As I said, NY, I thought you meant to help. I was afraid you read one thread and got a totally wrong feeling for this forum. I'm glad that was not the case. I love your blog.

Hi NY, if I can jump in here, for me, I was not offended so much as confused, and I am glad you clarified. Thank you for popping in to be clear. I am interested in your pic (why are they called Avatars?) to me it looks like a hippie chick dancing at a Grateful Dead concert or at Woodstock. However, my once perfect eye sight is not so clear these days. Your alter ego as you said?

Oh my goodness, NY Woman, that is so incrediably true! Women DO oppress other woman all of the time! A sisterhood is the last thing on most womens minds!

I have worked with woman all of my life. Dancers, Models, and in production. Producers are business minded and they, too, are oppressing towards each other! They have no problem running over each other one day and saying hello to their victim the next!

I just posted about it on my site.

I believe women can do a much better job of opening doors for other women. If we have a "connection," that will help another woman, why not share it?
If we have knowledge that might help another woman, why not share it?
Do we have to cling to what is ours with all our claws? Do we have to be almost afraid of one another to feel safe?
No.
We can be friends, comrades, sisters and REALLY mean it. We don't trust each other enough at all. We are led into competition by comparing ourselves to others and from there it is down hill.

This is a major hard pill for me to swallow. When I am in production I say in my first staff meeting, "You will NOT put one another down and work for me." "You will NOT sabotage one another and work for me."

I would not say it if it had not happened SO many times before my eyes.

My Gawd, if I had a quarter for every woman who tried to block my way I would have enough to forget about saving money! It's bad out there, girls and if you work with a lot of women, it shows like a beacon! The men sit back and watch us do it! It's a sad truth I am not afraid of!

Dotsie attempts here to do the opposite, to create a group of women who HELP one another. This is why I stay here.

Can't we all get along?

Dancer9

Oh Eagle, thank you for sharing your journey to trust in this community. You have been very honest, especially in stating the lesson that you learned that you "had no right to do that." I had a sense of trust from the beginning. Only once did I not trust another. (Funny how that happened after spending a week with my parents!) . I learned that when I trust, the one I am trusting is trusting me to trust her. By me thinking that she had ill-intent, I hurt her. We since kissed and made up. Only once do I know of that I have not been trusted, and that hurt, so I've learned from both sides of the same coin, so to speak. Trust is golden. I've been on other sites with wounded women, as a support to those who suffered abuse. I could not take how trust could not develop, even though I was in that place of distrust some time ago. At some point, for personal and spiritual growth, it is a matter of "dare to trust." On the other hand, as you say, I don't find women in the real world that I am so open with. Being open is vulnerable, and I don't always want to be at risk. Eagle flew home to this nest of women. L, PL

I have to take this slightly off-course, just briefly, to tell a story about not trusting someone. This was someone very significant. We didn't get along for many years, and that caused significant ripples within the family. I kept bringing it to prayer, and finally one day, the answer came: "you keep treating him as if he's your enemy. Start treating him as if he's NOT out to get you." It was hard, but I did, I stopped going into his home with my defences armed and ready, and I stopped reacting to him as if everything he said or did was a deliberate intent to hurt me. The change was amazing and almost immediate. I was stunned to realize that once I allowed myself to trust that his intentions were just like mine - to try and get along - we did get along. He paid me a beautiful compliment yesterday, something I could not have imagined hearing a year or so ago.

It opened my eyes to all the other encounters and circumstances that I enter into with my defences up and my mind firmly convinced that they're out to get me. In fact, nobody is out to get me (well, some say that just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT out to get you - but I choose now to believe that they're not), and most people are just as scared of confrontation and hostility as I am. Daring to trust is a powerful healer - opens doors and allows the other to be trustworthy.

I agree, Eagle Heart, that this place is a home and the women here are extraordinary. I, for example, had a personality difference with one person as will happen in families, after all, as we say on stage, "You can't be loved by everyone!

I wanted to say that this place has given me the opportunity to ask and understand women that are different from me. I am enjoying that so!

A dancer and a singer do not talk. Before you know it, you do not know how to express yourself to others. It happens to all dancers so we appear to float about and not make friends with anyone. The truth is that we don't know how to play a game, a fun one, to know someone and we don't know the complex thing that is relationships. We only know to speak the truth and have spent our entire lives in a dance studio, "shutting up," and learning to talk through our bodies. It would be easy to SHOW you, for example, how i feel. But to tell, I need help.

This forum gives me that help. Although my posts can be unusual, I'm guessing, at least they listen to them and post back as if I am one of you all.

This is why I returned to this forum with its open minded women who chose to trust me. For this, I a blessed.

dancer

NYWoman, I enjoyed the link you provided. Very interesting reading. I could identify with the definitions and saw some previous co-workers and behaviors. It was so real I looked for their name to be beside the description. Uncanny. I believe this is very much alive, sadly.

Some people feel they are "oppressed" so they become the Oppressor! Do you agree? They actually act towards others what they dislike about themself the most. I'm not saying its right, just that it happens.

Does that make sense? Or have you witnessed this? Also, some people LOVE being the victim and are comfortable in their misery, so if you try to lift them up, they will become aggressive and again...the oppressor. Just my experience. Thanks for posting this interesting link!

Good food for thought.