(Disclaimer: This is being written while I am on allergy medication, so it may come out disjointed or jumbled, please be advised.)
So I am looking online for a new layout for myspace when I decide to make my title a quote because I find certain phrases, sentances, and moments inspiring. When I came across a French American writer called Anais Nin. What an amazing insight this woman seems to have for someone of my thinking. Her perceptions and ideals are oddly matched to my current frame of mind. As such I thought I would take this opportuninty to post some of her quotes and under them describe what about them touched me.
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Here is a small Biop on her:
Anais Nin (1903-1977)
Anais Nin is best known for her journals, published in ten volumes as The Diary of Anais Nin. Her ideas have influenced feminist thinking -- in agreement or reaction -- although she herself moved away from political forms of feminism.
#1. "I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman."
All right let me say this, I was STUNNED by this quote when I first read it. What an amazing point of view to see such a liberated and independant ideals. I completely feel that way about myself. To paraphase Jo Dee Messina's song. "I want man who walks beside me, not in front or behind me." I want to have an emotionally equitous relationship. I want the man I love to have the capacity to see my value and worth as a woman and understand what strengths I have. To be seen not only as a creature of desire but to also be seen as someone with a valid and strong viewpoint.
#2. "I disregard the proportions, the measures, the tempo of the ordinary world. I refuse to live in the ordinary world as ordinary women. To enter ordinary relationships. I want ecstasy. I am a neurotic -- in the sense that I live in my world. I will not adjust myself to the world. I am adjusted to myself."
Now this, my friends is something I have had come out of my own mouth. She is speaking on how the world tries to force you into some selected shape, some small boxed ideal of what a woman should be. Right down to what type of SHOES we were and WHEN. I am truely touched by this quote in that she speaks of standing strong against the world. Against what someone elses idea of your life should be. Having the courage to forge your own path, your own life, outside of what society tells you a person ought to be.
#3. "I do not want to be the leader. I refuse to be the leader. I want to live darkly and richly in my femaleness. I want a man lying over me, always over me. His will, his pleasure, his desire, his life, his work, his sexuality the touchstone, the command, my pivot. I don't mind working, holding my ground intellectually, artistically; but as a woman, oh, God, as a woman I want to be dominated. I don't mind being told to stand on my own feet, not to cling, be all that I am capable of doing, but I am going to be pursued, fucked, possessed by the will of a male at his time, his bidding."
Now I am sure you think this goes completely against everything she said before, but you must look deepre into what she is saying. In this quote she states that she has no problems defending her life as a intellectual, artistic person. But in the intimate relations between a man and a woman, she speaks of something more primal, somehthing far deeper then a mere social status. She speaks of desire, of the innate need women have to feel desired, to be wanted, chased, and as she said pursued. To have someone so deeply ennamored with your very essnace they struggle after you in almost animalistic ways. She speaks of being bent to his will, but this is much more then that. It is not a mere subjugation of the female psyche, it is a battle, a rare battle in which submission is true victory. The ability to allow yourself to grant someone the trust and control that they care for, desire, and love you enough to bring you to the heights of heaven, and cradle you close as you come back down. Such passionate encounters are rare, and they can never be planned. I find it even more so an illteration of her indepenance as a woman to ASK for this, to demand it. Most women fear having such a strong sexual appetite because it is seen as wrong, even to this day, for women to want to enjoy, explore and ask for any form of sexual encounter. Even women who are in married, monogomous relationships are given a bit of a stigma by other women if they express a desire to be sexually aggressive. How amazing that for a woman born in the forties to have such a broadend view of her own sexuality, and have no qualms about speaking on it!!
#4. "From the backstabbing co-worker to the meddling sister-in-law,
you are in charge of how you react to the people and events in your life.
You can either give negativity power over your life or you can choose happiness instead. Take control and choose to focus on what is important in your life. Those who cannot live fully often become destroyers of life."
Here I connect with Anais on the ideal that we cannot allow others to force our emotional hand. In doing so, they achive their goal of making life a misery to everyone around them. These are the people who cannot survive without drama, without control, or chaos. She is right in stating that we can choose our fate among them, either by allowing their negative disease to spread into our hearts, or adversely choosing to live above and beyond that. Allow ourselves to rise to such occasions and beyond them. I have let a GREAT number of people recently color my view on myself, my life and what it should be. I allowed said persons to tell me what should and should not be. When I finally stood up to them, finally refused to let their negativty and dilusionary sense of grandure impede my life, I felt as if a weight had been lifted. I cannot live my life for other people, I can only live my life for myself, and in doing so -I- must choose to be happy, to be whole. -I- must choose to accept who and what I am and learn to love that part of myself. It is my choice to allow them to control me or not.
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So those are the quotes that touched me, once again this was written in a Claratin D haze, but I feel as if I have written some truth down, some insight, I may had not have had before. Feel free to comment, e-mail, or pass on.
-Sammi
