Archive for October, 2015

Why we should all be gender-aware

Being aware of gender-related issues is part of the solution, not part of the problem

I happened to be questioned a lot about my “feminism” lately. I put “feminism” between commas because it’s a term that is no longer historically relevant. It is like saying I’m an “anti-colonialist” when colonialism is no longer in place. It made sense to call oneself a feminist when women were completely oppressed, and this is no longer the case.

Feminism has brought amazing progresses around the world. For example the right for women to vote, the right to divorce, to have an abortion, to decide whether they want to have children or not, the right not to be considered a property of their husband and all sort of positive things for the life of women.

Feminism is, however, an historically old term.

But does it mean that with once feminism has done its part and it’s buried in history all gender-related issues have disappeared? This is the big problems of the 21st century: some people think that society is now perfectly equal and there’s no need to talk about gender-related issues.

What issues am I even talking about? Women can do anything they want, right? They can choose whether to get married or not, to have children or not, to study engineering or language (that’s me…)

That’s true. The possibilities are laid in front of us. But there are things that haven’t changed yet, and the biggest one is our mentality. Our mentality hasn’t evolved yet, and it’s showed in how we raise our children, how we condition our children to behave in a gender-related way. Even though the biggest inequalities between men and women have disappeared, the effects continue.

Think about it with an example: even if pollution stopped completely today, would earth already be cleaned tomorrow? If war stopped today, does it mean the country is in peace tomorrow? Anything that is done long enough modifies not only the present, but the future as well. As pollution and war will continue to affect in the years to come long after they stopped, so will the centuries and centuries of inequality between men an women. And ultimately it’s not a surprise that some people don’t see this, because they got used to the status quo, they’ve been (we all have been, I should say) brainwashed into not seeing the inequalities any more. We just live in it.

I have to say I’m very grateful for my life, for being born in Europe where inequalities are not as life-disturbing as in other parts of the world. There are parts of the world where women get raped and they get jailed if they report the raper, they get genital mutilations, upset people through acid on their face, there are women who get sold, women who get killed as they are born, because they’re women. I suffer for those women as if this was done to a sister.

On the other hand, inequality in Europe is expressed in more subtle forms, for example in the fact that often women are the only one who do the house-works, even if both men and women have a full time job. It’s expressed in the fact that often children are considered a responsibility of the mother only instead of a couple’s responsibility. It’s expressed in the fact that if I’m 30 and I don’t have a family people will simply think “I told her she was to strong and she would have scared men, she should have been more humble and feminine, now she’ll be alone forever” while if a guy is 30 and unmarried… I mean, who does even need to find a reason for that? It’s considered perfectly fine.

These limitations are not important, and at the end of the day we can very well ignore what society thinks we should or we shouldn’t be. What scares me is the limitations that we women have inside our hearts as a consequence of centuries of inequality. I’m talking about:

  • we have a sense of guilt the size of a continent, for anything.
  • for example, we have a huge sense of guilt any time we do something for ourselves instead of something for others. Is it because biologically we’re programmed to give, in a wider sense, with maternity? Probably, but this affects our life when we sacrifice our time, our health and ultimately our identity for someone else.
  • we don’t perceive our identity as defined as men. When we get into a couple our identity starts melting with the other. Did you notice that often women start talking in plural after they get a partner? “We like this, we like that..” But what about your identity as a single person? It gets lost in the couple.
  • we don’t know what we want as much as men do, because for centuries we’ve been taught not to ask ourselves what we want. I know, I know: now we can choose anything we want so why should we blame the past? But again, we’re like a country after a war that lasted years. We are still rebuilding after years of destruction.
  • we teach our daughters to be humble and not to have too much aspiration, because men might feel intimidated by strong women.

These are just the first examples that come to my mind when it comes to psychological effects of years of inequality. I want to think that I struggle because I’m 30, and the years of inequality are just one or two generations behind me. Hopefully for next generations will be easier and easier.

Many men will say that things are not this way anymore, that everything is fine now. My answer is this:

That many men do not actively think about gender, or notice gender, is part of the problem of gender.

Being aware of gender-related issues is part of the solution, not part of the problem

Below I collected some of the most amazing TED talks about feminism and gender-related issues.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do men and women really communicate so differently?

Tell a woman your problems and she’ll empathise with you. Tell a men your problems and he’ll try and fix them.

Every person is different. Or so they say. But when it comes to communication, almost all men communicate in the same way, and almost women communicate in the same way which is, you guessed it, very different from men.

