Women, Patriachy and Emerging Leadership

The #METOO movement in the past few months brings the topic "Women and Men" blatently into the foreground of the discussion.

We talked about the topic "Men, Women and Power" last October in The Wisdom Factory.net

(Watch and find the Timestamps/Summary HERE)

In this context it is almost inevitable that the topic arose also in our monthly meeting of WOMEN MATTERS and, naturally, the topic of PATRIARCHY as "the source of all evil". I know, many women think this way and proclaim their hate for patriarchy openly and with emotional power. But do they really know what they are talking about when they talk about Patriarchy in the way how the radical feminist taught us to think and speak? 

In my opinion, most of the time when we blame Patriarchy as the oppressor of us, women, we throw the baby out with the bathwater, unfortunately. Patriarchy equals power, blame and disadvantage of women, and the necessary status of being the victim of this power which is operated by MEN.

When you force yourself to be limited by an ideological view on the world, well, that's what you see and believe. But when you are open and take into account history and the evolution of consciousness and also of human society, than you would be able to see things much more differentiated. You will be able to detach a male person alive today from the oppressive forces of patriarchy. It is not the fault of men alone that we have chosen this form of society in the past. Women have done their choice, too, and for some time living in what is called "Patriarchy" was what they chose. 

SPIRAL DYNAMICS and INTEGRAL THEORY explain very well how societies were formed and grew during the past thousands of years in a certain way, in stages which start, come to bloom, then develop pathologies and finally die and give way to the next stage. And women and men alike were contributing to the development all the time - as they are presently doing by awakening the public consciousness about appropriate versus inappropriate sexual behavior.

The WOMEN MATTERS Conversation wasn't only about this topic, but it expanded afterwards by an email exchange (read it HERE) and also prompted me to write an article where I explain more in depth what I have been saying here. (Find it in our blog at The-Wisdom-Factory.com)

We also had a conversation about how we can allow leadership emerge in a group? If we don't want groups anymore which are led by someone assuming the role as leader, how do we organize that? How can one person be the leader for a certain time or topic and then another person take over leadership? Much to explore and learn here!

We also spoke about decision making and the fact that only a small amount of factors are actually visible to us when we make decisions and that most of the facts, considerations, feelings, conditionings etc. which are leading us are completely out of our awareness. 

So no wonder why we humans have a hard time to make really good decisions.

Finally, it is Christmas Time

My nephew's children enjoy Christmas as I did as a child.

 The topic Angels came up. Can we imagine angels as an energy field? Or are we stuck with accepting or denigrating angels with wings etc.?

Interesting that scientist talk about angels too, like Rupert Sheldrake in his co-authored book "The Physics of Angels". I have ordered the book and am looking forward to get to know more. If you are interested, too, just click on the book title!

Well, If you are Christian or not, in our culture Christmas is a big deal even if it is called differently sometimes for PC correctness. This doesn't erase history and I wish you all a wonderful celebration of the new light, coming into the world after a time of darkness. Lets pray together that the present darkness which has covered our whole planet with threats of violence, war, destruction will soon cease and give way to a new light. And may this new light become ever brighter and brighter!

HAPPY AWAKENING INTO THE LIGHT!

Communication in Service of LIFE

We are living in times where the existing power structures are revealed and the need for change is evident. So far we were governed, in politics, society, business, everywhere, by people who understood power as a means to dominate others and force them to respond to their will.

POWER OVER versus POWER FOR

This is the concept of "POWER OVER" and this use of power has discredited the word "power" altogether. But there is another way to use power as "POWER FOR", and this form of power is absolutely necessary in human life. If we want to be free and thriving in our lives we need to have the "power over" ourselves and what we decide to do and how we decide to be. We need to own our power and do with it what we need to do to foster life and existence. If we deny our own personal power we are responsible for the fact that others take it over and use their power over you - as it has happened often in the past and is still happening.

