Whilst swimming in the pool I observed a young girl injure herself whilst playing, albeit only slightly, yet the response from the adults around her was to immediately suggest she ‘get over it’, ‘harden up’ or ‘laugh it off’. And as I observed, it had me wondering…
Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?
Have many of us not been taught from an early age that being girly or delicate means that we’re just not strong or tough enough to be out there in the world?
And with this, it makes me also wonder, who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall, the reverse of delicate, when you’re a person with great sensitivity, and not the emotional kind, deep within?
To me it sounds like a lot of effort, and a tiring way to live! I once ‘tried my hardest’ (excuse the pun!) to live this way for most of my adult life so I know what it feels like. But what I didn’t realise was that the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out. As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.
What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.
With the support of Universal Medicine practitioners and in particular the Esoteric Breast Massage modality, I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer.
I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments. For example, the way I gently touch my own skin feeling its texture, how I type on the computer, the way I walk, move, sit, or carry my shopping home. The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.
I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood. Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.
By Cherise Holt, Nurse, 31, Australia,
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I suspect that many of us have seen delicacy as a weakness. I know I have. I watched my little grandson playing recently and he looked so sweet and delicate, he shone from the inside out. Imagine what life would be like if we reflected (or at the least, taught) our children to appreciate and retain their sense of delicateness. Perhaps there would be less harming and more harm-less-ness.
Well said Ariana, and the world is sorely in need of more reflections to show that there is another way to live life and that we do not have to ‘push through’ things.
When we live in a way that does not honour us, that does not look after us, that means we must harden ourselves to life, then this is what does the most damage: “As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.”
Our body is our marker – when we allow ourselves to feel how something feels then through the body we know exactly what is needed. But when we harden or switch off feeling, then the head is the one trying to rationalise and decide what to do which requires an effort to calculate and work things out and this does not necessarily honour what the body actually needs.
Thank you Cherise for the beautiful reminder that delicateness is indeed our true strength as women.
Is it just a simple case of giving ourselves permission to feel and be this once again? It seems currently a lot of the time we live to how we ‘think’ we should or how others ‘think’ we should instead of what feels true for us from our bodies. There is so much as a whole we need to let go of.
What you have shared here has reminded of not asking for support, I feel they are very similar in how we use a hardness or toughness to get through or by feeling for some reason if we ask another for support we will be looked upon as weak. That has been a big one for me in the past striving on, sometimes very stubbornly, without being humble enough to ask another to help me. When I started to do this, the walls cracked within and it was lovely too feel how important it is to actually ask for help when it is needed and receive this knowing we do not have ‘go it alone’. In fact it is the complete opposite we certainly do not have to strive through and do everything on our own because we are meant to be working together as one ✨
I love the different angle you offer here Ariana. What would it feel like and what would life look like if girls and women were to honour their delicacy? Far from what we fear I imagine since there is a great strength in being delicate – there is something flexible, responsive, deep, warm, embracing, unassuming, present, real, gentle, tender, sweet and lovely. All these qualities the world is desperately craving.
‘Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?’ Observing girls as they grow I have noticed how quickly they can harden up denying their delicacy and sensitivity. I recently had a colleague ‘playfully’ call me a ‘wus’ for honouring mine and yet this woman was saying this while enduring the consequences of an injury for not being delicate with her own body! How deep is the denial when in the face of our bodies telling us strongly to take more care, we ignore it?
Crazy huh but we can do many things that will help us to mask our delicateness like the foods we eat and the way we talk all of it matters. and we are either healing or harming at every point.
A beautiful definition – “strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness.” Getting in touch with this delicateness is available to us all.
We can learn there is such a power and strength in being delicate and vulnerable, when we understand the true meaning of these words. It’s not whinging and moaning but it is expressing how we are feeling deeply and honouring that from the connection to the movement of our bodies. So as you say, the little girl was doing really well in feeling her delicacy and as adults this exposes our hardness and contraction.
Delicateness to me mean there is no trying, in being delicate there is a surrender to the all.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength” There is so much more power n the delicateness and preciousness of a woman than the brittle hardness of a perceived protective shell.
I don’t always find it easy to be delicate, I can be dismissive towards myself and my commitment to life and not wanting to feel that which I cannot but feel. It takes a lot of effort to go against this innate quality, so I wonder why trying in the first place. The answer is to go into my body, feel the way I move and delicateness is just there waiting to come out, to be honoured and confirmed, no thinking required, very simple actually.
Delicacy is more than just a gentle touch, it is a way of living. And like the exquisite feeling being delicate can offer, your entire way of living can be this way. The empowerment from living with delicacy everyday is huge.
I recently had a very challenging situation at work and honouring the fact that I am sensitive has supported me far more than growing a thick skin and carrying on as if I am not affected.
Everything in this world we have created is telling us delicacy will get smashed if we let it out. It takes true resolution and absolute commitment to see what happens if you live it anyway. But if we understand that anything less is game over anyway, we’ll see there’s actually nothing to fear.
Yes, feeling powerful with our delicateness is new for many of us, and what a strength this is, ‘And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’
It’s true that although less intense than for boys, there is a pressure for girls to toughen up, stop ‘being a princess’ and get on with it. I am sure all parents wonder how their child if left in their delicate and precious naturalness will survive ‘out there’. It’s interesting as parents that we try to change our kids so they fit in rather than get active with changing what is harsh and unloving ion the world.
Yes Cherise, it is about accepting our true nature, the delicateness from within and then we bring this to all others knowing they have the same quality within themselves.
Feeling delicate has gone from being a foreign concept in my body, to a familiar state that I now absolutely relish and willingly yield into.
Great point Alexis – even though it is a true natural to be delicate, so many of us have walked away from this way of being and hardened, so much so that to come back to that may actually feel a little strange to begin with.
Henrietta the truth is so deeply buried under an avalanche of lies that all of our natural ways are totally foreign concepts to the vast majority of us.
I love that you have discovered what really makes you strong, your blog has me pondering what could be my true strengths and how much I release them or appreciate them.
We champion good looks, knowledge and achievements – imagine what would happen if we celebrated our preciousness? It seems so many of our unloving actions are powered by overlooking this and staying stuck in our hurts.
If we’d cleared all of our hurts, then there would be no need to want to hide, deny or dismiss the preciousness that we naturally all are and hold within. It takes a lot of effort to fight who we naturally are and to not allow the world to see that.
If we said less but brought more of our delicacy we would communicate so much more. Words are so easily used as a defence – where as loving quality naturally let’s others in.
‘Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?’ Society is in need of women living their delicate nature and at the same time is asking of women to be tough and hard. Living in our delicateness consistently is living our power and even more when a group of women chooses to live their delicateness… we are unstoppable.
Thank you for expressing this so well which has inspired me to explore my delicateness one small task at a time e.g. how I am typing this comment and how I prepare myself for bed at a time when I often feel tired and can’t be bothered. For me this journey continues to unfold but I am certainly feeling far more connected to others and this feels super supportive.
I am also seeing more of the social conditioning that makes us believe we have to harden up and that sensitivity is a weakness. I feel we need to be really aware of this as parents, so at least in their home, kids get to know that sensitivity is a strength. That means we need to role model this too and not pretend to be superwomen who can handle any abuse.
I suspect you are correct in that we are just scratching the surface here, ‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’
Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?
This is a great question to ask as we are taught from young to toughen up and not be cry babies.
I have lived most of my life keeping people at bay not wanting them to see or feel just how delicate and sensitive I am because as a society it is seen as such a negative attribute when actually we have been collectively fed a total lie.
It helps keep us separated as I too played the pushing others away game when upset. If we did honour that sensitivity there would be far more harmony and less individuality in the world. Being united in sensitivity isn’t a bad thing it helps us support each other.
To stand in the presence of someone who truly knows how precious they are, it’s like they glow and beam light streams from every cell. And they don’t have to do a single thing, to demonstrate or prove they are a divine human being.
Beautiful Joseph.
Well said Joseph – it is a feeling which leaves a deep imprint and marker of something that we already know we are but have not been choosing.
Being the delicate Women that we are you can feel is exactly what the world is craving for yet really it is the stark opposite to how we are living. I too have been deeply inspired by the Esoteric Breast Massage to feel and connect to this innate quality that I am. Giving myself the permission to be this in a world that otherwise tells me I am not to be this.
I am returning to the delicateness of who I am and just today I recognised how I can then react to anything that is not delicate around me. I can feel how I did this as a child and so withdrew when words or actions were not gentle or loving. Learning to stay delicate when very little in life offers that reflection back is something we are not taught yet is so vital in staying with the loving gentle way of being that is naturally within us all.
This is very beautiful Cherise. Dropping the hardness is something I still struggle with, so this is very inspiring. Thank you.
What a marvellous example where we can choose how we are going to be and respond to life.
It is an exhausting way to live as it is the opposite to how we naturally are so that requires so much effort.
“Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?” Great question and one that should be pondered on deeply. If we do allow that delicateness out we find the a deep power that lies deep within.
Very beautiful Cherise. The deeper I go into feeling the delicateness within me the more the tears come up, tears of what feels like an immense sadness/grief from all the choices I have made to not live the natural, delicateness within.
This is inspiring Caroline the willingness to feel what we have done to ourselves and everyone around us in this hardening is really painful.
Stunning Cherise, in these words I can truly feel the delicacy of you. It makes no sense to make a rock out of a flower. Yet with ourselves we try. It seems to me that delicacy amplifies our awareness and our power – so what if it’s no coincidence that we fight letting our delicacy be seen?
I am very familiar with ‘the brick wall’ and it is something I am letting go of, my body is clearly showing me that it is time to fully live the delicateness that I am. So instead of choosing to keep ‘the brick wall’ cherishing and embracing this natural quality within me and letting it out.
Resisting our innate delicateness requires us to brace against it in order not to allow it. It is our natural quality so it takes enormous effort and energy to resist it. I can feel this struggle in my own body.
To observe a woman honour her delicateness is a truly healing quality. One can observe that the surrender to this is by far a choice that allows another woman the permission to do so.
‘ I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer.’ I so relate to this.
Today I spent the day with some young men and a couple of male support workers. They were all from different nationalities and the young men asylum seekers. What was lovely was they were all very respectful. I accepted and appreciated how the male support worker completely supported me in what I was needing to do. I didn’t go into protection or get defensive ‘got to prove myself’ when the worker interjected to help the young men understand my English – as I would have done in the past. I had to follow the support worker in my car and he said to park in a space that I realise was too narrow to reverse park. I managed it in a different way but in the past I would have been kicking myself not getting it right 1st time and thinking I looked inept.
Learning to be so much more understanding of myself as a student of life in all its elements. There is no need to be competitive. Being more accepting of myself allows me to accept support without thinking I shouldn’t need it or I’m less for doing so.
What I find is that when I admit or show my vulnerability to someone it can often be taken the wrong way. If someone else sees this as a weakness it can be used against me. This has happened a few times in my work environment and it has not put me in a good light.
What I find with the brick wall syndrome is that it cuts me off from feeling anything at all- it desensitises me to the point of inaction. Allowing myself to feel vulnerable and fragile means that I’m allowing myself to feel everything else, too, including what’s there to say and do next. Instead of being lost in a fog of numbness, when I allow myself to feel everything I feel more empowered to take ownership of my life and responsibility for how I am in it.
I used to think that delicate was weak and would not allow myself to feel any delicateness. But underneath the hard exterior I portrayed was a delicateness that I allow myself to now be in touch with, a sweetness that I had hidden away for a very long time.
I wonder if delicateness is a key marker for us as women, we could approach it like an experiment, and when we cannot feel how delicate we are there needs to be a moment where we stop and recalibrate so that we don’t continue on for days (or weeks .. or years) without feeling how naturally delicate, beautiful and worth cherishing we are.
Such a great question? Why don’t we let ourselves feel how delicate we are? When we allow this to come through we offer others the permission to feel the same.
I recently had a day of really feeling my fragility. In the past I would try and toughen up and hide how I was truly feeling. That day I was able to share with a few people – without any pretence or hardening. What surprised me was the amount of support I received, not sympathy but a realness and acceptance, an understanding of how I was feeling. One or two were dismissive and judgmental, but I was able to see that their own hurts made it difficult for them to see the delicateness and fragility in another. Perceiving that accepting our fragility and delicateness can be a strength is now something I have experienced for myself rather than it just being a piece of received knowledge without any livingness backing it up.
Awesome subject for our consideration, I spent most of my life from a very young age finding ways to toughen up, I felt protected by having layers of hardness- these were physical and in being. As I let layers peel away, I feel a preciousness within and it is so exquisite. We set ourselves up defending, hardening, protecting. The more I drop my guard the more I am able to handle all situations and feel how lovely it is to be a woman.
‘being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’
It is such a powerful trick of the world to let us think that delicateness is pathetic or weak when it is there where our true power is.
These days I’m appreciating being aware of the tough bricked wall that I’ve created to protect myself from others. I’m finding a very healing opportunity to let go this protection simply by nominating how I’m feeling in every situation, understanding that every reaction comes from an old past hurt that needs to be healed. It’s being a very precious moment to accept and embrace myself no matter what. I deeply appreciate the support that I’m receiving from the Sacred Esoteric Healing modalities and my practicioner who treat me with deep respect and tenderness in every session that I receive.
I agree Inma – nominating how I am feeling in every situation offers a deep healing with simply being honest with myself, rather that protecting myself from feeling the past un-dealt with hurts.
I feel comments such as harden or toughen up, get over it etc are a reaction by others to what they are seeing. It’s not that someone is crying necessarily, but that someone is being honest open and transparent to how they are feeling and allowing themselves to be seen as sensitive. When you have not allowed yourself to be sensitive (our natural selves), it can be the last thing you want to see, hence the reaction.
Such a great question Cherise. As truly how often do we allow, appreciate and cherish our delicateness? What world have we created that asks and expects us to override, dismiss and condemn this innate quality of who we are as women? This irony is that living in connection to our delicateness, we are living who we really are, and with every step with take in connection to our essence, is a step lived in the grace of who we are, and this is our true power.
I have been rediscovering my preciousness and have discovered there are so many layers to the armour I have been wearing!! How can we walk around not knowing we have layers of armour? I am astounded at the layers I am having to get a chisel out to get through at times. My chisel and a sense of humour are my best friends now because I want to search out anything that stops me feeling all there is to feel regardless of my feeling it or not.
For a woman to be living a quality of delicacy and preciousness in everyday life is not only very empowering and truly healthy it is also a quality we are all blessed and can be inspired by.
So beautifully said Cherise. Our delicateness conveys our true strength.
Re reading this today I felt the delicateness within my body, a quality that allows a sensitivity, to truly feel without any emotional entanglement.
When I am honouring the delicateness of my nature I see and feel things with a depth of presence that I would otherwise miss if I overrode this quality.
I can relate what you shared here Linda. Being aware includes all and sometimes can be uncomfortable feeling these layers of protection that I holded for so long, but feels very freeing to let them go as now I know that they are not part of my true nature. Receiving Esoteric Breast Massage and Connective Tissue Therapies are also hugely supporting me to feel my body again from inside to discover how sensitive and truly delicate I am.
It’s deeply beautiful to see a woman or a man connected to their innate delicateness and sensitivity. In the middle of a world that is constantly telling us how to be – in most cases enough tough to not feel – finding people allowing themselves just be as naturally they are is a gem, as remind us that there is true strenght in delicateness that can be expressed in full.
Appreciating the true strength of being aware of your delicateness and preciousness offers the opportunity to feel the power of just being who you are.
The wonderful thing about delicacy is how it is an ancient part of us, because it is something, a quality that although at times may need to be re-connected with, it never leaves because it lives in our movements which deep down we all are the masters of.
It is true what you are sharing Shami, delicacy is an ancient part of and also a quality that connects us with each other, a very natural connection without comparing or competing with one another.
‘Being a delicate woman is my true strength’. So true Cherise, it is beautiful to watch a woman embrace her preciousness and delicateness and to feel the power these qualities bring to others when they are lived and expressed in full.
I have noticed it in others who have clearly embraced this delicateness and is now their normal way of living. It is not forced, there is no trying, it just is them. I have found this with myself, the more dedicated I am to honouring what I feel, the more delicate I become and the more I honour that as my normal.
Our delicateness and vulnerability is indeed our strength as women rather than our weakness.
Yes the more we deny how sensitive and precious we are the more we have to build walls to not feel the harm we are doing to ourselves and our relationships. We all then suffer such reduced ways of being together.
Our movements have a natural ease, grace and flow to them, but we become so ingrained in our daily movements that we don’t even realise that the way we move our body may be harmful or hard or not in line with our natural delicateness.
It was lovely reading this today because I’ve been feeling very vulnerable lately and trying to hold it all together only means I shut people out because of the hard shell I create. Allowing myself to feel the delicacy reminds me to walk gently, to put cream on my hands tenderly, opening doors tenderly, in fact being tender with everything especially how I think about myself.
I agree Carmel this is why it is so important to stay with our vulnerability and delicateness other wise we become hard and uncaring, not only to ourselves but to everyone else around us
I don’t really know why but for as long as I can remember I always had this feeling that I needed to be tough and that I couldn’t show others how sensitive I am. It has been only recently that I am learning to drop this guard and honour my sensitivity and fragility- it has been such a beautiful experience to be more delicate with myself and let go of the hardness and self judgement.
Me too MW…I had this feeling of hidding my natural delicateness till I knew Esoteric Women’s Health and Universal Medicine. From then I started to realize that being delicate, sensitive, vulnerable…is not weak but truly strong and powerful.
For a long time I resisted my own delicateness – detested it and wanted to crush it, wishing that I wasn’t delicate or fragile and mostly pretending (to myself) not to be. But actually allowing myself to feel it, it isn’t so bad – it’s actually quite lovely to feel vulnerable, to feel like you haven’t got it all sorted, because it’s real and raw- and that is who I am, who we all are, and there’s an acceptance of myself in that, instead of a fight against it.
Hardness or toughness is simply a protective coat we wear. We are all sensitive beings, even under the toughest of exteriors.
Thanks for sharing this Victoria. Sensitivity is not a quality for the special ones but equal for everyone.
It is strange that we are often encouraged to be tough and ‘strong’ from young. If we have not allowed ourselves to be vulnerable and delicate in our own lives we will see it as a weakness and not as a strength and sensitivity that allows us to truly feel the multi- layeredness (new word) of life.
When I was young I was always the one to be told I was brave and I very rarely cried, instead kept the sadness well hidden. To now see and feel my vulnerabilities and delicateness as a strength I can see how sharing this with others is being open and transparent in relationships and holds them to also feel this quality equally within themselves. That is a beautiful quality to appreciate for all.
At times I still have a picture kick in that I need to be tough but the more I let this go I realise that the better equipped I am to handle situations in front of me and the more I express my tenderness it allows others to do the same.
Yes, I am experiencing this too MW. True tenderness and delicacy coming from the body is an inspiring and powerful reflection for others to respond to.
When we grow up we do know how delicateness is definitely not a weak thing but a very beautiful thing but what I found is that when everyone around you says it is weak and not cool at some point I did give in. Not wanting to stand out too much and for me definitely the feeling of wanting to be the same as everyone else. Now I can feel though nothing touches the joy of feel delicate and tender it is very joyful and playful to express in this way.
“WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?” We know as a child that we are delicate but everything in life is telling us to be otherwise. Like your example at the swimming pool Cherise, when we hurt ourselves we are told to be strong and not cry and overrule every feeling we have, but these feelings have to go somewhere, so we bury them along with our many other hurts until they re-surface sometime in our life ready to be truly healed.
“WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?” Reading this today in capitals has made me stop I could feel how I was getting caught up in things that were not honouring my delicateness and the truth of who I am and beginning to harden, so perfect timing to read this just now.
Having shunned my delicateness for most of my life it is revealing to start to explore this and feel the strength that underlies this and how it supports me in my expression and connection with others.
I totally agree Helen.. I have shunned and got quite cross at any sign of my own delicateness, because I perceived it as a weakness and something that made me stand out and not fit in with the rest of the world. But it’s quite hard work to constantly try to shut down who you actually are, and sooner or later it becomes easier to give up the fight and just be who you are, letting go of the need to be approved by others.
Yes it is hard work and no wonder there is so much exhaustion in the world when most of us (women and men) are living denying our delicateness and shutting others out and thus are not able to support each other to express from our true natures.
Something so simple “The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” we do need to hold ourselves in a quality first, that delicateness before we can hold another in that same quality.
Living our delicacy, our tenderness our deep surrender offers a solid foundation that never waivers. This foundation offers a strength the world is seeking yet is blocked form the earliest years. It is time for all beautiful woman to claim their delicacy and re-new this experience for all others to observe.
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too” . . . I am taking this into my day today as I am feeling particularly delicate today and have a big working day ahead.
“WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?” So very true, we feel like we have to compete and go into hardness a lot of the time. Instead of surrendering into who we are and the love that we are also.
I know delicateness has the power to change the world, so to speak, and yet living it is a challenge especially in my work, to not go in the rush and expectation of others and of myself, to not absorb the anxiousness in the workplace. It asks me to stay with me and feel the strength in my delicateness and to value this quality more and more where ever I am. It is now a bit of a on and off switch and this hurts not only my body but also people around me.
It is the honouring of our natural delicateness through the awareness of our simple movements made in our day to day living that we discover our true power. There is so much joy and depth to be felt in these ever expanding moments of observation that we can continue to peel back the layers of protection and hurts and show our true tenderness that blooms within each and every one of us.
Recently I felt the absolute delicateness I am while having an Esoteric Breast Massage, there was no mistaking it. After I then moved and made choices that supported that delicateness, instead of hardening and hiding it again. When life gets busy and full on, I often forget about my delicateness and soldier on but then pay for it later with pain and discomfort in my body. Life changes and doesn’t effect me as much when I stay with my delicateness. This is a great reminder again today to make choices from there.
I can relate to this Aimee. My body shows me the moment I am moving out of my delicateness and the true flow that is there to guide me. An immediate tension is felt inside my body – like my cells are being squeezed way too tight.
The moment any part of our body hurts we know how delicate we are, and how perfectly designed we are for everything to work in order. Knowing who we are in this much detail is definitely a strength.
I can’t recall being asked to toughen up as a girl, but I do remember being asked to ‘put on a brave face’ for others, so they didn’t have to feel bad if something was going on for me. This still leaves you living a false persona of always appearing to be ok and not giving yourself permission to just be and feel who you are.
My experience is that those who tell us to harden up – and I was one of them – have quite a few hurts close to the surface and those hurts can be triggered simply by seeing another in pain. Hence we may wish to stop that experience by asking the other to suppress the pain they are feeling.
That’s it Christoph, feeling where people are at and where their comments are coming from takes the sting out of what they are saying and then has no affect on us.
A powerful realisation. Recently my very young Son was expressing his vulnerability, a great strength of expression as he shared exactly what he was feeling and did not hold one ounce of it back; he was pure delicateness in this moment and this reflected to another adult the hurt and hardness that they themselves had chosen to uphold and so the response from them was to tell my Son that he was lying (meaning that, he wasn’t really upset or had nothing to be feeling vulnerable about). Bringing this understanding to our situations gives us a great deal of respect and observational qualities to meet these circumstances for what is really going on and not changing (just as my Son did!) one iota for anyone else outside of what we truly feel to express.
Gorgeous blog in celebration of our delicateness as women. I have been inspired this morning to take this deeper in myself and it feels beautiful even to bring this to the way I am typing on my keyboard as I write this comment. Thank you Cherise.
When our quality of ‘being’ is felt and honoured over what we are seen to ‘do’ we will all, no matter our gender or age, be known and seen for the sensitive, precious, cherished and adored beings we are.
I love attending Universal Medicine retreats and courses, because I get to see women I may not have seen for a whole year, and wow I am often blown away by the changes in them. There is no doubt now of the tangible delicateness and power that I can see many of the women beaming with.
What you have shared makes so much sense Cherise. There is an effortlessness in being who we already and naturally are within, and it is so true that when in connection to our essence there is nothing more solid and steady that this. Our greatest strength without question.
‘ As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most’.- What I am loving is the honesty shared in these blogs and calling out the truth in each of us as men and women. We are deeply sensitive, loving and precious beings and sharing like this one calls for a ‘stop’ to the hardness and push we have grown up to accept from the world around us.
Awesome to see delicateness and preciousness as a strength, so often we are told that sensitivity equals weakness…it is far from the the truth. To be sensitive, means we can feel, which means we encounter life in a rich and full way. Yes we will feel the yuck more, but we will certainly feel the love and divineness that is available also in more depth.
Due to how warped the media representation of women has become our young girls to not see enough examples of women showing that delicateness and sacredness is a powerful quality and not a weakness in the world.
I watched a beautiful kids movie last night, its called “Mohana” about an Islander girl and one of the key messages was portraying the power of women in their stillness, it was so touching to see this message in a mainstream Disney production, it made me cry. This website is amazing in what it offers but I know that it does not draw a young crowd unfortunately.
In the appreciation of one’s innately delicate nature, we find the doorway to true empowerment.
We may feel we have to harden up to be able to cope in this world but that doesn’t allow us to feel all that is going on; our natural sensitivity and delicateness is a strength as we get to feel the depth of ourselves, others and life and there is greater understanding.
Having recently started an exercise program apart of the program is to lift hand weights and what was actually stopping me from doing this part of my program was an old belief that doing the weights would make me be hard and get big muscles. Weird but true, once I let go of that belief, I added the weights into my program and what I actually felt was the gorgeous fluidity and lightness of my movements. No hardness or bulging muscles at all. Appreciating the depth, delicateness and power we have in each movement we connect to, brings a much greater awareness to our qualities as women and that is truly amazing to feel.
We have such a deeply ingrained consciousness in society today that purports that we are ‘weak’ if we show how we feel, if we let others see our fragility, our delicateness or the tenderness we feel. We are all delicate in essence, men and women, boys and girls and regardless of our age we all feel what it is to love and be love. Yet learning to override our true inner-feelings is the first step to learning how to avoid being responsible for expressing and living the truth, the power of who we are, the love we are within. For our greatest strength is found through our connection to our essence within through which we live with confidence freely expressing ourselves and what we know is true.
Slowly, but surely, I am rediscovering my delicateness; thank you Cherise for the inspiration and encouragement. I love what you have expressed here;
“I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments”
Beautiful Cherise – so great to re-read this blog this morning and be reminded that being delicate isn’t a final point but a constantly evolving journey. What you thought was delicate last week can seem harsh and constrained the next, for the more we embrace our true awareness the more delicateness we begin to see. Like an old painting being restored, it seems there is always more beauty to bring to light. So today I am feeling why not just enjoy the process and allow for the fact that there is so much more to us and to life?
Some people might think of delicateness as a state where it’s difficult to leave the house, where the world around is too much. This is absolutely not the case. As you show clearly Cherise it’s a quality of movement that we choose, that naturally considers our every cell and everybody else. I’m inspired to live this delicate way today and no matter what the task or deadline, to honour my divine quality.
When the world around us is constantly promoting protection and behaviours that, without directly but under the surface saying, you have to brace yourself and be on guard and be strong because the energy around will crush you should you go against it. To be able to stand within all of this and be delicate is a strength that no physicality can match, to me it feels like a strength beyond this world. Thank you for this reminder Cherise.
The fact that it is our Oneness that makes us, and hence we are all women equally with the strength of authority, love and equalness. Hence what we love inside, is what we can bring to our outside (people, environment etc.) We as women can all come back to that, and claim our love within – a beauty of wisdom that holds no check (only is and let’s all be). A stillness beyond image, a love beyond doubt, a craziness and sexiness that is beyond words, a divinity beyond stupidity. A gorgeousness that resides in all.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength”, when I was growing up, I didn’t really understand this, I used to think it was the opposite, that I had to toughen up, match what the boys did or tried to do, but i have since learned that being tender and delicate is definitely ‘true strength’.
Delicateness is something I have been rediscovering in myself over the past few years and I am finding more and more to honour and keep surrendering to this renewed quality within me.
We are born tender and delicate, but as we grow and begin to relate to family, friends, siblings, school teachers… we begin to toughen up and it is almost as if we brace ourselves against the world instead of, as you say, learn to trust and embrace it.
‘being a delicate woman is my true strength…’ as I read this Cherise, I realised that I too have hidden my delicateness behind a bricked wall, in fact to allow others to see my vulnerability I have to feel it first, and due to the hurts I have been stubbornly holding onto, this has been quite a challenge. We are so indoctrinated to believe that to be strong we have to be hard and tough, but as you have presented, this is so not the truth, so thank goodness we have the esoteric breast massage to re-kindle our delicate nature, where the true strength lies.
‘With the support of Universal Medicine practitioners and in particular the Esoteric Breast Massage modality, I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer…’ and why should you, were born a delicate, tender little baby so why not claim this for yourself as a grown woman? It is indeed not in our nature to have a ‘bricked exterior’ and like you Cherise, I have built this wall too, and I don’t want it there anymore either! I guess we can both say a HUGE thank you to Universal Medicine and the EBM modality for allowing us the opportunity to drop the shield and return to the delicate, tender and sensitive nature that we are, and that it is not sissy or weak, but powerful with a sense of authority and inner strength.
A woman (and a man) who have the strength to remain delicate without being effeminate are very strong, perhaps too strong for many. Perhaps this is the reason for the reaction and asking the girl to ‘harden up’.
When I was a teenager I was taller than most of my friends and was often called a ‘big girl’, this made me feel cumbersome and certainly not feminine. It took me a long time to shed the belief that you have to be small and petite to be delicate and that delicateness was a quality that came from within, for both men and women, whatever size and shape you are.
Being a delicate woman is something that I had never considered growing up. My shell of protection was so strong that I am still working to dissolve it, and thanks to the EBM the shell is finally coming down. There are moments when I resist my vulnerabilities and delicateness and when I do, up comes that brick wall again, but thanks to the esoteric modalities and especially the EBM, I am more aware of my behaviour and what triggers it, and I am beginning to allow myself to just be myself, which means to love me for who I am without judgement. After all, when we have an EBM we can hide nothing, much is revealed, and going into a session with the intention to heal and look at what is coming up is one big step to coming back to ourselves as women, and then reflecting that quality to all women.
“Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness ” – how much do we condemn ourselves and everyone to a lesser existence by trying to build a fortress in our bodys to withstand the world, when in fact what the world is crying out for is true tenderness, delicateness and connection. No-one wins when we try to out-tough each other, but we all win if even one person chooses to connect and hold on to that inner sacredness and light that we are all naturally from and miss deep down.
I saw a similar thing when I was visiting my family overseas, where my little brother is very much still in touch with his sensitivity and when sternly spoken to by our grandfather he began to cry.
This behaviour is accepted at his age however if a man dare does this action some may question his mental health.
This is a topic for much discussion. Our delicateness is powerful as it allows us to feel and honour all that we are feeling.
I agree Vicky, our delicateness is powerful. I have seen many children crushed by a fleeting remark from a sibling, parent or teacher… ‘toughen up’, ‘don’t be a sissy’, or ‘grow up’ – speaking from my own experience it is these seemingly throwaway comments that do much harm and add to the layers of protection that we build up over time.
Brilliant Cherise, I can feel today how this applies equally being a man. How may ways there are of this sneaky self-satisfaction still being there, saying you are a good person for pushing through and overcoming what happens in life. How different indeed to sit and appreciate and hold ourselves as precious as the most beautiful flower!
What a blessing to read Cherise, a depth of power that is not spoken about.. Yet until here now in this blog and many more blogs on here.. We are as women to re-discover our power from inside out, not just the rights that the last decade has been growing.. We got so much beauty, tenderness, precious holding inside – that we should treasure ourselves and eachother in that way!
True strength is found in delicacy, and what we call ‘strength’ is only force applied to live in protection of such delicateness. Thus, our true power comes from letting the world see in full the gorgeousness of our true self and never ever from the hardness we apply to hide this.
The more I contemplate and connect to my own delicateness, the more I feel how solid and powerful it really is… for with it comes an authority of reading situations, others, myself and life that if I was to hold myself in hardness or numbness just would not see the light of day.
Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel our own delicateness. We are indeed missing out on the richness within.
Learning to reconnect to my delicacy as a women has to be one of the most significant and most important areas of healing I have got to in my life.. Everyday when I feel this quality, my appreciation for where I have got to and the choices I have made is confirmed. To be able to celebrate being a woman rather than be in loathing because I am one – is huge.
“the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out” The word ‘tried’ is already enough to say that it is not natural to us to hold our delicateness and sensitivity back from the world. I was living in a castle with huge brick walls and to break these down is a wonderful process and I appreciate the love that I feel on the inside confirming how I live my delicateness and sensitivity more and more.
Cherise – thanks for inspiring me and inviting me to explore delicateness today, when something it troubling you it’s easy to drop this, but that’s when your body needs delicateness the most.
Yes, a beautiful example of how powerful our sense of delicateness actually is Meg. In a situation that we wish to bring our understanding to or to read in full, it is our sense of delicacy that connects us to our wisdom and ability to observe and detach; completely contrary to our ability to harden-up in reaction and thus change or alter the situation we are in to a perception that suits us. From this hardening we can’t actually read our next move with ease or clarity and can find ourselves stuck in emotional reactions for too long.. one second of this is too long! With delicateness the space around us opens up as do our senses and a far more intelligent way to move and to be.
When I accept and appreciate the sensitivity and delicateness that I hold, I then carry the key to how to behold others in the same quality that they are too. When I am in connection and hold awareness of the essence of me, I can’t not communicate with other people with an understanding of who they are too; regardless of any behaviour that they may be portraying. It feels like the key to relationships for me and my way of no longer building my wall of protection simply because another is hiding behind theirs.
It is great to read this today, yesterday I was in a situation where it was quite rough and harsh. I can feel I denied my sensitivity, buried it with food and then enjoined. It is good to read this and feel this today to be more aware of the choices I make in the future.
love the way you highlight ‘try your hardest’. Its such a common expression but underneath it.. who wants to be hard all the time?
In my sensitivity, my awareness and connection I can deal with anything that life brings towards me.. this is massive when we live in a world that prides itself on being hard and tough. How much effort it does take to keep up the walls around us and how painful (deeply hurtful) it is to do so as we miss out on the love that we truly are and the loving connection we have with each other. When the choice is made to drop the wall, we realise that we had only ever built a false sense of protection in the first place, another realised waste of time but worth it to find out that our greatest protection is always to be our full selves – in full. Letting everyone see, with transparency, just how sensitive and magnificent we all truly are.
“the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out” It takes a delicate touch to remove every last speck of dust from that brick wall.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too” I so agree, not that I would always have agreed. I didn’t really know what it meant to be or feel delicate. If anything I had always felt frumpy, reactive and not very joyful in life. But over time I have dropped a lot of the hardness, the self abuse that used to carry on within me and replaced it with feeling tender and loving with myself, it is a remarkable transformation from where and how I used to live.
I can really relate to this Raegan, and am still finding in little hidden ways the ‘deeper’ more internal abuses towards myself. I am discovering the true blessing and opportunity in seeing these and replacing them with tenderness and understanding towards myself.
I have hidden myself behind the brick wall of protection for too long now. But thanks to Sacred Movement presented by Karin Becker I am slowing returning to the true woman I am, increment by increment in the way I dress, walk and express myself through my movements. I never realised there was such a powerful yet gentle woman inside of me until I began to connect to it through the Sacred Movement and now I have a responsibility to reflect to other women that there is a tender, delicate women inside of themselves too, and all it takes is a willingness to connect to it and begin to make self-loving choices and let go of the hardness and protection that we have surrounded ourselves with for so long.
The Sacred Movement groups I attend with Karin Becker and other gorgeous women are supporting me enormously to connect to the delicateness and fragility within me. The depth of delicacy felt is blowing me away knowing that this depth is inside me in every moment yet I do not honour and appreciate it in the way I truly deserve. The honesty, observations and appreciation of myself is offering and helping me to make different choices.
Isn’t that interesting if your not living and honouring the delicateness of you either if you are a man or a woman you are building a brick wall. I’m sure there is many who would say there not doing both. But everything is energy, and therefore everything is because of energy so, in truth this is correct energetically speaking. You are either one or the other.
Great point Rik, how many people would say that they are in touch with their innate delicateness and the strength and empowerment that comes with such a quality? and if there aren’t so many who can, what are they really walking around in (what quality?) all day long.
“I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness,”Thank you Cherise for a beautiful read, your above words, strength, power, and delicateness, I would never have put together, but as I continually explore my own being as a woman I am gradually opening up to the fact that these qualities lie within me and all woman.
Cherise it would be so wonderful if more men and women could live their innate qualities perhaps we would be less exhausted and would have more fun in our lives.
I used to feel too big and strong to be delicate, but the day it was suggested to me that I am a delicate woman and I stroked my arm with my fingers, I was moved to tears in feeling the exquisite delicacy there. It is part of me – always there.
I can really relate to learning to hide how I feel, from physical pain to feeling hurt about something that has happened. “Be brave”, “be a big girl”, “toughen up” all communicate there is something wrong with being sensitive and honest about how I feel. I still at times feel mocked by men for being fragile or expressive about how I feel, as if being toughened or hardened is somehow superior.
‘Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate.’ Inspiring to read your appreciation and acceptance of your own preciousness and delicacy which I have only recently started to explore with the support of a programme of Esoteric Breast Massages. The resistance I have felt in this journey has been interesting to observe and the images I have been letting go of to allow for more delicacy to shine through have been revealing, this is an ongoing process which is gradually dismantling my walls of protection.
I’ve recently felt the wall that is built when I hide my delicateness. It is a hard exterior for those around me and it is crushing and suffocating for me. It makes no sense at all to do this and I’m amazed at the many behaviours I’ve developed over time that automatically lead to the wall. If I constantly stay with my feelings and let myself feel volnerable and tender and even very fragile in my body I find the wall does not get put up.
Being like a feather is much easier and inspiring than being like like a brick wall.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.” That’s so true. I’ve thought during the most part of my life that being delicate meant being weak and that I had to be in the world trying to be strong. Even not consider that was another way to live! But from some time ago I could experience in my body how easy, delightful and powerful is connect with this quality and surrender to the true nature of my body, which tells me the truth about who I am. Esoteric Breast Massage is a great support in my process of returning to the beautiful and delicate woman that I am.
Understanding we have a delicate strength is so much more supportive and sustainable. It is exhausting walking around and doing anything with the protective tough I can do this attitude and approach to life. Discovering I can still do al that is needed but with an appreciation of a little additional support for a few heavier tasks, I have a much more vital energy for everything else.
I too once saw delicateness as a weakness but since learning to re-connect with my authentic self I can feel the true power and strength in my delicateness.
Cherise, your questions remind me of how much we can get lost in trying to be something we are not and how much it can deeply hurt us …. ‘who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall, the reverse of delicate?’ and how we’ve allowed our world and ourselves in it to be less the delicateness we are and as a result we contribute to the harshness that exists in the world and it doesn’t work for not only do we cut ourselves off from the world when we act tough and hard, but we cut ourselves off from us, from feeling the gorgeousness and delicateness of ourselves. Now why on earth would we want to do that? We don’t, not truly and it’s great to be reminded that to honour that delicateness we have is a choice, and it starts with being honest about when we are going hard and slowing unpicking it piece by piece.
Having recently had an Esoteric Breast Massage I have also felt the delicateness of my body like never before. In the past when I heard the word “delicateness,” it was seen as weak or fragile, but to feel the absolute truth of delicateness from our bodies is amazingly powerful and a greatly needed reflection for all women.
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” Today is Mothers Day, and what better way to spend it than feeling my delicateness and tenderness. I am working in a restaurant so this will be a challenge as it is one of the busiest days in the year-however I am worth it and so is every woman who comes in today to celebrate. What a blessing they shall receive today as I celebrate myself and my own sacred mothering instincts.
“WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?” I realise that I don’t allow this by denying self loving choices for myself. I have been asking for mats to be put down in the bar that I work to relieve strain on my legs and feet but to no avail. I realise I have not been adamant enough due to the fact that I haven’t taken my own SELF-REGARDING CHOICES SERIOUSLY ENOUGH. I REALISE THAT WHEN I STAND UP FOR MYSELF AND DO THIS WITH ABSOLUTNESS, I BECOME A STRONG REFLECTION FOR OTHERS TO DO THE SAME.
Holding ourselves in a way that we harden, or to be someone that we are not, simply has the effect of harming our gorgeous womanly body as it is going against everything this body knows itself to be. When we instead embrace the beautiful and delicate woman that we are, our body is there in an instant, supporting us as we come to learn that to be all of who we truly are is the lightest, loveliest and most natural feeling one could ever experience.
What you’ve shared Cherise has made me question where and how I got the belief that being a tomboy was the way to go in life. It wasn’t something that was ever encouraged by my family but was a reaction on my part to not being honoured as the deeply sensitive child that I was and that instead of staying with the tender me I opted to harden the little girl as a defence against the harshness of the world. And yes, it does take a lot of energy to maintain this way of being.
Delicacy is a lovely word, and it is worth finding that quality within, because it will be there , when the walls and shields come tumbling down, within all of us.
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too”. I know that now to Cherise although I must say there are times when I waver. Choice and responsibility keep ringing in my ears!
Absolutely Linda, a confirmation that continues to deepen and consolidate as much as we allow it to, deepening the flow of connection with who we are and accepting more of the grandness and beauty that is innate and lives within us all the time. This ‘allowing’ is the key as we give ourselves the permission to be real, be honest, be delicate and thus powerfully strong from a true way that most of society does not see is even possible (yet!).
I can relate to a lot of what you’ve shared here Cherise in that I too am learning how the brick-wall, tense and hard body way of life is anything but strong or a truly successful way to live. It’s like being on a boat on the sea, life shifts and changes and flows and if I were to stand on the boat rigidly with my knees locked and everything tight and tense the movements of the boat would make me fall over instantly. When I am tense and hard to not feel my body then my life feels out of control as I am left to roll around on the deck of the boat. But if I loosen the tension, release the grip I have held my body in I can work with life and the flow of the sea, I stand on the deck strong and stable yet sensitive to the changes in the flow around me.
This is a beautiful blog Cherise, it is incredible to see how much of our delicacy is discarded as being weak and soft, while it is the quality that I feel makes it possible to deeply connect to others, without holding up our guards that we have learned we need to cope with is coming at us in this world.
What a great question Cherise: “who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall”? Well I sure know that I don’t but that sadly that’s exactly how I existed for a very long time with my wall of protection growing higher and wider as the years went by. To know without a shadow of doubt that there is a strength and a power in being delicate, not the weakness that we have been raised to believe, has been a knowing that has changed the way I look at myself, and in turn has changed my life. I now love feeling the delicateness that I am, rather than that life obscuring wall.
It is very inspiring Cherise to read and feel your claiming of your delicateness here. We pride ourselves on being a great multi-tasker and doer in life as a woman in our octopus-like behaviour, leaving behind our naturally gorgeous traits like, delicacy, sweetness, beauty and grace, all to prove we can do so much and be so much to everyone. If every woman on the planet simultaneously stopped for one moment and connected to their sacredness, we would witness the true power of women in their stillness that would reconfigure the world forever.
Absolutely Julie Chung we are holding so much power and of a kind that have we have not claimed as women. “If every woman on the planet simultaneously stopped for one moment and connected to their sacredness, we would witness the true power of women in their stillness that would reconfigure the world forever” What a gorgeous thought and of course we can begin to live in that sacredness now, and as we do things do change. Very beautiful.
we can begin to live in that sacredness now, and as we do things do change. Very beautiful. Yes elainearthey, very beautiful indeed to truly see and feel women in their divine essence, is an absolute beauty to behold and a true heavenly gift for all.
“Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?” This is a great question and one I haven’t asked myself! I’ve been aware of how from a very young age I tried to prove I was as good as a boy, which only succeeded in creating layers of protection and hardness that now need discarding. All this was done through a lack of self worth, but never did I ask the opposite question – rather than wondering why I chose hardness, why did I not choose to feel how delicate I am as the woman I truly am? Thank you for asking Cherise – there is much to consider here.
This is beautiful and so empowering for all women to read and truly trust and know our own delicateness and our loving strength from this. An inspiration from something you live and know and this is something I am discovering more and more in myself too. It feels never ending the depth of delicateness and preciousness we can feel in our bodies as we start to appreciate ourselves for who we are and to really let go of all we are not that we have protected ourselves with. Thank you Cherise
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too”.
What a beautiful and precious thing to know Cherise, thank you.
it is interesting to read that the young girl was told to harden up after a slight injury… I thought it was just young boys that were told this, and this message continues all the way up until as young men the walls and shields are truly up, hiding the sensitive and tender and delicate beings that we all truly are.
Exposing that we as men and women nowadays think that boys and girls equally need to be tough or not show their sensitivities, providing a safety net for the adults to not have to drop their own protections and walls. In time we will all learn that false protection to not be harmed or hurt is a disregard towards ourselves and in fact, hurts us already, exposing further the illusion that protection and hardness only create more devastation than we have wanted to realise.
‘But what I didn’t realise was that the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out.’ Cherise this is so true, when we don’t honour our delicateness we protect ourselves by keeping everyone else out when our natural loving way is the opposite.
A woman colleague was sick recently and she apologised profusely for not feeling well and having to stay home because of the work that she will miss doing. We have learned to apologise for the messages our bodies are forcing us to listen, because we cannot feel how precious our bodies are with all the hardness that we have made normal. We do have to apologise, not for missing work, but for all the abuse and disregard we have put on our bodies year in year out, treating it like a machine and arrogantly thinking all will be okay as long as we are young, and irresponsibly accepting that our bodies simply break down when we are older. But the world is getting sicker and sicker younger and younger, and that we cannot ignore. Our apology to our bodies is not in guilt or giving up, but in being honest that we do hear all the messages of the body but we have chosen to ignore or be unaware, because we did not know better, but none of that is truly normal. Not feeling our own delicateness consistently in our bodies is never normal.
Apologising for the way that we feel, what our bodies experience and thus the corrections, illness or disease that we need to heal is nothing but detrimental and exposing that we hold images and pictures of what we always think we ‘should be like’ and ‘should be doing’. But when this comes at the expense of us is it truly worth it? and most importantly are we embracing the offering of true learning, new choices and evolution that is on the cards?
I love how the delicateness that exists in every human is being rediscovered and valued for its beauty. My delicateness is absolutely my strength.
Delicateness is not supported to be felt or shown in our world where rush and achievements rule. Most women may think we cannot afford to be delicate, as there is no tangible reward, we may think being delicate has nothing to do with finishing deadlines—but it does! When I do not honor my delicateness, I do not feel me and all that I actually do is not true. It may fulfil a job requirement, but it is a job done in bullying and abuse to myself, and wait, I am also bullying others with my hardness and drive. In a world where delicateness is not the norm, when we walk into an office, we feel bullied; when we walk into a school, we feel bullied; we are living in a world where there is energetic bullying on-going everywhere.
As you say Cherise, the meaning of delicacy has been tainted over the years to now often be construed as something to be avoided. The role modeling of people such as yourself is vital to support others to recognise and value their own form of delicateness. It may take a bit of experimentation to find out just how it fits for each of us, but it is definitely is there.Thank you.
I agree Helen, it is there for everyone as is the opportunity for exploration within ourselves. The more I speak to people about delicateness the more it is evident that people see it as being ‘not strong enough’ or unable to cope or manage; when the truth still lies in the fact that we are indeed more sensitive to reading our awarenesses in our delicateness and this comes with a responsibility that we sometimes think we don’t want to choose.
This is so true Helen, the word delicacy when applied to another human being has often been used in a derogatory way, saying someone is ‘delicate’ was not a compliment! How the true meaning of words can be changed! I am beginning to connect to the feeling of delicateness inside of me, and it has taken quite a time to accept this feeling and let go of the hardness that I have carried most of my life. Accepting my delicateness also means that I have to accept that it is okay to feel vulnerable too, and that the two feelings go hand in hand. After all, if feeling delicate is part of our true nature and expression then why hold back from feeling it, just let go and allow it I say…
Gorgeous Sandra, I have come to know my delicateness and fragility as both strengths of me being in and with my own essence and this is where the strength comes from; i’ve been learning that the more I accept and appreciate this about myself the more I learn just how hard (near impossible) it is to try and deny it. When I gaze in my eyes or touch my fingers together I feel nothing but purity and beauty and to embrace this as the natural way that I am is a profound learning that comes with the ease of …this is all I need to do.
A beautiful sharing Cherise, from a very wise woman! To honour who we are as woman and recognising that our strengths don’t have to be the same as anyone else’s ,frees us up to be who we truly are, and those around us .
It does free us all up Roslyn, because the natural qualities and talents we are here to reflect are of equal worth to that which another offers. We can just let them spill out of us and basque in the gorgeousness and glory that true Livingness has to offer.
When I was little there were 2 women who came to visit. They were not married and had a precious and gentle air about them. Everybody loved them. Their every move was gentle as was their conversation. Everyone was in awe of them. I was fascinated as everything about their movements spoke of care for themselves. There was a great strength in this and made such an impression I can still feel the imprint of it.
How gorgeous Amanda, showing us all that the quality we are and live is unmistakable and when it is reflecting deeply of true love and care it is a feeling that will stay with us forever.
This reminds me of all that we are and that delicacy is such a beautiful quality, just letting ourselves be delicate brings a great strength.
The other day I was testing the weight of something I needed to move, and a man who was also moving things told me I better harden up. I’m lucky because it’s the first time this has so openly happened to me and I was clearly able to reject the suggestion because I can feel how powerful it is to know my body and to feel what is going on. It is beautiful to feel delicate and to feel like I am nurturing myself. For the first time I am appreciating living in a woman’s body and appreciating other women too.
Honouring our bodies is true self care and is equal to the care that we hold all others in too. Your choice to continue your movements in honour of what felt true and in rhythm of yourself Amanda held that gentleman in the same quality of delicateness and thus presented an opportune healing for him too.
Being true to ourselves supports everyone around us and most people aren’t even aware of this fact.
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.”, I have been recently feeling this for myself, it has been lovely to feel this delicateness in myself as for so long I have walked around in protection and hardness. We all have this in us, if only we allow it to been felt.
My daily life experience continues to confirm to me that all I need to do is keep accepting my exquisitely deep delicateness and the developing awareness that this brings. This is the opposite of hardness, that which we experience when we keep others out from fully seeing this quality we bring.
This is so true Linda and the more we allow our delicateness as our natural way we begin to move in a way that easily discards the old patterns and cycles we have lived that are not us at all. To drop these takes real strength and who would’ve thought this comes from feeling our preciousness.
I love what you shared about holding a quality within yourself in everything you do that is accepting of your own delicateness. This with the awareness of your movements is a beautiful way to truly let go of the hardness that denies the expression of this delicateness that blesses us all… and honours it in the way it deserves.
Thanks Samantha, honouring and appreciating the quality that we are and bring by just living is deeply divine and exquisite beyond comprehension sometimes. To just walk around in this quality and know that our movements bring a lightness and a beauty that is felt by everyone is an honour in itself but it also means we increase our awareness too and this is great because it just calls for more surrender into and acceptance of our quality.
You’ve made such an integral point for us all Cherise. What happens to us over time, when the very young and tender young girl takes the ‘toughen up’ option, and denies her natural delicate and fragile nature? From my own experience, we become increasingly disconnected from our bodies, and can then all the more readily push ourselves through things that hurt, and or harm…
And how is this for men? Equally tender and delicate as young boys, imposed upon most often from a far younger age and with a much harder message to ‘toughen up’… A friend of mine studying psychology several years ago shared a study with me, where if a little boy and girl both fell down and equally hurt themselves, the girl was six times more likely to be assisted and cared for. The boy usually got told to “get over it”, “don’t cry” or “man up son”… (horrendous)
The conversation on honouring our delicateness most definitely needs to be had, and it’s beautiful to feel the true strength you’ve found in this Cherise – deeply inspiring, thank-you.
Yes, Victoria, I totally agree that we desperately need a change in this world whereby both males and females relearn the true value of delicateness. Pushing and driving our bodies is admired in our society, leaving people avoiding anything that can be perceived as delicateness and vulnerability. It will take some time to change and even I am finding it is a slow process within myself. Having more open conversations around this topic is most welcome and is supporting change to occur. Small scale at this stage but the momentum is growing.
The small steps must always be valued, and deeply so, Helen, I agree.
For every single step of reclaiming ourselves and the truth that we are actually strong in our willingness to be delicate, fragile and vulnerable is what can allow the ‘bigger picture’ societal impositions and story to change.
Yes we certainly do well to fill roles as men and women, being something rather than just being who we already and naturally are. The thing is we can be strong and powerful beyond the physical if we claim the fulness of who we are. I know some of the most delicate and gentle women who are very strong – and they are so very claimed in themselves as women – in fact they are role models to other women simply by being a reflection to us all. No toughness or hardness, but an unwavering connection. Perhaps if we started to appreciate this for the true strength it is, we would not be trying to be tough on the outside.
Well said hvmorden. And hence why any avenue such as this for such a discussion is so vital. We simply have not appreciated the true strength in our delicateness and fragility enough. Our societal values remain so skewed… and it will only be through such role models as you describe – which can be each and every one of us – that things will change, and the hard walls, ‘soldier on mentality’ and the rest can continue to break down…
I admit I’m finding it a challenge to break the conditioning about ‘strong good, delicate bad’, so reinterpreted has the word ‘delicate’ become in our world. So your own account of the ways in which you choose to feel delicateness as a woman and the growth in awareness of your delicateness that this brings you daily, is really helpful – a timely spoonful of encouragement to rediscover my true sensitivity in a way that helps me recognise its unique strength.
For me gentleness = tenderness= fragility= vulnerability. I can accept that I have all this qualities in me and seat, or type, or wash dishes in this qualities. What is challenging is how to carry 1000 kg of soil down stairs feeling tender? Or remove 35 bags of green waste feeling gentle?
Perhaps reading this blog ‘One step at a time – anything else is just too tricky’ (http://truthaboutsergebenhayon.com/2015/11/24/one-step-at-a-time-anything-else-is-just-too-tricky/#more-5060) will support you further Elenalight. I have found for myself that fragility is a quality within me that is in fact super strong and committed and my body is here to reflect this too; yes I’m pretty sure I’ll never be able to carry 1000kg of soil at one time on my own. But I don’t have to! There is a strength in building a relationship with our bodies that has us understanding our capabilities including what we can and cannot do and asking for support where it’s needed whilst never feeling less for any of it.
Really appreciate your honesty Cathy. There is so much for us to break down here, isn’t there – that we CAN recognise delicateness and true sensitivity as you say, as a strength. For sure, the ‘soldiering on’ mentality – so strongly held in many, many women – can still be a part of our lives in so many ways.
For me, I can appreciate just how much of this has broken down – most especially since coming to the work of Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s Health. I simply would not have discovered a truly tender relationship with and knowing of my own body as a woman, without such powerful inspiration and wisdom shared here.
Hear hear Victoria, without the inspirational women that we are and we know through Esoteric Women’s Health we would have missed the true delicateness within ourselves for much longer, and longer than necessary! because our true qualities are never that far away.. sometimes only a breath or a movement and we are back in line with our hearts and our true beauty.
Delicateness is such a nurturing quality and deeply honours the innate sensitivity to the core of our being.
Beautifully express Abby, you have taken the words out of my mouth. Slowly I am appreciating my delicateness, my sensitivity as being the core of my being.
Gorgeous Abby thank you. My job can be quite physically demanding at times lifting boxes and such. What I have been made aware of lately is that the more aware I am of how I am feeling in my body allows me to be honest with how much I can actually do now at work on a physical level. Boxes seem much heavier and I now ask for help and I can feel a new level of delicateness in my arms and fingers which is a very new feeling but one that is greatly cherished. I know that I now have reached a new foundation for myself and my delicateness and it will develop over time. Sensitivity really is something to be treasured for us all.
I love your words ” being a delicate woman is my true strength”. My feeling is, that it is the same for men. The moment I connect to my tenderness and delicateness, I feel so yummy and divine. Thanks for your awesome sharing.
I love your words ” being a delicate woman is my true strength” also they really stand out to me having had the belief for so many years the delicate really meant weak pathetic in fact. I had such issues with the word delicate. These days I really love to connect with my tender delicateness and appreciate the true strength in it.
I love the way you write Cherise and the example you gave of the girl at the pool. Often when we don’t allow ourselves to express our vulnerability and sensitivity we find it difficult to observe those who do and if we don’t support ourselves in this way we struggle to support others even a child to honour their sensitivity. We need to bring that warmth, care and tenderness to ourselves.
Absolutely Kristy. I recently overheard a woman say to a man that it was ‘a good thing he isn’t too sensitive’ when he was feeling hurt about something. This confirmed even more so for me that we seek for another to be ‘hard or tough’ so that we confirm for ourselves that it’s ok to be hard and protected ourselves which is totally not ok. The man that I observed was quite confused and further hurt by the assumption that he not be allowed to express his sensitivity in that moment and proceeded to hold back his true feelings. In these situations no one learns or evolves together or is left feeling loved and connected to, in fact, this only serves to shut down our natural abilities to connect and support each other in what we deeply feel.
We need to develop more deeply our relationships with ourselves so that we get to know our sensitivities and build trust in sharing them with our loved ones, supporting us to feel them when we are out in the world and breaking down the walls that keep us all from our true universal interconnectedness.
Sensitivity can be so beautiful and to me it is being very aware. For a long time I thought sensitive was to take things personally and overreact – but this is based on being emotional and totally opposite to being truly sensitive. I’ve learnt there is a huge difference between being aware of how we feel (sensitivity) and how we respond to that feeling (action or reaction) If we are sensitive and react, then it is not the sensitivity that needs to be looked at but why are we reacting in a way that is not truly us? To sit with our sensitivity and appreciate it for what it is, allows us to confirm the connection we have for ourselves and with others.
Absolutely Kristy. We can find ourselves squirming when another actually honours their fragility… You’ve highlighted the personal responsibility in living with such care for ourselves here so well – for without it, how can we truly be there to offer others the support they deserve? And we end up with generations that beget generations, who say ‘hardening up’ is ok.
Take a moment to truly connect with the little, tender cherub each and every one of us once was, and still in many ways is, and the ‘harden up’ option is absolutely not ok. We are delicate and beautiful beyond measure.
Absolutely Cherise, I have found that it was only until fully embracing and accepting how delicate I actually am, and can allow myself to be, that I was able to get a true sense of what it means to be strong as a woman, and the power that comes from that depth can be felt in a single glance.
Love this Giselle and Cherise – the blog is all about celebrating the woman that we are rather than striving to be the woman we think others want – wow this is just so needed for me to read at the moment and truly honour my body for who I am right now.
Yes ! great point! Letting go of striving is such a true relief when returning to living life as a truly honouring woman.
There’s just nothing to strive for when we are connected to ourselves and our essence which naturally comes with ease and grace. This is the opposite of how so many of us as women are living our lives today and so the conversations we’re having are super important. What is it about us that has chosen to and continues to strive for recognition in the world when we are already everything and enough in our essence? There is a lack of education at play here and much work to do to remind women of the key they already hold to unlocking themselves.
I was at an event about ‘the relationship with your body’ It is amazing how we as women have bought in to believing that we have to build a wall of protection by hardening and overriding what we feel. This actually leaves us at the mercy of everything we take on from what is outside of us. Instead in choosing to feel from within our body and connect to our delicateness and allow our fragility and feel what is exactly going on. With this true way of being we feel everything that our bodies communicates and everything that is communicated to us from the outside. We can than observe this and make choices that truly honor us.
Beautifully spoken, we can be at the mercy of that which occurs around us or be with the might that we innately are within.
That is such a powerful distinction Cherise, and once grasped we can live with a clear choice about how we respond to life.
After many years of living in a hardened way, my body now tells me how delicate I am. I welcome the aches and pains as they tell me my life story and how I can now lovingly let go to reveal the woman I am.
Beautiful Kathy, the aches and pains can also represent the sensitivities we have in life and the fact that we feel and are aware of everything that happens to us and around us. This is profound when it is deeply understood as our bodies not only feel everything, they are there to observe things and let things pass through, but not hold onto things for long. When un collaboration we also understand this concept, we begin to deepen the relationship with our bodies and the commands or tools we hold to allow the energy we experience to continue to flow and not stagnate in us. We begin to love the bodies we are in, their clear messages and the powerful role they have.
What a loving way of seeing those aches and pains as confirmation of what has always been true about you Kathy- the delicate tender woman you are. I love how the body always knows the truth of who we are, and never lets up reminding us.
I love this Kathy and Felicity, our bodies were made for communication with us and when we are on the same page i.e. open to listening and working together, we really can love all the signs and symptoms that we receive; because from here we can choose that which feels to be and honours harmony and beauty in our lives.
That all men and women know their own strength and intimate selves feels like it should be a fundamental right for humanity.
i completely agree, this is our most basic truth, and this is what we should all be encouraged to hold onto from early in life, the incredible richness within.
This amazing website is that exact starting point – giving us an opportunity to bring ourselves back to the basics and the richness within.
And the richness within never gets dull, its an ongoing adventure reconnecting back to who we truly are.
Cherise this is an incredible break through. I too have re-awakened the Woman within and she never went anywhere, my seeking else where wasn’t it! I love my delicate, sweet and precious self and for me to truly feel this and know and accept this as my normal is huge. The EBM has been an enormous support with building this.
Yes Natalie, we never actually go anywhere !! The love, beauty and super-fine delicateness that we are is heavenly and unchangeable. We are just love and we can cover up this love with layers of protection, hurt, emotion or other ..stuff! but our very core, that which is burning brightly in our hearts and Souls can never be tainted.
I agree in full, having felt this and been reacquainted with it from my own body.
The EBM’s are a huge support and having a much deeper relationship with my body is a huge part of developing this relationship more and more.
The Esoteric Breast Massage is a modality that has changed my whole relationship with myself as a woman. Through my sessions I have learnt the ways in which I have dulled myself, held hurts, held back and taken on others choices through sympathy and I have equally re-connected to my divinity and my preciousness as a woman and the very fact that I hold no issues in life, whatsoever. This modality is everything that is needed to support a woman back to her truly nurturing and honouring way of being and living. It’s priceless!
I agree aminatumi, the EBM’s are a most delicate, tender way to re-connect to our bodies and expose the level of abuse and hardness that we have imposed on ourselves. Every time I have had an EBM I come closer to the true me. I’m not giving my power away to a modality but the support of the EBM and the practitioner is worth its weight in gold, and that goes for all the esoteric modalities.
I love how you found the awesome woman within- you are absolutely right, she was always living within us all, just waiting to be rediscovered! What a joy to feel!
“Feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness” These are words Cherise, that I would not have put together some time ago, but now,as I am gradually feeling and letting go of the hardness I feel in my body I can start to feel a sense of tenderness and delicateness, claiming more of me as the truly loving woman I feel myself to be.
yes me neither, but it’s so true, we do become more powerful by how delicate we are. it’s a new way to know oneself and well worth exploring.
Life appears to be like a rubber band. We begin to connect to our power which feels amazing, so amazing in fact that we begin to pull back from it because we fear own strength. Yet the rubber band can get smaller and smaller so the ping back becomes less and less, and then we can hold onto more of our power which then begins to grow incrementally, and accept ourselves for the amazing, delicate women that we are. We are pioneers in exploring ourselves, and the re-discovery of the power within us is just there for the taking, just what are we waiting for!
Once that power is found and claimed, its a case of never looking back for those who want to live that power in daily life. It simply feels amazing.
I love this Felicity, we don’t have to look back as we have nothing to ‘fix’ and certainly no penance to carry out. When we connect with what is true for us this is all that exists, what’s next is simply accepting this in full and the responsibility to live this more and more in our lives for the benefit of all.
Yes me too Jill. When we peel back the layers of hardness the true beauty of our delicateness shines. That is oh so powerful for us all.
Cherise I have been working on feeling my delicateness and bringing it into my day and every moment. It is a continuous unfolding as I use to hold myself in so much hardness and control, I still find that there are parts of my body still hard and holding onto control, but slowing it is unfolding.
I think it’s fantastic that you have committed to such an invaluable endeavour – what is more important than developing who you are into every day…
I agree Dean this is an amazing unfoldment and something for every women/girl at any age, allowing that delicateness out to be enjoyed and shared is a large part of truly letting people in and letting ourselves be seen, a concept I did not know existed until presented by Serge Benhayon but now I do I see as being very important.
Yes, Serge Benhayon is forerunner of our time.
I too am working on honouring myself on countless ways. I am so worth it. There is so much more to be claimed back and lived.
I have found that the more I connect to my delicateness it exposes the hardness, because when I was living in hardness I was numb to it. I was under the illusion that this was the real me because I had lived with it for so long. For me also, it is accepting my vulnerability and that it is okay to feel vulnerable and I don’t need to put on that hard exterior for anyone. Having the layer of hardness surround me not only stops me from feeling my own love, but it stops me from feeling it from others. Acknowledging the hurts and feeling them melts the hardness away to reveal the delicateness underneath. More unfolding please!
Ha, I just love this Sandra! more unfolding and more melting indeed! To come to know ourselves and relate more to the connection we have that doesn’t feel hard or tough is so freeing, giving ourselves further permission to live this wherever we are.
I too knew no differently when ingrained into the hardness and not appreciating the truly delicate woman I am within. I love what has been uncovered from within me via the healing modality of the esoteric Breast massage. It’s incredible to be getting reacquainted with the true woman I am.
Yes, the irony, the trick and the lie of the hardness is that we think we are protecting ourselves from being hurt – when in truth we are not letting out our love or letting love in, which hurts us BIG time… and Love is the one thing we crave the most!
I too am learning to let go of protection, to let love in and love out…and the key to letting go of all the hardness is delicateness – being delicate in all that I do leaves the hardness to melt away, there is nothing to hold the protection within my body anymore – and in fact the delicateness becomes a strength and power all of its own.
Amita- after reading this blog I realise I am still holding myself in the hardness especially across the chest when I am in a “drive” to do something, or feel pushed to perform . I now choose to be more aware of the quality I am holding myself in throughout the day, for I know that delicateness and tenderness is my true nature.
Yes, I can feel what you mean Cherise, being delicate is our true strength as women and although this is innate within us all, how many times do we receive the message that women can only survive in the world if they put on a tough exterior. I know that when I was young being sensitive was frowned on, so I ‘tried’ very ‘hard’ to conceal this feeling from the world in case I was derided. The result of this being that I now have many hurts to heal – how wonderful if children were now taught to honour their delicacy and sensitivity and allowed to feel the strength and empowerment of being true to themselves. With inspiration from women such as yourself the world is slowly changing.
Unfortunately as a race we still need to understand that we travel around in cycles, we repeat behaviours and we accustom ourselves to the behaviours of our parents and others around us when we are small. Serving only to continue the holding back and retracted expression when children and continuing on into adulthood. Adults and children, everyone, needs to return to the fact that they are equal in divine nature and therefore equal in beauty and love so that the cycles and family trees begin to change.
Thank you Cherise for a very beautiful and inspiring article, I am amazed through reading it, that I can feel the beautiful delicateness that is part of my being. Delicate is a word that I would never have applied to myself in the past, but I now know that it is a part of the true beauty of being a women.
Being a woman in her delicacy is showing men the way forth.
Correct Felix, there is a true equality about this statement as without a ‘lead’ to light the way down truths path there would be no one to do so and all would suffer the repeated cycles we have grown accustomed too. To lead the way so that all other men and women know their own strength and intimate selves is an honour and what true family is all about.
Delicateness allows me to fully feel and appreciate each moment. Hardness denies me this beauty and depth of presence.
Yes, being hard leaves us powerless to the onslaught of energetic exchanges that constantly occur and bombard us in our every single moment… There is nothing strong about being hard, it only serves to close us off from feeling that which we cannot help but feel anyway and keep us thinking we are unaware.
Cherise the word delicateness has been redefined and its meaning expanded so beautifully in this blog, to bring forth its true qualities which include strength and truth, gentleness, harmony, clairsentience, vulnerability, tenderness, and above all the beauty of a woman in her grace and power.
Absolutely Bernadette, all of these qualities and more! and when we truly embrace these as our strength and know it to be normal we inspire all others to make their own connections ~ confirming that men and women everywhere are truly precious and divine and nothing less.
Wonderful Cherise that is an awesome blog. I was touched by following sentence: “I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” I am also discovering this qualities more and more each day and it is a great joy to not hold it back or to withdraw from it. It is so much needed that we as women life our true sensitivity instead of hiding it.
When I read all the ways you choose to be delicate now Cherise, it is like being given the warmest, most precious hug. How powerful delicacy truly is.
Holding ourselves in this warmth is the embrace of love that is always available to us, each time chosen serves as a marker of the love we not only deserve but actually are. True power is in our ability to allow this way of being to solidify and form a foundation in which we can walk through life knowing our own holding and true strength.
Amazing what strength there is in delicacy, but it is not a strength that perhaps we may immediately expect, for example, recently I was in a challenging situation. I say challenging because although there was someone else involved, it was actually a challenge with myself to not go in to old patterns of hardening my body, becoming judgemental and reactive. So I removed myself from the situation and choose instead to allow myself to feel the hurt of what I had just experienced. From this I could feel how sensitive I was and I chose to accept this, not to shut it down or override my feelings. Then I could feel the delicacy in my body that was always there returning to my awareness. After giving myself the opportunity to feel all of this I was able to see the situation more clearly and in fact move my own issues out of the way, this allowed more understanding of the other person involved and when I returned to the situation we were able to come to a greater appreciation of each other – because I had taken the time and made the choice to accept the delicacy of my body and this confirmed who I am, so I did not need the drama of the situation to give me anything and when I brought this back, everything was easily resolved. This in turn provided a great learning opportunity for myself and the other person.
What a great example Shami. Allowing our own sensitivities to be felt and then honoured is huge! Not because it is difficult to do, but because we live in a world where we so often shut them down or choose to not be aware of what we feel. Doing this gets us know where but further shut down and out from ourselves and each other and this is a real shame for humanity. What if when we feel how sensitive we are this actually gives us the strength to deal with anything that comes our way, to read and understand any situation and to allow the love and joy that is natural to us ~to just be~ no matter what.
I am discovering through Sacred Movement sessions, a deeper connection to my delicateness and it is this marker of deep preciousness and sacredness and allowing myself to be vulnerable and surrendering to me that i take to my day.
I have discovered this in myself too Cherise, through receiving treatments on an Esoteric Women’s Health program. I see that since childhood, I have developed a myriad of behaviours which effectively harden or numb me to feeling my sensitivity and my super delicate nature. Once I accessed this exquisite delicateness, I saw most of these behaviours all at once and had to wonder how masterful I have become at suppressing my awareness, thinking it was protecting me from being hurt, when truthfully it was keeping me locked in an unhappy fortress, separate from the magic and connection of life. Letting go of these behaviours has not been quite as quick, I find myself falling back into them and yet, not as much. Bit by bit they are dropping away as I honour my connection to myself, to the deepest part of me that now guides my choices and treating myself with care in my day. The strength, I now feel, is my connection to God and the capacity to read and understand life, my innate wisdom and knowing that I am now claiming.
Absolute and beautiful Emmadanchin, what you share here is what so many women will relate to, that the patterns we have created to not be hurt actually hurt us more and keep us feeling separate from our innate wisdom and connection to God. Claiming, expressing, appreciating, accepting and valuing this connection that we not only hold but equally are here to naturally present to all others is a remarkable gift and responsibility to have.
‘keeping me locked in an unhappy fortress, separate from the magic and connection of life’. These words stuck out for me here Emma, as I feel this sums up exactly what the hardening and shutting ourselves off from our sensitivity does. When we shut it down, we shut everyone out at the same time. For me, reconnecting to my sensitivity and allowing myself to open up with those close to me, is also allowing me to start taking this out into more of my relationships. The more I go out, the more I realise the cocoon I have been in, but then I realise this must be first seen and felt in full as I open up to share my true self once again.
Whilst we are redeveloping our relationship with ourselves, it feels like we can re-build trust in relationship with someone close to us, a partner or perhaps a friend, which teaches us new skills. Then this foundation holds us in making it our way with people.
I agree Emma, having those reflections from those around us are super important and super valued.
I love knowing that it is natural to be delicate. I am very small in stature and build and I have put myself down for this – feeling less and accepting (even encouraging) put downs from others about my physical weakness. All the while I have became tough and hard. My delicateness has been covered up under a layer of protection that doesn’t feel great at all. I appreciate the opportunity I have to connect to the truth about my delicateness and look forward to embracing it once more.
Gorgeous sharing Leonne, from your fragile essence. I just pictured a small bird and a large elephant standing side by side and felt the symbology that just like all humans on this earth, despite our size our delicateness is immeasurably equal. What a confirmation it is yet again that body image does not make up nor dictate who we are and that being delicate has nothing to do with ones external frame and everything to do with the being that is housed inside. That being is the part of us as women that is aware of and reads everything that happens and from honouring this part of ourselves we have our true strength in action.
Absolutely Cherise. I am only just beginning to feel how powerful it is to be delicate. I love the image of a delicate elephant too – I can feel that these creatures are in fact as delicate as a tiny bird. It is a great reminder of the truth of delicateness.
Beautiful Leonne and Cherise. I can feel that it doesn’t matter our size or shape, delicateness is something innate in us all, and does not look like anything in particular.
Very Beautiful Blog Cherise ! I too have been deeply inspierd by Serge Benhayon, I have found myself – a gorgeous young woman.. I love what you shared: I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer.
I for long long time thought the same, no not anymore, I am now everyday letting go of more and more shields, everyday I discover more – that I am a truly precious woman.
Gorgeous to feel and to claim Danna, I am claiming the absolutely beautiful and precious woman that I am too. Each and every day is an opportunity to confirm just how tender and loving we really are in our bodies and when we allow ourselves to be valued in this way we take this confirmation into everything we do.
Well said Cherise hold – this is so true : ”When we allow ourselves to be valued in this way we take this confirmation into everything we do”. Absolutely beautiful truth.
Cherise, this blog inspires me each time I read it. I have been learning so much lately about how powerful it is to really let myself feel everything that I am feeling, even and especially when it is something that hurts me. Staying open and expressing my feelings is teaching me a lot, so long as I am willing to see that what hurts me is my responsibility and not the other persons (even if it was their behaviour and not mine causing the hurt).
I love this Anna, the other thing I have learnt is that we never stop feeling the hurts that take place and are deeply felt, ever. But what we can know is that we don’t have to hold onto them at all, in fact when we feel them and nominate as you’ve shared where they have come through or how they have come to be we can nominate and drop them quite simply. The key for me is in keeping my awareness on! reading the situation and honouring what I feel is true.
Beautiful Cherise, thank you for sharing that it is just a choice to let go of our hurts once felt. Rather then harden, protect, judge, blame and as a result stop ourselves from fully loving and letting others in. Simple but something that takes practice.
I feel like the simplicity does come with practise and not in the sense of getting it right or wrong sometimes but more deeply in the sense that this simplicity is actually who we are and confirms us. When we let go of that which is actually not real and reconnect to what is, simple is all that we know! and what a great marker we have to continue the refinement of our choices and our deepening self-acceptance from there.
Gorgeous Cherise, ‘simplicity is who we are in essence’. Complication means we have simply stepped away from ourselves. This is a great confirmation for us all.
I use to be hard and proud of it, but via esoteric women’s health I have learnt to connect to myself as a woman and come to feel the delicateness of what it is to be a woman. Thank you Cherise for your blog.
So true what you have just shared Cherise, The delicate of being a woman, this is our essence. When we forget this we are separated and then take on what else shell I do and I too took up hardness until there was a stop to that and in the reflection and stop trying the delicate and stillness returns. Thank you Cherise for your story.
Being gentle, tender or delicate was not even a consideration whilst growing up and we were always encouraged to fight our own battles, sometimes literally – so to me that was considered normal and then when I had two girls I wanted them to be able to stand up for themselves and if they showed that they were too delicate or too sensitive, then it was my belief that they would be bullied for being perceived as weak.
This is why it is important to have men and women break away from this old way of being and realise that it isn’t weak to be delicate and that yes, life can hurt at times, but we don’t have to pass on from generation to generation our fears.
Reading the first paragraph about being encouraged to ‘harden up’ had me thinking about how much this happens to boys too. It seems that people do not want to see any vulnerability as it may remind them of their own previously squashed sensitivity. And some parents may be concerned that their boys need to learn to be a ‘man’ so that they’re not a target for other ‘tough’ boys or even just for the knocks that can occur in life.
I can so much relate what you are sharing. In being constantly more delicate with myself brings a total different emanation in my body. It supports me to be more clear and dedicated.
Cherise, I notice this with boys and girls, ‘How many of us not been taught from an early age that being girly or delicate means that we’re just not strong or tough enough to be out there in the world?’ I often observe this with young children that if they fall and hurt themselves often they are encouraged to get up, get on with it it – told that “your ok”, “your strong”, when clearly they are not ok, they are upset and in pain. I also know of young girls that were sent to rugby for toddlers to try and “toughen them up” because it was felt that they would be bullied or would not be ok if they grow up as sensitive as they are now. I can see how in society sensitivity is seen as a weakness not a strength.
I felt really empowered the other day, when I connected to my fragility and delicateness. I found I was able to express a truth to someone, which could have been a challenge, but the words flowed during the conversation and I was able to hold steady with tenderness, openness and love. This was a great marker of what it felt like to express in full from the woman.
Thank you Cherise. On re-reading this blog I am reflecting on how deeply sensitive and delicate I am and how because I have not been met by a tenderness I have lived most of my life in lots of protection and hardness in my body. Through the support of the Universal Medicine modalities and the consistent loving reflection from Serge and Natalie Benhayon I am learning to trust the world again and let go of “the brick wall”. I have come so far in letting go this protection and yes there is more openness and expression of the delicateness to allow out but today I am celebrating my willingness to go there and all that I have healed thus far that is supporting me to be the exquisitely delicate and sensitive woman I am out in the world.
To introduce delicateness into our day, i have noticed there requires to be a certain level of presence and awareness… no checking out, but rather checking in with our body, and moving with this. This simple task, this first step, presents the ‘thin end of the wedge’ of the power of presence, the power of a woman in her essence, is very capable of bringing.
I had this sense of delicateness and tenderness within me recently and I was somewhat overwhelmed by the magnitude of it, due I suspect largely to the fact that I have not allowed myself in the past to feel the depths of it “I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way.” It felt like coming home and yet I was shocked, because I recognised how ‘hard’ and ‘rough’ I have been with myself in the past. Delicateness for me even 5 years ago would have been used to describe babies,flowers and butterflies and yet now I have felt it within me and it feels true. I am learning to feel the power in it, as I learn to honour the delicateness that is naturally within me to express. If we open up to feeling everything that there is to feel and honouring that, we develop wisdom and awareness, and that is powerful.
Delicate was not a quality i expressed growing up, in fact I did not know, see or feel this quality in other women until I started attending Universal Medicine presentations in my mid 30’s. That is a long time not to have lived and expressed from the true woman. It is with great joy that i am re-discovering these gems within as I give myself permission to feel how natural it is to once again be me – a delicate, beautiful woman.
Delicateness was not a quality I saw in the women around me before I attended Universal Medicine presentations either. The women around me were strong and dependable, the backbone of the family. Delicateness is a quality I too am re-discovering – I am seeing it reflected in many women around me now and that is very inspiring.
“Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?” I used to equate my strength with ‘success’, if I was successful (in whatever) then I was not weak. The only way I’d learned to be successful was to drive and work very hard, but this involved hardening myself up for this push through life. So with that belief there was no way I could let myself feel any delicacy, if I did, I couldn’t push any more and if I couldn’t push, I wouldn’t be successful or show strength. How wrong that was! Delicacy can melt ice and smooth stone and discovering my own delicacy I know for sure THIS is the super power and not the hardening.
This is beautiful in bringing the words delicate and strength together, it totally breaks the illusion that delicate can mean weak. I am still working on allowing myself to feel the delicateness and tenderness of being a woman the whole time, I have moments of this but can also see how I go into ‘protection’ and my body becomes hard.
“I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments.” This is beautiful Cherise, and something that I too am discovering. It is those moments of deep love for oneself that step by step can build a body of love, as the body pays us back for how we treat it, however that maybe.
Why is girly a word with such a bad connotation that being it is a problem even for girls? A girl-woman that is truly delicate offers a reflection that is not only beautiful but also too much for people that has made of hardening their way! It offers the possibility to stop, connect to that feeling inside you and go from there. No wonders why people react so much to it. It is way too much to ask. By contrast and mysteriously, the word manly does not have negative connotations for men even if acting manly is precisely what makes boys loose themselves.
Cherise this was so awesome to read for me. Real beautiful that you’ve allowed your delicateness and fragility. I know I had/have the assumption that the world is way to rough for me to be delicate – I’d feel like I’d get eaten alive… It’s a dog eat dog world out there isn’t it?
Lately though, I am finding the opposite, keeping fragile and delicate makes the world go round a whole lot easier. And the interactions I have with others is different. Everyone drops their guard a bit I find… As I have dropped mine.
Letting go of hardness is really something to be applauded, and nowhere near as easy as it sounds. That tough body, and hard way of being becomes an internal suit of armour, seemingly impervious to the arrows/bullets/missiles fired by life. To let that go? Well at first I must say I found it terrifying. I felt as raw and exposed as a newborn baby without a warm blanket…but then I discovered an inner warmth. As radiant as the Sun and as powerful. I could never feel that while I had my metal suit “protecting” me.
So was that hardness ever protecting me at all? If it was, why did I always feel so hurt by people and situations? Why did I never trust anyone? After all, if the suit was working surely I would have skipped through life like it was a breeze!
What I have discovered is that the clanking armour shielded me from my own essence, my tenderness and stripped me of any sense of who I truly am. Letting it go made me feel like I was suspended in space, until that greater discovery was made, and it has been the greatest discovery of my life.
I can relate to this suit of armour put on to protect myself from everything going on around me, but actually locking myself away from me. As I’ve learnt to reconnect to my own inner essence sometimes the suit of armour vanishes, but sometimes it still comes back and locks itself firmly on. As I am learning to feel the difference between the two in my body, I am learning to be more aware of the choices I make and the consequences they have.
“I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments.” I can so relate to this! I am also feeling more and more how delicate and tender I am. Usually I would lose this as I went to work but today I did not. I realise that today I honoured that I am very delicate and made everything I did about love. I could feel that by making my day about something that I know is absolutely true, and that is love, I could be myself, present and very delicate, sexy and beautiful.
Very inspiring Lieke – I make more and more the same experience. The more I allow myself to be tender, the deeper my connection to myself and other people and that feels just wonderful. Important is – as you say, to honor my tenderness on a daily basis, sometimes I forget this and I get lost in the doing.
Is it possible that we do not honour our delicateness and sensitivity because that is where our true power lies – and we settle for a life of protection and keeping people out? Are we living each moment avoiding our true power and might? What a ridiculous game with no winners, other than the energy that feeds this game.
We are taught that there is no power in being delicate and sensitive, so to (re) learn this now means a complete overhaul of everything we have known until this point. I have come to appreciate the absolute strength and power within my fragility and to honour these even in times when I am challenged and asked to be ‘harder’ than that which I naturally am.
This is so true Cherise. Why are we ashamed of how delicate we actually are? And why is it seen as a bad thing? It seems the whole world is obsessed with toughening up, even the kids in the playground.
Its interesting Rebecca that you use the words ‘ashamed’ here. Perhaps this is something some women feel depending on how they were raised and what they were taught is acceptable as a woman, but for me it was more about thinking I would be crushed, (or even annihilated) if I allowed myself to live the true delicacy I can feel within me. I realise now how judgemental and pre emptive that is/was. These days I am just working on living it, without worrying what anyone will think or say – but rather my focus is on my commitment to living the true me – which is naturally very delicate.
All that effort into safeguarding ourselves against being hurt, yet its hurt that is at the seat of that very approach. In a single delicate touch or look the space emerges to allow opportunity for the tough exterior to begin the fall and release.
Thank you Cherise. I feel that the word delicate is just coming into my radar. I can feel it in the petals of a flower or gossamer wings of a butterfly, however to consider myself as delicate and strong within that delicateness is something I feel just opening up for me. I have lived a life of protection and there is a hardness in that – void of delicateness. A work in progress as they say, and deepened by your sharing, thank you.
I love that you bought the examples of nature being delicate and open I too have just started noticing the flowers – super tiny exquisite detailed petals, amazing delicacy all reminders that this is what resides within!
Beautiful sharing, I continue to find that the strength comes in valuing and accepting more and more of my own delicateness because it is in this lived way that I am allowing myself to be aware and therefore more truthful within life and in situations. From my delicateness I can speak my truth without a nervous energy or doubt that I may have it wrong, from my delicateness I know exactly who I am and that I am everything I could ever want to be and from this strength I claim it in my walk, my action, my thought and every movement thereafter. This strength has me handling ‘anything’ that comes my way.
Cherise! You have taken this topic to another level here. I can feel the lived delicateness you express and it is deeply beautiful. Don’t stop sharing and moving from this truth you have connected with. It is desperately needed in the world by all women – and men alike. So beautiful! 🙂 🙂
In your words Bernadette I can feel the potency of connecting to the delicateness that we all innately hold within our body. For me this is just beginning but when I read your words ‘I can feel it in the petals of a flower or gossamer wings of a butterfly’ I can feel the stirrings of deeper connections that will continue to unfold.
Those gossamer wing get me every time Susan! I feel the delicate parts that are within my heart valves when I feel the word, gossamer! Let’s connect with out gossamer selves more and more each day. Thank you.
I am reflecting on a moment when my little 3year old granddaughter fell and picked herself up and brushed herself off and said she was ok before I could approach her. When did the moment come that ‘hardening’ became the way and the delicateness of which you speak Cherise began to be overridden? Thank you to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine for bringing more awareness to the choices we make as adults and the opportunities available to us to live something different, to show the world through our livingness that we are delicate, fragile and tender. It is time to celebrate all these.
Such a great blog, Cherise. I asked someone I know well to carry a heavy- ish bag up two flights of stairs for me last week. His initial response was to imply that I was a strong woman and I could do it – ( this is someone I know very well! ) A few years back I wouldn’t even have asked for help, but I repeated my request and he obliged. But what I learned from this is how I have been in the past, acting the strong woman, not needing help and and ‘I can do it’ attitude. So it is hardly surprising that others, who I know well, assume that I can do it alone. Learning to accept and appreciate my delicateness and thus my fragility and vulnerability, is now unfolding.
Great experience to share Sue. Such a reply, telling you you should do it yourself, is such a stereotype of hurt around not knowing our true place as men. It is awesome you asked again and re-imprinted the whole situation, both for yourself and for him.
I have noticed the great level of sadness and hurt that can be felt within women from disconnecting to how delicate they are and hardening their bodies, and then it as if they continue to protect themselves so as not to feel the raw fragility and hurt they have caused themselves by hardening and so the first step to coming back to that level of delicateness is actually in allowing one to deeply feel the level of hurt and pain that they hold in their body as a result of dishonouring ones fragility
Brilliantly observed Oliver. This is very true. We continue on denying the delicateness to not have to feel the pain of already having denied it for so long – crazy hey!
I would not previously have described myself as delicate, I used to think it was a word meaning weakness and not coping. I am dropping that harshness critique now of how I had learnt to think, and am awakening my suppressed hidden feelings of delicateness. It’s quite yummy.
The delicateness of a woman or man is so precious. I’m aware of this more and more as well. The more I’m delicate with myself, the more I also feel my vulnerability and fragility. These qualities become now my true strength.
Cherise this is wonderful to read. My walls aren’t so thick as they were but I’ve felt I how I’m on subtle alert and it’s really draining. Reading this and I’m inspired to allow my delicateness and feel who I am to a greater depth.
Yes I agree
To know our own delicacy is to know and feel the fact of our own divinity, whether we are man or woman.
Its true the further we get away from our delicate nature and way of being the further people are from us. The harder we become the more people move away. Its so simple yet we do not see it for what it is. Our delicate nature is what brings people in both men and women. They love the strength within that too.
I have noticed that being delicate can still be regarded as a weakness and as ‘the wrong way to be’. And yet I know women who live their delicateness as a matter of fact and without the slightest trace of being precious or pathetic, a true inspiration for us all.
I agree Gabriele, that women who live their delicateness as a matter of fact are truly inspiring. I am appreciating this quality so much when I feel it in myself or others, it is delicious.
I wonder if when a person judges another as being weak or wrong, they are actually rejecting their own delicate nature, or simply just making sure that it will not be seen, maybe it would be too painful to accept what has been walked away from. I can certainly understand all of that and have done each one myself.
Thank you Shami. I feel this to be true. It is a very clever trick – to have us believe that being hard and controlling is the way to succeed and be strong when it is love, compassion and true humility that hold sway. There is such strength and power in vulnerability, fragility and delicateness when it is true but it has been used in an untrue way to manipulate and coerce and has lost it’s credibility and trustworthiness. it is up to us to bring it back.
As Elaine has said I too can feel this to be true for me, so thank you for your comment Shami as it leaves much to ponder on. It does feel painful when we realise all that we have ‘walked away from’ – however this can now become an opportunity to feel again the true depth of our sensitivity and to embrace this in all that we do.
I agree Gabrielle, what you speak of is true inspiration for all – women and men equally.
As a man, there are so many ways a woman in her delicateness is strong and powerful. With a simple look, she can open your shoulders and melt your heart. When she offers a smile, it can reassure and warm your whole body. When she offers her delicateness in support of a task, without asking you to do it differently, it allows you to connect to your essence and honour yourself and her more deeply.
Wow Simon, that’s beautiful to hear how it is from your perspective when a woman is honouring her delicateness.
As a female, it is wonderful to hear how one’s delicateness can be so powerful and supportive. I had the experience recently of a man opening a door for me. I was a bit shy, but he had sensed my gentleness and delicateness, which in the moment allowed him to express and show his care, sensitivity and appreciation. It was a very lovely and tender exchange.
Yes this is indeed beautiful to hear Simon how it is for a man when he feels a woman in her delicateness. In the past if a man offered to help me carry my bags etc. I would see it as a weakness and push through myself. Now, when a man offers to help I see it as a compliment He has clocked that I am honouring my delicateness and I can feel how much he naturally cares.
Simon what you have expressed so beautifully here has melted my heart. Thank you.
This is gorgeous Simon, you have really connected to the essence of a woman. It is equally as powerful to experience a man being truly surrendered and tender and in this exquisitely honouring.
This is the power of a woman living in true connection within herself, what she offers to all around her is beauty beyond measure and yes it is something that can melt even the toughest brick wall in another – why? because the wall is built on a false belief of protection whereas the love that is being offered and the quality of preciousness held in presence holds equality and is more powerful than all the stars’ light combined. Thank you Simon.
Truly beautiful Simon Voysey.
And what of a man who honours how delicate he is also? Now that blows me away beyond measure. For when a man honours all that he naturally is, I (as a woman) feel exposed to the core for where I may not as yet have dropped my walls – all is laid asunder, and though it may bring some discomfort, I welcome this for it allows the true alchemy of what each sex can reflect to each other – i.e. that we are all, essentially, the same.
This is a beautiful post Cherise, I too am enjoying and allowing myself to embrace my delicateness, this is still a work in progress, so great to re read your experience of this.
Great article Cherise, thank you. I am also discovering how delicateness is a strength, as this quality brings with it so much presence to any activity you do. And when you are present I notice that there seems to be more organisation, order, routine and enough time to ‘do’ things. Its quite incredible how honoring your delicateness brings so much along with it.
As a younger woman I felt I had to be tough and hard to survive in the world and saw delicate sensitive woman as weak and pitiful. I closed my heart to not only myself but to everyone thinking that would keep me safe, if I didn’t let anyone in or express love then I couldn’t be hurt. Since listening to presentations of serge Benahayon and Universal Medicine I choose to look at life very differently. I now know that by working through my hurts and the picture I had created from my own values and beliefs of how a woman should be, act, dress and the role in life I chose to take on is far from true.
I now know the incredible strength and safety I feel in re connecting to my authentic self and opening my heart and learn to love myself and others. I am amazed just how delicate, tender and sweet I truly am. By re-claiming my femaleness and the gorgeous woman I am I feel love and warmth emanate from the core of my being
Isn’t it amazing how we can fool ourselves into believing that if we don’t let anyone in we can’t be hurt! Not letting others in is one of our greatest hurts for we will always feel alone and isolated if we persist in this.
Lucy it so true not letting people in is the biggest hurts, it took me a long time to let people in, as from very young I was hurt and due to that I kept prople out and never trusted anyone. But since I have started to let people in to my life, it has been full of love and joy.
Me too Mary and Amita. I was a master builder of walls in the past, but it was hard to see as it was hidden behind a mask of smiley, friendly and apparently open. When I think about it, it was a brilliant disguise as I could hide in plain sight whilst be thought of as an open woman. I got so good at it that it was quite a shock earlier this year when I realised that I really didn’t let people in at all. Making others jump through hoops to prove they are worthy of trust before we let them in is so far away from love. I am learning what it feels like to be truly open now, and at times I still want to run for the hills, but the more I choose to stay in my vulnerability the more honest and loving my relationships become.
I really relate to what you shared here Margaret. I too have seen my sensitivity as a weakness, and my delicateness almost wussy, but I am realising more and more each day this is not the truth. It is our delicateness, if truly honoured that we can stand strong in. I am just now discovering how to do this, and simply by building my confidence in living it.
Delicateness has been seen by me as something elderly ladies carried, or oriental women held in their tiny frames. But strangely enough, even some oriental women were banished to having their feel bound and crushed to force ‘delicacy’ – The thing is I was seeing delicacy as an external way of living, whereas I know understand that delicacy is a choice I make to live something within me. To be delicate is to be present, to take care and to be aware.
I am absolutely lapping up this journey I’ve stared to allow more delicacy not to define me, but to let myself be a true woman.
I also grew up feeling that my delicateness was my weakness. We start to develop stories around being too sensitive and judge ourselves quite harshly. What I am realising is that by shutting down my awareness and delicateness, I have avoided having to feel what is around me and also speak up or deal with what I have felt. I can feel now there is no way people in the world will remember how normal it is for us all to be delicate unless we are reflecting that.
What a truly beautiful transformation and testimony Margaret. I am touched deeply by your words, having known so many women who have chosen not to drop the walls… and continuing the amazing journey of dropping my own walls myself.
I would love to see your comment here as a blog in its own right. Can feel the truthfulness and beauty of you in every word. Thank-you.
I just loved your blog Cherise and have drawn so much inspiration from it. Learning to be more delicate has certainly been an interesting one. Having been so hard on myself in the past, understanding what being more delicate actually meant was at times a challenge. I now understand it is very much in the details, as you so beautifully have shared, how we speak, tone we use, how we touch, ourselves, others. How we open doors, movements we make. It is all a learning and it continues to be so for me in this space.
What you have so beautifully shared resonated with me greatly Reagan. The delicate quality we hold is in the finer details of ourselves and this is one I sometimes forget and don’t appreciate within myself. Thank you for the lovely reminder.
I too love the reminder Kelly as you mention in response to Cherise Holt’s great article – sometimes that is all we need, a gentle reminder that it’s okay to feel our tenderness, our deicateness – even on occasions the fragility of us. I find the developing of this awareness has the possibility of bringing a greater sense of whole-ness as we learn to appreciate all of who we are truly.
I too can relate to being in hardness in the name of protection. Not honouring our delicateness is yet another way that we keep ourselves as less because it is in our delicateness that our power lies.
It certainly is in the details reagankcairney. If I find myself not being as delicate as I know I can be, or I’m rushing, I focus on the smallest details of how I open doors, close drawers, how I’m holding my body and mostly I focus on how my fingertips feel. I get this sense of ‘ah, that’s it’ when I feel how delicate my fingertips feel as I move my fingers and thumb together very delicately. It’s a way to re-focus and remember that I am in fact a delicate woman.
Yes our hands and fingers are such a great way to reconnect to ourselves. It’s pretty tricky to do things without being delicate when we truly focus on our fingertips.
I understand the challenge you speak of Raegan, hardness is a very old pattern and a well reflected way of being in our society that I know I feel that I stand out like a sore ‘delicate’ thumb most of the time! But I am learning all the time that I have nothing to apologise for this way of being with myself and with others.
If I go into any hardness my whole body tenses and aches to be let free again – there is nothing strong about this, the true strength comes in allowing our bodies to be natural and honour ourselves in our movements and muscles with a dedication to expressing who we are and feeling our delicateness and equal strength in motion and in our quality.
I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” I agree Cherise, delicateness is a foundational quality for us as women. I love to feel this in other women, and I can feel it in you and in myself reading your blog, it is exquisite!
I too appreciate the delicateness that is our innate nature as a woman. As I read your beautiful blog Cherise it allowed me to feel my own delicateness whilst I felt yours, through your loving account.
Yes I too have come to such a different understanding of what it means to be a beautfiul woman, and embracing our true qualities is key to this. it’s a lovely freedom we can have to honour our delicateness, gentleness and love.
This is great Cherise and can directly apply to us blokes, we are all deeply sensitive and tender but from such an early age we don’t stand a chance, its toughen up or you are labeled a sissy or a big girls blouse and told to get on with it. On seeing more and more of us aligning to the fact that its not a weakness to be tender but rather a strength, the fate of the human race doesn’t seem so bleak.
I agree, there is a brighter future ahead when man and women know there is another way to be ~ To Just Be Themselves !
I love how you have expressed this Linda. I feel this too.
The hardness and protection that I have lived with has been exhausting compared to the delicateness I can now feel which is as light as a feather with no use of energy from my body. This is a natural state of being for women and men and beautiful to feel and behold. Reconnection to this beauty within us all is possible if we let down those barriers of protection.
Morning Cherise, I love your directness is this piece of writing and your ability to share what so many of us women do. Holding onto brick walls and hardness does not serve anyone and keeps people out. It is over many years that we build the brick walls up from people bullying us, life situations happening that may not be so great but as you share our greatest strength is our delicateness and it is this alone that will help support and melt the brick walls, bringing us closer to all others around us. Which is the most beautiful way to live life and something that we are all looking for.
Yes Natasha, as we chip away at that brick wall as this is where all our hurts have been stored for most of our lives that brick wall gradually comes down. As we deal with the hurts/issues that we have experienced we gradually open up ourselves allowing people in to feel the love that we are and in turn they get to feel their love.
Beautiful Cherise. Your comment – ‘ As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most’, is particularly exposing and also empowering. We can choose to be the delicate, loving and nurturing being we are if we choose. We can challenge the times we see others re-enforcing the ‘toughen up’ stance. We can allow and nurture those around us to truly see how delicate, tender and fragile they are. Beautiful blog – something to be celebrated and appreciated.
Great point Cherise that to be delicate and sensitive, does not mean you are an emotional person prone to breaking down in tears or keeping yourself tucked away because it hurts too much to be in the world. I’ve also played the pushing through and ‘I’m as good as any man’ game, where in fact, I am the most delicate of flowers with a gorgeous sensitivity. I’m finding that I can reveal this as I look at where my beliefs, that I have to be hard, stem from. It’s a work in progress but well worth everyone’s while when we can be in life with the sensitivity of a delicate woman.
Allowing myself to feel the absolute delicateness that is me as a woman has been an evolving process. And appreciating that within us all is a preciousness and sacredness so beautiful when known.
Knowing that being delicate is a strength not a weakness and allowing this side of me to be seen is an on going daily learning. We are so not taught this anywhere and this is why I love the Esoteric Women’s Groups. They are so encouraging and inspirational in allowing women to see that we are delicate and precious and that this is what the world not only wants to see but has been waiting for us to step into.”What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” Me too Cherise it is a whole new way of being but is so much more joyful than my old way of pushing through and getting things done.
Delicate women do show their strengt in full by allowing the natural delicacy that every women holds within to be lived in all its different expressions. Women living this quality of delicacy are changing the world by breaking down the brick walls around them. And by doing so, not only the hard brick wall around themselves, but also all the brick wals that other women and men are carrying with them in protection to the hard and tough world we currently live in, will be broken down. Therefor it is a great gift you present to us Cherise in expressing your delicacy through this blog and I want to thank you for that.
It is very true what Cherise has presented and you too here Nico, that by taking responsibility to take down our brick walls, we are inviting others – both men and women – to take theirs down too. Not only is that a huge healing for ourselves (and a whole lot less to be carrying around each day – bricks are heavy!), but also a healing for everyone we meet. The “ripple effect” starts here.
Thank you Cherise, reading your blog instantly re-connected me to my delicateness as a woman. Most precious feeling to have.
‘who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall’ I really love how you wrote this because I can really relate surrounding yourself with walls of brick doesn’t achieve anything but we just become hard and try to bury how delicate we are
..and it’s the burying that never ever works, it only delays us from knowing and living how amazing we totally are!
I met a beautiful woman yesterday. I felt her delicate tenderness and a lived embodied stillness that emanated from her every pore. I was struck by the absolute and immense power that she radiated from her stillness. I was inspired like never before to build myself in the power of being still whilst honouring my delicateness and tenderness.
It’s a shame that we as women learnt from such an early ago to hide that delicateness and view it or be told its a weakness, when theres nothing more gorgeous then seeing this in action it melts away that wall.
Bricks can also be stumbling blocks once we have taken down the wall, which can be there to remind us there’s always more to look at… also to appreciate how far we have come in demolishing the wall.
I am all to familiar with the brick wall I lived behind, thinking it was the way to protect myself. As men, we are bombarded with ‘toughen up’, etc. from a young age, that learned behaviour with men means we get so far away from that delicateness, we don’t have any idea it is who we are as well. As I write, I can feel how my unresolved hurts are the mortar in the wall, as I become aware of these hurts, and let them go, the wall falls apart brick by brick, there is still work to be done, but at least the light is getting through both ways now. Thanks Cherise, a simple account of the truth.
I like this comment about hurts being the mortar for the brick wall. I can completely relate to this as well. Sometimes though, I wonder if I pick and choose the hurts I hold to create walls for keeping people out in certain situations, thinking that it is only for that place, choosing to not see that actually the wall carries with me everywhere ~ that I cannot just keep one set of people out with out excluding the whole of everybody.
I have come to learn that I cannot (ever!) let someone in and not another, it is an impossible feeling in my body as I am either shut off to everyone or open to all. It’s a fact that my body just knows.
It’s devastating but also a very harmful illness in my body when I shut people out and my body suffers considerably. What I am also learning is that its just a choice ~ and no matter what my reasoning is it always hurts me more to choose protection over being seen, be that in all of my absolute glory or in the absolute power and grace of my vulnerability.
Thank you for sharing Mark, I can feel there is a great key in allowing ourselves to feel the specific details of the hurt that may be arising so that we can feel it for what it is and not continue to use it as mortar. Asking ourselves to drop the brick wall doesn’t work, but asking ourselves why it is we think we need to protect ourselves in the first place is invaluable as we can express what is there and something that we may have held for a lifetime can dissipate before our very eyes.
Absolutely Cheriseholt healing and nominating the core hurts will allow us to stand taller and see beyond the brick wall to the golden potential we are choosing to block out.
“who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall, the reverse of delicate, when you’re a person with great sensitivity, and not the emotional kind, deep within?” I know this very well Cherise, and was living like a brick wall for many years but wasn’t aware of it. And it was all in an effort to protect myself against the world, or so I thought. Thankfully now, since also having several amazing Esoteric Breast Massage treatments from Universal Medicine practitioners, I have been able to feel how beautifully delicate and tender my body is, and as a result have been able to break down my brick wall (most of it anyway – there are still a few random bricks in the way!). I know now that I no longer need this layer of protection -all I need is a deep connection to who I truly am. And that is enough.
I use to work hard as a gardener and would discover scratches or bruises on my arms or legs and not know how they got there. I was so far away from my connection to myself and my body.I worked like a man and lived that way, I was very hard. I now have an awareness of my almost every move. I can feel a tenderness in the touching of the keypad, or how I speak with my voice. I never thought possible that I would connect to myself as a woman, but I have embraced me, who is an amazing, delicate woman that needs a nurturing bath, or lovely scented oils and lotions. I bring this tender, delicate woman with me now where ever I go, and that’s thanks to what Woman in Livingness and Natalie Benhayon has presented and has shown me that as a woman I am all that, an amazing delicate and tender woman and not forgetting amazing!
Hi Natalie, It’s amazing how we have championed women to be exactly as you describe your former self. Tough and man like, yet this is an equally false picture of men… who are naturally tender and sweet as women. Can you imagine if we had lived with the reverse trend where men where honoured to be more like women rather than women to be more like men? What would society have looked like then?
Being accepting of our own delicateness is one of the most precious gifts we can allow ourselves in a world that continually demands that we toughen up and override our feelings.
It is a very powerful gift too ~ there is so much power in reading a situation and being open to receiving all that is there to see. What an illusion it is to think that being tough is powerful when it is actually full of the energy of avoidance, denial or giving up. This isn’t powerful at all, vulnerability, sensitivity and awareness is our true strength in life and is something we can embrace as natural and normal more and more.
I love this Cherise ; “… there is so much power in reading a situation and being open to receiving all that is there to see.” And when we truly get the ‘reading’ and act on it, what a true gift this is and the more we do this, the more this also becomes just ‘normal’. Awesome.
Yes and I just got that with regards to exercising too. I shared a little story on a blog about tenderness, I might just share it here too as I feel it wants to be expressed on this blog as well.
For the past year or so I have been working out with a personal trainer and have been aware to some extent of listening to my body when exercising and feeling what feels true to the body and where the mind wants to push. Mostly I have gotten a good handle on this and it feels great listening and adjusting. However, the one thing I always enjoyed and have not ‘given up’ was our little boxing exercises, myself with gloves and my trainer with paddles. It wasn’t a boxing match, it was arm exercises and I loved them, they always made me laugh too. I had pondered over the months if that was truly loving yet did not let go of it. Then, a few weeks ago, we trained outside and did the boxing for 15 minutes. At the end of it, as I stood there taking the gloves off – I saw a little tiny baby bird lying in the grass next to me, dead; it had fallen out of the nest high up in the tree. As I saw it I immediately knew it was telling me that by exercising in this way, I was ‘killing’ the delicateness within me. I shared this ‘reading’ with my trainer, and since then we now have dropped the boxing and exchanged this part with something much more gentle yet equally as effective, and funnily, I don’t miss it at all.
Kehinde2012 a beautiful summation of the myth we as men and women have fallen into living against our natural ways. We have been shown a ‘new awareness’ that debunks our old survival techniques and reveals our natural power … yes a blessing to humanity!
I am learning that it is my innate delicateness that is my true power and that i can express myself from this without needing my body to go into protection or hardness.
Yesterday I went for my lunchtime walk. I saw a lady walking with her grandson, a gorgeous little boy of about 3 years of age. He was at that stage when little boys and little girls are unashamedly delicate, and most adults are willing to see them that way. What struck me very keenly was that grandma was walking at a pace that he had to almost run to keep up. He stumbled a couple of times but she just kept going at the same pace. I had the immediate sense that she was not being callous…just so lost in her own world that she was completely unaware of his struggle. He was not complaining or crying, just doing his best to keep up.
What a moment that was and what a reflection of the injury that we all bear in this life – from such a little age we learn to toughen up and just keep pushing through and on to keep up with the demands. Slowly, we turn into grandma, a woman who is innately tender and very delicate, but has lost touch with it to such an extent that she is no longer aware of herself or the the little boy whose hand she is holding.
Thus the problem is perpetuated generation to generation.
hose people in Cherise’s blog who told the little girl to get over it are not evil or terrible…but they have lost themselves, a long time ago, and not taken the care to find themselves again. That is the evil that keeps it all going.
Great sharing Rachel, one of us makes a choice to harden up but the truth is we all equally have the same choice at any moment. To honour ourselves or dishonour and push through. What if it were so that we all knew our equality and chose the awareness and wisdom we innately hold forever in our own bodies? what if we didn’t override this? then what a different view and learning of the world we would be seeing.
So often how tough we are, how resilient we are and how we can withstand trauma is heroically championed. The power in appreciating our delicateness and preciousness, the strength in our tenderness goes far beyond any of the afore mentioned.
We are re-writing history! Power is sensitivity and delicateness, this is a fact as felt and lived in my own body. This is not the normal definition of power and yet it is stronger and withstanding of anything that you could ever throw my way, I could have never said this about my previous wall of protection. It was an armour that continually got chipped and scarred and was breaking down by the exhaustion and trauma that it took to hold it up there!
So beautiful Shirley-Ann, my power is also in my love and my ability to hold others in their own ‘stuff’ or wherever they are at in their relationship with themselves and then all other things. My power is in my grace, ease and sensitivity as nothing easily gets by me when I return to my body, my power and allow myself to feel. There is a new power in town! and it is as normal and simple as breathing all of me!
Beautiful Cherise and such a precious sharing thank you. Simply looking feminine is vastly different to living our innate delicacy and tenderness and this can be felt and is inspiring for us all.
Well said Tricia – “Simply looking feminine is vastly different to living our innate delicacy and tenderness..” It’s true that it’s about a feeling rather than just the surface looks.
Cherise, your words: “my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood’ – what I got and enjoyed from this line was that the gorgeousness and beauty of a woman’s womanliness is in fact her own delicateness. Womanliness is Delicateness.
Thank you for your beautiful blog, Cherise. So many pearls of true wisdom you offered here! It has been difficult for me too, as it has been for many other women I know, to allow myself to be truly delicate and fragile. It is like living with an immense wall which separates me from myself, the true me, and hence from others. It is painful and not honouring of who we truly are. Although I still find difficult at times to let people see me fragile and raw, I have been surrendering more and more to what is simply there to feel without hiding it. It is so liberating and so confirming to connect to my delicateness and the preciousness found in it: I feel my chest expanding, tensions melting away and the beauty of being who I am with no veils, filters or pretences. And, the most beautiful thing is that this allows others to feel that they can be delicate too. No barriers, no walls.
Thank you Cherise. I am only just beginning to feel for myself the power within delicateness and how gorgeous this is.
Being a women with my natural strength, power and innate delicateness is what I have been working on for last few years. Thanks to the “support of Universal Medicine practitioners and in particular the Esoteric Breast Massage modality,” I too am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough exterior which I was walking around with for many years. My true nature is to be gentle, tender and connect to my delicateness. I am truly working on deepening my connection to this awareness.
In the moments I am aware of my fingertips and the quality with which I am using them, I know I am open to feeling my delicateness and the true grace with which we all can be in life. It is a feeling of real strength.
I have always considered delicacy as a weakness. I was proud of my hardness, more like the boys. That was cool. Imagine how far I was from my true self. And then to know that boys/men have an innate sensitivity too. What a turned up world we live in with all this hardship championed by the society. I am connected everyday to my delicacy and with that I see and feel the layers of hardness in my body. And I can feel how quickly they dissolve just by me choosing for delicate touch and movements.
Being a delicate woman hasn’t come easy to me and is still a work in progress. But by being aware of how amazing it feels when I do treat my body in a loving and delicate way, things around me flow beautifully and my body doesn’t get depleted and filled with aches and pains. When I connect to my body and be delicate with it I can easily feel when I begin to harden and can now stop and bring myself back to being tender and delicate. I’m always refining this way and taking it deeper. Living this way creates the space for my body to feel connected to in all my choices.
I love your blog Cherise. Delicateness should be cherished:) rather than being fought at. I can imagine the ‘following’ the world’s demands, reactions, because I’ve only recently found out that I’ve actually never allowed the Love from Women really in. That is a bitter pil to start feeling, to swollow. Women are very dear to me, yet I’ve chosen – out of my own hurts – to not feel their Love. I’ve been focussing on the what is not, rather than confirming and appreciating the warmth and care that is within every women, waiting to be connected to. That Love is very delicate, lovely. Smooth. And as I (and many men) miss the connection to that same quality that we have within ourselves, we choose control. Either to ‘own’ it or to belittle it. It is crazy and doesn’t support anyone, but this is how many men choose to behave. Thank you Cherise for a beautiful piece of writing. I’d love to read more.
Thank you, Floris, for so sweetly sharing how men avoid receiving and expressing love for women and in so doing deny themselves and all of us the tenderness we all are. A shake up and an inspiration.
Reblogged this on florisvanderschot's Blog and commented:
Over hoe ‘delicate’ vrouwen zijn, allemaal – ondanks dat de wereld ons anders heeft doen geloven.
This was deeply touching Cherise. I loved this line “feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” Having carried so much hardness all my life, and oscillating between allowing myself to feel the delicateness, and returning to hardness… I can feel the effort and struggle in being hard, and that allowing the delicateness is like a beautiful surrendering, a letting go and allowing what is so naturally and exquisitely within us to be.
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” Beautiful Cherise, it is an innate quality we can bring out as it just feels so good to to express from that delicateness in my every move, word and thought.
I am just starting to make friend with my innate delicateness. Sometimes it feels super scary to let myself be so delicate because this is a new way of being for me. I am use to hardening to get by, it is my go to. However, as I start to open up to delicateness more and more I can feel the strength and the power that comes from it, in a completely different way to what I might of ever imagined. Slowly, I am beginning to turn inwards to my delicateness as my new way of being, rather than reverting back to the hardness. There is such beauty in delicateness, a loveliness where I feel precious and whole. I know that this is where my true strength lies. Thank you for the lovely reminder Cherise by reading your blog this morning.
Love this. Making friends with my innate delicateness. Now that is a friendship worth working on. Thank you, Donna.
Thank –you Cherise, gone are the days of when I saw my own preciousness as being a weakness. I now know that’s being a delicate woman is my true strength- as I do every other woman, this also applies to men too, and what an awesome team we become !
Appreciating the delicacy within us all is a doorway to finding the true strength in connection that allows us to live within the potential of who we truly are.
Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as weaknesses because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. And I know that being a delicate woman is my true strength. We can ‘look’ feminine but actually feeling this and living tenderness and delicateness has such a different feeling to it, To feel that from another is the most amazing reflection and gift you could receive. So beautiful and inspiring what you share with us Cherise- thank you.
I love this point “who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall” for I can relate to this very closely, I have lived part of my life as a brick wall and what I know is how disconnected I was from how I was feeling because if I was just to stop and feel myself for a moment then there is no way I would want to live with so much hardness and protection out in the world
Oliver, I have felt like a brick wall for so long, living in contraction and protection. This wall is beginning to melt and I am finding exquisiteness in feeling my delicacy and fragility. I cannot choose the old way anymore it hurts my body too much.
This blog is a great way to discuss and celebrate how we are as women – and how we choose to live in a way that honours how we really feel.
Cherise I agree, we even use the insult “don’t be such a girl” when someone is not tough enough. It is as if we really really want to forget the delicateness women/girls bring to the point we use the term above.
This is so true tonisteenson. And what a ghastly reminder of how we denigrate women and the true qualities of our femaleness from an early age. We have created and invested in a society where this type of language is accepted and “normalised”. It feels like it is through articles like these that we can stand up and say it is no longer okay not to honour ourselves as women and these qualities we hold.
A brilliant and sobering point made here. How do we re-establish treasuring the innate qualities of women when our language has so much denigration normalised within it? Go, Cherise and all, for sharing your understanding of the power and unifying nature of delicacy.
This is such a great point Matilda, thank you, I have noticed over the years how often I would talk myself down , undermine myself and once I realised I was doing that I heard the same from so many other women. Very few women stay being the delicate powerful women they naturally are. I am a health practitioner working in a complementary healing clinic and I have the great privilege of working with a few young women who do. I am continually inspired as I see how other men and women melt and let their guards down around these women. I watch their bodies relax and they naturally become more open to others and their healing starts as soon as they talk to or see these women. Now that is true power, the power to inspire and let another come back to feeling their natural delicateness.
The melting factor…the power of delicacy. Happening simply when we let our naturalness (which is delicacy) be part of our everyday living and expression. Beautifully said, Kate.
It is very true what you have shared here Cherise. The more I honour the qualities that I emanate naturally – such as delicateness (and for me lately it has felt like grace) – the more I feel the depth of how amazingly beautiful I am and when I share this with another, I see it within them too. It is a commitment and making the constant choice to honour myself in each movement that I make,
I can see that I do this in each movement that I make – how I close the draws in the kitchen – delicately or roughly – or the way I open and close the car door – how my voice is…there are so many reminders throughout the day…opportunities to be physically delicate that represents the way that I feel in the inside.
Delicateness is a power within us all that we need to become familiar with again. By breaking down the hardness that is in our bodies the delicateness can gradually be felt. I feel the Women’s Movement took us further away from this innate quality as it promoted that we were equal and capable of doing what ever men did. How can this be so when men are naturally stronger then women. Thank you Cherise for sharing the naturalness of delicateness and how this is a strength and not a weakness.
That is true Anne while I was not an active member of any women’s movement as I felt they were all too extreme for me, being strong and to be able to do what a man could do was a familiar thing for me and most people I knew were in one way or another doing the same. I chose jobs that were male orientated such as bus driving or working in the computer industry ( in the 80’s.) I felt I had to compete and strive to better than them as a way of proving that women could do the job too and the only way I could do this was to harden and loose the delicateness that was so naturally there.
‘Delicateness is a power within us all that we need to become familiar with again’ – this comment of Anne’s – it is ironically the complete opposite to how so many of us were raised. I was “too sensitive” as a child – I thought I had something wrong with me for wanting to express this delicateness that was me – then as a teenager I overcompensated this by becoming a very rebellious sexy tomboy – then my twenties an activist and advocate for fighting for the rights of any exposed to injustice – especially towards women – now finally – permission to be delicate again! And to realize – owning my delicate beauty has greater power than any doing. Permission to be, granted by myself. It is so confirming.
Absolutely annbroadbent58, the Women’s Movement took women into hardness, competition with men and attempting to prove through achievements that we were just as good as men, that we are equal. None of this has done any good for women or men – women are not being themselves and men are confused by this. It is in our essence that we are equal. As human beings we are equal and not in what we can do.
“Who honestly does want to be out there in the world feeling like a brick wall…”?
Cherise your question jumped off the page to me and I said OUCH! While I’m constantly deepening my connection with my own delicate and tender self I can appreciate the immense difference in the regard I know have for others and myself. Toughening up cases heart attach.
The shame is that many of us have been living our lives “feeling like a brick wall” for so long that we begin to accept this way of being as real, believing it is who we are. I came to the realisation that this was not a true way for me to live through the teachings of Universal Medicine and I have begun the journey to commit to shedding the layers of protection that I have placed upon myself allowing the feelings of tenderness and gentleness to come through. Being hard on myself only creates more feelings of hardness and that is counter productive to who I truly am, a precious, tender woman yet un-realised but solidly working on it, day by day.
I adore every woman and man on this Earth who allows her- and himself to be delicate. It’s such a support to have people in the world who live in delicateness. Thank you Cherise.
I love how you describe this Cherise: “I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments. For example, the way I gently touch my own skin feeling its texture, how I type on the computer, the way I walk, move, sit, or carry my shopping home. The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.”
I am onto this as well, and this checking in with myself in my daily actions really helps me to identify where I can still be more connected to truly feel this delicateness within myself.
