MFN: Feminine
===
Welcome to, We Don't Have a Clue About Love. I'm Mim Kempson here with Katie Eden Todd, and today we're diving into the feminine. We explored last session, the masculine, and today I feel is really important in its own way. And I'm going to open up by talking about how the feminine and masculine seem to be commonly represented across the media or social media, these dominant ideas, because then I want to throw it to Katie on, on how, how she sees these, but one of the things I've noticed is the feminine is something that is, you know, exclusively for women. Women, we're fed this idea we're meant to step more into the feminine and men step more into the masculine. And as you would have heard so far, Katie and I are completely challenging these binaries
of energies and gender. So this reel that I saw, I'm going to use as an example. Let me go back. So titled Common Reasons Men Don't Take the Lead in Relationships. They don't have a connection with their desires, wants and needs. They have nice guy tendencies, people pleasing, being passive and not assertive.
Expecting that every decision should be made together rather than taking the initiative. Laziness. Being so busy that he, he sees leading his woman as a burden. And he tried in the past and it wasn't received well so he avoids getting rejected again. Now essentially what this post is doing and in it you have a picture of a woman and a man and she's meant to be letting him lead is the idea.
And he's failing at that but what it's speaking to is perhaps the man being described there as a primary feminine and there's nothing wrong with that.
So I'm going to throw it to you Katie, what are your
thoughts?
What are my thoughts, exactly, Mim. That
is so appalling... I'm... it... I'm lost for words, that doesn't happen often, but I'll try and find some, shall I? So if I'm looking at the feminine as an energy that can be in any gender, that post has just named beautifully how the feminine in shadow, when it's struggling, behaves.
It's passive. It doesn't wanna be rejected. It wants to make decisions collaboratively because that could be a strength. But I don't want to take responsibility for the decision alone. Could we just agree together? Then you won't be cross with me then I won't get it wrong. I just wanna serve you.
I just wanna please you. The people pleasing is classic feminine. Conflict averse. I tried something. It didn't take much. It didn't go down well. Uh, Frozen. Well, I'm not trying again. I won't risk it. This is any person, any gender who has strong feminine archetypes within them. You know, the real story of humanity, just going a little bit big picture here, we're meant to learn how to marry the feminine and the masculine and I've put the neutral in as well. Bring it all together within us, that we've got all three, we've got them in different strengths. It's like the legs of a tripod, you know, a man might have a very strong feminine and have a strong neutral and not much masculine.. . We're going to go into these, but we're not all even in these and that's our work. And think we are seeing a very conservative backlash, which is in reaction to gender diversity, sexual diversity. People can't cope with the thought that a man shouldn't be masculine. Women shouldn't be women. They are so binary. They are so threatened, as your audience will understand, neurodiversity, when none of us were ever meant to be in that binary form in any way at all. So everything's meant to be like multifaceted. And we know that's true. My husband is primary feminine. I am primary masculine. I'm the initiator. I'm the leader. I'm the one who ultimately does the decision. I say, you decide. He goes, no, but I'd rather you decide. Or, no, but I don't want you to be upset. You might as well just tell me, saves us a lot of running around, you know. It's an innate, I'll put you first. I'm okay if you're okay. It's an innate codependency, because the masculine has very obvious shadows. We looked at that last week. You know, anger, bossiness, intimidation, overruling, dominating, not listening to others, being superior. But the feminine has its shadow too, Mim, and we don't call that out. We talk about toxic masculine, well there's toxic feminine and there's toxic neutral. So I think we just say, let's all own that we're human beings. We've got shadow and there's a toxic feminine. And if we get stuck in these and we don't know that we're stuck in them, we're going to hit the same brick walls. We're going to have the same patterns in friendships, relationships, work relationships. The feminines will hit exactly the same problems forever. Now I for one don't want to see that. I'm really keen to set people free from the way they invisibly tie themselves in a knot. That's what I'm about. So feminines... Yeah, this man that you just spoke about, he's got a strong feminine, he's feminine first.
You can't change the way you are born to be. That is it. It can be light. It can be used in a really positive way, and we'll talk about that in a second. Or, the shadow is, that's exactly how it comes out. And then masculines and neutrals go, don't be like that. Can't you be like this? Do this instead. It's like, that's really hard for me.
That's not, doesn't come natural, but then the masculine and the neutral, many won't have the feminine and
they're really poor at that. We've all got a weakness, haven't we?
And marrying all three within ourselves is, is the work, but whatever is our type or our avatar and our primary, if it's, if it's primary feminine, we're not going to want to lead or make the decisions or take big risks. That's not, that doesn't bring us joy. And so in relationships, these are like you named with your husband.
These are all dynamics that we agree to, we discuss and we consent. Hey, how do we feel about, you know, maybe I make this decision cause I'm confident in it and I'm happy to. And the other person goes, yep, I'm, I'm willing to, but then they go to the depth of, but I'm not going to blame you if things go wrong because we're a team here and that's what this reel is not talking to is, is saying, Women, let your man lead and men stop being so lazy and be more decisive.
And it's like,
but if that's not
in their nature,
Who
you are.
Yeah.
