Many Sensitives feel as though they are aliens among humans or that they have been dropped into an alien world. Many who have been on this planet for some time have tried, usually unsuccessfully, to fit in with the other humans around us, but often that process is more to our own detriment than it is to our benefit. We get lost in that process.
Recently, I had the opportunity to attend a business networking event. I had no idea what to expect of this group. I have never personally met the man who invited me, but I am well aware of his reputation. He is a big name in my hometown, someone who is greatly admired and sought after. So, when I received the invite from him, it piqued my curiosity. It has been years since I attended a group, but something about this one felt… different.
It was different, but in ways that surprised me. In the past, I have entered each new group, only to discover that I already knew about 80 percent of the room. This meant that even though I was visiting different ponds, the same fish were there. In this meeting, though, I knew only two percent of the people there. I recognized two out of the 100+ faces in the space. Definitely a new pond and I was immediately excited about that.
Then I looked around.
The room was overflowing with masculine energy, represented by around 75 men – mostly in power suits – and around 25 women – also mostly in power suits. This was another difference. Most of the groups I’ve attended have been about 95% female, with a lone male or two for balance. That is because most of the business networking groups I’ve attended have been in the “frou-frou-la-la-woo-woo” communities of spiritually-based practitioners. I was stunned to see how many men were there.
Something about that statistic boosted my confidence. I know that sounds sexist, but I noticed that being in a room with all of that masculine energy was intoxicating. I could feel the success around me. The sensation of being around the drive of masculine energy, versus the flow of feminine energy was invigorating. And before you go getting all angry with me because I’m talking about man versus woman and siding with the men, let me be clear… I am talking about masculine ENERGY versus feminine ENERGY. It is very different than man versus woman. Women can lead with masculine energy as easily as men can lead with feminine energy. In this particular room, however, masculine energy was dominant and men outnumbered the women by at least 3:1.
The event was facilitated by a man. In addition, there were three male speakers, one female speaker. The four men held my attention without problem. The woman? I wanted her to stop talking almost as soon as she started talking. She was trying too hard. I don’t even know what she talked about, but I can tell you the point of the four men’s presentations.
I’ve thought about this experience since I left the room. There were so many dynamics going on for me, that I still have yet to process it all. The one thing I did notice, though, was although I didn’t feel like I fit in, I didn’t feel out of place. I looked around me and noticed that all but one of the women I could see were wearing power suits, had false eyelashes on, lots of makeup – to the point that some of them looked orange (what the hell is that?!) – and most of them looked like they were anxious, tense, and had worked out far too long that morning – or were long overdue for some really good sex. Most of their bodies were very trim. Nearly all of them had perfectly coiffed hair and lots of hairspray; even the long, straight hair did not move. At all. All of them had obviously professionally colored hair. Most of them had false nails.
I have no idea what anyone in that room did as business. All I know was we were all there because we are entrepreneurs who want to change the world, somehow, for the better, through our messages. I don’t know why these women looked so uptight or stressed out. I don’t know why they were there. I don’t know why they all looked like they had been pushed out of a Barbie machine. I don’t know why they looked so “put together” and rather plastic. But they were. I could maybe wax poetic about women being forced to live up to some sort of invisible standard to compete in business, which is stereotypically a man’s world, but I don’t know if that is really the case. My sense was that these women were not competing with the men but were, instead, competing with the other women. And they have been doing it for longer than they realize.
The superficial appearance of the environment was incredibly uncomfortable for me because I am so not that. I am short. I am round. I am natural. I haven’t had my hair colored for over a decade – I went through a dark hair phase for a short time that was a blast, but incredibly expensive. I don’t wear false eyelashes – the idea creeps me out. I wear very little makeup, stay out of the sun because I’m a delicate flower, and I have short fingernails. I tend to dress comfortably, in flowing skirts and soft materials. And my signature mark is my faerie dust; I wear it around my eyes, on my chest, and in my hair. I love it because I bless it when I wear it and then, when it jumps to someone else – because faerie dust migrates easily – it takes the blessing with it.
There was not one woman in that room that dressed like me. And I can imagine that most of the women would have balked at the idea of faerie dust coming anywhere near them, let alone on their faces.
It was an intense experience for me, being so obviously out of place superficially. In the past, I wouldn’t have stayed. It would have undone me. I would have belittled myself and called myself stupid. That day, though, I stayed and giggled silently for the entire time. I giggled because, based on external appearances alone, I so did not fit in there and I was firmly aware that it was glaringly obvious.
However, just because I am a flow-y woman who is soft and round and not made up, it doesn’t make my message any less powerful than the men in the power suits. Neither is my mission any less important than the Appearance-Perfected women in the room. For one moment, I remembered a conversation I had once had with a woman who was much slenderer than I who told me that she didn’t think I had a right to be on the stage leading women because I am overweight. That thought came to me as I looked at the women with the bodies that seemed to match the stereotypical media’s definition of the “perfect” female body and I allowed the emotions to wash over me. After nearly a half century of trying, I finally have come to accept that at 5 feet tall, I will never match the media’s definition of the “perfect” female body and that still does not diminish the power of my purpose on this planet.
That was the realization I came to as I sat there, feeling oh so not “in” and realizing that I wanted to be nowhere else in that moment. I wanted to sit there, not matching the people around me, and just be me. This was a first for me; to actually want to be me in the face of so many who seemed decidedly different than me, but similar to one another.
I was a lone faerie gypsy witch in a sea of humans dressed to look professional and all I could do was laugh inside.
When we played the introduction game at the beginning, I noticed that the more particularly model-y women stayed away from me, actually turned away from me when I came near. I laughed inside, feeling their discomfort caused by my flowing nature. I noticed that the men shook my hand, gripping it with strength, like I imagine they would grip another man’s hand. That caught me off guard, but I chalked it up to the fact that I gripped their hand like I imagined a man would grip it. The women who did approach me all asked me if they could hug me; I witnessed these same women greeting other women with only a handshake. Some of the men, when they noticed the sparkles around my eyes, actually softened into little boys right in front of me and their heart energy immediately opened up and expanded. Every woman who approached me, commented on how much they loved the sparkles.
It was an interesting social experiment for me to remain in a space wherein I felt societally inadequate just by appearance alone. I was so out of my element, surrounded by business people who emanated well-defined success and money and linear focus. Whereas, I embody nurturing, embracing, and fluid energy of Love, Allowance, and Acceptance. I was literally a curvilinear energy attempting to fit into a grid and I immediately caught onto that, as soon as I stepped through the door into the space.
Rather than breaking myself in the process of blending in, losing track of myself because I was so focused on everyone else, or running away in terror, I stayed and felt the discomfort. And instead of forcing myself to be straight, I chose to shine a little brighter and be a little curvier. Rather than falling into line within the grid to fit in, I chose, instead, to just weave my magic throughout the space by following the flow that I am and giggling silently whenever I noticed that a piece of my magic had migrated onto one of the straight lines around me.
For the first time in my life, I allowed myself to fit in by not fitting in.
