Let’s Talk About Emotional Intelligence: Feminine Energy

On this week’s episode of Let’s Talk About…, Elise sits down with co-host Sarah Joseph to talk about feminine energy.

Sarah is a certified emotional intelligence coach whose mission is to help you get comfortable with your emotions and master them to live a more purposeful life. She understands how our lack of emotional management can impact the longevity of our relationships and can inspire our emotional healing by plugging into our most powerful tool, the Mind. Her philosophy is that our emotions show up in every aspect of our lives and it’s your right to learn how to manage them effectively to your advantage.

On this week’s episode, Elise and Sarah talk about what is feminine energy, finding the balance between feminine and masculine energy, and how these play a big factor in relationships and workplaces.

“…Mother nature is always blooming. She’s always giving birth to new life, and you want to be in that space and absorb the energy because what’s gonna happen is it’s gonna help you tune into that sensitivity, to that birthing, to that nurturing, all those qualities of yourself, and you’ll wanna embrace them a little more than normal.” Sarah tells Elise on Let’s Talk About.

Check out for show’s full transcript below.

[00:00:00] Elise: Hi everyone, and welcome. This week let’s talk all about feminine energy. We’re continuing our series on emotional intelligence with Certified Emotional Intelligence coach Sarah Joseph. Hi Sarah. 

[00:00:11] Sarah: Hey, how are you? 

[00:00:13] Elise: I’m good. How are you? 

[00:00:14] Sarah: I’m good. I’m super excited for today’s topic actually.

[00:00:18] Elise: Yeah. So it’s Women’s History Month. Sarah and I, in terms of brainstorming topics, Sarah came up with this, thought it would be a great idea, very timely to kind of get into this. So do you wanna set a little bit of a baseline with what does it mean to have feminine energy?

Because we’re not talking about like you’re a guy, you have male energy, you are exactly assigned, like you associate as as a woman or a female. You have female. It’s not really what we’re talking about here. So can you. Set a little baseline for what we are talking about . 

[00:00:48] Sarah: I can actually, so you’re absolutely right.

It has nothing to do with gender. So feminine masculine energy has nothing to do with association with a gender. But what we’ve seen is that through history of time, through men and women, there are these traits or these qualities and behavior patterns that we usually have, which end up, you know, portraying being portrayed in our energy.

So for example, um, a daughter, a mother, a grandmother, right? You’ll see paternal or maternal traits within them that you know that that’s a feminine, a feminine quality, or that is a masculine quality, for example, right? But both men and women can have masculine and feminine energy, and it’s actually really important to have both.

So specifically for feminine energy, I think it’s great that we’re talking about it for women’s month. Then, , you could kind of define feminine energy as allowing yourself to embrace kind of the flow of life, kind of being able to expand on your creativity, being able to explore your nurturing, caring, kind, loving sides of yourselves, that sensitive side that you know people, Can express emotion a little better with their feminine energy.

They can feel their feelings a little better. Um, they’re a little wild in a sense, but they’re also a little silent in a sense. So there’s very serene and transcendent energy. It’s about tapping into your feelings and emotions and. Essentially being able to grasp that idea of like nurturing and rebirthing.

So a lot of feminine energy is about, uh, bringing more light and energy and purity into a lot of the work that you do or who you are or in the types of tasks that you do, and when I talk about rebirthing, it’s kind of like breathing life into things or breathing, um, birthing life into things or, or in your creation, for example.

So, um, it could be in your work, it could be in your relationships, it could be in any area of your life. But learning how to embody these traits, um, can really help with how you go about your relationships, how you go about managing your money, how you go about. , um, having a better relationship with the people in your life, or your coworkers, for example, or your professional life.

[00:03:04] Elise: Okay. Interesting. And does this idea, what does it, like, where did this stem from feminine and masculine energy? Does it have anything to do with gender rules or like, Caveman and men were hunting food, women were staying home, kind of anything to do with that or 

[00:03:19] Sarah: it definitely can come from there, right? So it definitely started with those roles and how those roles play.

