turning forward

A Story, A Twist, and Some Thoughts

2006-10-04T06:53:00.000-06:00

1. The Story

I've got a confession.

I hope this doesn't freak you out, but I have... certain feelings. They've been with me for a long time - my whole life, it seems. I never really felt like I could talk openly about it because it makes so many people uncomfortable, or they just don't seem to understand (it's kind of a controversial issue). Lately, though, I've been coming to terms with it and I can talk about it more easily. So here goes:

I'm __________.

There, I said it.

Sometimes I feel so ashamed of these feelings. (Or maybe I should call them 'impulses', I don't know.) But other times it feels so natural to have them - like they're an integral part of me, not something I can simply choose or un-choose.

I'm not sure what to do.

Many people say that it's good that I've acknowledged this, and that I'm finally coming to accept myself. In fact, some warn me that these feelings will never go away, and insist that my best and only course of action is to declare publicly that I have these feelings, and that I should even be proud of them, give them full expression and build a life around them.

There are other people out there who say that it's actually unhealthy or wrong to act on these feelings, and that I should deny them, fight them, ignore them - in short, try to overcome them somehow. Some even admit that they themselves used to feel this way, too, but that they've somehow found a way to minimize if not completely eliminate them.

All these mixed messages, even from well-meaning people, leave me feeling confused.

On the one hand, I can't even remember the first time I felt these feelings. They've been with me for so long, it sometimes seems like this isn't simply something I feel, it's who I am, as if it were a fundamental part of my character. I've identified so long with these feelings, I'm not always sure where they end and where I begin. And I'm told that if society has a problem with me because of this - well, that just reflects society's bigoted nature, not any weakness on my part.

On the other hand, feeling ________ has only ever caused me sadness. Oh sure, there were times when I finally decided "OK, this is who you are - go that way," so I tried associating with other people who had these feelings, too. But you know what? After a while I realized that I didn't fit in there, either. I had so little in common with them. In society at large it's often not socially acceptable to be this way, yet even here among like-minded people - where I was told I'd find my place in life - I was often rejected, an outcast among outcasts. And whenever I acted on these feelings, I felt bad, like it was all a huge mistake. I mean, there might have been a temporary pleasure or euphoria involved, but that always quickly dissipated, and was replaced with guilt and/or regret. I ended up hurting myself or others. There was some comfort in knowing I wasn't alone, that others struggled as I did. But what I experienced by joining this crowd and acting on these ________ feelings was not what I was led to believe it would be. Virtually nothing about it felt right to me.

People often say,"To thine own self be true" - but to which part of myself should I be true when I experience conflicting desires?

Sometimes I just try not to think about this whole issue. In fact, I get so busy with work and stuff that I hardly have time to think about anything. Interestingly, I've noticed that these ________ feelings seem to fade into the background as I focus on other things. This gives me some hope that maybe it's possible to live happily without being ________. On the other hand, sometimes when I least expect it a thought or a feeling will pop into my head or heart or body and I'll immediately be back in that crazy mix of sensations and memories and desires and frustrations.

At this point I'm trying to define many things about myself, like who I really am and what I really want out of life. I try to balance that with reasonable expectations (reality checks?) from my family, from society and from my own, deeply-held personal faith. Not that I'm simply trying to please others by the way I live - I do want to be an authentic and healthy person (true to my self). But I also want to be good, honorable, Christ-like, a righteous son of God, a contributing member of society, a true friend, maybe even someday an example for others to look up to.

Are these incompatible?

------------------------------------------------

(Thanks for listening. My story is over.)

2. The Twist

OK, the obvious way to fill in the blanks in my little coming-out narrative is to use some form of the terms gay or Same-Sex-Attraction.

But of course I've crafted it partly for predictability. :-)

We've become so accustomed to thinking about and talking about these issues in the politically correct manner that even without using the clichéd terms (gay, coming out, homophobia) it would be hard to miss the implication. However, I also forewarned of the coming twist, so you might have entertained other possibilities.

Here's the word I actually had in mind: violent.

Yes, I was thinking of violence - something that, like sexuality, has roots in thoughts, feelings and impulses and finds expression with both inner desires and outward behavior - and it's an increasingly serious issue in our society. Now go back and try reading the story again, this time filling in the blanks with the word I intended.

