Chapter Twenty-One #5
“You aren’t my only purpose,” I insisted.
“But providing for you feels good. It feels like this is what the tribe would’ve done back before modern inventions— before our ancestors got their magic, even.
You want to be a strong, independent woman, and I admire that so much about you. But I want to be here for you, too.”
Ava ran her hand over the leather journal beside her.
“My parents said all relationships have duality to them, a masculine and feminine energy we all embody. Maybe I went wrong because I didn’t give you enough space to make me feel safe.
I was too worried about protecting myself, and providing for my needs all on my own, because that’s what most women have to do in today’s world. ”
“Your parents also said we all have masculine and feminine traits within us. Maybe we got it wrong. You have a lot of masculine traits, like being a great leader. What if you’re supposed to be the masculine one, and I’m the feminine one in our relationship, even though it’s opposite of our gender?”
“I don’t think so,” Ava mused. “I am a good leader, but I’m not convinced that’s a masculine trait.”
I furrowed my brow. “How so? Hasn’t it been the case for millennia that men rule as kings?”
Ava scoffed, like the idea of men ruling was comical to her.
Can’t say she didn’t have a reason not to think that way.
“I’m not saying men can’t be great rulers, but great rulers need a balance of masculine and feminine energy to reign effectively.
You went too far into your masculine when you were trying to stage that coup, but in contrast, Cameron has leaned too far into his feminine.
In this time of war when his people need him to fight for them, he wants to sit in the palace gardens sipping mimosas. ”
Ava went on. “On the other hand, there are many great rulers who come from a place of nurturing and caring for their subjects, which I’d argue is a feminine trait.
I think at their core, the best rulers are rooted in feminine energy, even in times when they have to engage the masculine to get things done.
In the Hawkei tribe, women were the traditional leaders.
Even when men served as chiefs, their wives had the important job of supporting and counseling them.
Our matriarchal society worked well for hundreds of years, until women were pushed out of leadership roles and we took the masculine too far in the Hawkei Civil War. ”
“My grandfather seemed to embody both traits. His energy must’ve been balanced,” I noted.
“It was. That’s what made Cassiel so great.” Ava dared to lean into me, her arm against mine, and it sent my world on fire. “It’s in my blood— and my nature— to be a leader, but I have to stay rooted in the feminine when making decisions, and I have to call upon the masculine to take action.”
I digested her words. “I suppose even in Elvish culture, the Holy Mother serves as a guide for the Emperor. It is the Emperor who delegates tasks, but ultimately, it’s the Holy Mother who is leading the Emperor behind the scenes.”
“It works out well to have both,” Ava agreed.
“I think our problem is I’ve been playing a masculine role for so long, and it isn’t working for us.
We share a masculine-feminine wound. We need to fix it and reach a state of equilibrium, both in ourselves, and in our relationship, before we can move forward.
Neither of us can have too much of one or the other, because we need both to work in harmony. ”
“What exactly is a masculine-feminine wound, and how does it show up in our relationship?” I asked. “You’ve been taught this stuff for years, so you know more about this than me.”
“I don’t think it’s just in our relationship,” Ava said.
“I see it in our individual selves— wounds that were formed before either of us met. And because we’ve been hurt, we’re avoiding stepping into our natural roles, because we’re trying to protect ourselves from being hurt again.
For me, so much has happened in my life that has made me feel like I have to take care of myself, because I struggle to believe that anyone else can.
I’ve always been the kind of person who, if I wanted something done, I had to do it myself. ”
My fingers wandered closer, daring to touch her skin, and she let me. “I’d say that describes you pretty accurately.”
“But that’s not who I’m meant to be,” Ava continued.
“It’s a survival skill I adopted, but my struggles have reached the point where I have to admit I can’t take care of myself all the time, and it’s not just because I’m disabled.
I need help in other ways, too, because otherwise, I’m just dealing with one crisis after another without allowing my community to step in and support me.
It’s not sustainable. I want to let you take care of me, but I have a hard time with that, because I’ve always had to be so strong.
