More Than a Woman

If it sounds haughty to elevate my human status as “more than” anything, I get it. But I am learning to reassemble my internal dialog toward self-worth and self-respect. As other planet-sharers attempt to tell me what I am not, I become increasingly aware of the words I use with myself. So this is for Me and nobody else, but feel free to borrow anything that fits for you, too.

I tell myself often that what I am is simply Rare. Not weird, not freakish, not deserving of caustic legislation meant to Other the shit out of children just like me. Rare.

I occurred in nature just as my trans siblings did and do. Just like all of my LGBTQIA+ family does. We show up as a variant of the human condition. Like my original red hair, blue eyes, and left-handedness. All quite rare in the scheme of things. Combined, I must conclude I am a Unicorn and shall proceed accordingly.

Consider the miracle that we are here at all — each of us representing the one sperm cell that won the race, out of a Hundred Million sperm cells ejaculated that once. We’re all rare compared to the rest of the momentary goo. What would this world look like if we respected every One as a One-in-a-Hundred-Million Champion?

We don’t.

(And this is not an argument against abortion. I remain solidly pro-choice. I was an unwanted child. It’s a slog. Life is hard, and kids -and their mothers- fair far better when they are wanted -and not resented- in the first damn place. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.)

____________________________________________________

Our internal dialog is our driving force. That, combined and fueled by the hormones that race through us, shape our daily lives, our choices, and our decisions. My own internal dialog has been a Harsh mistress over the years. The things I have told myself about myself, reflecting the messages I got as a brand new human, are despicable. Ugly. Dehumanizing and debilitating. I assure you it’s a wonder I’m here at all from the sheer weight of Shame, imposed.

I’ve spent a great deal of time in my life examining and attempting to define the sacred. The immutable. The truth or Truth over time and generation. I confess, I only have use for the ancient “holy” texts as they are used to uplift and improve the current human condition. I’ve had a Bible shoved down my throat, and used as a cudgel most of my life. When anyone weaponizes the notion of “God” they aren’t doing it right. Period.

I have held space with many folks disillusioned by religion. And I mean priests (and former priests) and theologians and Biblical scholars, not backwater preachers with GEDs. (Not that there’s anything wrong with having a GED, I have one myself.)

Time and again they wrestle with their own queer identities and the mistreatment and misinterpretation of same. It’s a hell of a thing to have spent literal decades immersing oneself in “the Church” only to see her betray you. Harshly. And it happens more often than not as folks dare authenticity over doctrine.

I will say with every breath I have left, if there is a god at all, She loves me every bit as much as those who claim to speak for her. Maybe more. Because I’m not leading anyone astray. I’m not playing a game called, “Love the sinner, hate the sin” because it isn’t for any of us to decide what is and is not “Sin.” We don’t know. We don’t even know if there is such a thing, because, at the end of the day, we don’t begin to understand this marvelous and complex Universe enough to be so certain. Certainty is Hubris, and hubris never did align with anything I learned of the Divine.

Those who are entrusted by Life to install much of our early internal dialog can simply be wrong. Wrong. Completely in error. Because we all speak from who WE are, we define no one but ourselves. But boy howdy can we fuck up a small human.

Much of the struggle I see between those who still want to insist the gender binary is “the Norm” (and define the rest of us as pervs) and the queer community, feels like so much jealousy.

“You aren’t constricting and contorting yourself into these rigid roles we “must” follow so closely? How dare you!” They want us all to suffer the weight of a silly set of rules we could all wake up and walk away from at any given moment. And, for LGBTQ+ folks who stay alive and come to their authenticity, that’s precisely what happens. They step away, a bit at a time, from the illusions. From the disinformation. From the self-loathing. Into the light of their own Divine Nature. Because Truth as we discover it within, is powerful. Peaceful. And hella Strong.

I’ll spend the rest of my life sweeping out what was carelessly deposited in my psyche. Just when I’m having my best day so far, I find another filthy corner to deal with. Another pile of detritus under the chifforobe. Another way I have been abusing myself, perpetuating the abuse I barely survived.

Trauma is heavy. And as we attempt to move about under its weight, we spill it on everyone nearby. It’s as if we carry a large, open-mouthed vessel brimming with acrid stew and no matter how careful we think we’re being, it splashes about. We are messy creatures.

It gets even stickier because we are often taught that our trauma is virtue. We’re told that the doctrines installed are sacred, when that’s not really how this works. WE are sacred. And we live in a world swirling with shared ideas. Those ideas become things at the hands of each creator, and we are “shown the way” based on what the previous generation absorbed. It’s up to us to sort that mess.

If there is one thing I wish humans would thirst for above belonging and othering, it is the skill of Critical Thinking. The ability to sit and discern that which serves us and that which harms others is perhaps the best and highest use of our time.

And didn’t we all just take a two-year pause and engage in some of that? Maybe for the first time. There are so very many Trans COVID “babies!” Why? Because trans folk had to take the pause and sit with themselves, too. And the proverbial sky ain’t gettin’ any bluer.

