Tiny Buddha

Tag: gender roles

  • How I Stopped Worrying About What Others Think of Me

    How I Stopped Worrying About What Others Think of Me

    “Live your life for you not for anyone else. Don’t let the fear of being judged, rejected or disliked stop you from being yourself.” ~Sonya Parker

    On August 4, 2022, I buzzed off my long, thick, luscious hair.

    I marched up Sandy Boulevard in Portland, Oregon, walked into Take Pride Barbershop, and sat in the chair with the most badass barber. She quelled my last-minute fears and boldly took the clippers to my never-shorter-than-shoulder-length hair.

    It was instant liberation.

    I had finally worked up the courage to do so after four years of internal debate and worry, which went something like: What will people think? Will people think I’m a man? Will people treat me differently? What if I’m actually ugly and my ugliness will be revealed? What if my head is oddly shaped? Will I have to wear a bunch of makeup?

    My worries and thoughts were clearly steeped deep in societal conditioning about beauty and femininity. We are told that long hair is feminine and beautiful. We are told that young women aren’t supposed to have short hair. We are told that if you are a woman with short hair, be sure to wear makeup and jewelry so you look feminine.

    But I finally stopped all the thinking, broke free from those norms, and I just did it. I said, “Off with the hair!”

    And now I feel free-er, sexier, and prettier.

    I feel more like me.

    It’s as if I shed layers that were actually hiding my true essence. My true essence as an adventurous, empathic, sensual being who sometimes feels soft and tender, and other times feels bold and badass. My true essence as someone who is wary of rules and authority.

    It’s also as if I shed layers of my ego. Because whether I like to admit it or not, my hair was a significant piece of my identity as a woman. Hair is an expert communicator, with the ability to send so many messages through a single glance. Hair communicates gender, sexuality, wealth, age, health, and parts of our personality.

    Now that I have shed my long hair, I think the only part of me that is still communicated via my hair is my personality. For one can no longer look at me and quickly deduce my gender, sexuality, wealth, age, or health. (I do have very toned muscles and glowing skin, so people should be able to make an assumption about my health, but some people only see the short hair and assume I have cancer).

    What is communicated boldly is that I create and live by my own rules. And if people know one thing about me, THAT is exactly what I want them to know. 

    My buzzed hair also lends an air of mystery, as people wonder about all of those other little check boxes (gender, wealth, age, etc.) that are usually communicated via hair.

    While I did shed some layers of my ego, my buzzed head also makes a pretty strong statement, and in full transparency, I get a lot of attention. This attention comes in all forms.

    Sometimes it’s “Excuse me sir…oh! I mean ma’am.”

    Sometimes it’s “You need to wear lipstick to look more feminine.” (Who said I wanted to look more feminine?!)

    Other times it’s “Omg, you’re so beautiful” or “I LOVE your hair.”

    Sometimes I get free guac.

    I get a lot of smiles from passersby on the sidewalk.

    I get a lot of lingering looks at the post office, the coffee shop, and the dance floor.

    And while I do love to be called beautiful (who doesn’t?!), I don’t attach myself to the praise or the criticism because I have decided for myself that I am strong, radiant, and beautiful, from the inside out. I no longer care if people think I look masculine or feminine, ugly, or beautiful. I don’t care if people in Idaho think I have cancer. I don’t care if people think I look like a skinny boy without makeup on. (What’s wrong with looking like a skinny boy?!)

    This level of not caring, of being so confident in who I am, is the ultimate freedom. 

    Plus, I know that when people react one way or the other, it is not really about me and my hair. Their reaction means that I activated something within them. I activated their desire to be free and to stop following the rules that someone else laid out for them.

    In the best cases, I offer others a little permission slip to step into their own boldness. Which is one of my favorite parts of buzzed life—when women tell me I’ve inspired them to buzz their long hair! That they were so worried about what people would think, but after seeing me do it, they now have the courage too. That is powerful.

    So while the hairstyle of one woman may seem like a simple and insignificant thing, it actually plays a small but important role in the liberation and empowerment of women.

    For when a woman has the courage to push back against beauty standards, that courage is ignited, and she also develops the courage to choose freedom in other facets of her life as well. 

    For me, that has looked like more sexual freedom—making me more playful in bed and bolder in sharing my desires—and more confidence in all areas of my life.

    Buzzing my hair has also created more time in my life, as I spend less time getting ready. It’s created more mental space, as I no longer spend inordinate amounts of time thinking about how to style my hair, when to wash it, and whether or not to get it highlighted.

