Softening in your feminine essence through heart-led forgiveness, an article for the woman who is desiring to release her past and restore the radiance of her being.
in my feminine softening work, i have noticed that when a woman starts returning home to her feminine essence, she experiences two kinds of emotions she is not expecting to find on this journey.
a deep grief for what was lost, for the time that got wasted, for a live unlived, for desires that were suppressed.
and, a burning rage for the wrongs she allowed to happen to her, for the ways she abandoned herself in the pursuit of love, belonging and connection with others.
she also knows that for her to keep moving on this journey of homecoming, she must feel these emotions, receive the medicine they carry within, gather the lessons they are teaching her, and use them to create an even more beautiful life for herself.
this begins with her practicing the art of forgiveness radially and wholly. forgiving without the former scorekeeping, forgiving despite the former resentment, forgiving even if there was a lot of hurt involved.
but this doesn’t always feel as easy as one can think of it to be. living in a heart-hardening highly-masculinised world, so many of us women lose touch with our softness, with the essence of our feminine energy souls.
this way of living feeds the ego, it is designed to work that way now. because any piece of history will tell us that when the world wasn’t so deeply masculinised, we thrived on connection and love and belongingness. we were open and willing to understand others’ perspectives and forgive them for their shortcomings.
today, that’s different..disconnection is the norm, empathy and understanding aren’t as valued. it feels easier to hold a grudge than to simply let go by forgiving and releasing ourselves from the life-reducing tendrils of the past.
and yet, we know that this is not the way we want to live, grow and shine our radiance in the world as women. we don’t thrive under this weight of resentment. it instantly reflects in the beauty of our souls, in the texture of our skin, in the glow of our faces, in the inner harmony of our heart.
it takes a rather radical inner shift to be able to see that forgiving and releasing ourselves from our past doesn’t signify weakness. instead, it is a deeper decision that’s rooted in our softer power as women. one that doesn’t let us shatter but instead helps us feel the pain of a heartbreak and alchemise that ache into something even more beautiful. a quality of our quiet feminine power may not be as celebrated, but is still a treasure that lies deep beneath our hard masculine shields.
because if there’s one thing i have felt in my own experience and in coaching women with their feminine softening and embodiment, is that once we have released an undesirable part of our past from our beings, it frees up so much of our life force that was trapped under this huge plateau of resentment, regret, remorse, anger and more denser emotions.
it helps our inner world regain its natural, pristine state that had taken a different shape with these emotions stored in our body. it helps us regain the emotional safety we felt within us before unpleasant things happened to us.
the deeper we can allow ourselves to soften into the ache of these darker emotions that we have been avoiding, the easier it becomes to reach that point within us where there is nothing else left but to forgive.
at this juncture, it is no more about the other person or our selves. it is simply a release, a liberation from what’s holding us back from living our most radiant life.
freeing ourselves from these traces of our past clears up our energetic aura creating a fresh new space in our lives for newer possibilities, relationships, and experiences to be allowed in our life. it makes us feel lighter, happier, more connected with our natural feminine Eros as sensitive-hearted women.
we start feeling more open to exchanges of love, to support, to compassion and kindness. we regain our inherent sense of playfulness and pleasure towards experiencing the bountiful richness of our lives.
we are able to open our heart to new possibilities and live out our most fulfilled version of life. and why else are we here on earth if not to create our own heaven of peace and happiness?
we are meant to flow through life, not restrict ourselves with the burden of undesirable experiences. not hold grudges for what didn’t serve us or affected us adversely in our past.
we are deserving of moving through life with ease, savoring each moment as it comes.
i can share an experience from my own journey of feminine softening and embodiment that when i started realising how much of myself had i lost to the hyper-masculine conditioning that was instilled in me starting from my teenage years, i felt so angry at everything and everyone around me.
there was also a deeper sense of grief that i felt for the years i had lost, for the ways i abandoned myself to meet the ideals of success and prosperity that my social culture had instilled in me very early on in life. for the ways i felt disrespected by a work culture that was not designed to support my growth as a sensitive-hearted woman and so i had to place shields after shields on my heart to toughen up and get going, climbing up the corporate ladder of success that on most days felt meaningless to me.
after going through quite a few rounds of this anger, resentment, grief and remorse, i found how exhausted i felt from this relentless spiralling. and as is the natural progression in the process of feminine healing, i reached a place within me where there was nothing else left but to forgive and release all the people, situations, experiences that had caused me harm, in one way or the other.