It's not who you're born to be. So the reason this is happening,
it's a patriarchal backlash to how it's changing, how things are now becoming more diverse. So we're now having you know, gender diversity existed since the beginning of time, Mim. Sexual diversity existed since the beginning of time. Neurodiversity has existed forever. It has not been tolerated, and now we are seeing it come forward in such large numbers that it can't be ignored. This is a very good thing, because there's great strengths in this, but the backlash has been that feels too much of a radical change. It frightens people. It's a social revolution, actually, that's going on. And it frightens people. They want to put us back in the old boxes and they're religious boxes. They are fundamentalist religious boxes. Go back and be as women were with the man in charge. You know, we've got a woman on the Supreme Court who believes in this and lives like this. It's utterly horrifying. Well we've moved on and the majority do not agree with this. But there's a strong minority that are very vocal about it, but they're very frightened, Mim. They're very frightened because they can't see that empowering women and all genders. They only see that they miss out. They only see loss because that's the way that they see the world. And I have been entitled, and I have been the leader, and I'm in charge, and I want to categorize people in the ways that I'm comfortable. This is all genders can be in this dark way. There are famous people who are, but others are going, hello, wake up, it's the 21st century, for fuck's sake. So this is a backlash to how far we've gone to same sex marriage, you know, IVF for queer couples. These sorts of things that terrify, and it makes them feel disempowered. It's like you're taking away my role. So if I'm not the hero, the protector, the provider, the boss in the family to the children and to the wife. A lot of cult stuff goes here. And this is the way that we do things. It's, it's bolstering up this really dark idea and there's no freedom. You are, you are little automatons who are going to live this way. And it's changed. We're not going to. It's taken a long time. It's taken a very long time for us to be able to evolve to this place. But they want to bring that back and it can't happen. It actually is impossible for that to happen. Too many people are aware and too many people can just say but that doesn't work. I've got a little boy who's a beautiful, soft, feminine, who's the nicest kid who gets invited to all the girls parties. You want me to change him? He's five. You know, a parent can tell you that. And I've got this little tomboy daughter who's out there who plays football with the boys every break. You want me to say, go and play dolls and do cooking with the kids, the other girls? No, I'm not going to. And then there's a neutral over there in the corner who's reading a book and said, is there another book like this?
Cause I loved that book. Can I learn more about that? So I say, no, go and play football.
This is about letting people have the freedom to be who they are.
And, and you can hear how having this language not only benefits our adult relationships and how we treat ourselves and not internalize this and shame ourselves, but also how we raise children. Like, if we knew this language, you would know how to parent each one of your children.
I've been doing a group this week about how it was when we were raised, Mim, and we looked at our birthing story, our birth blueprints, we've done past lives, we've done what it was like for our grandparents and parents and with our siblings and the way we were raised. And our parents, without exception, not a single one, in all the groups I taught, not a single one had a parent who understood them, who could get them.
But not one of those parents was understood either. They were not understood either or seen. So it's so difficult what we're trying to do here, but there's this wealth of information that's coming through and you know, let's let people have the freedom and support them. So let's support feminines from moving from toxic feminine, passive codependency, tears, manipulation, refusal to lead their own lives, refusal to decide anything.
I'm waiting for the rescuer to come in and save me. You know, that lovely person that I keep seeing on all the Disney movies? Because I like Disney movies. Because there's that romance story where they end up happily ever after. And I want to believe that so desperately. Well, you know, the one they're waiting for? The one that comes in on the horse to rescue them, that's your inner masculine. It's never a person out there. The more whole we are, Mim, the better and more whole our relationships and the more we learn about love and the more we experience love. But the feminines have been taught to wait, to be a servant, to know your place, you're back in line, sort everyone out first, you come last.
That's a very hard way of being to change, to think that someone would want to hear my opinion, would care what I think. I don't know what I think. I don't know what I feel. My opinion and who I am was not important before. I was second. I'm here to make the masculines and the neutrals feel better about themselves.
They need me. I look after them. Do you see what I mean, darling? It's like we don't want to get stuck in those roles. I think that your listeners. Our listeners are going to go, Oh my God, I know people like that. My mum was like that. My dad was like that. My brother's like that with his wife. Why is it? we You are born with these, they're energies, they're traits, they're archetypal, and you can't change them, but you can move from being the shadow of them into the stunning light of them.
I think maybe I should say something
light.
Yes. Yeah. And if, if you like, cause um, you know, differentiating between FN
and FM, you could do it that way if you like.
Yeah. Well, let's just do light first, but
for
feminines, because that's feminines across the board. Remembering that
there are different archetypes.
I've written MFN as an archetypal language, but then there's other archetypes underneath that are different. So if you've got an F and I've got an F, Mim, which we both have, but we have different archetypes as our F. So that accounts for our differences, which is really interesting. And then there's even more, like it just spreads out. It depends how detailed people want to go. The positive of the feminine, there's a kindness that's natural. There's a gentleness. They're naturally, especially when it's their dominant, if you're a dominant feminine, being nice and pleasing, I mean, it's just your go to.
It's who you are. In fact, you can find it very hard to know who you are other than the nice one. Feminines can say, I don't get angry. Ha,
don't you now?