I also grew up getting the message that delicate equalled weakness and did my best to cover this up. I did this so well that I believed I was the opposite! What I feel when I allow myself to feel delicate is a tenderness and softening of my body. I can feel the need to protected and ready for anything drop away. I can also feel the hardness towards myself and need to get it right leave too. As Cherise has said, not being delicate takes a lot of energy.
Very true Fiona. In our delicateness we are so much more able to deal with whatever needs to be dealt with. The moment we go hard or protected we miss out on receiving everything there is that will support us with whatever is needed next.
Exactly and that is a great marker for us, to return to that gorgeous delicateness within.
Covering up our natural delicateness so well that ‘I believed I was the opposite’. I so get this, Fiona, and am often rather surprised by the quality of sweetness I am, as I allow it to emerge. Also know to my core that this delicacy is stronger than any fortress wall (hardness) ever built.
Thank you Fiona and Cherise, this is a gift for all women , I have found it exhausting holding that hard protective guard up. Over the last few years as I have reconnected to being more gentle, then more tender then more delicate – I am more naturally me, so I am not fighting myself. Before I was using so much energy just to keep that guard up. When I stay naturally delicate with out a guard I am open to people , I have way more energy and I can often feel others around me melt as their guard slowly dissolves too.
There is much strength in being delicate, and in fact in my experience it is the greatest strength a woman has for it melts everyone you come in to contact with. So often each of us are hard on ourselves in one way or another and a lot of the time without even being aware of this. This is the case for women and for men, young or old. When I allow my delicateness to be there I find I cope a hundred times better with the daily stresses of life, if I don’t it seems those stresses compound and beat me up.
Yes Terrianne – I can totally confirm your sharing here. When I am truly connected to that delicateness, things flow beautifully within and around me as well as others. The moment I drop it everything becomes a little harder, harsher and more effort is needed to deal with things.
Terri-Anne you make a really good point that when we are just being our delicate natural selves it melts the other person. I have experienced this too and it is such a beautiful thing to observe and then the connection you get to have with the other person is so open and true. Deliciate is such an empowering way forward for woman – and we don’t even need to go anywhere to find it – just connect to the quality that we all hold within.
‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’ Yes Cherise, the more I deepen my appreciation of myself and the delicacy I hold, the more I can feel the hardness that I have been protecting myself with.
I too have felt this hardness in my body which feels like a real constriction, heaviness and tighting in the body where delicateness feels light as a feather and allows the body to flow easier. This to me is a more natural way to be as women.
I am also experincing that delicacy is more natural to me as woman than any inch of hardness. Hardness was my middle name for many years. I started to open up, become more gentle with myself and recently I started to deepen that by allowing the delicacy in me. Just integrate it in my movements, my touch. Slowly I am realizing it is already in me. It is just the engrained patterns of hardness that are letting go.
As a man I have felt that too Jenny, that I am scratching the surface of the depth of delicateness that I am. There is so much more to me than I think.
If in essence men and women are the same then take away the facade and that are we left with, a tender, delicate, sweet, delicate being, powerful beyond measure because we not only ARE love, we come from love and this is what we are scratching the surface of, coming back to something that we miss with all our heart.
– and this hardness that I know I have lived with for many years – more and more feels foreign and uncomfortable as I know myself as truly precious and delicate.
The prevailing myth was that women are weak and men strong, we know to be false. In the western world women, in their attempts to be equal and as strong as men, threw out the baby with the bath water. Now, with new awareness, baby back in arms, women are re-connecting with innate qualities once associated with weakness and now reclaimed as strengths: preciousness, sensitivity, tenderness, gentleness, sweetness. Myths for men have also been exposed. It’s as much a strength for men to be tender, gentle and loving as it is for women. What a blessing for humanity. Thank you Universal Medicine for sharing this wisdom and bringing forth a new awareness.
“Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. ”
It is such a beautiful unfolding process discovering our true innate qualities as a woman. Preciousness is definitely not a weakness anymore, but a strength for myself also.
I saw a situation the other day in the park that left me wondering and reflecting: a little boy crying and his dad shouting to him: “don´t be such a girl”…It is sad, and disturbing but it also tells me how part of the world is still, and what ideals are we still passing on to our children. That is why it is soo vital that we claim our delicateness, as women, as men, everybody. The world needs it so much. I am enjoying more and more the feeling of my clothes in my skin and the tender feelings I have for myself and other people. And I can relate to what you say: “What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.”
We do see a lot of this hardness around us as it has been the ‘normal’ for a very long time. It’s invaluable to bring our understanding to the fact that this was once all that we knew and our appreciation to the fact that we now know so differently. There is much to observe in the world, to discern for ourselves and to make choices that are from a truth and an honouring of what feels right for us. I like the simplicity of this.
What this taught me is that I don´t need to react, instead if I accept that he has some very harming beliefs, I can look at my own harming beliefs, that are very different to his, but still harming, to start to be aware and undo them and come back to the delicate woman that I am underneath all that, as you say in your blog. Not add more hardness by reacting to other people´s hardness.
A beautiful tribute to the exquisite strength of delicacy and how our expression of that, in the way we live, supports everyone. Thank you.
It was so lovely to read this blog after returning home from a ‘hard day’s work’ on a late shift, because it gave me a reminder to reflect on my sensitivity – had I been tender all day or did I harden with the relentless pace of the work? It also reminds me to feel my delicateness and to lovingly and tenderly take care of my body as I put myself to bed.
Beautiful Carmel, strength in sensitivity and then gorgeously actioned into practise 🙂
I always thought that in my generation (I am 41) that I had to stand up for women’s rights, make a stand against men, be like them, tough, direct, hard. These were the unspoken behaviours I picked up during teenage years and also early years of working. What that created in me was the need to match where men were at, thus creating a real competitive way with men, when in fact it is the absolute opposite that I have not understood what is true. That it is indeed being delicate that is my true strength as a women. That it is in me being able to be in my tenderness, speaking this way, moving this way, talking in this way. It is the quality in which I am with me that actually is very much a strength.
This is pretty huge to become aware of Raegan, thank you for sharing your experience of the belief system that you can now see was around you and there to take on. I love what you share in that your true quality is actually what is your strength, this blows all of the women’s movements and ambitions of being hard and competing with men and other women out of the water once and for all. It’s an illusion that we don’t to invest in any more.
Well said Cherise… As a woman, who really does want to be hard, tough and hold up a brick wall… it’s an extraordinary point that your making. If we’re to be super honest, we would want to be our precious, delicate self but somewhere along the lines of our life we have been hurt and clearly thought it to be unsafe to be so open, and naturally loving, delicate etc. I am working now on coming back to that quality that I had as a child and it’s definitely a process, but the further I get with it the more beautiful it is, and like you say, it’s actually a strength and not a weakness at all.
It really is a process Ariel, and the more we can embrace this the more we allow ourselves to expand who we are and let go of the next layers of barriers that we have been carrying around. Sometimes we may not even realise we have a layer of protection up until we feel what it is like to have it dropped away, this is something that the healing sessions with Universal Practitioners supports me to feel and be more aware of.
Thank you Cherise, it is lovely to read the way you have reconnected to your delicateness as a woman and to know that there is a real strength in that. This is the same for men as the more we embrace our tenderness and allow to feel and honour how dedicate we are in our bodies the more we can let go of the hardness, protection and old beliefs we have carried for ages. Unfortunately the world does not supports us to be that way (women and men) but the level of joy and harmony in our lives and our relationships with others is worth giving it ago.
I couldn’t agree more Francisco, for what is there to lose?! When we are our naturally delicate selves no matter who we are we hold ourselves in a love that has no limits and no end and are able to bring ourselves to any situation we encounter. This speaks of a true freedom and a joy and comes with giving ourselves the permission to not worry about anything else but being true to ourselves and therefore live from the knowing of who we are and expand the joy that life can be.
There were times growing up that I would work and play along side my brothers just to feel close to someone. This meant for me to be noticed by them and admired by them and my parents I would lift heavy buckets, jump on the back of the tractor, lift rocks from the paddocks, get dirty in the cattle yards, and generally do anything where I felt they would see me as an equal. I don’t think there is anything wrong with this as I was often having fun but the fact that I felt I had to harden up and not show my sweet delicateness to be accepted by them left me feeling sad. I continued living in this hard way into my adult years and this left me even more sad. My brothers or parents never asked me to harden up, I just chose it as the way to be seen by them. Through this I lost the connection with my own sweet beauty, and it has taken working with the amazing Universal Medicine practitioners to feel this hardness and return back to the gorgeous, sweet, delicate woman I am. No different from the precious little girl I remember once swinging around deliciously in my pretty dress, just as sweet as the bumble bees and flowers around me.
The strength comes in knowing who you are. I love what I feel Cherise when I read your words, and that is a beautiful, woman strong in her delicateness and sensitivity that knows this from her body, so she doesn’t have any doubt of who she is. I therefore feel this in myself also. Thank you.
Thank you Cherise. On re-reading this blog I am appreciating how much more I am allowing myself to acknowledge and feel the deep sensitivity and delicateness I am. There are still some bricks of hardness and protection that I am holding onto but I know how have a relationship with the delicateness I am thanks to the support of the Esoteric Healing modalities and presentations of Esoteric Women’s Health.
Yes Cherise, I can say exactly the same when you expressed this:”What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” It is so beautiful to truly feel this and allowing this feeling in too, and then knowing that we can be this all of the time, it is just a choice and a continuous awareness around how we are being and feeling in any given moment.
I have often felt the delicateness of women and a sense of my own and that this quality is innate although so often it is not enjoyed- thanks Cherise for a blog about delicateness to assist in appreciating what is already there and available.
I’m enjoying getting back in touch with my innate delicateness, something I had pushed down through not appreciating its power and the great support it can bring for others. Natalie Benhayon has been and is a great role model for me in honouring sensitivity and delicateness in their true senses.
‘Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness’ This hit me as a STOP moment, as I still feel I have a view of what precious means and yes I have lumped it in with being a bit special, needing attention and it takes time to treat yourself as precious. Obviously I still have a pocket of resistance to my preciousness and fundamentally I think this could be at the bottom of lack of valuing myself. Thanks for the session I will take that with me in my day!
“As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.” I melted when I read this sentence Cherish, and I related so much to what you have expressed. In fact, I am going to read it again because it is so beautiful and so powerful. Thank you.
WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE? This is such a great question to ask, and as I started to read the blog I realised how illogical it is to not want to feel this natural part of being a woman. However, it is something that I have chosen to do for most of my life, confusing delicate with being weak. Somehow, I resolved that squashing this part of me would keep me safe, and would leave me almost untouchable … this was not true. Re-discovering my delicate self, right down to my fingertips, has been a delight.
Interesting how the phrase ‘try your hardest’ gets used and that’s often exactly how we do it – become hard whilst trying!
I can truly relate to what you are sharing ‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’
This is beautiful Cherise sharing your delicateness and tenderness as your strength is such an important message. The hardness and pushing through as a way of getting by and strength is not true and working in our bodies and it is the time now to accept this and live knowing there is another way. Are delicateness and fragility is our strength love and power from within and feels beautiful honouring and a real joy inside to live and honour this.Thank you
It was so beautiful being at a course recently, where I met many delicate and tender women. Their lightness of being and fragility blew me away and the power that lay underneath was real and tangible. I realise, that for me, by meeting these amazing women was like looking in the mirror as they were reflecting back to me my own light, tender and fragile qualities. I was able to go to a deeper level of self-appreciation by feeling the amazingness in them.
Although I felt I had to be tough and hard as a kid I feel I did not have the pressure boys had/have. I can understand better now how difficult it must be for boys or/and men to feel and allow to express their delicateness and tenderness. And how absolutely beautiful it is when they do.
That is true Ingrid, and what a great point.. I know that I have hardened myself in my own ways but I never went into the hardness that I see most men going into as they grow and If am to imagine that they are exactly the same sensitive and delicate as we are as women then gosh, that must really hurt to have to change that way.
Since I allow myself to be more tender and sensitive, I am able to appreciate and see it in others and feel the tenderness reflecting back. It is easy to fall into the toughness and hardness of the world as it is all around us. And there are those moments when people care about one another when faced with trauma or tragedy which often brings us closer without the need of an outcome, hence allows an expression of tenderness in the human connection, that’s what counts.
Yes I have seen it and felt it myself when someone is very fragile in there trauma or hurt and another person brings out their own natural, yet strong sense of fragility and sensitivity towards this person supporting them without any hint of need or imposition but to meet the person fully in love and connection. I have seen this to bring a calm and lightness to the emotion of the situation.
This is gorgeous Elizabeth, thank you.
There are times when I definitely do not feel delicate with my body, and other times when I do. This I have come to realise is very interlinked with my menstrual and ovarian cycles as where I am in my cycle seems to also contribute to how I feel about myself, which I have discovered effects how I care for my body.
Cherise what a beautiful reminder to accept my delicateness in this world and to re-learn to live in a way that honours that within myself and another. We really are so very very precious. Thank you.
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” – Ditto Cherise, I know I have barely scratched the surface of just how delicate I am.
I need to read this everyday, Cherise to be reminded of my delicateness in everything that I do. It is so easy to go into hardness when we are rushing and I can feel how this hurts my body. Thank you.
Thank you for the timely reminder Anne, to read this blog often as I also have noticed that at times in the ‘rush of the day’ that I of course allow, I have forgotten to stay in touch with the gentle tender being that I a am. And when I remember and take a gentle breath and reconnect to my self, it feels so good to just drop back into this tender delicateness and restart from there.
Anne I realise I also need to read this everyday as it has already made me stop and ponder what underlies this lack of awareness of feeling my delicateness.
I agree Anne, when we go into rushing we automatically harden our bodies. I also find if I complete my tasks on auto pilot my body tenses up. It is like the body senses my mind is not with it in the task the body is completing and thus it goes into tension in case there is a threat of some sort coming up. Allowing my mind and body to be together as I go about my day really supports me to feel more delicate and aware of how my body is moving and feeling.
I have been finding it interesting to feel the difference between my left and my right sides, especially my hands and forearms and the way I use them. On one particular day I wasn’t able to use my right hand due to a burn and had no choice but to feel how delicately my left arm wanted to and needed to perform tasks, from lifting things to brushing my teeth! It was so obvious the way that I have been using my right side in a drive or rush and the tension that this has me in; so I am working more on allowing a balance between the two.
Cherise I love this ‘I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moment’
It’s in all the little details for me. The way I type right now is so very delicate and I can feel such a strength in this expression.
Cherise thank you for bringing your awareness into the world. Blogs like this are extremely confirming and much needed.
So many practical ways to remind ourselves, there must be hundreds of things I physically touch in a day, all opportunities to feel a connection with my gentleness
“Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. ” When we spend that time building our brick wall of protection, which is no protection at all in truth, whether it is a man or a women, we shut out so much of the world. When the wall comes down and we are in our truth and glory we are so much more aware, in the world and in our power.
Yes Shirley – me too, and I feel this delicateness more and more now, allowing it to become a strength.
‘Being a delicate woman is my true strength’, I can feel how true this is, I have been connecting more and more to my delicateness and this feels gorgeous and the truth of who I am, after so many years of living the complete opposite to this, it is beautiful to be returning to live in this most natural, harmonious way.
What a beautiful and truthful blog Cherise- “being a delicate woman is my true strength”
Yes, I am now finding the more I connect to my delicateness, tenderness, preciousness and sacredness as a woman deep within I feel awesome, empowered and strong as a woman
More and more I feel my delicateness and the strength of it is clear to me. This is a huge shift from feeling weak and thinking I had to harden to keep myself safe.
‘Being a delicate woman is my true strength’ – these words are a gift for me this morning, thank you, Cherise.
Learning to allow myself to express as my natural tender self has been something I have found difficult due to having built up such huge walls of protection in an effort to not get hurt. I travelled very far from my true nature and I am enjoying getting to know myself truly and allow others to see that.
I love your honest sharing Vanessa, how you do feel like you travelled very far from your true nature but have enjoyed coming back. The great thing about our innate delicate and loving nature is that it is always there and always our nature no matter how far we may stray from it, there is a way back and we can commit to that whenever we choose.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.”
Cherise, this is so true. When I connect to my delicateness it feels like time stands still.
I can feel the power in my hands and feel what I leave behind is for others to feel as well. Sometimes I look at a bench or a rack of clothes that I have tidied up,and I find myself standing looking as I can feel so much more then the rack of tidy clothes or the bench. I feel the glow of the energy that I have re-imprinted the space with. The love that is left for others.
Women so struggle to admit to their fragility and vulnerability. As women we feel we have to be all things to all people and rarely figure in our own nurture, our lack of self worth being acute. Because of this it is easy go hard and be resentful of others and of life. However what you share here Denise is gorgeous because this is the true essence of every woman. I can literally feel the lightness and glow coming off the page! What is demonstrated by this blog is that to return to this utter yumminess is possible and not only this, it is possible to live from this quality every day. Yum.
I always felt that I needed to be tough when I hurt myself or got hurt, and to not express my pain. And I did not want to feel the pain. When I am hurting now I allow myself to cry if that is what my body feels to express. And I take a moment when I physically hurt myself to feel what happened and where I was when it happened, clearly not present in my body. Have I been too hard? contracted? being way ahead in the future with my mind and not present with what I was doing? To be delicate and tender I need to be present in my body to feel it. I feel strong when I am totally in and with my body.
Ingrid I used to cry if I lifted something heavy together with my partner at the time and I felt embarrassed that I responded to this activity in this way. I can now feel that I was pushing against my delicate ness and it hurt. Now I am careful with my choices and if I do hurt myself I definitly take the time to consider why.
It is beautiful when we connect to our delicateness. When I first came across the word it was considered to be something that makes you sound weak, but when I understood the true meaning off it and saw people living the true meaning, it completely changed my view. Delicateness is precious and powerful in its true sense, when we connect to the true sense of delicateness there is a deep sense of joy. I am still working on the delicateness with me, I do find myself sometimes getting hard or being in control takes over. It is still a work in progres.
It is great Cherise how you make the link between connection and awareness for this has been and is my experience also. As I connect more deeply to my essence and the quality that is there to express I am more sensitive and aware of energy and what is going on within and around me. As such, I realised that part of the reason why for years (lifetimes!) I worked very hard to stay hard and disconnected in my body because I didn’t want to be aware, I didn’t want to feel the choices I was making and their impact on me and those around me, essentially I didn’t want to feel my hurt and so my life became about avoiding, dulling, numbing myself that at any cost. And the cost was great – because I never felt truly rested, at ease, or connected to life or others – it was like there was a separation between me and the world and no matter how much or how well I ‘did’ it could never quell that emptiness.. so much struggle… When all along there was my essence, inner-heart, Soul and God within me just waiting for me to re-connect to it.. and what a glorious unfolding that is. Thank you for sharing yours.
Beautifully said, Sarah. The more I connect to that delicateness inside, the more I share that out in the world, and the more I am aware of that precious quality in everyone I meet.
Me too, janetwilliams06
‘…I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’ How beautiful it is Cherise to be talking about these qualities we have; sharing them with the world now. Let’s not underestimate the difference this makes and how inspiring it is for me and all women to connect with ourselves as delicate and precious.
Connecting to our delicacy and preciousness is not something we are generally encouraged to do when growing up. In fact the opposite is true as we are told to toughen up and be less sensitive. How all the more beautiful this blog is which supports us all to be aware of our innate qualities and connect to them as women and girls.
‘I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments’ This is so true Cherise. With every tender and delicate movement that I choose I know that it is building this quality within my body. For me it is still a work in progress but knowing that connecting to by tenderness and delicateness is a choice. Thank you for another inspiring blog.
Who cannot but melt at some level to feel a woman in her delicacy! “I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness”. Most definitely a powerful reflection for humanity Cherise.
I agree Rosanna, a great refelection for humanity. I can also identify with Cherise when she said:
“The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” When a woman (or man) is accepting of this delicateness, and can share that with another, there is no doubt that we are all innatley the same.
Cherise this is beautiful and there is a powerful line in there “I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer”. This is where choice comes in and this line resonated strongly with me. I do not want to protect and hide by beauty and tenderness from the world – I know how exquisite we are when we openly share ourselves with another and how gorgeous the exchange is when this true way is felt.
I totally agree Jo Swinton. No more brick walls for me either. All my relationships are changing as I come out of hiding and dismantle the protection. I used to want to be alone a lot but now I am finding my self rally wanting to be with people more and more.
Cherise, in sharing this you remind me again how delicate I truly am and even if I am much more tender now than years before there can be more deepened. So thank you for the reminder
I can say the same Kerstin – the tenderness and delicateness I can now feel within my self can still go way deeper.
Cherise, I was one of those girls who was “taught from an early age that being girly or delicate means that we’re just not strong or tough enough”. This together with the fact that I was a tomboy who preferred to play with boys rather than girls, and not just play with them but ‘lead the pack’, meant that I was always getting scratches or bruises and was told that “it will strengthen your immune system!” This developed a hardness in my body and it was not until I was 60 and met Serge Benhayon and was inspired to make different choices in life that I started to appreciate “just how delicate I truly am”. Like you “I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer”. Over the last twelve years I too have reached a point where “now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength”. This has been life changing for me as I deepen my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, which is my innate delicateness.
I am not sure where I learnt that being a girl wasn’t acceptable. I just remember feeling that it was unacceptable and so I began to act more like a boy. It wasn’t until my mid twenties that I began to question my rough and rubble ways and wonder if I was in fact feminine in any way. Meeting Serge Benhayon and Natalie Benhayon finally confirmed for me what I had been feeling for awhile and that was that being a woman had value and it was necessary to feel like a woman and from this express as a woman. Knowing and exploring this has been extremely healing for me and I am enjoying becoming more and more of the woman I naturally am.
I remember being very ‘girly’ as a young girl and saw this as a weakness as I was treated different to my brother. He seemed to be allowed to do things I wasn’t, because he was a boy, which made no sense to me at all. I ‘tried’ to be a tomboy but it just wasn’t me at all but I did see being a woman a weakness and went on to prove I was just as good as any man, particularly in work where I could use my mind and my sexuality to get me where I wanted to be. That all started to change in my early 40s when I met Serge Benhayon and Natalie Benhayon and the wall of protection I had built up started to crumble. It is still crumbling as I allow myself to feel my exquisite delicateness and preciousness, and get used to living that in the world.
Sandra, thank you… again, this could have been my own story as well. I tried being a tomboy to be more accepted, whereas in truth I was such a girly little girl who adored to simply be in the sweetness of that girliness. Reading your comment brought back a deeper memory of this for me to feel. The past few years with the support of Universal Medicine have been incredibly healing enabling me to chip away at the protective wall, and this i continue to do to this day. When the delicateness that I am does shine through, when i do make this choice, it is the most exquisite gift to myself and to everybody else.
What I saw growing up was that being male came with perks! You didn’t have to do the dishes, women brought you what you asked for and you were the boss…you had the final word. As I looked out through my sweet and tender eyes, I didn’t much like what I saw about being a girl. And so began an attempt to prove I was just as good as a boy through my grades in school, and then when I became bored by that, being as naughty as any boy and then using my sexuality to get the attention of the boys. Now I can see why I felt the way I did as a teenager and adult…I’d buried the sweet and tender girl beneath a whole lot of behaviours that left me feeling empty and worthless. Thank God for Esoteric Women’s Health for helping me return to the real me.
Like many others I grew up seeing delicateness as weakness. In my family at a very young age I learnt life was not safe to be the sweet innocent child I was born to be so I quickly contracted and shut down inside my body and developed a bullet proof shell on the outside of my body and pretty much felt nothing as a way of protecting myself. It actually wasn’t even until I had been having sessions with Universal Medicine practitioners for some time I felt how little I actually felt at all. When I was in a session I could feel something but quickly shut it down again after the session and went out into the world. With the support of continual sessions with Universal Medicine practitioners I now feel everything and spend a lot more time truly connected and continually deepening my connection to the amazing strength of the sweet delicate woman I am and living in the power of being me.
And the kicker is that shutting down our delicateness makes us weak and open to being hurt because we don’t have ourselves as a base. It has been through coming back to my delicateness that I have been able to see the trickery in this belief and am now enjoying more freedom in being delicate again and expressing this in all that I do as often as possible.
Beautiful Margaret. That is amazing.
Margaret, your story could have been my own. Gorgeous sharing. thank you
Cherise delicateness is my true strength too – the hardness I can create as a false sense of strength and protection is an isolating cold place, and here I am weak and alone, but full of false bravado. Thankyou for your beautifully written blog on our true strength as women.
Yes Anne so true that the effort to maintain the false bravado of strength paradoxically leaves us feeling so weak and drained of energy.
And all the time there is our true strength just waiting for us to connect up.
Totally agree, Kathiefreedom, I am discovering more and more of my true strength as I drop more of that false bravado. There are many things I can do, and have in the past, but my body doesn’t want to anymore, there is a beautiful butterfly gradually emerging from that tough old chrysalis I used to live in.
Spot on, Anne. “…the hardness I can create as a false sense of strength and protection is an isolating cold place, and here I am weak and alone, but full of false bravado.”
I too know this ‘false sense of strength and protection’. So very well said Anne. It is indeed an isolating place, and is such an illusion, as I have also discovered that when I am coming from my true strength there is no trying or pushing but strong and deep feeling of connecting to my delicateness and knowing who I truly am. In this instance, the delicate strength simply emanates from me and my voice – this is my true expression.
Oh Anne what a lovely comment, and yes thank you Cherise for this is true our true strength is our delicateness and sensitivity. Totally the opposite of what the world tells you about strength. True strength is returning to humanity.
Thank you Anne, an awesome confirmation for me as well to read your words. My goodness how we’ve let ourselves be misled to think that trying to put up a hardness and shunning away the delicate, fragile strength that is truly there can get us by. When all along our greatest strength is within us and it is so so powerful if we let it express forth.
It’s great what your mentioning Anne about the false strength, even on my path of developing my true delicate strength, I am having to address my false strength where I make out like everything is all okay and that nothing can hurt me… the “I’m fine. all. of. the. time.” attitude, I have found difficult to let go of, seeing that as my protection.
It’s so true that the more I allow myself to feel my delicateness the more awareness I have of my day and how full it is – as opposed to shut down and dull. So wonderful to read about this as I find this blog further encourages me to take the space to allow my delicateness.
Yes I so relate to what you say here Karin, I find the same, that the more I truly feel into my delicateness and accept it the more more glowing I feel and my days become so much more bright and alive.
And in this delicateness I also feel super steady and solid. This delicateness is actually my rock. Far from the opposite misconceived notion that we need to be tough in order to be solid.
This was such a beautiful reminder Cherise, I know that I do feel an incredible delicateness within, but that does not always translate in my actions and behaviour. This feels like something I am still working on, to bring that fragility, vulnerability and delicateness in more of what I do and who I am. So it has been so wonderful to read this, very inspiring.
Such a beautiful reminder for me Raegan. Thank you. For me to bring “fragility, vulnerability and delicateness” to my every day living and relationships I feel will allow for myself and others to feel and see more of the real me.
Likewise, Elizabeth and Raegan. Even though I’m naturally a very delicate woman I have for a long time, kept this under wraps thinking that it will not cut it in today’s world. But what I’m learning now very starkly is that in holding back this delicateness and fragility i literally cut people out. I miss out and so do they. Reading these comments and this blog have been a gorgeous confirmation of the possibility of choosing very differently and not shunning away who I am, but staying open and delicate with everyone that I meet.
What you have shared here rings so true for me too Reagan. I too am working on allowing my own innate delicateness to shine with strength and true power it holds. Deeply inspiring indeed thank you.
‘Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’ So beautifully put Cherise.
Yes indeed. And allowing ourselves to feel this as woman is great.
I have been feeling my body recently at nights before bed to write down how different parts feel. To my amazement my body feels warm and expansive underneath anything that may be on top underneath is this feeling of expansion. My question recently to myself was why was I waiting for the end of the day to check in to that feeling, why was it not the first thing I did as I woke, why was it not in fact the focus of my day to breath and feel that which is within me?
Beautifully shared Jenny and this also applies to men too.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.”
Thanks Cherise these words made me look at delicateness in my life. I’m gentle with myself and learning to be more loving in my choices. But to stop and really feel how I had not been treating myself in a delicate way, not allowing myself to feel the preciousness of who I am. Feels like an eye opener.
Delicateness is indeed an innate quality. It is interesting how we feel we have to hide it even from ourselves.
‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’ I too feel this way Cherise and it has come as a surprise that I have dismissed and dishonored that aspect of myself which has always been there. I have begun to honor my delicateness and realise how beautiful it is. When I see it reflected by other women’s expression it confirms me in my own.
Every woman is innately delicate we need to recognize and honor this quality in ourselves and live moment to moment in a way that fosters this delicateness. For example type with a delicate tap and then we feel this same quality in our whole body.
Cherise I love how you have shared how you feel the power in your delicateness as a women. This has shown me how the word power in todays society is a vision of a women in a power suit depicted with hardness and a tough exterior. Your blog has shown me that true power comes from a deep power to step into our natural delicateness which I often feel. Thank you for sharing this.
I wore a hard exterior to attempt to protect myself from the world and the hurts I imagined where there to get me. I had no idea that I would be able to feel so delicate and tender, it is new and wonderful to feel. And yet I am aware there is a depth and more for me to feel, absolutely amazing.
Thank you Cherise for sharing this beautiful delicate blog and the insight it offers in the unfolding of a woman to her delicateness, as a man I too am learning to be in my delicateness through my hands which in the past I have injured all to easily and am now being brought to that awareness through my amazing body , if I even bump my hands now they bleed ,so I am learning to be delicate through my hands which is opening up a whole new world and way to live.
Beautiful Cherise. “Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness”. I too am having fun knocking down my protective tough exterior to feel the precious, delicate and tender woman I am and discovering the power that comes with appreciating that this is who I am, no walls to hide behind.
To recognise that delicateness is indeed a strength is empowering, as it is the complete opposite to what is displayed and suggested in society. The exquisite qualities of presence, stillness, love and sacredness that are all within a woman, can be squashed and dismissed if the accepted stereotype of what constitutes a woman to be powerful is taken on. This is where the Esoteric Womens forum and the modality of Esoteric Breast Massage supports the woman to return to the truest sense of herself. The healing to herself and the quality she then brings to others is most definitely transformational.
Here is a beautiful blog by a woman who knows her delicacy and her sensitivity to be her strength. Equally so I was reading the other day, a beautiful and sensitive blog by James Nicholson, who talked about his sensitivity as a true strength in himself as a man. It is definitely time the word sensitive had this powerful redefinition for us all. http://truthaboutsergebenhayon.com/2015/07/07/celebrating-our-strengths/
Jane, I agree, I’ve always known I was sensitive, and in the past, was called over sensitive at times, and I may well have been. I feel the over sensitivity came from a build up of not honouring my delicateness and tenderness so that little things did then affect me, and to the outside world, I may have appeared overly sensitive. But the more I allow myself to feel my delicateness, it’s gets much clearer as to what is and what isn’t love.
Only yesterday I felt another level of the true tenderness I have as a man. As you share Cherise, this is not a weakness in any way, but a deeper connection with myself and with everything around me. As I become more tender, the world around me becomes more truly alive and I wonder for just how long I have been forcing my way through life missing its – and my – true essence. Thank you for sharing your delicateness and supporting my tenderness as you do.
Feeling that my sensitivity is something to be denied I too have played the game of ‘hardening up’. What I’ve discovered as I’ve sent my message to the world that I’m ‘tough’ is that I’ve gone into such deep protection of my fragility (buying into it being wrong) that I’ve shut this exquisite part of myself down and the rest of the world out.
Bringing my attention to the detail in all I do is now allowing me to feel when and where I harden my body and remind myself that there is another way.
A way to be tender in this world as I support myself with what I know and feel to be true.
Thank you Cherise, a timely reminder indeed.
So, so precious Cherise.,,when we feel and connect to our delicateness we can feel it in others too and that changes everything in how we are with ourselves and everyone else.
Thank you Cherise for this timely sharing. Delicate, Fragile, Tender, Precious are all words that are being re-imprinted in my life. These words are coming up repeatedly in what I am reading, in conversations I am sharing in, in people I am interacting with. A true message to me with much meaning and symbology. My sense of what it means to be a woman, the beautiful delicate, fragile, tender and precious woman I am is only now just starting to make herself known. My deep appreciation to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine for encouraging our growing awareness and to Natalie Benhayon for modelling the essence of these words in her livingness.
The wall of protection that I had built around me so I would not been seen as deeply sensitive, delicate and deeply hurt, so I would fit and not be seen as ‘weak’ in was constructed with the tough ‘I can handle anything’ bricks and cemented with complete dishonesty with myself by championing how good I was at it. ‘I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments.’ – beautifully said and very profound Cherise. I also am finding this to be true and with this deepening awareness I can feel the true sense of the power we are within as we connect to the divine delicate essence that we all are as women.
The more I feel my delicateness the more I see that other people are just as delicate but they are not always able to show it so they often need to protect themselves behind a wall. Whether it’s a thin sheet or a thick brick wall it serves to keep other people out and keep the person feeling they are a separate individual. We often don’t realize that it takes so much effort to hold up this wall but it seems easier to do this than face the possibility of getting hurt again. But what if the hurt that we think we are protecting ourselves is only a ghost from the past that can only haunt us if we believe in it? What if by dropping the wall we actually allowed people in and could receive the love we so long for? Cherise, thank you for your blog which confirms to me that allowing one’s delicateness is not weakness but is in fact a true strength.
Sandra, I love your question about hurt being a ghost from the past that can only haunt us if we believe in it. Very powerful and true I feel, that we are the ones that give our hurts the power to keep us down. The other thing that comes to mind as I read your comment is how we close down our innate ability to feel everything around us as if it is something terrible, and yet, to feel and be sensitive is actually delightful too. Yes, we might feel the pain of our hurts but to not feel, ‘just in case’ is really quite tragic. The world around us is constantly ‘communicating’ with us and we miss it all if we build that brick wall before it.
What a revelation is was for me to read: ‘It is also a poison in our bodies to live less than who we truly are’. I had a real ‘stop’ moment as I had never considered my hardness, the protective shield I used to mask my delicateness and sensitivity as a poison to my body. Yet, when I ponder on how much I have abused my body with layers and layers of ‘poison’ I am now learning to recognise it, nominate it and discard it as I journey, ever so gently and tenderly, to sharing by delicateness and therefore my strength to all of humanity.
Every time I return to this awesome blog there is an inspirational moment to stop and feel my delicateness. Somehow this delicateness can get lost in my doingness. Old patterns which are constantly just waiting to jump back in. To look into the eyes of another living in their delicateness is very powerful, yet inspiring, gentle and warm, like an invitation to join them. This offers me a choice to feel that same innate delicateness in me too. Amazing blog Cherise thank you.
I love coming back to read your blog Cherise, I find reading it allows me to feel the delicateness in me which feels exquisite, ‘The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.’ I can really feel how powerful delicateness is and how I can deepen this quality within myself.
I find it interesting how much I agree with you Cherise, and I whilst I am far more accepting of my sensitivity now than in the past, there is still a little ringing in my ear that tells me not to be too sensitive. I still have a belief that I need to protect myself just a little bit. I don’t agree with this, because I know that protection protects nothing at all in fact, but it’s just one of those things I’m chipping away at, bit by bit.
It’s funny how we can deny ourselves of knowing certain things about ourselves just to protect and shield us, or so we think. To misinterpret a word and use it against ourselves. I did that with the words, sensitive, vulnerable and fragile, and didn’t want to be considered any one of those words as I saw them as a total weakness and avoided them for years. But as I have been building much more of a loving relationship with myself through my choices and how I am with myself, I made the discovery that I actually am truly happy to claim those truths for myself, as I feel the power and absolute strength within them. Holding back on my delicate, precious and sensitive nature, is holding back from not only myself but all others that I meet and allowing another to know their own selves in that way through my reflection.
“Being a delicate women is my true strength, and every other women’s as well.”-
When I honour my delicateness and sensitivity within it feels so beautiful and loving.
I can feel the preciousness and sacredness of who I am as a woman.
Now this feels power-full.
This is a beautiful example Jane, in which I can relate. Sometimes we have pictures of what we think abuse actually is and once we begin to uncover the depth of detail in which it can occur in our lives the more we need to stand up and say no to it. Our relationships with ourselves and all others need to be based on love only and the expansion of this; whilst calling out abuse as that which does never belong.
Sounds so good Cherise. Yes, there is way to much emphasis to ‘be a man’ in the world and a women is left feeling that delicateness has no place and that being a woman is not enough. No wonder a lot of young women are confused and self hate as they would feel that they can’t just be themselves whilst growing up and so leave delicateness and change to fit in.
Absolutely our true strength as women lies in our ability to embrace and live our delicateness. This has also been my experience too.
I had an experience today of how when I react from a hurt, I harden and then when I speak, it has such a devastating impact on the receivers, and on me – it smashes everyone. I then experienced feeling my delicateness after doing just a few minutes of Sacred Movement and then approached the people concerned and in the way I did it, from this delicate and vulnerable place, the whole situation diffused, just like that, in a nano second. It was an incredible confirmation of the power in allowing ourselves to be tender, delicate and vulnerable.
That’s a lovely example Sandra, of how when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable it allows other people the space to be who they are. Without any imposition there is not need to defend.
And Sandra, I’m realising that feeling vulnerable and fragile is something I walked away from, and am now returning to, and each time I do, particularly where an issue has arisen with another person, I see it is the only way. It is impossible to resolve something from hardness and protection.
The thing I find truly wonder-full, grace-full, beauty-full and absolutely magical about, connecting to the gentleness, tenderness and delicateness within is the fact that life begins to reflect those very qualities back, opening up ever expanding opportunities to go deeper and share more.
Opening up to our own true tenderness is a life-changing experience. How many lifetimes have we hardened up in order to hide our vulnerabilities? Our sensitivity is our strength, delicateness our true nature and we can choose to honour that.
I completely agree, and our sensitivity is actually our awareness ~ our number one life skill to hold and to nurture, not shy away from or ignore. Our sensitivity is our ability to read energy and read any situation for the whole encompassing picture that it presents and to observe life from a point in which we stand in stillness and in connection to ourselves, to God and to us all. This to me feels like an amazing strength and the complete opposite to what I may have used to believe ‘sensitivity’ to be. Our sensitivity is something to cherish and to claim in full as our strength.
We are all such exquisitely tender and delicate beings and the tragedy is that we don’t want to show it in case we get hurt. Feeling that we have to protect ourselves from each other is a horrible way to live.
Elizabeth, I agree. It is a tragedy that we all live so protected and don’t dare share and show ourselves from our tender delicate side. Yet every person in the world has these qualities.
It is also a poison in our bodies to live less than who we truly are. Fully open and full of love for ourselves and everyone else equally.
It is wonderful to connect to the strength in allowing ourselves to be delicate, and to really nominate how no-one gains from us living in protection and a lesser version of ourselves.
And counterproductive, Elizabeth. Because as we ‘protect’ ourselves from not being hurt we move further away from our natural delicateness and further into hardness. What is the kicker though is that being hard doesn’t actually protect us from being hurt and in fact it causes us more hurt because we lose connection with our delicateness and this is very painful for all of us. To lose our ability to be strong through delicateness is enormously hurtful.
This is very true, it’s devastating to feel in fact. When we know our true potential in all its grandness and limitless, to hide away or be fooled into thinking this needs protection in some way is painful and also detrimental to our health and wellbeing. To live less than our potential of full beauty, radiance and love is an illness and one that we don’t have to play ball with if we choose and continually choose to confirm who we really are and what purpose is behind living our truth.
Yes Robyn, this is worth repeating: ‘being hard… actually causes us more hurt because we lose connection with our delicateness and this is very painful for all of us’. We are all born delicate and sensitive and that doesn’t go away no matter how much we try to cover it up. And being out of touch with that essential nature takes us further away from what we are all looking for – our true selves.
