Is thinking you are the opposite sex unconscious?

[Cameron]

I was born with male body parts. And for most of my life I’ve had a masculine attitude. Dominate the world. But I’ve always from a very young age had thoughts and feelings of being female or feminine. I watched Leo’s video on  masculinity vs femininity and based on his descriptions I feel like I’m a lot more feminine than masculine. I’m 25 now and have been doing consciousness work for at least 5 years. Watching Leo’s videos, reading books, contemplating, meditation, psychedelics. I’ve had amazing experiences that have dramatically changed my perspective. One area my mind is open on is gender spectrum. I feel like anyone can be whatever gender energy they feel most authentic as and anywhere in between. I don’t think it’s important that if you are born with a penis that you have to have a male attitude/energy and vice versa. I think it’s far more important to be authentic. I under this isn’t oneness. It’s all still identity based. I am.... Which is what brings me to my question. Is being transgender unconscious or delusional and just some identity distraction? Or be what I feel is a more authentic self and keep practicing spirituality?

[Devi Shanti]

In my point of view, matter is condensed energy. So, things and living beings are expressions of the spirit of nature, energy. I really think we are born with the appearance of who we really are inside. But, I know there is too much social speculation about behaving depending on your sex. I think that if we really connect to nature, ignoring many of those social patterns, we can find a real way to be in harmony with our bodies, gentilly flow with it. Our sex says a lot about us. We are driven all the time by our hormones, cicles, form of brain work (all those are strictly related to sex).

Many people are investing giant efforts in a war against their bodies and society, destroying their physical health, their relationships and going into a way back where only suffering comes from because they don't accept their sex. I can't see more than ignorance on it, I am sorry. The end of suffering comes from acceptance. Accepting the reality manifested in us is a fundamental part of spiritual development.

Maybe you only have limited concepts about men's/women's behaviors. Maybe you have a deep emotional wound that makes you reject the masculine in you.

These are my thoughts about this subject. You can meditate about it, considering. I hope some of these words could help you someway.

Wish you peace.

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti Thanks for your response. I feel like accepting who I am is being feminine though. Being masculine feels forced and unnatural. I’ll keep thinking about it!

[universe]

Thinking your are a woman is the same kind of identity as thinking you are a man. Or what was your question?

[Devi Shanti]

@Cameron you can be what you call feminine, but you will still be a man. That's the unavoidable reality. But you can find your way of being a man authentically, in despite of that image of the masculine you don't feel identification with. 

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti I find it useful to break it into 3 categories. Sex, Gender and Sexual Orientation. Sex is what you are born as. Can you make a baby inside of you or not. This never changes. Gender is your psychology or the energy you have. Masculine/Feminine. Be whatever you feel most authentic as. And Sexual Orientation is who you like having sex with. Have sex with whoever you want.

[Devi Shanti]

@Cameron I see complexification on what is quite simple. There are people claiming for social recognition for more than 30 different genders. If we keep forking concepts, it will be endless. Simplicity is always the shortest way to find Truth. Why are we always highlighting our differences? Why do we keep labelling ourselves and others? Why don't we highlight our similarities? Why don't we stop creating complexity and just contemplate the beauty of the simple and wide open truth?

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti I never said anything about 30 genders. I don’t think we need to label anything. People can just be whoever they want, have sex with whoever they want. Doesn’t get simpler than that. 

[Devi Shanti]

@Cameron either I didn't say you said it. It's just an example of where things can go if we keep categorizing everything. 

In short, my friend, I wanna say you don't need to spend your precious life feeling different and misunderstood by society because they don't understand the theory of sex, gender and sexual orientation. Pay attention on what is that isolate a person. This is the ego trap. Reality is one. The closer we get to people around us (in heart level), the closer we are of oneness.

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti I’m not sure what you don’t understand? Are you saying people having a sexual orientation/preference is complicated? It’s not a category. I’ve just noticed people having a preference with who they have sex with. Isn’t this obvious?

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti Same with sex. I’ve noticed some people have a penis and some have a vagina. Nothing about their body parts tells me who they like having sex with or what their personality/energy is like. Whether they are mostly feminine by nature or masculine by nature. These aren’t concepts. Look around, talk to people and you’l see what I’m saying. People have sexual preferences, people have different body parts and people have different masculine/feminine energies.

[Devi Shanti]

10 hours ago, Cameron said:

@Devi Shanti I’m not sure what you don’t understand? Are you saying people having a sexual orientation/preference is complicated? It’s not a category. I’ve just noticed people having a preference with who they have sex with. Isn’t this obvious?

I am saying exactly what I am saying. We keep looking for what make us different, we keep getting away from oneness. It is simple. No much to explain. 

