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Thoughts from the
Nativerse |
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 On the back of Sydney World Pride 2023 and in the lead up to International Women’s Day, I thought I’d share one perspective on the unique challenges, as well a gift or 3 that have emerged from over a decade of exploring life off the well beaten cis gender heterosexual path, of what it is to be more closely identified as bisexual and or gender non conforming, than as a strictly cis gender, single heterosexual female. As my email and social feed (and possibly yours?) came to be filled with short corporate ads claiming to be YES for Pride, and as I found myself involved in numerous discussions about Pride this last week, and witnessed many heated comments about misunderstanding the origins of Pride Activism, Australian mainstream female media personalities giving the PM shit about not dressing up to march in Mardi Gras and listened to objections about straight people using Mardi Grad parties as another excuse to dress up & get pissed, and now as my inbox fills with emails pre International Women’s Day about what it means to be female and either a Mum or a Not Biological Mum, I found myself re-contemplating what does that really even mean, to be FOR Pride? And what does it mean to be Female in 2023? And who really does understand what it means, that they’re claiming to be for PRIDE? And perhaps most importantly, as someone who would identify as being more bisexual than cis heterosexual, and if we start diving down the spiritual rabbit hole of evolution, a little bit queer and a few shades of gender nonconforming in the middle (in other words, I feel no real need and actually find it a bit limiting to try and fit into the box of any one particular label) do I even get what the hell Pride even really means? Let alone how do we best support all people who identify as Women on International Women’s Day, and during Sydney World Pride, to be them/he or she?? That led me to re-doing a lot of research on the origins of pride activism in both western white centric cultures, as well as the origin of pride activism for People and Cultures of Colour. And what that means to largely White Westerners across the US and England, as well as what that has meant historically within my hood in Australia and New Zealand, and various states within Australia. As I contemplated the challenges and wins that LGBTIQ+ activists have achieved over several decades, protesting against hundreds of years of abuse, legal exclusion of basic legal and human rights and the denial of service to people we might now identify as LGBTIQA+, by virtually all segments of society; from the criminalisation of consensual same sex adult sexual activity and dressing in clothing out of sync with ones biological gender, from lack of government representation, to employment, health, housing and religious discrimination, and withholding of marriage or adoption rights organised crime control of establishments where LGBTIQ+ people might’ve spent their time, not to mention where such legal and human rights challenges overlapped with other laws that withheld basic rights based on race, ableism or disability, socio economic class or social status, throughout history, I couldn’t help but also be immensely grateful for all the work that has come before. Victories that have afforded people like myself the freedom to even be able to speak out loud about, let alone have explored, what gender or sexual identity means for them personally. And have influenced too, what we have to talk about on International Women's Day. If a large part of creating greater psychological safety between individuals involves developing a greater understanding of each other, then I contemplated that to truly be FOR pride and ALL Women on International Women’s Day, perhaps one needs to better understand why one might identify with any given part of the LGBTIQ+ spectrum, let alone being bisexual, for example, as well as what that ultimately means that one might journey and experience in the course of life, past present or future. Because to be bisexual or questioning, in my humble personal experience, is sometimes to be very misunderstood about where you’re coming from and what drives you. As well as comes with its own unique set of challenges, learnings and ultimately also gifts. In saying that, I am by NO means, amongst the most knowledgable, visible or proactive LGBTIQ+ advocates or allies, so I’m not proclaiming to represent a collective viewpoint here. But I did want to talk about my own personal experience of areas over the years, as I started to, particularly in my 30’s, colour outside the lines of cis gender heterosexuality and contemplated whether or not to openly declare bisexuality and the implications of that, in the entrepreneurial world, the workplace and various aspects of personal life. For me personally, I would say that it was in my early 30’s that I started connecting with both Men and Women in dating and relating. But I knew from a teenage age, without really being specifically attracted to any specific person, that I was same-sex attracted in moments AND simultaneously, had an undeniable love of and chemistry with people who identified as Men. Given too that I grew up in conservative, heteronormative country Victoria in the 80s, imagining growing up, getting married and having kids some day with some likely similar aged, taller than me, dark handsome man (definitely NOT how my relating life even remotely turned out, for the better), my focus and energy were channelled for decades into finding ways to co-create that reality. From my