Season of My Softness (warning: long read) 
I was having a conversation with my 26-year-old, wise daughter about the feminine and the masculine. Specifically how I was feeling in my relationship with my partner that had become
more argumentative then usual.
To my wonderful surprise, my daughter has at times, become a sounding board of wisdom as I transition into a season of vulnerability, having become an empty nester and figuring out who I am beyond motherhood. Don’t get me wrong, I will always be a mother; it’s built into my DNA. It’s just that now it’s more about me. Yes, I said it. About me. So back to what I was contemplating from our conversation. 
I am in a season of major life transitions and self-discovery, and it has been met with a lot of head-bumping between my partner and me. I was feeling frustrated because I wondered how I was supposed to grow if I faced pushback from him. How are we going to grow into this season together? I am just too tired to fight anymore, even in the smallest way.
And my beautiful daughter, knowing us as well as she does, proceeded to ask me the following:
“What would it look like if you stepped into a supportive and feminine role, helping him feel confident, powerful, and amazing just as he is, and inspiring his action versus just wanting to receive because you want to? You both are tired; I mean, it’s been a long time. But what’s the alternative?”
“Have you thought of maybe stepping into your feminine side by supporting his vision and actions so he can feel confident enough to provide again without being in survival mode, allowing you to receive in a more luscious way?”
Oh boy. Depending on where you are in your life, that could be received in many different ways.
And that’s okay. Trust me, I get it! We can unpack that another time.
For me? When she said that, something melted in me. If she had said that a few months ago, I would have responded defensively. But at that moment, something shifted inside me, in my very heart.
When we started going through these big life changes—from selling the home where we raised our four beautiful children for 20 years, to losing our business and significant income that we built together with blood, sweat, and tears, to becoming empty nesters and starting anew in a foreign country, amid all the moments of anxiety, sadness, and a sense of failure—during that time, I had become hard. I cut myself off from gentleness and softness. The parts of me I valued most had been buried deep, locked away, and replaced with fear and anger. Fear of the powerlessness I felt due to all we had lost. Anxiety about the uncertainty of our future. Anger at not building something for myself as a woman after investing my whole life and being into my family. Incredible guilt and shame for feeling that way.
I had become combative and unwilling to move from my position when met with any kind of pushback because I had done that for so many years. I just wanted to be seen and heard, and I was screaming it from the depths of my soul. No more softness and gentleness. My softness had quieted my voice when it should have spoken up. It cost me friendships with people who took advantage of that part of me but couldn’t reciprocate. I was angry, hurt, and fed up. All that softness made me feel weak. Compounded with all the change, I was like a time bomb ready to explode, and my husband was getting the brunt of it in his season of tiredness. We had become like two bulls in a china shop.
That leads me to where I am now and the conversation with my daughter.
What would happen if I softened? Supported him in his season of fatigue? Helped support his confidence so that I could receive it in a more luscious way?
We both have gone through a lot these past four years. I was so focused on myself (which, honestly, I needed for a time), but the shift that happened in me at that moment felt like clarity. Clarity that my softness was my strength. Those parts of me that I had buried were ready to resurface but in the soil of a more healed heart. The soil of clarity, being able to see that my husband’s combativeness was coming from his own fears that maybe all my fighting meant he wasn’t enough. Choosing my softness enabled him to stand in his strength, while my combativeness put him on the defensive, starting a cycle of mutual hardness. We were not supporting each other in the way I know we can.
So I tried it. I brought out my softness again. I let her be who she is while still using my voice when I felt a boundary was being crossed or I was being taken advantage of.
But let me be clear:
I choose this BECAUSE/AND. BECAUSE I value those parts of me AND it helps my relationship with my partner, whom I love and adore. (although at times I still want to bop him in his big Dominican head)
BECAUSE it makes me feel good about myself in how I communicate AND it helps support my partner in his season of fatigue AND that feels right and good to me.
BECAUSE/AND…I’m embracing those parts of me again. Instead of burying them, I protect them by speaking the truth with love and kindness. And if you can’t hear me in my softness, that’s okay. You need to work that out with yourself. Because this girl is done with fighting. And I know my partner is too. That has been the luscious receiving for me in all of this—not choosing to please or receive from my partner, but from myself. I am returning to me and all the feminine parts of me that I love and value. I am receiving that lusciousness from myself because I am choosing those luscious parts of me. And in choosing myself, my partner and others benefit from it. So in answer to my daughters question. Yes! And that right there feels luscious! Love S
Sherry Taveras 
