We: A Manifesto for Women Everywhere

Noticing and naming are two of WE’s most important tools. You’ll be using them for the rest of this journey and hopefully the rest of your life. The answers lie within each and every one of us, and noticing and naming provide the mechanics with which we start finding them. Your journal will continue to be a valuable tool throughout this whole process, so keep it close for all these new discoveries.

Noticing

Noticing is like a flashlight in the dark – it leads you to awareness. Allow yourself to notice what’s going on inside and around you. Don’t judge it or be impatient for answers. Just be curious. You can’t be honest about something you don’t know exists. Noticing will bring insight. You’ll spot contradictions, you’ll spot inconsistencies, and then over time you’ll start to spot what’s congruent with the real you and what isn’t.

Perhaps you don’t actually want the promotion you’ve applied for because it will leave you with even less time with your kids, but you’re scared to admit it lest you look like you’re giving up on your feminist ideals.

Or maybe deep down you know you don’t want children, but you pretend to be broody because you fear the dismay and pain coming clean will evoke in your parents or partner.

Remember ACT – Action Changes Things. Well, noticing is an action, so notice what you tell yourself, notice what you tell other people, notice how you feel, and allow yourself to become aware of what the reality of your life is.

Naming

Once you’ve noticed an uncomfortable reality, it can be easy to want to slip back into denial. If you spot buried and painful emotions or truths, it can be tempting to sweep what you’ve noticed right back under the carpet. Naming is how we stop denial from creeping back in.

Sometimes acknowledging what you’ve noticed feels like it will be enough, but it isn’t. Things become more real when you name them. Write it down in your journal so it’s there in black and white. If you have someone safe to talk to – a therapist, a non-judgemental friend, then say it aloud to her too.

Out the truth. Notice it and then name it – in writing and, if you can, out loud.

Of course, notice and name what brings you joy and peace too. Take nothing for granted. You are on a mission to chart your own internal territory. It is an eye-opening and profound experience being this honest. Do your best to embrace the process and enjoy the wonder of meeting yourself anew.

People-pleasing

It’s natural to want to be liked and to want to be kind. But people-pleasing – saying yes when you mean no or pretending you like something when you don’t – is a form of dishonesty. We all do it, but if we do it without noticing and naming it, sooner or later we lose sight of what we do actually want and need.