Peeling Back the Layers

Recently I read 2 very different books that caused me to think a great deal about the way that we are socialized as women within our culture.

The first book called Tracks: One Woman’s Journey Across 1,700 Miles of Australian Outback, by Robyn Davidson, describes the author’s odyssey through the deserts of Australia with her dog and four camels as companions.

Ms. Davidson grew up in Adelaide, Australia, but she traveled to the Central Australian town of Alice Springs in the mid-1970’s, arriving with just $6 in her pocket. She went there with a desire to learn about camels and the outrageous dream of crossing the outback from Alice Springs to the Indian Ocean by herself, using camels to carry her gear.

To support herself while preparing for the journey she worked in a bar and to learn more about camels she apprenticed herself to a camel owner, performing menial jobs. It took a long two years of preparation, but finally she was ready to pursue her dream of crossing the outback alone.

Tracks is brilliantly written and both touching and funny.  While the saga of preparing for and taking the trip made for an excellent adventure story all by itself, what really spoke to me was Ms. Davidson’s passion for completing this journey and her introspection, honesty, and insight along the way.

She doesn’t make up some great-sounding reasons for why she wants to make this trip. In fact, she  explains that she doesn’t know why she wants to do it. She just does. In the book, she doesn’t spare from showing all sides of her personality. She knows that at times she was unreasonable, unfriendly, and contradictory and she shares that as a part who she is.

I am about the same age as she is and I couldn’t help thinking about what I was doing in the last half of the 1970’s—starting my work life, getting married, having our first child—living up to the cultural expectations for a young woman. Hers was a totally different trajectory in life, pushing outside the boundaries of expectations for women in that time and shedding the layers of socialization about how one should look and be as a young woman. In the time she spent preparing for the trip, alone in the desert, or traveling with an Aborigine Elder named Eddie, she saw and broke through and shed many unnecessary layers.

“I liked myself this way, it was such a relief to be free of disguises an prettiness and attractiveness. Above all that horrible, false, debilitating attractiveness that women hide behind. I pulled my hat down over my ears so that they stuck out beneath it. ‘I must remember this when I get back. I must not fall into that trap again.’ I must let people see me as I am. Like this? Yes, why not like this. But then I realized that the rules pertaining to one set of circumstances do not necessarily pertain to another. Back there, this would just be another disguise. Back there, there was no nakedness, no one could afford it. Everyone had their social personae well fortified…”
― Robyn Davidson, Tracks: A Woman’s Solo Trek Across 1700 Miles of Australian Outback

Even though the book was written 30 years ago, it holds up today, with lessons for all of us about what is real and important in life.

The second book I read, Circling the Sun, by Paula McLain, is the story of Beryl Markham, the first woman to fly across the Atlantic from east to west. Markham grew up in Kenya with a very unconventional childhood. Her mother left her and her father in Kenya when Beryl was only 4 years old. Her father, busy starting a large horse farm, neglected Beryl during her childhood. This left Beryl with great freedom to make friends with, play with and follow a Nandi boy named Kibii during her childhood.

As a result of the neglect and lack of parental supervision, Beryl grows up as a free spirit, independent, adventurous woman with very little concern with society’s strictures or expectations. She becomes the first licensed female racehorse trainer in the world at age 18. And later, despite losing a dear friend in a plane crash, becomes a pilot, supporting herself by flying in the bush in Africa.

“We’re all of us afraid of many things, but if you make yourself smaller or let your fear confine you, then you really aren’t your own person at all—are you? The real question is whether or not you will risk what it takes to be happy.”
― Paula McLain, Circling the Sun

Markham also wrote her own lyrical and beautiful autobiography West With the Night, one of my all-time favorite books.

Living An Authentic Life

Both of these books and both of the women portrayed in the books have much to teach us about living an authentic life.

I observe so much time, effort, and attention being paid to things that do not bring joy or satisfaction in our culture today—like how we look, meeting the expectations of others, filling our lives with possessions and things—and so little time spent exploring the unknown or developing our gifts and passions. We have become addicted to comfort and luxury, rarely stepping out of our comfort zone.

I’m not suggesting that you travel 1,700 miles alone across a desert or go to Africa and become a pilot unless you truly want to do that. But I am suggesting that you consider moving beyond comfort and expectations and try something that scares you just a little.

Stretch yourself and break through self-imposed limitations.

Each of us is covered with layers of socialization and expectations that do not serve us. We opt for comfort and safety instead of facing up to our fears and breaking through them. For much of my life I silenced my voice in an attempt to fit in and be “successful.” Now I am re-discovering my voice through doing what I love.

I believe that all our lives will be infinitely richer if we take the time to discover and explore whatever it is that we love.

What is it that your heart is telling you to do that you have been ignoring or suppressing for too long?

May you walk in beauty.

Tree Heart