Actually I don't like talking about this subject because once people start separating their sex/mind/body this way, it becomes a complex net hard to get out of, and in general they don't want to get out of it. You keep thinking I don't understand you, and you start being ironic and talking to me like I was stupid. I don't really know your real intention on this thread. I thought you were looking for an answer (or at least for different opinions about) for "is thinking you are the opposite sex unconscious?". And my short answer is: yes. It's like thinking you are a cat or an alien, just because you are not.

I carefully measured my words trying to be the most polite and compassive I could. I'm sorry if they can't help you any way. I understand it's not easy to consider different points of view about a thing we are so attached to. If you allow me giving you a piece of advice: keep exercising it with truth deep in your heart. You don't have to defend yourself of anything, you don't have to fight. You only have to sincerely consider.

Peace.

Edited September 23, 2019 by Devi Shanti

[Cameron]

@Devi Shanti You’ve really tried to help me and I appreciate that. But I just don’t understand what you’re saying. It’s frustrating but almost none of it makes sense to me.

[Forestluv]

Hi Cameron, I think you ask some really good questions. Not only can these questions reveal insights into relative personal and social constructs, the questions can also reveal insights into nonduality. I think some of the confusion may be due to mixing absolute and relative perspectives - which I will do my best to explain. . . 

It's easiest to start from a nondual perspective: that is - Everything is One. So there is no distinctions between "me" and "you". No distinctions between "masculine" and "feminine", no distinctions between "male" and "female". If Everything is One, all of those distinctions dissolve. As a metaphor, imagine Everything is Blue. Then there is no "Blue vs. Not Blue". If Everything is Blue there is no Not Blue for comparison.  We would need to create a distinction - that one thing is Blue and another thing is Not Blue. As soon as we enter into this relative arena, things get tricky. . . Who decides what counts as blue or not blue? What if scientists say a specific wavelength of light is blue and philosophers say blue is a personal experience of perception? What if one society defines blue one way and another country defines blue another way? And what about "sort of blue-ish" - at what point does it count as "blue" and how decides? . . . So these things can get messy. We can say "Everything is One, there is no reason for all this blue business". Yet at the same time, blue is part of the human experience.

Similarly: sex, gender and sexual orientation can all deconstruct down to One - there is no sex, gender or sexual orientation. From there, we can create personal and social constructs. We can create simple constructs or complex constructs. Yet notice how these are relative constructs that all deconstruct back down to absolute nothing. So why even create such constructs? Because it's part of the relative human experience. It also has practical value in navigating through society, yet at a deeper level it is part of who we are and how we interact with others. We are both One and unique individuals. 

We can contemplate gender from both personal and societal perspectives. These two are integrated, yet can also be in conflict. How you personally consider "masculine" and "feminine" may differ from some societal constructs on what "masculine" and "feminine" is. Or, personal and societal constructs can be aligned. Likewise, how you identify as "masculine" and "feminine" may differ from how fragments of society judges you as being "masculine" and "feminine". This is all due to relativity. There is no one universal objective definition. . . Understanding this will allow new space to explore.

As you mentioned, we can define male and female "sex" based on genitalia and genetics. The male sex has XY chromosomes and a penis, while the female sex has XX chromosomes and a vagina. This would be a scientific definition based on physical features.  This would also have practical value in society. If a male sex person is having pain in their testicles, they would look for a doctor that specializes in diagnosing male sex issues. Defining the sexes based on genitalia is generally straightforward, yet there will be some exceptions. For example, there are rare inter-sex individuals with genitalia that is hard to distinguish (for example, a tiny penis/clitoris hybrid). As well, there are some individuals that have had surgery to remove a penis. Yet these are relatively rare cases. Are designation that male sex = penis and female sex = vagina still has practical implications - we can deal with the exceptions on a case by case basis. For example, in medical school we may learn male sex anatomy and female sex anatomy and the professor may mentioned that there are some exceptions - such as intersex and briefly cover that situation. If a student wanted to specialize in intersex medicine, they would take entire courses in that area.