This is indeed a real tragedy Elizabeth, ‘We are all such exquisitely tender and delicate beings and the tragedy is that we don’t want to show it in case we get hurt.’ I can see how delicate we all are and I can see this wall of protection that we build and it just doesn’t fit, I see sensitive, gentle men trying to look hard and tough, delicate young woman trying to be tomboys and play it tough, as I did and i know from my own experience that it doesn’t work, that it is far more lovely and natural to allow myself to be the tender woman that I am without the hard wall of protection.
Hear, hear Cherise “being a delicate woman is my true strength”. I can feel the exquisite delicateness in your expression. Your commitment to living from this innate quality is very inspiring.
Cherise, reading this blog again today I am appreciating more of your reflection as the still, loving, joyful and glorious woman you are. This radiates for all to learn from, so please keep shining, for us all. You are amazing.
Cherise, I so loved reading your blog this morning as I am very much a work in progress in allowing my exquisite delicateness and tenderness be felt and seen by all…including myself. I did toughen up to cope in the world…I saw no other way growing up. I saw women who were meak or subservient and felt this to be a weakness as I saw how they were treated – lack of respect and with abuse. So I toughened up so as to not become like them…I did not want to be treated in the same way as I knew that wasn’t right. But in the toughening up, my delicateness and tenderness got buried to protect myself. Your blog is such a beautiful confirmation that being delicate IS my true strength.
Sandra, I can relate with all you share here, seeing women as weak and subservient as I grew up, knowing that was not right, and not wanting to be like them, so I toughened up. I am returning to being the delicate, sensitive, vulnerable and tender woman I naturally am.
The more I connect to my preciousness the less I feel the need to protect myself as this purity within is untouchable. It feels so natural and as you say Cherise a greater awareness in every day comes with this. Thank you.
I completely agree with you Ruth. To live my delicateness is so very empowering and feels so natural now… after the initial period of feeling uncomfortable with it as I had kept myself from feeling it for years. In the beginning it felt awkward but now I love it and welcome it in my life.
There is an art to being delicate and living this in a world that does’t always honour that. Allowing the delicateness and not hardening up means we have to feel more. By learning how to handle the feeling more/the roughness of the world it becomes easier and easier to keep with delicate expression.
For me, Rachel, the more I allow myself to get to know my own delicateness again, the stronger I become and the less shaken I am with the roughness I feel in the world.
This is a great example that shows that when we surrender further to our own delicate nature and the strength of this, that we are in fact left with a foundation that cannot be shaken by the rough or tough existence that we may experience in the world. What greater strength could there be? than to hold ourselves in love and beauty in the face of anything.
I love what you share here Robyn and Cherise. Learning to recognise and deeply know our delicateness and to accept it is who we are in full is an unshakeable foundation that supports us in the craziness of the world around us. No protection needed when our foundations are so strong.
Yes, connecting to and living from our natural delicateness is an “unshakeable foundation”, Lucy.
This is a great question Cherise, ‘WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?’ I can feel with myself that I don’t want to appear weak or vulnerable, I guess its a kind of protection pretending that Im tougher and not as sensitive as I am, but writing this i can feel how silly this is as being delicate is not weak and playing tough has never worked, it feels awful. More and more I am saying no to doing things that I don’t want to do as they do not honour my delicateness and sensitivity, i can feel how I do still compromise myself though and that I don’t fully claim and live my delicateness, tenderness and sensitivity, seeing them as my strengths and not my weaknesses is very supportive, thank you Cherise.
I am in awe of women who are claimed in their sweet delicateness and who have a quiet inner power of knowing who they are.
A beautiful blog that has nearly brought me to tears. I have felt how hard I go and how much this keeps people out. It is not a very beautiful way of being in the world where you are shut off to how you truly feel about things. Re-developing tenderness and sacredness in moments and rhythms is helping me break down the walls I have constrcuted to keep people out… all in the name of protection but a protection that is not needed because if I am delicate and precious, I am innately delicate and precious and this cannot be damaged.
” Being a delicate women is my true strength, and every other women’s as well.”
Thankyou Cherise for expressing the powerfullness that all women have.
I noticed in a conflict with a friend recently, that I was finding it quite hard to understand the expressions on her face. I would say she had a good “poker face” I found this really frustrating as I rely quite a lot on visual cues and would often get confused in conversations. i realised in reflection that in the middle of our debate as soon as I felt unsafe and upset I put on my “game face” which was a non expressive face that is meant to give nothing away in order to stay in control. It had me wonder if i had shown her how upset I really was how differently might the conversation have gone. For me the game face is a protection and mechanism for maintaining control.
Great awareness nicolesjardin…the games we play are crazy. I love seeing how kids handle conflict…they just let it rip and let the other person know exactly how they feel. And then, when it is resolved, they are back to their exquisite selves again because they are not holding anything in their bodies from the interaction. As adults, we can learn a lot from watching how kids handle things. So I’d say yes, letting other people know how we feel is a game changer and then we don’t go into the ‘right and wrong’, but can keep it honest and truthful.
So true Sandra I was reflecting on how very little I really let people know how I feel both the good and the bad it is still very measured.
I’ve also seen how if I don’t express in full about something at the time, that non-expression laces every conversation I have with that person and then if something does come up with them, it looks like I’m making a mountain out of a molehill. But it’s because that single interaction is laced with everything not expressed plus the resentment, frustration or anger from the original incident. It makes things complex and messy.
Great awareness Nicole. I have noticed how I actually look for confirmation from other in visual cues and can feel very uncomfortable if they are not responding in the way I am hoping for/expecting. This just exposes there is more work for me to do on knowing that I am confirmed in myself when I speak and I don’t need another to approve or recognise me for me to feel that I am ok.
It is an interesting one as our interpretation of visual cues can be so loaded I have found myself asking people what does the expression on their face mean. It really comes from and anxiety for approval rather than a connection to what is true.
Why don’t we allow ourselves to feel and acknowledge the physical hurts? Are we any better with emotional hurt? When we are not met from our hurts we feel hurt even more. So we go into protection, reaction and deception. How different would we behave if we lived and communicated in a way that validated our preciousness, tenderness and delicateness.
Thanks Cherise – I can definitely relate to what you say here about building a wall around you… It goes against everything we’re taught to leave the brick wall behind us and be who we are in the “big bad world” without getting hurt. I’m only just scratching the surface of a possibility that the only protection for me, the only way to not get swallowed up and spat out by the world is to honor myself truly and bring all of me to the world. One step at a time…
Today I was with a woman and noticed her delicate hands. I mentioned this to her and spoke about how delicate she actually was as a person. Her whole face lit up as no one had every said this to her before. Through not claiming our own delicateness we miss out on being able to celebrate another’s.
I have recently been realising how delicate I can be with myself and had forgotten what this felt like. When did lose this? It must’ve been before my teenager years because I remember being delicate as a little girl, but got toughened up in school and became a tomboy at home. I am enjoying returning to being delicate in so many little ways, like physically returning to lovingly creaming my body delicately and mentally by stopping the voices in my head beating myself up. And I can feel there’s much more depth to go on this journey.
Cherise, when you speak of looking deeply into another’s eyes, letting them feel our delicateness and honouring theirs at the same time, I can feel the power in allowing ourselves to be open with each other and the strength this builds in relationships.
Janet, what you have described in the honouring of each others delicateness in relationships is so powerful. It seems so obvious but if we aren’t honouring and appreciating our own delicateness then there is no way we are going to be able to offer that to another.
Yes and the courage it takes sometime to do this is needed but I am learning to beats the walls of protection any day.
I was completely lost in the ‘doingness’ of life which allowed my huge brick wall to be built, not just around me but my physical body was getting very hard. The very first Esoteric Breast Massage I received, this self built wall of ‘protection’ started to crumble, the bricks started to get loose and the water (tears of realisation started to flow) loosened the binding cement in between. Living in a way now that includes self love and self nurturing what is emerging, is this most amazing, delicate, beautiful and sensitive woman. Learning to honour that daily – in my fullness. To feel that from another is the most amazing reflection and gift that you could receive. So beautiful and inspiring what you share with us Cherise – thank you.
So is your expression Marion hawes. Unique & powerfull , as you are sharing your living wisdom with us.
I love coming back to this blog and reading it over again, it is such a great reminder of how I have lived and that there is another choice. Honouring my sensitivity is something I haven’t done but it is something that I would like to feel more and is so worth going deeper with.
I have previously lived with a drive, hardness and busyness and what i choose now is a surrender to the natural qualities of tenderness, delicateness and stillness i hold as a woman. A lifelong celebration of my return.
Surrender ~ it’s such a key word and a choice that we all have that encompasses all that we accept about who we are, what we need to do and where we are going in life. There is a real depth of beauty in surrendering to your own heart, your own love.
Beautiful, thank you Marcia and Cherise for your words on surrendering or in other words ‘letting go.’ This is something I have found difficult at times when those negative thoughts creep in that I am not enough… but one thing I have noticed though is these thoughts often relate to not doing enough – which is interesting as I am measuring my worth on what I do and not what I bring or who I am. Something to look at some more.
Absolutely Marcia and Cherise -Surrendering to Love, to Divinity and letting go of everything that is not True,
I agree SusanG, this is a blog I love coming back to as well, as I read it and as I comment I am reminded of my own delicate quality and how far I’ve distanced myself from it.
So beautifully said Cherise… and I love the way you have written this by helping the reader to ponder “do we really want to be hard and tough or have a brick wall exterior?” it’s so easy to say no to that! we’re women… we want to be feminine and beautiful so it’s crazy to think we can be feminine when we are as hard as nails. We can ‘look’ feminine but actually feeling this and living tenderness and delicateness has such a different feeling to it. That is our strength as women. absolutely!
Oh Cherise your words are like such a breath of fresh air to me, stirring the desire within to claim the true preciousness that I am. I found your last paragraph “I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood. Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me, I have gained more awareness in my everyday life, which I greatly appreciate. And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.” – to be so powerful as it felt like it called out in me the truth that I too am a precious, powerful woman and that this is the truth I am now willing and ready to claim, as it is who I have always been but never really claimed for myself. Thank you.
Jade, I agree with you wholeheardetly — those words from Cherise’s blog also resonated very deeply within me. Like you, I felt the power in them, calling to us to claim our preciousness, amazing beauty within and still feel the power of showing our delicateness as our strength.
Cherise, whenever I see a delicate young child, boy or girl, I am always so impressed with how natural they seem to be. And yet this delicacy does not make them weak, a child is often very willing to speak up and make their voices heard. So why is it so hard to keep that going as an adult? I suppose it is all the hurts along the way to adulthood that helps to build up these layers of protection, burying the delicate child underneath. I wonder what life would be like as an adult having not let that delicacy go, having remained true to my voice and stayed in connection with my body but in the world and life with all the responsibilities of an adult.
I can still feel the reality of this for myself Shami. I know that at times I still cover up the vulnerable and delicate parts of me in an effort to show the world that I am ok and capable. When this happens I can hear this in my voice.
Yes, I too can let some protection sneak back in without fully being aware its back again, maybe not as strong, but still covering the more delicate and tender being that I naturally am.
It has been very awkward for me to allow myself to be deeply vulnerable and for the world to see this when i have always been one to keep it together for everyone else, capable and strong. How deeply i feared bringing my true sensitivity to light which served only to keep me a prisoner to my own choices. I now feel like an enormous burden has lifted in being free to just be me, not needing to be anything and accepting myself in my own skin and accepting that vulnerability and sensitivity is a strength and i can Trust me no matter what.
After a lifetime of being a gung -ho, just get on with it,diy-er, I am slowly uncovering the delicate me that got buried under the detritus of all that doing.More and more I look at what needs to be done and feel I know I could do it, but It wouldn’t be good for my body, and so the energy I would do it in would be harmful – and not just to me. So when I ask for help,it is from the strength of my delicacy. When I wobble I remind myself that I am ok, I am capable, capable of asking others into my world to help. There is still resistance but at least now I understand it, it is there to show me how much more of that lovely delicacy there is in me.
This is an incredible discussion thread. There is so much to learn in everyone’s comments. It is allowing me to get a true sense and feeling of what is meant by feeling tenderness and delicateness in my own body. I am able to read it in the lines of each person’s comments while feeling it in my own body as I read them. Feeling the true magnificence of what it means to be a woman and allow myself to open up to sacredness…for the first time. Slowly, slowly opening…petal by petal!
I like this, Irena, slowly slowly…petal by petal. I tend to want things to happen immediately and can get impatient with myself if it does not. Not having felt much for decades through shutting down in early childhood, then drugs and alcohol…. I slowly learn to feel again the gorgeous delicate me. And when I think(!) I feel it there is always a deeper level of delicateness.
Thanks to your sharing here, I first read a few weeks ago, I was able to unfold a new quality and level of tenderness and delicateness in my life. Feeling that this is just the beginning, same, as you wrote: “What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” I am coming to a new awareness of not being the tough maker (I always wanted me to be) at all, but something completely else, very delicate, sensitive, vulnerable and tender. I am digging this tunnel since a long time, always knowing there is something else than I used to tell myself to be – and now as there is a break through and this connection started to rebuild, I know, I wont leave it ever again.
I have been feeling how much more delicate I am. I am choosing to stay with my vulnerability and feel whatever is needed to be felt.
Since reading this blog for the first time a couple of weeks ago, I have felt much unfold in feeling my delicateness more and more. I am realising that I am so delicate and that I have spent most of my life not honouring this delicateness of me, going into doing, hardening to protect. But what I am realising is that none of this works. True strength does indeed lie in allowing myself to be open and live from this beautiful delicateness that is there within every woman.
Great to return to this blog today. It helps me to realise how far away I am from my true nature, how hard and I have actually become how ideals and beliefs of this world are things that I have aligned to and in that lost myself. But all is not lost, I’m slowly rediscovering me, the process of self discovery is actually very enjoyable even though I am so far away every step I make that leads me back towards myself it’s taken joyfuly knowing time is on my side.
‘Being a delicate woman is my true strength.’ Just reading this title is a ‘light bulb/ coming home’ moment and I can feel my sharp edges melt away. Sharp edges that I have adopted in reaction to hurts and struggles in life, which actually just hold those hurts and struggles. I read the title again and feel a melting from the inside out, that show the sharp edges for what they are (a self imposed defensive structure of behaviour) and leave me clearer and stronger in my delicateness. Thank you, Cherise.
It is so amazing to feel the love, the tenderness, the delicacy, the preciousness and the divinity that emanates from this blog and comments and the power and strength of them all.
And it’s so lovely to have a man acknowledge that Nicholas ~ thank you.
Thank you Cherise for this very lovely expression. I can very much relate to what you describe, creating my own brick wall by firstly aligning with the world of men (I learnt from an early age they had the better deal – or so I thought) and working early on in an industry in which everyone was expected to be extremely hard and in complete denial of any sort of tenderness at all. It has been a long, slow road back to feeling and reclaiming my delicateness, and I still have more work to do in terms of breaking the bad habits, the ill momentums I adopted during my first career – and am in fact now paying the price for embracing this way of working in the form of a chronic health condition that is due in part to adrenal exhaustion. Youth is on our side for a while, but the long-term effects are undeniable. This alone should be sufficient motivation for embracing a more tender way.
Hi Cherise, I too have discovered that the brick wall I have constructed around me to stop people from hurting me is also keeping everyone an arms length away from me.
As I work on being the more tender loving person that I naturally am I notice a new awareness in everything I do. With this new strength the wall just disappears.
I can really feel the knock on effects of women being expected to toughen up and the impact this has on men also. From my experience women have always been the more delicate sex and this has influenced men to show their more tender sides. This is affected by the increasing masculinity displayed by many women where there is a big desire to keep up with or outdo the boys in physicality. That is why I enjoyed your blog so much Cherise, as it is written by a women who is embracing the qualities that this world needs more of from women. Delicateness, fragility, gentleness and tenderness are not words that anyone need shy away from.
So true, Stephen G. After all, do we shy away from the delicateness, fragility, gentleness and tenderness of an exquisite flower? No… So why so in ourselves?
‘From my experience women have always been the more delicate sex and this has influenced men to show their more tender sides.’ In the simplicity with which this is expressed I could feel the breaking of age old misinterpretations of delicacy and the madness of the game of ‘outdo each other on toughness’ that we have played. Thank you, Stephen G.
So many of us have been taught to hide our sensitivity and delicateness, instead to compete in a ‘dog eats dog’ world, at least this is how I was raised. With four brothers it was only when alone I could express my fragility. It wasn’t accepted in the family or in the wider world. How beautiful for students of Universal Medicne to now be able to role model to younger women and girls that these precious qualities are signs of being a true woman.
In my last Esoteric Breast Massage i could feel how I was fighting my own delicateness and not allowing myself to feel it. Once I could feel the resistance to wanting to go there and that the only person I was resisting was myself and my own love i allowed myself to let go and feel how gorgeous it was to feel delicate gentle tender loving and warm, without the armour of hardness,…… why would I not want this every day? Once I stopped fighting me I stopped fighting life. There are things that still come up but without the fight i can see everything without my usual reaction. I love all the Esoteric healing modalities but the EBM’s offer the possibility of connecting to this most precious part of me, the sacredness and preciousness of being a woman that is so yummy that I have discarded to cope with the rigours of living in a society that no longer truly honours this part of being a woman.
Yes – the EBMs have been so important for me too for the same reasons. I know if I hadn’t discovered firstly Universal Medicine, then Esoteric Women’s Health and EBMs, I know I would have contracted breast cancer, so far from the woman I am I was living. I did everything in an excess of push, drive and nervous system tension and had persistently sore, lumpy breasts to prove it. Today this situation has totally reversed. I might still get breast cancer one day, but it won’t be from living like one of the boys.
It is the same with men. The more we allow ourselves to feel how delicate and tender we are and live these qualities, the more will we realize that this is our true strength.
I can sign this: “What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” and I am looking forward to discover more of my streng of delicateness. What does support me a lot here is ‘sacred movement’ – a ‘dance’ which is presented by Natalie Benhayon and I practice with other women regular. It’s like open up a treasure chest inside of me, which was always there but closed with thousand locks. Now I learn to let go of my locks and embrace what will get free again. It is like get to know my true self. The sacred movement is like me, dating my divinity.
Awesomely said, Sandra: ‘The sacred movement is like me, dating my divinity.’ Yes, you’ve nailed it. The Sacred Movement classes I’ve attended have had a profound effect on me too. They are opening up a whole new way to be. For the first time I am coming to understand the true purpose of women – to connect to and convey to all our divine nature – and how to live from that space. Profound and exquisite it is and we are.
It is so super gorgeous to feel a woman talking and living delicacy and preciousness. This is unfortunately rare in modern society.
Delicateness and preciousness is the ‘new black’ in my books Joshua. Stay tuned, these ladies are really hotting things up, and theres more to come.
I am most definitely watching this space!
It is the space to watch!
Love this article Cherise. As I feel glimpses of the true delicateness of myself I can say that I clock this feeling in my body because I have been far from it for such a long time. It humbles me to feel the strength in my delicateness.
Being delicate is a true strength. It is admitting that you are made of love.
The EBM modality has been hands-down the most powerful healing for me in coming to feel, accept and embrace this delicateness and its power through having a very nurturing, quiet and unimposing environment to develop more awareness of how I was actually receiving life when I stopped and felt what my body is and was telling me.
Delicateness & awareness of life go hand in hand.
Cherise this is a beautiful blog and reading this has given me a reminder to connect to my delicateness. I have recently done an esoteric yoga program and connected to this myself and the loveliness for myself and my children was remarkable. They actually found enjoyment from me applying their sun cream of a morning as I applied in pure gentleness. exquisite to feel.
To see delicateness as a strength is very uncommon these days. Being delicate is so often seen as a weakness -I find it interesting how we have changed the meaning of this word and then chosen to live from something that is far away from this.
Acting tough is really a defensive measure – its staying delicate or tender that requires a true strength. To stay open to other people even when we have been hurt, being willing to feel everything when its not pretty. But this is the way we stay connected to what is really going on in life, and the feeling both for me and others around me is immeasurably different.
Simon I so love what you have written. Staying delicate, tender and open to other people even when we have been hurt, is something that I have to actively choose, otherwise it won’t happen. And when I do choose it the deep level of love and inner connection as well as appreciation of others confirms that I have chosen well.
Beautiful words Simon. Be brave not tough.
The problem with ‘getting over it’ or acting tough is we (and I include men here) get these tougher outer layers.. a bit like a builders hands they become capable of rough work without feeling the pain. But at the same time the cost is that we become un sensitive. Having a long history of this my experience is that life then becomes 2 dimensional, and all the feelings… painful and joyful, get locked away behind that facade. It can feel like I am not truly living.
Great blog super inspiring thank you
Cherise I love your example of being a delicate woman “the way I gently touch my own skin feeling its texture, how I type on the computer, the way I walk, move, sit, or carry my shopping home. The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” It sure is our true strength.
Thanks Cherise. The world will certainly benefit from more delicate expressions. Its those ones that are out of the ordinary but completely heartfelt and they instantly make us remember that we are all innately delicate.
It never ceases to amaze me how delicate and strong we are at the the same time and how this delicacy goes deeper and deeper all of the time. The exquisite vulnerability that comes with this helps us let people in and from this our relationships are stronger too – we are stronger together through our willingness to be delicate and vulnerable.
If only we could trust all of humanity with our delicate vunerability
Gemma I have noticed as well that if I choose to be vulnerable and delicate with myself and others then the core of me or who I feel I am strengthens. My confidence grows.
It’s hard to go there sometimes – to be truly vulnerable and delicate – but it’s always worth it.
Such a beautiful expression Cherise. Thank you. I am developing this for myself but only just understanding that I am needing to be super honest with how I actually am with myself. This is taking a lot of courage because I feel too vulnerable to let go of the reins and feel how in control and driven I am; once I surrender I am terrified about what I will find! But I need to support myself with this and gently allow myself to feel my choices, make different ones but know this is a journey which has no end or whiz bang finale – it is a deepening of the exquisite love I already know myself to be and learning how to honour that in all I do.
You have expressed so beautifully what I am slowly discovering for myself Cherise, that my true strength lies in my vulnerability, delicateness and fragility as a woman. It is so freeing to drop the mask of being able to endure anything and everything.
WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE? This is an important question and something to be reminded of regularly as we live in the world and our daily lives. It comes from everwhere and everthing we do to hide this and not show or feel it and this causes us a lot of hardening and pain to deny our very essence as women and who we innately are. I love this blog and all it shares and to inspire us as women to truly feel and claim and feel our delicateness and honour this in every moment – beautiful, thank you.
There is still a barrier that inhibits us from saying just how much things hurt when they do – it is possible that there is a fear of completely crumbling under the pressures of the day, being seen as weak and helpless that makes surrendering not an option. What Cherise has shared here is that this fear keeps us bound and when we allow vulnerability, the expression of it is a strength, which seems counter-intuitive but once discovered it really is the way the return to our true power as women.
I agree tricianicholson, a question we all have to ask and then realise that at times we push ourselves on, whilst being everything for everybody else, and get in the habit of leaving ourselves behind. Since I have taken the time to feel my delicate and tender nature, and not see them as weaknesses, I have noticed how this reflects in my body and how much more I feel. So if I become too fast, rushed and hardened it now stands out more and I am more clearly able to make the choice to return to the flow of delicateness instead of getting carried away with the rush.
I love this Cherise, and I wonder just how much of all women’s health issues, illness and disease comes from this very fact – that we are not honouring our delicateness.
At those times when I do surrender to myself and allow my natural tenderness and love to be, I have felt as you say Cherise, that the delicateness I feel, is my true strength and others do respond to and appreciate that reflection.
At those times when I do surrender to myself and allow my natural tenderness and love to be, I have felt as you say Cherise, that the delicateness I feel, is my true strength and others do respond to, and appreciate that reflection. It’s like a breath of fresh air for them.
“Being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too”. This is such an empowering statement Cherise – no longer do we have to place our worth on how much we ‘measure up’ to the men, we can feel strong in our delicateness
Even just reading the title of this blog highlights for me that growing up in the 70’s and 80’s I adopted the approach that life as a woman was about making sure that my delicate nature was well and truly hidden behind a front of ‘strength’ … I too have found esoteric women’s health modalities the greatest support in allowing that delicateness to be experienced as the power that it is.
This delicateness I have brushed away, disregarded and worked against it for so long in order to be able to ‘survive’ in a world which seems to not accept it. But the truth is that the delicateness and preciousness which every woman holds within is the fondation and the strength we need to be all we are in this world.
’Re-reading your blog Cherise, I reflected on how delicacy, this precious quality, has eluded me for most of my life and why as an expression, it was never ever part of my vocabulary, until now. I know with time I will feel this part of myself, once I’ve released the guardedness I’ve held on to for so long
I’m always bruising my forearms at work moving boxes around in the freezer, or burning my hands on hot oven trays. The injuries are minor but each one is a reminder that I have not been present with my body, not been tender or fragile in the way I move. My body can take a lot but why should it? Why do we women try to be equal to the men and lift things that are heavy? I am learning to ask for help getting high things down, or using tongs to reach when my arms are too short. Accepting our physical limitations does not mean we are lesser, it means we accept what is physically true for us.
I like your very practical examples Carmel – I’ve spent my life over doing it and then having my body remind me that ‘no, it can’t lift that rock’. Those little cuts and burns are our reminder to slow it down, take due care of ourselves and honour what we are doing as there is no need for that seemingly minor abuse… physically, emotionally, mentally or energetically.
I had such a great experience recently of allowing myself to be tender and delicate with an elderly, aggressive, confused gentleman and the affect on him was quite profound. His aggressive behaviour stopped and he was just himself. If I had hardened up like I saw others do with him then he would have become even more aggressive. The world needs people who are prepared to be delicate and tender because being hardened and tough has not really gotten us very far.
Oh this is just beautiful Elizabeth. No need to harden up for fear of being hurt, or as I wrote in an earlier comment, broken. Delicateness and tenderness melt us all – your sharing is a hugely inspiring example of this. Time to give it a go methinks 🙂
Elizabeth this is an exquisite example of the power of our delicateness.
The tender way my daughter puts on her socks and shoes in the morning always stops me in my tracks as I have gone into my morning drive to get to school on time.
Yes, it’s funny how we can choose to be a certain way with colleagues at work and momentarily let go of our naturally fragile and delicate self, to fit in or to not stand out. Much more regularly now I am noticing myself more and more doing this and it has got me quite curious about what triggers that for me, and why I would even choose to do that, because when I do stay with my body and move lovingly, those intimate moments with myself are so delightful.
It was great to read this Cherise as it applies as much to men and women. In fact it is amazing how similar the experiences of men and women are, it is sharing like this that make those wall crumble. Thank you.
Hi Joel, yes that’s true. How powerful is a man in his tenderness and delicateness. But in order to be able to see and appreciate this, me as a woman needs to allow this first to myself. Too easily we brush away this gentleness and blanket it in our rush and drive. Women and men can reflect and remind each other to be what they truly are.
I totally agree Joel, we are just as delicate,tender and sensitive when we are young and it is time the world took notice of the men and women who are returning to this way of being.
‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality’. Thank you Cherise, this is exactly how I’ve been feeling. I’m developing a far greater awareness of my body and all the nuances it’s sharing with me, constantly. This has led me to take far greater care of myself. I’ve been feeling the cold a lot more and have started wearing fingerless gloves at work as I spend a lot of time on the computer. Every time I put them on, I’m appreciating my fragility and the beauty in choosing to honour me.
Thank you, Cherise. Re-reading your blog I feel the next step for me is to be delicate and fragile when I am with others. I can still put up a facade, and there is no reason to do so, so it’s something to become more aware of, and then keep opening up and expressing exactly how I am feeling in my body and from deep within.
This is the case for me too Janet. I find it difficult to remain connected to my delicateness when I am with others, especially at work. I too find the facade coming up. It is a work in progress for me to be able to remain true to myself in all my interactions.
Thank you Janet,
I am becoming aware that much of the soreness that I feel is simply because I to have been putting on a facade with others (for most of my life, definitely since about the age of two), stepping away from the delicateness that I am beginning to truly know myself as. My body has lived this for a long time and so has much to clear around it. However to support it I know that my next step is to stay with my body when with others.
Cherise, your blog is so beautiful and so very powerful. I wonder if you even realised when writing it, just how powerful this sharing has and will be for women all over. For women to reclaim their delicateness, tenderness and gorgeous sensitivity as their strength and natural way has the power to change this world. I am most certainly enjoying every single word shared in all the women’s responses to this blog, learning so much more about myself, and feeling for the first time, that I am not alone in feeling uncomfortable and somewhat afraid of my sensitive nature as I have for so long, but rather supported in developing this part of me – which is in truth the beginnings of living from my essence.
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.” I love this Cherise. Thank you for this gorgeous blog. As I rediscover my own delicateness, which I have locked away for most of my life, I am allowing myself to feel the extent to which I have missed me, through the my choices of ‘getting on with it’ and laughing off things that actually really hurt. (Boarding school didn’t help here!) The sadness that emerges now I want to escape again, but am staying with it, to feel the beauty and strength that comes from feeling my own delicateness once again.
Simply reading the title of you blog makes me feel empowered, ‘Being A Delicate Woman – Is My True Strength’, I can feel the absolute truth of this and it is so beautiful to have this delicateness confirmed and appreciated, for so long I held it as a weakness and tried really hard not to be the delicate woman that I am. I am now really enjoying feeling more and more of my natural qualities such as delicateness, gentleness, stillness and tenderness.
So true Cherise, we create all this hardness and protection around us and then sit in this self-built prison sulking that nobody sees and accepts us. But how can they if we do not show ourselves tot he world? It is very much worth it to open up and allow the world to see us in our delicate and precious nature.
Well said, Judith. I can feel the irresponsibility in robbing ourselves and the world of our true nature and expression, rather than naturally sharing the divine qualities that make us all uniquely beautiful.
Beautiful Judith, I can feel how we can easily choose to put up that protection, not even giving others a chance based on our past hurts and experiences. It is such a shame that this is the way of the world. It has certainly been my way. I have held others at a distance and not shared my absolute preciousness with them for far too long now, mainly from this false belief that I would be crushed or bullied, or laughed at, the list goes on. But I realise now that none of that really matters – others will do what they will, and yes, some will respond in this way, and others will embrace it, but more to this, it needs to not matter how another will respond, but the resolve in ourselves to live more truly from our essence, and this is what I am finding is most important.
I agree Judith, Janet and Anna,
Committing to living more truly from my essence is showing me that there is actually a place in the world for this. It does fit in the world, it fits because it feels exquisite. Yes some will love what they feel and others not. But isn’t that what happens when we live form our insecurities any way? Some wallow with us, while others judge us for being that way. This realisation has greatly supported me to surrender to my essence more. And to realise that as Elizabeth shares above that I am feeling what I am here to do.
These are great words annamccormack, we do hold others at a distance, thinking we are more safe when we not let them fully in and show all of who we are, but really we are just hurting ourselves and others.
Well said Katie you summed sensitivity up perfectly and just to add the obvious, when we have this sense of what is needed in any given moment we are able to deeply nurture ourselves and others.
Such a timely blog Cherise. This is something I have been pondering much on recently in light of the awareness that I have for so long misunderstood my own sensitivity and delicateness, very much feeling it a weakness and as a result feeling not ’strong’ enough to be out in the world. Consequently, I have spent much time withdrawn from life, not truly present in my body, but rather being run by anxiety and the thinking mind. I am now really looking at this, and choosing to explore more my sensitivity as being a strength I can hold, and not at all something to be afraid of. I can feel that my very understanding of the word sensitivity and its true meaning is about to change completely, and this I am looking forward to unfolding within myself. Beautiful inspiration, thank you.
Very beautiful annamccormack26, I can relate to the mind thinking ‘I need to be strong out there’ and it’s been an interesting unfoldment for me of late as I have fully understood how it is that jealousy has played out in my life. From a small girl not wanting it directed at me, not wanting to be a target, I began to play small and built a hardness upon myself to hide my true sensitivity and to not be attacked. But the truth is that there is not a naturally hard cell in my body! it was all fabricated to avoid jealousy and then used to punish myself for hiding what I knew was the true me the whole time.
Once I opened myself up to seeing how this played out as a child and am continually working to bringing this to my awareness as an adult now all is making SO much sense. My strength is in my delicateness, my awareness and my beauty because it is here that I reflect to the whole world that jealousy and targeting any ill behaviour at another is NEVER ok and when I am living my true self, I am blessed to be standing up tall to this fact. Now that’s power!
Agreed Cherise, that IS true power, and I can relate completely to all you have shared here about jealousy and shutting down to avoid feeling it. Unlocking the past and seeing how has played out and my own responsibility in choosing to harden and hide myself has and continues to be a great learning as I now choose to live more and more from my own delicate nature.
I like this line “I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments”. I agree, allowing our sweetness and delicateness as a woman does build a heightened awareness of who we are and what we are here to do.
Yes Elizabeth, this has been my experience, and to add, it makes me more sensitive and aware of how others are feeling.
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.”
This is so powerful and so beautiful Cherise. Thank you for expressing your tenderness. It is truly felt.
Yes Beverly, I agree – Cherise’s blog is so powerful and so beautiful. It is so important that as women we begin to openly discuss the true strength and power in our delicateness, and all that gets in the way of expressing this.
Agree Beverley.. And this is an incredible example of how when you live all of you, and claim yourself as an amazing woman – everything you write or say will have and contain that same power and confidence. Pretty cool isn’t it…
Very cool Susie.. and all, once we know what our true power really is there is nothing else to do but claim it in every moment that we can and not give it away to anyone else.. This is becoming a deeper learning for me as I know that I don’t just walk out the door and ‘claim it’ so-to-speak, but what I can do is bring my awareness to my connection with myself in as many small details and moments that I can. When I do this, I am honouring my depth of knowing who I am, I am confirming me, my divinity and my connection to God unwaveringly and I am making a choice to claim it in full. So then when I walk out the door, I am already everything and whatever happens next has the flowing foundation of detail, awareness and claiming it even more so.
once we reconnect to our natural delicate and tender way of being as a woman, living without the full honouring of these qualities feels really horrible and very painful indeed. The body is showing us/ communicating to us the way back to living in harmony – are we wise enough to learn without having to suffer, get sick?
A great point you make Alexandra, do we have to wait until we get sick to learn this point? Unfortunately, I didn’t learn this lesson before having a diagnosis of breast cancer and it was through this diagnosis that I started to wake up to the fact that the way I was living wasn’t in honour of the delicateness that I am as a woman.
Thank you Alexandra,
This past week I have dropped deeper than ever before into feeling my delicateness, yet my body is sorer that it has been in years. I am coming to understand that it is showing me just how hard I have been holding it in relation to the true delicateness that it wants to express with. The learning here is to honour deeply what I am feeling and allow the delicate woman that I am to be more present in my body through out the day. Deepening my love and care of my body in how I walk, sit, hold and be with it.
It’s at times when our bodies are feeling pain or discomfort that we are gifted the opportunity to feel even more deeply into the energetic state of our being and how it is that we are living. Illness and disease are a true way of healing (and I have found to be joyful when I understand the whole process and choice it offers) because yes we are able to bring our focus to supporting our physical bodies but without a whole approach to understanding the energy we are living in – be that our true selves or a reserved version of ourselves – we can heal faster and with greater clarity than ever before.
And the result, an even deeper relationship within continues..
Great question Alexandra… ‘Are we wise enough to learn without having to suffer, get sick?’ – Many people (most of the world probably) wait until they get a serious illness or injury to listen to their bodies, and previous to that point they often disregard the messages that tell them things like slow down, look after yourself more etc. This seriously needs to change, otherwise we will end up with more and more sick people and injuries. Listening to your body and acting on the small symptoms like a sore arm or headache should be taught in schools worldwide.
I have spent a large proportion of my 46 years being a tough woman. When I think about it, it has probably only been the first 3 years of my life and the last 3 where I haven’t! These past 3 have been, and still are a gradual shedding of the layers of protection I have encased myself in to protect the delicate, precious 3 years old from the toughness of the world around her. I clearly remember the first time I connected to the delicateness in my body. I was saying to a friend how I couldn’t relate to delicate being me, but then felt an impulse to caress my forearm with my fingertips. I started sobbing because in that moment I could feel how delicateness was just waiting in my fingertips to be expressed. I amazed me how powerful the feeling was and I was deeply saddened because in that moment I realised this was something I reserved for others but did not give to myself. Even with this awareness there has been a resistance in me to fully ‘going there’ with delicateness. As I write I can feel there’s a belief I’m holding onto that being delicate in an indelicate world I might get broken. But what resonates so clearly in your blog Cherise is the strength and power in our delicateness. Thank you.
I can really relate to your experience Lucy. I grew up being a tough woman and had no memory of how delicate I was until I started experiencing it regularly in esoteric yoga sessions. Treating myself with delicateness requires space and tenderness, with no rushing or focus on the outside world. It has also taken me building my love for myself. Like you I have always been very delicate in my touch with others but not with myself. I am amazed by the simple ways I can experience delicateness. The way I move my hands, the way it feels when I brush mascara on my eyelids feels delightful. I have experienced feeling the strength of delicateness and continue to work at undoing my belief that it is a weakness in the world.
yes I can relate to the delight you describe here Fiona in appreciating how delicate and lovely it is to take the time to apply mascara and utilise it as an exploration of how to be extra tender with yourself. the little things aren’t so little, everything matters.
Very true Fiona, it’s only in the slowing down and connecting to our innate stillness (which I’ve enjoyed and developed through Esoteric Yoga) that we connect to the very delicate nature of ourselves and our body such that any speed or rush feels too awful. When we feel our nature as this delicateness, it infuses our expression and indeed becomes our strength.
Absolutely Felicity, it’s those little things that can make all the difference about how I feel about myself.
Lucy, I loved your sharing. I can relate to your experiences and the belief around being broken. I recently have made the decision to let this go and actually explore what does happen when I choose to express from my delicateness and preciousness in front of those whom I believed would break me (which includes pretty much everyone besides my close friends and family). So I made a commitment to myself in my workplace (and everywhere) to really express from this part of me and to look at what it is that stops me from doing so, when and where I harden and why.
Since making this commitment, the responses have been mixed. Some people really welcome this, they are open and warm and will make a comment towards me such as, ‘you look really different, in a good way’ or ‘I love coming through your checkout because you just seem so calm in this place – and it makes me feel calm’, others are not so open and really struggle and are uncomfortable around me. Some I can even go as far to say detest this in me, talking about me around corners and quietly nicknaming me ‘Princess Anna’ – with no loving intent. It is these latter few that I have in the past chosen to shut down to, but I cannot any longer deny myself who I am, or waste time sulking because of others opinions and jeolousy driven responses. I am still very much finding my way with this, and not at all perfect with it but I am committed to keep expressing, to staying open, to not need anything in response, but to express this because it is who I am and we all deserve to be who we truly are.
Wow! I too believed I was broken and have only just come to realise that I wasn’t all along, just very hurt that the world was as it is but even more hurt that I compromised my expression and put the lid on my delicacy to protect those hurts. As an adult to commit to re-claiming that delicacy everywhere you go, no matter if it brings up reaction and jealousy in others – Susan this is really inspiring. I guess here the importance is to read the situation and reaction of others rather than get caught up and hurt by it, as it is those hurts that caused us to shut down in the first place.
wow, what an inspired commitment to make with yourself at work and to just observe those around you. You giving yourself that permission is huge for everyone as is me reading this and saying you know what I could do the same and stay with myself even if I feel others react to their own choice to not be delicate when it is who they are too.
Annamccormack 26, it is this negative reaction that has held me back in the past, not wanting to feel that some might think I was playing helpless to get attention. Great that you are not reacting to that but continuing to express your gorgeous, delicate womanhood.
