Category: Women

At War With Women

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I was raised by a first generation feminist. My mother broke into a male dominated field full force. Her generation was the one who shouted, “I am woman hear me roar!” Her generation demanded to be treated as equal in the workplace and not just a piece of meat, “a honey”, or “a sweetie”.  She brought to the table the intelligence to do her job and the strength to push through boundaries of race, culture, and gender. My mother used terms such as Male Chauvinist Pig to describe men who tried to objectify her and tried to take her back to where she had to use her body instead of her mind as a way to move forward in life.

In the beginning of feminism it was about equality. Knowing you were a woman, but not limited to roles in job or pay. Today feminism, like every other movement, has gone to places I can’t follow. They have created a chaos in women’s identity but the one thing they still revere and I still appreciate is that they believe intelligence doesn’t favor a male, in fact, it is equal to those who choose to apply knowledge.

So what is the deal with women today? We have decided cleavage is power. Once again we don’t feel smart enough to compete in the workplace so we use our body. There is a term that when I first heard it, made me cringe and not believe it, but I have to be honest, I am agreeing with it these days. It’s called Female Chauvinist Pig and she is empowering men once again to objectify women by issuing her own war on women by allowing herself to be defined by her body. What causes her to breakdown the work of the women who forged a path for her? Clearly, it’s a self-esteem issue. She doesn’t think she has the smarts to win the battle in the workplace. Women admittedly say they showed cleavage because mistakes on the job were overlooked. Really? So when we don’t have a brain we show our body because being objectified allows us to keep a job we aren’t qualified for? I don’t think so. Women fought hard so that a woman was viewed as a whole person and not just the sum total of her breasts.

In Kathy Shiffer’s article Cleavage=Control? I Don’t Think So, she refers to an article written by Marge Fenelon entitled Cleaveage Does Not Rule where Marge Fenelon makes the statement:

Let’s go back to the title, which suggests that a woman can and should use her cleavage as a means of control over her life. In actuality, it’s not the woman’s life she’d be controlling with her cleavage – it would be the people around her and the way they perceive her. To take it a step further, she wouldn’t really be controlling her life; she’d be controlling the way people respond to her generously-revealed breasts.

Sorry but cleavage isn’t sexy when it’s free to everyone and no one ever looked down a woman’s blouse thinking she was wise.

Men Don’t Matter

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What a lie we have been given.

If you haven’t read Part 2 click here.

As women, born of this generation in America, we have this ideal of a single mother that while true for some is not true for most. We can buy a house without a man, we earn our own income and for some we earn more than the man in our life. For some women who are not interested in equality in a marriage, often because of their own daddy issues, this becomes the seat of power in which we devalue a man and emasculate him to show our power. This has nothing to do with love and everything to do with pride.

We can buy a car, we have great credit and we can afford to do so. We can pay for private school, camp, medical care, and trips to amusement parks. This is the picture of a single mom. Only that usually isn’t the case. Many single moms struggle to make ends meet. Often have more month than money left at the end of their payday, and life isn’t this happy place they thought it would be. They get up early to get their children ready for school, lunches packed, themselves ready. They work hard to get the laundry and dinner and homework finished while they are dogged tired. They make grocery lists and hope there is enough money for the food they need to buy. They make pancakes for dinner at the end of the month because sometimes that’s all there is. They don’t get to go and have spa days or go with friends to have a nice dinner because it isn’t in the budget.

And no matter how much we try and no matter how much advances in technology and medicine we make:

A woman can’t be a father.

 

No matter how much we try to fill the void of a male influence we can’t do it. We’re failing miserably statistically. Our children are missing out whether we want to admit it or not. Sure, there are statistics of moms who raised incredible people on their own but they don’t outweigh the statistics of those who can’t. I have a saying,

“A woman can do it all. She just can’t do it all at once.”