I want to enjoy the feminine aspects of myself, like listening to my intuition and being creative with music, but I can’t, because I’ve been so traumatized. ”
Ava sighed. “When Monica died, I wasn’t strong enough to save her.
So I learned that if I could be tougher, stronger, more brave, bad things wouldn’t happen.
I still love to shop and do my makeup and all of that, but those are the simple parts of my femininity that I can hold on to without any danger being involved.
There’s no risk to enjoying those things, because I won’t lose anything.
Those deeper parts of femininity like allowing people to help me, forgiving others, and being gentle is difficult for me.
I love unconditionally, but my love is harsh. ”
“I don’t think that’s who you are deep down,” I said. “You keep people at a distance to protect yourself.”
“I know. But I’ve come to see that by doing so, I’ve only hurt myself.”
I nudged her. “You’re not the only one responsible for causing hurt.
If you have a feminine wound, then I have a masculine one.
The masculine is supposed to be the provider, right?
I grew up unable to provide for myself, and I didn’t have any strong masculine role models.
My grandpa was the best role model I ever had, but I didn’t have enough time with him, and we both know my dad isn’t a man worth looking up to.
I don’t know if I ever learned how to react logically and think things through, because I always had to take each moment as it came.
I didn’t have a future to plan ahead for, so I learned to react out of emotion.
My decision to pull the coup was one out of feelings, not logic. ”
“That’s true,” Ava said. “You think with your heart, and I think with my head. You’re too far into your feminine, and I’m stuck in my masculine.
No matter how pissed off I am, I’m going to calculate my response so I can stick it to them.
If it was me, I’d have done that coup right, because I’d have thought it out logically no matter how pissed off I was. ”
I chuckled. “Yeah, you would’ve.”
“I don’t think one way is better than the other, but I don’t think we’ve been acting in ways that are authentic to us,” Ava added. “Maybe that’s why we both chose to incarnate here together, to learn the duality of these roles. Ancestors know it seems to be the theme of our lives.”
“What do you mean?”
“Have you ever heard of twin flame mirroring?”
I shook my head. “No. What is it?”
“It’s this concept I’ve been looking into, because we’re minai— or twin flames. Or at least… we used to be.”
A pang cut through my lungs, and I managed to utter, “Even if we don’t have a soul bond anymore, maybe this still applies. I want to hear what you know.”
“Okay. Well…” Ava took a breath. “According to lore, when your soul incarnates in two separate beings at the same time, it’s because you’ve chosen to come to Earth to learn intense life lessons.
Your twin flame becomes a mirror for you, reflecting back your deepest fears and insecurities so you can both learn and grow at a rapid pace.
I think we could feel this mirroring in our soul long before we even met, like how your issues with food security showed up in my food anxiety years before you came to Kinpago.
I’m wondering if this twin flame mirroring is what’s causing our masculine-feminine wound within the relationship, because obviously, it’s more than just an individual problem if we keep triggering each other and perpetuating the wounds. ”
“That’s interesting,” I mused. “So how can we heal?”
“For starters, it gives us understanding on what we’re going through and what our job is moving forward,” Ava said.
“We have these wounds because we’re supposed to gain a better understanding of these energies.
But we can’t keep holding up the mirror to one another while doing nothing.
We’ve exposed these wounds, and now we have to help each other find balance. ”
“I think we know what our goal is going forward. I need to work on getting comfortable with my masculine side, and you need to embrace your feminine. The challenge is going to be putting that into practice and balancing it within the relationship. I don’t want to go too far to one side, because there are feminine aspects of myself I like, and masculine parts of you that work for us.
Like caring for Casey. I let my feminine side come out around him because I like caring for and nurturing him. ”
“But are you doing that because it’s your role, or because you’re trying to provide the emotional support Casey needs when I can’t step up and give that to him?
” Ava wondered. There were no accusations in her tone, but there was an edge of heartbreak.
No matter what she said about not wanting to be around him…
that she wasn’t able to was bothering her.