But just in being a woman, you, you and I being women ourselves, right? You can feel the femininity within you. It’s an energy, right? It’s a source. It’s a place within you that you can go into to tap in, right? So even if we didn’t come from, Those role models from before, we have access to it internally, and I love that because it’s great to be able to have access to it, but a lot of us are kind of shut out from it and tuned out of it, specifically our feminine energy.

So most of the world is moving to masculine and it’s really hard to tap into that feminine when we’re so masculine dominated. But we’ll get all. 

[00:04:03] Elise: Okay. Oh, really? Interesting. Yeah, so I, I think maybe a next good question is what can you, you said a little bit about what feminine energy is. Can you say a little bit about what masculine energy is so we can like decipher the dis the difference.

[00:04:17] Sarah: Yeah, so masculine energy again comes from more of that behavior of men or that those traits of men. So it’s a lot of embodying strength. It’s a lot of that protector, um, energy. It’s a lot of that drive that dominance, the stability, clarity, and focus. It’s a lot of, uh, predictability and control, right? In the things that you do and to be able to provide protection and honor in everything that you do.

It’s the process of moving forward. Whereas feminine energy is the process of moving slowly through, right? So allowing whatever needs to flow to flow and to come in and to kind of embrace. The balance of uncertainty, whereas masculine energy is more embracing rationality and it’s embracing, uh, predictability.

Um, it’s also great with structures and following rules. So it’s very structured in that way. Um, and building really strong foundations. So if you think about it, like the men of the house, right? Um, what is he responsible for? What are his traits usually look like? And it’s, you know, prob probably, you know, providing for his wife and his kids, providing for the family, um, putting a roof over their head, right?

So providing income, probably providing some type of structure. and then the women, the female energy or that feminine energy kind of flows in with the nurturing of the children, the birthing of the children, the guidance and the PR unpredictability, and just being that structure in the home as well. So I guess you could kind of differentiate between the two with, with 

[00:05:48] Elise: that, and it’s, it’s interesting because you said earlier that we’re kind of out of touch with our feminine energy and.

I also wonder if it’s because we’ve put so much more of a burden on women to like to be, um, high profile jobs and things like, of that nature. Not, I wanna say, maybe burden’s not the right word, but we’ve put so much expectation on women that I can see how that masculine energy gets in there, because now not only do, is it like the nurture, et cetera at home, which that never went away.

Right, right. , and now you’re putting in that other kind of Okay. Like move forward energy as well, which I don’t even think is just involved in work. Like I feel like now as you mentioned in society in general, like I think we all feel like we, at least myself, I always think like productivity progress, like that I would imagine is kind of masculine energy.

Like that doesn’t feel like. , I’m like going through something that feels like I have a, a very clear, like forward motion. 

[00:06:55] Sarah: Right? 

[00:06:56] Elise: So I’m guessing that it’s probably, and maybe vice versa for men too, in that, you know, there is more of an expectation to be an As or should be like nurturing your children, et cetera.

And so now this is kind of. every, everyone’s crossing over, I guess maybe, or roles are crossing over, and so what does that look like for energy? But I would also imagine energy is like on a spectrum, right? Like some, is it like you could have, you know, it is, you could be more masculine or more feminine in terms of energy in any given day or different situations or, or are you naturally as a person, is it like, I’m the way you would’ve say, I’m more type A versus type B.

[00:07:45] Sarah: I feel like did the situation spectrum, I think you had it there with the spectrum, so it’s kind of like specifically in what you’re doing. So your specific situation, your task at hand can invoke certain things. So part of embracing your masculine and feminine energy is learning and knowing what energy to use and when.

Right. So knowing. Energy to channel within yourself to be able to get the outcome that you’re looking for, right? So not everything in life requires you to be so focused and clear and stable and structured, right? Sometimes you need that feminine energy to balance you out, to allow you to enjoy the journey, right?

To allow you to kind of settle in and be calm and nurturing and loving towards yourself so that you can get the outcome that you want, right? A lot of the time, like we were talking about earlier, a lot of us spend so much time in our masculine, and you’re right, it’s because of those, um, a lot of us were expected to grow up a lot sooner than we needed to.

Right. So a lot of us were taking on household responsibilities, especially women, you know, uh, much earlier. and what about single mothers? Right? If you think about single mothers, they have to be both masculine and feminine, right? They need to be able to embody both so that their child can get the best of both worlds.