What does it mean to have "power over myself and my life"? First of all: recognise that you are co-creating your experience. It is not that life happens to you and you are the poor victim of what is presenting itself to you, the good things and the bad things. You won't have the full power over your life as soon as other people are involved in it - and humans are always embedded in a social network of one type or another. But you have the full power over what you say and what you do.

MEN, WOMEN AND POWER

Coming to the conversation about "Men, Women and Power" where below you find the last part:

(Find the previous parts HERE)

What is going on between men and women is co-created, always. Nowadays there is the movement "Me Too", women bringing in public their experience of being abused, as they say, by men in the public sphere. What I personally am missing is the part where the women were responsible for what had happened to them. Well, this is not what we talked about in the below conversation, but about the necessity to find ways of communication between men and women, between people in general. We are so caught in thoughts and assumptions about what is happening and what others think or do. We don't bother inquiring but take our viewpoint for THE TRUTH. And it is exactly this what is creating conflict and war in our world: our inability to communicate!

Enjoy the conversation and join it! Visit our broadcast platform

www.TheWisdomFactory.net

How can we clean up the mess in the world? - Women Matters in The Widom Factory

No doubt: our world is presenting itself as rather messy these days.

Politics and power struggles, social unrest, financial insecurity, religious fanaticism, terrorist attacks, social justice warriors promoting totalitarianism, declarations of independence in nations which seemed to be united, global warming, draughts, floods and hurricanes... the list goes on and on.

How can we deal with all that? It seems to be overwhelming for most of us. All these horrible news! We get the impression that the world is a dangerous place - and probably it is. But it leads us to feel helpless in the face of not really knowing what we can do to change the situation.

Building the plane while flying

One thing is obvious: the "normal" way of problem solving doesn't work anymore. Abuse of power and violence lead to more of the same and to increase the problem instead of solving it. We need new ways of meeting the challenges and to begin to do something constructive which takes into account the impact of our doing on the future. Women in contact with their feminine qualities have always been the source of true problem solving, of finding creative and caring ways to do what needs to be done. These are the really powerful women who source their power by tapping into the unknown and exploring and intuiting what is the next step in the unfolding of the future. Not merely goal directed thinking - a quality of the masculine aspect - but going ahead in a constant feedback loop which sometimes requires to change the goals while moving toward them.

In our monthly conversation of WOMEN MATTERS we explored what we perceived as challenges and what we see our personal and collective contributions to solutions could be.

We ended the conversation with the gender topic, the freedom of choosing gender and children who are seen as already so smart to lead us adults the way. 

Well, we women need to be very aware to not add to the mess by our tendency to overestimate our children and at the same time to overprotect them!

Enjoy the conversation and if you feel inspired to join us please let me know!

Join the regular live broadcasts on a variety of topics at TheWisdomFactory.net

Women and Power

Why is this still a topic in our times and in the Western world? Don't we have passed the Women's Lib movement and aren't we free today to be powerful women in the world? So why still talk about WOMEN and POWER?
Yes, we women in the western world theoretically can do what we want, we can go to University and become a professor and we also can become engineers or trash truck driver. Is it that what we want? And is our feminine power expressed through entering into professions which traditionally are the domain of men? YES and NO, at the same time.
Watch this first part of our conversation with Prof. Dr. Barbara von Meibom where we explore the topic. She, herself, has entered in the masculine way of doing and achieving - until her body sent her the message that she needed to change her life - by living now with a partially paralysed face (She talks about that in a later excerpt. Watch all at: bit.ly/barbarameibom1)

And please, let us know what you think about it, and, if interested, contact us for conversations among women in different parts of the world!

Addressing the key challenges 

which humanity is facing today

In the midst of all the chaos in the world, from hurricanes to earthquakes, to inappropriate politics, to financial disasters for private people and in the whole world economy: How can we live and aim for the good, how can we stay in a positive mood and not despair in the face of all the challenges?

These questions are moving the women of the conversation group in WOMEN MATTERS of the Wisdom Factory. They are meeting once a month and exchange their views on the matter.