So while we’re busy earning a buck and climbing a corporate ladder, our children are missing out on a critical component of a family. In their mind, they are learning that they may have to go it alone that one day, they too may be called to raise children on their own because families may or may not be sustained.

So let’s throw the lie out. Let’s begin a discussion with young women about how valuable they are and how we need to make better choices in the men we choose to father our children. Let’s talk about working on our marriage before they are broken and let’s talk about marriage before babies. I know it sounds counter-culture and I know it it will sound sexist and it will be met with push back and name calling but I’m okay with that. And here is why: Watch this video and tell me daddies aren’t important. Watch this video and tell me that she has someone else who fills this void in her life regardless of who her daddy is. Tell me that these daddies are not necessary. Tell me that she isn’t affected.

“When he does time, she does time.”

 

I’m okay with the being an unpopular voice if a child gets an active, involved, worthwhile, father. I’m okay with the term baby daddy being thrown out of our vocabulary. Because it was never meant to be there in the first place.

A Dad Is Important to His Daughter

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So here is Part 2 to the post I wrote about why father’s are important. If you didn’t catch it, click here so you have a basis of where I’m going with this.

Let me tell you a little known story about my life. Its basis is formed on a lot of self evaluation and counseling and reading and life.

As a little girl I was a daddy’s girl. I liked the things he liked, I admired him, I thought the goofiest things he did were absolutely wonderful. He was the light of my life. He was my safety and my love. That all changed around age 13ish. Suddenly the goofy man who could never remember lyrics to songs so he’d make them up, was irritating. The man who broke out in a falsetto out of tune rendition of a Queen song was embarrassing. I no longer wanted to hang out with him and I no longer really wanted to sit on his lap and all of this is a normal progression of life and puberty. Your parents are supposed become nerds or we’d never the leave home. There’s a post for another day.

Only my dad didn’t know how to take this. He retreated as well. We no longer had the conversations about boys and how they were supposed to treat women. We no longer had secret dates to the mall where he’d buy me something my mother forbade. We became awkward with each other. Not on purpose, neither of us had the tools we needed.

One night, when I was about 14 my dad called me on the phone. It was late about 2 am and I was breaking curfew by talking on the phone and I thought I was busted. Instead he began to talk about how he loved me, missed me and felt disconnected. He said, “I wish I could reach you but you’re so caught up with boys and friends and I don’t know how to make this better.” I assured him I loved him and told him I would be fine because honestly I didn’t know what I needed any more than he did.

A year later I had my first boyfriend. I was doing stupid things, going against my convictions and knowing that I was doing the wrong thing only I didn’t know where to stop. My father was becoming even more distant, sending my mother in to talk to me about his concerns. He was concerned that I was on the brink of having sex with my boyfriend but didn’t know how to approach me. We were creating a chasm in our relationship that honestly still exists today. How I wish we both knew better in these moments but you know, parents do the best they can with what they have. Neither of us had been here before and we didn’t have Dr. Laura and the experts telling us how to do this father/daughter thing right.

My father completely shut down when I became pregnant. When I decided to get married he sat me down and had one of the most profound conversations of my life. He said I had made serious mistakes but they didn’t have to continue. He urged me not to get married. He said it would be a disaster and he also told me that if I insisted he would not attend.

As I walked out of the door to the chapel to get married, my father looked me in the eye and said, “Don’t go.” I smiled at him and said, “Oh daddy, I love you and it will be fine.” Of course it wasn’t.

Do you get why I think dads are important? Because when mine stepped away is when I floundered. When a dad is absent is when a child gets in trouble. And I’m out of time and not finished talking so wait for Part 3.

Daddy Is Home

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My mother created a culture in our home in which our family wasn’t complete until my dad came home. There was always a celebration, a feeling of security and warmth and love when my dad entered the scene. She taught us that he was important to our well-being.

