Happy Friday! It’s Daniel here, checkin’ in for my weekly one-sided therapy session that I invite you to sit in on. Thanks in advance for listening ;)
In case you haven’t noticed it’s been Pride month around the world, and as we near the end of the time of year where every company changes their logo to rainbow colours, it’s probably time to let you know… and this will probably come as a shock… but my husband Steve and I are gay (*gasp*!)
For me, LGBTQ Pride has always been tricky for me to navigate. While this might be a controversial statement, I’m not proud to be gay… I’m proud to be me…and I just happen to be gay. There’s never been a part of me that has felt like my sexuality was, or should be, my qualifier or identity.
Additionally, being yourself and respecting other people being themselves has become shockingly political and with all the extremes from every angle I think it’s started to take away from the real intention, which is to be proud of who you are.
So today I’d like to put a fresh spin on Pride. I want to share some of my journey in finding out who I am, and then take things outside the confines of sexual or gender identity to make it all about self love and how we can strive for a positive sense of pride in our daily lives.
Sound good? Get ready for a gay ol’ time.
rain before the rainbow
While I don’t recall the exact moment I knew I was “different”, I do recall in 1996 when Backstreet Boys came out with their music video for Quit Playing Games with My Heart. I knew something was up when I realized I was watching it on repeat more for the visuals than the music, if you catch my drift.
I used to get teased pretty badly as a kid. I got called “girly man” and “f@g” pretty consistently from elementary school through high school. It was terrible at the time and, yes, the things they said were mean, but in hindsight those @$$holes weren’t wrong! But at the time I didn’t know for sure I was gay a) because I didn’t really know what it meant and b) denial is a powerful force.
In high school, like many kids who feel different, I defaulted to distracting people with humour. If kids were going to laugh at me, it was going to be because I wanted them to. I ended up the lead in the school plays (a gay theatre kid!? surprise!), was voted the president of student council, and was eventually voted valedictorian of my graduating class. Sadly, even while these accomplishments were happening in real time, I still didn’t love myself.
For so many years I just assumed people didn’t like me, when really I didn’t like myself. Why? Because I wasn’t being my true self, nor was I being honest with myself. Deep down I felt like the biggest loser on campus, and yet in retrospect I was probably one of the most popular guys in my school – popular in the sense that most people knew who I was – but that didn’t matter because I didn’t.
Luckily these days, my insecurities have nothing to do with being gay. I’ve moved on to bigger and better things like body image issues and imposter syndrome, ha!
Seriously though, here’s the wisdom I gained from all that drama:
Don’t be delusional enough to ignore the fact that you’re amazing just the way you are. There is always room for improvement in life, but who you are is who you are. Own it every step of the way and release the burden of other people’s opinions. Learning to be yourself and love yourself in the face of adversity is the biggest flex on the planet. It’s also the source of true freedom.
closet wars
After confusing best friend energy for “romantic” feelings, the first person I came out to was my first (and only) girlfriend Julie in Grade 9. Then I told a couple more friends. Most were cool right away, others were in denial (girls with bad ‘gaydar’ who had crushes on me).
I didn’t come out to my family until I was 19. That’s a long f!@#ing time to pretend to be someone you’re not. I was nervous to tell my mom, but since she’s always been a big ball of unconditional love, it was no big deal and I’d been afraid of nothing all along. I then made my mom tell my brothers because I wouldn’t have been able to handle their disappointment if they were upset. Famously my mom’s convo with my little brother Curtis went like this:
Mom:
Curtis…. Danny’s gay.
Curtis:
….so, everybody knows that!
Mom:
What do you mean everyone?
Curtis:
Gimme a name.
This still makes me giggle.
Whether you’re hiding your sexuality, or your deep desire to become a famous trumpet player, the best thing about the proverbial closet experience is coming out of it. So why do we hold back? What secret part of ourselves are we not sharing with the world? Why are we afraid to be 100% aligned in living our truth?
My hypothesis: fear of rejection and fear of persecution. No one wants to feel like they won’t belong or be accepted and no one wants to feel like they won’t be safe in being who they are.
But the tricky part is, we can’t control other people’s conditioning, traumas and dramas, so why should we rely on their approval in order to be ourselves? How we feel about ourselves should never be up to other people.
love yourself
A while back I shared a quote from one of my friends and mentors Christy-Lynn Hicks that applies strongly here: “Be so authentically yourself that you repel anyone who is not for you”.
We do such a disservice to ourselves and the people in our lives when we hold back who we really are. The sooner you live life as your true self, the sooner you can weed out the people in life who are never gonna get it, and the sooner you’ll be embraced by those that do.
Moreover, if we’re constantly hiding pieces of ourselves, we’re cheapening the already short experience we have on this spinning space rock, and robbing ourselves of the chance to live fully.
In today’s battle for tolerance and acceptance, I think it’s important to point out that there’s a real big difference between radical self-love and expecting/forcing the world to adjust itself to accommodate who you are. Of course, everyone deserves to feel safe, seen, and loved – but if you truly love yourself it shouldn’t matter what anyone else believes about you.
I left my hometown at 19 years old, still mostly in the closet. I came back almost 20 years later and showed up with a hunky husband on my arm living in a house that’s steps away from the school where I was bullied. The difference now is, instead of walking by that school with fear in my heart, it’s full of pride. I’m in a happy, healthy relationship and, even though there are some iffy days where I’m too hard on me, I really do love the $#!% out of myself.
So, whether you love a label or prefer simply identifying as you, remember that no one else gets to live your life but you. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to continue down the path of self-discovery to consistently shift into the next biggest, brightest version of yourself – and love all of it.
In a wild, full circle moment, for the first time Vortex will be taking part in the Collingwood Pride parade Saturday July 13th at 5pm and the theme of our float is “Love Yourself” (shocker!). I’ll be singing high-vibe tunes from the back of a pick-up truck, gliding down my hometown’s main street, beaming with pride as we represent our happy lil’ self care studio.
Remember…
Be yourself. Love yourself. And live a life you can be proud of.