MIchelle, I feel what you say here is very important. For me reading the situation is what empowers me. If I can feel jealousy coming towards me because I am choosing to express more from my essence and from my delicateness then another say is, I try to remain open to what that persons experiences may have been, to hold understanding. Thats not to say I should accept the behaviour, especially if it plays out aggressively or rudely towards me, but it just supports me to not take it on as I have done so much in the past.
I love your comment annamccormack26, it can be so easy to slip into old patterns of hardness when we feel jealousy or resistance coming our way when we being are true to ourselves. But like you say, you are expressing in this way BECAUSE it is who you are, so that means it is the truth and why would we not want to live our truth. There appears to be many reasons for not living our truth, and as is stated above, maybe we feel sad because we have left our delicate and tender nature behind and spent lifetimes hiding behind a hard, protective exterior. It sounds to me that the walls are beginning to crumble for all of us and we are beginning to accept our innate preciousness and delicateness and how it feels to be gentle with ourselves, and not just with others. What’s wrong being a Princess, when I was a girl I used to play Princesses, and I am sure many women can identify with that!
I’m giving myself permission to be a Princess too, in a beautiful, gentle serene, delicate way and at the same time holding on to my inner strength and power.
K Barea, it is amazing to make this commitment and also to not put any pressure on myself in doing so, but to just observe. When I feel jealousy at play, I am learning to hold myself, even in the face of some pretty nasty looks and comments that are directed right in front of me. I am starting to feel that I don’t want to leave me or change me for anyone or anything.
Love it Sandra, and yes, there is nothing wrong with claiming our inner ‘princess’.
I too can relate to people responding differently to me at work Anna, and those that don’t want the reflection I offer, I respect 100% and don’t get in their way, but as best as I can, keep being myself around them and not contracting away out of hurt (of them rejecting me) as I used to.
Thats awesome Sandra. I am still developing this with myself, to not contract away or hold back my love and expression from those who are not open to me. A big lesson for me and a work in progress for sure.
It’s a work in progress for me also, and something that I am able to feel more deeply is the hurt that I hold in my body when I hold back from someone (for whatever the reason, ideal or belief) for I can’t think that I’m open to some people and not to others. It just doesn’t work like that, not energetically. Without perfection of course, but I am realising more and more that I can let people in, let everyone in to see how beautiful I am because they too can feel in me that I hold them equally when I do this.
When there were difficult moments in my life I noticed how the people around me told me to be strong but this version of strong meant to me, don’t show your true feelings, bottle it up and get through it. “Grin and Bear it’ comes to mind. I now know that being strong in the real sense is being true to myself, to feel my sensitivity and honour my feelings. There is immense strength in this and is a million miles away from what I thought being strong meant.
Susan I too thought being strong was not showing your true feelings even to yourself! Now I feel being strong in the sense of standing firmly by my own side with all that I do feel.
Great points K Barea and Kirsty. I feel it’s when we are very sensitive but we don’t know how to honour and accept that for ourselves. I feel this is why people said to me to be strong so they don’t feel the pain and hurt either – it’s easier for them to deal with.
“I’m giving myself permission to be a Princess ” I love this Sandra. A princess with all the delicateness that we innately are. Beautiful
‘I could feel how delicateness was just waiting in my fingertips to be expressed.’ I Love this. Delicateness is not something we need to learn, it is always there waiting to be expressed.
Its true Esther I agree. I too am waking up to the fact that delicateness is a quality that resides inside me all the time, I just need to take a moment to touch something very gently to be reminded of its presence within. A joy to re-discover what ever age we are, as it is something we all innately long to be connected to again.
There is an ease and grace and a preciousness i feel when i connect to delicateness for this is our natural expression – effortless, embracing and accepting of our divinity in full.
Yeah that’s very cute. I love that it’s not something that we ever lose. No matter how much we harden up, we can always choose to come back to our innate delicateness.
Lucy, I love what you share here. The resistance to being our absolute delicateness in the harshness of the world around us, in a fear of being hurt. And yet, if our true power resides in our claiming of who we are and that being our delicateness and strength then there is nothing to be afraid of; in fact, could it be that we are even more well equipped to deal with all and anything that comes our way because of our abilities to stay with ourselves, our touch, our own grand love and most importantly our awareness. With this we bring understanding to our situations and more of an ease than a protective or defensive layer could have ever provided.
Lucy this is very familiar for me too. I have spent my whole life running from the idea I may be delicate as I saw this to be weak and therefore of no value. As I now reconnect to that delicateness that I naturally am I have begun to feel the true power and strength that is there for how can we be anything but powerful when we are living the fullness of who we truly are.
Living in and by my body I too am discovering how powerful it is to be guided by my sensitivity. It’s like there is a part of me that when I choose to feel into these more delicate qualities that I am starting to claim as truly me there is a reaction to go into sadness to avoid acknowledging having ignored these greater parts of me. But my body is a great tool to show me just what the quality of this sadness and avoidance truly is. Nothing is greater than who we truly are which is why resisting those qualities within us is so draining.
Dear Leigh,
I love that you have exposed that as we claim more fully our delicateness that we react by feeling sad that we have disregarded the preciousness of this before and that the sadness is actually a way to avoid fully claiming and living the delicateness now. Such a trick to again keep us from fully feeling, claiming and living from the delicateness that we are and so keeping us away from our true strength as women.
Your right Leighstrack… it really does feel like a trick… sometimes it feels like situations are deliberately set up to make us choose not to feel. That’s exactly why it really is our strength to keep feeling, stay tender and delicate.
Exactly Leigh it literally drains the life out of us not being ourselves, I am loving that I am so much more free to be myself and are no longer living with critical thinking and judgement of myself and others, this was not me but it was my focus, today I am so far from that I surprise myself in how at ease I am in my body and with myself and others.
“This was not me but it was my focus” – how many people believe that those judgemental/critical thoughts about themselves and others are actually them? This I reckon is something key here as when I pause to feel into some of those thoughts it does not feel like the me I do know me to be.
Thank you Leigh M and Leigh S, I love the way you have expanded to share the reactions we can have that come after realisations as profound as returning to a deeper level of who we truly are. Sometimes I can feel the reactions of others, of me having changed and leaving behind a layer of hardness. It reflects to others that I am now choosing more of the real me and this can make them uncomfortable as I am reflecting to them that they are more too. But this is exactly what is needed, otherwise I would be holding back my new awareness and giving my power away in preempt of someone else’s reaction.
Cherish thank you for your comment. Realising that as we let go of a layer of hardness that those around may and at times do react to this is very true and I personally have at times found it difficult to hold the level of tenderness that I personally have allowed myself to go to when this happens. What I am realising though is that when I choose to not stay with my new felt level of tenderness that my body feels sore, tight and I become exhausted in trying to live less than who I have come to know myself to be. I can see how I have preempted others reactions and in so doing have already formed a way to counter this that is not coming from my tenderness. Choosing instead to stay still and present I can feel that I have everything that is needed if and when another reacts. Because, sometimes there is no reaction from them, but the sense that they feel the truth and accept it without any fuss.
Not being ourselves drains the life out of us, holding back who we truly are so we do not upset another is giving our power away, which again drains us, and then we wonder why we are so exhausted.
This is all so very true! Thank you all for expressing the expansion of this truth. It is indeed a fact that we are drained and our bodies feel when we are holding back or hiding our true and full quality. It is a clear marker for me that my body is saying Yes to being fully in my light and committed to ‘going there’ with all and everyone and if my head says No to this for whatever reason, ideal or belief my body replies with a very clear ‘I can’t hold this back’ and so I feel the instant tension that arrises. This is an amazing marker of science within our very skin and a clear reminder, we can’t ignore who we are (and why would we want to!) we must shine as brightly as never before and allow ourselves to be seen for our light and tenderness in full.
Thank you all for expanding on this, and sharing how it affects our bodies when we are in protection. And it isn’t protection anyway, it is just hardness. True protection comes from being open, delicate and tender so we can feel everything. When my body is hard, I’m not as able to feel everything around me and so it is actually a false sense of protection that just lessens my awareness making me ‘think’ I am protected.
Yes, and again this trick actually sells us the same story – only with a new jacket on – as this trick carries the same energy that made us become harsh, guarded and protective at the first place. A vicious cycle, that we tend to not have broken before, but we can. It is our tenderness that will lead the true way and let the wall of protection fall. That to me sounds almost like a war story, but its true.. And guess what?! I think I wars are over then too!
Cherise, I am finding that the more I get a relationship going with how delicacy feels in my body, the less afraid I am to be with it in more situations. Previously I would presume that this was too vulnerable a state to be in around people. But now, it’s fine because through experience I am discovering that nothing bad actually happens when I am delicate out in the world, in fact, the people in my life feel more welcoming.
Connecting to delicacy within myself still eludes me. As I read and re-read your post, conversations and comments, I begin to understand and appreciate more. Delicacy is a strength, already part of me, I Just have to choose it.
It is true, Cherise, the Esoteric Breast Massage has supported me hugely in feeling my delicateness and tenderness as a woman and to get more connection to it.I feel very blessed to receive those treatments which help me to come back who I truly are: tender, delicate and full of joy.
Simply beautiful Cherise – ‘to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness’ is an inspiration for us all to feel. That this is who we are in essence and that there truly is another more honoring way to be with ourselves and each other. Thank you for your powerful reflection.
It’s so accepted in society to not feel how we truly feel inside and instead putting on an act to appear strong. Beautiful to see how you reconnected to that quality inside
Sensitivity doesn’t have to be an emotional thing. So often it is used to describe people who are being quite emotionally reactive or highly strung when simply sensitivity can be about being more aware of everything that’s going on. I’m so glad Universal Medicine has and continues to help me redevelop true sensitivity or greater awareness, it’s really useful in life.
Well said Fiona. It was once said to me by an esoteric practitioner that I am sensitive, but to be aware that sensitivity has two sides.
It can mean being emotional, reacting to situations and perhaps taking them personally or it is having an acute awareness and connectivity to what is going on. This as you say is ‘true sensitivity’ and is the one to cultivate.
It is interesting that we think putting up brick walls helps make us strong.,,we think we are offering a skill to protect our kids from the harsh realities of the world by telling boys not to cry and for women to toughen up. I was told many times when I started my job 6 years ago in a call centre that the only way to deal with the onslaught of distressed customers was to toughen up … The other term expressed was to “suck it up” when given directives on the latest change or process being enforced on us by our corporate leaders. Fortunately I had built a strength already within myself in connection to my inner heart through the work of Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s Health that I have been able to stick it out despite the onslaught of abuse from customer and corporate identities and can show delicateness, tenderness and genuine self care is a strength no wall can block whether I build it or someone builds it to keep me out. It’s a work in progress and it most certainly is the way … You only have to look at my ID photo when I started and how I look today!
Thank you for your sharing Cherise, I too feel that I often go into a hardness and like a wall or fortress ascends around me as if to protect myself. In my body I notice that as a hardening in my shoulders and a tension in my upper body and upper arms, as if subliminally preparing myself for a fight. When I allow myself this awareness, I can remind myself to let go of the tension, to allow the wall to drop, to be less defensive, to not speak from my hurts but rather to let out the sensitive and beautiful woman that I am, and this feels exquisite. So in the end it really is very simple – allowing myself the awareness of when I am shutting myself out and then making the choice to re-open up again and breathe.
I feel and own my being delicate more than ever before and in doing so I have found that others respect me and treat me likewise. Life really is a reflection.
Every step I take towards my own preciousness and tenderness the world constellates to embrace that in me.
Beautiful expressed Jenny and so true.
‘Strength’ and ‘strong women’ are concepts that wear many faces in the world today. Is the strong woman the too cool for school tough chick? Or the surviver of great adversity? The athlete or the savvy (and sometimes merciless) business women? There are so many ideals of ‘strength’ being lived by women the world over. . .
But for me, Cherise, what you illustrate here is true strength. True strength doesn’t come from the experiences you’ve had, you ability to ‘keep up’ or meet challenges. It is already there within. Living your essence on the outside, letting your tenderness, your preciousness, be seen and felt by others . . . to allow yourself to be vulnerable with outhers (paradoxical though it sounds) is where our true strength lies.
Thank you Cherise for your sharing. The quality I feel myself to be when I connect to my preciousness is very powerful. Never can someone tell me anymore that my delicacy, fragility and preciousness are weakness, they are qualities that reflect my essence, my divinity and my immense strength as a women.
Well said Shirley-Ann. True resilience is as you say it is.
I used to have really bad period pain every month. This matched the lifestyle I was living which was hard, rushed, arrogant and disregarding of my own body. As I have learned to take care of myself and honour the delicate woman that I am I no longer have period pain. But my body always tells me if I have been disregarding in any way. I now have slight period pain if this is the case. I love my body for showing me this.
You hit the nail on the head for me Cherise when you talked about putting up a wall of hardness as protection. What I have come to realise is that this brick wall was simply to avoid feeling my own hurts and the fact that I was naturally and innately delicate and sensitive. The more I let go of this brick wall and this protection, the more I not only open up to people, and allowing myself to feel this delicateness, but also allow others to feel this same quality within them also.
“Being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.”
– Thanks Cherise for sharing the importance of embracing our delicateness as a woman, and that indeed it is not a weakness. But how often in our everyday living do we override this? It reminds me of all the times I’ve avoided feeling my body and carried excess heavy shopping bags all at once, or tried to lift or push heavy things without asking for help; carry the vacuum cleaner up the stairs, whist feeling sore arms; open jars whilst clenching my jaws. I will now be more aware of how I am in all that I do during the day, and start celebrating the delicateness I can feel within, instead of burying it, in order to get things done quickly.
I love what you share here, Cherise, “I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments.” It’s as though, with that awareness we are allowing ourselves to go deeper in our surrender to our gorgeous selves which in turn it strengthens our own foundation as a woman.
This is beautiful Cherise to share as it is such a gift to honour oneself for the delicateness and sensitivity we are . True graceful exquisiteness is our natural innermost way and our divine nature and the treasuring of this has not been taught to us to respect as we grow up as you say. However thanks to Serge Benhayon and his family this is all changing and learning to live and claim the love we are and be in is our real strength and power and this delicateness is life changing for so many.Thank you for sharing this so simply.
I definitely am rediscovering my delicateness and how much I have lived in protection to that fragility. I am often shocked at hugging some people how super hard their bodies are when I know they are super sensitive people, we create bodies that do not represent the truth of our tender natures.
I can relate to your words about scratching the surface of your own delicateness Cherise. When I first connected with my own delicate, loveliness, it felt so amazing and I could have stayed with that but more and more my body is calling me to go deeper with myself in that way and truly love myself to the bone. Having Esoteric Women’s Health, all of the supportive modalities like EBM’s for women, and the upcoming Women in Livingness workshop, are an absolute God send in supporting all women in claiming their true selves back in full. I am so thankful I am a part of this historic time when women all around the world are aligning to their truth, living it and sharing it with others, showing us a true way, a way that we have always known and now are choosing to live.
Beautiful to re-visit this blog Cherise and feel the strength of the delicateness that you are expressing in. I know that for me, to embrace and cherish the delicateness that i am has been quite a journey, from thinking it was a weakness, something to shun and hide, to accepting it as a powerful quality of immense strength. Delicateness and fragility has been turned on its head to be considered to be something it is not — a weakness and a mishap even that makes women less. This could not be further from the truth. It is in our fragility that we have the innate knowing to feel and express what is true, what is needed for us and the other. Our fragility and delicateness has the power to stop another in their tracks, to let them come back to themselves if they’ve gone astray. That’s the true power we have as women.
What if we had curriculum change in schools, colleges, and businesses. Instead of purely academic and professional courses, we began explored loving human qualities, often abandoned but laying deep within each one of us: tenderness, sensitivity, love, delicateness, gentleness, what a difference this would make. And in the absence of this, and thanks to Universal Medicine we are learning how to reconnect to those qualities and bring them with us in life where ever we are.
Beautiful Cherise. It is not only men that get told to ‘harden up’ but girls as well, shown by your experience at the pool. There is always a deeper reason why we hurt ourselves, and being taught to brush it off or harden up is exactly why we have become so disconnected from our gorgeous inner qualities such as our delicateness and our own innate knowing of why things happen. Our true nature is certainly to be embraced, and for me it took time to let go of hardness in my body, but supported by the Esoteric Healing Modalities including the EBM’s I found sweet, lovely me.
So true Jo. Men and women alike have been fed the line that true delicateness is a weakness. What a classic trick to keep us away from the amazing power we hold through our tenderness and delicateness.
I so agree Jenny, as it is this tenderness and delicateness that inspires and allows another to also drop their hurts. That is the power. It is another way of being with ourselves and with each other than in defense and protection as has become our ‘norm’.
I can really relate to your article Cherise, I feel like this could have been written by me. I was a ‘tomboy’ for years and convinced myself and others that I was hard and tough, this actually felt awful though as deep down I knew this was not true. I have been re-connecting with my delicateness and sensitivity for the past five years and this feels exquisite, so much more true and lovely than the hard, tough girl I was trying to be.
I really enjoyed this blog, thank you. We are all super sensitive, delicate and tender, yet so many people, including myself, pretend we’re not by becoming hard or shutting down. More and more I realise there is another way to live that openly honours this sensitivity and tenderness instead of shutting it down and living in my own effective cave.
When we are caught up in emotion, drama and struggle our bodies are primed to deal with the next challenging situation (which we have created). It is a merry-go-round that hardens the body and is designed to keep us away from the natural delicateness and stillness that is ever present when we choose to let go. For me, it is a matter of becoming more conscious of the choice I am making in what I connect to and therefore live by.
I can relate to so many of the comments on this blog about living a life where I was proud to be hard and tough. I would refuse help if offered a hand with my shopping and was always trying to show that I was physically very able to cope on my own. These days I love being offered a helping hand and will sometimes ask for help. I am aware of the power there is in honouring who I truly am and I know that I am delicate and embrace that fully now, thanks to the teachings of Serge Benhayon and attending the wonderful and incredibly supportive Women in Livingness Groups.
I really love how you bring a deep sensitivity to being delicate Cherise and how intertwined this way of being is. Women are often touted as being too emotional, especially around the time of our periods or the full moon but could this be a call, and in some cases a scream, from the body to stay stop, stop, STOP! I received a screaming response to STOP 15 years ago and I am only beginning to appreciate the strength in being delicate and the honouring of the sensitivity of every cell in this amazing body I walk around with every day. The more I honour this sensitivity by appreciating my delicate nature the less emotional I need to be. Esoteric Women’s Health and the EWH Program in particular has been key for me to tap into what I also feel is a deep connection that has only just begun.
“I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” This is so true Cherise, tenderness, delicateness, gentleness, are most powerful qualities, fundamental to the truth of womanhood; gifts that unlock the love and beauty within us all regardless of gender. Its only mental perception that takes us away from our true deep intrinsic knowing and makes them otherwise.
Thank you Cherise for this gorgeous reminder to honour and appreciate how delicate and tender we truly are. I am noticing in my own life where I am still being hard or tense when doing simple chores etc, reading your blog is perfect timing for me and very inspiring.
How gorgeous are your words Cherise ‘ And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’
It is so beautiful, allowing myself to feel and be the delicate woman that I truly am – deeper and deeper. And with that I can see how my son naturally has permission to express his delicateness and tenderness, even more than he already does.
This is gorgeous and powerful Jenny, as what you have shared clearly shows that by honouring and living our true qualities reflects to those around us and naturally inspires them to live from theirs as well.
I love whre you say ‘deeper and deeper’ highlighting there is a constant process that is forever possible of allowing more of our delicate beauty (that is already all within us) to be lived, and there is no getting ‘there’ as there is no one fixed point, or anything external to acheive or reach for, but a series of allowances, opening ups, letting goes, letting it all out again ‘allowing myself to feel and be the delicate woman that I truly am’, and this is ongoing in our own timing.
Cherise, I need to take this with me each day as in reading this again I feel the hardness and protection still around me in my daily interactions. I am still holding back and can feel that my delicateness is not being fully expressed. The reflection of your delicateness in what you have shared is so powerful.
Only very recently I observed a little boy about 6 years old he’d fell over and was starting to cry and an adult walking next to him quickly said ‘man up’ Ouch!!! I could really feel the sensitivity and preciousness in that little boys hurt response – another ‘brick’ for that protective wall for him to work with later in life? Not a wonder that for many men who by nature are so gentle, find it difficult to let this gentleness be felt and expressed. A great sharing Cherise thank you.
What comes back to me from all that has been presented is the hardness in me that has shut people out for a lifetime from when I was abandoned, as I saw it, at 8 years old in a boarding school. The joy is that I know that everything that you say, Cherise, applies equally to me and to all men – time to honour this for all humanity and offer up my delicateness and tenderness – with love.
This is so gorgeous to read Michael and your choice to up your delicateness and tenderness. I must say that I love witnessing the deepening tenderness and care with which you interract with everyone. As a woman who is still working on the acceptance of her delicateness and tenderness it is so powerfully healing to witness men who are expressing these qualities, as well as inspiring. It is also simply delightful to witness and experience. Thank you.
Thank you Michael, please offer your delicateness and tenderness to all woman and men. My son, now 8 years old, and all other boys and girls are desperate for role models like you in their life.
Being hard is really hard for the body to feel–no one really enjoys it! Our bodies carry the wisdom and science to tell us truth, the body is our forever on-going learning and one which I would joy-fully sign up to go to classes on.
As I have learnt to listen to my body more and more it becomes more and more of a loud presenter of truth every day. When I am feeling hard, it is really hard work and it feels incredibly yucky, and I will invariably pay the price. Learning to appreciate this as a gift and a blessing is still a commitment on my part but it is well worth it, for expressing from the delicate gorgeous me feels absolutely amazing.
I agree being delicate is my strength too and I’m a guy!
Exactly Dean, ain’t that the truth!
Totally true across the board hey Dean – we have all been so fooled into a false version of strength and of weakness….and it has effected guys just as much if not more than women – this tough guy thing to live up to, and women stirive to be ‘equal to’ rather than all just settling back into the power of our naturally delicate ways as our greatest strength.
The Esoteric Breast Massage(EBM) is a revolutionary modality that is transforming women’s lives world wide. Many of us have re-connected back to our essential delicate self and have reclaimed the divine woman within through having EBM’s. As a community of women who have had the privilege of receiving this modality it is time to get behind it and take it out to all women.
Hear Hear maryloiusemyers – thank heaven for EBM and the huge huge support to settle into my body and let go of layers upon layers of hardness, protection and all sorts of stuff that had sat over the top of the delicate self, preventing her from being felt, let alone shining in a world that so sorely misses its tender women folk. Thank God for EBM modalies and the incalculable depth of practical support they offer the world – reminding us always there is so so much more to us than skin deep, there is a woman worth cherishing and a divinity to be felt and lived and known.
I agree Mary-Louise, it is time for all of us who have benefited from this very important modality, the Esoteric Breast Massage, to write our own case studies so that we can share our experiences and inspire other women to seek the very same deep healing we have experienced.
I constantly remind myself of being delicate and not overwriding it. Shifting the believe that delicateness is weak took me a long while. But the journey to my true self was worth it and I am looking forward to what will come.
I must admit I found it difficult at first to even recognise the preciousness and delicateness you describe Cherise, having lived the exact opposite all my life. To me these words meant being weak, unsubstantial and feeble and any association with them was unthinkable. My ‘way in’ though, was through increasing my awareness by listening to those ever-so subtle messages from my body and heeding them. For example, feeling the soreness of my forearms against the sharp edge of the desk when typing or noticing I’d be cold and needing more layers on a walk. By being responsive in this way, the signals just kept coming, my awareness increased and my connection to my own delicateness was confirmed. In heeding these subtle feedback signals, I began to honour my body and in that honouring, I accepted what was true for me. That was the birth of my true strength – honouring me.
Love it Cathy – some very practical steps to deconstructing the layers we have built up over our lives… simple, not difficult but powerful in providing us access back to really feeling what is going on.
I went to boarding school when I was 6 because my parents were living in the Middle East and they felt an English Education would be better for me. I learned to cry very quietly under my bedclothes and that stayed with me into adulthood – I hated crying in front of anybody, because I felt it made me look weak. Now I am being more honest and understand that my fragility and sensitivity and honesty are strengths, and the hardness I developed over the 65 years of my life served no purpose other than to shut people out – I’ve missed out on many beautiful relationships as a result.
Such a deep clarity Carmel. While we ‘think’ we are saving ourselves from hurt by hardening we are actually adding to the load. There such a heaviness to hardening I find it very tiering to hold and carry it constantly. Letting me out of this bond and opening up my fragility frees me up and allows people to see me for who I am and at the same time I’m inviting a deeper more loving connection between us. This is a win win, rather than the alternate loose loose.
What a wonderful addit to this blog Carmel, so appreciated and I expect much heeded by younger readers with their whole life before them. At the same time it is clear from your delicate and beautiful expression that we can open up and let people in at any age!
Thank you Carmel for sharing how hiding our sadness is another way of keeping people out. I can relate to this and behaved in this way for many, many years and at times still can hide how I am really feeling, though am learning that my body suffers greatly when I do this as anything not expressed is held in it somewhere, which means I then have to harden more to not feel this tension. Letting go, and letting people in and expressing is certainly the way to go :).
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.” I am just beginning to realise this too Cherise, and it is such a lovely freeing feeling, as I allow the delicateness to replace the hardness that I have held in my body for most of my life.
Me too Alison. The hardness masks the delicateness, so it is very freeing to drop it and honour our true delicate quality. Something I am still working on but get glimpses of how delicate I am when I remember to honour myself.
As I read this and look back on my own life I can see how we miss out on so much when we build this wall and I can see now that if there are any ‘windows’ in it they are murky and tainted with assuming everyone and everything in the world will harm me. I lived like this for most of my life and at times can still see the world through this window. However as I connect with and honour my tenderness and natural delicateness more as well as accepting sensitivity as our true nature, the wall comes down, the windows become cleaner and I get to feel how life can really be with love, expression and allowing other people in past the iron ‘gates’! Thank you Cherise.
Very beautiful jsnelgrove36 – something I’m sure many of us can relate to, and the ‘other way’ you present is as accessible as it is inspiring – Thank you.
so beautiful shared jsnelgrove36, thank you.
Recently I met a young woman in her 20’s and was struck by how delicate she is, her bone structure, her skin and her general manner. What was interesting was that she took up hobbies that went completely against this delicacy – horse riding where she had broken a number of bones, and kick boxing! The kick boxing was suggested to her by her mother as she was see as being too fragile to handle herself in a tough world. How sad it is that we feel we have to toughen up to survive instead of honouring who we are and the beauty that we bring.
I recognise what you write Susan about her handling herself in a tough world. My oldest daughter had a few self-defence lessons. She didn’t feel it was for her because she had to toughen up and the physical contact was painfull. Whe talked about it and she said with so much trust and an inner knowing, that she was not afraid that anything would happen to her. And that was her last defending lesson, we stopped it because the lessons felt harmfull to her body.
wow that’s amazing Diane that she could feel the inner strength that she has as opposed to building an outer strength – which essentially keeps the inner locked away.
That’s really interesting Susan – I have noticed that too in some of my friends – they are so delicate and yet they choose to do things like horse-riding and kick boxing which to me seems completely against their nature.
I remember being championed as a girl and teenager for being strong and doing things that were more common for boys to choose. This just confirmed to me that it was ok what I was choosing and so I continued it into Adulthood as well. I’ve now, thank goodness, returned to knowing myself in a more true and natural way and saying no to many things that are rough or hard. Thank you for sharing your delicateness in your expression Cherise.
I do remember that too Aimee. I had a very strong ideal that doing the same as most boys did was more valued than doing things most girls were doing. Looking back from the point where I am now that is so strange as why would it be better to do more things that are common for boys?
So beautiful Cherise, I love this line “being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too” The more i am feeling and learning to allow my true delicateness be felt by those around me, also within myself, the more i can see that and feel that in other women. It fosters understanding and a love for others that i didn’t think was possible. Which feels pretty amazing.
True what you share here Mary “We all hold onto this brick wall that we build around ourselves thinking that no one can penetrate our defence”. But by doing this we also hold ourselve prisoned. We don’t let people in and we also do not let ourselves out in the world.
“Being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too”. This was the exact feeling I had by the end of reading your blog Cherise. There is so much strength in accepting how delicate, gentle, caring, loving, and the list goes on, we are as women. It’s enough strength to knock any brick wall down.
And it does just that Kim, it knocks down the walls of hurt that keep us separate.
It is so easy to fall into the roughness and toughness of the world, and no wonder, we are surrounded by it every day. But then there are also gentle moments which I can mostly observe in people when they have a caring moment for another. We have made hardness, fastness and efficiency our daily goal but it keeps us away from connecting with each other and deeply caring for one another. We still have to come a long way and we need to understand that the human being, the human connection is what counts and not the outcomes in whatever we are doing.
Well said Esther, it is the connection between us that matters, taking a moment to ask another how they are, connect listen appreciate. That is the essence of life and we do seem to have abandoned it in favour of the material world. Cherise’s article restores the importance of embracing our delicate and tender qualities and placing them centre stage in our lives. When we do the magic of life comes home.
Rowena – I love how you write ‘placing our delicate and tender qualities centre stage in our lives. And the magic of life does indeed come home from there.’ Who would have guessed ?
Same here Alexandra… the true magic comes from our connection, our ability to build and cherish deep relationships which all get desensitised when we ignore them (especially if there is any of that ‘stiff upper lip’ the English are renowned for!)
As I re-read this post the word ‘resilience’ came to mind. In the corporate world, resilience is a quality much used, admired and sold as something to cultivate. But what does it mean? One definition of resilience is ‘a process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats or significant sources of stress — such as family and relationship …’ * There are courses designed to teach people how to be resilient. It occurred to me that the quest to become more resilient could be misdirected, lead one away from delicacy and tenderness and towards building hardness in the body and forming protective shields. True resilience is living life in a way that minimises stress, through connectedness to self, harmonious living and remaining open and loving. We can be strong and delicate, able to respond to life challenges and threats without putting up protective barriers or going into attack. Instead we can learn to see each threat as an opportunity to lovingly evolve and enable others to do the same.
*American psychological Association
i love this thread as what is showing from it is how if we allow our tenderness and delicacy in our expression and ways of being and connecting with others we will create a ripple affect of inspiration that will support all we come in contact with to experience and reconnect to their own delicacy and tenderness once again.
Yes Esther, ‘the human connection is what counts and not the outcomes in whatever we are doing.’
I can so attest to this as I lived in hardness for so so so long (and still do but to a much lesser extent) and since connecting to my gentleness and loveliness, I am much more connected and open to people than I have for many years. Being delicate is the perfect antidote to hardness.
I agree, in many ways the world is designed to for us to perform as quickly and as efficiently as possible and often without care, creating a hardness in our bodies. I know when I use drive to be faster and more efficient I loose connection with myself and other people around me, however if I connect first I’m naturally pretty efficient and do everything with a much deeper care.
Great observation Meg. Yes, we have been fooled into thinking that we have to look like we are stressed, and push, so to be seen to be busy and look committed. How wrong we have got it.
I totally get that – being seen to be busy or look ok is a big thing for me, and most people I think. I notice at work if I’m at the computer doing admin jobs I sometimes have the thought that people probably think I am doing nothing. It’s crazy! Instead of trusting this is what I need to do and knowing it doesn’t matter what other people think. It really shows me how much what I do and think is influenced by who and what is around me.
HI Esther, good point – it is the roughness and toughness of the world that has had me believing and convinced that my sensitivity and delicateness won’t hold up. That it will be crushed. This is why I can feel it is so important to re-claim the strength of our sensitivity – rather then be fooled that it is not strong enough to withstand the harshness of life as I have been up to this point. Earlier in this blog a comment from Nicola Lessing stood out for me where she said ‘it takes great strength and courage’ to live our true sensitivity and delicateness. I feel inspired.
I have been getting more in touch with the delicateness I feel inside myself & it feels very different to before, where I believed being delicate was a weakness. There seems to me to be a whole depth of delicateness to explore which I have ignored in the past. Thank you for a lovely article Cherise, and I loved where you said ‘being a delicate woman is my true strength-and also every other woman’s too’.
So many of us have been tricked into seeing being delicate as a weakness hey Sue – and I love where you say there “seems to be a whole depth of delicateness to explore” – this is how I feel too, that as the hard top layers are let go of, there are then a forever work in progress layers, or depths of delicacy and true strenght to accept and allow in our daily lives.
Yes it is as you say Kate, to accept and allow it into our daily lives because it is always there for us. It’s not something we need to acquire or manifest, it is just there waiting for us to connect to it and accept that we have it in spades and to allow it freely without judgement.
Isn’t that so flipped as to how we have come to imagine ‘development’ is – nothing to reach for, nothing external to be gained or acheived, and everything already there inside just waiting for us to feel and allow, and this is an ever literally ‘unfolding’ process as we accept and let go back into ourselves more as we open back up to our own innate heavenly nature.
It is such a total trick indeed Kate – well said
Thank you Cherise. I do too see this in men as too in women. it is sad when this gets moulded out of us, particularly from a young age.
I completely agree Ben – both men and women are naturally very sensitive, tender and delicate. It takes strength and courage for us to allow and live that but when we do it is very powerful and well worth it!
I love your words here Nicola, strength and courage. Thank you.
Thank you Nicola,
Your sharing stills me deeply. Opening for me more space to fully accept the sensitiveness that all of us have inside. Allowing me to understand deeper exactly why we all react the way we do sometimes, especially when we are feeling super sensitive and vulnerable.
Since i allow myself to be more tender and sensitive i am also able to see it in others. Especially in men which is amazing! Men might have a strong body but if you connect they often respond to the tenderness being offered.
I agree Ben, I feel this in men just as much as women. There are times in my workplace when I am serving a couple and the man feels closer to this sensitivity then the woman does. I don’t feel gender matters at all when it comes to our sensitivity and willingness to connect. Its down to the person.
I’ve been getting more in tune with my innate delicateness too and feeling how actually it is really powerful and has real worth in the world.
I feel the same Fiona, feeling that I am getting more in tune with my innate delicateness and observing how actually it is really powerful and so valuable and needed as a reflection in our world. And in that, I also feel as Cherise wrote that I am only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality, there is so much more to unfold, embrace and realize.
Cherise I love this blog especially when I see so often women being hard and toughening up like I sometimes still do under the false belief that this is a necessary way of surviving in this world. Your blog and women like you inspire me to live a different way, of honouring my preciousness and accepting and loving my natural way and not over riding myself. Thank you so much.
Working with children I cherish those moments when I observe a child giving themselves (and being supported to do so) the space and grace to feel and express when they are hurt, either physically or by words. It is almost like I can see the patterns of toughening up and gender regulation crumble and have less of a hold over all of us.
Cherise what you have said really sings to me. I always equated girliness, womanliness and delicacy with weakness and the kind of vulnerability that invites attack and abuse. There were no role models to show me any other way. I also was extremely sensitive, and developed a lot of ‘scar tissue’ or brick walls to protect me from the hardness of life. It can be a big job to come out of the hardness into delicacy and discover that it is part of a woman’s true strength, as I am just beginning to understand with Natalie Benhayon and the other powerful women living the Livingness. Never too old to learn something gob-smackingly new and wonderful!
Imagine the length of the China wall well that felt like the depth of the wall I had around myself to not show anyone how delicate, caring and tender I was, there was this don’t mess with me going on and really it was a tuff act to keep. Esoteric Womens health has opened my heart and eyes
Cherise this beautiful blog has reminded me of how much I once needed to accepted by the boys I so closely identified with as they appeared to have more ‘freedom’ to be themselves! boy did I get that wrong as they were going through their own toughing up journey. Being one of the boys soon became exhausting, being aware that men are actually delicate a sensitive too, we can melt together in this exquisite delicateness that we are naturally.
Thank you Cherise for your gorgeous article – a sure reflection of the gorgeous woman that you are! This was just the right article for me to read, for at this moment in time I am in the process of letting go of another layer, a layer of hardness I have carried with me for so long – a layer that I have used and still sometimes use as a protection. It is so much about me catching myself when I use this hardness, and then reminding myself that it is OK to just allow my delicateness, my sensitivity and my fragility to show, and in the process allow the world to see me.
Why don’t we allow Ourselves as woman to feel how truly delicate we truly are ?
Is going against our true nature the very thing that hardens ..yes I totally relate to this and the more I become aware of this each day the less the need to harden. It only takes a moments pause to feel and appreciate the sensitivity, now that is a true strength !
Cherise I could really feel the quality in which you touch your face with when I read your words. This has inspired me to pay more attention to the delicacy I already am with myself. It is through the noticing of all that already am and express that inspires me to express more. Thank you for the inspiration Cherise.
I like how you’ve said that you are only just scratching the surface on how delicate we are. I always get a sense that when we were young we knew this naturally and it was the only way I knew how to be with myself. And now that we are rediscovering what it means to be delicate, we get more in touch with our natural divine nature.
I see the delicateness and fragility in small children and know that is in me and everyone too, men and women. Connecting to this is definitely a strength.
Recently, I have felt the delicateness within me more deeply and it is so beautiful when I am able to sustain it. Reading this beautiful blog is a wonderful reminder of the delicateness I know is within me and within every other woman and man too. Thank you Cherise for sharing.
A beautiful blog Cherise, you have outlined what is so common amongst women today, of toughening up to match the men. It is so lovely to see women retain their natural delicateness as you describe, in fact to me, it is what is most beautiful about a woman. And what’s more, it is even more rare in a man, but equally beautiful in my eyes.
The example of the girl in the swimming pool that you gave at the start of the blog is very common and if you are a little boy, well you are given even less space to express your delicateness and fragility. Is it possible that men are actually very delicate and sensitive too and to honour this is not a weakness but a great strength?
Andrew, this is a great point, little boys who fall and hurt themselves also feel the pain yet we ask them to toughen up with no room for the sensitive beings that they are. Is it not time that we treated our young boys with the gentleness that we wish them to be as ‘gentle men’.
A great point you make Andrew. Could it be that all boys and girls, men and women are equally tender and genuinely precious? and far greater than any amount of hardness could ever cover up.
Feeling our delicateness as a women and living this is our real strength and power and is beautiful and inspirational. Thank you for writing about this and sharing with all women to claim and know who we truly are.Our sensitivity and divineness is well worth claiming and celebrating as this will bring a change and loving way to ourself and to the world much needed .
Acceptance is key, accepting our body and accepting all that we are, including our imperfections, is how we give ourselves permisson as women to shine, shine our beauty out into the world for all to see.
Thank you Cherise. Yes, we need to claim this delicate preciousness within ourselves to live as true role models for every other woman in this world so we can all come back to living from our true nature.
Growing up, I never had a problem being delicate when alone, but always felt I had to harden up when others were around. Everything around me told me it wasn’t acceptable to be delicate and sensitive, however inside I knew the oppositite to be true. I conformed and took on those false beliefs, which were never beneficial to me or anyone else. We are all naturally delicate, sensitive and beautifully divine women.
I can relate to this Carmin as I would be the same and act aggressive and defensive as though I was armed ready for attack when with people, but when on my own I was a different person – never likely I preferred my own company. It is interesting that what we label as a weakness can actually be our greatest strength.
Thank you Cherise for sharing how we can be delicate as women yet be in our power.
Cherise, I too am feeling the amazing strength that comes when we embrace our own delicateness. It is very sad how so many of us women have lost this sense of who we are as women. We have fallen for the belief that we have to compete with men, and join in with what they present. But out expression is rather different, and if we don’t allow ourselves to be naturally delicate, we all miss out on this tender beauty.
This is so true, Esther. To nurture and appreciate our delicateness is like laying a warm coat of love around our shoulders and body.
I really enjoyed this quote “I now hold a more true sense of what it actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” There is something profound about considering the words, power and delicateness together, something very honouring and truthful. Being aware that as a woman I can be both powerful and delicate and these can be seamlessly expressed.