See, I'm doing the shadow
again.
I can't
help myself.
Yeah.
They like to go to resentments.
I will get to the
lovely stuff because they're beautiful. I married one.
And one of my children is a primary feminine, an FM. So, you know, they're fantastic. So they're warm. Feminine is warm. It's loving. It's kind. It's patient. It's modest. It doesn't put itself first. It genuinely looks out for other people. It genuinely likes to look after. It likes to nurture. It likes to create.
It has... it likes to have fun and to have joy. It's looking for love and lightness. It's not necessary, depending on the archetypes. It doesn't want to go too deep. No conflict, so conflict averse, can get so silent, can have real throat issues, you know, um, can't speak up for themselves, they're terrified of that and then they, they can be very poor at conflict resolution because they've had no practice. They've avoided it for their whole lives. If something's not going very well, they don't feel great or they just push it aside and focus in on you.
So I don't want to feel this that's going on. So I'll focus in on you. Instead, I come outside of myself. Anxiety can be there as well and resentment, but underneath that, trust me, feminines have anger and rage as well. It takes a lot to get there, but there will be and they can fall into being hurt and hoping that people can see their hurt. And then hoping that people will come to their rescue and go, are you okay, Mim? Are you? Is there anything I can do for you? And if it's not working, well, you better look a bit more hurt, Mim, like. can you just show the signs a bit more because no one's picking up the signs so they can get stuck in playing the hurt child.
I'm very hurt, but I'm not going to talk about that. And if I ask you, are you hurt? Are you alright? Yeah, I'm fine. No, no, you don't look right. You're like, no, I'm fine. I'm fine. They're going to deflect you. They don't want to go inside, Mim. They're not an internal person. There's one archetype that does, but others, they don't want to know. So it's deflect, deflect, deflect. And then I get a little bit annoyed, a bit agitated because I don't want that focus. Look, can we just talk about something else? Don't want to go there. really. It's very frightening for them to come inside. They, they just don't know who they are. This is in history. No one cared who they
were.
They were a role. Nurture me. Look after me.
Does
that resonate
with what you've seen?
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, I have a lot of that personally, Katie, you're calling me out. So I'm acknowledging this as a
primary masculine with feminine second.
Um, you know, doing this work, I've been able to see myself with such clarity that has absolutely transformed my life that no other therapist could ever name, because it's...
it's quite uncomfortable to look at how we are passive and complicit in creating and setting up these dynamics in our own life. Um... oh, there's so much I wanted to speak to that I've got. I mean, that's the thing. Feminines, um, you know, of, of the variety that there are, they can be overwhelmed and confused and frazzled and things that you'll hear them say, you've given examples, other things might be, Worrying
a lot
I don't, Worrying. Worrying lot.
what was
Worrying. Worrying frazzled
worrying.
Worrying Panicking.
Going
on loops,
panicking,
um, you will hear them say, I don't know,
Exactly.
don't know how I feel, I don't know what I want, how do, but how do you feel, what do you want, I'm, I'm happy if you're happy, um, there's a real like, yeah, abandonment of, of self or neglect of really going into your own feelings, needs and opinions because that feels scary. There's an anxiety
there.
And let's name the anxiety. So the greatest fear of the feminines is to be abandoned. So if I name what I want then I talk about a topic that people might not be comfortable with, they won't like me. They won't want me. I could end up
Like they might replace me for another, cause I'm not very special really. So I don't really know my worth. I need to be needed. I need to belong. I need to be useful, be attached. So if I start being, and I'm not happy and pleasant, well then, they won't want me around. Then I will be alone. I will be alone. Now going really deep here. What feminines do is they consistently abandon themselves. They treat themselves like they couldn't give a fuck who they are. They don't know who they are. They don't know what they feel. They don't know what they think. They don't know what they want because there was no place. If you think about the servants in Downton Abbey know, in that show, very romanticized time, you know, it wasn't like that. It was way harsher. It was written by an aristocrat to put a very nice gloss on it. But you understand the upstairs, downstairs. Well, the feminines were the downstairs. The feminine was not valued and our world has suffered horrendously from the lack of feminine kindness and love. Every war, every place of pain, every austerity cut to social programs, it's all about lack of feminine values. Not caring for the children, young children, not making sure everyone's got lunches at school, you know, the things that happen. A feminine would say, surely we can do that first. I don't need a lot of money.
I don't need that. Can we look after everyone?
Can
we make the table longer?
And you can hear how the feminine is like, I don't know if I want to go as far as to say the most important for relationships because what, like the affection, the intimacy, the closeness, the being in the present, not thinking about these things like money and schedules and responsibilities. They're just so there with you.
You would want that in a partner.
I tell you what, you have a better success of making relationships work when the people have an F.
Be it
Yeah.
an FM,
NF...
Like it's easier. Though, if you've got, um, partners who don't have F between them, so they're NMs or MNs, they may have found a way of relating that they just don't, they don't want that.
They don't want to go to that place because it feels too vulnerable. It feels too vulnerable. So feminines, yes, absolutely can do that, but they've got to go more than skin deep into who they are and their feelings, Mim. They can't keep playing and hiding behind the niceness and the pleasing. Like that's a non person.