    It has also freed up more money because I no longer spend hundreds of dollars on highlights and cuts. My fiancé buzzes my hair at home and, occasionally, I bleach it myself.

    It’s also led to freedom in how I dress. Sometimes I like to dress to express my femininity. Other times, I dress to express my masculinity. As someone who used to be deeply insecure about her tomboy-ish-ness and lack of desire to wear makeup, I have reclaimed the masculine parts of me with pride, which has been an integral part of my healing and expansion journey.

    It has also deepened my sensuality. In the shower, the water massages my head more intimately. On a summer day, the sun kisses me deeply. On a breezy morning, the wind and I dance a graceful dance. On the dance floor, the softness of my fiancé’s lips activates my crown chakra. I feel less separation between the world and me. I am more integrated. I am more aware of my oneness with the natural world.

    Yes, all of this because of my buzzed hair!

    So I’ll leave you with a few parting words of wisdom:

    1. People are going to talk and have an opinion about you no matter what, so you might as well do what you want and be who you want.

    2. Others’ opinions of you really have more to do with them than they do with you, so don’t take stuff too personally and concern yourself first and foremost with your opinion of yourself.

    3. If you want to buzz your head, do it. If you don’t like it, it’ll grow back. But I bet you will like it!

    So here’s to taking action to live as a more free, wild, and confident you!

  • Trust Restored: Why I’m Letting Go of Preconceived Ideas About People

    Trust Restored: Why I’m Letting Go of Preconceived Ideas About People

    “The problems around us are only compounding. We will need to rediscover our trust in other people, to restore some of our lost faith—all that’s been shaken out of us in recent years. None of it gets done alone. Little of it will happen if we isolate inside our pockets of sameness, communing only with others who share our exact views, talking more than we listen.” ~Michelle Obama

    I’m up at the American River, one of my favorite summertime spots. I have a ritual of floating down it, then hiking back up the hill to my clothes. I love how the swift current knows exactly where it’s going, making any paddling unnecessary. I love how you can just lie back and let it take you as you look up at the cloudless blue sky.

    As I float, the sun beats down on my skin, but the river’s coolness counteracts its scorch. Small groups of Canadian geese speckle the shore. The air is still, its quiet punctured only by the occasional train sounding in the distance.

    Once I’ve reached the bottom, I set out back towards my towel—walking along a series of dirt paths consisting of small hills. They’re quick and steep like bunny slopes, coated with golden dust that glints beneath the sunlight.

    While walking them I notice two men picking fruit from a tree in the distance. Feeling exposed in my half-clothed state, I immediately tense up. I realize that having no shoes means I’ll be unable to walk quickly past.

    Bracing myself for discomfort, I continue walking. As the distance between us narrows, I wait for them to whistle, or to jokingly ask  if I need help finding my clothes—or create discomfort in whatever other way, be it through words or stares (as I’d become accustomed to men doing).

    I walk past, armor on, shield up—raising it a little more when one of the men begins to speak.

    His words are, “Hello,” followed by,  “You’ve got some tough feet!”

    They contain no sexualizing, nor any subtle attempt at intimidation. And in response to this comment— the kind one human would make to another, his equal—I find myself reacting with human thoughts in return:

    Yes—this terrain IS pretty rugged. I guess my feet ARE pretty strong. Thank you, Sir.

    **

    I think about how, in Whistling Vivaldi, a black man whistles classical music when crossing paths with white strangers on the street. He does this in hopes of quelling their fear and discomfort that are born from prejudice. Implying benevolent intentions and sophistication, his whistling preemptively wards off prejudicial treatment.

    Perhaps this man’s comment was the (gender) equivalent to this example—an attempt at polite conversation to keep from coming across as threatening.

    Or maybe he’d briefly entertained the same thoughts that often precede the sorts of comments I’d anticipated. Maybe in the past he would have converted those thoughts into unwitting weapon words, then launched them my way. Maybe, though, because our society is growing and learning and its people are evolving, he decided that day not to.

    Either way, I felt relief that the men did not behave in the way I’d predicted.

    It got me thinking about preconceived ideas. How we often develop templates, then apply them to the individuals we regularly interact with. How few encounters encourage us to challenge or expand these templates, because much of our lives are structured around familiarity. And how it’s easy to take one look at a person and file them away into a specified bin inside our minds, perhaps unaware we’re even doing it.

