to new life possibilities, and, when we say “no” to honor ourselves and maintain a healthy boundary.

For example, do you say yes to donating your time to a cause because you feel it is a good thing to do, but then start bouncing checks because you gave too much of yourself and your bank account? Maybe that should have been a no.

Do you say yes to learning another language, traveling abroad and possibly meeting the love of your life? That yes could work.

Sometimes the Zen of “Yes” or “No” can be a tough call.

We’ve all probably had the experience of sharing a confidence with a friend, and then they later spilled the beans to someone else. The next time around when they asked you to share something intimate, you thought twice about this.

If you are a yes person, learning to say no can feel difficult  — especially the first time! The first time I said “no” to someone when they asked for one too many favors, I was so nervous. I was so afraid the person was going to get angry with me. I wondered if I was being selfish, or even worse, not nice. I even contemplated reversing back to “yes.” If I said yes though, I would be betraying what I knew to be true for me — deep down I wanted to say “no.” After much deliberation, I stuck with my no.

“Anybody who is learning to say no has to put up with anger for awhile,” says Louise. “You can expect that reaction.” The people around you have become so used to you saying yes, that this disruption in the pattern can be unsettling for them.

Although some people would have you believe that when you say no, you are closing off to possibilities in your life … I would like to challenge that by saying that sometimes saying no, will open up tremendous possibilities.

Maybe when you say no to someone in certain circumstances, you are actually saying YES to yourself!

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

Making More Money Than Your Man

Written by Tabby Biddle

What would it be like if you made more money than your husband or your boyfriend or your father? For some of you, you are already in this position. For others, what once seemed like a faraway possibility, is now closer in view.

According to a recent article in Time, 75% of the job losses during this recession have gone to men. In order to pay the bills and support the family, women are stepping in to work longer hours and, those who took time off from their career to raise children, are re-entering the workforce – many of them as business owners.

Before the recession, Sarah Janosek, a 47-year old hospice nurse and mother of three daughters in Austin, TX, brought in roughly one-third of her family’s income. Once her husband lost his job as a software engineer, she became the principal breadwinner.

So what happens if the balance of earning power is tipped toward the woman? How will this change the relationship of the couple?

For those of us who grew up in a generation or a household where it was expected that Dad was the one responsible for bringing home the money to support the family, and Mom was the one responsible for cleaning the house and raising the kids — the idea of the woman now being the main breadwinner can be daunting and frankly, disorienting.

One friend, who is close to earning a lot more money than she has been, revealed to me that she keeps tripping herself up because she doesn’t like the idea of making more money than her husband. When I asked her why, she told me that she didn’t want to lose respect for him.

I asked another friend her opinion on the subject, and she told me that she was afraid that her husband wouldn’t feel like “a man” if he earned less than she. “So what would this mean to you if he felt like this?” I asked. “I’m afraid I might lose him,” she replied — sounding surprised to hear herself say this.

Could it be that some women are afraid of their own achievements because there is an old tape playing that says, “My marriage will dissolve if I make too much money.”

We often hear about Hollywood couples breaking if off not too long after the woman gains more spotlight and cash flow than the man. Hilary and Chad. Reese and Ryan. Halle and Eric… to name a few.  Whether there is any connection between the bigger earnings and the breakups is hard to prove, but word around town is that it was a factor.

I have a friend who is the CEO of her own company and is re-entering the dating scene. One day at a women’s gathering, she asked our opinion about whether she should avoid talking about her work as she goes out on dates. “Why would you do that?” I asked. She replied: “Because I don’t want him to feel intimidated.”

With this remark, it started to dawn on me that as modern and as ambitious as many of us women are, there is a lot of old belief system knocking around and perhaps knocking us back.

While many of us ache to earn more, charge higher fees, and bring in more money for our time spent on work, can we get comfortable with a role reversal? Are we willing to let go of old belief systems and truly respect a man who makes less than we do?

And finally… can we as women own our own earning power?

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

The Anti-Affirmation

Written by Tabby Biddle

I have heard it said over and over in the personal growth world that in order to reach your potential, you must “embrace your dark side,” or “shadow.” What the heck does this mean? I thought for years. What dark side?

Little by little I would step a toe into what I thought was my “dark side,” but I was navigating through uncharted territory and I would inevitably turn back.

Instead, I found my way to positive affirmations through the wise women teachers Louise Hay, Anodea Judith and Caroline Myss. This seemed like a gentler approach to waking my potential. I liked the idea of overriding old programming that said, “You can’t do it,” “You’re not good enough,” and “You’re just a girl,” with “I can do it!” “I am good enough,” and “I am proud to be a girl!” This all seemed liked a worthy pursuit and revealed hints of working, but I have to admit never felt like I was getting down to the root of things.

Then more recently I heard someone say, “If you want to manifest your full potential you have to reclaim the parts of yourself that you’ve denied, hidden or given away to others.” Could they be referring to our “shadow” I wondered?

The person who said this was Debbie Ford, author, teacher and faculty at the Chopra Center in La Jolla, California. “We might not like all of our disowned parts, but acknowledging them to ourselves (and maybe even others) is a huge step toward owning our potential,” she says.

But how do we figure out what are the disowned parts of ourselves?

One method, according to Debbie, is to first look at all the qualities that upset you in other people. The idea here is that what we dislike in others is actually a projection of the parts of ourselves that we have disowned.