late 20s onwards, I was surrounded with a lot of people in the community services, personal development, arts, private practice and spiritual communities, and had plenty of friends around me going to Tantra or Relationship workshops, or running them, who were exploring and supportive of exploration of sexual identity and sex positivity. Also, the combination of my attempts to heal my own trauma, with my efforts to develop my own focus in private practice, inevitably evolved from wanting to help other Women re-find passion and purpose beyond time of trauma and life transition, into also focusing on relationship and life coaching people through sexual and reproductive health and illness concerns and becoming a Speaker on such things (before later moving on to Coaching & Mentoring on Practice Success in the sphere of Health and Wellbeing, and confidence in communication and leadership In both professional and entrepreneurial contexts). But it wasn’t until after a breakup of sorts in my early 30’s, where a partner ended things to re-pursue the (bi-sexual ) love of his life, that the time began where I was connecting with both Men and Women. And my next few connections came with a few possibilities of healing and exploring everything that came up for me amidst that breakup, among other things, while my ultimate goal still remained evolving towards a deep, monogamous connection…and overcoming what was still in the way of that. With the exception of a few podcasts, blogs and speaking pieces aside, where it might have had relevance to certain client groups and their challenges (and the odd moment where I felt I owed networks of thousands to over 20 000 people some form of explanation as to my departure from Leadership roles) innately, I actually tend to want to be pretty private about my romantic pursuits, for wanting to create the kind of trust and safety, where there can be depth & longevity. So, in truth I never really ‘came out’ as bisexual or questioning, so much as I was kind of outted by a male lover in my early 30’s on social’s proclaiming of a connection, with himself and other Women, as a part of his open, authentic, sex positive, unashamed philosophy of living, being and sexuality. While some people were fine and supportive and both surprised AND not surprised by this, for others, especially in professional contexts, it then felt like I got pulled into personal and professional "damage control." To manage the fact that this privileged piece of information did not arrive, to the people I cared about, or clients or work colleagues on my socials, as I might have intended, from me personally. “Damage control”, because to be openly bisexual, is also sometimes perceived in some ways as a threat, and I wanted to be responsible, ethical and respectful in showing up for the chats I might need to about people’s professional and personal concerns. Celebrating ME, I would say in hindsight, I let take a distant second. Simultaneously, the whole experience also revealed A LOT about some of the misconceptions, beliefs, stereotypes and judgements we collectively and individually held, maybe still hold in places, about bisexuality and deviating from the cis gender heterosexual road well travelled. For one, it was and is sometimes, not taken seriously and dismissed as a phase you’re going through; a phlegmatic, white privileged, over-indulgent party phase of experimentation. As a bisexual female Comedian pointed out recently in her piece at the Sydney Lunar Comedy Evening, “when you mention being Bisexual to some straight people, they tell you to get off the fence and just pick a damn side!” I'd go one step further to say you sometimes hear it in same sex scripts and conversations too, but in the form of "oh yeah, they're still THERE." So there can often be a judgement of indecisiveness, uncommittedness and immaturity that comes with it. It can also get dismissed as just a phase of healing you’re going through, on the way back to being "straighty 180." While a lot of my sex positive Counsellor and Coach colleagues and friends simply embraced it as my next step of exploration and evolution, it wasn’t that way in a lot of high end Coaching and Business Circles. A lot of those Mentors viewed it as a phase of healing. And maybe it’s because I didn’t push hard enough, but it felt like everybody in them Mentored and gave business and marketing advice about how to position myself, under the (heteronormative) assumption that I was just a confused heterosexual Women, broken from losing my Mum and Grandmothers young, Daddy damage, and a host of instances of sexual and physical assault, who just needed to be healed back onto the path of a monogamous relationship with a Man, pop out a kid and all would be right in the world again. And did I really want the complexity and baggage that would go with owning THIS part of myself publicly too, on top of everything else I’d been through in life? Hadn’t I already had it hard enough? But that’s also the nature of Mentoring for you; their intention is to guide you based on their past path of success, and success in those days sometimes involved hiding your private sexuality business under a cloak of shame and public approvability, and regarding sexual explorativeness as a threat to the reputation of all involved. Not to mention often dismissing mine at least, as a phase of healing. And then there’s the slut shaming that came with it too, particularly in white male dominated high achieving business circles. In a “bisexual = promiscuity = whore…. & the kind of woman you wouldn’t take home to meet your family, or to your rich, status-holding mates” kind of way. The kind you bang and dispose of, not build a life or have kids with. To be bisexual or questioning was in some cases, to be ranked a lesser value class of Woman. And thus here come the ways that it can be perceived as a threat:
