Why are men and women competing with each other? Why are we choosing life partners basis an agenda? Why are we witnessing increased misogyny and feminism in and outside courtrooms? Why in a country like ours, where we have grown up worshipping SHIVA and SHAKTI(the two cosmic energies of masculine and feminine), we are still fighting gender wars? Why we are not realising the power each gender carries? Why have we lost the faith in the power each gender carries? When did we forget ‘WE ARE ONE’?
To understand our oneness, we have to first understand our separateness.
We have to go back to basics of understanding what we really are.
Let me start by dropping a truth bomb here, after much self-reflection, visiting my own duality and an intense research, I have come to the conclusion that both men and women have both masculine and feminine energies in them. Yes we carry both energies in us. And that’s what makes us a complete human being.
When both these energies are in balance within us, we achieve a union within, which is divine in nature. We call it divine union or Love Vipassana. And when we are in imbalance within, we attract Hell. Because today we are getting more and more imbalanced as human beings, we are manifesting this battle of genders, failed marriages, hatred, competition in our work environment and in short a corrupted world. In fact in context of marriage, if we observe we are slowly moving from failed marriages to late marriages to no-marriages because we have totally lost the faith in the other. And this, really is very sad. If this continues, the institution of marriage will shut down soon.
Let me explain this imbalance a little more in detail.
We as humans, carry both aspects of masculine and feminine energies in us. Yogis call it Ida Pingla, Chinese Philosophers call them Yin and yang, Scientists call them Right brain and Left Brain. And when we evoke both energies in us, we become a complete human being.
We achieve a state of Love Vipassana. A state that beyond gender tags. It is the state of complete union within. No separation at all.
How do we get there? It might sound complicated yet it is very simple. Let’s understand the two energies(Masculine & Feminine) in their totality first. Both carry positive and negative aspects.
1)Positive masculine and distorted masculine.
2)Positive feminine and distorted feminine
For a complete union, we have to understand the qualities and vices of Divine Feminine and Divine Masculine Polarities. Knowing them is our first step on the path. Almost all masters say, ‘Know thyself’, because once we know us, we would know everyone.
The man will know the woman and the woman will know the man and peace shall prevail. Because when we know that what we carry within is what the other also carries, it would be easy to accept the other with more love and acceptance.
Ladies first, so let me first talk about how to evoke Divine Feminine energies in us.
1) Resting- When we pause, we allow divine feminine grace to flow through us. Just being in the moment, no music, no tv, no books, just being in your breath and body. In this void, we connect to our higher self or intuition and download lifechanging ideas. Stop here, take a deep breath and release it, this peace which you just felt is this energy.
2) Intuitive – When we are in peace within us, without any ripples or anxiety, when there is no restlessness, we receive the gift of ‘intuition’. It is our inner voice guiding us to what’s best for us. It is a divine blessing we receive when we surrender to the divine. Intuition happens when we disconnect from all sources of information externally and go within. Intuition is a super power(which knows everything) and the more we listen to our intuition, the more we increase this power in us. This is pure divine feminine energy in us.
3) Heart-centered – Being focused on qualities of heart like- love, care, generosity, patience, gratitude, loving kindness, forgiveness, connection etc. When we practice these qualities of our heart, we open our heart and we give power to this divine feminine
quality in us.
4) Wise – When we are connected to our heart and listen to our intuition, by default we take wise decisions. Wisdom flows through us in our being. Wisdom takes care of everything.
5) Nurturing – When we nurture ourselves, our ideas and our loved ones, we get in touch with our inner feminine. It is usually agenda less. It gives that nurturing for the sake of giving only. It is pure energy.
6) Allowing/Receiving – When we allow us to be open to receive new ideas, ways or solutions, or even our relationships without any resistance, we are in the most fluid feminine energy. This non-resistant nature in all situations makes us divine.
7) Creative – When we create anything, be it a song, movie, a dish, a piece of art or even a solution for a problem, we evoke our creative energies or our divine feminine self.
