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understanding your emotional age: mother, daughter or woman?

By on July 16, 2013
crystal lilac

Never before in history (her-story) have women had empowered, independent, lighthearted, strong, authentic, liberated, beautiful, and confident public leaders . . . until now.

Since the beginning of time, women have had two main personas to navigate in the world: Mother Energy™—the selfless, responsible, caring, giving, doing, protective essence of woman, and Daughter Energy™—the helpless, coy, cute, dramatic, and demanding embodiment. Although these two archetypes have nothing to do with having children or being young (you can be 20 years-old and childless dripping in Mother Energy™ or be 65 with four children and ten grandchildren and be in Daughter Energy™), they have been the primary ways for women to act and react.

And while both of these energies have served women to a certain degree, we have reached a pivotal time where things must change (and not by women doing more, giving more, needing more, or wishing for more).  We must transcend these two personas to access a third, far more potent expression of ourselves—Woman Energy™!

When a woman deliberately awakens this incredible force within herself, she becomes dignified and enlivened in every area of her life—physically, financially, sexually, emotionally, and spiritually. She knows who she is. She knows where she’s going. And everyone around her feels it, too. She exudes “a presence” the minute she walks into a room. She teaches people how to treat her by the way she treats herself.

Although all women embody all three archetypes at times in their lives and with different people, most women have a “Dominant Energy™” that influences the choices they make. It’s almost like an “Emotional Age™”, regardless of our Chronological Age. Here is an overview of these three dominant energies:

Daughter Energy™ is self-absorbed, reactive energy. It’s what drives grown, capable women to act helpless, irresponsible, demanding, afraid, selfish, manipulative, and/or needy. Overwhelmed with her own feelings and fears, worried that her needs will never be met, a woman in Daughter Energy™ knows she deserves more but can’t figure out how to achieve it. So she deploys a variety of ways to get what she wants from being excessively fearful to excessively aggressive, from excessively pleasing to excessively needy, and from excessively sexy to excessively shy. She can be coy, dramatic, self-sabotaging, overtly sexy, troublemaking, and/or angry. She is the “dependent” part of addictions. Extreme examples of this are women such as Marilyn Monroe, Lindsay Lohan, Courtney Love, Paris Hilton, Whitney Houston, and Amy Winehouse.

Mother Energy™ represents the complete opposite of Daughter Energy™. The consummate giver, doer, fixer, rescuer, and savior—she always knows what’s best for everyone and will do whatever she can to help. The trouble is, she doesn’t help herself. She doesn’t know what she, herself, even wants or needs. Disconnected, she lives from the neck up—almost numb to her own body. Instead she devotes her life to being a “good woman”. She is the “co-dependent” part of addictions—the caretaker or enabler. Famous examples of women resonating in Mother Energy™are much harder to come up with because she is the selfless wind beneath everyone else’s wings. These are a few of the more obvious: The Queen of England, Mother Teresa, Margaret Thatcher, Alida Margaretha Bosshardt (the leader of the Salvation Army in the Netherlands), and Rose Kennedy.

 

Yet, inside every woman is an energy of pure magnificence: Woman Energy™. It is an emotional sense of being that is incredibly empowered, loving, light, joyous, confident, humble, independent, playful, open, receiving, allowing, intuitive, sexy, strong, determined, and capable. When we step fully into this place, we become authentic and powerful beyond measure.

Embracing Woman Energy™ isn’t difficult. It’s an innate knowledge we all naturally possess yet most of us have forgotten or buried. Instead, we naively believe our power is something we find outside of ourselves—in a man, career, body type, dress size, church pew, or bank account balance. It’s not. Think of women such as Oprah Winfrey, Jane Fonda, Julia Roberts, Gloria Steinem, Michelle Obama, Sophia Loren, and Barbara Walters, just to name a few.

So imagine who you could be if you learned how to let go of the drama and dysfunction of Daughter Energy™ and/or the guilt and exhaustion of Mother Energy™, and operate strictly from the most empowered and authentic aspect of yourself: Woman Energy™?

Imagine if you:

-Parented from courage, willingness, wisdom, acceptance, and love (and sometimes that meant “tough love”). How that would change the direction of your child’s life; and how much more peace would you have.

-Practiced self-love, self-care, and self-nourishment with your physical health and diet. You would look and feel amazing.

-No longer viewed yourself as a caretaker, cook, or cleaning lady, and instead felt like an equal partner, passionate lover, and financially independent woman.

-Invested the same amount of energy into building your own dreams, passions, and purpose as you spent on building someone else’s.

 

Today, I encourage you to have an honest look at yourself and the choices you’re making—the “energy” you’re resonating in; and to question if, perhaps, you are worth more than you’ve been living?

The decision is yours. You choose how you will think, feel, act, and react.

A great start is to make a checklist of the qualities you believe Woman Energy™ exudes, and then ask yourself throughout the day as you find yourself in different situations, “What would a WOMAN do?”

Then, do it!

If you’d like to find out your Dominant Energy™ or Emotional Age™, click here to take the quiz!

 

340006_10150311350648122_335684808_oCrystal Andrus is a bestselling author, international speaker, women’s advocate, host of “The Crystal Andrus Show” on CBS Radio, and Founder of “The S.W.A.T. Institute (Simply Woman Accredited Trainer)” ~ the world’s #1 online Personal Empowerment Certification Coaching School, exclusively for women. She can be reached at www.crystalandrus.com or www.swatinstitute.com.

 

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