What i'm about to say, i'm not going to share as THE way things SHOULD be done, or what i think anyone ELS should aspire to or do. It's simply the place i personally have evolved to within all of this, as it relates to my spiritual world view. For me, I’ve had enough experiences in life that I undeniably believe in the existence of a higher consciousness and the existence of benevolent beings that guide us. Me being raised Christian and my Mum, being Christian, before she died, took it upon herself to hand write a book for me, in which she copied OUT of the Bible, summaries of the life lessons that she thought were the most important to live life by. Many of those she wrote, are shared by multiple spiritual methodologies, across the globe. But essentially, she left out all the parts that I believe she felt were written for a time that is now several centuries out of date, both in terms of population size, our current level of awareness, scientific, medical and and technological advancements, not to mention modern day leadership and motivational theory, having taken a substantial turn away from negative reinforcement and shaming, in the direction of strength based approaches, positive reinforcement and encouragement. I'm sure i'll be shot to sh*t for saying this, but i feel the difficulty being with the original Bible, that those who published it have done such a fine job of instilling fear of damnation into so many peoples' minds, that it’s difficult to actually now change it, and reinforce the teachings that are in it about unity, unconditional love and acceptance instead, without completely destabilising a huge number of people’s core sense of psychological safety. The constant emails I get sent, and the judgements and concerns i've worn from some Ministers, let alone the being screamed at weekly by Nuns at my workplace that i'm going to hell, being constant proof of just how hard people will fight you, to the detriment of all else, on maintaining the parts that instill fear, judgement, discrimination and division, over love. I have to wonder how many of the world’s problems could be solved if the heads of the various churches, or even better, a range of spiritual leaders from across the world, got together and decided to tune into God/Higher Consciousness/s to channel an updated one for the present day, with the intention of serving the highest good of all, NOW? But will they? Until they do, I’ve basically opted to put that book down and go direct to source for guidance, and to hang with people who are walking the talk on unconditional love and interested in finding the threads that unite us. My spiritual evolution too, has since taken me personally, elsewhere. For me, the questioning of cis gender heterosexuality and exploration of bisexuality and stepping outside the lines of traditional gender roles, sexual preferences and identities, was also a product of my expanding spiritual and energetic and universal worldview, as i continued to explore the shamanic, transpersonal, the "new cage" movement and both modern and ancient spiritual and wellness methodologies and ways of living. As well as considered life and consciousness OUT THERE, across dimensions, time and space. Love, for me, had also evolved to be more about the soul in the body I’m connecting with, more than it is about the specific anatomy of the human body attached to it, at this particular point in time in space. Never was it more obvious to me, than standing at the foot of my Mother’s bed, 5 minutes after she had died, just how thoroughly pointless this amazing biological machine that is the human body becomes, once the consciousness that once lit it up, is no longer there. But then I’ve also come to embrace the idea that ‘heaven doesn’t only have a one-way door.’ For example, take the idea of reincarnation, and consider that as souls, we might of known each other at different points in time and space, at which we might of existed and grown to know each other, with different gender identities, soul purposes, personalities and preferences to the ones we have in this lifetime NOW, as a consequence of our experience in that particular lifetime. If we were to reconnect with them again in this one, and remember any of this, integrating that awareness may well require the adaption of a somewhat gender fluid and potentially bisexual, or even pansexual worldview to accomodate that new awareness, of what genders we were and when. (“Pansexual” being a term often used to describe people who identify having a physical, emotional or romantic attraction to any gender, not just a biological gender, that also had applicable in such spiritual world views.) There are parts of the community now too that also now recognise the term “2-Spirit” as a form of sexual identity, or gender identity. My understanding is that this is a term derived from Native American culture, to describe people who are male, female or intersex and have both a male and female spirit within them? I relate this also to a quantum energetic worldview, that incorporates both the model of multidimensionality of the universe, ideas of other forms of sentient organic lifeforms and non-physical consciousness into it. And or accounts for the potential influence of fragments of ourselves from other incarnations or times, or dimensions. And or the presence of other sentient consciousnesses, that could be influencing our experience in this one. Such viewpoints again, invite and