But because there’s such a heavy burden on providing and that stability, it makes it harder for a mother to embrace her feminine energy and be that secure, nurturing person because there’s so much stress that comes with trying to do both and being both at the same. , right? Hmm. So it’s interesting because I even found this in my own relationship, right?

So when you have two energies that match, so you have a masculine and a masculine, there’s no feminine, there’s no balance, right? So I know I have, I had a lot of very masculine energy, and my boyfriend also has a lot of masculine energy being just the man that he is and. , that creates a lot of clashing and disconnect, right?

Emotionally, mentally, and physically. And with that comes the disconnect where you’re not able to connect fully, you’re not able to embrace each other fully because you’re both fighting for this dominance, right? You’re both fighting for this masculinity. And me being someone that had to grow up a lot older, a lot more than she needed to, or I needed to, you know, take on responsibilities of my household that I shouldn’t have as a child, but needed to because, uh, my parents were not just emotionally stable to be able to take on those roles. So I had to take on those roles and now I’m bringing that story with me right into my relationship. And now we’re both kind of in this place where I wanna be masculine, but I’m masculine, right? But what I’ve been l working towards more, and especially with my career now, Is being able to embrace my feminine and knowing when I can and when it’s appropriate too.

So learning how to ask for help is such a big one, and actually being comfortable asking for help and understanding that you can lean on your other masculine, lean on your partner for guidance and support in that way, and. , if I’m so stuck in my masculine, it sucks the life out of someone who is naturally masculine and wants to be masculine.

It definitely takes away from my partner’s ability to show up in his masculine if I’m not showing up in my divine feminine, right? So, . There are ways in which he needs me to be my feminine, but then there’s ways that I need him to be his masculine and vice versa, right? So there are times where I need him to step into his feminine and there are times where I need, he needs me to step into my masculine because we’re stronger in those specific areas.

But in other circumstances, we also need that divine separation. So when I started embracing more. My divine feminine, I was able, we were able to connect on a different level because I wasn’t so focused on being dominant, right? I wasn’t so focused on needing to provide, I wasn’t so focused on needing to, um, be the person that, you know, set X, Y, and Z and this is how things went, or structured the rules, right?

It gave him space to embrace his masculine, and that’s literally all, any relationship really needs to embrace both masculine and feminine. 

[00:11:48] Elise: So we need both of those to like coexist. Now, how did you tap into that divine feminine more and how did you encourage him to tap into his divine ma divine masculine, if that’s what it’s referred to, and divine feminine when needed as well. Like how did you. , how did you balance that and how did you do it within yourself and encourage your partner to do it?

[00:12:09] Sarah: So how I went about it was I started learning, really tuning into that awareness piece and focusing in on the areas of my life where I noticed I was really heavily masculine and really heavily feminine, or vice versa, right? So I was, I noticed that I’m really heavily masculine, was really heavily masculine in my career, for example.

And that was because that’s all really career driven. That’s income driven, that’s ego-driven, right? So there’s a lot of areas in yourself, in your physical self that. Kind of bring up that masculine for me and a lot of responsibility on my shoulders on top of that. And then the higher and higher up you go, the more responsibility that comes with that.

So, um, what I started noticing was that if I didn’t learn how to embrace my feminine, I was burning myself out and stressing myself out so much more then I really needed to. So what I started doing was after I became aware, I went, how can I bring in feminine qualities into my work so that I’m not so stressed out?

And what that was for me was coaching itself. And specifically the type of work that I do is so feminine driven because it’s all about feeling your emotions and understanding what they feel like and understanding that you are the source, right? So understanding that divineness understanding. That there is a silence almost with all of this.

There’s a peace and tranquility with all of it, and I started learning how to, A lot of meditation, for example, is something that I practice not only with my clients, but with myself, and that allows me to tune into my body. So tuning in and meditation is kind of another way that you can kind of explore your feminine a little more.

