S.O.F.T. and Strong: Midlife Women On A Mission

Episode 25: F is for Feminine...The Art of Just "Being"

March 01, 2021 Bernice McDonald Season 1 Episode 25
S.O.F.T. and Strong: Midlife Women On A Mission
Episode 25: F is for Feminine...The Art of Just "Being"
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Who are you? A woman who "takes charge" all the time and avoids feeling much of the time? I call this woman "Sarah".

Or a woman who feels and senses and has an amazing intuition? I call this woman "Collette".

Both are amazing, capable, impressive women with big hearts. But one lives in her "head" and one lives from her "heart".

Though both have use of what we call the "masculine" and "feminine" sides of us, one rarely lets the feminine show up. Which one do you think it is?

In this episode we're talking about the "F" in S.O.F.T.

S = Strong on the inside
O = Open to life and to love
F = Feminine
T = True to Yourself

An heart open to love has a strength inside that allows a beautiful softness to emerge on the "outside".  Allowing yourself to find your feminine is often tied to how you answer the question, "Am I enough for someone to fight for me?"

Power Pillar #1:  Your "why". Whatever you do, whatever decisions you make for how you choose to act or "be" are based on the answer to this one question.

Power Pillar #2:  The Truth Is...The answer to this one question must be "Yes".

Power Pillar #3: Hope Filled-Action  - A sense of peace and confidence will start to grow when you step out of life for a few moments every day and do this.

The app I referenced here: CALM   (I don't get any commissions from this - it's just a wonderful app).

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0 (2s):
When we think of being soft, we're talking about that whole acronym here - being strong on the inside. So we can be soft on the outside. Knowing who we are. O is for open being open to what life asks of us and what life brings to us. Being open to love. F is for feminine, which we're talking about today. And the T we're getting to - true to yourself. All of these things work together to create a soft in you. And if you want to open your heart again, this is where you must go...

0 (47s):
to learning, to be in your soft, so that you invite. So you're a woman beyond 50, what is standing between you and the dreams that you have in your heart. I'll tell you, it's the Story that you're telling yourself. This podcast is about keeping our heart awake and open to love because those stories are what closes your heart and keeps it locked up tightly. It takes courage every day to face those stories about 15 minutes a day.

0 (1m 27s):
Only. In fact, I'm Bernice McDonald, Courageous Happiness Coach. And that's the journey that I'm on in this life. I want you to find your heart again, to find the real you, the amazing courageous, loving, crazy, sexy woman that you were meant to be. Yup. Even after 50. Are you ready? Okay. Come on in. Let's take those 15 minutes right now. Alright, I am so excited because I am at episode two 25. That's a quarter of a hundred episodes and I made it this far.

0 (2m 11s):
Yes, I am doing a happy dance and celebrating. I hope you will, too. The way that I want to celebrate today is by telling you about something that is so near and dear to my heart because it's one of the most beautiful things about being a human being. I'm going to tell you a tale of two women. One is named Sarah, and one is named Collette. These names are not real to protect the innocent, but both of them represent a whole group of women that I know and who I've come across in my life.

0 (2m 57s):
Now, Sarah lives in her head. See if you recognize some of these qualities that I'm going to tell you about, Sarah is always thinking, planning, doing, taking care of all the details, making sure everybody's fed and the laundry is done and they get to their soccer practices, and etc., etc. She's done that for many, many years. Now that she's beyond 50 and her kids are either in their teens or beyond 60, and she's on her own.

0 (3m 38s):
She still always at work or wherever she is thinking planning, doing, organizing, prioritizing - you know, the kind. And she can't rest and less. She's doing that. In fact, she has a very hard time resting. Then we have Collette. Collette is a woman who lives from her heart that doesn't make her wimpy and it doesn't make her weak. Instead. Collette kind of stands back and observes a lot. She senses, senses where people are at.

0 (4m 19s):
Senses what's going on around her. She feels, she knows and recognizes her own feelings. She cares. It's as if she's watering others in her life but she does it with great sensitivity. She notices what they need and she attempted whatever way she can to, out of her own resources, to help with that. If she can't, she just cares. Now, which women, which woman do you identify with?

0 (5m 2s):
We all are one or the other. And we all take turns being one or the other. The important thing is where we live naturally. Now we're talking about opening our hearts. We're talking about being S.O.F.T. Because you are most yourself. When you soften. Did you know that Sarah who lives in her head probably has a really hard time actually being herself. And I'm going to tell you why in a minute, because both of these women are human. Both of these women do this.

