Whether it’s fashion, shopping, the café culture, hairstyles, shoes, make up, holidays or overworking, career aspiration and achievement or ‘supermum’ syndrome, we women have so many trends to choose from today. We can be pampered, stimulated, motivated and indulged – even exhausting ourselves as we are presented - with a greater array and number of trends than at any other time in our history.
Has any of this truly brought us either happiness or joy, or a sense of inner contentment in ourselves as women? If not, then what exactly are these trends that we follow?
Dictionary meanings indicate that ‘trend’ is the term used to describe a group movement. In the world around us, we often only see variations in lifestyle, behaviours and attitudes and then call this a trend, as we observe the changes within various groups. The key for we women is in determining whether or not the movement we connect with is true to our inner-most essence (our heart) or is externally influenced, imposed or derived. Hence the need for us all to discern the sources of the many trends we encounter daily.
Generally, there are two main derived sources of Energy which found all of these Trends – the first being one of mental energy and external pursuit, and the second being an internal exploration which fosters an inner deepening and more freedom to outwardly express one’s truth.
The mentally derived trends suppress all that we are as women, putting us into excess activity and the stress of relentless motion and ultimately, into exhaustion in pursuit of the latest, external trend.
The inner trends support us to express unreservedly all that we are as women, allowing us to connect for ourselves with what truly nourishes our body, based upon how we feel on the inside.
Currently the majority of trends are founded on the choice of mental energy. Whether it’s coffee, clothing styles and brands, TV programmes, hairstyles, interior design to alcohol, tattoos, drug taking, piercings, body sculpting, mutilations, anorexia or obesity, we go along with these external trends when we ignore or avoid our essence as a woman.
Who or what sets such trends?
In the avoidance of our own inner connection, we allow Society, the media, magazines, models, actors, advertisements, corporations and our social groups to determine the decisions and choices we make about every aspect of our lives. These changes from a source outside of us put pressure on us as women to be a certain way in order to be socially acceptable, while concealing the fact that all such trends require a collective group life force to sustain their longevity. Without the cooperation of each person subscribing to each specific trend, they would fizzle out very rapidly.
Is it not a strange arrangement where the outside world tells us how to be and determines how we express ourselves in all aspects of our lives , and yet, without our personal sanctioning of these dictates, the trend, fashion, fad or movement would simply fade away.
This effect is further compounded by the fact that we hold some trends as being more or less acceptable and healthy in contrast to the more extreme trends. This scale of acceptable / less acceptable trends brings us the illusion of moderation, whereby our health is determined on a collectively agreed upon continuum, generating perspectives along the lines of, ‘I’m healthier than a drug addict because I only have my flat white coffee and my glass of red.’ This provides the mindset that we are ok if we are following a socially acceptable trend but less ok if we adhere to a more marginalised one.
This leads us away from questioning the source, type and quality of any and all trends and carries the notion that some trends can be endorsed as ‘normal’ (e.g. following fashion), good, and hence ‘harmless.’
But is it the case that all these more acceptable trends provide the platform for the more extreme one, because in truth they validate a lifestyle based on mentally derived and externally imposed trends?
So how do the inner trends that are derived from our essence look and feel in our daily lives?
Living Health From Within and the Inner Trends of Our Essence
Living, feeling and honouring our inner impulses brings a way of living that has no need to follow externally derived trends.
How we live, what we do, what we wear, how we express in life, are all impulsed from our essence and these chosen expressions confirm and appreciate the value of our essence to the outside world. Inner trends are those where women express themselves in their connection with this essence, in celebration and confirmation of who they are and know themselves to be, as well as supporting themselves in their fragility, delicateness and tenderness.
One example of this phenomenon is in the way some older women, when they are impulsed to live with greater inner integrity and simplicity, often choose to wear clothing that is of a simple ‘classic’ design, as a means of expressing both the impulse and the intention to live honouring themselves in the face of the many contrary beliefs about how older women should look. (1) Younger women in connection with their essence and true womanliness may choose to dress to express their absolute gorgeousness - the Heaven’s curves of their body, wearing colours, clothes and accessories that truly express how they feel within themselves.
Both of these examples are in stark contrast to dressing in accordance with the fashion trend of the moment, as dictated by magazines or TV advertisements or celebrities.
Inner Trends do not need your life force.
A significant aspect of inner trends is that they do not require a collective group life force to sustain them, nor do they result in exhaustion as there is nothing to live up to or aspire to be. If, for example, The Women in Livingness magazine is focussing on honouring and taking true care of our breasts, (2), this makes freely available to all women the choice to connect to the self nurturing qualities of our breasts and bodies. However, this invitation, comes with neither the enticement nor inducement that typically accompany external trends; the invitation simply allows us to feel the truth of this for ourselves and then to express it in a way, if we choose to, that reflects ourselves.
This is in huge contrast to the mentally based trends, which always utilise some form of pressure to elicit our compliance with them.
So an inner trend is seen in those post-menopausal women who are bucking the more traditional trend of middle aged frumpiness and are living their true sexiness as women. These women know who they are and have met themselves; they have connected to their inner beauty and essence. Such women simply live this way without the need to advertise, hook others or receive social endorsement, and there is neither personal nor financial recognition for them. Their reflection may, however, inspire other women of the same age to live in a similar way.
On the other hand, we observe the external trend of many teenage girls and young women harming their bodies with multiple piercings and cosmetic surgical enhancements (3) because it is the current fashion and everyone else their age is doing this also in order to have a certain ’look,’ and to be socially acceptable to their peers. Social alcohol bingeing, the ladette syndrome and sexual promiscuity are all further examples of such trends. (4)(5)(6)
Have these trends emerged because we women are separated from who we are within and so we then need confirmation of our value through our subscription to external trends that have us looking and behaving the same as everyone else?
And yet these ‘solutions’ are precisely what drive us into deeper and deeper levels of disconnection and exhaustion.
Is Discernment the Key to our Inner Health? Clearly to support our own true health, the key for we women is to discern if the external changes that we see in the world have been impulsed from within or are external forces.
Externally derived trends require our life force to keep them going. A source outside of ourselves places pressure on we women to be a certain way in order to be socially acceptable. We find ourselves in the situation of being in competition with each other, separating ourselves from other women, with the reward being that of belonging to a specific group whose sustainability depends on our unconscious tacit consent.
Inner based trends arise from the inner essence that is common to all of us. This essence is fixed and immutable. Its gently vitalising source energy, the heart, naturally shares its quality with others if they choose to accept this natural reflection. Other than that, it simply lets us be.
If Health from Within is to be our chosen way of life, the understanding and awareness of the fact of differing trends is an essential foundation for all of us.
References
Facebook – Whatever they want page – avoiding / denigrating Elder energy - https://warningcurvesahead.com/2016/06/04/24-things-women-over-30-should-wear/
Women in Livingness Magazine, Edition 1 http://www.wilmagazine.com/edition1breastcare ( accessed 14.12.2017)
New Statistics Reflect the Changing Face of Plastic Surgery https://www.plasticsurgery.org/news/press-releases/new-statistics-reflect-the-changing-face-of-plastic-surgery ( accessed 14.12.2017)
Women Drinking More Than Men and Putting Themselves at Risk http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/women-drinking-more-than-men-putting-themselves-at-risk/news-story/70838cd0430f3d988619f43adc53ad85 ( accessed 14.12.2017)