You might as well be a fucking doll,
you know,
an ornament.
What was that? You may as well.
Be a
doll.
Be a doll.
a doll.
A doll.
Yeah, like if you're just going to be a beautiful ornament or a sweet, a sweet, nice, pleasant person, that's not enough. And it's actually not all of who they are. So compassion. Yes, masculine can be passion. The feminine, compassion.
We want a marriage of both. That's what I'm saying. The fire needs to get released in the feminines for what they love, what they'd love to try, what they'd love to do, what they'd love. Like love is passion and compassion. So the masculines need to learn way more about patience, gentleness, kindness and compassion But that the feminines need to learn about... let yourself feel more. Let the, let the temperature gauge go up above 10 degrees. Like, like can we just get a little bit more coming out here?
Yeah. And.
Fair enough.
Uh, absolutely. And of course it depends on what, whatever they have least of. So can you tell us the difference between feminine neutrals and feminine masculine?
Okay. Feminine neutrals and feminine masculine. Yeah, absolutely. So we have, I'm just going to get the titles here that I had. Oh, that's right. I did remember. So, an FM, I love these titles because they sort of tell you straight away, it's a friendly go getter. So, they're friendly, they're warm, they're not competitive in the sense that I want to beat you. If you've got M first, you want to win. That's in the dark. In the light, you've grown up a bit and you understand that that's not what the point is, but you're very competitive. So an FM, they've got a friendly exterior, they're personable, they're nice, they're popular, people genuinely like them, but underneath they've got this hidden drive to create something unique to sort of stand out a bit, but they don't have to beat people down. They don't have to dominate. They don't want to bully or take over. None of that. It's just that I've got their feminine with their fire underneath and I'm going to go forward and do this. So we had a few names,
didn't we?
Yeah, I'll name...
To help give us...
Yeah, let me...
I can think of one straight
away. And I'm thinking of Kramer in Seinfeld. I'm showing my age here, but he's an absolute classic. He's a little bit all over the place, but wouldn't hurt a fly. And so there's a sweetness with all primary feminines. I actually think Taylor Swift is one of these. I don't think she comes across as a threat.
I think she comes across as really sweet and nice and a good girl. Like she's Miss Americana, you know, eight year olds want to go to her concerts. She's, you know, there's a, there's a sweetness here, but underneath there's been a drive and she didn't expect or aim to be the global mega star. She is, whereas an M... Madonna, trust me. Madonna absolutely did. And that's been there since she could talk. That definitely had that ambition. So did Beyonce. No question. That's not there in Taylor. There's a sweetness on top. And so other people go, you know, she talks about relationships all the time and love
and
you know, breakups,
fairy tales
and it's all the
feminine
world.
And so all the little girls love it. All the prepubescent, all the teens love it, and people who have primary feminines. It's like she's singing my life story. She's talking the feminine, but she's got the fire underneath. She's brilliant. She's generous. She's done a lot. I think her songs all sound the same.
So sorry, Swifties, but there you go. You know, we're not talking great depth of philosophy here in what she's talking about, but she's brilliant in other ways. For an FM, it takes a long time to cross the line for them to be angry or to step up and speak out, but she has done so courageously on issues where she's obviously an easy target. And I respect the hell out of her for that, about women's rights, about abortion, about voting, about making your voice heard. She's done that. That's the masculine fire underneath, but she didn't come in and go all guns blazing. It's like, oh, you've triggered me. I'm going to tell you, that's what a masculine first would do. Feminine masculine, once they've decided, it's like, no, you've crossed the line. And she didn't even do it particularly aggressively. She just wanted to inform people, didn't she? Out you go get out there. She had voting booths at her concerts. It's really interesting. So, but it took a lot, because she always insisted, no, I don't want to be involved. So she's used her influence well there. Who else did we have? We had Hugh Jackman. Um, FM's are people you go, I just love them. Like, they don't bring up envy or jealousy. It's like, oh, they're just great.
I love them. I love them. You just feel like
They're so likeable and warm and maybe cause you know, FMs and MFs to differentiate say, so Taylor is FM. Would you say an MF to show that's not exactly a sweetheart, but has neutral last would be Miley Cyrus as an MF?
She could be an MF.
I don't know her well enough. Definitely M first.
Yeah.
You... an MF
is
an
exuberant leader. So they want to lead. Like, get me in front and lead. And I want to lead. I want to do it my way. And they will set up hatred, Mim. I don't know if you could relate to that. I can relate to it. You and I have been executed many times because we get bossy and we think we should lead.
Nobody asked us
to.
Mm
hmm.
Like, we just want to take over.
We know better.. There's a
superiority that comes across in an MF. Shane Warne had this. So he's a bit of a rogue. We don't abide by the rules a whole lot. Cause they're not written for me. If you want to follow them, your bad luck. You know, whereas that's not an FM.