She tells the story of when she was a little girl and her father had to work three jobs to make ends meet. When she would get up in the morning, her dad was already gone off to work and when she went to bed at night he was still working but she says that she always knew he had come home and that they were loved because he’d leave a treat behind. A pie, or pastry. Something to let them know that he was providing for his family.

It was these memories that have kept me thinking about Father’s Day and all of the appreciation of it. Father’s are critical to the well being of the home. A father, in his proper order, guides and leads a home with strength and character.

The latest statistic is that 43% of children are being raised in fatherless homes. Our statistics in America get dismal from there, click here to read statistics

Despite what anyone tells us as women and how we are capable of raising children alone, we simply lack something that dads bring to the table. Yes, we can clothe and feed a child, teach them manners, help them with their homework, love them beyond belief but children still know something is missing.

TD Jakes said in his message Crash Course in Fatherhood, “Anything a man loves he will take care of it, protect it, provide for it.”

Here’s the truth women. You don’t wait until a man loves you and marries you to have his baby. In fact, you’ll have two or three in the hopes he will marry you. Beloved, if he didn’t do it before babies, what makes you think he’ll do it after? Do you think love is sustained by a forced marriage? We all scream about arranged marriages, yet we have no problem backing up our sisters with the cry of ‘do the right thing’ to a man. How about looking her in the eye and speaking the truth in love? Although she may not need a man to help her financially raise a child, like it or not, she needs a man to help her raise a whole child.

I know I know!! This isn’t a popular message. I become a hater to society who says we must do things our own way but could it be that we, woman, are not embracing the biblical principles set before us, and setting up a house where life is complete when daddy is home? Where a man leaves security for his children on his way to making ends meet?

TD Jakes also said, “When a man has no authority, he has no potency. So when you shout, ‘I am woman hear me roar’, you may be roaring alone.”

We weren’t meant to do this alone. Wait for Part 2, ’cause I’m not done yet.

Women in Community

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This saying hangs on a plaque in my office. It’s an homage to my mom and her sisters.

I was raised by a mother who had three sisters and seven brothers. Those four women were extremely close, my Aunt Margaret has passed away but they still miss her profoundly. I was raised right alongside my cousins. Although we are cousins, we are a lot like siblings in the way we were raised as the sisters had no issue in mothering each other’s children. I began to think about this community of women recently. How each of them have poured into my life and shaped the woman I am today.

Women have the ability to shape and influence a tribe and these women certainly did. They were all very different in their approach to mothering but they all had one common goal to make sure we were loved.

There is a strong bond between these women. None of us will ever know the secrets these sisters have kept for each other. They have their occasional arguments among each other but they have always worked them out… among each other. I can call my aunts with a problem even today and the question is always, “Have you told your mother?” They have fierce loyalty. It is nothing to walk into a room and have them all look up from a serious conversation and stop talking. Their topics are their topics. Yet, when I have found myself in trouble, I could run to any of them and find love and comfort and advice.

I remember as a teen, the first person I told I was pregnant was my Aunt Margaret. She gasped, burst into tears and held me tight. Her words to me were, “Don’t worry. We’ll get through this.” Then later after the shock wore off she said, “You big dummy.”

It was just recently when I was diagnosed with a benign brain tumor that my Tia Pearl, called me on the phone one morning and said quietly and seriously, “Susie, your mom told us about what is going on. Now I need to hear from you what is happening.” When I explained, her next words were, “Why didn’t you call me?” When I explained she said, “Okay Mija (my daughter), do you need me to come up? I can go to the doctors with you.” At the end of the conversation I heard, “Next time call me okay?”

My Nina Delores handled the tumor news in a completely different way. She sent a card. She loves to send and receive mail. Her card read, “Susie, your mom told us what is happening. I am praying and you need to call or come over. We are family.” It’s the same message, different approach.

From these sisters I have learned to be a friend. I have learned to tell the truth even when it isn’t popular, and to stand strong when someone can’t. I have learned to be a voice when someone has no words. I have boldness because these women were never afraid and I have strength because these women are pillars in their family and community.

