It's ya girl!
I'm back again
with some more insight
on this thing called life
I'm back again
with some more insight
on this thing called life
... my life anyway. :)
So the previous post is a poem about identity, and I was inspired to write it after a conversation that my brother and I had. I'll give you a little background:
I was feeling a bit frustrated with my hair. (Long story short -- The dermatologist diagnosed me with sebhorrea of the scalp and basically said that it caused me to scratch my hair out in 2 spots. And I want that hair back. IMMEDIATELY.) So feeling a bit frustrated with my hair and I came out to the living room and got on my computer (great cure-all, huh?). I made a few offhand comments about how I was feeling about my hair, and I noticed that every time I said something, my brother would respond saying that he had the same problem. Well, I was beginning to get frustrated with that because I was talking about ME. I was having a pity party (yes I admit it and am deeply ashamed :D), and I wanted sympathy for ME. He kept talking about himself, making me feel as if he thought our problems were the same! Yeah right! The dermatologist has not diagnosed you with a scalp malfunction that causes you to rip the very hairs out! How dare he compare himself to me in this respect! (You get where I'm going so far?)
So I began to speak to him about communication and how some people need different things out of conversation. Right then, I needed sympathy. I wanted someone to listen to me and understand my frustration or act like. I wanted to feel as if I wasn't alone in my hair struggle. But he didn't quite get that.
Well, this caused the conversation to morph into gender talk. Ahhhhhhh! Not man/woman stuff! Ugh! We began to talk about women being "more emotional" and men being "more logical." Regardless of the truth of either statement/assumption for each gender, I began to feel very trapped. Oppressed, if you will! The more my brother spoke of how he just KNEW that women have more emotions/broader range of emotions/more occurrences of emotional moments, the more I felt trapped, suffocated, and agitated. This man/woman rhetoric has been around for a long time, but more than anything it's as if the emotion v. logic argument has become the number one definer of women v. men. And much of the time, negative language is associated with women's emotions...they're so "complicated"... "too much to deal with"..."annoying" or "illogical"... or "controlled by emotions". What would you take away from these conversations if you identify yourself as a women and the world or "they" say that women are emotional and emotions need to diminished (Emotions are BAD)? How do you feel when what you see as yourself is seen by the invisible masses as too much or annoying?
So as the conversation wound on, I became more and more frustrated and less and less willing to accept even truths from my brother's mouth. I didn't say he was wrong; I just couldn't take it as fact. Because in my mind and heart, that would've meant that I had to take on the identity of inadequacy that is often communicated in this rhetoric.
So I had to back away from the convo and gather my wits because the enemy was messing with me! Then I remembered that I HAVE BEEN REDEEMED. Everything that I am, surrendered to the Holy Spirit, has been made NEW and it is VERY GOOD: emotions and all (I know I've got them). I am not locked away in these man/woman views that say that I am a certain thing and need to be less of it in order to acceptable! I throw it away!!! That is not who I am! I am expansive; there's a lot inside of me and it all came from my Father. I am Redeemed from the curse that manipulates the beautiful things in me to make them ugly. I am Redeemed from others' opinions about me and about groups that I seemingly "belong to." I am Redeemed. And I feel so free!
Stay free, dear friends, stay free!
So the previous post is a poem about identity, and I was inspired to write it after a conversation that my brother and I had. I'll give you a little background:
I was feeling a bit frustrated with my hair. (Long story short -- The dermatologist diagnosed me with sebhorrea of the scalp and basically said that it caused me to scratch my hair out in 2 spots. And I want that hair back. IMMEDIATELY.) So feeling a bit frustrated with my hair and I came out to the living room and got on my computer (great cure-all, huh?). I made a few offhand comments about how I was feeling about my hair, and I noticed that every time I said something, my brother would respond saying that he had the same problem. Well, I was beginning to get frustrated with that because I was talking about ME. I was having a pity party (yes I admit it and am deeply ashamed :D), and I wanted sympathy for ME. He kept talking about himself, making me feel as if he thought our problems were the same! Yeah right! The dermatologist has not diagnosed you with a scalp malfunction that causes you to rip the very hairs out! How dare he compare himself to me in this respect! (You get where I'm going so far?)
So I began to speak to him about communication and how some people need different things out of conversation. Right then, I needed sympathy. I wanted someone to listen to me and understand my frustration or act like. I wanted to feel as if I wasn't alone in my hair struggle. But he didn't quite get that.
Well, this caused the conversation to morph into gender talk. Ahhhhhhh! Not man/woman stuff! Ugh! We began to talk about women being "more emotional" and men being "more logical." Regardless of the truth of either statement/assumption for each gender, I began to feel very trapped. Oppressed, if you will! The more my brother spoke of how he just KNEW that women have more emotions/broader range of emotions/more occurrences of emotional moments, the more I felt trapped, suffocated, and agitated. This man/woman rhetoric has been around for a long time, but more than anything it's as if the emotion v. logic argument has become the number one definer of women v. men. And much of the time, negative language is associated with women's emotions...they're so "complicated"... "too much to deal with"..."annoying" or "illogical"... or "controlled by emotions". What would you take away from these conversations if you identify yourself as a women and the world or "they" say that women are emotional and emotions need to diminished (Emotions are BAD)? How do you feel when what you see as yourself is seen by the invisible masses as too much or annoying?
So as the conversation wound on, I became more and more frustrated and less and less willing to accept even truths from my brother's mouth. I didn't say he was wrong; I just couldn't take it as fact. Because in my mind and heart, that would've meant that I had to take on the identity of inadequacy that is often communicated in this rhetoric.
So I had to back away from the convo and gather my wits because the enemy was messing with me! Then I remembered that I HAVE BEEN REDEEMED. Everything that I am, surrendered to the Holy Spirit, has been made NEW and it is VERY GOOD: emotions and all (I know I've got them). I am not locked away in these man/woman views that say that I am a certain thing and need to be less of it in order to acceptable! I throw it away!!! That is not who I am! I am expansive; there's a lot inside of me and it all came from my Father. I am Redeemed from the curse that manipulates the beautiful things in me to make them ugly. I am Redeemed from others' opinions about me and about groups that I seemingly "belong to." I am Redeemed. And I feel so free!
Stay free, dear friends, stay free!
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