    How often do we go into an encounter with our mind already made up—both about the person and about what they could possibly have to say? Their words pass through a filter in our head, confirming what we already know or believe to be true.

    Sometimes our expectations turn out to be accurate. Other times they do primarily because we expect this of them, therefore never open our minds to the possibility that we might be proven wrong.

    People act in ways that contradict our initial views of them, but we don’t see it when we’re not looking for it.

    When I was a Lyft driver, I drove many passengers I was sure I’d have nothing in common with. One was a seemingly straight-laced white man who worked for a tech company. I thought we’d have little to talk about, but an hour later we were eating In ‘N Out and discussing everything from our country’s quick fix approach to handling emotions to how his brother’s coming out changed their relationship to finding a balance between impactful work and a job that pays the bills.

    So often we decide a person is a certain way. Our mind closes. Thereafter we do, indeed, fail to connect. But not on account of differences, but the fact that no connection is possible when the heart and mind are closed.

    **

    No shift in thinking takes place in a single instance. The fact that those two men at the river pleasantly surprised me, for instance, doesn’t erase the overall pattern. Many more such encounters would be necessary for a true paradigm shift.

    But it’s a start. And from now on when I have the bandwidth, I want to give people the opportunity to act in ways that contradict my preconceived notions of them.

    I don’t want to get to that point anymore where I stop seeing others as individuals. Where I’m blinded to what we have in common because I’m seeing only what they represent; the harm done by the larger group they belong to; the political implications of their behavior.

    For instance, several years ago a young man had approached me while I was reading at a bar—and I completely ignored him. At that time I was so fed up with men, so annoyed with their repeated intrusions on my dates with women, and so frustrated that it was them who approached me in public (never women), that I just kept staring down at my book. I didn’t say anything back. In the moment it felt empowering.

    When I thought about the incident years later, though, I regretted my behavior. The guy hadn’t even been aggressive in the way he’d approached me. He’d been earnest, apprehensive, even shy—the way I imagine I can also be at times when I approach women. He didn’t represent All Men; he was his own person, doing something in that moment that might have made him nervous, or pushed him out of his comfort zone.

    I’m not saying it was my job to ease those feelings, or that I owed him this. It’s more that I realized that now I would have genuinely wanted to. Wanted to have at least said hi. Wanted to have at least politely told him I wasn’t up for conversation. Wanted to, maybe not have smiled, but at least treated him more like a human than an implied enemy.

    I want to take my frustrations with patriarchy and heteronormativity up with the concepts themselves—and with individual humans only when they are truly practicing it.

    I’d like to believe that polarized positions aren’t set in stone. That they can evolve and expand with time. That we won’t be doomed to perpetual gripping of shields while walking this planet.

    This isn’t our climate right now—but I hope and wonder if one day we’ll at least start inching closer.

  • Rethinking Masculinity: Why I Want More Than Bachelor Parties and Football

    Rethinking Masculinity: Why I Want More Than Bachelor Parties and Football

    “Patriarchy is the expression of the immature masculine. It is the expression of Boy psychology, and, in part, the shadow—or crazy—side of masculinity. It expresses the stunted masculine, fixated at immature levels.” ~ Robert Moore & Doug Gillette

    Seventy eggs, packs of bacon, and multiple types of beer filled the fridge. On the counter lay handles of liquor and energy drinks. The dining table was lined with snacks galore: chips, Cheese-its, popcorn, Oreos, Doritos, and dozens of Fireball nips.

    I’ve been to many bachelor parties, and it’s not surprising that health is never a priority. Yet this time, things felt different, or at least they should have. Most of the men present were fathers approaching forty. Everyone was married, had highly respectable careers, and lived in nice homes across the US.

    It was clear that this weekend wouldn’t be a free-for-all of strip clubs. We no longer had the beer guzzling metabolism of our twenties or the naivete of our youth. But if not late-night revelry, what would it be? Accepting that we were older and in a much different place in life seemed to be in tension with what this weekend was supposed to be all about.

    The expectations, unspoken and unexamined, were looming over each of us. We were supposed to act as if we were decades younger back in college. The story we were unconsciously telling ourselves was that honoring a man’s last single days was to be full of drinking and debauchery.

    We didn’t come here to be emotionally vulnerable and eat salads. We came together to get rowdy.

    The question on my mind is whether there is space in our current paradigm of masculinity to do both?

    * As grown men, do we have to revert to childish ways of interacting?