How does this change your interpretation of the story? In what ways does it affect your feelings about these issues? What does it suggest about the ways we think about and approach biology, genetics, self-expression and human behavior?

3. Some Thoughts

Disclaimers: first off, I'm not trying to equate violence with sexual orientation. That misses the point entirely. And yes, I know it oversimplifies complex issues, as most stories do. So don't try this at home, kids - this is for classroom purposes only!

But let's consider a few issues this story raises regarding the complex interrelationships among genetics, biology, emotions, identity, self-expression and behavior:

Should everything we feel - simply because we feel it - be considered something good or desirable or healthy? If not (and obviously not, since that is part of the point of this little exercise), then where and how do we draw the line?
Is "socially acceptable" ever a legitimate basis for fashioning rules/laws/cultural norms regarding behavior? If so, when and why?
What if it turns out we really were born that way - does it necessarily mean we should live that way? Does it imply that society should therefore deem these feelings/desires/behaviors normal and natural and acceptable? For most people, such an idea is easier to affirm when applied to sexuality, thanks to several decades of lobbying by gay activists, etc. - but what about with an issue such as violence? Increasingly, research shows (...a favorite phrase, by the way, of those who compile studies in support of an unproven idea) a connection between biological inheritance and violent behavior. There's even talk out there of a violence gene that is more prevalent in certain slices of the population (read: prison inmates). But even if further research were to prove a genetic link - how is it that we so easily jump to the conclusion that we're all mere puppets of our DNA? The devil didn't make me do it (what a silly, Medieval notion). I'm a sophisticated 21st-century man - my genes are actually to blame!
Will the ongoing Nature/Nurture debate ever provide us with a definitive answer? What if it does, what then? Even if it never supplies an easy answer, might the argument over causality itself possibly distract us from answers which are more relevant, 'truthful' or practical?

Turns out the born-that-way argument doesn't make a very good long-term companion after all, and even some out-and-proud gay activists have begun distancing themsevles from the notion. The older approach is slowly being supplanted by a newer one which insists that we should have unlimited personal expression of (choice in?) sexuality not because of biology or genetics, but regardless of it. This is an interesting idea, but it merits its own discussion in a later essay.

For now the simple but thorny question remains, to be or not to be.

envy and attraction

2006-09-21T21:14:00.000-06:00

There are times when I catch myself looking twice at a guy, and if I think about it I seem to feel an inward curiosity or attraction or something. Sometimes my reaction is to beat myself up over it, but there have also been times when I've decided instead to try investigating what underlies that initial impulse of interest. So I do a little retrospective introspection.

And usually what I discover is envy.

I ask myself what it was about the person that I noticed, and I often answer myself back that he seemed attractive, in shape, confident or popular. Or he might have appeared well-adjusted, well-dressed, successful, wealthy, or perhaps even smart, likable, humble or spiritual - anything from the most superficial exterior descriptions to the deepest, most admirable character traits.

I seem to make these snap judgments about strangers from glimpses that usually last no more than milliseconds. I could be passing a guy in a car, or walking by him in the mall - it doesn't happen with everybody, but with some guys the merest glance can leave me wondering about them for hours.

It's amazing that I could "know" all this about a total stranger, and in such a short amount of time! Anyway, as I further analyze these feelings - surprise, surprise, I've often found them to reflect unconscious ideas about myself, not about him, that I carry around with me - or maybe not ideas, but feelings. Whether I actually am popular, attractive, spiritual, etc., doesn't really seem to matter, only that I don't feel so.

It's as if I have this identity, composed of assumptions and fears and beliefs about myself, which I'm constantly carrying around, just below the level of consciousness, and which affects the way that I think, feel, act and see others. And because much of that identity consists of some pretty miserable feelings and low self-esteem, I apparently pick up on the presence of my missing-and-oh-so-desired qualities in other people, usually guys.

For the most part this attraction to total strangers from afar lasts only briefly, and I immediately go about my day, contemplating the meaning of it all only after the fact. But there have been times that I decided to break out of my comfort zone, and try a slightly bolder version of my research: I go up to the guy (usually rather self-consciously!) to say hello, or to ask what time it is or how to get to such-and-such a place, using the most innocent reason I can think of in order to engage him in simple conversation. The main object is to try relating to him as a person rather than a distant and idealized object of envy.

