IWD: The Divine Feminine
Today I had the pleasure of having coffee with my friend Libby at the Chief Clubhouse in downtown SF (thank you Libby for inviting me!) and I was mesmerized by how gorgeous the space was. It’s clear what a difference it makes when something is designed by women, for women. In a stark contrast to the industrial, masculine, tech-bro office spaces I’m accustomed to, Chief felt… right. Soft, rounded furniture with lush and inviting fabrics, textures and colors. Velvet curtains adding warmth and sophistication. Phone booths with mirrors and selfie ring lights so that you can look your best on your important calls. These are the details that celebrate the feminine, and on International Women’s Day, it has me thinking about a much bigger issue.
I may venture *slightly* out of my expertise here but let’s go with it. I recently saw one of the Tesla Cybertrucks in person for the first time. I was struck by two thoughts at once: 1) Wow and 2) This must have been designed by a man.
The truck’s sharp edges and stainless-steel frame are about as masculine as can be and while the design is certainly impressive, it made me realize that it’s men who are deciding what the “future” looks like, even at an aesthetic level. By law, the future is a blank slate, and yet this one single automobile design will surely influence the next generation of car design, and before we know it, most cars will look sharp, sleek, brutalist and industrial as a standard. But what if a woman had designed this car? What design decisions would she have made that would then trickle down and influence the rest of automobile design for the next 50 years? What would “the future” look like if women got to decide what our spaces, our transportation, and our physical environment look like? And what would psychologically change for us as as society if our foundational principles of space and time were grounded in the feminine rather than the masculine? Would we have more parks instead of skyscrapers? Would our homes be bubbles instead of blocks? Would we prioritize sleep, rest, and connection over productivity? Would our children feel safer walking home from school if women were the ones charged with keeping our society safe? Would we even worry about safety at all, if women had designed society from the very beginning?
We can all know and understand that masculine and feminine energy are equally important and each hold important roles in maintaining a balance for the natural order of things. Even the seasons and the natural environment possess both qualities at different and critical moments of the life cycle. But as a society, we have been shaped disproportionately by the masculine, begging the question: What are we missing out on? How do we restore balance into how we are organically meant to operate?
To celebrate women on International Women’s Day means many things. It means celebrating the women who have raised us as well as those who have charted new paths for us to have the freedoms that we have today. But more importantly, it means taking a deeply critical, and thus deeply intersectional, look at all of the systemic ways in which women, especially BIPOC/LGBTQ/marginalized women, have been written out of the story. What are we missing when we fail to uplift those voices? What kind of world are we creating for anyone who doesn’t see themselves represented in their system or environment? What kind of future are we designing when only men, or white women, get to make the decisions about “what the future looks like”? What psychological impact are we writing into our fate when we fail to embrace the plurality of the global feminine experience?
My hope today and every day is that everyone has to courage to ask the hard questions, challenge assumptions, check our privileges, and invite the voices that represent and fight for our collective Divine Feminine.