Power is one of our cultural taboos. To desire it is to suggest moral corruption and spiritual deficit. And to be fair to such ideas, we can understand them — those who desire power the most are usually those the least deserving of it. The lust and the will-to-power can easily turn a person into a beast, deficient of all higher human qualities like compassion or temperance.
Still power is something that most seek and desire. Otherwise the countless books on money, seduction, self-improvement would not sell again and again — money, seductive power, beauty, accomplishments all translate into power. The movements for the liberation, legal, social and political benefits of women are often labeled “empowerment” — we understand in it that if a woman has no power and agency over herself that any talk of liberation or such is just a fancy.
For example, we want traction on social media because it is a form of power — the “influencer” wields power of influence; a writer who is powerful wields power to impact others and the collective mind. At the end of the day — if what you offer is genuinely good and something that people benefit from or are inspired by, why shouldn’t that thing have power to reach people and bestow “blessings” of beauty, wisdom or anything else upon them?
Yet to admit, as a woman, that you want power is to invite even more pearl-clutching. The world may tolerate it in a man, even admire when he is debauched in his will-to-power, but not to you. And still, power calls you since you are it — you are the embodiment of power. If you have internalised the social whispers, you will hide from it and hide yourself from the world — you will castrate and neuter yourself lest someone in your vicinity is affected (and it is understandable since their reactions can often be violent). But as you do it, you will fixate on and envy women who dare express their power — the “gold digger” who marries a billionaire, the “slut” who makes money from her body/sexuality and gets married to a good man while you remain single, the “air headed” girl who giggles her way into admiration, influence and money…
We may admire the stories of Helen of Troy or of Cleopatra and their power. We may idolise and are drawn to the images of femme fatales, of sexually liberated women, because they demonstrate power to us. We may dream about being a woman who with a single move can bring “a man to his knees”. We admire and dream because it feels aspirational, almost god-like.
Many women also fantasise about or desire a “powerful dark man”, who, even in their own fantasies is often an underground, chthonic, “dark” figure — he is an image of masculinity that is not radiant and high, but one that is tied to the power of the chthonic earth. He is the son of Gaia, dwelling in her belly which is the Underground. The fantasy of him is fantasy of “descent” into the earth and her power — it is the end of the more “etheric”, disembodied ways of being, of the “maiden” and the start of the chthonic fertility deity. She is no longer a dream, a vision, but flesh, blood, death (and so the soil for the abundance of life to emerge).
The power we speak of here is not the egoic desire for control which we often associate it with, but power to move and set things in motion. As mentioned earlier, woman is the embodiment of this. Volupta often mentions that all woman has to do is exist—naked or in a burqa—to cause a wave of reactions and days of discourse on social media. This is why we cannot approach it with same advice given to men — advice for men is full of control and subduing of ego and will-to-power exactly because a man does not naturally embody it and so will seek to obtain it (and often through impure means). This is not to suggest that a man is to stay away from power. His path towards it is different. His journey is to purify himself so that power may be granted to him, laid down before him — like a knight who is offered Excalibur by the Lady of the Lake. The sword has magical powers but is only offered to a hero worthy of it.
Counterintuitively, when as a woman, you surrender to this force that is inside of you, you find the most profound purity and ease, as you stop moving against yourself.
You probably have seen that famous quote that often circles around, by Elana Dykewomon:
“Almost every woman I have ever met has a secret belief that she is just on the edge of madness, that there is some deep, crazy part within her, that she must be on guard constantly against ‘losing control’ — of her temper, of her appetite, of her sexuality, of her feelings, of her ambition, of her secret fantasies, of her mind.”
or the one from the “My Brilliant Friend” by Elena Ferrante:
“They were more severely infected than the men, because while men were always getting furious, they calmed down in the end; women, who appeared to be silent, acquiescent, when they were angry flew into a rage that had no end.”
These are the feelings that emerge when you deny yourself the power that you are and when in order to preserve the fragile worlds of others, you sacrifice yourself. You sacrifice at the altar of their weakness and impurity. Woman’s rage comes from the perception of injustice, since woman’s fear is not the fear of being annihilated (like man’s often is) but of being treated unjustly. The madness arises from constant castration of oneself, from forcing yourself to be “nothing” when in fact you are “so much” and very much a “something” (everything reacts and has an opinion of you).
The power of a woman is a simple truth. Mother has power of life and death over her children, a woman who simply walks the street without hiding her beauty or appeal has power over the people who will look at her (and be positively or negatively impacted), a woman has the power to decide whether a man’s seed is worth going into future. How often in fiction do we see the cult leader have that one woman who is his most devoted follower, willing to spread “his gospel” and punish those who go against it? She gives power to his ideas, she gives them life so that they can circulate. People may be apprehensive of a man but they will be less guarded around a woman.
Power as force that moves and creates is not evil. And neither is it good. It is neutral — we often hear how same hammer that builds something can crush the thing. It is same with power. It is not about avoiding it but about the correct use of it. We can use social media influence to post rage baits or we can use it to bring something of value into the lives of others.
But to go back to an earlier point — often, the images of female power in our current culture are of more forward and predatory women. Those of course, are also faces of the Feminine & serve a purpose but power doesn’t only come in the form of femme fatale or such and to force a woman who isn’t naturally so into that role can harm her. There is power, as above said, in the mother and the matriarch who the entire family obeys and even the sons who are “big men” fear. There is a power in the “doe-eyed” maiden — her blushing can inspire virility, or if not, the agitation that her gentleness causes in others is also the mirror to her power.
Today, as usual, Volupta shall give you ways to develop a wholesome relationship with your power and ways to protect yourself against the reactions of others.