Where are the elders?

So I have actually come through a weekend of hell that I didn't even realize.  I am fighting with myself - a battle of wills and I realize who do I have to talk to about this?  Oh right my life coach - so here goes.  If you watched my weekend from the outside you would see that really it just looked lazy. No matter how hard I tried I couldn't seem to hunker down and get work done and now as usual I'm forced to work madly with a deadline looming and things that are left too late.  My children will suffer for this and I will try not to be angry and stressed.  Who's fault is it? - Mine.  However, this life pattern is so hard to break - for awhile I will go along and be fine and then it grinds to a halt like this weekend.  I'm smart enough now not to lie to myself - I had plenty of time to get projects done this weekend but instead I escaped and read books and didn't do what needed to be done and now I'm in panic mode.  Look I'm even procrastinating to a certain extent by writing this - ridiculous. So I'm going to get coached about going in to flight mode.  My work that I get paid for will get done on time - but other stuff with fall to the way side like childrens' school, my homework, spiritual work, exercise.  So why do I do this to myself?  That's what I'm wondering.

I titled this where are the elders because I feel this lack in our society.  Don't get me wrong I have  a great mother I can go to and talk with but she is facing enough of her own stress (some caused by me and I need to elleviate that) and I don't want to add more.  So I feel this lack of wisdom in my surroundings.  We have lost a sense of guidance in our culture - oh I can get a book out, take a course, talk to a friend, pay for therapy but there is no built in cultural wisdom to fall back on.  Who can I run to and say -why, why do I flee from life?  Why do I doubt myself all the time?  Why do I constantly let myself fall so I prove  my unworthiness?  You see I can come up with the answers to that in my head because I have taken the courses and done some of the work, but I want to sit in a circle with the wise ones where they look in my eyes and don't criticize my lack of worthiness but bolster the confidence I need.  Not by patting me on the shoulder and condoning my insecurities but telling me stories, looking me in the eyes, bringing me in to the fold, pushing me in to the dark nights of the soul but being there on the other side.   They would tell me you are not crazy dear sister, no on has ever explained your gift to you have they?  You do not have to be like the others but you do need to fight for your gift?  You must grow up little one for you are no longer a child you soon will take your place in this circle and you must have the  breathe of assurance in yourself to do so?
These are the words I long to hear.  Where is the circle my mother didn't get to enter, my  grandmother?  So I struggle and howl at the moon and search my heart for the wisdom that I know the ancestors of my family have place it there, the spirit of wisdom and love is there to find from God, Great Spirit, the Universe whatever you may call it and I know this.  But I long, I long for the counsel, the wisdom, and the warm embrace of the cirlce of elders.....

THE INSANITY HAS TO STOP NOW

THE INSANITY HAS TO STOP - NOW!!!

I’m a writer. It’s in my very essence, however, I rarely write. I don’t have confidence in my ability and often I just don’t know what to write about. So my motivation is usually to let spirit move me and wait for the inspiration to come.Well checking my facebook account this morning was that inspiration. I can’t even say why it hit so profoundly today. I have often seen posts on this topic that bothered me but something in me snapped today. And before you read on I need to clear a few things up. 1. This is not a male bashing article. 2. This is not ignoring that bad things happen to boys but my focus here is women.

We do not have equality!!! I don’t care what your comments are, I don’t care what your opinion is, I don’t care what dammed study you have read, I don’t care what your religion is, I don’t care if you are a man or a woman, I don’t care if you are paid the same as your counterparts, I don’t care if a woman ‘took’ your job, I don’t care if you go to work or stay home, I don’t care if you live in an ‘advanced’ nation or a third world country, I don’t care if you have little girls at home, I don’t care if you have gone to a march, I don’t care if you mother was mean, I don’t care if your boss is a grumpy witch, I don’t care if you don’t believe in feminism - I don’t care. You know why? Because facts are facts - the equality is not there. People talk about the stats - 1 in 4 girls will be sexually abused; no its 50%; no actually it’s higher- are you reading these numbers people?!!! Who cares what the official number is - it should not exist at all. What are we doing as a society? Why are we not changing this number? Don’t get me wrong there are some amazing organizations far more dedicated to this cause than my one angry rant but I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!! Until I start reading articles about how rape culture is gone, how date rape drugs have been eradicated, how it is almost unheard of to read about girls being sexually abused and where rape is obliterated then I won’t be satisfied. 

If you think women are inferior, if you think women have no voice, if you think it’s ok to rape because women were mean to you or maybe they hurt you when you were little, if you think she meant yes, if you just couldn’t stop the urge, if your religion says men are superior then I have something to say - THAT'S BULLSHIT!! Yes I swore in my article - it’s complete and total CRAP!!!

And women if you don’t report a coworker abusing another coworker, a relative hurting little girls, a rape, a friends abusive husband because she may get mad, a soccer coach that is inappropriate or even your spouse or brother - STOP IT!!! It is NEVER, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER OK!!!! They are never in the right, it is never ok to protect them because they are paragons of society, he tore your family apart, not you by reporting !!!  Stand up - be the voices of the voiceless!! If you tell me you don’t know someone who has been molested or raped I call Bullshit! It means you haven’t been having the right conversations. And the fact that we all know someone or even more likely, we are someone who has been sexually abused, is monstrously wrong. To my friends and family that have been affected I am SO SORRY!! This should have never ever happened to you.

Take a stand today and say NO MORE!! Don’t say satan has a hold, it’s impossible to change the culture, it’s your religion, you don’t have a voice - STOP IT!! Shout it - out loud. NO MORE - NO MORE our girls and women will be seen as sexual objects no more. We have a right to walk down the street without getting raped. We have the right to grown up in a home without worrying about our uncle or pastor or dad for that matter.  We have a right to work wherever we damn well please and not get harassed. My daughter has the right to grow up as a teen girl and not have to wear date rape nail polish just in case an asshole shows up. She shouldn’t have to carry pepper spray and learn self defense. She shouldn’t have to fear entire religions in the world that say she is inferior. She should look in the mirror and say what a lovely beautiful woman you are go take on the world. The beautiful equal world not a scary one.

I am done with little girls having to testify against their attacker because our society didn’t protect her - her parents should never have had to worry about her safety. I’m tired of hearing of 3 year old's - 3 HOLY SHIT - being raped!!!  WHAT!! What flippin planet do I live on? No NO NOOOOO and more No - I will no longer be part of a society that turns a blind eye on this ridiculous, immoral, unconscionable, WRONG inequality. Women matter and if you don’t stand up for them tomorrow it will be your best friend (hell it probably already is), it will be your niece, your neighbor, you, and even worse your 3 year old daughter - can you really tell me you are okay with that?

I pray to every God that everyone believes in in this world that your answer is NO or we are doomed.