It's complicated

I'm going to try very hard to express something, but I expect I may fail.

There is this thought (or this group of thoughts, but really I'm only going to talk about one aspect for now) that I have been having for quite a while.  But the way conversations seem to go lately, unless you are fitting a certain definition, and using a particular terminology, there are people who are are going to get offended.  My purpose is not to be disrespectful to anyone.  I'm not pretending I know some great truth.

In fact, what this is really about it that I don't know.  And the horrible tragedy in Orlando last weekend got me thinking about it again.

The way society is, you have to be pretty clear that there is no other way you can stand to live with yourself to come out as gay.  I mean, there are a lot of people who think it is no big deal to treat you terribly.  There are people willing to kill you.

But I also know more young people than I have ever known before in my life who are expressing some preference other than gay or straight.  This makes so much sense to me.

So imagine a bell curve.  Up there at the top of the curve, those are the people who really completely only are attracted to the opposite gender.  over there on the extreme left are the steady 10% who are completely only attracted to the same gender.  Over there on the extreme right are the people who really aren't attracted to either gender.  Can you picture that?

So that means that there are quite a few people on those slopes, one way or the other.

Now, when I was growing up and learning about sexuality, the only thing that was openly acknowledged was that great "normal" center part of the curve.  If we ever felt some attraction to the same gender, say a spark towards a close friend or something, those feelings had to be backed away from really fast.  That way was the dark tunnel of "perversion."

I really hate the term "bi-curious" as it feels really disrespectful to me.  But at some point, we need to start realizing that sexuality is really complicated with a very wide range of healthy expression.  And how do you know for sure where you fall on the curve, if you haven't ever been free to follow a feeling and experiment?

For example, there were a few times when I was young that I was in a situation with a female friend where I felt attracted, but it was quickly shut down.  Now I know more young people are feeling the freedom to explore those feelings.

But then we have to label that, and we want the labels to be precise.  We need to know who is part of the community.  We need to know who to hate.

And then we get all the societal and religious crap thrown in.  And if you are afraid you will be targeted because of who you are attracted to, who you love, then if you aren't so much one way that you don't have a choice, you are going to tend to conform to what is safe.

If people don't feel safe to explore the full range of their emotions and attractions, how will they ever be able to grow and mature?  How can we really know ourselves?  How can we really love if we always have to pretend a bit to fit in?

Like I said, this isn't just coming to my thoughts because of the events of the last week.  And I seriously am not trying to make this about something else.  All I'm really trying to say is, I grew up in a strange and complicated world and sometimes I feel really confused.  I think a lot of people feel confused.  I hope we can figure out how to be nicer to each other and work out a better way to figure this stuff out, because sexuality really is complicated.  But being a decent human being shouldn't be.

Nobody

Game of Thrones spoiler alert, but from the books, don't know if it applies the same to the series, and I think the series is past this point, but have been told you must warn people anyway.

Arya had to become nobody before she could really become anybody.  She made this choice, but let's be real, she had a pretty f'd up life up to that point.

I was just thinking about my time in churches.  For the most part, I was always nobody, or felt that I was.  Even when I was in a small group setting and leaders were saying "we want to get to know you. we want to hear your story." they never really did.  If I started to tell even a small piece of my truth, it was shut down pretty quickly.

And it is not even that my truth is that bad.  Yes there are bad parts.  The problem is twofold, as I see it.  First, I refuse to feel guilty and repentant for the bad and hard parts of my life that happened because of the abuses and tragedies I survived.  God knows the darkness I have walked through and has lead me into a place of life and light, and he isn't asking me to keep beating myself up over those things. I think there is something inherently wrong when a religion can only hear a person's truth when they are either beating themselves up with it, or that is is so completely healed it is like it never happened.  My survival and the things I learned and the dark that closes around me from time to to me will always be a part of who I am, and I have earned to right to never have to pretend again.

The other part of this is is significance.  Churches often talk about how each person is significant, but they seldom act that way.  If you are not in a leadership position and/or a large contributor, chances are you often feel invisible.  I was involved in a small group once where the leader said "We want everyone to get to know each other better, so each week for a while, we are going to ask a different person in the group to tell their story." The first week, the leader and his wife shared their stories, the week after that was the secondary leader and his wife.  Then they said something else had come up they felt like we needed to do, and that was the end of it.

One example, yeah.  Felt personal, yeah.  But I could tell so many stories, and they mostly seem small, even petty.  But when there are so many, they add up to "you are not significant."

I am nobody,  I am anybody.  I'm fine with that.  But I noticed the man behind the curtain.  I took the red pill.  I understand where the masks come from and the cost of putting one on.  I won't lie to myself again.  It is called integrity, and I'm worth it.