One of the things that strike me the most, and continues to surprise me even if I’m 30 and I talked with a lot of men in my life, is how they react when you share a problem with them, or simply how you feel.

When you share something bad you’re going through with a men, he’s immediately thinking of possible solutions, better ways to deal with it or ways to improve the situation. And it’s fine, it’s amazing that they are so practical and they want to help you. However, women brain works in a different way. Most of the times, if a woman shares a problem with someone it’s really just to get it out of her chest. It’s a way to analyse the problem by laying her cards on the table. It’s a way to open up and ask for empathy. Sometimes she already knows the solution, she just need the right space to confirm what she feels.

I haven’t read the book “Men are from Mars, women are from Venus”, but someone told me a similar concept is explained in that book as well.

I find that this different communication style is one of the most common reasons why couples argue. I think the better way to deal with it is first of all to acknowledge the difference, and then to take action based on that knowledge. Here’s my suggestion:

Men, when your mum, sister or girlfriend tells you something like “I feel that friend is not behaving nicely with me”, “I’m thinking I should change job”, “I feel down today and I don’t know why” or things like that, pause for a couple of seconds before activating the automatic driver inside you that tells you to find a solution. First of all sit in front of her, look at her and listen. Resist the need to reply immediately, leave a bit of silence and space for her to feel comfortable and share what’s in her heart. Have the courage to bear that silence and stay in that space together.

Try and empathise with her. That’s what most women want. Ask yourself: what’s is she going through? Is she scared to admit that she feels insecure about her decision? Most women feel insecure, all the time, although we’d never admit it. But you know it, so with that knowledge ask her how this problem makes her feel. Listen and hug her. Ask her, very gently, if she would like a suggestion or she prefers to take the time to think about it on her own.

If all this process makes you feel very uncomfortable, tell her. There’s nothing that make two people closer than sharing what makes them uncomfortable, shy or embarrassed. And yes, I know you guys have a hard time sharing your feelings. It’s against your biological instinct. But if hundreds of years ago it made biological sense for men to show themselves as invincible and hide their emotions because they might have been killed by their enemy if they did, let’s all agree that it’s not that time anymore. You can let go. Please, do it. You can open up, you can share what you feel. Not with everyone, bear in mind. But with people who love you, you can. Do it please, and the world will become a better place.

When they say women are complicated it’s not true. We’re complex beings, but it’s quite easy to deal with a woman once you learn the code. Programming is complicated, but it’s doable once you learn the code, right?

Women, this part is for you though. We’re not innocent, we do the same mistake men do: we don’t take the time to learn their code. If you knew that most men are programmed to find solutions to what you share with them, you would probably choose more carefully what you share with them. In a nutshell: if your washing machine is broken, tell them, because they’ll do everything to try and fix it (this is a thanks for you, dad :)

But if you feel down because your period is coming and your hormones are all over the place, please, I beg you: call a girlfriend instead. You’ll get what you need (empathy) from a person who can do it naturally (another woman) and you’ll not ask a huge effort to your sweet half. At least, not more often that he can bear.

On the other hand, if your husband or boyfriend shares a problem with you, he probably wants some help coming up with a solution. They’ll rarely ask, because again, they’re conditioned not to ask for help. But if they do, please don’t do the same mistake: learn their code and reply in their language, or if you’re still learning it, ask them gently what they need from you instead of guessing they just want a hug as you do.

We’re conditioned to think that couples should meet all their needs within the couple itself, but it’s a huge burden to put on it. Include more people in your life, family and friends who can meet different needs of yours, and you’ll not put all the responsibility on your partner.

But, that said, wouldn’t it be heart warming if we could all commit to learn each other’s code? Imagine how much pain we could avoid to each other and to ourselves. Imagine what a wonderful world it would be. I hope we’ll all be able to make this little effort one day, that brings a lot of rewards. Bless us.

Love, Health and Happiness

About Love, Health and Happiness. And many other things that make your life complete.

I’ve always been interested in health. When you start having painful symptoms you normally get interested in health and that’s what happened to me. I had rheumatic fever when I was around 10 years old (yes, can you believe that?) and I had to get painful injections of cortisone every week. I had to take numerous blood tests and to cope with it I started to train myself into believing I actually liked it.

When I was a teenager I suffered from eating disorders. I often had stomach ache, it was actually the normal condition for me, a permanent stomach ache. On top of that, I was incredibly sad, all the time.