I don’t know what makes sisters so close. I’ve seen sisters who are in constant competition with each other. I just know I was blessed to be my mom’s daughter and to have aunts who have loved me generously.

When I talk to my friends about “The Sisters”, they laugh and tell me I make them sound like the Joy Luck Club. I don’t know about that, but I know I have some pretty high heels to fill and I know they have prepared me to walk in them.

Despite It All

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Philippians 4:6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; 7 and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. 8 Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy–meditate on these things.

I read a post on Facebook recently how happy posts were fake because people chose to post that their lives were good despite the fact that they had real problems. It made me think about how you can still be happy and positive despite difficulties, or you can judge others in your unhappiness. Not everything in life has to be a major catastrophe to your well-being.

I am in a really happy place right now. I’m sure my life, speech, and yes, Facebook posts show that. It took me a long time to get here and I am relishing in it. I was a pregnant teen who raised children to the age of 48. I had never had an adult life where it was just me. I had never written out a monthly budget that didn’t include children’s lunch or field trip money, a college fund savings, or a extensive food budget. I can leave home on a moment’s notice and not worry about babysitters or dinner. I can clean my kitchen spotless and know when I get up in the morning it’s going to be exactly how I left it. I can turn the music on as loud as I want to and dance without fear of someone saying, “Mom! Stop! It’s so embarrassing when you act like a kid.” I can buy tickets to a concert or a play and not worry about what is being taken out of the budget.

I have a man who loves me beyond measure and is close by my side. We like the same things and we very rarely even argue these days. It’s a peaceful season in our life. My job is going well. I have a lot to do but I’m no longer so driven towards it. I am enjoying the work that I do at a new level. I have a dog that I think is incredible, she is pure love and she is a total spas, who I think has the Young’s A.D.D. problem.

Do I have problems? OF COURSE I DO!! Everyone does. My problems big and small have always been there, not the same ones but isn’t there always something? I’d be lying if I said I don’t sometimes miss being a mommy. Sure, I like the freedom, but there are those days I want to watch Sleeping Beauty with the Princess Casey. The great thing is my age and life experiences have put them in perspective. They no longer rule my every thought. I’ve learned to be content. If you want to learn to be happy, click here for an article I found profoundly useful.

Here’s the problem with judging the heart of someone and determining their motives; you aren’t always right. A person can be happy in the midst of pain. A person can be upbeat even in the midst of chaos. Happiness is a choice. Be depressed, angry, resentful, or petty, if you choose to be, but don’t expect that everyone else will be. It’s entirely up to you. As for me, I’m going to live out this last little bit of life in happiness, I’m going to let go and plunge into the deep things of life and experience freedom, despite it all.

Seizing Power

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Last week I wrote about the word bossy here as it pertains to women, primarily how it pertains to me. The gist of the post was about how I don’t find the word bossy to be bad. When bossy is used correctly it is necessary.  It describes a female leader. A male is described as a boss but the role is still the same. Since I post here and I link it to my Facebook and Twitter pages I was asked about a term I used. I wrote, “I know myself and I know what I am not. I am not a usurper, meaning I don’t seize power, and I am not emotional.” So that brought about a series of questions.  What is a usurper? And then isn’t a bossy woman seizing power?

Usurp – verb -1.  to seize power by force or without legal right 2. to advance beyond proper established limits or to trespass

First we define bossy – ordering people around, overly authoritative

Notice, bossy isn’t usurping power, it’s using power given, sometimes overly using power, I call this rookie mistakes, but within a legal right. The word boss means a person who makes decisions, exercises authority, dominates. A boss has a legal right. It makes sense though that people would think bossy and usurper would be the same thing, because we don’t understand the context in which power is used, and let’s face it, we don’t like power very much except when we have it. The difference is being bossy doesn’t mean we have the right to rule over someone. It’s not the one who barks orders and is demeaning. That isn’t leadership, that’s what I call the Bull In China Shop kind of person and I’ll discuss that in a later post, this person’s style is emotional.