8) Sensual – It is time to claim the beautiful quality of the divine feminine – sensuality. She is the life force of all creation and that fire within has to be owned and not denied as something dirty. When we sensually awaken ourselves, desire our own self, hold ourselves beautiful in our own eyes, find beauty in our own grace, magnetism and accept even our imperfect self perfectly, we own our worth as a woman. The passion of a sensually awakened woman infuses her whole life. She dances through beauty of life. We can evoke our sensuality by indulging in sensual body moves, feeding us food that satiates us, indulging in fragrances we like, taking care of our inner beauty and external appearance, by listening to music or sounds we love. In other words, we can connect to our divine feminine by indulging all our senses – touch, smell, look, sound, taste to please our inner feminine.
9) Compassionate – When our divine feminine energy awakens, we become most selfless and compassionate beings. When we give just from the sheer joy of giving. There’s no agenda, there’s no hidden desire to receive that back. It is pure unconditional giving.
10) Collaborative – When we understand that nothing operates as a single unit, when we recognize the importance of each person’s existence and that how together by supporting each other we can work effectively towards achieving common higher goals.
11) Kind – This energy makes us kind, forgiving and appreciative of ourselves and the others in our life.
12) Magic – What everyone finds miraculous, or magic, is actually Divine Feminine energy that has the power to create within. It is fast and apt mostly because of its intuitive nature but mostly in the quest of logic, we snub our intuition and not let it guide us to the magic in store for us. As true aspirants seeking union of masculine and feminine energies, we must learn to balance between logic and magic and also be willing to lose the balance sometimes to watch the magic. It is the battle of ‘control’ vs. ‘losing control’. When we let go control, we allow God to deliver us what’s best for us, magically.
13) Abundant Mentality – When we operate out of a secure mindset that there’s enough in this world, we activate our abundant mentality. We don’t get into small mindedness of ‘this is mine’ or ‘this is yours’, we know universe has ample for all. We open heartedly share our resources, our ideas and not operate out of greed, narrow mindedness or scarcity that makes us hold on to things, ideas and people only for our personal benefit. This is the highest divine feminine quality which is often represented as Laxmi(Goddess of Abundance in India). We are fools to equate Laxmi with only money. It is Goddess energy that brings us our abundance mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually. Some people even hate Laxmi by equating it just with its physical aspect, because of their limited beliefs and experiences and failure to see Laxmi in its completion.
Now that we know the divine aspects feminine polarity in us, let's understand the negative aspects of it. Let’s see how distorted feminine energy plays within us. Remember this caters to both men and women. We both carry both in us.
1) Inner emptiness – We feel something is missing and we constantly try to fill that void with something external. For example, indulging in gossiping, shopping, drinking, browsing on phone, watch too much tv, seeking romantic partner, seeking appreciation, looking for external pleasure. Basically, we feel empty within and feel anxious the moment there’s free space and we run to our popular addictions not knowing what to do and falling more and more.
2) Superficial beauty – Spending all energy in trying to fix our looks or external beauty. Spending all energy in parlors, or online buying beauty products or giving all importance to external appearance. We are totally distorted if we measure our value through our outward appearance.
3) Drama – ‘When we don’t allow the present moment to be, we create drama.’ – Eckhart Tolle. We often resist situations and life problems by trying to stay busy. We feel by engaging in things that divert us from being in present moment, we can be relieved of them. Well suppressing something only makes it worse. We create Family drama, love drama, office drama, disease drama, tragedy drama- all just to keep us busy through the day. We crib, complain and spend our day revisiting this drama, day in and day out. We rather create drama than face what’s actually that we are trying to escape? We are big drama queens. We not only do drama, we also feed on other people’s drama by staying in toxic situations. And this applies even to men with dominating feminine in them. Don’t you know men who are big drama queens?
4) Victimhood – Blaming others for whatever we go through is victimhood. It’s a mentality in which we blame others for our shortcomings and losses. Rather than taking responsibility for our own life, we blame others.
5) Co-dependency – Depending on the other for our basic needs mentally, physically, emotionally and financially is Co-dependency. It is very toxic because in this we give our power and responsibility to someone else. This makes us dependent on the other and that leads to a lot of negativity in us, making us possessive, insecure, jealous, lacking self-worth and self-respect. In codependent relationships, we give all energy to other, so that he or she can fulfil our needs and when that doesn’t happen, we resent them. Co-dependency says ‘you complete me’. All the toxic romanticism gave birth to this behavioral issue. It is a deep subject and I’ll talk at length about it in my upcoming articles.
