 Concentrated Wisdom for Juicy WomenJean Shinoda Bolen
2003
This is a small book, sharply focused and perhaps useful for those of us who have trouble with the crone archetype— my first image of a “crone” is always a hunched-over, wizened woman in a ratty medieval cape with a hood, pathetic and vaguely menacing. Bolen says, pitting herself firmly against that image:
I am proposing that it is time to reclaim and redefine “crone” from the word pile of disparaging names to call older women, and to make becoming a "crone" a crowning inner achievement of the third phase of life. . .
To be a crone is about inner development, not outer appearance.
A crone is a woman who has wisdom, compassion, humor, courage, and vitality. She has a sense of truly being herself, can express what she knows and feels, and take action when need be. She does not avert her eyes or numb her mind from reality. She can see the flaws and imperfections in herself and others, but the light in which she sees is not harsh and judgmental. She has learned to trust herself to know what she knows...
Crones don't whine is a fundamental characterization. It's a basic "rule" that describes conduct unbecoming of a crone. Whining is an attitude that blocks spiritual and psychological development. Whining makes genuine communication impossible and extorts what then cannot be freely given.
Bolen enumerates thirteen qualities which define the “crone” in her definition. Luckily, you can have the qualities even if you don't adopt the word! My favorite is “Crones are fierce about what matters to them:”
We become fiercely compassionate crones when we are outraged at the suffering caused as much by indifference by those in authority as by the perpetrators. Compassion and anger come together for terrorized, abused, helpless, and neglected people, whose plight is considered of little importance because they have no power or values in a world where greed and power over others rather than concern for others is the ruling principle. Crones are not naïve or in denial about reality. When something in particular is an outrage, and doing something about it is the choice, a moment of truth occurs in which activists are born. The suffering of others or the feeling of enough is enough! radicalizes older women. .. the Crone is a woman who has found her voice. She knows that silence is consent. This is a quality that makes older women feared. It is not the innocent voice of a child who says, "the Emperor has no clothes," but the fierce truthfulness of the crone that is the voice of reality. Both the innocent child and the crone are seeing through the illusions, denials, or "spin" to the truth. But the crone knows about the deception and its consequences, and it angers her. Her fierceness springs from the heart, gives her courage, makes her a force to be reckoned with.
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