Another thing I would encourage is going out and spending time in nature. So mother Nature, mm-hmm. , the reason we call it mother nature is cause she’s a divine feminine, right? Yeah. So when we talk about the birthing or the rebirthing or the breathing life into things, nature is such a beautiful place to explore that because if you think of the trees and things growing out of the roots, mother nature is always blooming, right?

She’s always giving birth to new life, and you kind of all kind of wanna be in that space and absorb the energy because what’s gonna happen, it’s gonna help you tune into that sensitivity, to that birthing, to that nurturing all, those qualities of yourself, and you’ll wanna embrace them a little more than normal. Because a lot of us are stuck behind the screen. We’re stuck indoors. We’re not really going out as much, and we’re not, we’re kind of disconnecting from our feminine. So those are kind of some ways that you can do that, and a lot of reflection and connection to yourself. So sitting down to take a minute to really feel your feelings and observe what you feel and how you feel them maybe taking a minute to journal about them or taking a minute to accept you know, the negative feelings that you have that you don’t necessarily want to accept, and you don’t have to want them, you don’t have to like them. But acknowledging that they are alive in you and acknowledging that they are moving through you all the time and releasing them effectively is kind of one way that I started accessing my feminine.

So how, that’s how I kind of brought it into my work, brought it into my relat. Sorry, there was a second part to your question wasn’t, 

[00:15:20] Elise: yeah, it was about how, how you can kind of support your partner in that journey as well. But I just kind of wanna stop you there for a second because, yeah, I guess I, as you’re talking and walked us through that, When you think of how our lifestyle has changed of that, like we’re really not outside very often.

We’re sitting in front of computers, we’re kind of like not even really interacting much face-to-face to allow for that, like nurturing or compassion with people, right? Or those interpersonal relationships. Like it really does highlight how far we’ve moved as a society from our feminine energy, which is really interest.

Um, so just to comment on that, I guess. So, and, and then back to it. So how do you, how did you, or how do you suggest encouraging that in your partner, um, or in your children, or in your friendships or in your, you know, parental relationships, whatever that looks like, whatever relationship you’re looking to kind of focus that on.

[00:16:15] Sarah: Right. Something that really stuck out to me was allowing, I’ll use my relationship, for example. Um, allowing him to do things his way. Right. So I was definitely a person that liked a lot of control. I don’t like asking for help. Right. Well, this was in the past. Now that’s a lot different. . Um, and I like to have that control and that certainty that I can trust myself to get it done right.

And there were instances where I had to, you know, learn to lean off of that hyper independence and start asking for help, or there’s instances where I needed to share responsibilities because I was burning myself out. and how I allowed myself to become okay with accepting help was to allow him to do things his way and really get out of my own way and get out of my own head to think that I was doing it right the whole time, right?

Because what I was doing was I was blocking myself from noticing where I could improve and where I could change and where I could grow because I was saying, no, the way I do it is right, right? The way I do it should be the way everybody does it. That’s kind of a mentality where you get stuck, right? You, you just, you, there’s no room for growth there.

Right. 

[00:17:24] Elise: I feel like we all do that. 

[00:17:25] Sarah: we all do it. We’re all victims of it. You know what I mean? , 

[00:17:29] Elise: I think the way do everything is the way everyone should do it. 

[00:17:32] Sarah: Exactly. Exactly. But that’s just not the case. Right. And there’s actually nothing wrong with him doing it his way. Right. So maybe he cleans differently than I do.

But the end outcome is that he cleaned. Right. 

[00:17:45] Elise: Well, Sarah, I was gonna say what happens, this is probably a whole other topic, but what happens if he doesn’t even clean ? 

[00:17:53] Sarah: Well, that’s a whole different topic. Express our needs a little better and what we, we’ll get that. Yeah. But for, for me and my partner, we both clean, but we both clean very differently.

Right. Maybe I’m more of a deep cleaner, but he’s more of a casual cleaner. Right. He’ll clean throughout the day. 

[00:18:12] Elise: I’m tidier, I like to call it. 

[00:18:14] Sarah: Yeah, it’s tidier. Exactly. . Exactly. So it’s definitely different in the way that we do things, but I noticed that where I could access my feminine energy was to say he’s allowed to do it.

