I got a note back today from someone I've had a mild interest in. It's odd, cuz that interest really has been somewhat muted - yes, I notice an energy we sometimes get, but it's not as though I'm hot for this person, and we've not dated (I hate that word). So for me it is sort of "well, if something more happens ok, otherwise..."
but the reply that was sent leads me to something unexpected.
I'm well aware of how I've changed myself in the past few years. I'm moving closer and closer to a change in me that is core: I'm a trans person, but not in the usual sense. I self identify as co-gendered, a term that leaves most pople shaking their heads - "wtf?"
The reply examined the assumptions that this person knew of themselves, but led then into a kind of "I don't know how I feel about your gender expression" and "I'm not sure if I have the kind of interest in exploring this further due to that gender thing". I wasn't hurt so much by the reply per se - I don't have any stake, so.... does it matter that much?
but I was deeply affected when I reflected on how this kind of reply left me as a person. totally, utterly alone. And this, I think, is the future reality I have to face. It's as though I have finally come face to face with my own change, my own self, my new self, and now I have to either accept it or abort the whole thing.
I've travelled down this unknown road for a while, not knowing anything about the end. I've encountered the kinds of sentiments that let me know that, in the view of some, I am not "trans enough". And I've certainly encountered the views of those that think I am "too weird". I'm both. I don't want, I never wanted, to be this way. But here I am. I have no community, no ties that let me associate with others. I define myself in a way that is utterly singular (am I a singularity??). I need to acept that I will never have partners, never have a relationship. I won't be approached by others who think I am hot, or who want to spend time with me based on who I am as this person.
It's funny. I don't hold any of my own feelings about this against the respondent, but I am now more aware of how the path I've chosen or the path that has chosen me, is, in some ways, a social death sentence. I'm doomed to not be connected. I don't fit in either world. I don't really fit anywhere. And it leaves me sad, despondent, wondering if I should even bother with this whole identity blossom?
Showing posts with label Dark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dark. Show all posts
Thursday, September 09, 2010
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Head Noise
The head noise is bad this morning. I got persuaded a long time ago that this never does stop. Meditation and other things do help, but in the end the noise is always there. It is more about what you DO about this that counts.
So at 5 a.m. I am wide awake. *I hate typing* And I start ruminating on the usual stuff.
Not all is bad and ugly,
For example, it came to me that the way to plow through the dissertation is to start with the main question, to elaborate that quite a bit, not necessarily by asking more questions, but posing it in different ways. Then, for each following chapter, restate in some form the main question. This is very effective when I consider the "Why SXM?" chapter. I could start that by asking "If I am interested in technology and how it affects / interacts with the informal economy and tourism then this place is good b/c ..." See how that works? History could start with something too - perhaps "In considering the present and how ITC and I.E. and Tourism intersect, it is useful to look at the past."
But most of it is bad and ugly.
But then the same head noise quickly degenerates into my issues around K and why the relationship isn't working too well, even though part of me knows it is working. The part I am more in tune with now has to do with this sense of having to compete for time and energy and affection. I do not like competition at all, never have, probably never will. But I feel like capturing her attention is a matter of competing for her time. Then of course this whole part spirals down into all the things I hate about myself, which I think I am at least a little better at managing now. That whole cognitive shift bit still is there, for sure, but when I am overtired, and far from home and not at my body best, it is a lot harder to try and avoid the painful parts and to stay aware of how that works.
Part of me knows with certainty that the underlying drive at 5 a.m. is due to the body factors - lack of sound sleep, uneven nutrition, too much wine, off cycle, etc.. But that's not easy to let go of when I am simply lying there wondering it all. It gets away from the rational mind really fast.
I've learned in the past that usually (but not always) simply getting up shifts it around in odd ways, and I'm left with this sense of "WTF?". But underneath that is often a funny sort of body thing - something is off kilter there and I have no easy handle on what it is and therefore even less of a chance to try and fix it.
How can one fix the head noise?
Meditation helps, but does not eliminate. I should do more, but the goals now for me are so different.
Sex is an odd escape. I often find that playing with myself, getting really hard, building the energy that way is a useful escape, but wonder: is it simply an escape? Is it a simplification of things in a way that, like so many other approaches, merely tucks it under the rug kind of thing, leaving the harshness of what it is or might be festering in the back rooms of the head?