They don't want to cause conflict. They don't want to draw adverse... um, you know, what am I trying to say here? They don't want, they want to be approachable. They want to seem likable. They want to be popular. They do not want to offend people. Whereas an M will go, it needs to be said so it doesn't matter if I've offended people. That's how it is. There's much more assertive. A masculine is assertive, decisive, impulsive. They don't stop to think should I do this? Whereas the F is going to be cautious. And so they're not going to do that. And they're not going to share that personally a lot, necessarily, depending on the archetypes they have underneath, because quietly they've got this secret thing that they really want to do and they're going to go for it, but they're going to be liked as they do it. That's, that's, that's sort of the way they live. So we had a few more. Joey from
Friends.
Um, we had,
as well.
Who was that?
Phoebe from Friends.
Oh, Yeah.
Phoebe.
Yep, so
Kramer,
so we've got similar characters
there.
Yep. Dolly Parton.
Hmm. Yeah. I mean who doesn't love Dolly? Dolly is an exceptional human being, full of love. You feel the love and the goodness there, and she's done an enormous amount, very generously. You know, but she's never shown pictures of her husband. She's got a really strong private life. So it's not necessary that I have everything out there in the world. You can't contact her by phone, only by fax,
she's done Dolly world. She's provided reading and books for children in all the schools in her state in Virginia.
Extraordinary humanitarian. So the feminine is a very strong humanitarian bent. I think we could say that.
Doesn't mean others don't have that as well but it's a natural nurturing.
I'd like to look after.
Yeah.
Bringing people together and, community focus and, um, I mean the, the other ones we had Zoe Deschanel, James
Corden, and I reckon the Inspired Unemployed Boys.
Yeah, FM. So friendly go getters, can I say how they get
in trouble because I think
that's a really helpful way
to go, oh... So a friendly go, um, a friendly go getter is going to be gullible. They're going to believe the best in people. Oh, they're so lovely. No, they wouldn't be like that. They don't want to look at shadow. They don't want to look at their shadow. They don't want to look at others shadow. And they can get taken for a ride.
Their goodwill, their kindness, their volunteering of their time, their volunteering of their resources and creativity. They can get taken
for a hell of a long ride before they wake up and see what's going on.
Because they don't want to think that way. And they
also want to attach, they can love being in
partnerships in collaborations because that's a natural feminine way. masculine can
say, I want to be the leader, but I'd like my Royal Court thanks, that you're
all around there. Whereas the feminines go, can we all be in a circle and be equal? And let's all go together as a team and let's everyone get on. Everyone have harmony and it's peaceful and nice. And we all, you know, that'd be lovely, which is a great model, by the way, there's nothing wrong with that. So... that, but they won't then speak out in the circle. This isn't right. Or this isn't, I'll just... they'll think it, they might feel it. I don't want to be a burden. I don't, I don't want to be a problem. My radar's going off. This doesn't sound kosher. This isn't sounding right. This isn't sounding, something's a bit off here.
No, it's probably all right. It's probably just me. And so they'd rather second guess and doubt themselves. And then they do get into trouble and because they have got ambition underneath with their masculine. I mean Kramer got into trouble all the time. These schemes that were
going to work that don't happen. FMs will fall on their face as well, but they'll be attached often to a more
powerful person that they can come in underneath
and work with in that way. That can be something that you notice with them.
Hmm, and that's,
So it's gullability there.
Yeah... It
made me think because, um, you named feminine as, um, being cautious and all for equality, which are things that are also neutral, so I think it's key to differentiate that feminines will want everyone to come along with them in the light, no matter what, whereas neutrals in the dark who are all for equality and fairness will, they'll, they'll say, or think things like, oh, that person's not doing their bit.
They're not functional. They're not being a participant. Leave them behind.
Yeah.
They will
be judgmental. They will be judging and assessing and measuring.
So feminist
is
neutral. Feminine is this. It's different. It's not the same.
Feminines
aren't necessarily most.
It comes from the neutral, the
feminist.
Yeah.
That's where that comes from.
So the
measuring and judging,
whereas feminines
don't
judge.
They're very tolerant. I think you mentioned the golden retriever. Um, there was a something that's out there now like that. I actually wrote an archetype based exactly on the golden retriever cause I wrote them in animals and birds and dogs, dog's body and the golden retriever. So friendly, so social, go and talk to anyone.
I don't look at you and think, you're not mine or you're a deplorable or you're this or you're not up to me or you're beneath me. That's not in the feminine. They don't have that. This is one of their great superpowers. It's stunning. It's, we actually need to learn how to see everyone genuinely of equal value on a heart and soul level as a human being. know, So these are the kind people who go and work in disabilities and teach and are carers and in kindergarten and work with children and in the hospitality, like they're, they're looking after people in hospitals, they're, there's a natural wanting to help humanity... Is, is often, that's where they'll end up going, depending on whether they're FM and their other archetypes.
And working, yeah, yeah, I was just going
to name also working with animals is feminine.
Some would, not all of them, but some would. Some would definitely do that.
Definitely be the feminines. Definitely.
Yeah.
Good point.
So FNs.
Yes. You, you named, oh, do you want to describe them first and then I'll give the examples?
