Auroville’s warrior women

I understand that one has to be very careful in talking about gender issues today, but as a man from a generation where gender rules were far more defined, usually to the detriment of women, I have been struck by what I term the ‘warrior’ quality of some Aurovilian women.

What is a warrior? For all but a few people the word usually conjures up the image of a fierce, highly trained male fighter. But can women also be warriors?

Setting aside the fact that women are today increasingly playing combat roles in the armed forces of various nations, if one looks back through history it is certainly not hard to come up with other examples of women warriors of a militaristic nature. Joan of Arc immediately springs to mind, and the semi-mythical tribe of Amazons from ancient Scythia, who are said to have frequently fought battles with the Greeks. There is also England’s Celtic Queen Boudica, Greece’s Artemisia, Japan’s Nakano Takeko and Tomoe Gozen, the Apache Lozen, India’s Jansi Rani, Rani Rudrama Devi, Rani Velu Nachiyar and Queen Chennamma, and many many others, including Pallas Athene, Durga and Kali on the divine plane.

However, what I have in mind is a different type of female warrior, the non-militaristic warrior women written about by Carlos Castaneda in his books on sorcery in New Mexico, in which the Yaqui Indian Don Juan acts as a Guru-like figure, the Nagual, to a group of female “warriors” as well as to a number of men.

Re-reading one of Castaneda’s books not long ago, what struck me was a certain similarity between those women “warriors” and many of the women of Auroville. Castaneda depicts them as having an extraordinary range of qualities, from beauty, warmth and humour (at one point he refers to the Nagual woman as exuding affection and purity) to power, fierceness, poise, balance, control, self-discipline, integrity, unwavering focus and impeccability. He portrays them as beings ‘at war’ yet fully at ease, able to meet any situation and confidently handle it alone. In Auroville I believe we have a number of such women who have, in addition to other qualities, a strongly disciplined side which can be fierce, determined, powerful, a side which acts as a channel for what Sri Aurobindo refers to as the ‘Shakti’ force. It is not surprising that many of Auroville’s successful enterprises, services and programmes today are headed by such women, and that they are also very active and influential in many fields, including teaching, farming, medicine and healing, as well as martial arts like t’ai chi ch’uan, aikido and kalaripayattu. A few were members of the Auroville Guard when it was functional some years ago.

What did Mother want from Auroville’s women, from the women of the future?

At one point She remarked, “All men are feminine in many respects and all women are masculine in many traits, especially in modern societies.” With this in mind she encouraged people to get in touch with – and learn to bring out – latent ‘balancing’ qualities within themselves, especially those associated with the opposite sex i.e. she wanted men to find within themselves the ability to be more caring, nurturing, less testosterone-driven, and women to find within themselves the ability to be more organizational, executive, dynamic and forceful. In fact she said of women, “Women are in principle the executive power. You must never forget that. And in order to receive the inspiration, you can take support from a masculine consciousness if you feel the need for it.” Then a little further on, “…for the execution, it is you who have the power to carry it out in all the details, with all the power of organisation.”

In my view, some of the women of Auroville are unlike the majority of women elsewhere. They have that warrior quality which Carlos Castaneda refers to in his books – a certain air of controlled power and impeccability which distinguishes them and makes them formidable instruments of the shakti force