require an inevitable expansion beyond binary definitions of biological gender and gender and sexual identity. Hence too why I would say that, for me, short of whoever i dated in the last decade and why, it doesn’t feel as true to say I’m only cis gender heterosexual or only fit under one specific LGBTIQ+ label of self expression and gender identity, gender fluidity or non conformity, in a reality in which we exist, existed and will exist in multiple forms, physical and non physical. While many of the ways of looking at gender and sexuality diversity, sociology, human psychology and relating dynamics and spirituality can and have been perceived at times as threats, the other way to look at them is of course, as opportunities for growth, healing and deepening understanding of others, and breaking through the kinds of limiting beliefs that hold all of us back, in ALL contexts. Not to mention healing what gets in the way of us connecting with others well, personally and professionally. While I won’t deny that I found both healing and had a lot of fun along the journey of exploration of these part of myself, and I’m sorry, but I have little guilt or shame around admitting that, to me, my choice to be phlegmatically running around the world, running on desire or addiction, wanting to screw whoever I want, whenever I want, as the latest expression of my uncommitted, Sagittarian freedom & adventure-loving white privilege, as some have judged it to be. I’ve always wanted a committed, monogamous, deep relationship with someone who has similar interests, goals and loves people and being of service, adventure and the outdoors as much as I do. It’s just that also, as the decades have progressed, my world view evolved AND the possibility of having biological children of my own had come into question (after already having served as a parent and carer younger in life, in multiple different ways, yet still being more than happy to be open to the possibilities of other peoples children being present in my life, in future ways) that I became less attached to whoever that might be with, as needing to be of any specific gender. In the process of life over that decade, i realised that i was equally capable of falling in love with a Woman, as i was with a Man. I was drawn to each for different reasons and found that some dynamics too, didn't work for various reasons, dependent upon what i was needing and what is on my manifestation list at any given time, just like is the case with any other human relationship on the planet. What comes next, well i guess we'll see in time, wont we? Lord knows though, as a highly intelligent, hyper-independent, over-achiever in almost all of the areas of service I’ve turned my focus to, who’s life lessons and life purpose have largely turned out to be about facilitating interdependence and deeper connectedness, I’d say I’m about done slapping any more bumper sticker labels of limitation on my gender identity and self expression. And in this day and age, I’d honestly rather just be upfront about it, than have people either feel deceived or leave when they find out this part of my backstory. I'm not writing this because i want the world to validate MY existence. I'm just grateful that, now that i make a life or love choice, it's nice to be surrounded by more people now who are like "hell yes girl, GET IT!" rather than fighting me so hard on why MY life choice doesn't work for THEM. Thank you to those of you who are my "go get it" people, you know who you are. xx I hope that as I offer any of this history or perspective (that i've essentially made my peace and moved on from) it goes on to create greater understanding… about why people who are LGBTIQ+ identified, let alone identified with the B, the Q or the +, ever had reason to protest, and a need to speak up about things we had experienced. As well as why any LGBTIQ+ identified person might be celebrating and what he/she/they might be grateful for at this time. Hence why, as all the tokinistic, opportunistic Pride and IWD2023 ads started to roll around, i found myself and others wondering, "are you REALLY FOR Pride though, REALLY?" Then we celebrate International Women’s Day this week. “Woman’ or ‘Female’, as I’ve stated in all my Women’s groups past, being an umbrella term for anyone who identifies with the Gender or Sexual identities associated with being Female or a Woman. As so many minorities groups under that umbrella each step up and speak for their unique group's position to be seen and heard this week, every single person who identifies as Female in every single one of those groups deserves to be seen, heard and celebrated today. It can be easy, when we start highlighting such needs and differences to start to get lost in the divide over who is not honouring that and who's needs should take greater priority. Without any intention of "bypass", I think the challenge is to also remember what unites us under that one umbrella of identifying us Woman and celbrate that too. How do we both celebrate and honour all that it means in this day and age to identify with being a Woman? Just my one perspective, of many. Do with it what you will, but please promise me you'll be kind. Big love to everyone who identifies as LGBTIQ plus out there or as an ally and to ALL Women on International Women’s Day. May you be free to celebrate whatever it is that makes you, YOU. Until next time, have fun take care and may you and life continue to be amazing. Nat xx |
WriterIn a world in which we've got too busy for meaningful human connection, Nat talks about the ways we can bring it back. Archives
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