Writing is useful at times, but I'm never really sure I can separate myself from the mechanics of it all - I'm left slightly empty by the fact that the damn interface is so limiting. Is it what I really think or feel or is it driven by the curse of whatever I happen to choose as an interface? I think at times real pen and paper wrk better this way, but not always. I lose something "in the translation" which is to say that I never quite feel I capture what is IN my head as Itry and get it out onto a page of any sort.
So at 5 a.m. I am wide awake. *I hate typing* And I start ruminating on the usual stuff.
Not all is bad and ugly,
For example, it came to me that the way to plow through the dissertation is to start with the main question, to elaborate that quite a bit, not necessarily by asking more questions, but posing it in different ways. Then, for each following chapter, restate in some form the main question. This is very effective when I consider the "Why SXM?" chapter. I could start that by asking "If I am interested in technology and how it affects / interacts with the informal economy and tourism then this place is good b/c ..." See how that works? History could start with something too - perhaps "In considering the present and how ITC and I.E. and Tourism intersect, it is useful to look at the past."
But most of it is bad and ugly.
But then the same head noise quickly degenerates into my issues around K and why the relationship isn't working too well, even though part of me knows it is working. The part I am more in tune with now has to do with this sense of having to compete for time and energy and affection. I do not like competition at all, never have, probably never will. But I feel like capturing her attention is a matter of competing for her time. Then of course this whole part spirals down into all the things I hate about myself, which I think I am at least a little better at managing now. That whole cognitive shift bit still is there, for sure, but when I am overtired, and far from home and not at my body best, it is a lot harder to try and avoid the painful parts and to stay aware of how that works.
Part of me knows with certainty that the underlying drive at 5 a.m. is due to the body factors - lack of sound sleep, uneven nutrition, too much wine, off cycle, etc.. But that's not easy to let go of when I am simply lying there wondering it all. It gets away from the rational mind really fast.
I've learned in the past that usually (but not always) simply getting up shifts it around in odd ways, and I'm left with this sense of "WTF?". But underneath that is often a funny sort of body thing - something is off kilter there and I have no easy handle on what it is and therefore even less of a chance to try and fix it.
How can one fix the head noise?
Meditation helps, but does not eliminate. I should do more, but the goals now for me are so different.
Sex is an odd escape. I often find that playing with myself, getting really hard, building the energy that way is a useful escape, but wonder: is it simply an escape? Is it a simplification of things in a way that, like so many other approaches, merely tucks it under the rug kind of thing, leaving the harshness of what it is or might be festering in the back rooms of the head?
Writing is useful at times, but I'm never really sure I can separate myself from the mechanics of it all - I'm left slightly empty by the fact that the damn interface is so limiting. Is it what I really think or feel or is it driven by the curse of whatever I happen to choose as an interface? I think at times real pen and paper wrk better this way, but not always. I lose something "in the translation" which is to say that I never quite feel I capture what is IN my head as Itry and get it out onto a page of any sort.
Tuesday, May 05, 2009
Beltane Sacred Sexuality
This was Beltane number two for me. A decidedly mixed bag in many respects save one: the event was a lot of fun!
I hosted 3 workshops. The upside is.... I love giving this. The downside is that I miss almost ALL of the workshops I would like to attend, and here, that's quite a few!
Sexual meditations is really about a personal technique, and after 2 runs, and a small audience, I am gonna rethink this one. I love the method, I know the attendees love the result, but I'm not conveying something about this in the blurb. I either have to hard sell it or change tactics.
Body Image. This is ALWAYS a hard one. I had a good group this time, and all of us really put ourselves way out there with it. This time we had enough time each, and that made it a lot better. I also managed to remember to include a connect time at the END of the workshop - a simple circle and hold hands and an embrace one-on-one for each of us. I think that's important. The REALLY cool part about this is I was asked to present this workshop at a totally different venue later this year. This was a real honor, and I am hopeful I can pull it off (long distance to travel).
Body Painting. This was a first in this format. Last year I did a piece on the sacred mark - the idea there was to draw on the 50,000 year legacy of human beings to apply colors to the body. That went well, was quite different. This year, I decided I would have fun with it, plain and simple! So that we did: assembled about a dozen people and set up a nice range of crazy colors (silver and gold were huge hits!) and went at it. Lots of very cool designs, lots of interesting ideas, and then B and I paraded up vendors row with it! It was really fun. I plan to at least bring this to LR.
The Beltane rituals are really well done here. There is just the right blend of sacred, sensual and silly. They manage to be respectful while adding in a dash or two of irreverence to make it fun. It works well. I respect the process, and in fact wonder if it would make sense to go ahead and somehow require attendance at at least one of the rituals. Don't have any idea how that might work - maybe would have to be a carrot kind of approach, but I do see parallels here to the Winterfire no community meals issue. Shared participation builds bonds in ways that nothing else can, whether it is food or ritual, it's something that I think in the end really helps all the participants.