So I call them the gentle observer. So they're very kind and sweet and nice and people pleasing and what they're missing is the masculine. And then if you get them annoyed, and again, it takes them a while to get there because they're primary feminine, but if they get it to their N, they could suddenly be a bit cool and aloof. I don't appreciate that and we need these guidelines and I need this structure and the rule says this and I just don't think that's appropriate. I think it should happen. Da da da da da. Um, it, I have met many FNs and that's them really pissed off. Insisting on rules and following through stuff and being a bit cold and haughty and you know. Tick the boxes. Tick the boxes. Of course, everything I'm saying, Mim, is not only how we are out there, it's how we are with ourselves. So there's a perfectionist in the neutral part of them, that they've got to work hard. That they need to meet these expectations. There's this measurement. They've got good, strategic, logical minds.
They're clever. They can absorb information. But both the feminine cannot speak and share personally, you know, it doesn't want to burden people too much, or though some feminine archetypes overshare, let's be honest, that does happen, but the neutral part will also go, don't speak, don't share, like, will compartmentalize. So this is my private life, this is my personal life, this is my work life, you're a colleague, you're a friend, you're someone I go to this class with, like, let's get clear about
who's where. It's, it's differentiated and that's how they'll function. It's almost, it's got a chameleon quality the feminine can have and especially with a neutral that, I keep it like this and I know where I am.
God, you couldn't have a surprise party because all these people would come and you'd turn up as
a different person to all those groups, so how how
would you be? You just wouldn't know because you're trying to please them, you see, you can
mould yourself to them. So the FNs can find it really hard, the hardest, to get in touch with their fire because they're easy to be walked over. They're easy to be bossed around and told what to do and they will get cross, but that's as far as you get, you get cross. And then those things, but not if a big masculine is around, they'll be continually walked over and we often see very toxic relationship dynamics. We'll even see masculines getting furious that they won't come out with more of themselves. They just insist on playing the role. It's like, but I want a person here, but I just want, I'm fine, I'm fine. But we don't even know them. So it's a harder journey to find yourself, because the neutral doesn't want to go there, and neither does the F. So gentle observer, get, not
being, they don't want to come across as arrogant, but they do get judgmental when they're in neutral, but
they don't want to alienate people. They definitely don't want conflict. They want to mediate and keep everything
just in a nice, nice little
safe zone here. But then nobody is born like that. Everyone has got
passion. Everyone has got life and color. You
might not have been raised to know
that, it does
exist. And you find it through creativity. You find it through what you love. You
find it through what brings you
joy. That's how
you start
to birth these other parts of yourself. So we had Charlie.
An FN.
From Heartstopper.
Very cute.
Yeah.
Kind of high school show, um, about a gay relationship or coming out, one character being bi and the other gay. And, yeah, Charlie is very sensitive, just wants the best for everyone. Doesn't want conflict is so incredibly patient, you know, for a long time, he waits for Nick, his partner to, to come out.
And take all the time in the world, but then it hits a point where like, oh, actually, can you... there then comes in some impatience. Anything around that, you know, where they hit the threshold of, of
how long they're willing
that's That's what happens. Yeah, and then I want to take over control now. Then the neutral inside of it goes, right? Let's get this sorted because I just, I can't last any longer, but their capacity to last and wait, their capacity to wait and they can be living, waiting for someone, something all their lives.
There's a, in the FNs, the Gentle Observer, there's a total bewilderment about how do I take charge of my own life, how do I lead my own life, take responsibility for
decisions? Cause I never, I've never done it. I've always been around people and put myself and, attach myself to people and handed my life over to people for them to make the decisions for me. So, breakups can be absolutely terrifying because I've never done that before. I don't know how to do it. And feminines don't trust themselves to be able to do it, but they do have the resources inside, Mim. And like the rest of us
just make
mistakes. That's how we learned, but make a decision. Not making a decision is that's the worst.
It's fine
to fail. It's fine to make a mistake. We learned from them, but not acting, being
passive in your own life, in your
own life direction, that is a huge, huge default setting that hurts you and sets you up to be hurt again and again and again.
And
no one does that.
That's your decision and that's your responsibility for living like that.
Absolutely. And this is, this is, what this work really names is. It doesn't blame anyone else. It goes, well, if I look inwards, what do I need to tend to more? And FNs and NFs will procrastinate.
They won't wanna make a decision. They will postpone it or throw it to someone else for as long as they can.
NFs less so, but yes, but they'll certainly avoid tackling difficult issues in relationships. They won't want to bring it up. They won't go there. They will feel ambushed if a masculine comes in, MF, MN, whatever the combo is. Because let's go to this and they get really heightened in their intensity.
Intensity frightens neutrals and feminines. Like they instantly,
it'll hit
trauma wounds. I mean, it'll hit terror of, you know, masculine abuse and violation that has happened in our world collectively, all over the place. It's like, all I wanted to do was to be safe.