Here, in the Video below, is the recording of our September-17 meeting with Tammy Lea Meyer, Heidi Hornlein, Gertraud Wegst and Monia Fruehwirth. Tammy is busy with collaborating on a proposal for the Global Challenges Foundation where she wants the other women to contribute, too. It is a proposal to support collaboration to address the key challenges facing humanity today. Of course part of what she is suggesting, "beyond the core idea of people working together, is to convene conversations that allow us to understand our challenges, profile and engage with people that are demonstrating solutions/projects or ways of being that meet our challenges, and to together work towards specific interventions that can leverage our collective work."


To begin with, our evident main challenge was technology which caused a massive delay of the live broadcast and then didn't allow us a smooth conversation where Tammy would have been able to clarify her ideas well. Nonetheless, it was 3:1 in the sense that 3 of us were able to enter into a deep conversation about what we could contribute to the world in the present situation.

Please watch and let us know what your take is on the topic. And when you are inspired to participate in the conversation directly, please let us know!

The different approaches

We all have different inclinations. One person is more drawn to the inner work, the other is more present in the outer world, taking actions there. We were discussing which way would be more appropriate and/or effective. As informed by Integral Theory we agreed on this: the best way of contributing towards a solution of our world problems would be an integration of our activities in "all four quadrants", : 

• doing the personal inner work to become a fully grown up and responsible human being
• being in community and exchange our ideas and views in conversations
• Acknowledging the facts and the truth of what is real
• participate in organisations and systems which have a positive vision and aim to create a truly better world.

We are all different and everyone of us has special gifts with which we can contribute. Thus, in a co-creative group, we can cover all aspects of reality despite our personal inclinations to be active in only one or two of those areas. That's why we need to come together! 

And if you feel like a loner in a hopeless attempt to do something good and useful: do join a group of likeminded people and begin to be a part of the whole directed to positive change!

What do we mean by "Co-Creating"?

Co-creation: what does that mean?

We are talking a lot about co-creating a new world, collaborating and similar expressions. What does it mean? How is it done?

We are in the phase of experimenting what these concepts might mean. There are several attempts to explore that, like the "Conversational Experiments" where Tammy Lea Meyer co-creates sessions with Fleming Funch, and also our conversations in The Wisdom Factory, and especially in the section "Women Matters"

How conversations can be different

Here an example of how different conversations can be. Gertraud Wegst, at one point, mentions that our conversations here are "not normal". No, they aren't. They are not focused on bringing out what we think to push onto others because we already know so much. No, they are a collective exploration of what is present now, in the group, and what is coming up.

The session began with the title: "How to transform challenges into stepping stones". Finally, Luna Ceovelli explained what she is understanding under that term. From there the conversation was circling around in a spiral for finally condensing on the emotion of fear and how it can "overcome" or better used as a stepping stone, or even better as a walking stick to bring us forward and be our good companion.

What you will find

When you watch this conversation you will get a taste of what CO-CREATION may be. Here we are only women and our conversations are slightly different from those where men are present. You might ask why. MAybe you find out by watching the Women Matters conversation and compare them to the others.

For me, the below conversation was a surprise. I normally participate live and on camera, but this time I couldn#t be there being without the Internet connection at our meeting time. So I needed to watch the conversation on the recording. How it feels different to be there, live and co-creating and to just watch, having thoughts but unable to utter them being taken along the flow of the conversation in some other direction.

A

An invitation

When you watch the video and you feel the desire to join us in the exploration process of Co-Creation, please contact me via The Wisdom Factory

How can we stay inspired to work towards a sustainable future?

We are living in times of acute crisis. The world which we are used to living in is changing from day to day, virtually. The technological advancement has become so fast that there is no way to control things anymore in the way it worked so far. We are now living in a system which is self-organized. Nobody on the top can efficiently interfere and cause a fundamental change, no matter if they are presidents of a powerful state who believes he can make his country safe and secure, or social activists who believe that destruction will resolve everything, especially lead to their own future as dictators of the world.

WHAT CAN YOU DO AND BE WHEN EVERYTHING IS DESTROYED? AND WHAT IF YOU HAVE PUT IN PRISON OR ERADICATED THE LAST PRESUMED TERRORIST?

