Nonbinary, Polyamorous, Pansexual 🏳️‍🌈

Oh boy. Here we go again. Wait — too gendered — let me run that back. Oh humans. Here we go again, haha.

You folks seemed to really resonate with my last share like this - which I actually was not anticipating - but I’m happy that it seems like maybe sharing my experience helps you understand yourself better, or helps you to understand some people in your life that you love. I received multiple private messages in addition to the public comments on the post. It means a lot, because I never had a role model like me growing up, and that’s why I do what I do.

So I want to preface this with the disclaimer that I am NOT an expert on any of these topics by any means. While my Yoga and Ayurveda training does include a lot of psychology, physiology, and neuroscience, I am not a licensed therapist or a mental health professional. I AM a professional holistic lifestyle and wellness educator, and I want to share a bit more with you about my personal life experiences.

I’m also a HUGE NERD who has spent countless hours consuming podcasts, audiobooks, and scholarly YouTube videos that explore human sexuality, psychology of relationships, and gender. You could say it’s been one of my hyper-fixations for several years now.

Why do I take such an extracurricular interest? My best guess is probably because I’ve always found romantic and sexual relationships (and my own disposition towards them) to be super confusing! After all, my Venus and Mars signs are BOTH in Gemini, the mutable air sign known to be endlessly curious, lighthearted, and fickle. Yes - I choose to blame astrology for my “commitment phobia” when it comes to gender, relationship styles, and sexuality.

I can hear you asking yourself, “What on earth is Paisley even talking about right now?” Let’s break it down.

What’s the difference between gender and sex?

Okay okay, so for those of you who DO know what on earth Paisley is talking about right now, skip ahead.

For everyone else - this is 101. Maybe you’ve already gotten this lecture from your job’s mandatory sensitivity training or your children’s school. Evidently “gender” is the craze sweeping the nation these days. Is a gender a noun or a verb? Is it a thing that we are, a thing that we do, or both? Is gender a mythical creature? A cool video game? It has become all the rage!

Seriously though, word on the street is that a person’s SEX describes their biology and physical body. Meanwhile, gender describes whether a person feels predominantly masculine (masc) or feminine (femme). In her book The End of Gender, Dr. Debra Soh debunks the common misconception that a person’s gender is rooted in their mind and is not connected with their biology. Soh, a sexologist and neuroscientist, argues that from a purely scientific perspective, biology is inherently connected to both a person’s gender expression and sexual orientation. This does NOT mean that trans people don’t exist!

This misconception has given rise to the now-mainstream idea that “gender is only a social construct,” a performance enforced by the capitalistic patriarchy which benefits from gender roles and so-called “traditional family values.” If a person thinks that gender has nothing to do with biology, and that the very concept of gender is oppressive, then they may be inclined to identify somewhere outside of or in between the binary poles of masculinity and femininity.

Now, I’m not here to debate whether or not gender itself actually is a social construct. That conversation is above my pay grade. But I do agree with the idea that gender is a spectrum, mostly because of my lived experience. This blog post is literally about the fact that I personally see everything in this whole area of life and the human experience as a spectrum - masc and femme, gay and straight, polyamorous and monogamous. And I pretty much fall right into the middle of the spectrum on all of those. Hence my worldly confusion!

From a Yogic perspective, the entire multiverse is made up of similar “binary structures:” day and night, hot and cold, Shiva and Shakti.

But Yoga means union, and the final stages in the process of Yoga involve becoming ONE with everything in and beyond this material realm.

Consider the Yin/ Yang Symbol. There is darkness within the light, and light within the darkness. Both halves are equal, and both need the other to be completed. So they only appear to be two - to be binary - but really, they are one.

What is non-binary?

Seriously, what is it? Can you guys actually tell me? Because I’m honestly not sure if I’m qualified to speak on this topic. I can feel some of my fellow trans folks still seething over my daringness to assert that perhaps gender and biology actually are connected...

Let me start by clarifying that me sharing my own truth does not invalidate your experience. I cannot and do not claim to speak for the entire LGBTQ+ community on this. The only experience I can accurately share is my own.

So okay, for the purposes of this discussion, let’s say that gender is a binary spectrum, with one pole being masculine and the other being feminine. For me, having a non-binary gender identity means that I feel my gender as right in the center of the two poles. I feel equally masculine and feminine, and if my outward appearance matched my inner energy, then I would appear very androgynous.

However, as androgynous as I feel on the inside, clearly the outside world still sees me as a woman and treats me as such. This incongruence creates gender dysphoria, or mental distress due to the mismatch between my gender identity and the gender that was assigned to me at birth.