Safety is a big concern
as well for feminines, like I don't feel safe,
I don't feel safe. And what I always teach and have taught my groups and my clients for 35 years, the only one who can make you safe is you. The minute you step up and learn to have a voice, the minute you
step up and know what you want. If you use your voice. You can scream as loud as me. If you use your voice, you are safe. You can make yourself safe. It's an energy. But if you go out there, I'm terrified. I'm terrified. I'm terrified. It's like, I don't want to be violated. I don't want to be violated. Unconsciously, you've actually already violated yourself because your masculine has been left in the garbage bin 35 years ago. And it's nowhere to be seen. And you can pick this up in people. I swear to you, I meet people. I know what they are straight away. know what, I know what they are. Because it's really obvious how they speak, it's how they are, it's the tone of their voice, it's how they look, it's what they talk about, it's how they dress, it's just what they're interested in, it's all there. And the masculines, those who have cut off their own masculine, then set up having masculines come in to them. It's unconscious... If you bring your masculine through in your life, and what do I mean by that? I mean make a decision. Use your voice. Say no. Say no. I don't want to. I'm not going to. Now these things feel life threatening for a feminine.
I'm not exaggerating. Because they believe, and they've been taught to believe in our patriarchal world, that they can only exist if attached to another. Adam to Eve. They're Eve. You know, they're a rib. They're not a whole person. That's the lie our patriarchy, our patriarchal system has reinforced for thousands of years. And we all hold that unconsciously, incredibly powerfully and deeply, Mim. Whereas every feminine is a whole being who has the whole range of archetypes, just like you and I and anybody does, whatever gender we're talking about. It's a, it's a wonderful thing to go and explore and open the door to go and find out who you are this way, because you can't
see yourself as a half person, just an attachment to another again, that has always set people up for terrible pain. I'm all about freeing people from walking
into that
again and again.
And something I
wanted to clarify because you spoke about appearance and how we express ourselves, which last episode we said, you know, these energies don't necessarily have anything to do with that, but they do in the sense that, you know, if we dress in a way where we want to disappear into the background, or we want to be seen as outrageous, like that does speak to our energy.
Absolutely. So our appearance in that sense can.
So if you want to be invisible, you're not a primary masculine. You want to disappear? There's F and N going on. Though there's some Fs that are extraordinarily colorful, but if you're the non, if you're the quieter feminines, there's some louder ones, extraverted ones. And there's some introverted ones.
There's a range here. If you're the introverted ones, you might like beautiful, pretty colors, feminine colors, but you know, not necessarily too out there. Neutrals might go for
neutral colors, you know, browns and, blues and grays
and, I don't want to be, I'm not wearing hot pinks and lime greens to
work, I'll tell you that for nothing. So the different archetypes we have literally
create our style. It's really fascinating.
And, and that invisibility, cause when Katie and I were trying to come up with examples,
it was so hard to find feminines and more feminine neutrals,
because you don't like it's hard. There are literally going to be no musicians or, rarely actors or public figures, politicians that are FNs. This is why we had to go to fiction because fiction can represent these.
They don't want the center stage. So others in here is Neville and Luna from Harry Potter. Um, Ted Lasso, um,
Fred Rogers,
Yeah, Fred Rogers, yeah, Ted Lasso is an absolute classic FN. Um, you do get some musicians, you might get folk musicians or country musicians who are FNs who've done really well, where they're talking and sharing like that, and, but the style of music will even reflect that. You know how they are you would see them there. I'm thinking
of Casey Chambers,
you know
I reckon she could
be
she
could be an FN. I
don't
know but she could
She's a strong feminine there. I don't know could be FM. It's hard to know also, Mim. We've talked about this people are putting off a public persona. Privately, we don't know who they all are and we don't have enough information and we're certainly not saying you are definitely this or they are definitely that. We're having a little bit of a, a guess here, um, but feminine neutrals aren't necessarily, unless they've got a creative one, a little bit of an extrovert one in there. Ted Lasso has a bit of the extrovert of feminine, so that's why we see him as he is, but he's FN. His kindness, his compassion, his tolerance. He sees what's going
on, but he doesn't lecture. He doesn't need to do that, but he finds a way to help people learn the lesson they need to learn. That's it. It's a, you know, it's a fairy tale,
isn't it? It's a, it's a, a lot of people would think it'd be nice to meet a Ted Lasso cause we didn't meet him.
We didn't know
people
like that.
No, there's, there's a lot of forgiveness, um, you know, when Nate was a real dickhead and had his moment and, and it was like, it never happened to Ted.
That's the feminine has a capacity for forgiveness. I'm really glad you mentioned that. He understood. He had the wisdom to know that Nate was coming from the pain of his childhood and his family and what he'd missed out on, even though he was appalling. Like he understood.
Hmm.
Yeah. had more depth. He had he had, the feminine one that also has depth
of, of understanding. Whereas some
feminines are, I just accept people and love
people for who they are. End of story.
Hmm. Yeah. True. There was the, the, deeper compassion for,
uh, yeah, that history rather than this surface level kind of, but let's all be friends.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, never works.
No. Yeah.
Um, and then the others, Gwen from Gavin and Stacey.
Oh yeah, I mean, I love Gavin and
Stacey. My family
loves Gavin and Stacey. So I'd
say, yeah, Gwen there is definitely an FN. People who've watched that show will relate. Fred Rogers was from
A
Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood. That was a movie that Tom Hanks
played him, but he was a guy who did children's television for 40 years and managed to get millions and millions and millions of dollars out of the American government congress
to um, fund public television for children and it was all love and compassion and for 40 years make
them feel like they had a friend if they had a hard like time at home, you know. He was a beautiful man,
very much an FN.
