Eye on Gender

The guests at last week's Gender at Work Forum were all men.  This surprised me, because the norm at events with the word gender in the title is women, with a scattering of nice guys, the sort who get it. This means that we are talking of the kind of men who are friends with their own feminine aspect - more integrated, perhaps, in the way I hope to be when I grow up

We talked of the dominance of the masculine in hierachical organisations, where competitiiveness is rewarded. When it works, that is. In other words, it works for the people who are good at competition. The mystery is that in this way of valuing people, it is assumed that the guys (and occasional woman) who can fight and win are also best at decision making, creating visions, dealing with other people and so on. Makes no sense to me. But this seems to run the world.

Evidently something other than what we can see is going on. it's all a bit emporer's new clothes; don't rattle the mad illusions, don't even think about talking about what everyone knows. The odd feeling I'm having right now parallels this. It isn't really permissable to question the way the that gender and power in larger organisations works, and I have a sense that I'll get nowhere with them if I question too much. It's a bit creepy. Just for a moment or two it feels like much of the world is mad.

Once more I see evidence of this being blinkered to reality in a leading article in the Guardian, WORK section last Saturday, March 15th. Once more the inequalities at work for women are talked of, with such quotes as 'trying to eradicate the pay gap,' as if this was something inherent in the nature of human endevour that was difficult to do. Give me a break. The article talks of using successful women as role models. All well and good is what I think, but it's still not facing the real source of all the discrimination (let's use the word) against the feminine.

For me, the only way to fix my own life is to fix me first, and the place where it isn't working is always in the invisible part of me. It's no different for people in groups, at work for example.  This, to me, is the most fascinating aspect of life, and what we do in our lives. It's also the place of great power, the ability to change. It isn't the glove that's so important, even though it's what we see, and actually it's not just the hand in the glove that's so important, it's the mind connected to the hand in the glove.

It's always been my intention to lead us here, because turning over inner rocks and looking to see what I can find there is my fascination. It's where real change comes from. Why gender? Well, it's as good a focus as any, and better than most. Gender is the foundation of our identity, and with that the foundation of all our relationships, and how we act. It's also the basic puzzle of my life, one that I've been working on for a lifetime, and one that I have cracked.

In essence, what I am interested in working on in Gender at Work is the ability to move into looking at all of the mysteries of gender in the mind, from a place of what is often called Presence, that place of observation behind the mind, and see not only what is going on but also how to make informed choices in the hidden foundations. We are talking here of the intelligence beyond the mind, not something remote and weird, but within our own experience, yet often not identified, valued and drawn out. Women are often better at this than men.

Is this practical? Strange that I feel obliged to ask the question - I guess it's evidence of ancient patterns of thought within me that still whispers to me that such intangibles are without power or consequence, and with that the feminine is less significant and valuable than the masculine. 

Come what may I'm writing the book, and as far as continuing the Gender at Work series, well, it depends on who wants to play this game. Who wants to come down the rabbit hole with me?