In his own way, and that allowed him to step into his masculine. So that allowed him to go, okay, I am a man, I am able to provide and I am able to do things the way I wanna do things because she accepts me, even if it’s not the way that she would like it. She’s accepting that this is the way that I do it and I.

I like that. Right. So that actually brought us closer together, even though I was uncomfortable in the beginning. Right. Even though I w I didn’t know how to do any of this. Right. I was 

[00:18:53] Elise: going, you probably had to stop yourself from talking a lot or, or, oh, my directing 

[00:18:57] Sarah: or, yeah. . Yeah. Yeah. And I just kind of went, you know what?

I’m gonna let you do it your way, and I’m gonna have no expectation of you, because if I hold expectations of you, that only leads me to being disappointed, right? And I don’t wanna feel disappointed. So you know what? I’m gonna let you do it your way, because I’m going, I’ve been in a relationship with you for five years, then that means I trust you, right?

And if I trust you, then that means I should trust that you could clean that. , you know what I mean? . Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. . So we kinda have to separate ourselves from our masculine and allow us, allow ourselves to embrace our feminine. And he has surprised me more than one. More than one occasion. Right. So now myself, sorry.

[00:19:39] Elise: Uh, has there been, sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt you. Has there been an example where he’s had to embrace feminine more and how that happened. Yeah. Yeah. But anyone, I don’t wanna directly center him out. 

[00:19:53] Sarah: Yeah. Use me as an example, because I think it’s great for people to hear it.

 But even just most men in general, they have a hard time accessing their feminine energy when it comes to listening and when it comes to, embracing emotional work, right? So a lot of who I am is a sensitive emotional person. I feel everything, everything flows through me in, in and out of me. Right?

My thoughts are very sensitive. So, and I’ve noticed that, and that became kind of my superpowered as going, as going through the relationship. But, uh, what I found was he maybe struggled a little bit with being able to connect with me emotionally, right? So that means he needed to start accessing his divine feminine to be able to actually.

Come to me with emotion and not logic, right? So, or rationality, and that’s a big one. Emotions are not a logical thing sometimes, right? They don’t sound logical. Sometimes they don’t feel logical. But then if you come at someone with all this logic and reason and rationality, it could be really overwhelming on them because then they feel really invalidated.

So I struggled a lot with feeling invalidated because he wasn’t sure how to access his feminine to ask the right questions. That invoked a lot of expression of my emotion that helped me to express, right? So, or to help me feel safe to express, let’s put it that way. And slowly and little by little as he started learning how to access his feminine, he was able, now we’re in places where if I’m having a rough time, he’s not coming at me with, with, well, these are the solutions here, let’s figure it out.

He’s coming to me with, I see that you’re feeling something. Do you need a hug, right? Mm-hmm. , I see that you’re going through something. What do you need? How can I, how can I be here for you? Right? Or do you wanna talk about it? Right? Or what just happened for you there? You wanna talk about it? So he’s been, be able to access that feminine to allow me to express and validate my emotions rather than throw in a bunch of logic and reason and rationality.

And once I’m able to pass through that emotional phase, because our emotions are temporary, right? Once we feel validated, a lot of it goes away. Then I’m able to hear the solutions and rationality and focus and clarity that his masculine is bringing up again. So being able to access both your masculine and your feminine, knowing when to use them will 100% save your relationship.

It’s like a 

[00:22:08] Elise: superpower. It’s 

[00:22:10] Sarah: not a superpower. Oh, man. And it’s a skill that you can build, right? So even if. fully. You’re loaded up with a lot of masculine or loaded up with a lot of feminine, you can learn to balance yourself out. Right? And you can learn when, learn how to find it within yourself to channel what type of energy you need for that specific, uh, event or task or, um, occasion that you’re in.

[00:22:31] Elise: Mm-hmm. . So, no, I appreciate you walking us through that. I feel like that’s a great kind of overview of how feminine and masculine can operate in a relationship. You mentioned, and I think we, we talked a little bit about. . I think our corporate culture really, um, leans towards the masculine energy side. Is there any ways for women that are, and you mentioned your role, your role is very much like you are an emotional intelligence coast.

