In the 70's, James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis developed the "Gaia Hypothesis." They discovered that "all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet." In other words, Gaia, Mother Earth was determined to have her own state of consciousness that is interconnected and interdependent with our own human consciousness.
During that same era, the feminist movement initiated itself through the minds and hearts of wounded women everywhere. The feminine began reclaiming her voice and personal power, and at many points, it wasn't "pretty."
The unbridled release of the wounded feminine showcased the turn of the tides. The feminine archetype was no longer identified by her supporting role for the masculine. She, in fact, wanted her own seat at the table.
When an archetype activates, it means it wants to be heard. It may scream, yell, cry, and it certainly will hemorage...much like the wounded child who remains scared by abandonment fears, always seeking care, protection, and attention.
During the time in which the archetypal wound begins to express itself, it shows us where our work is. It points us to the rooms in our house that need cleaning. The wound cries out because all it wants is to be tended to and sutured.
About a decade later in the late 80's, SSRI antidepressant medication prescriptions rose by 70%. This is when fluoextine (Zoloft) was formulated. And the train hasn't slowed down since.
Who, do you ask, is the number one consumer of antidepressant medication? Women, that's who. But why? Is it that more women suffer from depression than men? Are women more likely to see a psychiatrist? All may be true, but if we fail to recognize the following thread, we are missing the entire point...
What this overenthusiastic prescribing paradigm for antidepressant medications REALLY says is "be quiet," "calm yourself," and frankly, "go back down."
The psychological rape of the feminine psyche is committed on a minute-by-minute basis in this country at the hands of Western psychiatry. It's a domineering and snarling force that says if you even think about releasing the wound, we will put you back in the cage.
The biggest travesty is that the only way the wound heals is to let it breathe first. What isn't released gets stuck, and no one wins when the disease turns inward.
The system I am describing is reminiscent of Persephone's rape by Hades (the underworld) in the Greek myth. It's Persephone's innocence that leaves her victim to the capture of the force she cannot wresle with because she was never conscious of it's existence in the first place.
While the war between the masculine/feminine may sometimes equate to gender and sex (woman/man, or female/male), it is much bigger than the human identity we put on this energetic framework.
The feminine is not just the woman, or female. In fact, the two often have nothing to do with each other.
Instead, the feminine is all about our inward journey towards higher consciousness and spiritual development. It's the solo adventure we are willing to embark on to find TRUTH, no matter what hell holes we must trek through. It's about how we nurture our soul and surrender to our calling by consciously going into the chambers of our own darkness.
So when we medicate the soul's drive towards wholeness, we annihilate everyone. Every, single, one.
