It is sad to see that men and women are classified and placed into certain categories within the different genders. We can also see that when they have placed us into boxes, these very boxes then have sub-divisions within them. Somehow we have to fit into these boxes and sub-divisions that other mortal men have pushed us in.
This has caused so much pain and insecurity within the hearts of children and these children grow up with these scars into their adult years, if not to their grave. Somewhere a mere mortal man had made a rule in society that men are supposed to look and act a certain way. Then women have to carry themselves and behave a certain way.
Learning about myself for the last year and few months, I have realised how complex I really am. I have realised that I am more than just what people perceive about me. My soul is literally a mystery and my spirit is a well. You cannot classify me and place me into a box that you think defines me. I am more than just what your mortal mind can contain.
This very thing has pierced a thorn in my side that stayed for a very long time. In Primary School, ignorant children laid the foundation for my insecurities to make a home inside of me. Not knowing and embracing that I love physical affection has affected me so much. It was taboo for a male to be affectionate, especially in a coloured school. Other boys recognised this in me, and they have sexually crossed borders with me continually because they viewed it as fun. I couldn't fight back because parts of who I am liked it and other parts of me was afraid. Hence this behaviour, I have then ventured into what these very ignorant children have labelled me to be, because I did not understand that what I was feeling was okay and that it was a part of me to crave and love physical affection from both genders. This is a language, not a language to one and a language to another.
As I journey on this amazing, yet thrilling adventure, I realise more and more of how much it angers me to see how people suffer because they do not know themselves and they do not know others. Identity is such a crutial part of this life on earth, that we can miss our very destiny because we do not understand or even worse, do not accept ourselves fully.
Now I find myself in my young adult years and I still seem to fight with myself often. Not as much as before, but I still fight. Why does it seem like such a struggle? It is because I have viewed the opinions of society in a higher light than what God has said of me.
Today we worked in a school and kids we worked with earlier this week had come to hug us. I love hugs, so this was the perfect way to start my day at the school! However, one boy, who never sat in our sessions and does not know us, came up to me mockingly and hugged me like he would to invade someone's privacy. This left me awkward and walking away from this hug because this feeling felt all too familiar. He had recognised that I was not like other men who has the sense of higher testosterone flowing through their veins and to him it was funny. This got me thinking, but also sifting. I was not bothered by whether or not I seemed like the rest, because I gladly am not. However, it was sad to see how another had treated me by just outward appearance and the way I carried my body language. A few months ago I probably would have gone home and this would have bothered me. Now, I don't give a damn *sorry for those who do not like the word.
I have embraced myself for who I am. I have become a perfector of myself. I have come to learn about what I do like, what makes me angry, the way I receive and give love, my personality type, my temperament, the way I am wired and I can go on and on. I have literally become a master of who I am.
A friend and I were talking in the week. She had grown up really awkward, not like the rest of the girls. Suddenly she became popular, and this was not because she worked towards that very vain goal. She simply embraced herself, and people loved her for it.
Once you embrace yourself and not compare yourself to another, you will soon see who are your real friends and who are not. There had only ever been one of you, and there will only be one like you. You are not what your family thinks you are. You are neither what the stranger said you were, and you are most certainly not who the public perceives you to be. You are unique. There is only one of you!
You might not have the hair you wanted or your teeth in the places you would like them to be. You might be a bit chubby, or it might look like you have a disease. But please, accept yourself and the things you cannot change and focus on your beauty within. Through this, you will shine like the sun because you are now free, free from yourself.
Go listen to my latest track on Soundcloud as I sing my heart about this topic.
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