The answer is an unequivocal yes. So why, if this is all so and too true, do women keep trying to bend and fold themselves into shapes that are not theirs? I must say, from years of clinical observation of this problem, that most of the time it is not because of deep-seated masochism or a malignant dedication to self-destruction or anything of that

That means undergoing initiations at various thresholds in our lives where we are forced to dismantle the persona we’ve worked so hard to construct—to look in the shadows lurking behind our bright performances to see what is pulling our strings so we can reclaim that energy for new endeavours.