I thought to myself…how many times have I called someone (in my mind) – lame, boring, phony, annoying, overbearing, stingy, greedy, manipulative, mean – and a whole host of other “undesirable” adjectives? Was I actually pointing a finger at myself?

Yikes!

“If we embrace it internally, we no longer have to create it externally.”
– Debbie Ford

Although skeptical at first about owning things for myself that I did not like about other people, I decided to consider Ms. Ford’s idea.

Here’s a method she uses in her seminars:

She asks participants to write down five words that they wouldn’t want used to describe them in the newspaper. Once they’ve got these words, she has them partner up for a mirroring exercise that looks like this: Say one of your charged words was “shameful,” you would look your partner in the eyes and say, “I am shameful.” Your partner would mirror back to you, “You are shameful.” Then you would repeat, “I am shameful,” and your partner would repeat, “You are shameful.” This continues until it no longer matters to you if you are shameful or if you are called shameful. You work with your partner until each one of you no longer has any emotional charge on any of your five “disowned” words. Wow, could this really work?

Having been a part of the affirmation generation, I wondered if by going around saying, “I am shameful,” — would actually be a wiring recipe for negative self-imaging and quite the opposite of helping someone expand into their potential.

Apparently not, according to Debbie, “Just saying the word out loud, over and over, breaks down our resistance to being called that word and to having that quality.” In other words, it loses its energy and grip on our life.

I haven’t taken one of her seminars yet, but I went ahead and tried another method she suggested. You can do it on your own. The old stand-by…go to the mirror and say the words to yourself out loud. I did just that and while unsure at the start, I was surprised to feel the words lose their charge and felt a sense of liberation!

What are five things you wouldn’t want to see written about you in the newspaper? Are you willing to own them? (Or at least look in the mirror and say them over and over?)

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.

Pleasure or Pain: take your pick

As a Buddhist practitioner you learn that lust, greed and desire are negative qualities – hindrances on the path to enlightenment and in some texts, even evil. You learn that sensual pleasures are better left renounced and the body just a vehicle to be trained and overcome.

It was 12 years ago when I embarked on my Buddhist journey — sitting for 10-day silent meditation retreats at Wat Suan Mokkh in Thailand, sleeping on cement slabs and reciting a Buddhist prayer before my scant meals to remind me that I was not eating the food in front of me for pleasure. It was on these retreats that I learned that lust, greed and desire were qualities to be abandoned. Being the experiential learner that I am, I decided to have a go at releasing these “evils” from my life. And with that, unknowingly, I also released some integral parts of myself.

I remember that upon returning from my Asian expedition friends commented on how peaceful I seemed. I felt peaceful. I felt relaxed. I felt like something inside me had shifted for the better. One close friend however said to me, “I miss your drive.” I didn’t know what to make of that statement at the time, but more recently I have found some meaning in those words.

There is a woman in New York City named Regena Thomasaeur who runs something called “Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts.” Regena, otherwise known as ‘Mama Gena,’ is all about women naming and claiming their desires to live their fullest potential. She gives women permission to feel greedy, lustful and desirous. She believes that women are taught how to study hard, work hard and deprive themselves – but who is teaching them about pleasure? She is! To her, pleasure is the key to a woman recognizing her own power and her full-throttle life force.

Recently I read a statement by Swiss psychologist Carl Jung: “I would rather be whole than good.” His premise was that the “dark side” of human nature needed to be integrated with the “lighter sides” into an overarching wholeness for full self-realization. Unfortunately I didn’t have this to reflect on at the time I was pursuing my Buddhist studies.

The Buddhist teachings initiated me on the spiritual path years ago, but it hasn’t been until recently that I have taken a closer look at the depth of how those teachings affected me. In Buddhism one is advised to release desirous attachments to eliminate pain and suffering in one’s life, however could it be that denying aspects of your very human self causes its own kind of pain?

I cannot discount the wonderful things that Buddhist meditation has brought me – like sitting quietly, watching my thoughts, breathing deeply and finding the space and peace between the thoughts. I cannot deny the growth I have experienced in terms of developing gratitude and compassion at a much greater level than before my days with Buddhism. And I don’t know of any other experience that has given me the depth and eternity of spaciousness that I experienced in my meditations in those days of silence. However I wonder today if I walked away from those retreats abandoning a key element of myself – my desire.

“In order to take a rightful seat at the head of the banquet table of our lives, we have to accept the rightness of our feelings and desires and act on them strongly, always,” says Mama Gena.

For someone who has followed (for the most part) a Buddhist philosophy for over a decade, and has trained herself to give up indulgence to live the Buddhist ‘Middle Way,’ this kind of suggestion could seem grossly out of the question. However for someone who is also committed to discovering one’s power and potential as a woman — Mama Gena’s philosophy seems like a worthy subject to investigate and definitely a fun one!

So I wonder — as a woman, could the power of pleasure be the key that unlocks the way to our potential? And could a healthy dose of greed, lust and desire actually be beneficial to our personal fulfillment and path toward wholeness?

Maybe pleasure is one alternate path to enlightenment?

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Tabby Biddle is a writer and editor specializing in helping women entrepreneurs and emerging authors get their message out. Additionally she is the founder of Lotus Blossom Style, a yoga lifestyle company created to support women in their personal transformation. She lives in Santa Monica, CA.