Contrasting Against a Strong Mother Archetype

I’m no expert on Mothering from a feminine essence/attribute perspective.  I’m certainly no expert on feminine mothering skills either.  My mother may have been bi-polar.  At least my memory of her and my aunt agree that this would have been a good place to start.  I also believe that she was deeply depressed for most of my life.  My own experience with depression has me relate more deeply with her on that level. Most importantly, my mother died with I was 15.

All of these issues took me on a journey to get re-mothered in a way.  I found some very strong women that helped me in the process.  I am deeply thankful to them and they remain in my life.  They are the ONLY reason that I think I can write an article like this.  Thank you Chiqui, Susie, Pam, Bobbi, and the many other women in my life that have helped me transform myself.

I’m going to ask some of these strong feminine mothers that I have in my life to read this article and weigh in on the comments sections.  With enough feedback I’ll rewrite this article many times until I at least get a consensus from the women/mothers that I respect that I’m 80% there.

After all, this article is for fathers so that they have something to contrast their fathering against over time.  Maybe we are not supposed to fully understand the mysteries that happen between a mother and her children. I’ll never give birth and I’ll never breast feed and I’ll never have the attributes of the female brain. Somethings are not knowable unless you are it.

Why is this contrast important?

Because I believe that we, as fathers, need to know when we are channeling and acting in the feminine versus presenting a strong masculine essence as a father.

And I’m NOT saying that any of the attributes is just for mothers and I am NOT saying that mothers need to be good at these to be “good” mothers.  That is why I call this an archetype.

Mothers are female by biological fact.  Feminine mothering is not reserved for mothers. I believe that for the most part (80/20 rule) that men are more natural at fathering and being masculine.  I also know for a fact from my own experience that I am capable for feminine essence mothering behaviors.  They just don’t come naturally to me and they don’t always seem obvious to do at the time.

And this is not an exclusive list.  And all of these behaviors / skills of mothering can be accomplished in a masculine way (except probably nurturing which I believe is the most fundamental of mothering skills, essential for all humans, and is fundamentally feminine is its essence.

Nurturing,

Intuitive Knowing/Understanding,

Protecting (Feminine),

Supporting, and

Loving (Feminine).

In a future version of the article I’ll add attributes to these but since I am under a very tight deadline to publish I’ll save that for a revision!