A person who usurps takes over without right. It’s sad when we see it and it isn’t exclusive to women. I’ve seen men try to take over as many time as I’ve seen women.

In marriage, usurping authority are things like siphoning money from the family budget to buy things we want knowing that our spouse wouldn’t approve. It basks in contradiction, and it brings about disunity.  It’s saying you don’t care what the other person wants, it’s going to be your way. It’s threatening and not caring what is best for the whole, but only what we think is best. It can be abusive.

In business usurping authority is seizing power where it isn’t given. It’s playing CEO without the earned right to be CEO. Just because there is a disagreement over a decision doesn’t mean we gossip, set up teams, poke holes in the boat and try to take over. A bossy woman, may in fact, voice her opinion but ultimately she knows where her role and responsibility begins and ends and she will back the vision up.

 

What I Am Not

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Perhaps, when you and other girls hear bossy, you can think of leadership. Perhaps, bossy could mean someone has an opinion and is comfortable sharing it with other people. Bossy could mean someone has a plan, that someone is bold. Bossy could mean that someone is the boss, a leader!~ Helen Drinan 

There is this movement to ban the word bossy. I’m not a fan. My second grade report card stated, “Susan is extremely bossy…” The grades were straight up good. I received the award for most outstanding student, most outstanding reader, most outstanding in math. Here’s what I remember about my second grade teacher. She spoke very broken English and it was very hard to understand her. I remember asking her to repeat herself many times. I was also a rule follower. She would make a rule and then when children weren’t following it, she’d become exasperated and yell and throw chalk, but never followed through on her point system. So I’d remind her. Someone had to. The black and white thinker that I am was already formed at this age. If you said that you’d take points away if we misbehaved, then I took you at your word and felt that you should.

Bossy doesn’t bother me. Female leaders are often deemed bossy but my thought is hey someone has to be the leader. I can get things done, I work very well with others. All that being said, when my mother read the teacher’s comment to me and asked me about it, she smirked. I think she’s always been understanding of the bossy girl that was born to her. I remember explaining the issues to her. She told me to try to get along with her. I do not remember the term bossy hurting my self esteem nor making me feel less than. I know myself and I know what I am not. I am not a usurper, meaning I don’t seize power,  and I am not emotional. When this teacher would yell and throw chalk I would just watch her and try to understand why she couldn’t take control of her class. I would raise my hand and ask why she didn’t use the point system and write our names on the board. Then she would break chalk on the chalkboard writing all of our names on the board. Obviously she wasn’t bossy.

Here is where the misunderstanding of the word comes in. Men are not called bossy and weak men are intimidated by a woman who know what she wants and knows how to lead. I would never be able to married to a weak man. He would not be an equal and it would be frustrating. My husband is an easy-going, super nice guy but he is anything but weak. Everything I do in our life is discussed with him and I get the okay before I move. E V E R Y T H I N G. Some things are discussed longer than others but ultimately his no is no and his no is honored. He is great about directing me. I am heard and he explains why an idea is a go or not. We work well together because he is a visionary but I am a detailer. So when he gives me an idea, I can make it happen.

Where women like me clash is with the personality of what I call the Bull in the China Shop kind of man. They run around barking orders, and puffing themselves up. They lead by bullying. Bossy and Bullies clash. This is why women in politics and female executives get such a bad rap for the most part. I’ll let that sit.

Getting rid of the word bossy will do absolutely nothing about personality types. We need to focus on directing those bossy second graders to greatness.

I Want To Marry You

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The  most precious thing you have in your life is time.

You can’t get moments back. You have to make sure that your life is heading in the direction of forward progress toward your goals.

