One foot nailed to the floor… and round and round we go!
We are such amazing creatures! I spend so much of my life with women and am constantly encouraged by our ability to detect the unseen, to hear the unspoken and to move that which appears to be immutable.
Amazing women. Powerful women. Women with innovative and unique ways to think about and talk about and engage. Women filled with intense passion and a desire to create, innovate and expand the expression of our humanity, for self and other.
Women who know a truth, buried deep and kept silent – but who know it nonetheless – and in spite of it all, continue to trundle through the ‘is’ of their lives rather than leave behind the people they care about. Women whose bodies have become a more powerful sensing instrument than anything that science has yet to create and who, despite this inner truth, choose to pretend they don’t know.
To me, this is like being an Olympic-calibre runner and choosing to nail one foot to the floor. We may get to move really, really fast AND it’s going to be painful and not get us very far. For sure, we’ll never be able to get our hands on the prize.
My search always is for the woman who is ready… the one who knows that it’s time to show up and be the truth of who she is. The one who recognizes that even though it may not be in her cultural conditioning, it is in her body to know that the only way she can ever create what she wants is to choose herself; that the only way she can ever give enough to her family is to choose herself; and that the people she loves will only discover how to love themselves when she has become the living model that makes it possible for them to know how.
I’m always looking for the woman who is ready…. the one who knows that ‘now’ is her time to lead; that leadership is an expression of the truth of who she is, not of what she knows or any templates or frameworks imposed by anyone else, no matter how well-meaning they may be; that her internal compass is the only one that will ever take her to where she is desperate to arrive.
I see them, time after time, and I am amazed at how comfortable they have become with hammer in one hand, nail in the other and a skilled and well-practised eye focused on the foot. Do we even notice when we’re doing this? Do we know how to name and claim that which contributes to our eagerness to start hammering… ensuring that we never really go very far or forget the pain? Do we think that this is in some way useful – to us or to anyone we care about? When you’re moving in a circle with your foot nailed to the floor , no matter how fast you go, you’re not going anywhere that you haven’t already been.
The women who work with me are few in number and immense in impact and potential. They change their lives and, from there, become a living example of what it is to change life. They change themselves and in so doing, become the ‘virus’ that invites change in others. They seep effortlessly into their collectives and communities, flowing through conversations and explorations, embracing the unknown and welcoming the invitation it carries to discover more of who they are – and who they might become.
The women who become willing to free themselves from their own bondage become the leaders in their own lives and in the lives of the people they care about. But, more importantly and more compellingly, they become the space within which others awaken to and discover the leader they are to become in their own lives…. and on and on and on it goes.
So, I wonder….. how have you nailed your foot to the floor? How many times in your life have you put aside what was/is deeply meaningful to you because someone else’s needs came into your awareness and became more important? How often have you become unwilling to hold to your commitment to yourself in the face of requests for you to commit to other things and other people? How often do you determine that it’s ok for you to have what you want/need as long as no one else wants it; or as long as having it does not cause someone else to notice their own unwillingness to take action in their lives? On the path to our full expression, there will always be distractions. The problems arise when we think that we should pay attention to them and engage them!
Women gathering in small groups, talking… often practice collective foot nailing – not because they want to, not because they have to, but simply because they know how to. What is familiar yet painful is often more attractive or bearable than what is unfamiliar, even though it will stop the pain.
I know these things intimately because I have lived these things… have been these things! I also took longer than many to discover that if I wanted to live, I would have to leave this practice behind – no matter what the cost. I have done so; have never looked back; and my life has never been more magical!
I, for one, am looking for the women who are ready to put down their hammers and discover what it feels like to really move!
