So here we are.

I look around and I can firmly say there are very few things that can be found consistent in this world. The ones I have discovered draw me to curiosity and drive me to constant evaluation. The light from a sunrise, for example, must have been the first thing this sphere must have felt, and really the first you and I felt too. The world has never spun in only black and white like the old movies might suggest, we know white light has refracted since the beginning. Colors have radiated from the sun and the rains have celebrated the relationship, the community, from the first day they fell. Rays of color have splashed across the faces of the children and their eyes drink in the spectrum. We too are apart of the community, though we often forget it because it has existed before us. We never seem to appreciate the things we didn't create, perhaps it is because it makes us realize how small we really are.

I believe our lives as children show us our true capacity; unguarded and joyful. You can not really understand me as an author if you don't know my origins. Our origins shape us and we have no control over them as vulnerable children. But often, we find harmony with one another despite our backgrounds and our struggles. The majority of the adults who watched over us never understood us because they never understood themselves. As a child, I would approach the pastor after a sermon and I would stand there amongst them and they towered over me. I reasoned and suggested and they heard my words and said "what a smart boy", but they didn't listen. When the people I respect didn't listen, it left me feeling alone, isolated. I quieted myself for a bit and hid my questions, and kept the answers close to my heart. Some of the adults, though, did see me for my value. They encouraged me and loved me, and my hope grew. My friends never understood why I danced and sang in that place, maybe I didn't either, but I felt safe and I wasn't hurting anyone. Singing and dancing had become my greatest vulnerabilities, showered by the embarrassing words of the others. I don't think I ever really understood them and the hatred they carried, the others. Purpose danced around them, but few joined.

Growing up, it was the artists that loved me. I wanted to be like them, to be with them, but I was different and it has taken me over two decades to understand why. I found myself surrounded by the others, the ones that were not artists, and it threw me around as if I were in a crashing wave. I have been called "queer", "fag", or "gay" as much as i've been called Jimmie, so you learn early on to become impervious to the people who hate what they don't understand. I loved them regardless, or at least I always tried to, if you can't forgive the others you will always be one of them. As I noted above, embarrassment is what causes us to break away from who we are and our innocent potential. The first day a child is embarrassed is the first real day the child understands hurt and pain. Embarrassment is a personal shame felt from failing a perceived social standard; as I described, mine was dancing. The kids laughed as I moved my backside left to right and right to left on the rhythm of the music that played in that chevy bronco. It was the first time I had heard rock and roll and it moved something inside of me that I didn't recognize. I should have smiled but instead I hid from the attention and fled it. It wasn't until six months into my twenty first year that I really began to see the flaws in my own logic, but when I did the light refracted in that mirror like I had never seen before. Revelation overwhelmed me. I hope, in this moment, you ask me what I found. This is the first key to discovering what you are missing in yourself, what the artists have known all along, is understanding this:


I allowed their judgements to destroy my joy. I expressed myself and they didn't understand. That day, I joined them and judged myself. My soul hid from the first scar I gave myself that day. I stood alone, in need, as I stepped away from myself.

Step One: Find the earliest moment that embarrasses you. Let your mind think back and try and see it for what it is. Detach yourself from them, who are they anyway? In isolation, only you can judge your own behavior. When you have no one to compare yourself to, you are the only one who can determine the social standard. Be proud of who you are.