    * Do we have to reduce ourselves to the lowest common denominator of health and wellness to have fun together?

    * Are there not other ways of being together that better fit our present realities as mature, adults?

    Still more questions drifted through my mind:

    * Can we take a responsible approach to caring for our body and still make room to party?

    * Can we find a balance between celebrating our friend’s last days of being single without making marriage out to be a ball and chain?

    * Can we eat salads together and still be “manly enough”?

    I believe we can do all of these things, but first we need to unravel some deeply held social norms about how men are supposed to interact together in groups.

    The Undiscussed Rules of Bachelor Parties

    The unspoken rule of bachelor parties is that there are no rules. Go wild. Get f*cked up. Have as much fun as possible because you’re about to lose all your freedom. Or at least that’s how the story goes.

    But where did this story come from?

    How did all of us guys end up with this template of bachelor parties as a drug-fueled escape from responsibility?

    What’s more, how did we end up with this notion of marriage as impending shackles or the stereotype of men running away from long-term relationships?

    Movies?

    Media?

    Watching older generations go through their failed marriages and broken relationships?

    Probably all of the above and more.

    The stereotypes of men acting like boys is a sad reflection of our present reality. We have strayed from the mythic stories of men as responsible, powerful actors in the world and settled on a version of manhood that seems woefully incomplete. 

    Perhaps the most noteworthy archetype framing masculinity is that of a hero’s journey. It is the quintessential growing-up quest where men discover their strength through adventure and adversity. Endless movies from Star Wars to Harry Potter rift upon this classic template of human development.

    Yet what is notably missing from all these sagas is the hero as a family man, caring for himself and his world responsibly as an adult. We are obsessed with heroic journeys and completely unenthusiastic about domestic life.

    I get one makes for a much better motion picture, but it is this void in our present mythology that leaves men hanging on boyish and incomplete ideas of what it means to be a mature man. How does the hero turned father integrate into society, build a family, connect with other men, and take responsibility for doing good in the world?

    If the hero’s journey is the fundamental process by which a boy becomes a man, the question of how to actually enact manhood remains.

    This void is exacerbated when groups of men come together. The expectation is that of unhealthy behavior. The bachelor party is just one manifestation of this—groups of men acting like teenage boys… hedonistic, rebellious, and immature.

    Yet the world doesn’t need more rowdy teenagers. It needs strong, healthy men. Men, it’s time we grow the f*ck up. The problem as I see it, is that we don’t know how.

    No Models, No Vision, No Manhood

    When I look around for good templates on how to spend time together, all I see is sports, fraternities, and bachelor parties. There is nothing inherently wrong with any of these, but as the only models for men to exist together, they leave a lot to be desired.

    Sports teams and bachelor parties may be suitable for the single twenty-something, but where are the role models for men trying to be a good husband or trying to make ends meet?

    I want more meaning and depth than our current cultural templates afford. I want to hang out with other men in a way that calls upon our higher qualities, not our lower ones.

    Yet I fear that the little boy in me so badly wants to be accepted by the other guys that I will continue to squeeze myself into outdated beliefs and unhealthy ideals that have me ripping shots of fireball just feel accepted—the policing of the proverbial “man box.”

    As men we must deconstruct this box and give ourselves permission to act differently. This includes

    * Learning to have drink without being irresponsible to our body, our friends, or our partners.

    * Learning to talk about our feelings as much as we talk about football.

    * Allowing ourselves to strive professionally without feeling like our self-worth is dependent on our ability to provide.

    * Feeling comfortable sharing our struggles with other men, so we don’t unconsciously accept that suffering alone is an inevitable part of being a man.

    Creating New Templates for Men to Be Together

    Loneliness is an epidemic. And for men, the feeling that you’ve got to “man up” and deal with all of life’s challenges on your own is a legacy of patriarchy that needs to be released.

    We need each other. More importantly, we need to learn how to be together in a relationship without feeling like beer and sports are the only way.

    Can you imagine a world where men hang out and actually come out stronger, healthier, and more sound in mind and body?

    I can. It’s not only possible, it is necessary.

    I can imagine the eye rolling among some guys. “That’s why there’s men’s groups. Don’t take away my bachelor parties or Sunday football.”

    To be clear, I’m not at all against bachelor parties. The “wild and free” mindset makes sense as a time-bounded final hurrah.

    I’m not advocating for less fun. I’m advocating for more opportunities for men (and women) to gather in a way that challenges the scripts and roles that have kept us prisoners to immature ways of interacting. 

