It Must Be Hard to Be Gender Different Hey?

 In a conversation with a dear friend I was asked that question. My reply was simple, “no not at all, I love being different and dressing my body in a way that feels natural to me.”

What IS hard though, is reaching a place of deep Self-Acceptance, inner-confidence and to learn how to not care about what others think. The most challenging thing I deal with, almost daily, is my own mind.

Now I’m not what I call an, over the top, dresser. Most days I look just like I do in the pics you see of me here on the site. I don’t dress much differently than most of the ladies I see in the mall or coffee shops around town in jeans, nice top and light make up. I wear footwear according to the season.

I remember those days of feeling so incredibly self-conscious and scared inside, like it was yesterday, oh wait, it was!!

No, I’m kidding, honestly it was not that long ago and there are still moments the childhood “program” that plays on auto pilot kicks in. Once I become aware of the thought, as apposed to “be” the thought, I then choose a new narrative. Being able to see it as a thought, not as who you are is key I believe.

For most of my life I have identified as the thought; this is me, I am wrong, I am sick, I am bad and disserve to be punished for enjoying this! And that realization was an epiphany for me. I Am Not, the thought. I Am, what ever I choose to be. And when I say that I mean, I “believe” that each of us has a “natural” inclination toward something that our inner self lives to express. Some become painters, some become been counters, some write, or go parasailing and still others grow things, and then there are some who love to decorate their body differently; it’s the natural expression of our heart. We are not what we think, those are thoughts. When we say “I Am”,,,we simply believe we are the thought.

I believe that we are one with everything we experience. All of us and everything we can see, taste, touch, hear etc etc are all a tiny part, of a much bigger picture, just look up some night at our amazing universe. I’ll write sometime about my experience of vision quest several years ago; amazing!

Any how, changing that One belief has changed my world. From a thought learned in childhood, like, I am bla bla bla (Insert Negative Self-Belief Here) bla bla, which left me feeling sad, hurt, angry and of course with diminished self esteem. I would feel hopeless and could place myself into a solid emotional state of feeling like I was victimized.

Changing that One belief has now given me more than I can say here, but I will try. The awareness of that belief shifting from “somethings wrong with me, I can’t do anything about it” to “I love who I Am, and I love how I choose to decorate my body”. I love how it feels in my heart when my body is loose as ashes, not tight and posed. I love when the scent of the perfume I am wearing wafts into my nose to delight me. I love to talk to my beautiful Self in the mirror; did that statement touch you?

Those kinds of thoughts, repeated several times each day, combined with as much affect and strong emotion as possible, will re-program the old beliefs we accepted as truth in our childhood. For me, I began saying out loud; “I am so happy, and I’m so grateful to be surrounded by people who accept me, respect me and love me just as I choose to be”. Now that is my reality.

It’s not hard being trans; and its not very hard to change our minds either. All that keeps us victim in this world, is our acceptance of a belief that says: “we are not powerful enough to do, be or have something different”.

I have been practicing a phrase I heard from the late Dr Wayne Dyer, “Live independently of the good opinion of others” which of course sounds simple enough, but it is not always easy at times. When the old messages play of programmed self-judgement, fears of rejection, needs to please and so on it becomes a challenge.

This is when awareness gives us choices!!

One we are aware, we can then practice a new inner dialog; one that empowers, strengthens and encourages us to simply Express from the soul, willingly and unashamed.

Now you know you can choose to practice the skill of noticing some of the, unsupportive and negative inner dialog that’s going on in your mind. The one causing so much suffering. With a new choice of inner dialog, and some wonderfully emotional reps, a whole newly empowered generation of beautiful people can step out of the shadows and into the street with freeedom.  The more we are seen, the less we are noticed dear souls.

I took a few years of being seen regularly by the locals, but this small town asked me to run for Mayor; That begins with, and, has everything to do with what I believe about myself.

I have had so few unpleasant moments as my playpen gets bigger and as I practice believing “I’m Okay” it seems that 99% of the people I meet, also treat me that way. One question I asked myself when I was considering changing that belief was, “what have I got to gain?”

Works for me.

Namaste’

Char