as i allowed myself to enter into this space of heart-led forgiveness, i noticed how much softer i felt in my being. this softening further gave me the strength to keep an open heart as i moved through life and showed me how to live a little more lightly, forgiving a little more sooner anytime i experienced hurt from there on.
and as for the highly-masculinised nature of the world we live in, i decided that the only way i could change it is by deepening even more tenderly in my own feminine embodiment.
this looked like allowing myself to fully embrace my softness, in my own life and in my relationships.
speaking my truth with courage even when i was the one who messed up.
not feeling scared to open my heart to love even after the hardest of the heartbreaks.
creating structures of business and success that honored my sensitive-hearted nature.
moving through life at my own pace, still believing that all that my heart desires is possible for me, even if it takes a little longer in this fast-paced illusion of time and space.
and so, if you’re at a point in your life where you’re hurting, where you’re feeling disheartened and weighed down by the seemingly assaulting experiences of life, please know that there is a beautiful life that awaits you beyond this ache and grief.
where you will smile again, where your heart will feel happy again.
and for that, you must liberate all that’s feeling heavy on your heart.
you must be patient with yourself and let your body process and release these emotions.
you must trust that you are still allowed to hope for a life that your heart still holds the desire for.
after all, that is the path of feminine healing, a path that asks you to soften and keep your heart open so you can allow love, ease, possibility, fulfilment and radiance both in your inward and outward life.
when you want to journey deeper
if you need more support on this path, i offer some meditations in my Feminine Healing collection around this. more specifically have a look at the Liberate & Flow practice.
inspired from some of these personal experiences, i’ve also created an email course titled Her Soft Power to support women who want to soften out of their hyper-masculine conditioning, reclaim the quiet strength of their feminine gifts and live a life overflowing with peace, beauty, ease, joy and pleasure. if you’re at a point on your journey of feminine softening where you’re seeking healing through reading, reflection and journaling, here’s where you can learn more about this offering.
whatever you decide to receive support from, i hope it helps you soften a little more deeply and forgive a little more easily.
Navdeep 💗
p.s. looking for more articles on feminine softening in life and in love? please visit here.
Reclaiming the quiet strength of your feminine gifts – an article for the woman who is seeking to dismantle her heart-hardening masculine shields and experience the true power of her feminine essence.
something I have observed in my feminine softening work is that the biggest fear of any woman who comes from a culture that isn’t very empowering for her kind, is to lose her control, and in turn, lose her power.
growing up in spaces that don’t value women or worse, where a woman’s worth is tied to how much she can sacrifice, how much she can empty herself in service to those around her, leaves a very deep imprint on how she perceives herself and her feminine nature.
with no right models of true feminine power around, she clings on to the only kind of power that is visible to her eyes in her highly-masculinised environments.
the loud kind, the forceful kind, the hardening kind.
this masculine shield of power that momentarily makes her feel less vulnerable, in the long run leads to her gradually disconnecting from her beautiful and sacred design as a woman. wherein..
she starts seeing her softness and sensitivity as a weakness.
she numbs her sensuality and her feelings through a plethora of pseudo-pleasures.
she hides her beautiful vulnerabilities and never lets herself be truly seen in her relationships
she clings onto every last bit of control over how her life should unfold, while secretly resenting this weight that hardens her further.
but underneath all of this, the essence of her tender femininity still exists.
in moments that feel out of control and overwhelming, while she is still wearing her masculine shields, her feminine soul quietly whispers to her ~ reminding her of its existence, reminding her to let go, to relax a little, to let herself flow even by a little measure.
other times, in a more louder way, her feminine body screams loudly through illnesses, exhaustion, burnout..reminding her to look within and finally honor her sensitive, feminine design.
its only when a woman decides to listen to these nudges of her feminine body and soul, is then she begins the process of reclaiming the quiet strength of her feminine gifts.
she slowly starts understanding that while her masculine essence has been fully activated, trained and put to good use in her outer world (sometimes to excessive amounts), the missing piece to her fulfilment is her feminine embodiment.
she starts decoding the truth that her softness & sensitivities are as important as her ambitions and achievement-oriented conditioning, sometimes even more integral to her overall nourishment as a feminine feeling woman.
she starts developing compassion for herself for suppressing her tender feelings and emotions for so long, because she can now see how she was never taught to read and interpret the language of her feminine heart.
from here on, she naturally starts cultivating inner safety in tending to her emotional triggers instead of repressing them, eliminating the possibility of their erupting unannounced and affecting her relationships adversely.
she starts paying attention to her heart’s sacred desires and quietly yet surely starts reclaiming her worth for them.
she starts witnessing how easily this inner fulfilment amplifies her outward achievements, that previously felt meaningless to her.
