Where is your Wild Feminine?

A friend asked of the quote in my email signature, “What does “Wild Feminine” mean?”
Christiane Northrup, M.D. was one of my early teachers. I first heard the phrase “wild feminine” at a workshop I attended in Kansas City in 1995. At that workshop, I heard Christiane say, “Wild Feminine is the medicine we all need to bodily reclaim the power and pleasure that is our birthright.”
Last year I took a yoga teacher training workshop with Leslie Howard in New York City. Leslie teaches yoga for the pelvic floor. In her recommended reading list is the book Wild Feminine: Finding Power, Spirit & Joy in the Female Body by Tami Lynn Kent. When the book arrived, I was surprised and delighted to find Christiane’s quote across the top of the front cover! Tami refers to her book as “a guide for women to access the power, spirit & joy of their inherent creative energy.”
In my work as a cranial-sacral therapist and yoga / meditation teacher, I have used the term “inner landscape” to describe the experience of turning sensory awareness inward. As external stimulation releases, internal awareness increases and one encounters a sensory experience of the “inner landscape” of their body.
Tami speaks of the “wild feminine landscape” as women’s internal creative range.
The world is shifting and it seems to some of us as if the “feminine” is rising. What does this mean? The world has long been out of balance with regard to the “masculine/feminine energies” and in our planetary evolution, the human race is moving towards balance. These energy patterns are discussed in the medical texts of China, Tibet and India. The ancient Chinese called the point of balance we inherently seek, “the Tao.” The Tibetans called it the “Rigpa.” In modern medicine the term is” homeostasis”, a state of equilibrium or a tendency to reach equilibrium, either metabolically within a cell or organism or socially and psychologically within an individual or group.

Consider the qualities of feminine energy. These energies, called “yin” in Chinese, are “relatively” dark, cold, passive, inside, downward, substance, water, matter, mysterious, moon, night, earth, and even. In contrast are the masculine or “yang” energies. They are “relatively” light, hot, active, outside, upward, function, fire, energy, obvious, sun, heaven, and odd. Notice that yin describes things that are relatively denser, heavier, lower, more hidden, more yielding, and more feminine. The opposite conditions are yang: things that are less dense, lighter, higher, more obvious, more masculine, and more dynamic. These energies are relative, not absolute. To grasp this relativity, compare one to the other. For example, in the context of temperature, we say cool is yin and warm is yang, but an 80-degree day is yin relative to a 100-degree day!
Yin contains yang, yin becomes yang, and yin controls yang. If we stay too long in an unbalanced situation, the universe acts to restore balance. It throws us to the other side. Some of us are actively working to bring about restoration of balance without having to go through the suffering that dramatic upheaval causes.
In support of this cause, I teach Yin and Pelvic Floor Yoga at my studio and mindfulness meditation practice. In a few weeks, I will be teaching my yoga practice and supporting the women who gather at Esalen Institute for healing the “wild feminine” at Healing the Pelvic Floor: Reclaiming Your Power, Sexuality and Pleasure Potential.
I believe men need healing of their “wild feminine” as well as women. Remember, yin contains yang. As we restore a sense of the sacred within our bodies, the “wild feminine” within us all will be recognized as the Divine Feminine, source of all creation.  As we individually find balance within, the human race will collectively experience equanimity.