    The current social pressure not only makes it difficult for men to be emotionally available, it also squashes so many of the joyful parts of our inner child—the playfulness, adventure, and energy of boyhood. It’s keeping us from our embodied selves.

    But we need to grow and integrate that into new rites of passage that allow men to avoid blindly accepting patriarchal norms.

    I don’t want to have to hide my softer, more vulnerable parts. I believe we can discuss how our social conditioning as men impacts our body and mind alongside discussing our fantasy picks and favorite cars. There’s room for it all if we can let go of outdated notions about how men can spend time together.

    If we can help each other evolve into a more integrated expression of what it means to be a healthy man, everyone will benefit—the boys who are coming of age, the men who are struggling to find their place in the world, and the partners who deserve men that are nurturing and generative, not hostile and destructive.

    Learning to be a better man, together.

  • Toxic Masculinity and the Harmful Standards We’re All Expected to Meet

    Toxic Masculinity and the Harmful Standards We’re All Expected to Meet

    Recently I woke up uncharacteristically early for a Saturday to meet a friend and her baby for coffee. I am embarrassed to say that by “uncharacteristically early” I mean 8:30am, which is not that early. I get it.

    As I walked by two chipper twenty-something-year-old girls in skintight leggings either in route to or on their way back from a workout class, I found my mind reeling.

    Why is it that I see so many more women in New York City whenever I wake up early on the weekends? Why do they seem so much more productive than men?

    I first noticed this trend when I graduated from college. I would be out way too late at a local watering hole and overhear a couple girlfriends talking about their plans to wake up in six hours and meet for a workout class. My only plans for the next day were to sleep in till noon and order a bagel (with scallion cream cheese, obviously).

    Reflecting today, I noticed that this tiny, little behavioral difference is so emblematic of society’s varying expectations of men and women.

    Toxic masculinity has bred men to be the life of the party. Drink hard. Smoke cigarettes. Do drugs. Be indomitable. This behavior always necessitates sleeping in to recover afterward and lower productivity.

    For women, on the other hand, there is more of an emphasis on looks, composure, and output. Essentially, on being perfect.

    This may sound misogynistic, backward, and antiquated, but unfortunately, these expectations still affect our society, though they are slowly changing. And the result is not very positive for men or women.

    Women often burn the candle at both ends, affecting their stress levels and happiness, while men try to be tough and unbridled, which often leads in behaviors that are severely damaging to physical and mental health. In fact, toxic masculinity is often linked to why men have a shorter life expectancy than women.

    Looking at these two women this morning, I felt a twinge of envy. I wish I was more of a morning person. I wish I took my fitness so seriously. I wish I was more productive. But I suspected I was zeroing in on the perceived positive side effects of the expectations of women.

    Perhaps these girls were extremely tired from the night before and trying to please everyone and do it all and look beautiful and never complain. Or, perhaps, they did not go out and genuinely are morning people. Perhaps this is simply their way of practicing self-care. Why must I try to define them?

    Nevertheless, I did feel envious. I am still unlearning habits formed at an early age.

    In high school, when I was closeted and trying to fit in, I found one of the easiest ways to do so was to drink. Even more, I would be rewarded for drinking heavily. It was a demonstration of my masculinity. Even worse, the escapism that this provided me from the haunting mental occupation with my sexuality made alcohol even more seductive and compounded the drinking. The habit was forming, the instructions clear. I should drink a lot. The benefits are endless.

    What they don’t talk about is the anxiety and laziness that is birthed from a lifestyle of partying to prove something. Most of my twenties, I would waste my weekends and leisure time imbibing like it was the night before the apocalypse, then feeling sad the next few days. I was stuck in this cycle.

    It took getting cancer to become more reflective on these feelings of depression, due in large part to drinking, to cut alcohol out of my life. And the difference is major. My productivity has skyrocketed. (Though, I still decidedly am not a morning person).

    Seeing these thin, legging-clad women bright and early brought me back to my twenties. Reminded me of this toxicity that I am unlearning. Reminded me that I have made changes, and that it is okay not to live up to the standards someone else put on me. But this morning also reminded me that women have it no easier in terms of what society asks of them. The grass is always greener.

    We all need to come to the middle and find some balance. These expectations on everyone are too much. We all need to define what is meaningful for ourselves—this should not be up to society.

    Who knew Lululemon could trigger me so much?