Monday, March 18, 2024

No matter your age

Living life as a female continues to be fulfilling. One becomes accustomed to it as things improve over time and, as you wash away all impediments to being fully yourself, all your objections increasingly fall by the wayside. Resistance finally becomes futile especially since you feel more relaxed than you have ever been.

I have preferred coming to identity via resistance because the other way would have had me think I was deluding myself. To fully embrace myself too early could have meant skipping key steps of introspection which in retrospect turned out to be mandatory for a person born in the early 60's.

Today young people have much less stigma and baggage to deal with but are potentially more prone to leap before reflecting which has helped feed the current detransition phenomenon. I am now more certain than ever that coming to a realization of who one is should be done with great care and constant second guessing no matter your age.

Less is more and you stop once at your own baseline.

Unwell

The world is not well at present. I just need to look at my city contrasted against 10 years ago. There are poor and mentally unbalanced people everywhere in the core where they wander around asking for change looking despondent and depressed.

This is a global problem and the solution goes beyond charities. In the US there are more than enough empty dwellings to house all the homeless but that isn't something banks are about to do. Eventually something will need to be done because the numbers will only grow. As technological progress takes away more livelihoods, the prospect of UBI seems increasingly likely.

There is something greatly off-putting to me about those who hold all the wealth preaching to others especially when they aren't the least bit concerned about their welfare. Telling them to get a job might feel justified except that advice was better suited to a decade ago or more. If you make more money in a year than most do in a lifetime, you might also want to think about shutting up about paying taxes especially when during the Eisenhower era personal income above $200k was taxed at 70% or more.

Just remember that what we used to call the middle class didn't disappear by accident.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Imbecile

 


Desire

Desire can fool us into thinking what is right for us when in fact we often do not know. For example, people will say they want to be married only to later find out it wasn't to the right person or that living with someone wasn't really for them. We often discover what is right for us only in retrospect but the experience brands us so at least we have learned something.

Being open to receiving rather than desiring is likely a better state. We live every day working on the self and invite experiences and the right people to come our way. We have thus substituted a search for being content in the moment and allow life in all its messiness to come to us bringing gifts along with its invariably negative surprises.

Those who have lived long enough know that much of what we wanted did not come to fruition or, if it did, it did not meet expectation. Conversely, some things came along we had not expected and in the long run made us better people.

Today I desire nothing but simply work on being open.

Dieu existe

Roger is diminutive and happy-go-lucky. He sees me coming at a distance and says "Joanne!"

We stop to chat on the sidewalk and he proceeds to tell me that he is sure God exists. "Je suis certain" he says in bon Quebecois. He tells me he loves everyone "J'aime tout le monde"

I used to see him and his young daughter walking together. A divorced dad of maybe 40 he always had a smile while deeply immersed in conversation with her. He works at a fruit and vegetable store on Wellington street where he earns his keep.

I tell him I am no longer religious but spiritual and he admits to the same. He cannot put his finger on the reason his faith in God has increased but simply places his fist over his heart as confirmation to me that he feels it viscerally. As good a reason as any I surmise.

He walks away happy and smiling yet again, wishing me a good day in the process.

Noise

There are political and social movements plus the onslaught of online opinion and we can become lost in all of it. At the end of the day however we must live our lives which often can be simpler than all of the drama the world is embroiled in.

I don't want to be immune to the noise but I also realize that a quiet life lived in reflection is good for me. I have hopped off the carousel of career and want to enjoy the everyday with more gusto and more mindfulness as I find joy in the little things.The outside world often works in opposition to internal peace and so we must live in it without becoming overly entangled in every minute trap. If I've learned anything in aging it is that I can more readily identify what warrants giving  importance to.

I walk Montréal seeing people rushing in the street or being absorbed in their phones on public transit and I recall what it was like to constantly bathe in hurry because there was another mission to be fulfilled. With that necessity gone you can see how much of life is steeped in artificial urgency which, in retrospect, did not deserve so much of our mental energy.

Saturday, March 16, 2024

Solfeggieto

 


I Lost my Head

Gentle Giant remixed by Steven Wilson....


Inclinations

Historically all human inclinations outside of acceptable norms were considered pathology. Even something we now recognize as statistically normal like homosexuality was considered a choice, a sin, or some unfortunate twisting of the child during early development. Both religion and society shunned them as outcasts.

There are also choices people make which are considered aberrant. There are sexual practices and fetishises which are frowned upon and thus those who indulge them tend to not speak of it to others. The reality is that there are deviances from norms everywhere in society which to varying degrees become known and tolerated depending on the era or culture. What I am always most interested in is the distinction regarding the amount of choice being exercised by the person. In other words, the proportioning of nature versus nurture built into their desire.

In the past gay and lesbian people were told to suppress their urges as a way to sacrifice to their disapproving God. Never mind that their "lifestyle" didn't actually represent a threat to society even as it was thought that it could spread. The fact this is still sold as an idea by right wing ideologues in 2024 is both regretable and deeply idiotic.

Consider the example within the sphere of gender variance the person who says I am a woman and I must transition contrasted against another who says they cannot explain their self-described compulsion just that they must indulge it. I have regularly seen both of these statements expressed but is there any relational overlap to speak of between these two people?

In the end I conclude that regardless of what society believes, the right approach is one where the person's nature feeds into an overall schema of well-being. Therefore, if their inclinations and subsequent approach do not improve quality of life, then there is work to be done to examine why.

As to societal judgement? It is as fickle as the changing direction of the wind and, given that critical thinking is in such short supply, it's hardly a metric worth giving much weight to.

Friday, March 15, 2024

Happiness poison

 


Happier

The reality of masculine women and feminine men doesn't seem to hold much weight as argumentation for the transgender condition. After all, both are plentiful in the world but don't have the kind of cross gender identification that transgender people do.

I featured that young transgender woman yesterday expressing her doubts about her origins and in the end she simply chalked it up to being happier. Her litmus test did not include brain scans or validation from a psychiatrist. She was more content living her life that way and certainly more so than as a gay man as she herself states.

The problem of course is that her happiness doesn't correlate with gender criticals who would rather see her unhappy than daring to usurp biology.

Heaven forbid.

No matter your age

Living life as a female continues to be fulfilling. One becomes accustomed to it as things improve over time and, as you wash away all imped...