There are many waves and phases to womanhood. There are the obvious phases of childhood and maturity, and then old age. But within those is an evolution …
The Maiden – child to adult
The Princess – adult to Lady
The Wild Woman – creative chaos and juice of full womanhood
The Queen – wisdom embodied and ability to navigate all arenas
‘Wait,’ some of you might be saying. ‘I thought it was “Maiden, Mother and Crone.”’ That is true in some beliefs, but we choose to view it differently. ‘Mother’ is a stage some women choose to pass on or are unable to be, and ‘Crone’ has such negative connotations that women tend to fear rather than embrace her. The ‘Wild Woman’ between adulthood and old age gets skipped over altogether. So, we have come up with a new way of identifying the phases of a woman’s life.
The Maiden in her youthful innocence is the beginning stage towards full Queendom. She is curious, playful, eager to learn and love. She can be silly and is unafraid of expressing herself.
The Princess is starting to understand her power and ability to make impressions on people. She is beginning to mature and ripen on her way to fully claiming her crown.
The Wild Woman is witnessing her connection to nature and her wild ways. She’s confident in her body, full and embracing of all her emotions. She is at peace with her wild and can move through all layers of her mess and magic with equal ease.
And finally, The Queen. She fully owns her power and knows who she is, unafraid and unapologetic, shining her brightest. Ageing excites her – she’s proud of her journey and accomplishments. She’s the compilation and completion of all the stages that came before, fully realised and magnificent.
The key is finding excitement in each stage.
We’ve all heard:
‘Wait until you get your first period: it’s awful.’
‘Wait until you’re an adult: you’ll see how hard life is.’
‘Wait until your clock starts ticking: you’ll want children.’
‘Wait until you hit menopause: you’ll feel like life is over.’
‘Wait until your hair goes grey: you’ll want to dye it.’
We may have yet to go through menopause, but we’ve had all the rest and bloody loved it. Having our periods feels like an ocean is going through us. Getting older feels like we’re growing into our power. One of us is happily child-free, and the other is a loving mother. And we’ve started getting grey hairs, and we’re excited by it. Honestly!
We find women with silver hair quite beautiful and never subscribed to the theory of the Crone as a lonely, haggard woman. That’s why we call her The Queen. Ageing and the process we experience in our journey can be beautiful if we appreciate each stage. The Queen is the stage where we fully embody our feminine experience and build a community to share it.
There is this perpetual sickness in our society of ‘not enoughness’ that pushes women out of the present moment. As teenagers, we want to be older. When we’re older, we want the body we had in our teenage years. When we hit thirty, we mourn our twenties. When we hit forty, we miss our thirties. We’re never ‘enough’ or allowed to relax where we are, here and now, in the moment.
Ladies, NOW is the only time there is, the place to live joyfully as we are – loving ourselves at each stage.
Now I’m sure you’re thinking, ‘So I have to go through all of those stages you mentioned before I can become a Queen?’
Well, sort of, yes. But you can always be Queenly.
Queenly qualities start coming through as early as the Maiden. They’re like compound interest, building over time as you move through each phase; they start presenting themselves, then when you are ripe they explode into this cornucopia of Queendom.
You arrive naturally at your wonder, wisdom and womanly maturity – it’s such a high, deep magical place to be and it’s effortless but full of feeling!
It’s vital to savour each stage, rather than try to rush through or ignore them. Because, otherwise, when we arrive at our Queendom, it will be barren. Our castle will be crumbling down, for lack of a strong foundation.
Being Queenly is about more than eating chocolate and having luxurious baths (although we love those, obviously). It’s about building a life and Queendom we are happy to live in with no desire to escape from. Relationships that have us feeling fabulous and support us to flourish. Knowing what we desire, identifying our desires clearly. Once we’ve identified what we desire most in life, we can take daily action to make it happen.
But it starts here and now, embracing where we’re at in every stage. Ladies, let’s start today and celebrate each phase of the journey on our way to full Queendom!
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