Natalie Benhayon: Redefining what it is to be a powerful woman
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Natalie Benhayon: Redefining what it is to be a powerful woman
When I was growing up, one of my role models as a girl was Madonna when she was still in the 80s tomboyish stage of wearing ripped jeans and singing about what it’s like to be a virgin.
Later in my teens I can’t really remember if there was anyone I particularly looked up to, however, I did aspire to be a strong woman, although at that time, my understanding or image of being a strong woman was about joining in or even outdoing the boys in their sports or laddish activities.
Everything I saw on TV or in the media showed me that to be a strong woman was to be able to live in a similar way to a man in a woman’s body and be able use those male traits beyond what the men can do. An example of this can be seen in Margaret Thatcher,[i] a woman who has been ranked as one of the 25 most powerful women in recent times who, regardless of the politics she stood for, was certainly outmanning the men in parliament at that time. And you only need to watch her speak or present to see that this was true.
Therefore, while I was growing up I felt I had two choices:
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Being girly, which to me meant being weak, pathetic and not to be taken seriously.
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Or you could toughen up and be a boyish girl, who then goes on to be the hardened woman by using what we could term as male energy, meaning living in drive and protection so that one cannot see or hurt the true woman living inside.
Meeting Natalie Benhayon and seeing her present at Universal Medicine events has completely busted through all the ideals and beliefs I had about what it is to be a strong and powerful woman. It was the first time I had seen living evidence that women do not need to use a force to seem powerful and strong, and that being female and showing all your womanly traits is not a weakness or pathetic by any means. The complete opposite in fact, as until knowing Natalie, what I thought were female traits were not even true.
Natalie Benhayon holds herself in such authority that you cannot doubt her power, yet she is delicate, nurturing, deeply sensitive and loving.
She doesn’t even entertain the idea that you need to out-man the men to succeed in life. She has shown me that you can be sexy without demeaning yourself by being overtly sexual; that you can take care of your body and nurture yourself without being wimpy or pathetic; and that true power comes from living from your essence as a woman instead of taking on what society so often projects as being a powerful woman.
Attending my first Universal Medicine retreat and observing Natalie in the way she presented, changed my whole perspective of how a strong woman can be. The profound yet practical wisdom that she is constantly able to share, the way she gracefully moves with not an ounce of ‘pathetic’ about her, the way she connects to people and can be so playful, and how she does not compare herself to other women, holding everyone she meets as an absolute equal to herself.
Finally, in my mid-30s, I found a true female role model who inspires me to live as the powerful woman I now know that I also can be.
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Hardness, Role models, Women in leadership, Empowerment