6) Attention stealing – By always putting your own needs over the other, by always wanting the other to cling to you, by creating drama and situations directly or indirectly to get his all attention is stealing attention. For example, an extreme example of someone seeking attention would be someone creating a disease just to get love, care and attention of loved ones. If we knew, how deep our desires go, we would work more aggressively to look within.
7) Planning for own selfish motives – This is a very common trait of woman or man with distorted feminine energy for own gain. They scheme maliciously to consciously hurt the other and get some advantage out of the situation. These days a lot of time is spent to choose a life partner basis a list of wants and desires.
Women lure a rich man looking for her future security. Man woos a woman who seems docile so that she can adjust with his parents. Both never get what they want because when we scheme against someone (especially in the name of love), divine justice punches us on our face.
8) Lack mentality – We carry a mentality which is narrow. If others get something, we start comparing. We forget all the good that God has given us but we compare in that one thing which we lack. We make our universe small and limited by hosting such regressive thoughts. This lack mentality is also the root cause of jealousy. And this doesn’t let us be in peace. Even the fear of missing out stems out of Lack Mentality. The truth is universe is abundant and has enough for all. With faith and by imbibing divine masculine and feminine qualities, we can heal this toxicity in us and manifest all that our heart desires.
9) Emotional Blackmailing- Playing with other’s emotion to get your way around is one of the favourite manipulations of the feminine. She will blackmail with her tears, with her victimhood, with her being the weaker sex, putting the other in guilt, not even knowing how ingrained this habit is in her. She will deny that it’s an act, but it is totally agenda driven. Withholding emotions or being extremely emotional is another form of emotional blackmailing. Heard of crocodile tears?
10) Fantasy driven – Too much dreaming about things, thinking things will manifest magically. Magic happens when we put in effort. In this behavior trait, we feel an exaggerated sense of self which is totally false. Distorted feminine lives in a fantasy that everyone loves her, wants her or that she is worthy of a prince who will come and rescue her from her problems. It is all fantasy she carries from the stories she has heard or imagined in her head.
11) Too allowing – When we put on a façade of being ‘overly accepting’ even if we are not ok with it. This comes from our childhood when we are taught, “Good girls never say no’ or how as girls we have to be flexible and allowing.
12) Excessively emotional – We as humans are supposed to own our emotions gracefully. Anger, Jealosy, feeling bad about something are all real emotions and if they are left unattended or unheard, emotions, they ooze out in an extremely toxic way. We throw anger tantrums, cry excessively and take our unprocessed emotions out on people who don’t deserve them. The saying, ‘hurt people hurt people’ is referring to this damage we unknowingly do to our loved ones. Only if we knew, we can turn this around totally to ‘healed people heal people’.
13) Fear of conflict – When we stay mum to avoid being in spot. When we don’t stand up for our truth out of the fear of losing peace in a relationship. When we keep pretending that all is well out of fear of argument or losing a relationship, this is all self-harming as it makes us fake. We basically keep lying to keep harmony which is fake. With a war in our hearts, how does it matter it there’s harmony outside. We know its fake and killing us deeply. So why not honor our real feelings? If we won’t, who would.
14) Fear from masculine – This comes from the fear around the masculine figures we had around us in our childhood. If we have past unpleasant memories of childhood with men, we will continue to fear them even in our adulthood. To heal this, we have to go deep and work on our father wounds. Then we will receive better relationships with the male gender.
15) Rejecting practicality totally – Living too much in the heart or emotions, cuts us from logic and practicality. We usually discount the importance of head conveniently out of sheer laziness in us which doesn’t want to make an effort and work on logics. That is why women are labelled ‘blonde’, ‘dumb’ or even honored with phrases like ‘Common sense is not so common’. This is just our laziness to see the complete picture of things which makes us distorted.