While I am non-binary in the sense of having “all the gender,” meaning that most of the time I tend to feel simultaneously very masculine and very feminine…

My best friend is agender, meaning that they feel genderless. They don’t identify with either side necessarily, and they are also non-binary.

There are still other non-binary people who may identify closer to one side of the spectrum than the other, or whose gender identity feels more fluid.

Attempting to list all the possible ways that a person can be non-binary would keep us here awhile. There’s no “wrong” or “right” way, and no end goal to reach here, and each enby has their own unique experience. So if you know any, just ask them if they’re open to sharing theirs. It’s up to them if they do or not - just please don’t push them if they feel uncomfortable. What I would recommend when interacting with enbies, is to remain open-minded and to validate their experience overall even if you can’t personally relate to what they’re saying. You don’t have to perfectly understand in order to be respectful.

Due of the binary nature of gender, there is confusion from both cisgender and transgender people around what “being trans-nonbinary” means. Many non-binary people may appear to align with typical gender expression and choose not to take any medical interventions to alter their appearance. Because these people “look cisgender,” there is an underlying idea that being non-binary is “made up” or “not a real thing.” At least, not “real” in the same way as a binary trans person, who takes hormones and completely alters their outward appearance to align with the typical gender expression of their identification.

I go by they/ them pronouns. I rarely wear makeup or paint my nails, and I have half of my head shaved. 90% of the time you can find me wearing the comfiest pair of sweat pants possible, beaten up doc martens, and a hoodie or tshirt. I also don’t use purses, just a fanny pack and a backpack if needed.

Nothing about my actual gender expression is overly feminine - but my body is. Binding my breasts does not do much to alter their appearance because they are large. Even while wearing all-male clothing, I get misgendered by people referring to me as “she” and “girl.” Both cisgender people and fellow queer people assume my gender and lump me in with women as a whole. Depending on the context, this is frustrating at best, and can cause a great deal of gender dysphoria at worst.

I’ve heard some people express that they feel members of the trans or LGBTQ+ community are “difficult” or “overly sensitive.” Please keep in mind that for someone who suffers from gender dysphoria, there are few options to alleviate their discomfort:

1) Go through the difficult, expensive, and potentially dangerous process of radically and medically altering their body and appearance through hormones and surgery so that the “outside matches the inside.” Even at the end of this (usually long) process, a person may still potentially face hatred, discrimination, and misgendering along with any medical side effects or complications of surgery.

2) Make everyone that they interact with uncomfortable by being “difficult and overly sensitive,” AKA simply insisting that their pronouns are respected and remaining vocal about their needs and feelings, even when those with whom they are attempting to communicate refuse to listen or change anything. To persist with this is extremely emotionally draining, so it doesn’t surprise me that some trans folks may have low tolerance for it or a short fuse here.

Which leads me to option three, which really isn’t an option:

3) Don’t correct people when they use the wrong pronouns or types of words. Suffer in silence because that’s more comfortable for everyone else, and socially more comfortable for the type of person who doesn’t like to draw attention to themselves or make a “big deal” out of things.

However, I say this really isn’t an option because it basically requires the trans person to stay closeted rather than actually addressing their gender dysphoria. The DSM-5 classifies gender dysphoria as a real mental health condition. Any mental health issue left untreated will typically NOT resolve on its own, may actually worsen, and can potentially lead to additional mental health problems and even death.

So if you know someone who identifies as transgender or nonbinary, please be kind and just respect their pronouns. It takes nothing away from you to do so, is free, and harms no one - it just requires a little more effort to change habits and be mindful. But for the trans person, this small effort can go a long way!

Not gonna lie, this blog post is mainly meant to explain about being non-binary. Those other two things are whole other topics deserving of their own posts, honestly. The three words just sounded good together as a title and worked with my self-deprecating humor about being commitment-phobic. I was also thinking of getting a tattoo with these three words or something like that to celebrate myself!

Anyway, please let me know if you would be interested in reading separate blog posts about pansexuality (attraction to people that is based on their personality and qualities, not only based on body parts or gender expression) or polyamory (ethically maintaining multiple romantic relationships at once).

Otherwise, that’s all I’ve got for now.

Thank you, dear one, for reading my reflection. If any of this has resonated with you, given you some insight, or if you identify as queer, trans, or non-binary yourself, I would love to hear from you in the comments below.

Until next time.

ॐ
With all my love,
Paisley Parvati Devi