You probably will be dead yourself or live in total poverty. The least thing you can expect that the changes are totally unpredictable when you deliberately work against them in a restrictive and fearful way by claiming to be as powerful as God in guiding the movement of the world. You are not, we are not. No technology will substitute the intrinsic human values, the feelings and desires we all have and the responsibility to find the very best way for resolving our problems - and this is not by proclaiming the EASY BUTTON or the old and often proved unfunctional ways of MORE OF THE SAME.

We are at this point in life because of the power of the solar masculine abilities to go out into the world and search for knowledge and visions and find ways to achieve them. Nothing bad about that, not at all. But it has been too one-sided. The feminine energies have been neglected, eliminated or at least constrained to operate on a very limited terrain. Politics and Economics, science and technology, masculine domains and brought forth mainly by men. Women, who try to raise their voice have to take into account that the systems they are operating in, are masculine systems. No wonder that we women after the women's liberation tried to become men, better men, but certainly not embodiments of the feminine power and ways of doing. 

Actually, we women don't know how a feminine way could be. There are no role models yet.

As a consequence, we women have to do our best to find out what a feminine alternative could be to the present situation. You cannot tell yet that women in the main leadership positions would do better. Single examples in the world politics are not really convincing. But yes, those women are working within the masculine framework and not really interested in experimenting and finding out what a feminine framework could be. 

Probably we need to build that up from the bottom by coming together and explore things from our personal perspective - which hopefully is more "feminine" than "masculine" just by our own experience of being a woman in the world. We need to sort things out, find out what "feminine" means and uncover our hidden biases and conditionings. It is a process and needs many of us women to collaborate in finding out how we can create a better world from our "indigenous" perspective.

That's why we have founded the WOMEN MATTERS series in THE WISDOM FACTORY. Women from different places in the world are coming together to explore their perspectives and their experience, always focused on co-creating something new and good in the world.

The below talk is about an important question:

 Being surrounded by so many discouraging events and attitudes of other people: how can we stay inspired? 

How can we be motivated to go on with the little we actually can do - as opposed to just give up and resign in the face of the unfavorable environment of a superficial culture which ignores the dangers it is producing?

If you feel inspired to join a conversation group, in English, German or Italian, please connect with us via email to paradisointegrale@gmail.com

(Watch previous conversations here and let us know what you think about it)

SENSING AND SILENCE – Feminine Qualities in Public Discussions

What are "Feminine Qualities" and how can they be helpful in our lives and in the world?

For a very long time feminine qualities have been dismissed as not appropriate for managing the "real world". Tough men had to say where the world is directed to and the feminine ways of being seemed to be more adapted to raising children and be good wives in support of their husbands. Well, yes. And we shouldn't underestimate the influence of women on their men. In my opinion they, sometimes, were able to calm them down a little and so prevent the worst. We cannot know how often and how much they were successful, but obviously not successful enough if we consider where the masculine way of being in the world has brought us: A life full of technology and wellbeing on the one hand and destruction of our basis of life on the other hand. The question arises: what is of more value and how can the world come back into balance - if it is still possible?

Certainly not with more of the same, with more masculine drivenness for power and dominance, for destruction of nature in service of ideas and ideologies. We women and the feminine ways of being and thinking - which can be embodied also by men -, we need to become active and take part in the destiny of our planet, give our gifts for the survival of our species. We are born caretakers and weavers of relationships, we have the innate knowledge of how to create bondings and how to take care for future generations. We are called to become self-confident about our abilities - instead of holding back for fear to be smiled on as "a weak woman who sheds tears on everything" and who is not able to deal with the hard facts of life. 

We need to present feminine qualities in the public sphere, push back against masculine arrogance and shortsightedness and offer our perspectives on everything that matters, directly and in public. We might not always be "right" - and we are not - but we need to counterbalance the overly rationalized and simplified ways of masculine reasoning of "one at a time", where they loose the wider perspective on the consequences of their decisions and actions.