she begins healing her previously dysfunctional relationship with her feminine sensuality and sexuality, recognizing the power she holds in her body outside the commercialisation and commodification of these gifts of her femininity.
she starts embracing her sacred rage, her grief and other denser emotions, seeing them as vital messengers to where she might be abandoning herself or letting herself be disrespected and devalued by those around her.
she gradually begins removing her hard masculine shields with deeper intention and starts practicing receiving from all those who are here to nourish and enrich her life’s journey.
through both my lived and coaching experience, i have come to see how there’s so much beauty and courage in choosing this softer feminine way of living in the harsh state of our world today. it is that quiet empowerment that we don’t receive in many spaces of personal development (that are almost always pushing the hyper-masculine ideals of growth, a subject that i talk more about in my feminine softening course).
this act of reconnecting and reclaiming the wide spectrum of our feminine gifts can often feel like a gentle rebellion, where feminine-hearted women relentlessly refuse to abandon the qualities that nature has so wonderfully and generously endowed them with.
where they’re able to discern that honoring their sensitivities, their tenderness, their need for slowness, their desire for a peaceful and calm life is not weak or silly, but is a very wise decision to preserve themselves in a world that runs on the extraction of their feminine (physical, emotional and more) resources.
because it is this very wisdom that not only fulfils us inwardly as women but also guides us in the most challenging of life’s moments where instead of letting us harden and mindlessly “push through”… it invites us to soften and melt into our ache, creating the space for the right solutions to emerge for us.
..and this can matter so much to those who desire to live a truly intentional and meaningful life.
i notice this a lot in my feminine softening & healing work wherein a woman who is on the path of reclaiming the quiet strengths of her feminine gifts, starts feeling the desire to slow down and experience life so fully and wholly that she never again has to rush through life and can instead experience the richness that exists in the seemingly mundane moments of her days.
she no more wants to permit her hyper-masculine environments or people extract from her precious life force energy in the name of love, success or prosperity.
she finds herself wanting to feel so connected with her body, her pleasure, her flow, and the natural aliveness of her feminine being that she does’t have to rely on pseudo-pleasures like gossip, scrolling, food, meaningless sex anymore.
she finds herself desiring to learn how to opt out of the heart-hardening ways of striving and hustling so she can magnetise her heart’s wildest and deepest desires with utmost ease, joy and pleasure.
this is a journey i support women on through my feminine softening and healing offerings, namely ~
Feminine Softening 1-1 session, designed for the woman who is seeking to peel back the layers of her hyper-masculine conditioning and soften in her feminine essence, so she can show up in her life and love deeply attuned to her natural pace, her values, her feminine eros, her sensitivities, her radiance, her magnetism and her inherent wisdom.
Her Soft Power, an email course created for the woman who wants to heal from the impacts of her over-masculinised conditioning, reclaim the quiet strength of her feminine gifts and live a life overflowing with peace, beauty, ease, joy and pleasure.
and the Feminine Healing collection of embodiment meditations, curated for the woman who’s finding her way back home to her feminine essence, her softness, her body, her pleasure, her beauty, her depth, her truth and her magnetism.
if need be, you may explore these and see what would serve you the most in the current season of your feminine healing, softening and embodiment.
Navdeep 💗
p.s. looking for more articles on feminine softening in life and in love? continue reading here.
When softening feels like a threat or a weakness, remember this.. an article for the woman who is learning to find safety in the process of her feminine softening, healing and embodiment.
in both my lived as well as coaching experience, i have found that when feminine-hearted women begin removing their hard masculine shields of perfection, performance and numbness, softening into their most natural essence feels quite vulnerable.
it feels like an inner threat of losing control over the flow of their lives.
it feels like an outer threat of being perceived as weak and silly for no more following the heart-hardening masculine ways of living.
it feels like laying bare to be seen for who they truly are, which can feel very scary if they are in an environment that doesn’t value the feminine way of being.
almost every woman who I have interacted with in my feminine softening and healingwork, has felt this at least once.
in the process of honoring this sweet desire of her heart to live more softly and move at her own pace, she has found herself questioning the legitimacy of this gentler way of living.
she has found herself wondering if she will be left behind in the apparent race of life.
she has found herself fearing how will she be perceived by the people around her now that she is feeling called to a way of life that is not as celebrated, most times not even accepted in spaces she is used to be in.
but the more she has allowed herself to trust this quiet inner calling, the more she has found herself grounding in the truth that..