I agree Samantha that it feels very truthful to consider power and delicateness as being expressed together. Until recently I would not have thought that delicateness and power could be expressed at the same time for we are led to believe that they are the opposite to each other. I have had the privilege of knowing many women now who are living examples of how strong and inspiring delicateness and grace can actually be.
I totally agree with what you are saying. I, myself have done exactly the same. All my life I have hardened my body and shut people out, in fear of being hurt. However, through having Esoteric Chakra Puncture, I have started to reawaken my womanhood and femininity, through truly connecting with my body and growing my awareness. I have also started to accept that my sensitivity is one of my strongest strengths and having spent a life time hiding it, I am now learning to embrace it!
Why don’t we as women allow ourselves to feel how delicate we are? This is a great question and one that needs to be answered and understood in the way you have in this blog. This liberates us to make a different choice and to be able to claim back the delicate woman which resides in each one of us.
To follow on from my previous comment : we can all be the true role models that women need, as who do they have to inspire them, if there are not women living delicately.
Reading this again Cherise, I can feel how much my whole body celebrates what you are saying. Yes, I can be delicate. Yes, I can honour my exquisiteness – to no end. In a world that is forever saying ‘no’ to this way of being – it is an absolute joy to say YES to another way – the way our delicate bodies have been craving.
I find it interesting to consider how as a child both myself and the girls around me all had a natural delicacy and that when the world started to impose upon this delicate nature, both myself and the girls around me choose to let it in, to change according to what was expected of us. When perhaps we could have chosen to to remain with our own sweet delicate nature and still be fully functioning adults, but just in a different way to the one being presented to us by the adults at the time. And then, as adults ourselves we would be the role models for the young girls growing up, showing them how to remain true to ourselves.
Cherise, i observe this reaction too from people when a child hurts themselves, ‘the response from the adults around her was to immediately suggest she ‘get over it’, ‘harden up’ or ‘laugh it off’.’ If my son hurts himself people often say ‘your ok’ or ‘your a strong boy’, basically saying don’t cry, this always feels awful to me as it is very natural for children to cry if they hurt themselves, so it feels like children are being encouraged to override what they feel, to not be sensitive and to not express themselves, but to toughen up and pretend they are ok.
Holding a quality of delicateness throughout the day – this feels like a valuable programme to put myself on, inspired by this blog and the comments. To get to know ourselves more in our essence is something really precious.
‘Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?’ A very important question, one that men could equally ask. Are we protecting ourselves from the hardness and tension that we live in? Are we pushing ourselves to achieve an ideal?
Great question Lisa, I feel that we indeed push ourselves and over-ride our delicateness to achieve ideals about being able to endure the struggle and challenges in life and beliefs such as ‘What does not break you makes you stronger’. As if it is character building to to push our bodies through things that are really at our expense.
Yes it is a great question Lisa. I feel it begins when we are young, our delicateness brought up to much for our mothers who had dis-connected from there’s and not liking the force that came with the jealousy we let it go and hardened up and continue to as we know that if we were to claim back our delicate, tender ways we would be subject to this force again. Just so we are clear I am not blaming our mothers as they too had to contend with that energy and changed themselves because of it.
As I read this blog I was reminded of the truly delicate nature of myself, and therefore how far away I actually was from it the moment before. Thank you. It is easy to get drawn away from the true nature of ourselves, but also easy to choose to come back.
Sarah thank you for your sharing how you experienced looking for acceptance. So may ways to turn away from ourselves, yet with great appreciation and a deepening awareness I’m discovering there is only one way to bring on back me to me. Yah for self acceptance, self nurturing and self love which fills us up from the inside out … no room for needing another’s approval to be who we already divinely are. :)) We are a joy to behold simply for this.
Thank you Sandra, it seems so simply when you put it like that and it should be that simple as it is the natural state which we will all return to at some stage.
I have to be honest although on a bigger scale I no longer look for approval and from a glance you may think that I have healed that in myself but as I look at things with more detail the ways in which I am still needing certain circumstances or people to do something for me or knowledge something, (on a subtle level) in order for me to feel confirmed in what I am feeling, exposes the fact that it is still not always coming from the inside out. Alas perfection is not the goal and we can only observe these things without critic until they no longer have a place.
In the attempt to liberate ourselves as woman we have step away from the qualities that makes us so beautifully different from men. I feel this hardness has been so drummed into me that at times in my life I actually thought it was who I was, which is not true at all. It is still a battle for me to see tenderness and delicateness as strengths. I am literally retraining myself. I was championed by my peers for being tuff and hard growing up, especially by men. There was always a comment ‘Your not like other girls Sarah’ and those comments kept me owned and I identified with the recognition. I had convinced myself that I met men as an equal but it was a total lie. It was me choosing a retardation of the woman I truly am, in order to be accepted and gain a false sense of love to fill an emptiness.
So well expressed Sarah so many of us change ourselves to be accepted and liked by others because we do not have enough self-worth to stay with how we feel to best express as a woman
Through EBMs with amazing practitioners such as yourself, I have been able to slowly unlock this hardness, realise my self worth and reconnect to the delicateness that has always been patiently waiting to come out. What you dedicate your time endlessly to in woman’s health has been life changing to have access to, I am glad you travel often as to offer that same blessing to woman all around the world. Thank you for who you are.
Beautifully expressed Sarah, I whole~heartedly agree that I am so grateful for my EBM practitioners and fellow women of Esoteric Women’s Health. Dedicated, committed and working with such a depth of purpose to bring true women’s health to as many women as possible. So that we may all reconnect to our innate ease and beauty of being a woman.
This is beautiful and so true, being delicate is not weak. It has a strength within, knowing who you truly are and being able to open up without a guard or angst to be hurt is true strength. There is nothing to protect, because you show everything.
Beautifully expressed Benkt, It’s time to learn to live who we truly are, and all the protection we have been using does not serve us at all, it never really has, so time to let it go and just be who we are. Seeing a woman living and honouring how delicate she is, is divinely beautiful and disarming. That’w what the world needs more of.
Reflecting on the incident of the young girl at the pool, I realised how familiar it sounded, with the adults piling in and offering their solutions of ‘get over it’, ‘harden up’ or ‘laugh it off, all of which might as well be carrying a neon sign of “Close off to your delicateness so you do not feel your pain!’
How refreshing and truly supportive would it be if instead we encouraged one another to feel our pain (which I find is usually more our inner reaction than the physical pain), reflect on what choices led to that scenario, use that situation to build our understanding about life and to evolve.
Well said, Golnaz, ‘with the adults piling in and offering their solutions of ‘get over it’, ‘harden up’ or ‘laugh it off, all of which might as well be carrying a neon sign of “Close off to your delicateness so you do not feel your pain!” It also feels like they do this so their attention is focussed away from any possibility of their connecting to their own pain of being told exactly the same thing when they were young and remembering how they disconnected from their true selves …. And so the wheel keeps spinning and the pattern of turning away from one’s tender and delicate innate way of being is trampled on and squashed out of existence and another generation loses its awareness.
Now, thanks to the Universal Medicine healing modalities and Serge Benhayon’s presentations, we are being supported to develop a deeper awareness of what is really happening in life and have the opportunity, no matter what age we are, to truly embrace these precious qualities we all hold within and start breaking the cycle for the generations to come.
What is there to gain from being hard and tough when we have to shut down our expression in order to do so. There is nothing weak about being precious.
Shutting down our expression and changing who we are so we can fit in with a world that not only says it is fine to be tough and hard but encourages and supports it in every facet of life. Learning to stand out and not fit and to honour our gentleness tenderness and fragility takes strength and as you say Joshua there is nothing weak in being precious.
Absolutely Alison. It actually takes a great deal of strength to be willing to stand out and not fit in. Honouring our preciousness is not weak at all.
Fragility takes more strength than being tough ever could
That is just it Joshua. Being hard and tough gets us absolutely no where and only builds another layer that needs to be broken down to reveal what was always there in the first place.
Feels like being hard and tough is making ‘hard’ work for ourselves especially when we want to get back to living the delicacy and preciousness we were living once again.
Well put Joshua, It takes more energy to be something we are not naturally, and then we have to undo this fortress we have built up to allow our true fragility and tenderness to shine.
Good point Joshua, to not live and honour our true tenderness, we shut down our natural expression. This is absolutley harming to ourselves and everybody around us. Without expression nothing happens, everything is stunted and arrested. Our reason to be is for evolution, and for supporting each other to evolve, back to who we innately are. Expressing more and more who we truly are, in all our delicate ways, is a most important step in this development.
Absolutely Esther. Well said
If we are aware of how delicate and intricate the body truly is we would never even consider kick boxing.
Living from my delicate and sensitive place within, is my strength. The hard and tougher exterior I used to express was to cover up and protect myself. I also now realise it stopped me from letting the truth of what love is, in, and kept me hurting.
Sometimes now I still catch myself speaking in a harsh way and it really hurts. The more gentle I am with myself though when this happens, the more I can feel my true sensitive self and know that I always have the choice with each and every next breath which energy I will choose to express from.
It is so lovely when we allow ourselves to be delicate and tender with ourselves. It changes everything around us. When I see it in a baby it melts me but I know it is possible to bring that into adult life too and not keep it locked away as we so often do as we get older.
I love re-reading this article Cherise, this time what stood out for me was ‘As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.’ I can really feel how this happened to me as a young woman and how sad it felt to not live my naturally sensitive, gentle way. i went the complete opposite and put on a very hard, tough front, but underneath i was super sensitive, it feels lovely to now be re-connecting to my sensitivity and natural tenderness.
Yes absolutely, rebeccawingrave, it has hurt me deeply too, more than anything to not embrace the beautiful woman within me. The more I connect, feel the true qualities of being a woman and begin to claim them, the more I love being me and therefore, there is less room for sadness.
Cherise, for a large part of my 72 years I too “ tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature”. I was forced, lovingly so, to deal with the consequences of ignoring the fact that I was a ‘loving and deeply tender woman living in a way that’ was so unnatural, although at the time I did not know any other way. It took several near-death illnesses and then meeting Serge Benhayon and Natalie Benhayon for me to become aware that ‘being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too. Thank you for an inspiring blog.
Thank you Anne, an inspiring account that we could all learn from.
If we stop to look a the way we go about our everyday chores, its amazing how little we regard our delicateness as women. As a mother of 3 young children i know that i chose extreme hardness to cope with the extra demands, this left me feeling exhausted and empty. With the continued support of Universal Medicine i have turned this self sabotage around and am beginning to appreciate the tender qualities that make a women so innately powerful.
As you say Cherise, I too feel I am just scratching the surface of true delicacy as a consistent a way of being. How gorgeous it is to take the time , really take the time, and allow myself to go deeper. My body responds, and I feel the true power of delicacy.
Well said, Jenny. When I too take the time and bring delicateness into the way I touch, move, speak etc, every cell lights up in confirmation that this is the true way for me to be in a woman’s body – and this can only deepen and get stronger.
It seems to be expected and respected that women (and men) toughen up to be able to deal with the world. And why would anyone want to be otherwise when they believe that they would feel and be seen as weak if they were to drop their guard. This was the way I used to feel until I discovered my divine essence within. My approach to life is now totally the opposite, as if I toughen up I cannot feel this divine essence within me. If I honour myself as a precious tender woman my essence gets stronger. This is an amazing replacement to the hardness and toughness that I used to think was so necessary. Well worth dropping the wall of protection.
I haven’t completely dropped my wall of protection Rebecca, but getting there. What you share helps me appreciate how much more there is to feel. ‘..if I toughen up I cannot feel this divine essence within me. If I honour myself as a precious tender woman my essence gets stronger’
I haven’t completely dropped my wall of protection either Kehinde, and I have days when I go into my old protections to deal with what is going on in my day. But I know the beauty I can feel within when I stop and feel and allow it, and the more I feel it the more I realise I do not need these protections.
It felt beautiful reading this Cherise. Once I would have scoffed at women talking about being delicate and tender, and seen it as weakness. I made my life difficult by being tough, independent, with somewhat of a sarcastic veneer, and a hardened ‘male like’ way of being over my womanliness. I did this to protect the tender girl inside and it actually hurt. To be allowing that delicate and tender woman space now, as you are doing, is the greatest gift a woman could ever give herself. For me, it has changed my relationship with myself and others enormously so there is much more honesty and acceptance. I love what you say here “The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” This is now my experience also.
The scenario you describe at the start of your blog is all to common. It is also often the case that ‘like a girl’ is used as an insult – you run like a girl or scream like a girl. But what if in actual fact a woman does not need to toughen up to be strong, and does not need to act like a man to do something well. What if this idea we have that to do something ‘like a girl’ is weak, is simply because we have championed one kind of strength for to long, and not truly appreciated that their are other kinds of strength that come from within – the strength of being vulnerable and fragile, the strength of caring and nurturing yourself and others deeply.
So true Mary, it has been my experience too. The more I have chosen to recognise and then dismantle my defences the more love I allow into my life. We put so much effort into protecting ourselves from imagined hurts, it seems to suck the joy out of us. How do we end up living the exact opposite of who we truly are? Learning to allow my tenderness and delicacy out into the world has brought immensely beneficial changes into my life and I know that this is available to everyone, if they so choose to start dismantling the walls that lay between them and the rest of humanity.
I can relate to what you have written here Cherise, having grown up hard and believing that I couldn’t be a weak female, the words delicate would never have come out of my mouth or even been a consideration until only very recently. Now I can feel that it is not weakness to be delicate at all, but a strength and deeply honouring of oneself.
As someone who is also just touching the sides of her delicate nature, only recently just feeling safe enough to be in this way consistently, I am moved to Stillness in reading this as I could feel the sweet delicacy of your words come home to me, Cherise.
If I stop to actually feel the damage I have done to myself by overriding this very natural and essential part of me, it almost brings me to tears, the image of a crushed flower, bruised and torn, upon the ground comes to mind. Yet going deeper and feeling into this Stillness, I realise the delicateness has always been there for me to return to, just waiting for me to let down the wall and just be with it. As you say, I have made it worse for myself by being protective of my delicateness and keeping people out just hurts. I became the crusher of my own sensitivity and I’m so glad this pattern of behaving is finally being let go of.
I loved these words, too: “The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too,” were just magic just as if you had held me, too.
I love what you have written here Peta, I too am returning to my delicateness and it feels so lovely. I am feeling the power of connection in hugs and looks and am aware of how exposed I feel at times in this connection.
So true Peta – I can see that it is very harming when I do not honour my sweet, delicate nature. it also hurts to feel how others override their delicateness.
Yes Peta, the image of the crushed flower, bruised and torn is a good one and yet we are the creators of our own crushing and bruising when we leave and let go of our essence. It is a blessing that Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s Health have highlighted the way back and have shown us the way home again.
This is beautiful Peta, I am also choosing to let go of my protection in favour of my natural delicate, tender nature.
Beautifully expressed Peta – the analogy of the crushed flower, bruised and torn on the ground says it all and knowing we crush our own delicateness by hardening in protection was very familiar to me. I am enjoying opening more to accept and truly feel the exquisite delicateness and sweetness that is within me.
When someone moves and behaves in a way that says they deeply honour their delicateness, it offers me a stop moment, it shows me how hardened I have become and how much I actually miss my own delicateness which deserves just as much love and honouring. Reading your blog, now I can feel how I used to choose to go even more into toughing up at those moments in order to avoid feeling the deep hurt of abandoning my own preciousness. What a hard work that has been. So glad to be finding my way back.
I have also realised that abandoning my preciousness is really painful. Then on top of that masking it with hardness only adds to the pain layer. Connecting to inner preciousness, delicateness, sweetness, lightness and tenderness is sublime. I am working on making this feeling my constant, and like you Fumiyo I am so glad to be finding my way back.
I agree, Fumiyo and Rachel. To let go of the hardness and the protective response to life allows us to start feeling the exquisiteness of our essence again.
Yes it is quite painful which is why we often build up the walls – and it is the walls that cause the pain – it can be such a vicious cycle. And the only remedy I have found is actually to commit to feeling my delicateness and my preciousness….because I have lived with the hardening remedy for too long now and it almost broke me. And I miss my loveliness so much when I do that. I am very grateful for Universal Medicine and Esoteric Womens Health for supporting me to re-connect to my loveliness and delicateness.
Like you Rachel and Fumiyo, I am finding my way back to inner preciousness, delicateness, sweetness, lightness and tenderness.
I find that when someone walks being completely present and with their body in their true power or is open allowing their fragility, tenderness and openess, as you have shared ‘honouring their delicateness’ this really inspires me and reflects to me a different way to be in my body. Also even walking with presence and in true power what I am learning is you can also be delicate, or sensitive in doing this.
Great point Vicky – walking ‘in our power’ doesn’t mean we have to be hard, strong or protected.. We can be powerful by being delicate and sensitive.
Beautifully expressed Fumiyo, this is my experience too.
I’m with you there Fumiyo as to falling for moments to choose to toughen up to avoid feeling the abandon preciousness,these days welcoming these moments to finding my way back…
Great statement Mary, ‘our lives are lived the exact opposite to who we truly are meant to be.’ It feels like it has been gradual and sometimes subtle layers on top of each other and unless we are aware of them building up, in time it becomes our fortress.
Why is this? Why are our lives the exact opposite of who we truly are? I know there is so much of me I am currently not living at the moment and wondering why even still I have excuses of not being all who I truly am.
The invitation to separate from self happens early in life and is constantly reinforced by comments like toughen-up, get a grip, try harder etc. reflecting on these comments I realise they are not about the person being spoken to, but about the person speaking – very exposing. Beautifully expressed Cherise and something I will take with me into the day – loving and being precious.
‘they are not about the person being spoken to, but about the person speaking’, great point ch1956. Those words are another persons expectations or ideals that we do not have to pay homage to.
Ah yes, it’s interesting when you’re labelled weak because you’re sensitive. I used to be hard as a rock, and I was one of those people who considered myself strong and fiercely independent. These days I choose to allow myself to feel a whole lot more than I did back then, and I feel sooooo much stronger in myself. Being more of the real me is far more empowering than spending all my time protecting myself from……myself really.
Amazing to hear you claim that Elodie – how being the real, sensitive you is more powerful than any protection or hardness you’ve developed to keep others out. We are reshaping ideals here.
Love what you shared here Elodie…choosing to surrender to my own sensitivity more and more, has also inspired a strength that is building in me and one that allows me to break down my own barrier to seeing and feeling more of the real me. Futile isn’t it that we spend so much time protecting ourselves from ourselves … thus shutting others out from experiencing the strength of our sensitivity !!!
True Christina…. and boy how much the world needs our sensitivity. One day we will realise we are all as equally sensitive and delicate as each other, and all the game playing of being tough, putting up walls and having ‘protection’ was the biggest time waster of all… a game that cost us years and lifetimes of being who we truly are.
That will be the day Kylie. a day to start living today!
Wow I felt such a sense of true power while reading your words Elodie. Being who we are, as delicate blooms in the world today holds so much strength.
This is beautiful Elodie.
I agree, allowing yourself to feel is like taking the cloth from your eyes and allowing yourself to actually see whats going on – it gives you a strength because you are not blindly going through life trying to make sure its okay, but instead feeling yourself and life and finding your way from there.
So called “protecting ourselves” from getting hurt by others by hardening and creating a false wall actually shuts us off from letting people in and from us letting our true essence shine out. It also stops us from feeling the preciousness, delicateness and sacredness of who we are as woman or men. I agree with you Elodie-
“Being more of the real me is far more empowering than spending all my time protecting myself from……myself really.”
And by being the “real me” it takes so much less effort. Having the wall up I have found uses so much energy. In the past I have wondered why I felt so exhausted all the time Could it be the more “real” we are, the more energy we have to get about our daily lives?
I agree and can relate with what Elodie and Loretta share here.
I understand just what you are saying here Elodie, as I have got older and don’t have to compete in a mans world anymore I have slowly removed my defences, become more tender, more aware and stronger for it.
If I am willing to feel my sensitivity, to really feel the pain that is there if say, people are harsh or abusive towards me, then I can truly express with honesty, and say how much it hurts to be spoken to in a harsh or abusive way. I can say no to it. It is this judgment free honest communication which can then help to stop the cycle of abuse in our communications. It gives another the opportunity to stop, and realise that their natural way is not to communicate in a hurtful or abusive manner.
Gorgeous Catherine, ‘If I am willing to feel my sensitivity, to really feel the pain that is there if say, people are harsh or abusive towards me, then I can truly express with honesty, and say how much it hurts to be spoken to in a harsh or abusive way. I can say no to it.’ I am starting to do this, particularly with how people speak to me and even if there are reactions from people when I call out what feels hard and abusive then it still feels really important to have expressed how i feel and saying no what does not feel loving, after years of living with lack of self worth it feels amazing to be claiming that i am worth love and being treated with respect, feeling and honouring my sensitivity is key here.
Yes you are right, it is not natural but unfortunately it has become a normal way of life for many. It is up to all of us to call it out on each occasion so we create these stops and build that awareness that it is not OK to talk to each other like this.
So true Catherine – the willingness to give ourselves permission to feel the sensitivity and the underlying ‘pain’ and express from there in a consistent, clear and loving presence is a key to true healing.
I am finding that it is in the choice to feel all that is going on that allows me to be delicate. To feel and to not re-act to all that I see and feel requires such a solid and steady presence. My strength is now in being able to remain delicate and open as I feel and observe.
Thank you Cherise. I too am finding that with my delicateness there is a strength. So different to what I believed.
Recently I have felt too how deeply hurtful it has been for myself and others to have held back in expressing the delicate nature of myself–all the times when I chose to pretend things were okay and have not expressed the truth in how I felt. Allowing myself to first feel and then express is a deep honoring any woman and any person can give to themselves. When I allowed that, it felt like I was able to trust in my own love so much more, and felt less need to protect myself.
I completely agree, Cherise. I have found that, once I allowed my self to feel these gorgeous qualities of delicateness and preciousness, the question arises how on earth could I ever have suppressed these in the first place? They are so absolutely lovely and so very natural: what happened? Why did it take so long for me to reconnect? Why did I disconnect? Quite likely a legion of incidents like the one you describe with the girl at the pool….now why on earth would we treat our girl, and boys, like that?
What I have just seen over the last few days and with a help of a friend is how shutting people out or getting annoyed shuts down and hardens the body, like a child having an silent internal tantrum .. this overrides the delicateness we truly are. So better to be open to love instead : ) and feel the tenderness and delicateness we are.
Reading about your delicateness, I can feel mine. I can also feel the hardness and tightness of the armour I still wear, so have to admit that I have not fully accepted and appreciated the true power of delicacy, relying on the all too familiar and horribly isolating ‘brick walls’. The practical examples you have given, Cherise, about the quality in our fingertips when we type etc. are really supportive…thank you.
Learning to stay connected to myself and be present has brought huge benefits that I am bringing to many areas of my life. The latest area is gardening, when I stay connected, listen to my body and let go of the racy rushing, I feel my innate delicateness, amazingly, I see this mirrored back to me from the plants and wildlife around me.
I no longer feel I have to do gardening like a man and see it as a chore, asking for help is not a sign of weakness. I appreciate and accept my inner strength.
As with all activity, it’s HOW I do it, I can be sensitive to what my body can manage, it can be done gently, this is a big, big lesson for me.
Thanks Cherise for your inspiring blog.
I learned to be very hard in my youth, but not in the way not to cry when hurt physically, it was more when hurt in the emotional sense to become hard in order to cope with the emotional stuff and also having done ballet, which is considered as a gracious dancing and not get connected as being hard. Being hard in the way like ballet dancing asked was considered as very female, delicate and gracious and being hard there was a quality which was considered as supporting this graciousness. As such the whole meaning of graciousness and delicateness got a total false interpretation, as true delicateness and graciousness are coming from being tender and not being hard.
I totally love your blog, Cherise, – more delicateness!! Preciousness. Sensitivity. This is what we innately are! Thank you for reminding me. I love it. I’d like to extend this to boys and men too. It tears me up seeing little, young boys hurt themselves and biting their teeth together to not show any sign of “weakness” or that they are hurt. Being human means being delicate and it’s the most lovely thing to witness someone treating themselves with true delicateness, preciousness and sensitivity.
“I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments. For example, the way I gently touch my own skin feeling its texture, how I type on the computer, the way I walk, move, sit, or carry my shopping home. The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” This is so beautiful Cherise, There is great power in accepting our own fragility as women.
The same goes for boys as well, if not in a more hardened toughened up way. Comments like its only a graze or a bruise, stop crying all teach us and stop us from showing how deeply sensitive we are. We learn to mask our feeling and fit in whilst losing the exquisite delicateness we are all born with.
I can feel a real sadness reading this because this what I did as a young woman, ‘the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out. As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.’ I was very sensitive as a young woman, but would cover this up with drinking and drugs, eating sugary foods, speaking in a harsh way, being hard with my body, this now seems so crazy to me as i have been re-connecting to my sensitivity and delicateness, I could not go back to these hard, abusive ways having felt the loveliness of who I am.
I agree no one honestly does want to live in hardness and insensitive to other people. The thing I have noticed about hardness in my body is that it comes with a psyche of dishonesty – I can justify it as necessary to get things done and ‘the way life is’. It is acceptable these days to justify being hard to protect ourselves from the harsh realities of life. If we however turn it around and see that we also harden to avoid feeling how false it is and how tender we can be, it doesn’t seem so reasonable! But this is what I did for many years until adopting some very simple techniques to promote body awareness, through Universal Medicine. I begun to understand that I was avoiding my innate tenderness and in a strange way, choosing to not feel how sensitive I was. I became aware that if I allowed myself to feel it, I would have to do some thing about it and shake myself out of my comfortable discomfort.
Many people equate being delicate and fragile to being emotional and often that kind of emotion feels awful and manipulative. We need to move away from this limited understanding to understand that feelings and emotions are separate things and that being delicate and fragile are innate qualities that are very beautiful and have a strength all their own. This expands our understanding so that we don’t need to tell someone to toughen up because we want to avoid their emotional outpouring, we have a different view of what might be going on and we can allow ourselves to be more supportive.
Very well said, Amanda. It is great to clarify the difference between feelings and emotions, because we can otherwise discredit the true delicateness and fragility that informs us of what feels true in life and what is not – therein lies our power.
What a lovely blog Cherise. I can relate to being in the world and feeling as numb as brick wall and I certainly had a very solid brick wall for protection built around me. Well I thought it was protection and it worked as far as keeping the would out. I am now very grateful to know the only way to truly feel safe is the opposite to the way I was living and to be love and let the world in and while I am connected to my authentic self and being love I am safe.
“What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality”.
I really relate to is comment Cherise I feel that all the time also the depth and quality of my delicateness, fragility and connection is forever deepening. Sometime if feel myself doing something or feel my own touch on my skin and think wow that a whole deeper level.
‘being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too’ – so true and when we live this, I feel it allows men the space and opportunity for them to be in their tenderness also.
That makes so much sense. When we (women) stop fighting our natural delicateness and fragility, men can let down their guards and wow the world with the power of their tenderness and sensitivity.
Delicateness is a woman’s natural quality, it’s just that we have got so used to covering this over with a hard outer layer. Thank you for the reminder of what it is that we naturally bring Cherise.
To break down stereotypes this goes for boys and men too .. to have permission to feel their delicateness, tenderness and beauty.
Tenderness is gender free…just one has to start and the others will join in – joining tenderness : )
I am discovering more and more of my true delicateness and sensitivity in myself also, and I love it – it feels amazing and so much joy! Thank you for expressing this Cherise! Just delicious- a letter for all.
So true Cherise, what makes woman IS our delicate nature, allowing ourselves to live from there is our true strength.
I am discovering more and more of my true delicateness and sensitivity in myself also, and I love it – it feels amazing and so much joy! Thank you for expressing this Cherise! And being the inspiration you are – for everyone.
Beautiful sharing. I love the way you have expressed this. As a young girl I adopted the ‘toughen up’ approach as a way to mask how sensitive I was. What this did was keep people out, I am learning to let this hard exterior go so that I can express myself more with others, this is where our true power lies.
Unguarded I blow myself away with my keenness to let the world in. My responsibility lies in making the choices that support this and dismantling the fortress walls I have built between me and people.
Kristy this is so true, we are not very old when we learn to ‘pull ourselves together’ and all it does is create a shield that keeps people out and we learn that it is not safe or OK to be just who we are. I too am continuously learning that to let people in and let them see who I truly am in all my tenderness and sensitivity, is where the true strength is.
I could feel all your delicateness and lightness within your writing Cherise. Beautiful reflection. I thought as a woman growing up that I needed to be like a man an equal tough, hard and strong. After all that’s what the Women’s movement told us. It is so lovely to have now discovered that I don’t need to be this way that showing my true colours is about connecting to that inner part of me that is delicate, still, fragile and loving.
It is so true Cherise, as women we are so delicate but so strong. Transitioning from the hardness back into the delicacy is such a beautiful journey, one I certainly relate to and find there is always more to me as a woman than I ever imagined- simply gorgeous.
A very inspiring blog Cherise, we are all so tender and delicate, us men included.
It is a great strength and power to claim and start to live this for me, breaking free of society’s expectations and ideas of what a man should be like in the world.
When I was a young girl I felt so alone feeling sensitive and delicate that I closed down this part and became a girl who gave her power away by being tough to be accepted. I even fooled myself, I had a complete false idea of how I looked like. Your question Cherise WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE? gives me a lot to ponder on and another start to explore my delicateness in depth.
Cherise I am returning to your lovely sharing on delicateness. It is something that as ( you observed) we as woman often feel is not OK , and others seeing us as the weaker sex etc. As we have been learning through the teachings of Serge Benhayon ,delicateness is not weakness it is a strength, and you mentioned this in your beautiful article. It would be lovely if we were allowed to express and be our true selves from childhood, and maybe that’s what the future will hold with the Esoteric teachings of Universal Medicine.
Cherise, like you I have found that the brick wall I built to appear strong to hide or protect what is a natural innate delicate sensitivity lead to me keeping people out and not fully able to express all the love I so naturally am. It is a great joy to feel the chinks appearing in the mortar and letting people in and love out more fully, an ongoing but beautiful part of my process of return to the true woman within.
It is a precious point you offer Cherise, that our fragility is not the weakness we may think but an ally, to assist us to understand life. In my experience, it’s this way for men too. Great to come back to my own fragility today inspired by you.
It’s so interesting that we think being sensitive and delicate is a weakness and what we put ourselves through to create a persona that is hard, so we won’t let anyone in. But how harmful this is on our own selves, which means no-one gets to feel the truth of the absolute beauty that is us when we are being delicate and sensitive. Beautiful article Cherise.
I love what you write here Cherise. The hardening we go into is like a thick, heavy, veil or straight jacket that covers and suffocates the exquisite tenderness and fragility underneath. We know it’s there but it’s like we don’t have access to feeling it in full all of the time. On some level we absolutely know we have compromised ourselves, resulting in self loathing and lack of self worth, which then perpetuates the cycle of the hardening and shutting down. To give yourself permission to feel the loveliness under the hardness is the beginning of returning back to it.
Such a beautiful blog Cherise – and being delicate is something that I feel I need to explore. I can so easily relate to the brick wall that I too have build around me to protect me from feeling this delicacy. Your lovely blog feels like a new beginning for me – to explore and embrace a new level of beauty that is innately me when I am claiming myself as a woman.
This is beautiful Cherise. A timely reminder to nurture and cultivate in our children and ourselves the gentle way of delicateness and appreciating the true strength it brings us.
Oh yes I am a delicate Women! Watch out wold and get ready for that.
Discovering more and more of my delicateness is disclosing an inner Strength I could not imagine. By trying to be strong I created a hardness to hold and protect myself and with that numbness for my tenderness and sweetness. Now, by letting go of the hardness I discover the strength I am longing for…. Funny he? I try so hard to become what I already am. Just that the trying/controlling does not really work – but surrendering to the truth does!
Very good point Sandra – we as women can spend hours, days, sometimes our whole lives trying to be something we already are. I would say most women have a particular tick list they feel they need to complete before they can actually say they are a complete, fulfilled woman.. For many this includes being a mother, having a societally acceptable body etc. – as you say this actually creates a huge hardness and protection!
well said Sandra and the irony is that the being strong, the trying, the hardening is what is actually hurting us while we think it protects us. I have never felt more safe and in control then when I let go of al control and protection and surrender in the delicious delicateness, tenderness and sensitivity that I am.
I can remember during a healing with a Universal Medicine practitioner feeling for the first time the hardness that was in my body. It was a hardness that I lived and didn’t even give a second thought to. I was actually shocked to feel it. My body felt like concrete inside and I had no idea until that point. Like you Carolien, now my strength comes from surrendering to the very precious and tender woman that I am.
Wow, I love it, Sandra.
“I am discovering that it is not in my nature to have a tough bricked exterior, and that I just don’t want to have this any longer.” I can relate to this also. This form of protection and management does nothing to truly support who I am and only fosters this self harm in others too as they follow suit in this merry go round.
I am falling in love with my delicateness. The quality of being delicate is light, unimposing and open. When embraced it can allow a sense of deeper awareness and understanding for others. It hurts to dim my delicateness down and harden against life. I have only just begun the possibility of not dimming it by not reacting virtually 24/7 to life. My delicateness is very precious and it needs nurturing and tending to.
Being delicate brings its own power of strength in knowing who your truly are and reflect this to the world for all to see.
I can relate to everything you have shared here Cherise, and the more I accept and surrender to my beauty, stilness and tenderness as a woman, I support and allow other women to do the same….if they so chose, it is always a choice of what we wish to express in each moment.
Delicateness is a quality that is so innate within us that it should naturally be emanated forth but instead we build walls, and barriers and shields to protect our delicateness when nothing can really ever touch it. It is so innate and so apart of who we are and where we have originally come from that it is almost silly that we are not able to freely be this within all moments within all of our days. It is absurd that we harden and protect ourselves as women which only ever really hurts us and our bodies.
Natasha, this is so true, however as I am discovering, letting go of the many defenses I have built to protect
my delicateness is a work in progress. It constantly surprises me as to how many I have set up. Each day I find another 1 or 20, so every day is simply the next step in letting all of this go and allowing my delicateness to guide how I live.
Yes Leigh me too. It’s about taking it moment by moment and being gentle with the unraveling of my old patterns and choices. Returning to the delicateness that has always been there, is a magical journey unto itself.
Woohoo Leigh, it is amazing how much we can let them go but it is amazing how much we can build them straight back up if we do not continue to deepen the self love we have for ourselves. It feels like we need to change the way we are living and continue to develop our relationship with ourselves to really allow the preciousness to emanate forth.
Dear Natasha,
I am only just beginning to realise that to live me in full that change is inevitable. I can no longer move the way I used to. Even down to how I hold my body is changing. Today I felt how when I leave my beautiful self that my pelvis drops forward. This happens because in leaving myself my kidneys contract and tighten my back, pulling on my pelvis. What the. Yes how we are feeling and what we are choosing are why our bodies are suffering pain, discomfort and disease. Our bodies need us to “continue to develop our relationship with ourselves to really allow the preciousness to emanate forth.”
Thank you Cherise. Is there anything more delicious than being our absolutely delicate selves?
Beautifully expressed Kylie, I couldn’t agree more.
So true Kylie, there is nothing more delicious than feeling our delicate selves and our presence!
To answer that Kylie, I can truly say that no there isn’t!
Thank you for reminding me that delicateness is very powerful Cherise. Lately I have had random memories of roller skating as a young girl. I used to tear around the rink with much older kids and teenagers and the shiny concrete rink was brutal to fall on. I remember feeling proud that I was brave enough to risk serious pain and injury. This seems like madness to me now. My true power is innately linked to my delicateness.
Ha ha Leonne, I can relate to the roller skating as well. I also remember putting myself in quite full on situations whilst backpacking around the world, thinking that I was amazing because I was so tough to be able to do some of the things I did. In reality a lot of the time I was very scared and really had to harden my body to get through those things. It feels incredible now to allow myself to be delicate, to realise that the toughness is just a protection and that true power comes from allowing ourselves to be delicate.
Oh Leonne, I did a little roller skating, not full on, but still enough to know the feel of the concrete floor. My thing was horse riding, mustering, general hard work involved in care for cattle. I too prided my self in being able to do most the things the men could. Yet all the while I felt a constant nervousness fear of being hurt. My delicateness is now felt and I can no longer do the things I used to. I do still find myself sometimes helping my hubby with fencing or shed work, but now it is done with great care for my body. I wear gloves and have a much greater appreciation for barb wire and treat it with great care.
I have to admit, that I have avoided being delicate and sweet for most of my life but I am really loving and embracing this part of me that I never knew existed because I was too afraid to show it or feel it as I had a belief that it meant I was weak.
‘And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’
Claiming my fragility has been powerful for me. I feel stronger and clearer every day knowing that my body is delicate, sensitive and not invincible. It is a moving a breathing home for my essence and must be treated with great care. Thanks once again Cherise for your gorgeous expression.
Beautiful, Kathryn. When I feel my essence, it naturally inspires me to be delicate with myself, so for me the key is to stay connected throughout the day and commit to that quality of being no matter what.
I agree Kathryn – fragility is very claiming and very powerful for all of us. The care we take for our bodies shows – and can be an amazing reflection to others
I love this Kathryn. Our bodies are definitely a home for our essence and needs to be cherished and cared for endlessly.
‘It is a moving breathing home for my essence’. Kathryn this is so true and my body deserves to be held with the utmost love and care always.
“It (my body) is a moving a breathing home for my essence and must be treated with great care” – This is absolutely gorgeous, Kathryn. That’s what my operation manual will say from now.
I used to think that being independent and tough, pushing my body to its limits was proving I could cope on my own I have come to realise that I was in total disregard of myself by being this way. What a transformation since becoming aware and feeling the true power in honouring and appreciating the delicate woman that I am and how wonderful that feels.
Me too Deidre, as a young woman I grew up thinking I had to be tough and independent and would take umbrage at anyone who offered to help or support me, imaging that they thought me incapable and weak. Sheer madness! I made my body hard and lean and it exhibited the consequence of those choices by making my periods extremely painful. I too have experienced the magic in choosing to cherish and nurture my tenderness and fragility, these are my greatest strengths without a doubt and qualities that are not only a joy to express but awesome to see in other women too, plus the added benefit of no more painful periods!
This is so lovely Cherise, ‘being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.’ it is great to have this reminder, I no longer see being delicate as a weakness like i used to, i love my delicateness now and am enjoying feeling this more and more.
I love the way that being a woman is part of the natural order of life.
Yes, it makes it easy and takes the trying out. I am a woman and simply can surrender to that natural rhythm within me.
I am also beginning to feel the power of my innate delicateness. Years ago I also subscribed to toughening up and hardening up because it seemed that it was not acceptable to be so tender. But I know that I can’t shut this part of myself down any more. I had a false belief that being tender was weak. Not any more. The more I allow the tender, delicate part of me to express the stronger I feel in myself.
I feel this too Rachel, ‘the more I allow the tender, delicate part of me to express the stronger I feel in myself.’ It really takes commitment to my tenderness, to choose it over the long held momentum that I have lived, it is so worth it though to choose my love, my tenderness as when I do I feel within an equal love for all.
A beautiful blog and great question Cherise: “why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we truly are?”
As you say it starts very young, we perpetuate the belief from one generation to the next that is how it needs to be. That we need to toughen up a bit, that feeling hurt and vulnerable for a moment will bring the walls crashing down. When will we stop this cycle? We can choose to change this anytime with more tender loving care, allowing ourselves and others to feel a little vulnerable at times and accepting a melting away of the harsh barriers that have be used as a false protection.
I have to admit Sandra that I still struggle at times with feeling vulnerable or hurt. I haven’t found it easy to simply feel a hurt and let it go, and I can get stuck in the process of it and subsequently feel like the hurt owns me. Thank the heavens that this is beginning to change. I am beginning to understand that the hurt is actually showing me 2 very valuable things. 1. that I (we) are so much more then how we live today and 2. where I am needing something or someone to be a certain way – where I am living with expectations around me and what it is I need to work on in order to not allow this hurt to affect me but be able to observe it. A wise woman once said to me that one of the things she has found in life was that we need to have no expectations. ‘Expectations will only hurt you’ she would say. I couldn’t understand this at the time, but I do now.
