Content warning softness and masculinity (long) (cw'd bc it feels vulnerable!)
One of the things I like the most about masculinity:
it feels like permission to be soft, if not a mandate for softness.
When I was trying to be a woman it felt like I always had to be hard. I had to be vigilant against sexist bullshit. I was aware of the ways I was seen, and I was aware of how my femininity was used to minimize my strength, my intelligence, my agency. I knew the lines people would draw based on my behavior, and i knew the history of sexism that influenced those lines, and I knew that the best way to combat it was to be hard.
I couldn't even enjoy shit like playing healers in Overwatch, even though nobody knew I was (supposedly) a girl, because I knew that some of the people I played with thought that was my place because of my gender. That mine was not to fight or lead or explore, but to sit back and support men in their endeavors.
I liked caring for people; I hated the way that caring was linked to my gender, and then amplified to my whole personality, when i am so, so, so much more than that.
Now that I'm embracing masculinity, I get such easy joy in softness. Being gentle and making space feels like a revolutionary act. Soft, gentle masculinity feels kind and loving and right. I get joy from all these things that gave me complication before. I delight in revolutionary kindness, instead of buckling under revolutionary hardness.
When I asked myself, "what kind of woman do I want to be," the answer was always somewhere in the vicinity of "strong."
When I ask myself "what kind of person do I want to be," the answer is murky, empty, unclear.
When I ask myself, "what kind of man do I want to be?" the answer is so easy and simple and strong. A kind one. A gentle one. One who makes people feel safe. One who cares for the people around me.
Feels like the framework of my ideals is actually pushing me towards a person I truly want to be, instead of a complicated balancing act.
and I know it's a mental thing, all of it--few people look at me and see not-a-woman, and I'm sure that nobody looks at me and sees anything approximating "man." The way I'm being perceived by others isn't actually changing. But the way I see myself, the lines I draw for myself...they're at much more comfortable angles now.