16) Works hard to prove her worth- The distorted feminine believes to win someone’s love or respect, she has to work hard. This comes from a deep childhood wound where she had to work hard to win her parents approval and love. Actually, this is a generational wound, and we keep passing it on the next generation. Little do we know that we don’t have to do anything to win anyone’s love. We just have to be. We just have to know us and then love us unconditionally. By the end of this book, you’ll know yourself well enough to feel loved in your own presence. And that love will overflow in all areas of your life. I promise you that
17) Taking your decisions basis what others believe – Instead of trusting your own intuition, you are ready to believe other people in your life. You take important life decisions basis what everyone else in your life feels. Don’t we know of those people who call us every time to help them take decisions. They lack a connection with their own self and just do what others say and later repent and blame the same person for pushing them into that decision. Toxic!
Now that we know the divine feminine and distorted feminine in us, lets understand the divine masculine polarity in us. Let’s look at what qualities we can embody to awaken our Divine Masculine Self.
1) Risk taking – The divine masculine embodies inner strength and courage not just in physical sense but also emotionally and spiritually. It is these qualities that help him take risks, face challenges with resilience and perseverance. He is willing to take risk yet remains unattached to the outcome and this detachment is divine energy.
2) Assertive instead of aggressive – Instead of using our physical strength, demeanor or voice, when we put our point across assertively without an iota of anger or force in it, we are in our divine masculine energy. Aggression comes from anger and the need to be right and heard, assertiveness comes from the purity of doing things the right way. Understand the difference.
3) Leadership – This energy evokes the power of third eye in you. Being the masculine energy(Shiva), it helps us see far hence giving us a vision, that not only motivates us but also helps us inspire our teams to pursue their higher potential and purpose.
4) Logic – This energic uses rational thinking and logical analysis to make decisions. It works to balance emotions with logic.
5) Action-oriented – Sometimes out of distorted masculine energy of perfection we internalize the idea too much. We keep holding onto it, trying to make it perfect. In our divine masculine energy, we lean on our intuition to know the right time to take action. We take actions that are driven by intuition not habit.
6) Integrity – Being honest to ourself, speaking our truth, honoring our truth and standing up for our truth are all aspects of integrity.
7) Objective – Having a purpose behind the action. Not just living and acting out of egos just randomly but out of purpose for a cause. It often maintain an obejective and detached perspective, enabling clear understanding not driven out of emotions. This ability to remain objective allows in unbiased assessments and problem solving.
8) Strategic – The ability to see both pros and cons, to see long-term potentials helps us plan well. The divine masculine energy makes us though through, adept at strategic thinking and taking right decisions.
9) Emotionally Intelligent – This involves being in touch with our emotions, expressing them authentically and holding space for others to express theirs’s.
10) Protective – The divine masculine energy protects self needs without asserting power on others. This energy is caring and nurturing that promotes growth and well-being of self and loved ones.
11) Responsible – Takes responsibility for actions and takes blame for mistakes and learns from them to create positive change.
12) Respect- This trait makes us honor and respect others as they are. It respects the divinity in the other. And the divinity within.
13) Connected- This energy is connected to divine and understands that there’s more to life than material possessions.
14) Generous and giving – This energy freely gives its time, attention and resources to others without expecting anything in return.
15) Order and structure – With a fixed routine, discipline and structure, this energy helps us achieve impossible goals. When we foster stability and predictability in everyday routine, we bring clarity to even chaotic situations.
16) Systematic Thinking – Divine Masculine energy understands the system as a whole. It understands how organisations move, how society moves, how groups moves. In other words it understands the interconnectedness of things and takes decisions and plan accordingly with a complete perspective. It is holistic in its approach.
17) Solution- driven – This energy doesn’t dwell on problems, instead focuses on finding practical solutions. It focuses on overcoming obstacles rather than talking about them.
Those were the divine qualities that exist in us but we also have distorted masculine energy within us. We must make efforts to know them deeply.
1) Lust – We operate with lust if we judge us and people with just physical appearance. This is very subtle and often manifests as ‘excessive touching’, ‘uncontrollable looking’, ‘looking for external appreciation’ etc. When we just operate out of our sexual desires and our life revolves around seeking pleasure all the time, we must know we are in total grasp of our lust and sure to be doomed.