Delicateness, sweetness, preciousness and womaness go so well together. Why would we ever want to move away from these qualities. There are what make up our strength. Thank you Cherise.
This is a good question, Patricia. Why go away from what we truly are? We truly are though at times cannot feel it or did not live it.
Feeling a delicate, precious woman feels heavenly, and I ask myself, where has this woman BEEN all these years! Why did I not connect to this before when all along it was who I truly was, inside. I love the feeling of being both gentle but powerful at the same time, we are women are AWESOME. For me it is an ongoing, developing process, going deeper and deeper, and I am just at the beginning of claiming myself as the true woman that I know myself to be. Thank you also to Natalie Benhayon for the reflection of what it is to be a true, beautiful, sexy woman.
Gorgeous ladies, Sandra I loved your line ‘I love the feeling of being both gentle and powerful at the same time’. These are very inspiring words for me as I reclaim my own sensitivity and preciousness for the strength and truth that it is – rather then how I have falsely seen it – something flimsy that could be easily crushed or brought down. This is a great blog and conversation for all women.
This is a blog which shows us that we can claim the true delicate and tender females we know ourselves to be.
It’s so true what you share here Cherise about being hardened to go out into the world. I can feel how there are so many forces telling us that we can’t be this innateness and delicateness, and if we are then we are weak and not worthy. Reflections such as yours, with True Beauty, Strength and Stillness are what is needed in this world to show that this is indeed possible, and a most amazingly glorious way to live.
I love this Cherise. It feels glorious to claim the delicateness and preciousness of being a woman. As you say – why would we want to ‘feel like a brick wall’? The more I get in touch with myself as a woman the more I can feel this delicateness. The more I feel it the more I want to take care of myself. Thank you for your blog.
A precious line Rebecca – ‘The more I feel it the more I want to take care of myself’
I love your title and blog Cherise and it makes me wonder why we all don’t see and feel that being delicate is a strength. I have always felt in the past that it was a weakness and reading your opening paragraph made me think about me as a little girl. I was always falling over and had big bandages on both knees as the concrete on my delicate skin done a lot of damage. I was told off consistently for falling and so when it happened the pain wanted me to cry but I would force myself to hold back the tears and act strong and brave. Is it any surprise when I came across the word “tender” my first thought was I don’t want that because I associated it with my knees as they were always tender recovering from the damage of falling.
Words are powerfull and it is interesting what we associate words with. Its taken me some time to make changes by choosing to be tender and loving towards what I know and can feel is my deeply delicate and precious body. I now value and appreciate my body and will continue to develop that quality within me which I know supports my life.
I have just began to feel what you say here:” The way I hug, speak or look with depth into the eyes of another, holding a quality that is accepting of my own delicateness and also theirs too.” When I honor my fragility, it becomes powerful, I accept it in me and hold myself in that love, and it is then not weak at all, but strong and inclusive. It is just the beginning, and people might not feel the same, but it does not change who I am.
Beautiful Cherise, I also know the brick wall as a way of trying to cope with life very well. Still I experience, that the identification with being tough and hard and be able to cope with everything has many layers. But also, the more I let go of the identification with hardness, the preciousness unfolds itself, it feels like sometimes I melt into it. Like you just have to remove the bricks and the preciousness blossoms, because it is naturally there. I am amazed and touched from this female nativeness in me and every women. Also I experience that the anxiousness and stress of living “with the wall” disappears to become a natural rhythm. When I write this now, I am still feeling it is a beautiful wonder.
Thank you Cherise, what a great realization you share here. More and more I am appreciating my own delicate nature and am learning not to just push through things without any consideration for my body.
A gorgeous article Cherise in which I can feel your delicate nature. This is a great question to ponder on, ‘WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?’
A beautiful blog Cherise, thankyou. I love this sentence; ” the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out. As a naturally loving and deeply tender woman living a way that felt so unnatural actually is what hurt(s) me the most.” This rings true for so many of us I suspect, certainly for myself. Being taught to laugh things off and told things didn’t really hurt when they did, made me doubt what I really felt myself.
This is so beautiful to read Cherise and I feel the same. For a long time being hard was just my way, to get trough life and everything I had to do. Just felt like there was no other way but, I now know there is another way thanks to the amazing Universal Medicine practitioner who are supporting me deeply in living more and more honouring of the beautiful delicate woman I am.
I know I am innately delicate and that it has never been a weakness. I became a hard and frustrated woman because of not living what my body knew but it seemed not possible to live with delicateness. The more I accept and appreciate my delicateness the more I feel how beautiful it is to be a delicate woman and to share this with everyone.
‘Gone are the days of viewing my own preciousness as a weakness because with my acceptance of what I feel is true within me’, absolutely incredible Cherise. I find it quite shocking how many women (myself often included) believe that preciousness is a fault and a behaviour that shows weakness… I have seen an increasing amount of women push their bodies to ‘match up’ to men, especially in business because they feel they won’t be listened to unless they prove their worthiness. You are lighting the way back home for women to be sweet and delicate. Thank you.
Susie, this is so true and I to have noticed there are an increasing number of women who think they need to toughen up to be able to do the same as men, and then some more. The precious quality that we all innately are is something that we learn to override because we see it as not measuring up and being weak. Cherise’s blog is a beautiful reminder that there is indeed another way.
Hello Susie Williams, I agree and where are we as men when we expect, support or allow women to do this. Both men and women have a direct purpose in life that needs to be honoured in many ways by all of us. No longer should we compete with and against each other but appreciate the support we truly bring to each other. There is a harmony that would naturally exist and that harmony is never found in any ‘match up’. Thank you Susie.
Thank you, Cherise, for this important contribution, encouraging myself and other women to really embrace our natural delicateness and see it as a strength to be developed that connects us to the divine beauty that lives within us.
Thank you Cherise this is so beautiful to read ,feel and honour for myself also. I love your claiming that “What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.”
I am experiencing that this is a never ending deepening connection to our preciousness as women also and what an amazing beauiful journey this is to reconnect to ourselves ever more.Truly inspiring.
Just before reading this blog I had a conversation that I had expected to feel different than it did afterwards. So then following I sat with myself after reading this and I noticed how hard and rigid I had become! This example just goes to show me how our expectations, towards ourselves, towards others and from others are a real harm in the world. Because if they weren’t harmful then why would the body tense up in defence or protection? By admitting how I felt the conversation returned but this time it was from a point of understanding which now has left me feeling not tense about the situation at all! If we are this sensitive and it creates such a strong reaction in the body why do we expect ourselves to live like that? Why did the adults need her to ‘harden up’ or ‘laugh it off’? Whats wrong with her admitting that she felt hurt?
Being more delicate and sensitive is actually very natural for both men and women. You only have to observe young children to see that. They are probably one of our greatest strengths, rather than a weakness, because they allow us to remain fully aware of what is going on energetically around us.
This is so true to me Cherise that our strength lies in our delicateness and sensitivity. For a long time i believed that my sensitivity was a weakness and i lived a very hardened and protected life. But now that i am allowing my delicateness and tenderness more and more i can feel how painful it really is to harden. It is a huge gift to return to me as the true woman, to myself but equally to all around me who get to share in my loveliness.
Really beautifully expressed and so true. To be delicate is a strength and to rediscover and live it again is the way for every women and as you write it to reflect it then to everyone because it is in there with all of us. Thank You for Sharing.
Beautifully described Cherise how all women should feel the real delicateness that has always been inside of them and enjoy expressing it to the world.
Thank you Cherise. I grew up believing that my natural delicateness and sensitivity was something to ‘get over’, hide and suppress in order to cope with the vagaries of the world around me but all it did was build a hard shell around my inner self. Serge Benhayon through the presentation of The Way of the Livingness has shown me that to let go of the shield and choose to feel and share the power and strength of a tender, delicate and sensitive woman is something to celebrate.
I love this Cherise. “feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness,’ this line is something that I have been working with for a while now, to truly embrace, breaking down my old beliefs about delicate and weakness and and being tough. I have come a long way but as you say I feel I have only ‘scratched the surface’ and there is an even more exquisitely delicate being within.
So true Cherise. We ask each other to ‘toughen up’ for fear of seeing the true power of delicacy exposed. Why does this scare us? Perhaps because it ask us to also open ourselves back up to the world we have long ago shut down from and learn to love and trust once more. Our time of elaborate fortifications and communicating from behind these fortress walls is well and truly up. Behold a woman or man in their true delicateness and you will understand and feel the power of God. Nothing to be frightened of but everything to be inspired by.
True inspiration – thank you Liane.
“being a delicate woman is my true strength”. I love that expression, Cherise, it actually feels so powerful in your declaring that. Yes, I find that the world needs this sort of strength to counteract so much ugliness that is in the world at the moment. Being delicate does not equate to weakness, it takes much strength to actually accept our delicateness.
I absolutely love your blog Cherise! So true, so simple, so life-changing. The world can feel pretty rough but as we go out there bringing all our true delicacy and power we are actually far less buffeted around that when we have the brick-wall or the reserve, or the withdraw-ness.
I have also noticed that wen I am conscious of my delicacy and don’t suppress it there seems to be so much more time and space and no rush. The timelessness of moving in delicacy is a joy to feel. Movies try to mimic this with slow-motion, but wow, the actual experience of it is well worth coming back to, as you have so well said, Cherise.
Claiming delicate as being our true strength as women is a huge step forward and it honours the men as well.
Hello Gabriele Conrad and I would agree. A true delicate woman is a great reflection for a man, it supports more than the eye can see.
I had to work hard and keeping the hardness. Such a revelation Cherise, I know for me I had been living the hardness for so long I actually forgot it was not my true state of being – tenderness and preciousness was and is. Letting go of the hardness, my protection to not feel was difficult, much honesty and healing was required along the way, but I can say today living my true tender and preciousness it is well worth it.
Thanks Cherise for your words of wisdom. I too am working on the ‘brick wall’ and I am often aware of it’s presence around others. It’s been the norm for me for so long that it’s just a habit to shut people out and ‘harden up’. But as I begin to unfold, I’ve realised that being ‘sensitive’ is not such a bad thing after all. In fact, it is our most precious gift as human beings. Sadly, it is the quality we are often made to feel most ashamed of! Being sensitive is a natural state of being and can be our most powerful tool, for it allows us to feel what is truly going on around us, i.e. our ‘sixth sense’. Thanks for your inspiration, as always.
Cherise such a great sharing. For years I too played tough and I was and am anything but, I’m a very tender, delicate woman learning how to be and show that in the world, to stand in it more each day. There is such a quality in it, another depth of feeling, for example I now feel the cold more, but it’s not that I’m colder, it’s that I just didn’t feel it before as I was hard and numb and as I consider this, I feel there is more I will feel as I continue with this exploration, how lovely.
Cherise I share your feelings on this subject. At some point in my life I took on many beliefs about what it was to be a strong women. I thought that the more that I did the stronger I was, I believed that to be emotionally hard like a man was impressive and I believed to be physically strong was an attribute. All of these things kept me hard and tough and in complete separation from who I naturally and actually was.
What a wonderful read Cherise, your words here stand out with such realised sense: “….the more I tried to hold myself in a way that didn’t show or honour my delicate and sensitive nature, the more I built up a brick wall around me which was actually keeping everyone else out” – and so how can the love we want actually come to us? Allowing our delicateness to be helps dissolve the brick wall and invites people in to join us. Where through an open door the warm breeze carries the 2-way flow and scent of love.
Simply gorgeous Cherise thank you. It is a moment to treasure deeply when we can truly feel and claim our delicate tenderness inside and know this is who we truly are. It is quality that is desperately lacking in our society today and very healing when honoured and expressed. Having been a real ‘tough nut’ in my time, discovering this innate quality in me has transformed my understanding of power. There is nothing more powerful than a person, male or female, truly claiming their exquisite fineness and expressing it in all they do.
So beautiful Cherise, thank you and thank you everyone else for commenting I’ve learnt so much from your sharings.
This is great to be discussing as there is a strong belief amongst us that delicateness means weakness. As a girl I certainly found the world harsh and blamed my delicateness for my getting hurt by what I felt and saw. But it hurts so much more to have a brick wall around you, to not show yourself or anyone else the depths of your care through delicateness. I too am finding the loveliness of delicateness, especially through my movements. I have found that just being delicate changes everything. A mundane task feels exquisite when done with delicacy. There is a strength that comes from the presence with myself, the loving quality I feel and the honouring of my body.
Hello Cherise Holt, reading your article made me reflect on how this all starts and as you describe in your opening paragraph the way we treat and speak to our young people is a part of this. When children are hurt it doesn’t seem to support them initially to explain all the ways it could have been avoided or to get them to not cry or to get over it. Initially most people and children just want to be held and at first maybe no talking just physical support. I have watched myself at times with my children and how I deal with them. I appreciate the changes as more and more I am aware of what has happened and take care to see them first and tend to them before I ‘give’ them anything else. Universal Medicine has lead the way in care and supporting people no matter what is going on for them. I have been inspired to bring more and more care to myself and equally my children. Through this care at times I see the only thing needed is my physical presence and the rest takes care of itself.
I have had experiences with young children crying where I have been the person that thought, ‘oh just toughen up’, but more recently I have adopted a more understanding approach, what I found was that for most children it is never about a physical pain, just the desire to be appreciated and recognised as the individual they are. Giving most children tender care and eye contact is more than enough and all they really want. Doing this with full commitment can transform the behaviour the child displays.
Hello Stephen G and I agree, well said. At times children can be ‘more hurt’ from how they were treated after than the actual physical injury. As we are seeing from the comments around this many of us are carrying scars from childhood that don’t necessarily go with being physically injured.
Not many people see delicateness as a strength. Yet to honour your delicateness when the world is saying to harden up is a strength. it allows you too feel so much more in and about life as well. I know that the more I Accept my delicateness, It gives me a solidness in myself which in turn is a strength.
Yes Emily, this ‘acceptance’ is so crucial and is a solid and profound strength to feel and claim in its own right.
Cherise, this is beautiful. I have observed much of the same and felt within myself the conflict and tension from having taken on the belief that to be the deeply delicate woman I naturally am in the world means being weak and not able to cope. I now know this to be one of the biggest lies ever sold to women, a lie that has made us walk away from ourselves and leave behind our true power. It is in our delicateness and in our fragility that we can truly support another. This is our true strength. It’s still a work in progress for me to fully embody the delicateness that I am, as it’s still a work in progress to not baulk and freak out at the condoning and encouragement of the exact opposite, of ‘toughening up’, towards young women and girls in particular. But I am steadily learning and remembering that the power we all have as women is in the depth of capacity we have to feel, and more and more with the strength of my delicateness, I am letting myself do so and not shutting down the beautiful delicateness that I am.
Prior to coming across Universal Medicine had assumed it is just a fact of life, you get older, you realise the world is not what you hoped, you toughen up, and that is all there is to it. Yet I absolutely love the opennes, delicateness and absolute presence that young children tend to have. It is a blessing to witness other women, as role models, expressing powerfully with these qualities and so now I know without a shaddow of a doubt that this is also my own true nature. Understanding this is one thing and actually living it another. Letting go of the many layers of toughness and protection for me is an ongoing thing, I am so much more open and less protected, yet still find it difficult to call myself ‘delicate’. I am getting there and every woman’s share, comment and insight helps. Thank you for this article.
Cherise, your ‘feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness’ inspires us all to not build that ‘brick wall’, for even the slightest disconnection from our love within lays a brick which immediately creates a sense of separation which we all feel.
I love this analogy Sandra – every time we harden not to feel we lay a brick and before we know it we are living behind a wall of solitude… we think it is everyone else that is keeping us out only to discover that it was us that laid the bricks and hence the divine revelation – it is only us that can take the bricks down.
Beautiful expressed Caroline, how we build our own protection, and it is up to us to say enough, no more, and actively start deconstructing this barrier that keeps people out.
There is a confidence and strength in not hiding, not putting on a front or pretending I am more or that I don’t get hurt. Knowing and appreciating that my delicateness and gentleness is precious and worth showing is very powerful, actually very sexy, and very easy.
Laura when I read your comment what came to mind is how when we stop ‘putting on a front or pretending’ as you say then this changes the dynamic of whatever interaction we are in. We are used to going down very familiar grooves with people. We have set ways of being that are to do with role playing and ultimately protection. When a person steps out of their protected role and opens themselves up then those around them are presented with a fresh choice to either keep playing their role (which will be slightly ‘off’ now) or to adjust themselves to what is being presented in front of them. They then in turn can make the same choice in their next interaction.
I totally agree and have felt this, when someone is completely natural and themselves with me, it stands out and I almost feel relief and sometimes a bit surprised that they are so open. I guess it’s because it is quite unusual, but it does make it easier for me to respond from that same effortlessly natural place, and the interaction is memorable.
This is beautiful Cherise. I also know what it is like to live with a hard, brick like exterior. As I’m coming to feel also, this is so far from my natural way of being… and I’ve been reflecting on how crazy it is that I believed that’s how I needed to be in the world, when being tender and delicate and open feels so amazing.
I relate to every word Cherise. The hardening up you have described plays out on so many levels too. I have become aware of just how sensitive I am (we all are) to the subtle undercurrents that play out between people and the way that I (we) shut them down…as though we are play acting that the tensions and disagreements are not happening.
What a denial this is of our absolute delicacy and our awareness of every subtly and every nuanced behaviour.
There is an incredible strength in allowing ourselves to feel these undercurrents in full. And there is something very disabling in feeling them and denying them to ourselves. Your words are a great reminder to keep embracing the sensitivity, knowing that it is a blessing and far more powerful way to live life than pushing through, pretending to be a brick wall.
“WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?” For me because I would get clobbered as a kid if I showed any signs of delicateness and so I toughened up and showed the world that nothing could hurt me, that I was always ‘cool’ no matter what. But I have reconnected to my delicateness, my preciousness and it feels innately divine in my body and something feels very amiss when I slip back into my old hard protective patterns, I feel weak and powerless. So I agree Cherise that “…being a delicate woman is my true strength … too”. I am forever grateful to Esoteric Women’s Health for supporting me to claim my inner beauty, delicateness and preciousness and to me for having the courage to drop my guard and feel this. I would encourage all women to try this.
What a powerful statement Marika. The ‘fortress’ of hardness we can build in so many ways, that keeps us separate from others, is something I feel we are all breaking down as women.
I agree, it’s truly exquisite and deeply beautiful to feel oneself again as it dissolves, and we come to discover that however ‘strong’, tough and competitive we may have been, it never offered us the true strength and power that we so naturally hold as women.
It is the same for me Jeannette – I’ve contracted away from showing much sign of delicacy or tenderness due to the ‘clobbering’ you speak of. I found especially at school with the other kids, what in their minds was harmless name calling or teasing ended up making me toughen up and grow ‘thicker skin’ as they say. If I think about this though, a couple of kids saying mean things shouldn’t be enough to shut someone down for life, so there was definitely a huge reaction on my part too! I intend not to continue this my whole life, and slowly slowly I am loosening the protection and hardness in my body.
I feel it in my body too Marika and Victoria. When enough of the ‘hard fortress’ was dissolved I could feel new ‘sensations’ in me and expressions from me that I had not previously been conscious of – preciousness, delicateness and sacredness. They are energetic and physical sensations and I cannot describe these qualities as anything other than natural and exquisite. I think it would be a lovely world for all if all women reconnected to their innate preciousness, delicateness and sacredness.
“Feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness” – this is an awesome quote Cherise, and goes against the widely held belief that to be delicate is to be weak, or breakable, like china plates for example, when this is not reality – as you say, the delicateness is powerful
It can be quite a process of uncovering the hardness and letting it go. I know I work on it daily and I’ve noticed the more love I build up in my body, the more awful it feels when I can feel the hardness in my body. It is much more of our natural state to feel gentleness and harmony in the body and not the levels of protection we bring in. It is through gentleness that I have also begun to connect the delicateness that exists within.
Similar to you Cherise I have been really accepting how delicate, tender and sensitive I am and allowing myself to surrender more deeply to these qualities within and express them in my everyday way of being. I read your blog and it inspires me to keep choosing to-reconnect to my innermost and keep letting go of the protection and let people in on a whole new level. Thank you
Thank you, Cherise for your sharing. I agree it is the allowance of being tender and delicate which supports me to be more aware what is going on within myself and my surrounding and as such being able to support myself and others in an appropriate way.
Kerstin that’s a good point that you make about how we are more aware of what is going on with ourselves and others when we are tender and delicate. What on earth was I connecting to or believing that I was feeling when I was rock solid ? I was permanently in the brace position and yet thought that I was a women who was in touch with myself and others !
With you there Alexis, i can remember that every time I hurt myself when I was younger i would carry on as if nothing had happened, all the while, despite dripping blood,bruised and scrazed, insisting that i was alright. Why on earth did I do that, refusing rest and support when my poor body was crying out for both. I do know why now, wanting to seem strong, independent, indomitable. Which I am, but now I show it in a tender and delicate way, and find that people are delighted to help when I need it.
I know right? Whenever I was rock solid I was not connecting to myself or others and unaware of this also. The more connected to the fragility the more aware I am of my life and all others around me. It just keeps deepening.
Alexis, you hit the nail on the head here! Rock solid… I remember that feeling, and even just remembering it brings the brace position into my body. It is as if my body remembers it so well, that it can take on that position just with a thought. A preparation for defend and to attack… and definitely not let anyone close to me.
Yes Alexis, being permanently in a brace position is an imprisonment, it is like being at war or in the trench 24/7 but still pretending everything is fine on the surface – we can only imagine what that is doing to our bodies.
i agree Kerstin, I too found that wen I connect to myself, and than naturally so to those qualities within me, i can feel from my body which offers me true awareness whereas before i would come from my head and mental observations. The difference is like black and white.
I love how you are claiming delicate to be your true strength!
Great slogan Marika I know it to be true, every day I am learning to feel what delicate means to me and learning how to listen and honour this. It really is my true strength and not all the other things I thought it was before such as being tough, pushing through and getting on with it. Delicatness and gentleness are my new ways of being and I love it.
Ha ha, now that should be on a billboard or spread across women’s magazines. Perhaps it could be a header for the next Women in Livingness magazine.
Love your slogan Marika – very powerful.
Absolutely love your blog Cherise – the naturally delicate and deeply nurturing quality of a woman is desperately needed for us as a humanity, it is what will restore harmony in society. As women we need to allow ourselves to be who we truly are.
I agree the Eva, the more I am embracing my own delicate and nurturing nature the more I realise just how much our societies are crying out for these innate healing qualities. Reclaiming ourselves as women is essential and a truly amazing journey to embark on.
Eva what a powerfully true comment. The true strength of women is what’s needed in society.
Love what you have shared Cherise as it reminded me how far I have come, from the woman who carried a shield of protection from such an early age and for whom hardness was simply a normal way to be; a very destructive way to be I realise now. I have loved my journey from this woman to the woman I am now, who like you, has discovered that: “ being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too”. Knowing that there is actually a strength in delicateness, as well as in fragility and vulnerability, has offered me a previously untapped depth of the knowing of myself as the amazing woman I am.
It seems to me that there was/is no room for nuance, or indeed for allowing that individual essence to make itself known and then to grow when it comes to being a young girl. You are either ‘girly’, or ‘tough’ or ‘sporty’, or some other broad facsimile which affords little to no space for space true expression. None of these comes close to the delicateness that you describe Cherise. I also wonder if those that find themselves in the ‘girly’ box ultimately find it harder to get aquainted with true delicateness, having first been sold a fake version.
Cherise, thank you for your delicate, tender blog written in honour of yourself as a sensitive, powerful woman. Inspiring.
I have long ago, well not so long actually, stopped trying to prove to myself and others, that I can do all the ‘manly’ things about the house and garden, instead now I choose to think of my body first and honour it by asking for help where needed, and I find, much to my delight, I am softening around the edges and returning to my true nature, that of being a precious woman, powerful on the inside and gentle and feminine on the outside.
Hear, hear Cherise, this cannot be said enough. The conditioning around hardening our bodies, as you expose in your blog, is thick and starts at a very young age – subsequently it takes a lot of undoing to get out of that. However it is very worth it.
Also we will then be the women who pass this wisdom on to the next generation, so for them it will be very easy to accept and honour their preciousness and delicate nature. And it will be passed on and on down the ages until it has reached all women and men.
I rediscovered my true strength as a woman aswell and it took me a while to really understand in my body that delicateness and vulnerability are no weaknesses. It is still a way to go and to deepen my understanding, but it feels already beautiful to be much more open towards my sensitivity and to honoure it in everything that I do.
Beautiful sharing Cherise, I also discovered that my strength is my delicateness and that my true power lies therein.
“being a delicate women is my true strength”- This is very affirming for me Cherise and I can feel that it is this delicateness that is the foundation of my day and all that I do in the day. Thank you for reflecting this back to me as I can feel that I already know this but do not always live it.
Hi Cherise,thanks for your blog!
delicateness is a true strength, that is also what I have found in the last years. It’s so strange that especially in western society, we are supposed to be tough and sexy. I was adapting to that image and have been overriding this delicateness. Now I feel stronger then ever, because the hardness is falling away, so I can acces an energy that supports who I truly am.
The more we as women accept our preciousness, delicateness and sensitivity, the more we can bring this into the world. And this is very needed at the moment, as there is so much toughness, hardness, competition and drive.
“And now I know that, being a delicate woman is my true strength – and also every other woman’s too.” Thank you for sharing Cherise…
Reading your blog made me stop and consider how much i still deny my own delicateness. I can use already words like sensitive and tender to describe me but delicate i had to open up myself to feel that quality which is beautiful to feel and embrace as part of me. Thank you for this invitation.
Taking down our brick walls and letting our delicateness show is something absolutely worth working on. It is not only us who will benefit enormously from it but bit by bit our kids will get a different impression how it is possible to live in this world and won’t even have to start building any walls.
The delicateness with which you wrote this and the sensitivity you expressed with really let me appreciate your delicate nature. So light and tender to read Cherise, thank you.
I agree Cherie one of the hings I am understanding about myself is that the strength that comes from honoring and sharing that delicateness, it is something so unique hat is not seen anywhere else it exists withing each woman and it holds a reflection that is needed by humanity.
Surrendering to our delicateness makes us powerful women. At first this sounded contradictary to me, but I have experienced the hardness is only a outer (very tiring) layer and allowing myself to be delicate gives me a strength from within.
This is such a beautiful explanation of the true power of women, in our delicateness. The power we have created in competition, push, climbing the ladder and multitasking to be super mum or hot shot business women feels like us trying to find the power we know is there, but getting lost. It’s ok to be a super Mum and be supper successful in business – but it can’t be at the expense of the delicate and still women we all truly are on the inside!
Lovely Cherise. Who wants to live behind a suffocating brick wall, when being delicate with ourselves feels so lovely?! So simple, once we accept delicateness as a strength and a fundamental part of ourselves.
Gorgeous Cherise and I absolutely love this. “I am finding the more that I allow myself to feel my delicateness as a woman, in the many ways that I confirm this as my natural way – then the more awareness I have in my daily moments,” I have been more aware of my own natural delicateness too in my daily life and I am loving what it shares with me. The more I allow this innate way of being and not fight against it, the more wonder it creates.
Gorgeous article Cherise, thank you for the reminder that strength is not in putting on an act, grinning and bearing it, or pushing through… true strength is allowing yourself to be delicate, gentle and even tender with yourself and those around you – it is allowing yourself to be vulnerable – not as in meek or downtrodden but vulnerable in your willingness to not hold back any part of yourself, to cherish yourself deeply and allow others to witness this love and care.
Awesome Cherise, reading this a few years ago would have freaked me out. Delicate?! I used to carry a deep fear that if you weren’t tough, you would be annihilated by the world, so I would try to toughen myself up (not very well I might add), or more successfully, if I just kept moving fast enough, nothing would get me. Exhausting. It never occurred to me though that both of these things do indeed add to a world in protection against everyone else. What you have written has touched me deeply and I know that delicateness and preciousness is my true being also, and to bring that out would only allow the world to be more of the same. Thank you.
I can relate with all that you share here Annie, I am choosing to let go of any remaining ares of protection so that my true delicate nature is allowed to naturally be present.
Delicateness is a quality that you are so naturally Cherise. From the touch of your hand to words typed on the keyboard, when seen and felt this holds such deep beauty. And with that you hold a reflection to all that this is who we are innately – divinity, love and a tenderness warmer than the cuddle from the softest teddy bear. Thank you for sharing this Cherise.
Really beautiful Cherise, it’s very deeply honouring to read this as a woman.
WHY DON’T WE ALLOW OURSELVES AS WOMEN TO FEEL HOW DELICATE WE TRULY ARE?
This is a question that I, in my late 50’s have started wanting to ask myself why there was so much disregard in my life so that I could show what I was feeling. It’s not easy task rewinding back on time and contact with the many hurts, believes and creations that build the wall you mentioned. I’ve avoided all of them throughout my life but now every day I feel closer to me. My body isn’t anymore the vehicule I relay on just to serve and obey me whathever I want. Accepting and responsabilizise for the fact that I’m the only one who made the mess helped me then to see clearly that my job next will be starting to undo it. Thanks to receiving Esoteric Healing modalities I’ve discovered the way to unfold my story in full collaboration with my body, it became then easier to listen to it and for that now the delicatess is slowly being part of my life AGAIN.
Thank you Cherise for this beautiful post.
I just experienced something similar this morning Cherise. I had received an esoteric facial release the day before and as I was putting my make up on it was lovely to connect to how delicate my skin felt as I applied the foundation … What a lovely foundation to have at the beginning of the day … Divine in fact! And like you say I have only touched the surface of the depth of how delicate I naturally am as a woman. Yum!
Delicateness is natural to us as women, yet i know that delicateness is something that i would as experience as fleeting moments when i became an adult woman…yet i remember the quality of sensitivity and delicateness as a little girl and it felt so beautiful, i felt really connected with the world around me, but getting knocked with hurt after hurt, i started to forget this place and became ‘strong’ ‘tough’ and hard…it is only recently I’m starting to reacquaint myself with this precious quality as it is within me always present…and true as you say Cherise, there is a power in the quality of delicateness i am starting to experience and understand! It’s beautiful, it’s within me, it’s me!
Beautiful, claimed and full of whole hearted expression ! Love it lovely Cherise.
I love the word delicate, it sounds delicate even to pronounce it. I know delicate when I read it, say it or feel it and yet I have for so long fought against it in the thinking this was not the way to be. From the reactions adults hold towards us when we are little, to the pressures we see all women under, to the ideals of being a super mum and the fame seemingly felt at being an independent women, lover and friend. None of this holds the grace and beauty I feel when I connect to the word delicateness, delicateness melts away all that I never was and allows me to feel that I am as delicate as the day I was born.
This sentence stood out for me ”I now hold a more true sense of what is actually means to be a woman with strength; feeling really powerful with my innate delicateness, which is something I’m really enjoying and loving as a foundational part of my womanhood.” I love the word ‘foundational’ and claiming the delicateness as part of a foundation is simply awesome and very inspiring.
I agree so much about how we teach our children to toughen up and how, without knowing it that is actually not helping them one bit. I also know that encouraging children to not toughen up does not mean they turn out to be unable to get on, engage or participate fully in life.
Thank you Cherise, I love the esoteric breast massage. When I first started having sessions, I wasn’t aware of what was happening. It was only a few years later when I started reviewing my life and the changes I had made towards myself, that were more loving and caring, that I could see that the esoteric breast massage was a pivotal factor in these changes occurring. A highly recommended healing modality.
It is interesting you say that Shevon. When I first received them the experience was very much at a physical level. It was only after a number of years that I reflected back and understood what a profound effect they had on my entire being.
I too love the esoteric breast massage. It took me quite a while to be actually feeling myself but the past year I realise I have come a long, long way in discovering myself as a woman, can actually feel more and more the beautiful delicacy that I am within and gradually embodying that in my whole being. It feels so absolutely awesome.
A delicious, divine and delicate reminder of the women we are Cherise – thank you.
Cherise, you are a great writer. It makes sense, in a way, for the adults to try to force the children to harden up, actually, for the children to numb themselves. If you become aware of everything that is going around you could quite likely respond with a lot of anxiety, something that may be less of an issue when we are properly numb.
It feels like the adults are choosing the lesser evil but it seems a rotten bargain. So much better to keep our awareness, our tenderness, our delicacy, our love, our joy, our truths.
I guess Christoph that our parents never learned how to handle or appreciate their own sensitivity and so how on earth would they be equipped to handle their child’s?
I feel very blessed to observe parents who are encouraging their children to keep their sensitivity alive….far from properly numb.
Thank you, Cherise, it is a great journey that we can all make, from the put-on hardness to the delicate tenderness that is naturally within us all – I am only just beginning to feel it and to truly appreciate the power of expressing ourselves in this way.
Gorgeous sharing Cherise. Thank you. You are absolutely true in saying our delicateness is part of our true strength. I find that the more delicate and tender I allow myself to be, others feel it and treat me with that- however when I don’t claim or live that then it allows the harness to come in.
It is quite amazing how women harden up to protect themselves and be strong in life and we build this wall around us that holds all our preciousness hidden and unexpressed. I had to realise that what I thought was my strength was in fact this hardness I had created, and I also through Esoteric Healing and Esoteric Breast Massage have been able to work through my guards and protection to the inner loveliness and delicateness you speak of here Cherise. It is a gorgeous and empowering true strength and it comes packed full of love.
I don’t know about you Jo, but my experience of melting the wall has been extraordinary and sometimes a little scary. I thought that hardness, that wall inside my own body made me safe.
The melting process has been like desperately clinging to a life-saving ring….letting it go…and discovering that the water I thought would overwhelm me is only knee deep.
Yes melting the walls certainly has been extraordinary and definitely a little scary, as I too thought I was ‘safe’ within my walls. My mother often used to say ‘the reality is never as bad as the thoughts you may have’ and this turned out to be true. As I worked on allowing my walls to come down, the feelings I had of overwhelm did turn into feelings of being supported and held, and I discovered that we are never alone. I loved your discovery that the water was only knee deep – gorgeously re-assuring for anyone reading this that still feels any apprehension Rachel.
Another great blog Cherise. I can certainly relate to what you share here. I too built up a huge amount of hardness in and around my body so as not to feel my delicateness which is perceived all to often as weakness. The more I allow myself to re-connect to my true essence, the more I let go of the hardness and feel the true beauty that lives within. This is so gorgeous to explore and feel.
A beautiful and delicate blog Cherise. Thank you for reminding me how delicate I am.
To be out in the world with the quality of delicateness will allow other women to see and feel how beautiful it is to live in this honouring way Cherise. Reading your words brought me to a delicate place thank you.
Lovely blog Cherise, this sentence could change the whole way we look at how we see ourselves as women…… “Why don’t we allow ourselves as women to feel how delicate we really are?” Before Women in Livingness and Natalie Benhayon’s and Sara Williams presentations, these words would not have entered into my way of thinking. Feeling the delicateness and gentleness that lay dormant under the hard shell exterior that I projected, has changed my life completely.
I agree, alisonmoir, for me also, it would not have occurred to me to feel how delicate I really am within, unless it had been for the presentations by Natalie Benhayon over the past few years. I have learned so much since then, still very much a work in progress, but I am coming to feel more and more the delicate woman that I am within and learning to present that to the world, rather than the hard exterior that I lived for so many years.
Yes alisonmoir, before Esoteric Women’s Health I viewed delicateness as an ugly word. I didn’t want to be delicate, I wanted to be tough, I believed that that was the only way to survive. What I have since learnt is that I had been sold a lie. That toughness does nothing but hurt my body. The true strength lies beneath, in the beauty, tenderness and exquisiteness that we truly are as women. I know that it is now time to let this shine, that there is no need to hold the protection or the wall. It no longer serves.
Cherise so beautiful to read your embracing of your delicate true nature as it supports me to sink deeper into mine. Thank you so much.
I can feel how delicate you are with yourself Cherise, it is beautiful. It is also lovely to feel how our bodies change when we surrender to a more gentle way with ourselves. There is more fluidity and spaciousness in the body and in the way we move and are.
Beautiful Cherise, thank you.
I now know it to be true also Cherise – that our delicateness as women is our true strength. Having grown up with my sensitivity not being valued for the wonderful quality that is I chose to become a tomboy to prove that I couldn’t be hurt. What I now find is that if I allow myself to be vulnerable it allows others to see me for who I truly am and for what I bring. It’s lovely to start sloughing off that tough exterior.
It took me some time to accept my delicateness and sensitivity (not the emotional kind) as the true strength that it is. It allows me to remain connected and to feel me, others and what is going on around me. There is such conditioning around ‘toughening up’ so we can cope– to be able to navigate life without being smashed. This is an awful way to live with a wall of protection; the body feels hard and it keeps everyone at a distance to a greater or lesser degree. It is often the toughest exteriors that are disguising the most tender loving inner beings. We are all deeply sensitive at heart and it is a joy to feel, appreciate and honour this natural quality.
Exquisite Cherise, thank you. How you have described and written about the word ‘delicate’, has totally deconstructed its generalized perceived meaning. There is very much a strength in delicateness, just like how a delicate breeze has the capacity to ruffle all the leaves on a tree in just one blow, demonstrating how the delicateness of a woman has the capacity for much change, without having to use any force.
I love your description Cherise ! Beautiful expression Of what true strength is .
Thankyou Cherise , this is a great gift to us all, especially women. I can relate to most of what you have shared here. I have always viewed my deep delicate nature as a weakness, growing up with brothers I learned to react, defend and fight back for survival. To let go all my hardness in my body and to surrender to my delicateness terrified me when I was younger – I felt I would dissolve into a puddle never to be seen again. Over the last few years the presentations by Natalie Benhayon, Esoteric Women’s Health and the Esoteric Breast Massage practitioners have really supported me to see and feel that my delicate nature is my strength too. As I surrender to this and talk, walk and connect with others from this place, I am more open to my love and more open to others’ love. This is what gives me the strength to be naturally me. So I realise now its a trick to fall for the belief that delicate means weak when truly delicate is a strength, like the strength of a willow tree, flexible, accepting, unshakeable and unbreakable.
I love your comment, kate273, “truly delicate is a strength, like the strength of a willow tree, flexible, accepting, unshakeable and unbreakable”. I also see just how much strength there is in being truly delicate, just love your analogy of the willow tree….. unbreakable. There is so much power in this, we need more truly delicate women in this world, to counteract the sheer ugliness that is out there in the world.
What a most powerful
sharing, when I live my delicateness everyone around me feels it. Right in front of my eyes people change, they become still and engage with me, sometimes the exchange is only a matter of moments, but this doesn’t matter, what does is that they have felt their own innate inner strength. This is what changes the world.
Beautiful Leighstrack, becoming a true reflection of beauty, for all to get a taste of.
Thank you Cherise, you touch on a huge topic for women – who I am sure – like me have been told to toughen up once or twice in their lives. I can remember falling down and wanting to cry, wanting to express how I was feeling shock and pain – but I held back because if I didn’t cry I’d be called brave and given a sweet.
So I took it into my later years, when sometimes i would want to cry and let out what I was feeling – but I held back – because I thought I had to be brave. What happened to celebrating our tenderness and claiming that it is a fundamental part of who we truly are. I love how you have explored this in the way you move and do things Cherise – it really had been the starting point for me too of coming back to being delicate.
This is gorgeous Cherise and is what I am feeling at the moment too, so I can very much relate to your article, ‘What I have been able to feel recently is just how delicate I truly am, and that I’m still only scratching the surface of the depth of this innate quality.’ There are so many things that my body says no to now, such as carrying anything heavy, being spoken to in a hard tone, pushing my body to name but a few.