..she will find people who will love, value and support her for choosing this path, who will cherish her sensitivities and her gentle essence, and
..she will be able to create a career path, earn a living and live a fulfilled life while honoring this desire of her heart to slow down and soften the hardness that’s been weighing her down for as long as she can remember.
from this assurance, it becomes easier for her to recover from the exhaustion she has felt in hiding her heart’s truest desires behind a masculine shield of nonchalance or indifference.
it becomes easier for her to drop the pretence that she can do it all on her own.
and above all, it becomes easier for her to decide that she is not going to strive, force or push herself through life anymore.
if you’re at a point in your life, relationships or work where you’re feeling called to soften and shift the way you have been living and being but are scared of losing yourself in the process, please know that you’re not alone and that this is a very natural and valid fear.
the hyper-masculine design of our world has trained most of us feminine-essenced women that the only way to feel our power is through striving, forcing, exerting and in proving ourselves worthy of our existence.
time and again, it has conditioned us to believe that our nature is ‘too emotional’, that our sensitivities and intuitive nudges are not a gift but something to fix, to hide, to contort into something more logical, something that makes sense to those around us.
it has made us lose remembrance of the truth that as deeply feeling feminine-essenced women, we cannot be pushed by logic, or what seems to ‘make sense’. that we have our own way of knowing, and it has little to do with shoulds and timelines and logical progressions.
it has trained us to oversee the fact that the masculine ideals of moving through life were never ours, that as feminine beings we blossom when we flow through life with a softer strength..
something i often find myself thinking about is how different our relationship with our softness might be if we had grown up seeing the right role models in the women who came before us.
would we still see our softness as a weakness if we had grown up watching women express their disappointments to their partners calmly and gently, resolving conflict as if it were simply a problem to solve?
would we still see our softness as a weakness if we had grown up watching our teachers or mothers teach the value of discipline without raising their voice?
when i look back on my own journey of feminine softening and embodiment, i realise how hardening makes it so much easier for us to break and fall apart. whereas softening, it strengthens our ability to survive, take a different shape and become someone new, someone even more beautiful..each and every time.
there’s a memory from my past corporate days that i still vividly remember.. a spring afternoon when i stood in the cabin of my department head telling me how i was “too soft to become a good manager” (looking back, i realise what she actually meant was that i was too soft to be successful in that highly-masculinised work culture). it felt so much easier to believe her then because she too was a woman, quite successful one at that. and i remember how from there on, i consciously started placing shields after shields on my heart that would continue to remind me that i’m never allowed to be seen as my softer self again. what i didn’t know then was that i would also be shutting down my empathy, my natural gift of connecting with people by taking on this new role of hyper-masculine toughness..
but as is the natural progression of life wherein those who are lost will one day find their way back, i too years later while still in that workplace, despite all my success just couldn’t carry the weight of those shields that had grown so much out of proportion. and so, i came back to the same softness in me but with more conviction this time as i had more experience with life, work, and my relationships with people now. i witnessed myself turn this gift of my feminine softening into my biggest strength that slowly yet surely repaired my relationship with the same people who had put up with my hardness for all those years in that workplace. and with that, i also came back home to myself, to my essence as a woman and never left my side again.
when i reflect upon my 1-1 work with women now, i find how common this trajectory is for women who feel called to the softening path.
for women who have experienced the harsh impacts of their masculine-focused conditioning, softening feels like a big exhale, like a respite from a way of life that they never really resonated with.
deep in their bones, they know the difference between the heart-hardening masculine way of life and the softening and nourishing feminine way of living.
they have walked the path of doubting their feminine value of softening only to realise a few steps later that it is their biggest and deepest strength.
they know how good it feels to soften into the trust of knowing that their life will unfold perfectly for them when they’re following their heart, instead of continually striving, pushing, forcing and proving themselves to meet the ideals set by their outer world.
and most of all, they understand that the art of truly softening into their feminine essence isn’t some outer social trend that they’re being drawn to, but it is in fact a deep inner calling of something unseen and only felt by them in their body, heart and soul..
if you too are in a season of life where you’re feeling this inner call, then just for today give yourself the permission to soften without guilt.
just for today, allow yourself to soften in the trust that your sensitive, feminine nature has a place in your life and in this world.
allow yourself to soften in the trust that your relationships, your deepest wishes and ambitions will blossom even more once you start embracing your heartfelt desire for a softer approach to living and being.
and in case you find yourself desiring more support around this, you may explore my feminine softening course Her Soft Power or work with me privately in one of my feminine softening 1-1 sessions.
Navdeep 💗
p.s. looking for more articles on feminine softening in life and in love? visit here.
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