Learning Balance

Woman: an adult female human being; a person with the qualities traditionally associated with females.

Yeah. Box 1, check! Box two... well, so we're going to take a quick turn to femininity I guess to get those traits traditionally associated with females.

Some quickly gathered associated words: passive, thoughtful, soft, graceful, intuitive, patient, nurturing, accepting, vulnerable.

Here's where I tend to be an un-feminine woman. I don't find myself agreeing easily with most traits associated with women.

Vibe check? Not passed. Actually, the bouncer just looked at the fake ID and moved it along.

Ok, for real. I do show some of those characteristics, and these are traits that are frequently mentioned about me (sometimes not even to me). However, I regard these things as part of being a human being with feeling. In that I mean that I have the capacity to be all of these things, of course I do because everyone does. It doesn't mean that I show them all the time or evenly but they get shown where I feel appropriate.

I don't tend to be very passive. I'm still working on being vulnerable with other people. I guess I have soft skin physically but emotional softness is generally reserved for children. Patience? Tah! The idea of having children is one I have struggled with, not because of my apparent issue with my experience of womanhood, but because I don't think of myself as a very nurturing person. Children need nurturers and I don't think I can be that for extended periods of time as children so often need. And with the impatience? That's a disaster waiting to happen and why should any child be subjected to that?

All in all, I just don't feel very feminine most of the time.

Has this come up before?

Oh, absolutely. Many a reading, in fact. Usually, that I am unbalanced.

Did I figure it out?

If I had figured it out... well, we wouldn't be here. Still struggling.

I have been told that at least a decent portion of it is the way I talk. I don't have anything to say about that. Yeah, sometimes my tone is a little cold but it's really not personal. There's a lot there. I'm not going to get into all of that.

Now, I'm going to focus on how my relationship to Isese is developing in this department as it is the most recent reminder that I really don't have that section of my life figured out.

I was told to learn to balance the masculine and feminine within me. I was also given the additional instructions that usually come with it. This one was no pants. For a full week, only dresses or skirts.

This presented it's own issue. I needed to go shopping because I didn't have any work appropriate dresses. I do now.

But here's where it loops back around. I struggle with traditionally feminine things. I was very pretty... and agitated! but pretty.

Why? Why do it if I was just so uncomfortable in my body? Why do it if the attitude towards it was going to be so negative and I knew that it was? Simple. Ifa said so.

The only thing I really have to show for it is a resounding “uh, what the fuck, why?” and guilt about not feeling into it nor exactly understanding why I have to.

Now, if you're not aware. I'm an African American. I grew up in the southern United States where I attended church in little tutu dresses. I am very vehemently anti-tulle. It sucks, I'm itchy and only itchy. All I can be is itchy.

Tulle is not a safe space.

The point of me saying that is that my lived experience is that of a little black girl tortured by dresses who grew into a black woman with a blended cultural and religious understanding of Africanisms and western ideas.

With that in mind, I presume that my concept of womanhood is different from that of an indigenous African woman. I'm sure there's some extra meaning to the need for a dress based in some cultural norm reflected in the odu. I don't have that cultural knowledge so this connection can only be made via what I do have.

In the States, dresses are valued as a form of femininity but it's not strictly required to be regarded as feminine or womanly. I might be willing to argue that it's still peak femininity but these days, it's not the only way to express that. I'm in the “other” category here.

Ultimately, it's obvious that not only does this not actually fix my problem but it feels distinctly performative.

I felt pretty and as an adult, I can choose what I wear so I chose silkier, uncomplicated dresses to make it easier on me. I did find things I liked but weren't me per se, but in part because I don't find dresses to be “me”.

I felt like I was just playing pretend for a few days, like I snuck into my mom's closet or something (which, by the way, I did not do that as a child). I even wore heels once because it went with it and I was like “well the point is to look like a woman right?”

In my day to day life, I generally choose what makes me feel comfortable in my body. That's just not often a dress.

Do I like being dolled up from time to time? Yes. Do I think it's a lot of work for like five people and myself to see me? Also yes. It's a lot of work to be presentable as a feminine person and for me to be bothered, it needs to count for something. There must be a reason for me to be in a dress, be it “please wear x for y occasion’, or ‘Ifa said this would help’ or “ah these pants are not passing the vibe check for a quick trip to the grocery for sweet tea.”

Obviously, I don't have all of the pieces on why those energies are out of balance. Ifa’s take on this wasn't provided either. If Ifa’s point was to yank out all of the random childhood memories of being ignored about being uncomfortable in the stupid fluffy dresses or how I hate shaving and how that represents yet another insecurity about being a femme person for me... well congrats. Maybe the point was to confront those things. I don't know, Ifa didn't exactly say.

I don't know.

I model a lot of the qualities of the women I looked up to in my family. I take pride in feeding people well. I take pride in a well-kept home. I take pride in a clean appearance.

These are women that have always prioritized doing what needs to be done. They're not really “wait for others” types. Not only is this behavior familiar to me but I don't care much for dependency. It's a childhood insecurity I'm working my way out of but it also means I don't prefer needing anyone else. If we're to keep a buck fitty, I have a hard time needing me.

I do not get the vibe that this is all there is to this.

Did I figure any of that extra shit out with Isese? No. Isese wasn't even the first to tell me that shit was out of balance. I was just slowly working my way through what I had space for between all the other things coming up.

Not to mention, that imbalance is also interpreted as "You need a man" and there's a hormone imbalance. Do I believe it? Eh for one, but I have other supporting proof about two because, surprise surprise, I live with my vagina. It does not tell me jackshit about the imbalance. Getting dicked down is supremely unlikely to change shit but also, Ifa this man you been talking about for the last year... where because I'm not going out and about in the rona times, I do know that.

So what to do? Discovery. Some analysis. An open discussion with some spirits. And maybe, for once, I'll chose to exist as I want to, without concern to what other people think or feel I should be existing as.

We'll see.

Blessings,

From the Lemon Trees