You Gotta Have Girlfriends

I just had the pleasure (and I truly mean pleasure) of reading a pre-publication copy of  Suzanne Braun Levine's newest e-book, You Gotta Have Girlfriends. For those of you who have been living under a feminist rock for the past few decades (and if you have, it's okay to come out now) in addition to authoring several books on women in their "second adulthood", Suzanne was also the first editor of Ms. Magazine. She has been an icon in the feminist movement and has covered the issue of women and aging so beautifully over the years. In her new e-book, she addresses one of the fullest expressions of our feminine power- friendship.

I had a busy schedule the other day but had set aside an hour to begin reading Suzanne's book. Before I knew it hours had passed without my looking up once.  I was gripped by the stories, and saw myself and my experiences reflected in every chapter. 

This much I know: I would not have made it this far without my girlfriends. They witness me, encourage me, make me laugh when life is painful, and at times, they have literally saved my life. And now as I transition into midlife, that awful, awkward reverse-puberty phase, I can't imagine surviving it without them. I was happy to learn from Suzanne's book that not only do our friendships save us on a metaphoric level, but also on a physical.

"One of the best things a woman can do for her health is to nurture her relationships with her girlfriends, especially after the age of fifty."Hanging out with a small but trusted group of other females reduces damaging spikes in stress hormones, reports New York Times science writer Natalie Angier. A circle of trust can, as she puts it, “mop up the cortisol spills that can weaken the immune system,” which in turn can support additional years of good health.

So there you have it, ladies. Sharing a bottle of wine (or four) and spending the day at Burke Williams Spa is actually a preventative health measure. Cheers!

But as much as we can improve each others' health, some relationships are just plain toxic. Suzanne's book also addresses this. Our friendships with other women can be complicated. Sometimes they are fraught with competition, jealousy, and oversensitivity. And sometimes, they just don't work out. I have recently experienced the loss of a close friendship. This has resulted in many sleepless nights and has been excruciating, to say the least. Reading Suzanne's book helped me to feel less alone.  It was comforting to read the experiences of other women who had been "dumped" by a friend, such as novelist Jacqueline Mitchard, who shared her story with Suzanne. In fact, reading You Gotta Have Girlfriends felt like a heart to heart with a close friend, someone who understood everything I was feeling.

I can't recommend this book highly enough. It is a celebration of friendship, and a look into our deeply layered relationships. It is both encouraging and uplifting and clear-eyed about healthy boundaries. After reading it, I felt a deep sense of gratitude for the close circle of women who surround me, and more at peace about the ones who left the circle.

As Suzanne says so elequently:

"In your gut, you know who your friends are. They are the ones people you choose over all others to spend your fiftieth birthday with. They root for you and they put up with you. They stand up for you and they stand by you. They patiently teach you how to use your smart phone (and can be trusted not to tell your kids you couldn’t figure it out yourself). They listen sympathetically when you need to vent. They know when you are hurt or angry and how to patch things up. And they make you laugh."

Do yourself a favor and buy this book today (at only $1.99, how can you NOT buy it?), and then, share it with ALL your girlfriends.
http://www.openroadmedia.com/you-gotta-have-girlfriends

A few words from some of Suzanne's girlfriends.....

“Suzanne Braun Levine made me understand why I always envied older women . . . life just gets better—more outrageous, more radical, more passionate, less fraught, wiser, deeper, and kinder.” 
—Eve Ensler, author of The Vagina Monologues
“Levine takes us beyond the frontier of our own expectations and into a new and hope-filled stage of life.” 
—Gloria Steinem

** I was honored to meet Suzanne at the Women At Woodstock conference last October where she sat in on a workshop Amy Ferris and I were leading, and then to have her on our Women Write their Lives panel at the San Miguel Writers Conference. We are thrilled that Suzanne referenced  Dancing at the Shame Prom in her chapter about overcoming shame. 

No one can break your heart like a woman...

None of us have gotten this far in life without enduring some heartache. I’ve had my heart broken more than I’d thought possible, but that’s the price I pay for loving- and not just romantically, but loving friends as well. Nine times out of ten, the rewards far outweigh the risk. I have great love in my life, and am blessed with deep and meaningful friendships. But I’ve had some really bad experiences, the kind that make you never want to reach out again. Yes, men have hurt me, mostly by being thick-headed. But women…women are another story. There have been women in my life who have been vindictive and conniving and intentionally cruel. Women who have smiled to my face while stabbing me in the back. In my experience, no one can break your heart like a woman.

So why is this?

Could this be why the ERA has never been eradicated, and why women are still making 77 cents to every dollar a man earns? I think it is. We've put too much focus on men for our inequality, when we need to get out of the victim role and start looking at ourselves. 

It is my personal belief that as women we aren’t yet standing in full equality because we don’t stand united. We want to rise in the ranks, but we fear there isn’t room for all of us, so what do we do?  We turn on each other. Not believing in our own full power, we knock others down by gossiping and judging and berating- all projections of self-loathing, (and in my opinion, this stems from shame). According to author Iyanla Vanzant, women cut each other down to feel powerful, but this is false power. She says, “It’s easy to be queen among paupers, harder to be a queen amongst queens”.

When we honor ourselves for who we are, the need to minimize others falls away. Happy, successful women don’t feel the need to criticize others. They can be glad for others’ success without feeling threatened.

I love what my friend Amy Ferris says about this- women should complete each other, not compete with each other. Amy and I achieved this while working together on our book over the past year and a half.  We completed, never competed, and because of this, we were able to make a dream come true - and do something positive in the world, to boot. Because of this, we are both stronger women. To me, this is feminism.

Personally, I’d rather be a queen amongst queens. The women in my life are strong and feisty and confident and powerful, and that’s just the way I like it. They inspire me to strive for excellence every day. I would never, ever say or do anything to detract from their bright shining spirits. One flower choking out all the others is not a garden. A garden is only is beautiful when it's brimming with blooms of every variety.  There is room in this garden of humanity for every woman to blossom, to shine in her own unique color and shape. There is room for every one of us to be exactly who we are.

I believe we’ll only find our happiness, strength and equality when we help other women find theirs. But first, we've got to stop breaking each other's hearts, for no woman truly succeeds until all of us succeed. 



Amy Ferris wrote a companion piece to this blog- read it here: MarryingGeorgeClooney.com