Yeah, great examples. And cause we're at the end, I've got so much more I could go into, but I, I think, and, you know, tell me if there's something you feel is missing. I believe really driving home how feminines set up dynamics that
they can often scapegoat onto masculines, maybe also neutrals of you weren't there for me
and to a degree play
into victimhood.
Why is it important that we name this?
Oh my god because you're going to keep fucking doing it if you don't know you're doing it and I'll tell you what, It's as good as throwing an insect repellent, spraying an insect repellent at someone. If you want someone to save you and rescue you, you got the wrong strategy. Don't go there. I call that playing damsel in distress. Feminines will know that. They get a bit teary. We're a bit upset and I've done all of this and I thought you would do this for me. I thought you would be here for me. When we go to that place and we all come from lack, Mim, we weren't fully unconditionally loved because that's what life is. Then we can be waiting and feminines are the strongest believers in fairy tales.
I mean, it's all them. It's them.. So when the partner, whatever they may be, I don't know, M, F or N, isn't living up to parenting me, saving me, rescuing me, loving me, healing my self esteem, making me feel complete like all the love songs and all the Disney shows and everything tells me is going to happen, all the rom coms. Well, I'm really hurt. Get over your fucking selves. Grow up. You're not five. You've got to learn that that no one is coming, the only one who can save you and love you is you, and when you start doing that, you become lovable. I would love you to have a loving partnership, feminines. I would love you to be matched and equal, but if you keep turning up as a child, wanting fairytale romance, no one can be that. And then if you cry, and wail, and also, the responsibility, I handed responsibility for my life over to you. Because I'm not prepared to parent myself. I don't want to make my own decisions. want you to fill my holes. Now, most people don't have any awareness of that, Mim so that's fair enough. But maybe, feminines listening to this today, and I think they know who they are. I've got feminine, and I have done this as strong as my masculine is, and mine's on steroids. When I've fallen, because I've been frightened of being hated for my masculine, I've fallen into the feminine. I've done this, and I am shocked and appalled, it was the worst times in my life when I played damsel in distress. Feminine who'd been done in. I was done in, but I handed myself over to be done in. I was. I was. It was a time where I refused to lead my own life. Only happened a few times. Worst times of my life. Worst times of my life. That's why we have to own it. So maybe it would be a lovely thing for feminines to do. Am I secretly sort of wanting this person here to meet my needs? Because I don't know how to and I don't want to have to do it for myself. Maybe if I just over give to them, then it will spill over and then they'll give it to me. It doesn't work. I have done thousands of clients doing this and they are so stubborn, the feminines. Nope. I'll find the one. They do exist. Yeah. You are the one. You are the one. When you start doing that, your relationships, your friendships, your relationship with family, work, you get more respect. The capacity to love you grows. We need you to step out of the I'm a nice person who doesn't get angry and I'll do anything you want. That does never ever, ever does that elicit love. It gets used, it's exploited. And then we can't say, woe is me I've been exploited because you handed yourself over. You said, here are my keys. You take me off you go. So obviously no one's going to fix this. Just hearing this Mim, but to be aware of that, I mean, we went into the masculine shadow last week, and we didn't paint a pretty picture. Like, the shadow in all of us is just the pain part of us that hasn't been loved, that hasn't known how to grow up yet. We don't
want to be a little girl or a little boy for the rest of our lives. Let's be an adult, feminines. I don't want to be that angry little girl forever either. I've got to grow up and
into my adult masculine, the neutrals, you know, they're going to hear a few things next week that's a bit confronting
as well. Trust me.
We're going to go there and we do that with all we don't hold back because we want everyone to see this so they can have quality relationships and,
you know, unite all of these parts of themselves.
And there's ways to do that. There's ways to learn it. We do courses. You do counseling. I've got materials out there for people to learn about this in as much depth as you want loads. So if you want to, and you go, fuck, this might be me. There's actually a way through. I've spent my entire life figuring this stuff out and then, with my little lantern going, this is the way through. So you didn't have to work it out for yourselves. So there's a lot of help. There's a lot, and it works. This work works. So all we're wanting to do with this podcast is maybe getting an idea or inkling of who I am and how I keep getting stuck in the same way.
And when you've had enough, that's the day you'll go, I think I might go and do something about that to see if I can correct it. And you will be able to, but there's also parents, Mim,, see they've got children who are stuck in this. Things and to learn about it. If you
learn about it as a parent so you know how to support your child not to fall into that, what a gift, what a gift.
Yeah, and that's what I love about this work. It's so tangible. We don't just lay all this out on the table and go, well, there, develop some self awareness. There are actually really practical tools that, that we can use bridge our communication and in connection with people who just simply are different types to us.
Let them be as they are, and you can be as you are, and we're going to celebrate you. I think it's really, we're not going to go where we're tolerated anymore, feminines. Let's go where we're celebrated, it starts with celebrating yourself first.
Beautiful place to end. Thank you, Katie.
I look forward to going into neutral next session.