I've learned some interesting things from this.

I sometimes discover, for example, that he's a normal, average kind of guy, and after a few brief comments we part and I wonder what the big deal was, anyway. Sometimes I'll notice not-so-desirable things about him: swearing, smoking, making a rude or insensitive or stupid remark, picking his nose, kicking his dog, having bad breath, throwing litter on the ground, etc., etc. (fill in the blank with any negative trait!) This usually completely destroys the aura of "perfection" or desirability that I had built up in my head about him, and I'm suddenly left wondering how I could have created so easily such a tenuous set of imagined/false attributes, along with the consequent feelings of attraction (which die away as quickly as they came). Other times he turns out to be really friendly - perhaps even better looking than from far away - but also down-to-earth, a kind of guy-next-door that could have been a roommate, a relative, someone in my Elder's Quorum or in a class at school, the type of person that I'm more likely to know up close, warts and all, and for whom I'm less likely to feel a distant, idealized attraction. In any case, most often what I take away from such experiences is a mixed combination of all the above observations, some good and some bad.

But regardless of what I've noticed about this person, because of this little exercise my perceptions have changed - of him, and of myself. He becomes more real to me - no longer merely a distant symbol of ideal qualities, but a flesh-and-blood, fellow human being. And what initially felt like attraction - an upward look of longing from my level to his - becomes instead normal human relating, on the same level, with a guy that I'm probably more similar to than I realized.

After thinking it over, I've decided that if there's a lesson to be drawn here, it's this:

learn to defuse the power of unhealthy attraction
by confronting and releasing the envy in your life.

I'm not naïve enough to think that this will "cure my homosexuality." But I do believe that it can save me a lot of grief if I ever find myself falling back into habits of thinking - or feeling, or relating - that are as inaccurate as they are unhealthy.

I'm thinking/hoping that this is one step closer to becoming whole.

Hello.

2006-09-21T12:01:00.000-06:00

Why another LDS-guy-with-SSA blog?

Umm... I dunno. I guess I hope to find the same catharsis from writing that others seem to have found. And help and new insight from others who might care to comment. Perhaps some reality checking, too? Heck, maybe even a good laugh every once in a while. :)

Of course, any dicusssion these days involving sexuality and religion too easily turns into shouting matches, where respect (if any existed in the first place) quickly dries up and only anger and prejudice are reinforced. Ideally, I'd like this to be a supportive environment, one characterized by openness, respect, compassion and sincerity as well as a strong desire to learn and grow and improve, for me and also for anyone who visits (which probably won't be anyone, but oh well! - at least I'll have a place to vent!).

Overall, I suppose I'm hoping for a place where I can explore and share my own spiritual leanings right alongside all the complicated feelings I have. It's not going to be easy, since I'm naturally a private person, but maybe the relative anonymity of a blog like this will help.

For most of my life, I never felt very valuable. I carrried around (and still carry, to a lesser extent) a really low opinion of my own self-worth. Not consciously, mind you. Outwardly, I was doing ok. It's only in retrospect that I have learned how far back, and how far down, this deadweight on my soul/personality goes. It didn't all stem from my awareness of attraction to other guys, of course, though that is certainly part of it.

In any case, I've finally begun to have glimpses of my own value that I rarely felt before. Friends and family, counselors, church leaders, the blessings of prayer and feeling and recognizing the Spirit - have all contributed their part in helping me to feel better about myself. I vacillate, of course. Some days are harder than others. But I've seen the light, if only for brief moments, and it's too late to go back. I'm clinging to that memory and that hope as I take each step further into the undiscovered country.

Thus the name of my blog.

Normally I hate trying to choose usernames, handles, online ID's - I can never decide what to put. It's so confining, to be limited to just a few letters or words! But I've also learned that it's easy to be paralyzed by inaction, so I made a choice, and I'm living with it. (Kinda like life, eh?!) This is generally how I feel about what I'm trying to do with my life these days: I'm letting go of some things and seeking out others, and even though I may have short-term relapses (of behavior or self-attitudes) I'm making long-term progess.

I'm turning forward.