I’ve always been introspective. I started to have a journal as soon as I could write decently. I’ve always observed myself and the way I was experiencing my life very sharply. Nothing was “just fun” or “just a mood change”. No no no, everything had a deep meaning, had to be analysed, dissected, categorised. My feelings, my experiences, my relationships, my choices. I was living every day of my young life very intensely, the good and the bad ones. I couldn’t filter, I was just absorbing every experience (with the emotions they caused) as a sponge.

Many people might disqualify the picture saying that it’s normal, that everyone during teenage feel depressed. But it’s not normal when it endangers your life balance. Sometimes I was so depressed that I would just go to sleep in the middle of the day because it was the only thing I could do to alleviate that pain I felt inside. It was both an emotional and physical pain, and the two sides were so interconnected that I couldn’t tell which one caused the other.

I didn’t know what I had, but by the age of 17 I felt that my life was very, very wrong.

I started to look for answers. My dad is passionate about TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) and holistic medicine. So I was lucky enough to have the house full of books about Chinese Medicine, acupuncture, Bach Flowers and so on.

I started to study Bach Flowers, and I liked the idea of using a flower instead of a drug to solve problems. But I was expecting a miracle from these disciplines and the miracle never happened. They didn’t solve my whole situation as I was expecting. I still wasn’t happy, I still wasn’t balanced.

In the meanwhile I was constantly arguing with my parents, to a point where I wasn’t feeling comfortable in my own house anymore.

It was around the age of 19, when I left my parents’ house to move into a “commune” (we were 7 people in a house, some studying some working, some both) that I started my real spiritual journey, a self-discovery path that brought me to understand the deep interconnection between the relationships you have, your mind and your body. I discovered the connection between physical, relational and emotional health. Mainly, I discovered that one is not possible without the others.

As soon as I moved out of my family’s house I realised that I had to take care of myself by myself. And not because my parents stopped loving me, on the contrary. But I simply couldn’t blame them anymore, or the school or the teenage or anything else, for my problems. If you think that the problem is the environment where you live, but you find yourself with the same problem after you move to another environment then you realise that the real issue is not outside, it’s inside you.

But so it the solution.

In that moment I made the conscious decision to start taking care of myself with love, thing that I had never done before. It was thanks to that decision that I started to heal.

I started reading about meditation, and I started practicing meditation 10 minutes every morning. It was the first step in the right direction. I also started to look for healers of every sort. Not doctors, but healers.

A wonderful friend of mine was studying massage, and I she did some shiatzu and craniosacral treatments on me. I also found that another friend of mine was studying kinesiology and neuro-training, and I did some sessions with her as well.

In the meanwhile I received a book from my lovely cousin: “The Artist’s Way: A Course in Discovering and Recovering Your Creative Self“. In the book the author describe an exercise to get in touch with your inner self: when you wake up in the morning write 3 pages of stuff. Just write down whatever is in your mind as soon as you wake up. 3 pages, every morning, before you do anything else. It connects you with your inner self, but more importantly it works as a trash folder. You empty your mind of all the “trash”  of the negative talks that we sometimes start our day with. 

I realised that the way I talked to myself was really, really bad. If I had to say those things to a friend of mine they would have never called me back. But I was saying it to myself. And I was wondering why I wasn’t feeling healthy and happy..

I also started to build connections with the people who were living with me, and the deeper the friendships the more rooted and healthy I felt. We humans are healthy when we live in communities. With no real friends, with no real love, there’s no health.

I started singing in a choir. Singing is for me a form of meditation, a spiritual experience that makes me feel connected with my soul. But singing in a choir is even a stronger experience. Hearing my voice crossing other people’s voice and making a harmonious melody made me feel part of something bigger than myself.

So really health didn’t come from one way. It came firstly from the decision to take care of myself with love, and that decision made me take actions in the right direction. It came from balancing my life on all levels. It came from having good friends. It came from expressing myself creatively. It came from nurturing my soul.

As the video above describes, health is not related to the body. At least, not only. Your body is really just the expression of your life. And life health is measured by how good your relationships are, how stable you feel, how well can you adapt to change, whether you express yourself creatively or not, whether you got in touch with your inner voice, whether you take action to modify what’s not working, and whether or not you talk to yourself with love.

So really health, love and happiness are so intimately interconnected that the more you start having of one of them, the more you start getting of all of them. For a strange magic it’s enough to start from one little step, and the other will follow. Start by deciding to take care of yourself with love. Start by taking that decision. And then take it again, and again and again. If you forget for a day, a month, a year or even several years, as soon as you realised you didn’t take care of yourself with love take that decision one more time. And with love for yourself, the health and all the things you need to get your life balanced and healthy will follow.

 

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