Turning to somewhat more personal matters....
I became aware at some point that every time I went near sex, this tape rolled in my head - "I am not good enough". I worked that for quite a while, trying to both notice it and overcome it. Of course, simply overcoming something like that is often problematic - without any knowledge of its root, overcoming is a little too much like ignoring. It doesn't work too well. I did not seem to make much progress on that approach. But then somehow it dawned on me: the problem is not so much I am not good enough, but rather that the same tape - "I am not good enough" - is a response to a deeper voice that scolds and reprimands and chides and denigrates. Once I found this vector, it felt different. Where did this voice come from?
And following a deep and heartfelt conversation with another participant - a conversation I not only did not know I was going to have, but also had no idea that it would take the crying painful direction it did take for me, I made this connection more tenaciously. He asked me at one point in reference to something else "Do you know whose voice it is?". that got me thinking a lot. IT is a way, I think, to try and approach the resolution or at least the management of this particular tape. If I can get to whose voice I hear, then I wonder if I can get to stopping the tape, perhaps beginning to erase it.
These are deep wounds, and I am not entirely sure I can heal them. They may continue on until I am dead. But I suppose in the end it makes more sense to at least try and work on them, to try and ameliorate the effects, and not simply let them continue to run me.
I hosted 3 workshops. The upside is.... I love giving this. The downside is that I miss almost ALL of the workshops I would like to attend, and here, that's quite a few!
Sexual meditations is really about a personal technique, and after 2 runs, and a small audience, I am gonna rethink this one. I love the method, I know the attendees love the result, but I'm not conveying something about this in the blurb. I either have to hard sell it or change tactics.
Body Image. This is ALWAYS a hard one. I had a good group this time, and all of us really put ourselves way out there with it. This time we had enough time each, and that made it a lot better. I also managed to remember to include a connect time at the END of the workshop - a simple circle and hold hands and an embrace one-on-one for each of us. I think that's important. The REALLY cool part about this is I was asked to present this workshop at a totally different venue later this year. This was a real honor, and I am hopeful I can pull it off (long distance to travel).
Body Painting. This was a first in this format. Last year I did a piece on the sacred mark - the idea there was to draw on the 50,000 year legacy of human beings to apply colors to the body. That went well, was quite different. This year, I decided I would have fun with it, plain and simple! So that we did: assembled about a dozen people and set up a nice range of crazy colors (silver and gold were huge hits!) and went at it. Lots of very cool designs, lots of interesting ideas, and then B and I paraded up vendors row with it! It was really fun. I plan to at least bring this to LR.
The Beltane rituals are really well done here. There is just the right blend of sacred, sensual and silly. They manage to be respectful while adding in a dash or two of irreverence to make it fun. It works well. I respect the process, and in fact wonder if it would make sense to go ahead and somehow require attendance at at least one of the rituals. Don't have any idea how that might work - maybe would have to be a carrot kind of approach, but I do see parallels here to the Winterfire no community meals issue. Shared participation builds bonds in ways that nothing else can, whether it is food or ritual, it's something that I think in the end really helps all the participants.
Turning to somewhat more personal matters....
I became aware at some point that every time I went near sex, this tape rolled in my head - "I am not good enough". I worked that for quite a while, trying to both notice it and overcome it. Of course, simply overcoming something like that is often problematic - without any knowledge of its root, overcoming is a little too much like ignoring. It doesn't work too well. I did not seem to make much progress on that approach. But then somehow it dawned on me: the problem is not so much I am not good enough, but rather that the same tape - "I am not good enough" - is a response to a deeper voice that scolds and reprimands and chides and denigrates. Once I found this vector, it felt different. Where did this voice come from?
And following a deep and heartfelt conversation with another participant - a conversation I not only did not know I was going to have, but also had no idea that it would take the crying painful direction it did take for me, I made this connection more tenaciously. He asked me at one point in reference to something else "Do you know whose voice it is?". that got me thinking a lot. IT is a way, I think, to try and approach the resolution or at least the management of this particular tape. If I can get to whose voice I hear, then I wonder if I can get to stopping the tape, perhaps beginning to erase it.
These are deep wounds, and I am not entirely sure I can heal them. They may continue on until I am dead. But I suppose in the end it makes more sense to at least try and work on them, to try and ameliorate the effects, and not simply let them continue to run me.
