Become a Rebel with a Cause – Step Out of Line

It's always been my nature to defy convention. Tell me that's the way it's done and I will surely choose another way. My taste for such behavior goes back to my formative years and the attraction I had for my Aunt Elsie. Blond, beautiful, and outrageous, she held court at our family reunions with her tales and a twinkle that always sent my imagination into overdrive. Aunt Elsie had a common-law marriage; she was well traveled and dripping in jewels and mink. Everything about her was far more entertaining than Aunt Mary who more than paled in comparison.

Still, my mother waxed poetic about Aunt Mary, professing her virtues which included staying married to a very dull man for fifty years, bringing up four outstanding children, and never raising her voice.  As far as I could gather she loved domesticity more than anyone in their right mind should.

So, when recently my uncle compared me to Elsie, I was flattered, even though I knew deep down that he did not intend it as a compliment. She was the family's black sheep and I was following suit. Running away from home, living apart from my husband for over a year, and then turning my adventures into a book was no way to accrue points in a repressed waspish family. I felt a sting when I heard his comment. Living up to your own secret standards cannot compensate for falling short of someone else's. Still, what's a woman to do?

The Jungian psychologist, Clarissa Pinkola Estes insists that women by nature are wild. The frustration so many of us feel comes from being tamed by the culture which spoon- feeds our values rather than making it acceptable to explore feelings and express contradictions.

Recently a young mother of four sought me out, haunted as she was by her husband's accusations that she was selfish. "Selfish," I howled. "Up until now it seems you've been selfless and that's why you are in trouble. If it is in a woman's nature to nurture, (and it is), than you must nourish yourself.  The cruel truth is that nobody else stands ready to do it." 

I think that is why so many women attend my weekend retreats and why they leave open, refreshed and empowered. They have done something for themselves—rekindled the fire within by allowing themselves to move about as they wish, in nature, beside the hearth, with each other. They've grown their spirits back and reclaimed those yearnings, intuitions and interests that have been dashed by a society that prefers us programmed and predictable.

"Every person has their own destiny," writer Henry Miller said. "The only imperative is to follow it, accept it, not matter where it leads." It's all about finally being your own person. In any case, it's pretty deadly not to be.

If that means breaking a few rules or stepping out of line, so be it. We have a choice—to allow things to happen to us or finally to decide to happen to ourselves. That's what taking a second journey is meant to be—a second chance and perhaps the first time you ever permitted yourself to be yourself. When the dreams of youth begin to seem shallow and pointless, than it's high time to create some new dreams.

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The Second Journey: The Road Back to Yourself is the currently featured book in the Getting Better All The Time group. Written by Joan Anderson, it's a story about finding yourself and what's important in your life. To join the group and stay on top of all of the new articles and excerpts, click here.

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