At the start of every yoga class we’re urged to set an intention for the practice. The intention is set as something to grasp onto when the practice gets tough. When your muscles are aching and sweat is dripping down your forehead you can come back to your intention for strength and motivation.
Recently I made my second trip to an advanced yoga practice. The first one had been a miserable experience. Overwhelmed and unable to follow along with the instructor I spent most of the class lying on my mat. It had taken a few months before I braved the advanced class again, yet the memory of my failure was still in my mind.
I knew that the class was going to be just as hard, and I would feel overwhelmed, tired and frustrated. So I chose my intention carefully. This practice I was going to focus on one thought:
Be Encouraged By What You Learn
Be encouraged by learning, not by perfection. Even if I try a pose and fail, my muscles become stronger, I learn more about the technique. Even if I’m too tired to stand up, I watch others and learn from them.
Throughout the practice I felt encouraged by my frustrations. I felt encouraged when I couldn’t do a pose. I felt encouraged when my muscles ached and my body quivered. I felt encouraged by what I was learning in every moment.
Crossdress and Be Encouraged
Sometimes crossdressing is like the most difficult yoga practice. You’re frustrated because you can’t seem to get your makeup right. Your clothes don’t fit properly, you struggle to walk in heels and you ladder your stockings. Every step you take as a crossdresser seems manly, clumsy and awkward. You may even have people laugh at you, or stare with intense interest. Your feet might be hurting, sweat ruining your makeup and the teller calls you, ‘sir’.
Despite being excited at the prospect of a wonderful day spent en femme you end your day in despair. Cursing your transgendered misfortune.
But Be Encouraged By What You Learn
It’s easy to get caught in the perfection trap. Always striving for perfect, yet never achieving it. Each failure chipping away at your pride until you barely feel like wearing anything at all. Don’t let your own judgments stop you from crossdressing.
Wear those clothes, do your makeup, put on that wig. Do your feminine best, and be encouraged by what you learn. Even if all you learn is how ill suited that red sweater is for your figure, have fun being awfully gorgeous.
We’re all just practicing our femininity, some of us have been at it a while longer, that’s all.
More Articles by Vanessa Law
- 7 Essential Tips to Crossdressing
- Win a Free Makeup Prize Bundle from Jecca Blac
- A Few Changes in Our Family
- I Want to Live Like That
- Hope in Despair, Light through the Darkness
My journey began 58 years ago at age 2 weeks. I actually did not fully realize I was male until I was 6 1/2yrs old. Seeing as how I lived as a girl pretty much full time. Being a boy was a game to me. It was so out there for a child in 1959 and the early 60’s to be transgenderd. But I was and did nt even know it. Life has been up and down many times. Today as I write this life is on the ups. Always getting better. My wife supports me in all I do.… Read more »
It hasbeen wonderfully uplifting
Reading your
This is a lovely encouraging article. .I have been feeling alone, guilty, embarrassed, ashamed, a freak. .just because I am a feminine male who likes to feel and dress feminine. .thank you.
Jennifer x
Having experienced at least a few of the disappointing feelings of cloths not fitting properly or the correct wearing technique. I’m encouraged by this article and feel a little less anxious about the fem cloths I love to wear around in my apartment and hidden under my shorts and jeans as I go about my daily activities as a man. TY
It was very interesting thanks
Hi ladies My name is Eve , I am new to this site and I love it already from what I have read so far.All I can say to my sisters is that to be your self and keep practicing who you really are inside, you will get it right doesn’t have to be perfect Eve
Thanks Vanessa, I totally agree. I think Brad Pitt put it best in Inglorious Bastards: ”You know how to get to Carnegie Hall, don’t you? Practice!”
I have been practicing for yrs. I just gotta keep on going. Hopefully one day I will be able to become more feminine and act more like a woman and dress and be able to use makeup to look pretty like other women. That would be my biggest struggle. Makeup.
This helps with my anxiety of going out for the 1st time. I will keep rethinking these points when I am in public. These days it does seem to be welcoming to us CDs than in the past. Well maybe not here in Alberta 😉
thanks