This week we have been traveling and I am enjoying some much needed PTO. Yesterday, we were lucky enough to experience the last day of The Great Elephant Migration Art installation exhibit in Beverly Hills, California1. It’s a collection of 100 life-size handmade Indian elephants on display that have travelled 5000 miles across America to help inspire humans and wildlife to coexist peacefully. It’s an exquisite installation. The craftsmanship and details of each elephant is stunning. Every elephant is patterned after an actual elephant that exists and is named by the people of Nilgiri, South India. The message of conservation and peaceful coexisting is also beautiful and thought provoking.
This impressive art and fundraising installation was created by an organization called The Matriarchy which is: “Made up of influential women across diverse fields, including environmentalists, philanthropists, writers, and creatives, The Matriarchy are rallying support for human-wildlife coexistence alongside the elephants…”2 There are some men involved in the process, but overall the project was spearheaded and funded by strong and determined women.
This is even more significant, given that elephants exist in matriarchies. The oldest and wisest of the herd is trusted to lead her family. “Elephants are highly social animals and, much like humans, they often look to strong, wise, and charismatic leaders to guide them. In elephant family groups, this role is filled by the matriarch. Usually, the oldest and largest female elephant, she bears the weight of making critical decisions, from determining when and where to move to how to react to potential dangers.”3 Take a deep dive into elephant behavior and leadership, it's really quite fascinating.
As I strolled down Santa Monica Blvd yesterday with my family and admired this impressive art installation, I started to wish that I was an elephant. I wished that I had been raised in a matriarchal society, instead of the patriarchal society and religion I had been born into. I wished I’d had the example of the elephants, where females are respected leaders. Where most interactions are peaceful and decisions are mostly communal. Where women’s voices were heard and heeded. I wished that I was trusted by society to lead. To keep people safe from harm. To guide people to the resources they need. I wish that I was looked to for advice. I wished that my wrinkles and graying hair were seen as a badge of honor and wisdom, something to embrace rather than reverse. I wish my health was better protected and honored4. Oh, in the moment, surrounded by their beauty and greatness, I wished I was an elephant.
And yet, I know that we aren’t going to somehow turn the societies and religions we participate in from patriarchies to matriarchies anytime soon. And to be fair, there are advantages and disadvantages to both, so trading one for the other may not be the ultimate solution. However, I thought of all the things we could do here and now. The things that we can do to give women the opportunity to see themselves in a different light. To see themselves as the mighty matriarch elephant of their families and communities, leading everyone to safety with love and with gentle power.
As I longingly admired all the handmade elephants standing proud and tall, trunks intertwined, juveniles looking to the matriarch for direction, I thought of my patriarchal religion and who I am supposed to look to for direction. It’s always a man. My patriarchal religion fails to give women genuine opportunities to truly and autonomously lead and trust their own wisdom. It’s a system that keeps women’s decisions tethered to men’s approval. It’s a system that stunts women’s personal growth and development. It’s a system that limits women’s ability to be valued as a matriarch, even in the small circle of influences they are allowed.
Men in patriarchal religions have a male God as a role model. But, women? Women also have a male God as a role model and it isn’t working for me and for many women anymore. Women need the leadership of a woman and a mother (I might argue men do to). I’m reminded of the Chinese concept of Yin and Yang, that we need representation of opposites in order to find perfect harmony, peace, and wholeness. Yet, patriarchal religions are not whole. They leave out the divine feminine and so we’re left with yin and no yang. They make no room for a Heavenly Mother (or such a tiny limited space, it’s not meaningful) and in doing so they leave no room for women to grow or become. If Heavenly Mother is not allowed to become the matriarch she needs to be, how can I?
Imagine if male and female leadership could align like the yin and yang in perfect harmony and cooperation?
That doesn’t mean that I haven’t found beautiful truths and opportunities for growth in my religion of birth, even among the constraints of patriarchy, I have. But I never had the power or the example to think for myself or to envision what I as a woman could become. For many years, I latched onto the teachings of Jesus (largely ignoring other voices) because he seemed to acknowledge and respect women in a way that the men around me (who claimed to be his followers) did not. At times in my life recently, I thought of wearing a cross to remind me of Jesus and his example. Of all the examples that men have laid out for me, his is one I find worthy of emulation for both men and women. But this weekend I’ve changed my mind. I am not going to buy myself a cross, I am going to find myself a necklace with an elephant pendant5. A reminder of the strength there is in a strong matriarchal example, a reminder of feminine divine, of a Heavenly Mother, a reminder that I am also God.
https://thegreatelephantmigration.org/
There’s some research that women in matriarchal societies have improved health: https://www.weforum.org/stories/2021/02/women-matriarchal-society-improved-health-patriarchy/.
The more I research and look at elephant jewelry the more I learn of it’s symbolism and meaning.
Yes! Patriarchy isn’t yin and yang. It’s hierarchical. Matriarchy may have mother elephant matriarchs, but it is inherently circular.
I have long been an elephant fan! And I heard about the traveling elephant art installation the day after it left my city. Boo! Thank you for sharing your questions and thoughts.