By now you'll likely have read my breakdown of the "reality concept" from Nigel Warburton's book "Philosophy, the basics"
If not have a peak here...
So, given I'd been thinking about that stuff a while, a conversation I've had recently popped back into my head, or specifically comment from it.
"...Ok, so you're a trans woman, but in your previous life you acted like a man and you're (still) interested in bloke stuff..."
It's a fair point. I like motors, a tuned V8 will make me weaker at the knees than most things in life, (and if its an RB series straight six.. I'm putty in ya hands.. ) I like geeky gamer shit, guitars, loud music, riding bikes, fixing bikes, and messing around with spanners and fire pits.
But under it all was this issue of gender dysphoria. I'm not a particularly "camp" individual...(although I was once accused of being so, but that's a story for a another day) So where does it all the "bloke shit" fit in? and more to the point where does it all manifest from?
Cause, effect?
Well. Growing up I really didn't have much of a handle on gender stuff, however I was a curious kid blessed with some intellect of sorts. "Dad how does that work" "Mum what does this do?" "but Miss what does that mean?" were comments often heard from me...I'm sure I drove people nuts. I read lots, lapped up the stories of CS lewis, Timothy Zahn, and more factual historical books on things like the falklands war etc with equal abandon.
I just got on with the business of being me, and of having an interest in the world around me. The old man was a truck mechanic, so it follows i might pick that up, yet mum's a gardening type and I can't grow anything...
Perhaps societal expectations and assumptions might play a little here... "Son spends time with Dad in garage" is a well known and well worn outcome of a father son relationship after all. But I wasn't pushed into it. And I remember - indeed I'm often reminded by - my daughter of when she did the same.."daddy what does that bit do?" whilst pointing at the fan in the sports car's engine bay...
For a teenaged girl she probably knows more than the average kid about what happens under the bonnet of a motor... why? because she was curious.. and her Daddy made it cool..and took time to teach her stuff, just like mine did. Mum often says to me: If I'm interested in a subject it gets 110%...if not.. 0% So it's extremely unlikely that young me was coerced into something as part of any gender profiling kinda deal.
There's evidence out there from the like of Simone de Beauvior about the performative elements of human gender, which may be at issue here. Yet performative implies perception on the part of the viewer, thus in the act of "doing" a meaning is ascribed to the doing of an action by the viewer not just the performer.
Consider that if a natal female had similar or identical interests to me, then they would not be viewed as "a man". More likely they would be viewed as a woman with atypical interests when one looks at the stereotypical models of gender behaviours. Similarly a natal male into "Girly stuff"
So the interests and activities argument alone doesn't stack up to disprove, or indeed prove, a trans gender identity, but in this case that wasn't the intention of the original comment. It came from (or at least i think it did) a place of wanting to understand the process of forming identity....
How do we humans form our identities?
It's been said that "you", your personality and learned behaviours etc are the sum total of the five most influential people in your life. Usually those you spend the most time with.
Because I was perceived as a boy, I spent most of my time with boys, and my family, who again perceived me as a boy. Girls wouldn't look the side I was on cos boys were yucky, and geeky awkward boys with glasses and zero charisma were just icky... so .. yup .. pretty much a girl free environment.
There were certain lessons that I learnt from the authority figures in my life at that point that I now no longer believe are true. Yet back then, because they came from a place of perceived authority I took those lessons on board.. believing that they must be right simply because of my faith in where they had come from.
As we grow, our social circle and sphere of influence increases and we learn stuff, some of which is contradictory to prior information, from other sources. We form our own opinions & beliefs and as a result we become independent, thinking, adult humans beings....yeah scary shit huh?
Yeah yeah I hear ya say...but opinion doesn't equal identity...so what is it?
Well ok, opinion isn't identity, but it sure is part of it. How we think, how we perceive the world and our place in it is a huge deal as far as our self awareness and sense of self goes. Knowledge is the key to unlocking those mental doors that in some people remain resolutely closed for life. Curiosity is the means by which we turn that key and open ourselves up to a world of unknown behind the door. Fear on the other hand is the one thing that can stay our hand at the point of turning...
For me, knowledge and context of the jigsaw puzzle pieces that just didn't quite "fit" came during the first year of nurse training.
Once I'd lost the fear, or perhaps over came it, or maybe my curiosity was greater than the fear, I'm not sure even to this day, which one occured but once that happened I turned the key. What ultimately came through that door was ironically enough more "knowledge". Knowledge of the possibility and plausibility of something that I had both discounted and left unexamined for decades, based on an erroneous assumption that it wasn't possible. Why not? because of everything that is in the first 7 or so paragraphs of this piece.
The line in the title of this piece comes from Star Wars: The phantom menace. Qui Gone Jin says to a young Anakin Skywalker:
Always remember: your focus determines your reality...
Now, ok it precedes what many think is the worst line in the franchise, but it speaks of an essential truth. How many times have athletes use creative visualisation? Belief in the possible and a concerted and defined effort to strive toward that goal.
Once I knew where I was, and what I had. (gender dysphoria) I had to decide what to do about that knowledge. Where to place my focus and thus my reality.
As a result my focus moved - in time - from being about outward things, acquisitions and the distractions of life to keep me entertained and busy. I'd spent so many years just putting on film after film in that cinema of perception that I spoke of in my last blog, that I never noticed the seats, the lights, the screen or the "inside of my head" as it were.
My focus shifted, for once, onto me. For the first time i started to pay serious attention to my internal world. And whilst my interests and collection of films on that cinema screen didn't change, and probably won't... I'll be less restricted in the adding of new ones, since I've now changed the reel from 8mm Cinefilm, to an 8k Imax, and can see a damn sight more of "the world" as a result.
Right I reckon that's enough deep and meaningful stuff for one day... time to put a film on... But which one.... hmmm
It's all part of the plan... unless you step off the script...
Till next time.. keep smiling, do what you do and just let life take care of the rest...
Sarah
xx
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