Trusting You, Trusting Me; an interesting story

Over the years I have felt as though I could only expose Char to people with whom I felt safe and trusted. If I felt unsure or afraid I would simply slink back into the shadows and remain unseen and unheard.

Moving to small town in Canada twenty years ago was a huge decision for me simply because the area I was moving to, now my home, was filled with “good ol' boys”. That’s not intended in any way to be negative. It’s just that the majority of folks around here are farmers, welders, ranchers and so on.

Many with hands big enough to easily crush a skull. Women who are used to throwing 80 to 100-pound hay bales around. Not many slightly built, prissy and feminine men around and in fact, not many gentle and delicate women either. All in all, these folks are a hearty stock of physically intimidating people who are built tough to survive the hard living of farming and heavy equipment operating.

I am not that. I was once told years ago that on Oprah’s swish-o-meter, I was an eleven!

So, what’s this got to do trust? Well, when I first landed in this small town I looked around and saw the people. I saw what I described above and began forming a story in my mind. The story basically said: if I expose delicate Char to these rough and tumble hard working folks, Char may become an endangered species rather quickly.

I imagined burning crosses in my front yard, things being thrown through the bay window and nasty stuff being spray painted on the outside walls of the house I was sleeping in.

In fact, I created some incredible stories that quite literally scared the bejeebers out of me to the degree that I kept the black out curtains closed, the door locked 24/7 when I was home, and I would sit silently in my room waiting until who ever was knocking at the door had left.

Fast forward a few years and a knock on my door; this time, dressed authentically I acted before I could change my mind and in one smooth action, I swung the door open. There stood one of the local good-ole' boys. He asked me, on behalf of the locals, if I would be interested and willing to run for Mayor of our small town. What??? Me? Are you kidding me?

The long and short of it is he was serious, I said yes, served and eventually stepped down, but in this process, I learned something profoundly beautiful and freeing for me.

I learned that the story I had told myself was simply one I had made up about the locals, and it was a total lie; no truth to it at all! The feel was real but the why, was a lie!

The fear, though it felt very real to me, was something I had created by myself, by telling the story that I was in danger if I was authentic and exposed as the local cross-dresser/trans. Basically, I thought and talked myself into being scared to death to step out my own door dressed nicely.

It has taken me several years to untangle my mind in that regard. Now I am free to be me because I have changed my mind. The trust was not that “they” might do something mean, that was the story I had made up, but rather that “I didn’t trust myself” to be able to take care of little prissy Char should anything nasty actually happen.

Just for the record, nothing bad ever has happened with these folks. I have come to understand that we, at times, make up a story in our mind based on other stories we have heard and maybe mixed it in with some facts to instill fear in the self. Due to not trusting my adult self to handle a situation well, I created a story so terrifying, and appearing to be about “them” that I actually created years of my own suffering and anxiety.

What is a story you are telling yourself? Is it one that empowers and supports you in your expansion to becoming or is it a story that isolates you and causes you to hide behind black out curtains and locked doors? Push the reset button this week and change your mind by telling yourself empowering, uplifting and supportive stories.

Thank you so much for reading.

Namaste’

Char