2) Self-obsession & Narcissism – Too much love for own ideas, own thoughts, own existence, so much so that it is doesn’t care if might hurt another is self-obsession. Narcissistic tendencies in our distorted inner masculine make us controlling and manipulative with others for our own advantage. There is a very thin line between self-love and self-obsession and its easy for someone practicing ‘self-love to fall on the other side. That is the most hurtful fall and a warrior on the path should always be vigilant to take note time to time on his pride and sense of entitlement to avoid this kind of fall.
3) Competitive – Competitiveness is what a distorted masculine energy brings to our peace. We are happy in our own world, when suddenly our competitiveness will be triggered in us to see our colleague, neighbor, sibling, friend doing better than us. We are blinded by this false envy which makes us an enemy of our own loved ones. We compare consistently and spend whole life trying to ‘one-up’ the other, rather than doing our own thing. Our existence becomes entangled with proving that we are better than them.
4) Materialism & ambitiousness – When all our existence is invested in possessing physical things and to achieve a certain physical status or certain in life. We as human beings have to find a balance in our physical and spiritual world. Our humanness finds peace in growth in the physical world and our being finds peace in growth in our inner world. Distorted Masculine in us keeps us more focused on the physical plane. But in our Divine Union energies we achieve the balance of Human and the Being within.
5) Inaction – Out of fear of going wrong, we freeze or remain stuck in our situations. We self-sabotage and stay in the state if inaction.
6) Rage & violence – When we use our anger to control the other. Raising voice, using physical power or emotionally abusing are some forms of rage and violence that come from our distorted masculine energies.
7) Stuck in winner/loser dynamic – When everything is a battle and personal. When we just want to win in all circumstances.
8) Abuse of power and control – When we strive to get powerful and use that power to control and meet own personal agendas rather than for the benefit of a larger group of people, we are distorted and in a negative life state. We become dominating, controlling and abusive in this state.
9) Rejection of intuition – When we snub our inner voice each time it tries to wake us up. We keep distracting us with addictions, habits and in everyday drama to avoid walking on our intuition.
10) Fear of intimacy – When we feel fear in coming close, opening our heart or becoming vulnerable to our loved one, that means we have distorted masculine in us. True love requires complete surrender and is possible only when we are in divine union inside us.
11) Extreme individualism – When it is all about ‘me’, ‘me’ and ‘me’, then it is my individuality that is causing inner separation. How can there be union when there is seperation.
12) Extreme rationalism – Too much logic kills the magic. Logic is masculine. Over analysis is distorted masculine and it kills the divine feminine magical ‘intuition’.
13) Inability to praise the other – When we compete and compare every moment, we become stingy in many ways, we shut our heart and eyes to the goodness of the other. Constant comparison makes us toxic within.
14) Rejecting emotions – When we fail to see our emotions, what moves us, what our real needs are, we keep rejecting our real emotions and keep distracting them towards something else, we confuse ourselves into mental diseases and distortion.
15) Playing it Big- When we feel small, we project a larger than life ‘image’ of us to the other. The reality is we are feeling very small that is why we want to prove to the other how big we are all. The time.
16) Hyper Independence- Wanting to be free of responsibility of another. Extreme need for independence or self sufficiency is a distortion of the masculine in us.
17) Lack of empathy – Distorted Masculine struggles to understand other’s emotions and feels lack of connection with others. Not being empathetic stops the masculine’s ability to understand other’s struggles and challenges and leads to failed relationships.
We must know that both masculine and feminine energies are intertwined. One triggers the other. Both have equal and unique powers. Both cannot exist independently. They are interdependent. In divine state, they take us up to ‘moksha’ or to the heaven and in distorted state, they take us down to the hell. We need both inside us and that too in balance. When they are imbalanced, we create suffering for us and our loved ones.
When we observe them with equanimity, knowing that we carry both masculine and feminine within with positives and distortions, we achieve a state of oneness, we convert our suffering into blessing. This state of Divine Union within is what we call Love Vipassana. It is the route map to inner union of masculine and feminine.
Understanding and embracing these energies can manifest our desires and improve our relationships with our loved ones. It will also end the battle of the genders one day. It will bring back the lost respect and love for each other. Marriage won’t have an agenda then. It would be born out of pure love. Love and only love is the need of the day. But somebody has to take the responsibility to make a start for that change. Knowing and evoking them is the first step towards the state of Love Vipassana. If not now, then when? If not you, then who?