0 (5m 45s):
They ask questions in their heads. All of us do. Our brains are amazing. Things like that. It's always asking questions about life, about us. Remember that you're on a path. Remember that life is simple. You are a heart, a beautiful heart walking on that path. And you are always assessing: 1. How you see yourself and 2. How you see others to do that. We are always asking questions and answering those questions, looking for the answers to those questions.

0 (6m 27s):
So what are those questions? It's asking, basically, "Am I enough?" Now that question may come in many, many different forms as we've talked about in the whole story phase, right? Things happen to us. And we come up with a story. We have asked these questions and we have received answers and we create those answers into a story. That story often falls and always falls under the umbrella of: "Am I Enouhg?" If I'm not enough, I won't be loved.

0 (7m 9s):
Those two things are our greatest fears. We are so afraid that the story is true. Now, both of the, the story that says I am not enough and, therefore, I won't be loved. We're so afraid that that is true. Both of these women, Sarah and Collette, both of them believe that one or the other I am enough or I'm not enough. And they're always asking that question. That question comes in the form of, "Tell me if I am acceptable, if I'm beautiful.

0 (7m 55s):
Am I talented, gifted enough? Can I make a difference? Do I actually, as a person, as a heart, have a reason to be here?" Many years ago, I read a book by one of my favorite authors, John Eldredge. I don't know if you've heard of him, but he talks a lot about what goes on in our hearts and the questions that we ask. And it just turned the light on for me. And I realized, as a woman I was asking, and he says a woman in her femininity, which is what we're talking about today is, is being feminine.

0 (8m 38s):
In her femininity she is asking the question, "Am I captivating? Do you find me captivating? Am I worth fighting for? Those questions come up in that whole arena of, "Am I lovable? Am I good enough? Am I enough to hold your love and your attention? And, of course, these questions would be primary when we're looking for love. Again, when we are wanting to find that relationship that is intimate and close.

1 (9m 18s):
When we think of being S.O.F.T., we're talking about that whole acronym here being strong on the inside so we can be soft on the outside. Knowing who we are .O is for open being open to what life asks of us and what life brings to us. Being open to love. F is for feminine which we're talking about today. And the T we're getting to - true to yourself. All of these things work together to create a soft in you. And if you want to open your heart again, this is where you must go to learning, to be in your soft.

1 (10m 7s):
So that you invite.

0 (10m 10s):
That takes us to the whole definition of feminine, which is the f in soft, which we are talking about today, Masculine, to be masculine. I like to think of it as caring about the whole body. The masculine looks after all of the outside of us, you know, the protecting the providing. And when we, as women, go to that place, that's when we go in our heads to the thinking planning, doing place. Men are much more, most men are much more comfortable in that place. They don't like to talk about their feelings. They don't like to go deep.

0 (10m 51s):
Where as feminine is more taking care of the heart - your own heart and the hearts of others. It's like watering. It's like nurturing and caring it's feeling. And it's sensing. And the most beautiful thing is that, as a woman, you are at home when you are just "being". I love that verse in scripture, which I have referred to before, and please don't be offended if I'm mentioning scripture, I was raised with scripture. And so much of it is just embedded in my life.

0 (11m 33s):
It's wisdom is undeniable. But the verse I love is this: the verse that describes the Mary, the mother of Jesus. And it says that Mary treasured up all these things in pondered them in her heart. Mary was in her feminine. Mary would step back and just be, and watch and observe, gather up all those precious things that were going on and think about them from her heart.

0 (12m 14s):
That is primarily what the feminine is all about. Allowing myself to do this changed my life. Just "being" is such an important aspect of refilling of nurturing ourselves.

1 (12m 34s):
Now that takes us to the Power Pillars. If we, if you are going to open your heart to love again, then you must come up with an answer to the questions" Am I enough? Am I enough to be loved? And our purpose here is to say, "YES, I am enough. I am enough to be loved". The thing that gives us strength to be strong on the inside. The thing that helps us to open to life. The thing that helps us to be true to ourselves, pivots on this.

1 (13m 17s):
To just "be" who you are to sit sometimes and just allow yourself to be, not even to feel just to be, to be that hard on the path and just observe what's going on around you. The whole desire is to then move to a place where you are who you are. To just be who I am and be okay with that. That's the secret here.

1 (13m 59s):
The Truth Is...Power Pillar #2. If Power Pillar number one is to ask if you believe that you are enough to be loved by anyone and everyone, to just be you - The Truth Is...that you are. What we do is that you, we, go to broken people on other paths beside us and put those questions to them. And we are asking those broken people to tell us that we're whole, to give us the message that we're enough to be loved, where they are seeing us through their own brokenness.

