To be the good girl you were taught to be….or not?
Be a good girl and….thats a good girl….aw you’re such a good girl. We have all heard these sentences, these affirmations of our goodness, our worth. Never said to harm, but to encourage girls to behave a certain way, the acceptable way. To be a good girl is to be passive, quiet, agreeable, caring, selfless, placing others needs way above your own. Easy, loving, kind and sweet. So, we build this picture in our minds of what it means to be a girl, a woman. What our role is in this world. Even that is a complex concept right now, full of juxtaposition and polarity.
Nothing activates me more than watching people parent little girls. I remember recently, sitting in the garden with my father. A gorgeous early summers day. You know, when it gets really warm in May. My brother had pulled out the swimming pool. My boys, then 6 and 4 were playing with my niece also 4 in the garden. Loudly! Shouting. Laughing. Arguing over whose turn it was to sit on the float. Screaming in joy and frustration. My youngest niece at the time was 2. She was toddling around the garden, silent. At that moment she was sitting on a chair, munching away at a snack. My father turned to her and said “oh! You’re such a good girl, sitting there nicely.” Then turned to me and said, “she’s so good isn’t she?”. It’s a moment that stuck with me, because it cracked the stone cap sitting on top of something I barely recognised at the time, rage. Wild, untamed, feminine rage. My insides burning. I just smiled. Looking at my niece, I thought, “Give them hell, and change it all”, she looked up at me then, and it was like she knew what I was silently telling her, she scowled at me, then smiled. Today, she is a powerhouse of individuality. Not afraid to ask for what she needs. Will challenge anyone who says she can’t do something. Uses her voice, discerningly, but powerfully, when she speaks, we listen.
That day in the garden, unravelled my good girl. She in that moment felt unseen. Deeply unhappy in my work as a midwife, I had started to pull away from it. Having my heart broken on a shift-by-shift basis by the system was getting too much. I was still seeking external validation to an internal issue. Everyone around me was saying the right things. Encouraging. Commending my bravery. But, inside the good girl was petrified. Crying in the corner. Everything I was told to do, to be good in this world, go to school, get good grades, study hard, go to university (in my case three times!), meet a man, build a career, get married, have children, buy a house and live happily ever after, felt like it didn’t fit. I didn’t fit. I didn’t fit in the medical system – I saw the illusion and lies there but pretended I didn’t. I didn’t fit in my house – it’s too big in the centre of a town, I’m definitely a country cottage girl. I didn’t fit in my marriage – I was a martyr, putting everyone before myself, I didn’t express my needs and avoided conflict at all costs. I was disappearing.
There was no room for me in the life I had created, but I was a good girl, so I was safe.
I have spent the last 5 years working with that conditioning. Working with my inner good girl. Gently unpicking safety. Working hard to comfort myself as I learn to say what I need, using my voice for me for the first time, recognising what I need in my relationships, reducing my hours in midwifery, appearing more me in public (crystals, candles, incense, rituals, energy work and all!). Speaking more about what I know is true for me about health and wellbeing. About our connection to nature. The real me, mothering the good girl all the way because she was taught the act of expressing her truth, is unsafe!
Standing out as a woman feels unsafe. Why? Yep, here it comes, I’m going to say it, patriarchy. Women suppression and persecution meant that if you stood out, you could be labelled a witch, tortured and killed. This is not forgotten. Our bodies remember it, our bones remember it, our cells remember it. So, we learn to be small and quiet to protect ourselves. To be unseen. It’s survival. Our fathers know it, they sub consciously know their daughters will be safe if they aren’t outspoken, dress modestly and marry. This is protection. This is what we have been taught. Even though, time and time again this is proven to be untrue. Oh, and while we do that, we must also do man things and chase that career and earn good money. I am not throwing judgement at people’s choices, that is something I would never do. If you make the conscious choice to live your life a certain way and then actually do it, I nothing but proud of you! But so many women live a life they were taught to want, and then find themselves wondering, is this it? Living with anxiety, depression, bouts of burnout, all caused from living out of alignment. Caused by living the life of “The Good Girl” that was designed by past generations. By our fathers, grandfathers, great grandfathers and so on.
I decided long ago that the pain of living out of alignment is worse than the pain of feeling unsafe. Does that mean I find all of this easy, absolutely not. I have to have quiet and sometimes very loud words with myself daily. I have to constantly remind myself that the good girl life, isn’t for me anymore. I want more. And I am not waiting for permission. Are you?
How does your good girl show up for you? Mine, was a life completely misaligned. A life I had almost erased myself from. The key to alignment is conscious choice. Those choices you make with your eyes and heart open. These choices aren’t always the easy path, but you’ll know in your bones they are the right ones. The brave choices. The vulnerable choices. Make those choices. Hold the tiny hand of your good girl self and with all the love and reassurance you can offer her in your heart, choose, jump, leap.
And even as I read this for the 100th time, to check that I’m not being “too much” of anything, I recognise that my good girl self is here. With me. Sitting on the edge of the bed, begging me not to post this. She still doesn’t want to be seen. She still doesn’t want to be heard. She is still frightened. So, I close my eyes, take a deep breath, I imagine holding her shaking hands in mine, I offer her love and compassion. I reassure her that it is safe to be seen. And press share.