Power to the Feminine!
Power to the Masculine!
Introducing ‘The Archetypal Approach’ To Relationships
Joseph Serra

“We never row” one couple said, as they introduced themselves at the workshop. Elisabeth and I, who were facilitating, both thought “oh, poor them!” If you could’ve seen the thought bubbles above our heads, you’d have seen one relating to the feminine, and one relating to the masculine.
The feminine one would’ve been full of questions like “has she given up on him?”, “has she given up trying to call him back into intimacy?”, “has she become bitter, detached?”, “is she scared of him, physically?”, “is she afraid of her own feminine power?”, “is she afraid of being abandoned?” “why isn’t the feminine standing up in this relationship?“, “why isn’t she insisting the masculine keep returning to intimacy? That’s the feminine’s job!”, “why is she so disempowered?”
And then the other bubble above our heads, the one relating to the masculine, would’ve been full of questions like “what has he done with his anger?”, “is he ashamed of his masculine power?”, “is he pretending to be nice and sweet and kind all the time ~ an unthreatening ‘new man’?”, “does he intimidate her physically, or does he intimidate her covertly, with a silent, rumbling disowned anger?”, “does he cut-off and disappear?”, “where does he run away to ~ pornography, work, alcohol, spirituality…?”, “why isn’t the masculine in its power in this relationship ~ it must be so painful to feel so disempowered in front of the feminine”, “why can’t he be both powerful and intimate at the same time?”
Don’t get us wrong ~ we don’t run workshops on teaching couples to row! We run courses on empowered relationships. We want to see the masculine in his power, and the feminine in her power ~ because that’s where the magic happens.
When the feminine comes into her power (which is the power of body-knowing, and interconnectedness, and the power of a fiercely vulnerable heart), then she is both formidable and tender. But to own this power she has to travel deeply into trusting her feminine nature, and into trust itself. She has to take her wounded little girl in her arms and rock her softly ~ while standing up uncompromisingly and unapologetically for all that is authentic, for all that opens her body and heart.
The masculine who is in relationship with the empowered feminine ~ or, at least with the feminine that is commited to her own empowerment ~ is truly fortunate and blessed. But he better get his balls strapped on! She won’t put up with an iota of inauthenticity. And he’ll only be able to take it if he is totally commited to his own empowerment.
The masculine comes into his power when his raw animal energy and sexual potency gets put in the service of awareness and selfknowledge and truth. He follows the path of honesty, surrendering through layers and layers of male conditioning, shedding skin after skin of false-power, power-over, and every fear of inferiority and inadequacy. Gradually the masculine comes to a place of presentness and power-in-himself. This delights the feminine and opens her body and heart. But the path is not easy, and every step forward is accompanied by a step backwards, and at such times the feminine will say ‘no’, and the masculine will need to be powerful enough to be humble.
We’re emerging from thousands of years in which the disempowered masculine has dominated and abused the disempowered feminine. But just because today the feminine is standing up, that doesn’t mean she automatically understands the true nature of feminine power. And as the masculine lets go of false-power (and then of falsesoftness), it also faces massive questions about the nature of its true power.
This is the work we are passionate about. We run a project called The Culture Of Honouring Project. We run courses for men, courses for women, and courses for couples: honouring the empowerment of the feminine, honouring the empowerment of the masculine, and honouring the potential of their union.
This work is about starting a fire underneath the bum of the feminine, and another fire under the bum of the masculine! We want them both on fire with their own commitment to themselves. Relationships are not about compromise. How often have you stood in awe in front of your partner? How often have you seen that through him you meet Man, through her you meet Woman? Through you and your partner Woman and Man, Yin and Yang, the two great energies of the universe meet. For thousands of years these two great forces have not been meeting. The masculine has been the persecutor, and the feminine has been the victim. And in that, both have been in distortion.
The masculine and feminine are evolving in and through us. We are evolution! We stand with our ancestors behind us, with our brothers and sisters alongside us, on the cusp, the leading-edge, of evolution. There is no such thing as a bystander to evolution. There are no spectators. We are all involved.
We are all involved ~ and we are all conditioned! We are all full of the conditioning of history, and we need to form brotherhoods and sisterhoods to support each other in de-conditioning ourselves, in re-empowering ourselves, and in opening to a new potential which is neither matriarchal nor patriarchal but which equally honours us all.
So let’s get practical: what does this actually mean in our everyday super-busy lives? What does all of this mean when we’ve got to pick up the kids from school, get the shopping done, remember Auntie Belinda’s birthday, and make enough money to keep up a half-way-decent lifestyle? Is all of this ridiculously grandiose and irrelevant, or can it be integrated into our already over-full lives?
Firstly, yes, you are going to have to take some time out. We’re talking here about an entirely new approach to manhood, womanhood and relationships. We call it The Archetypal Approach. There’s a relationship crisis in our culture ~ most conventional relationships end in separation or divorce, and the statistics among ‘growth working couples’ are actually worse, not better. (Having been conditioned to expect Hollywood-like happy-ever-afterness, we can only wade through our treacly ‘stuff’ for so long before it becomes unbearable ~ and we split up, yet again.) And the Tantra path people, in terms of separation-statistics, are even worse!
Please pause and ask yourself ~ is this article is just more hype, or is it actually introducing a new approach to relationships? Has there ever been an era in which the feminine was honoured in the authority of her connectedness and her body-knowing, in which the masculine was simultaneously honoured in the fi erceness of his devotion to truth ~ and in which they saw themselves as allies in shedding their conditionings, and in meeting in their fullness? Probably not. So this is both a very big picture, and a very personal one ~ and, yes, you are going to have to take time out to explore it.
And then, once you’ve glimpsed the potential, you’re going to need to walk towards it ~ and that takes commitment. And community. The buzzwords we use are Context, Commitment, Community and Compassion. Once we’re on the path, we need each other. We need to hear other couples’ struggles and breakthroughs. We become mirrors for each other’s relationships. We see how similar other couples’ relationships are to our own. We draw strength and compassion (for each other and for ourselves) from meeting up together, and from friendships with other couples.
Couples often say to us that this approach is what they always wanted ~ that it was as if we were giving them a way to live the potential they’d always known they had. For our part, it is always an honour to see the feminine and the masculine standing up in their power, and a sacred joy to see them come before each other.
Joseph and Elisabeth Serra are the directors of The Culture Of Honouring Project, which runs events and courses for men, women, and couples. Visit: www.cultureofhonouring.co.uk You can also call them on 08456 123432 (local call rate), or (01803) 663413, or e-mail them at info@cultureofhonouring.co.uk