Sometimes crushing the patriarchy looks like walking away, palms open to let loose everything you’ve been holding so tightly.

No looking back, no making a fuss.

Quietly, quietly, the whisper of your absence echoing through the corseted confines of space you once occupied.

The grief a balloon billowing above you –

Carrying you, if you let it, to the freedom that waits on the other side of letting go.

And other times crushing the patriarchy looks like walking away – but taking down the CEO on your way out the door.

Like a righteous, rage-ful howl that starts as a whimper, a faltering step, a hesitant stake in the mud.

It’s a pulsing, breathing, living thing, that rage.

A rage that will remind you who you are, if you let it.

A rage that will rattle the cage around your existence,

Demanding that you break free.

That you fight.

That you hold your ground.

That you refuse to roll over.

That you take up every inch of the space meant for you in this world, and not allow another man to get off unscathed with actions that make him a monster.

It takes more strength than you knew you had – a resilience that has always been there,

but that got lost behind the facade of the Good Girl you were conditioned to be.

“Stand down,

watch your tone,

make yourself smaller,”

she says.

“It’s for your own protection after all,”

she says.

Crushing the patriarchy requires the death of the Good Girl within, her ghost giving way to the You that was there all along – your wild force contained within the confines of a neatly wrapped package.

And like a phoenix rising from the ashes, your soul will unfurl from its prison and your voice, hesitant at first, will soar like a songbird set free.

Crushing the patriarchy looks like bringing yourself back to life.