I recently spoke to a woman who has dated her boyfriend for five years. She wants a ring. Her boyfriend is happy with the way things are. He’s not in a rush and says it will happen ‘one day’. This causes an argument. So I asked her why she was waiting and why she thought he was THE ONE.

She loves him.

She sees herself driving his kids around in a minivan.

He has a good job.

He loves God.

They have a lot in common.

They love jogging together after work.

They attend the same church.

Their families get along.

They believe the same things.

WAIT!!!!! WAIT!!!! WAIT!!!!

I had to stop her right there.

They have a ton of stuff in common. They love to talk to each other. They love to spend time together, and although all that is true, I have no reason to believe she is lying to herself or to me, they aren’t heading to the same place. You see, even though they have lots of things in common, they are not headed in the same direction. Even though they love each other, their destination is different. She wants marriage, he still hasn’t figured out he needs a wife. She can whine, stomp her feet, and give him an ultimatum and he may cave, but they both will know they manipulated a situation and that is no way to live.

Neither of them is a bad person. Neither of them is wrong. The only problem here, and it’s the deal breaker, is they don’t have commonality in the goal. So this relationship needs to end. Why? Because all we have is time and wasting it in the push and pull of trying to get someone to go your way, only delays your destiny to find the person who really is the one for you.

I once heard Bishop T.D. Jakes say about letting go of relationships, “Don’t abort the future on the altar of your past.” This isn’t just good advice in a romantic relationship. This addresses all relationships. Not everyone is going with you and you’re not going with everyone no matter how much we love them and how much it hurts to part. There are people in your life with whom you are at a fork in the road with and some are going your way, and others aren’t, don’t change your destiny in a compromise. The misdirection will waste time and cause resentment over time.

Amos 3:3 Can two walk together, unless they are agreed. NKJV

No one is evil, it’s just that their destiny is parting from yours. You never know if this is a forever thing, or for a period of time, in either case, choose God’s will rather than yours. In time, you’ll see why it wasn’t meant to be.

 

Stay In Your Own Movie

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Drama.

Some people are magnets for it. For the rest of us, we have enough drama in our own lives that we don’t need to go looking for more. I mean honestly, if you wanted a Emmy winning Lifetime movie you could look no further than my own life and I’m sure yours too. We’d have these nail-biting scenes where we wonder if I’ll ever get back into those jeans or not,  these amazing dramatic love scenes, break-ups and tears, and love and passion, then treacherous relationship that would make most soap operas look like amateur hour, and of course those scenes that look like blooper reels. Our own movies would be blockbuster hits!

So what makes us steer our car over to the drama of others and insert ourselves into their scenes? What makes us think we can do better?

EGO

We think somehow their drama is fixable, not like ours of course, because we are professionals. We think if we just share what we know, we can make it all better. Only let’s be real, what is it that we really know?

I love how Oprah does her famous question dramatically, “What’s the one thing you know for sure?” Then her guest look like they didn’t know the question was coming and they have to think about it. Trust me, if I were interviewed by Oprah, I’d know this question is coming up so I already have an answer. Are you ready?

“The one thing I know for sure, is the longer I live, the more I don’t know anything at all.”

But I guess that’s why I probably won’t be interviewed by Oprah. So her guests answer her question with pretty much a version of, “Well, Oprah the one thing I know for sure is that there is a force within us and we will return to that force one day.” And yeah, well I believe that too. Only I call my force Jesus.

EGO- I learned from a Wayne Dyer book that EGO can be an acronym for Edging God Out. In other words, when we come into the scene in rescue mode, often times we play God and none of us is fit to fill that position. Sorry to break it to you, when we act from a place of the mind, what we know, instead of spirit, what we don’t really know but discern from God,  we Edge God Out. I can hear some of you screaming “BUT WHAT IF”. My response is, “Even if”.  Stay in your own movie. Don’t go photo bombing someone else’s scene. Smile, close the door and know that if they will access Jesus they will work out a solution. Give advice when asked but please stay in your own movie.