0 (14m 49s):
When I realized this, it gave all the more reason to look up in the whole idea of just "being". I needed to come to a place where I was more like Collette than Sarah. I was not in my head when I was doubting myself, when I was wondering why I'm here. And if I even have a reason to be here, if my existence is even justified, if I deserve love, if I'm lovable. I couldn't go to the people on the paths around me, I needed to go to my heart and I needed to realize that this is me on my Path, who I am.

0 (15m 36s):
And it's okay to be who I am. It's okay to just realize I've been made. I'm I've been created that alone means that I am loved. That alone means that there is somebody who recognized that the "me" that I am was worth making. Isn't that a beautiful idea? I'm here. Therefore, I matter because I'm still here.

0 (16m 18s):
Somebody higher than me, somebody much bigger who holds the whole key of life and death decided that I should still be here on my Path. No matter what's going on around me, no matter what bombs are going off or boulders are flattening me out of the blue. No matter what rocks people are throwing at me. No matter what bad fairies are in my life wanted me to prick my finger on pain and put my heart to sleep. No matter about all of that, if you strip it all away, I am here and I matter.

0 (16m 60s):
So the whole answer to the question, "Am I enough? Am I worthy to be loved?"...Is YES!

1 (17m 7s):
And The Truth is... I have a life to live. I have a song to sing. I have a story to tell. I have something to do out of who I am. I can bring joy. I can bring healing. I can make a difference. I can help somebody smile. I have something to do. That, my dear ladies, has to become your purpose. Has to become the thing that gets you through life. No matter what's happening around you.

1 (17m 48s):
No matter if COVID is hitting us and causing us all to be at home in our houses, we need to look outside of ourselves and find out what we can do.

0 (18m 1s):
What little things... Can we talk to a friend on the phone? Can we send an email? Can we do something online? Can we post encouraging posts on Facebook? Can we do something to help others to smile on this journey? There is something we're meant to do. That's the truth. So Power Pillar #1 is to answer that question. "Am I enough? Am I worthy to be loved?" And to come up with "YES! I am. And I can." That is opening to love again. Power Pillar #2 is The Truth Is...

0 (18m 44s):
I have something to do in this life and I can just be that person without anything else influencing me, without answering to anybody else. The question, "Am I captivating? Am I worth fighting for? is YES! Even if I'm the one who has to fight for me, I am worthy of that.

1 (19m 13s):
So Power Pillar #3: Your Hope-filled Action today is to just "be". About a year ago, I was in a really dark place, a place where I was asking the questions. Why am I here? What purpose do I have? I mean, I'm getting older. I'm in my sixties. I don't know how am I going to face retirement? How am I going to be on this path? Am I just going to get old? Am I just going to give up everything and stop doing what I'm doing? I started to go to an app because I heard about meditation.

1 (19m 58s):
I needed something to help make it into my heart. And so I started using the app. "Calm". I'd looked at a couple of them and Calm was the one that I chose.

0 (20m 10s):
Now as many times a week, as I am disciplined to do it, I have to go there. I have to stop. And I put on the noise of the water lapping and the birds in the background. And I listen to them guide me for about 10 minutes into a place where I just "am" - where I can just "be" - to feel my breathing, to hear my breathing, to think in my heart about just being me, see me as a heart on my Path.

0 (20m 50s):
One of the most beautiful exercises I've been taken to through is to say to myself and then to think of the ones I love in my life - and to say these words, "May you be loved. May you be at peace. May your heart overflow." And those three simple things, in whatever way I put them, just bring me back to a place that is my heart where I can feel, and I can sense and I can know that I have a reason to be here.

1 (21m 37s):
You must go here every day to a place like this. And I want to make that your Hope-Filled Action for today. "May you be loved. May you be happy. May you be at peace. May your heart overflow". Treasure up all those things around you so you can ponder them in your heart and live from your heart. Alright, you go and have a great week.

1 (22m 18s):
Just be okay. And I will talk to you in the next podcast.

A tale of 2 Women: One in her head, one in her heart
The questions your heart is always asking and you don't even realize it.
Sometimes we are feminine - sometimes we are in our masculine.
Power Pillar #1: What is Your answer to this Question - "Am I Enough to be loved?"
Power Pillar #2: The Truth Is...the answer is "YES - I am enough".
Power Pillar #3: Hope-Filled Action - Just "Be". That's all.