Take the Apology Out of Being a Woman

Have you ever wondered why women seem to be constantly apologizing for being a woman? I have and what I discovered was, that it is time for women to stop apologizing for being female.

Now you may be asking yourself what does this mean, I never see women apologizing for that. But if you take a moment to think about that statement and what it is really saying, you might find yourself answering this question differently.

Women have been apologizing for thousands of years for having a vagina, or vulva, for being sexual, for being powerful, clever, smart, creative, for being a woman  with a body that is sexual by nature. It is this apology that is actually part of our collective consciousness and is inbred in every woman and man whether they are aware of it or not.

Today in our society it may look like women have made huge strides in the world of men. This is true in so far as a few legal wins, being able to vote, and sexual freedoms. But the culture in which we all live in, the collective field, still holds the belief that it was a woman that caused the downfall of the human race.You may be thinking this isn't true, that the idea of 'original sin' really is an old one that no one holds except fundamentalist Christians. But if you take a look at the world as it is today and begin to look a bit deeper at the messages in advertising, movies, music and in many of the sacred religious texts all over the world, you will understand that what I am saying is still a predominant belief.

Women's bodies are exploited as sex objects that are used to buy and sell anything to make money with. The selling of sex whose predominant workers are women has become a multi-billion dollar industry. Kathleen Barry calls this the 'prostitution of sexuality'. The fact that women themselves exploit their own bodies for money and are not aware that by doing so they are supporting the very system that they say they are free from, is in itself proof of the depth of this belief. The sexualization of women and girls is rampant, sexual slavery is thriving and there seems to be no end in sight. 

The story of Adam and Eve was one that the Christian Patriarchs created from an original Sumerian myth about the Goddess. It was fundamentally changed so that the concept of the Great Mother, the Goddess, was seen as less than God or man. Woman was created to be less than man, from his rib, subservient to him.

All myths reflect the times in which they were created and it was at this juncture in time that man had most recently discovered his role in procreation. The discovery that a woman needed a man's sperm to fertilize her eggs gave the patriarchal fathers and the men in power just the tool they need to turn the Goddess on her head.  The most prevalent belief of the day soon was that it was a man who created life and woman who incubated it thus reducing woman's role from Creatrix to host.

This belief was then reflected in every myth, text, and religious scripture throughout most of the world. Women were in essence demoted from their role as "Earth Mother, the Great Goddess" to a subservient role to man. The goddess was now a woman who, because of her ability to allure man not to be trusted. The body, in general, became evil and dirty, but women's bodies specifically were targeted. Because of their sexual allure and women's sexual appetite (based on the myth of Eve), women became a threat to man's peace of mind and his focus on God. Women reminded man of his instinctual self (the serpent) and because of her sex and body, he denied and condemned her for what he rejected within himself.The world was turned upside down with this shift from honoring of the feminine form, woman and nature, to honoring the masculine as God, who had the ability to give life, to procreate with his seed.

Now whether this was inevitable or not as a part of the evolution of the species is not the point. The point is that as the myth of Adam and Eve was created to reflect the teachings of the Christian Church, women were forever condemned to apologize for being a woman.

Taking the Apology Our of Your Life

Today we have a choice whether to continue to believe in this myth. As women, we can begin to reclaim the innocence of our bodies. By reclaiming our innocence as a sex, we can each begin to stop apologizing for having a female body and for being sexy and sexual. We can stop hiding our bodies behind layers of fat. We can stop internalizing the messages that music and the media are telling us.  We can stop rejecting our bodies the way they are and see our bodies only as something to please men, to fulfill their fantasies of what is sexy. 

We can instead begin to value who we are rather than just for how we look, to learn how to love our bodies whatever shape they are in, to take pride in being born a woman with a  with a natural sexual allure and a healthy sexual appetite.

We can reclaim the innocence of womanhood that was taken away from us, and we can begin to walk tall, feel safe in our own skin and be true to who we really are. We can learn how to express our sexuality authentically and to honor our bodies once again as representatives of the Goddess here on Earth.


Please visit my website to find out more about programs that support your full feminine power: The School of Womyn's Mysteries.