When we talk about how women influence the male-dominated workplace we often say that women create balance. But that isn’t very impactful and it doesn’t portray the full power of women.
When we think of women balancing men we equate it to men going too far and women tempering their efforts. It creates the perception that men are the driving force who get things done while women apply the brakes and slow them down from 120 mph to 90 mph so they don’t crash and burn.
This concept of balance doesn’t portray women as an equal driving force who can also get things done at 90 mph.
We also think of balance in terms of pendulum swings. For a while the pendulum swings in one direction. But then it goes too far causing things get out of balance and no longer function properly. In response we then swing the pendulum in the opposite direction…until it goes too far and we decide to swing it back in the opposite direction.
When the pendulum is swinging upward we think we are making progress and accomplishing great things. We push the pendulum to greater heights and greater extremes. We forget that we will eventually push the pendulum too far and cause it to come crashing down amongst turmoil, chaos and negativity.
This drive to extremes and the resulting cataclysmic crashes are causing us to associate balance with high drama. But balance isn’t about drama. It is about two forces of equal strength and importance continuously interacting and influencing each other so they produce a steady state of harmony and equilibrium.
We find this type of balance in the concept of Yin and Yang.
When men and women apply Yin and Yang to themselves, they recognize that they are each one half of the whole and need each other for balanced action. As we picture the Yin and Yang acting on each other we see them rotating in a circle. Yin and Yang each take turns being the driving force that pushes them over the top to create the rotation.
Their rotation is gentle, peaceful and very efficient. There is none of that clumsy wasted energy we find in pendulum swings. Acting together, Yin and Yang build up energy and increase their momentum without falling out of balance.
If you read Jim Collins famous book Good to Great you remember him talking about the flywheel effect. He described the way the flywheel begins rotating as “a cumulative process – step-by-step, action-by-action, decision-by-decision, turn-by-turn of the flywheel – that adds up to sustained and spectacular results.”
But what he doesn’t say it that the flywheel mimics Yin and Yang interaction – it requires women to assert themselves as full equals in the workplace. Without women helping to complete the rotation, the flywheel becomes nothing more than a pendulum.
This explains why flywheel companies like Circuit City couldn’t sustain their results and came crashing down.
Many companies avoid the crashes by moderating their pendulum swings. But this won’t create sustained and spectacular results. That is why we need to stop thinking about balance and start thinking about working in wholeness.
Wholeness is a much larger concept than balance. Wholeness has the power to hold everything together and create unity. It doesn’t allow Yang to disregard Yin as it goes off to act independently or put itself first. Wholeness reminds Yang that its actions affect Yin and will cause Yin to act in response. Yin’s resulting actions will then impact Yang.
Wholeness creates a complete circle so an entity’s negative actions always come back to them. Likewise so do their positive. Therefore, wholeness inspires people to act positively. And it is only through positive action that we can achieve sustained spectacular results.
Where we have gone wrong for centuries is believing in the great myth that men have the miraculous power to create wholeness all by themselves and therefore have incredible power in comparison to women. Consequently women have been demanding men to give up half of what they have and give it to women. But in reality men only have their half of the whole and only one half of the power.
Women’s half has been sitting off to the side patiently waiting for women to recognize it, realize its value and put it into action.
Men cannot put women’s half into action. Women have to act on their own volition and do this themselves. That after all is what equality and empowerment really are.
Whether or not we continue to function through wild pendulum swings or begin functioning like the flywheel is completely up to women. Because at this point, the power to create wholeness lies entirely with women. It depends on whether or not women recognize their inherent equality and put it into action.
Empowered Women Choose to Assert Their Half of the Whole
To learn more about how women create wholeness checkout my book.
Women discuss their work and family conflicts but we often forget this is not just a female issue. The reality is that men today have many of the same family and work conflicts as their female co-workers. How many of your male co-workers and managers are divorced or have a working wife? Or have a stay at home wife who still expects her husband to share equally in raising the kids? Probably most of them.