The Feminine Art of Problem Solving

Some discussion has been roaming around about my story, The Mermaid, and my ongoing interpretation of the masculine and feminine. I say ongoing because I am unfolding these universal terms phenomenologically. Much like writing The Mermaid, I am not sure where the experience of discovering universal concepts for these terms will take me, but as Michael Scott from The Office says, “…I just hope I find it along the way, like an improv conversation. An improversation.”

I want to speak on one story interpretation here: the feminine art of problem-solving. First, let’s look at my current definitions of the masculine and feminine.

Masculine: The structure of reality (or horizon) seen before us. It often provides stability for society as we interpret this structure as unmoving. Associated with a logic of calculation.

Example: A table / A hand moving / A written law / Data Output

Feminine: A moving structure that is the void containing what is. It looks like nothing because what is in this void is everything specific to a given Being. As Daniel Garner from O.G. Rose would put it, this is more of a logic of “apprehension” in a collection of accumulated whys and can seem “apathetic.” The mermaid in the story says to Thomas, “Your logic does not exist here.” That doesn’t mean there is no logic; it is just different, perhaps indirect logic.

Example: How the table may be decorated / The apprehension(this is a working thought) that willed the hand to move / Every moment that caused that law to become a structure / Data input

Again, this is a working definition, and I will refine this as time passes; however, it is essential to lay these terms out initially to capture a starting point for this piece. Notice how the definition of the masculine is shorter than the feminine. It is more straightforward and to the point than the feminine. This moving structure that is the void is complex to explain as it exists in a realm that I believe pertains to everyone but is specific to each Being. I often turn to stories to try and explain this concept, so I will turn to one now. (In this story, I use general assumptions of how men and women behave, but this is to lay out a foundation to explain the feminine that must be described indirectly.)

Turner struggles to understand his wife when she has a problem. When Turner has a problem, he often internalizes it and jumps into solutions that can be turned into action. To him, all his wife wants to do is talk about the problem but not actually solve the problem. Lenora cannot understand her husband. He is overlooking essential details of the problem. Lenora knows that things like emotions and tiny little factors affect this problem, but she’s not quite sure how to express these things that she knows would impact the outcome of this proposed solution. So what does she do? She goes into the void, which is to lay every single detail out on the table that has to do with the problem. This includes emotional aspects and things that don’t even seem to have anything to do with the problem, but they actually do, just to her relationship with the problem specifically. For example, say Lenora is having serious trouble at work, and her boss constantly belittles her and treats her like a servant. Turner tells her to stand up for herself, and of course, this would seem like a logical solution. Someone bullies you, and you stand up to them.

But Lenora is not thinking of this solution at the moment. Instead, Lenora submerged herself into the feminine realm to think about exactly why she wasn’t standing up to her boss. She will lay it all out on the table and continue to talk about it until she finds a pattern or until something pops out at her. Lenora takes her husband, Turner, on a journey and begins to tell him the story of this encounter with her boss. As she goes deeper into the story, Lenora finds patterns that hit emotional chords and follows them. She remembers that she was bullied in High School, and so she follows that feeling and goes deeper because, though she sees a pattern, nothing significant enough has popped out at her yet. Finally, Lenora remembers when she was a little girl and how her grandfather bullied her mother. She acknowledges how helpless she felt at that time and that it indirectly shaped how she was responding to this particular problem.

Oftentimes, when women communicate this way, it doesn’t look like they are trying to solve a problem for the other person. However, in a feminine form of thinking, what must be addressed as a prerequisite is the thing that caused the initial apprehension in the first place that created this structure of feeling helpless. Once she’s able to find that and address it, it not only offers a different mindset to fix that problem, but that mindset shift has the capability of creating a higher structure that will move someone like Lenora out of those situations so that if that problem presents itself again, she will have the specific why to get through that problem with more ease than before. Multiple layers must be considered to move into this higher structure of problem-solving.

I think that men typically go through this process as well, but the movement or mode of the feminine is much more internalized for them. This is only a guess, but I’m not a man, so I cannot say for sure based only on what I have observed. Lenora lays it all out on the table as a story or something to experience, and I think because she knows that Turner wants to help her solve the problem, she says, “Come experience this story and all of these emotions with me, and you can help me get to the very bottom of this.”

This is a tiny glimpse of what lies in the feminine. Again, I use the example of men and women here, but I don’t want the terms masculine and feminine to be saturated into the definitions we typically see in culture. I think of these concepts as movements; we all have these different movements inside of us and go through both of them. Based on the particular data given, the feminine seeks to create and expand into a higher structure, and the masculine holds that structure in place. They move back and forth like a dance and are essential for growth and stability.

That is all for today! Thank you for embarking on this journey with me. Writing stories and poetry and exploring theories I'm passionate about is truly a joy.