It's funny, I forgot how much I actually did use this blog. When I think of it now, I often think of a place that I had "a few" posts. I forget just how much I captured here.
A lot has changed since I wrote regularly, and I am a very different person. Looking back at titles of older posts, never mind the content, has that incredibly awkward feeling of reading an old diary and cringing at one's former self. And yet, I have so much love for the past versions of me that exist both in my physical diaries and in this blog.
I have been thinking a lot lately about social media, interpersonal dynamics, and self-expression. I have made some decisions and set some goals, but those will be more covered in part two of this reset (to come on an incredibly predictable date) in which I will look forward.
First, though, we need to look back. This year has marked a big one in my life, despite having few actual specific events I can speak to. In many ways, this was still a COVID year (that's a fun thing that this blog has not talked about at all - and I plan to continue that strategy). We ventured out of the house a bit more (and sometimes headed back into the house) as we balanced safety, anxiety, and habit. I ended the year in the same job I started it in (happily so), in the same house, and the same relationship.
And yet, I feel like I ended it a very different me.
There's the external changes. I embraced my non-binary identity and moved to asking people to only use they/them pronouns for me. Here is what I wrote on the long form social media site at the time:
So... I've started to change all my things to just they/them instead of she/they.My current understanding of my own gender is a 10 minute lecture but the tl;dr version is 'not a woman even if I look like one'.I do not experience dysphoria when I hear myself referred to as 'she/her', but I absolutely experience euphoria when I hear 'they/them'. And I've decided I am allowed to ask for the thing that brings me joy, not just accept the thing that doesn't hurt me.So... If you all want to do me a solid, you can start using they/them for me. You're going to mess it up and that's okay. But I'm also a great person to practice this for since I don't have dysphoria so you won't harm me when you do mess up. However, if I catch you doing it right and using they/them you'll make my day.Thanks all!
Interestingly, once made this change I found that I did start to experience more discomfort with 'she/her' and with being called a 'girl' or 'woman'. I tend not to correct loved ones too often, because I know they are making an error out of habit and love and it's awkward and all those excuses, but I will need to start as it feels weirder every time.
Making this change (and a related conversation with my incredibly supportive co-worker/manager) gave me a boost of bravery to do something else I had been playing with. I chopped my hair off again, despite my weird anxieties about the place where fatness and visible queerness meet, and felt like I uncovered a layer of myself I had been hiding away. I found new ways to express my true self in my look, and have fallen in love with the real me.
Those changes are significant, but they are only one layer. 2022 has been my first full year as a conduct and conflict resolution person. I spent the year learning about restorative justice, and had my entire worldview shift with it. I found healing from some of my deepest fears about myself: I can no longer believe that I am a bad person who has people fooled when I have embraced a belief that there are no good or bad people (but a lot of deeply harmed people). I came to see the rotten roots of a lot of ideals that I hold, such as perfectionism and fear of open conflict, and began the hard work of detangling them from my brain (sometimes more successfully than others, see my hesitance to correct people on pronouns for example). I saw the value of giving others (and myself) grace, and of starting from curiosity rather than judgement, and of resisting the urge to assume another person's intentions. I discovered a whole new spectrum of shades of grey (the values kind, not the bedroom kind). I began to unpack both the ways I was taught to hate and not listen to my body, from food to movement to emotional needs, and the anger that I feel about that harm. I can feel the shakings of more change to come, and I know that this growth is nowhere near done.
Excitingly, I also began to plan. I have never had a five-year plan. I've never felt able to plan, I was too busy trying to survive. But I know where I want to be in 5 years, I have a path to get there, and I am so excited for future me. Which brings me back to the lead in to reset part two... to come soon...