Monday, March 09, 2009
Through a Glass Darkly
I'm really having issues around relationships these days. I crashed and burned REALLY badly this past weekend, feeling a deep sense of despair and rejection and a horrible sense of worthlessness. While a lot of the feelings appear to stem from a particular relationship, I'm not entirely convinced that it is that per se. Every time I try and analyze it,I seem to wind up in the same place: it comes from a deep seated sense of inadequacy. I'm puzzled and frustrated and even angry that it always seems to connect back to sex. Why is that? Why is it that the worst of the emotional freight train winds up there?
And each time I think I am past it, each time I feel like I am ok with her fucking someone else, some other, odd confusion of circumstance shows up that leads me away from that place of being ok. This time, it was around timing. I got sandwiched in between a call of being together and dinner/dance, that had her getting a great fuck in between that 2 hour window. On one level I am ok with it - pleasure is good, sharing is good, it's all fine. But I push my head into this sick little corner that says I am second fiddle, last, not desired simply beCAUSE of this. Part of me rejects it out of hand, and says I don't care if I feel that way, it makes no sense. But the larger and older and more powerful part of me takes over, reminding me that I am in fact undesirable, no good, not wanted, and that being last is part of who I have to be.
I went upstairs and cried really hard for half an hour. Inside I felt I wanted to reject ALL relationships, run away from ALL possibility of pain, and I tried this. I then texted and said don't contact me anymore. I think I was subconsciously reaching out past my broken, fucked up self, and wanting desperately for her to find that broken me and soothe it, come back to it. I feel disingenuous about that, a lie I cannot stop. I took it further, though, and sent that same note to another whom I love. Reject everything, the mind said, and avoid it all. "Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter Here" might as well have been the sign I had hanging on my head.
Funny how, after 24+ hours of reflection (which included me processing this with her over deep tears, as well as a passing remark after I apologized for being so fragile, that she thought we should probably talk about that) I am now entering some sort of anger phase. It's a kind perverse play on the Kubler-Ross stages - denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. First for me in this case was depression, followed by bargaining, then some denial, and now I feel this odd anger. Who am I angry at? I think it is me, but am not so sure.
(return to this later. It is nice to finally have back something that is not read by others I know. IF you're passing through, please comment. I don't know you - it's safe)
And each time I think I am past it, each time I feel like I am ok with her fucking someone else, some other, odd confusion of circumstance shows up that leads me away from that place of being ok. This time, it was around timing. I got sandwiched in between a call of being together and dinner/dance, that had her getting a great fuck in between that 2 hour window. On one level I am ok with it - pleasure is good, sharing is good, it's all fine. But I push my head into this sick little corner that says I am second fiddle, last, not desired simply beCAUSE of this. Part of me rejects it out of hand, and says I don't care if I feel that way, it makes no sense. But the larger and older and more powerful part of me takes over, reminding me that I am in fact undesirable, no good, not wanted, and that being last is part of who I have to be.
I went upstairs and cried really hard for half an hour. Inside I felt I wanted to reject ALL relationships, run away from ALL possibility of pain, and I tried this. I then texted and said don't contact me anymore. I think I was subconsciously reaching out past my broken, fucked up self, and wanting desperately for her to find that broken me and soothe it, come back to it. I feel disingenuous about that, a lie I cannot stop. I took it further, though, and sent that same note to another whom I love. Reject everything, the mind said, and avoid it all. "Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter Here" might as well have been the sign I had hanging on my head.
Funny how, after 24+ hours of reflection (which included me processing this with her over deep tears, as well as a passing remark after I apologized for being so fragile, that she thought we should probably talk about that) I am now entering some sort of anger phase. It's a kind perverse play on the Kubler-Ross stages - denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. First for me in this case was depression, followed by bargaining, then some denial, and now I feel this odd anger. Who am I angry at? I think it is me, but am not so sure.
(return to this later. It is nice to finally have back something that is not read by others I know. IF you're passing through, please comment. I don't know you - it's safe)
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Sighing
Like leaves. In the cold grey sky.
Honestly, I sometimes wish I had not fallen quite so far, so deep in love. It can hurt. It can be happy, sad, crazy, silly, mad.
And the power of the moment can carry me forward, even as I despair about the future.
Makes no sense.
Honestly, I sometimes wish I had not fallen quite so far, so deep in love. It can hurt. It can be happy, sad, crazy, silly, mad.
And the power of the moment can carry me forward, even as I despair about the future.
Makes no sense.
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