You’re in emotions all day, so I would imagine it naturally leans itself a little bit more to the feminine energy side. Is there some, color or context you can, or even tips you can give to women that are maybe listening cuz I know a lot of friends have had this issues, women or men, but I think, I know my friends as females have had this issues where you’re in a corporate culture and it’s very masculine, energy dominated.

Um, how, how can you balance that in a very corporate environment? . 

[00:23:29] Sarah: Right. So it’s interesting because even though a lot of my work is very feminine driven, right? So it requires me to stay in my feminine and access those parts of myself, I need the masculine energy in order to make it something a livable career, right?

[00:23:46] Elise: True. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:23:48] Sarah: Masculine to be able to show up to events. I need the masculine to manage my business. I need the masculine to set up foundation, right? So I still have to live in the balance of both, right? Even showing up today, like that’s a lot of masculine energy to prioritize showing up and creating content and getting everything done.

But the actual creation of it is a lot of feminine energy. So I like that I get to experience both. So how do we bring that into our corporations? Accessing your feminine is going to be great because you’ll be able to show off the qualities that not a lot of men, that aren’t embracing their feminine, have.

So what you can do is use your feminine to access that empathy within yourself, right, to access the compassion and vulnerability within yourself to be able to portray that. To the masculine. Right. And whether they like it or not, right. We can’t control that, right? That’s out of our control. But what we can do is be very open with ourselves and be open to our feminine and allow it to work its magic because there’s a lot of creative energy in, in our feminine, there’s a lot of intuition in our feminine, right? And when we have access to intuition and, you know, second thought thinking, and then just all these great, um, attributes of our feminine, we’ll be able to shine through, right? To show what we’re really made of, right?

And we can balance it out with the masculine, right? So we can balance it out with the follow through of, uh, whatever it is that we’re, you know, speaking on or in which we’re in the corporation, et cetera. . Mm-hmm. , 

[00:25:22] Elise: when you, when you talk about it in terms of career, it almost sounds a little bit like left and right brain.

Mm-hmm. Like a right. Brain’s more creative, or sorry, left brain’s more creative. Right. Is more doer like when you speak about it than that, that aspect anyway, but very interesting and true that at the end of the day we kind of need both and it’s like deciding what you need in that given situation or what makes most sense to tap into in that given situation.

[00:25:50] Sarah: Exactly. And being able to have both. All I can say is like you will be unstoppable knowing when to be, you know, the man of the house and then being able to be a nurturing figure at the same time. Like you will be approachable 10 times more than someone who’s only sitting in their masculine. Right. Your kids will wanna be more involved with you.

Your kids will want to, you know, be more understanding towards you, or they’ll probably really like you, we will be more approachable, right? Mm-hmm. . And then there are, same thing with the feminine, right? If you’re able to access your feminine, but then also be able to access your masculine in the household.

Imagine, you know, the connection that you’re having with everybody in the household, right? Mm-hmm. . So it creates so much more strength when you have a balance of both and knowing what to access and how to access them from literally within yourself. 

[00:26:39] Elise: So interesting. If there’s, if people wanna read more on this topic, is there any books that you’ve read or come across that might be interesting?

[00:26:48] Sarah: I haven’t found any books specifically, um, but I’m pretty sure there’s quite a few out there 

[00:26:54] Elise: Quick Google search. Yeah. 

[00:26:56] Sarah: Yeah, just a Google search would be good. Um, but there’s so much content just on TikTok. There’s so much content on Instagram. There’s so much content just everywhere. Even just Googling, Googling, it’ll give you a list of what the traits are.

[00:27:09] Elise: There might be too much content actually, but that’s. Oh, there’s an Hopefully today we synthesized it a little bit for everyone. . We took all that content and brought it, brought it together. Well, what an interesting topic. Thank you so much. Can you share where we can find your social? 

[00:27:25] Sarah: Yeah, so you can find me on Instagram @sarahjospeh_coach. You can find me on TikTok @sarah.eicoach and Twitter @sjlifecoach111 and then I also have my article that came out on my five-step process, and you can check that out at shemadedigital.com. 

[00:27:43] Elise: Awesome. Thank you so much, Sarah, for today,

[00:27:45] Sarah: No problem. Thank you.