Pema Chödrön, the wonderful Tibetan Buddhist nun, talked eloquently about “When things fall apart.” When things fall apart, there is an opportunity to sit with the pieces and move toward them, not away. We are in constant transition — that is Life — but when we expect things to continue to flow, and expect uneasy thoughts to accompany us, we can befriend change, and befriend ourselves. We can befriend growth. We can befriend our true selves, always there beyond and behind all the things we absorbed about ourselves.

A Dear One in my own life, now the CEO of one of this world’s largest companies, once paid for me to attend The Landmark Forum. This program evolved from Werner Erhard’s EST training. I didn’t go down an MLM rabbit hole, didn’t induct anyone, and I have a fairly profound story for another day about how my skepticism was met profoundly. I walked away for the first time in my life, believing that I could conquer the crippling shame of my childhood.

What I took away from that weekend retreat (so you can save the money) was this: we are all afraid. We are all so very concerned about the good opinion of others, we hide our foibles and carry them around, the sack getting heavier and heavier — and we ALL do it. It’s ultimately such a pointless waste of human potential. Debilitating work we engage in without thinking, because we hold reputation above character.

Now, this was back in the mid-1990s, and I see younger generations with far fewer hang-ups to begin with. I raised my own kids to be far more open, to trust themselves far more than I ever got. I think many contemporary parents have, and I am heartened to see younger folks who accept themselves in ways I never could.

But I see these amazing young people being met with ugly resistance to this day. I see the same ugly misinformed religionist tripe being issued from on high, consuming State Legislative bodies across this nation, and it is beyond troubling to watch this cancer spread. It’s as if we’ve learned nothing when so much has been available to be learned over these past 30 years since I sat down in a group of humans, baring their souls and attempting to heal their lives.

I’ll tell you what I didn’t see that Forum weekend. I didn’t see the condemnation of one group or another, divided and sorted by race or gender, or orientation. No light or air was given to any of the -isms, and it was refreshing. We got to the root of it all as human beings, and learned to decide what we stand for, and get out there and stand for it -our pasts be damned.

I’ve been doing my best to do my best for the entirety of my adult life. That doesn’t make me special. And that certainly doesn’t mean I haven’t made hideous mistakes, and hurt Dear Ones along the way.

I actually think humans are wired to do our Best. But our “bests” are far from equal. I know my parents did their best with what they each had to work with. They had stone-hard lives before coming together (young and inadequately educated) back in 1950. They drug their own trauma buckets around with them. The household they formed was toxic for all born into it, but I do not question they navigated as well as they could muster. They honestly didn’t know any better. Because each time they did learn better, they did do better. Often too little too late for my taste, but I saw their growth later in life and commended it.

It breaks my heart that today, with access to the internet being near-universal, having more solid information about trans life experience than ever before at our literal fingertips, we STILL see kids cast from their homes for being themselves. We are seeing elected officials behave in disgusting, intentionally obtuse ways, and it is children who suffer. They will unnecessarily wrestle with the trauma Our Government is currently imposing.

These children are not “confused.” How can I say that with certainty? Because I was not confused by my identity. I was confused by what I was taught about my identity. I knew who and what I was. I was taught I’d better unknow it, quick, if I knew what was “good” for me.

The LGBTQ+ community is not grooming or indoctrinating these children. We are there as adults to support the kids like us. We work to keep them alive, to give them the promise of life that belongs to them in the first damn place.

Most of us had ZERO role models. We didn’t see or know queer and trans people, and where we did, they were closeted or stealth. It’s just the way it was. But these kids SEE us. They identify earlier because of visibility, not because of some grand conspiracy.

And while it may feel like our numbers are swelling, it’s just that more of us are telling our stories directly. And that resonates. It’s just easier to “Find your tribe” when so many more traditionally hidden and marginalized minorities are seen. And it scares the bejesus out of some. So they legislate. They find the ugliest words to string together to spread fear and misinformation, because they see their delicate structures crumbling. The curtain is ripped off the rod, not merely pulled back, and the wizard is just some old white dude/s with a penchant for Viagra and a waning sense of import.

It’s a good time for each to clean out their own mind. Discard that which does not serve, and learn to cherish this brief life alongside each and every beautiful human that walks with us. Truly, none of us will be free until all of us are free.

I don’t know how to initiate productive discourse with those who hold their breath and refuse to see their own bullshit. I wish I had the answers. I’m deeply in favor of mutual respect and civility, but not when it comes to discussing my literal existence, or the literal existence of my LGBTQIA+ siblings.

We are Real.

We know ourselves individually and collectively better than any onlooker. And yes, there are far more queer tendencies out there than some want to acknowledge. But they are real, the heart wants what it wants, and most of it is only ugly because it is hidden away for the fear of being thought a lesser human.

It isn’t sucking dick that makes you a lesser human, friend. It’s doing it in the dark and then legislating against the other cocksuckers when you go back to work. Stop already.

None of us know with certainty what meets us when this life ends. But we do know what we have said and done -the work we have chosen- is what lives on. The people who knew us carry our legacy. And we decide what that will be.

As for Me, I will choose Love. And as I peel this onion, I invite you to come along. I’ll always tell you the truth of it, smelly as that might get.

Peace, Lovelies

- MM

--Thank you for reading my essay. If you would like to stay up to date with my upcoming work, please subscribe below. Also, tips are always greatly appreciated. Peace, lovelies!