For this reason the women of "Women Matters" inside the Wisdom Factory come together and explore what can be done and how we can be in order to become part of the solution instead of perpetuating the problem.

Watch here our meeting last month - and if you feel inspired to collaborate, contact us!

How can we stay inspired to work towards a sustainable future

We women are called to step up and share what we can contribute to the world. How can we best do that? Well, everybody has their own preferences and methods: writing book or blog posts, giving speeches, meeting others to create community, in person or online, going to public manifestations of protest or support. Innumerable ways of engaging are open to all of us.

I think that women are best in creating connection, in understanding and in creative dialog - as opposed to fighting which men seem to enjoy a lot. That's why we gather in WOMEN MATTERS, about once a month, to co-create a space where we can engage in these things.

All of us live in the conviction that EVERYTHING matters, that we live in an interconnected Universe where everything has an impact on everything else. 

From this supposition, it makes complete sense that every action, from thoughts to conversations to manifest actions in the world, have their impact on the whole. When we want change to happen, change in a direction which we perceive as positive, we have to do something to allow this change to occur. Sitting around and hoping that "everything will work out well" is not as effective than a deliberate effort to increase the sort of energy which enhances the change we desire.


When you create a group yourself, exploring the ways for change to happen, don't get frustrated if only a few people show up to listen to you. Stay confident that the energy you give out into the world is maintained and works its way to combine with akin energy somewhere else in the Kosmos.

Energy doesn't just disappear, positive and negative energy alike. But the can neutralize each other. When we feel that there is too much energy in the world right now, then we need to counterpose it with the positive and constructive energy which we can create together. If we limit ourselves with complaining and seeing what is not going well - we increase the sort of energy instead of neutralizing it. It doesn't mean to ignore the bad things which are happening, but to find a way of not being caught into them.

Get inspired by watching these women! And then go out there yourself!

In the following video, you will find participants sharing their practices to remain centered and helpful in pursuing our calling. Find more information about the participants and also timestamps - a list of topics addressed in the video with the indication of the minute in the video.

Connect with us if you want to be part of the conversation, in the audience or on camera!

What's up for 2017 for us women?

We are entering chaotic times - where change can happen.

Times have dramatically changed since last November - and certainly since January 20th. Male chauvinism and Macho ways of de-valuating women have become a normal thing out of the mouth of a president who rules a nation which had claimed to be the most advanced in all eras. Real progress has been reached in the last century, especially since the 60ies. And now? Shall we allow sexism and other things to become socially acceptable again?

Considerations like the ones above urge us women to finally step up and claim our rightful place in society,  the rightful respect as human beings which are not treated from a  sexist perspective. we don't want to be dominated by the whims of a human gorilla!

So what are the real chances of the unfolding chaos and the present thread to fall back in medieval times?

What does it mean to face the challenges today as they present themselves?

• This is an existential demand to become aware and responsible for ourselves and for the political situation in our countries
• This is the moment when everybody is asked to act in the face of the breakdown, step up, be courageous and name the atrocities
• This is the moment where single people and states need to face their shadow, to take responsibility for their own past actions, admit errors and work towards repairing them
• This is, again,  the proof that a top-down approach to life is not working. We cannot rely on others, not on politicians or big business, to find a solution for the benefit of everybody and the whole world.
• This is the call to come together and collaborate in creating the future. The change needs to be initiated from the bottom, by us, and then the change in our societies will manifest.

In "Women Matters" we came together in January to share our insights into our present situation and to name our intentions for the coming year. Our meetings and many of similar gatherings intend to empower those women who, themselves, are not yet part of a co-creative group. Listening to others can open you to do the critical step and come out of your hiding place. You can create your own group, in private or in public.

 Be aware: whatever we do has an impact on the whole world, practically and energetically. Don't underestimate your power. Be part of the change and engage in ways which are good for you in the present moment. And remember: you are co-creating the future, how it will be this depends also on YOU. 

Here the recording of our conversation, you can also access it on our website The Wisdom Factory under http://thewisdomfactory.net/women-matters/