Gender designation enters a much more relative word. Here, it's not so easy to say "Male gender is A" and "Female gender is B". Now we are getting into personal identity and this introduces phenomena of self-value, self-expression and self-survival. Once we enter this arena - the fight is On Like Donkey Kong. There will be people that want to define male/female gender based on their own self interest and others that want define it differently because they have different self interests. Therefore, there will not be a universal definition that anyone agrees on. So some people say, gender should be based on how a person identifies. Another person may say "No! That would mean there would be 30+ different genders people are identifying with!!". So society is working things out and evolving. The old, conservative construct is that gender is the same as sex. A person with a penis is the male gender and a person with a vagina is the female gender. Yet this is a very simplistic binary construct. There is also "masculinity and femininity". These are additional features. By the old, conservative view - Male sex = Male gender = Masculine and Female sex = Female gender = Feminine. This is an overly simplistic binary construct that was the mainstream consensus for centuries. . . Over the past 40 years, much of society has questioned this binary construct leading to a a higher evolved construct that is more complex. People have asked "What a minute. . . what does masculine and feminine even mean? Aren't males and females mixtures of masculine and feminine? Can a male sex person with a penis have more feminine features than masculine? If so, should we call them the male gender or female gender". This has led to a spectrum in which some cis-gender males are hyper-masculine and other cis-gender men have more feminine energy (perhaps 60% masculine, 40% feminine). Some of the male sex (with penis) have much more feminine energy (perhaps 70% feminine, 30% masculine). These male sex individuals relate more to the female gender side of the spectrum and are trans-gender female. . . More recently, some individuals do not relate stronger with either male or female designations and are nonbinary.

These new, more complex constructs are at a higher evolutionary level, yet there will be backlash. There will be traditional men and women that want to maintain the older binary construct of Male sex = Male gender = Masculine and Female sex = Female gender = Feminine. They will feel very threatened by new gender expressions they see outside of their norm. Many of these conservatives will feel so threatened that they will fight to maintain the old constructs. 

[bejapuskas]

@Serotoninluv  What do you think is the relationship between being homosexual/bisexual and depression? It just happens so that all of my female friends who aren't only attracted to guys or not at all also have some psychological issues. Do you think there is any connection?

[Forestluv]

27 minutes ago, bejapuskas said:

@Serotoninluv  What do you think is the relationship between being homosexual/bisexual and depression? It just happens so that all of my female friends who aren't only attracted to guys or not at all also have some psychological issues. Do you think there is any connection?

There is a correlation between homosexuality/bisexuality and depression. There is an even stronger correlation between transgender and depression.

At a genetic / neurological level, there is not considerable evidence that gender identity or sexual orientation is physiologically linked to depression via genetics. So people that are homosexual/bisexual/transgender are not at a higher risk of depression due to inheritance of gene variants from their parents. (although a small genetic input is possible). It appears the vast majority of the correlation is due to environmental inputs. For example, homosexuals/bisexuals/transgender people may face stigmatization/marginalization/ostracization of being "abnormal", "immoral", "unacceptable" etc. This can come from within family and socially. . . At a physical level, this negative environmental input would alter a person's physiology increasing the risk of anxiety and depression. . . It's not the sexual/gender orientation itself. It is the environmental response to the sexual/gender orientation. 

[bejapuskas]

@Serotoninluv  Interesting, so you think it's only because of the lack of acceptance? Don't you think there might be also some other factors worth considering?

[Forestluv]

35 minutes ago, bejapuskas said:

@Serotoninluv  Interesting, so you think it's only because of the lack of acceptance? Don't you think there might be also some other factors worth considering?

Well. . . "lack of acceptance" includes A LOT. Within "lack of acceptance" there is stigmatization, marginalization, ostracization, violence, abuse, trauma and on and on. At a physiological epigenetic level, this can lead to alterations in gene expression correlated with neuroses. 

I'm open to considering other factors. What do you have in mind?

[remember]

@Cameron  feeling as a female did you ever try living as one? just for a day? i mean do you feel you also want to dress like a woman or is it just that you feel both aspects in you, have no conflict with your outer appearence but a strong feminine vibe and feel more home chatting with women and being loved by men or are you in that sense lesbian? i met some really beautiful transgender women and i don`t think it`s unconscious to feel your female aspect as you say yourself you just have to find a form in which you can live that side of yourself, meaning also to find the right community where you are accepted the way you are without constantly having to think it over or run against walls. maybe a community where you can experiment and play with that aspect of yourself and get supported by, and at one point have a coming out on your femininity. maybe even with a second name. there is only unawareness on who you really are untill you discover who you really are. you can even develope it into an artform or just live it out in a relationship. although if you want to go that path you might have to change some aspects in your life, it`s probably more difficult to live this at some places on the world than at others, but if it is important to you go on a journey to yourself! there are some cultures where femininity in men are more accepted than western culture, usually it´s the spiritual aspect of it aswell - so no, unconscious would be the denial about it.

[bejapuskas]

@Serotoninluv  I am just wondering if the lack of acceptance is external, internal, or both enhancing each other mutually... Does it start with denial of sex and then escalate into homosexuality/bisexuality/transgender, or does it start there and then lead to lack of acceptance from the inside? Or maybe there are all these different cases mixed in society. It might seem like I hate them, but I actually love my lgbtq friends and I want to be able to support them better... Maybe I should just behave normally, sometimes that's the best you can do for someone.