113. I Am Boy

Would you mind telling me whose brain I did put in? And you won't be angry. I will not be angry. Abby someone. Abby someone. Abby who? Abby normal. This is the Abby Normal Podcast, here to tell you that you're weird and that's normal. What is weird about you? I don't know if it's weird or not, but like,

I'm a birder. I love birds a lot. Oh, my God. That is weird. I'm glad I found something that qualified them. Totally. Especially at my age. It's weird. Like, that's the other thing where it's like, I'm totally doing this like 60 year old man thing, you know? The birder is my friend Gray Doolin. They're a morning person who enjoys community singing, lives in Minneapolis, works a nine to five job and have coaching and consulting work they do on the side.

I have a master's degree in counseling and did six years of a PhD in counseling psychology. So I'm trained as a therapist and left that doctor program. I just had one thing left to finish and was burnt out. Bro. Bro, you got to finish. You're going to be Dr. Doolin. Help me. I mean, I have the education. I don't need the credentials to feel like the baller that I am. Music. And I met in an online book club talking about Sarah Bessie's Field Notes for

the Wilderness, a book meant to guide those who have left the faith they were raised in and are navigating an in-between space. Gray's counseling skills showed up in the club because they were a good listener who carefully acknowledged what other people shared and easily pivoted toward sharing their own wisdom and ideas.

Long story short, with this limited information, I liked them, and I wondered if they had any insights about the body stuff that I've been pondering that maybe we could learn from. Identify as a queer person and a transmasculine person. Yeah, as a person in trauma recovery and also like a seeker. Music. Now, when we finished that book, we decided to continue with Understory by Laurie

Ferguson Wilbert. It's Wilbert's story of disorientation after religious and political unrest in the evangelical church. And she looks to the forest to learn how to live and thrive when everything seems to be falling apart. It is gorgeous. Yeah, it feels so poetic to me. Yeah, she's really hooked me in, you know. And I think she's got a good mix of, like, describing beautiful nature things and then tie it in with, like, real life.

Yeah, it feels like a real masterpiece, the way that she brings the natural world. And the way she weaves these things together to bring us home at the end of each chapter, I'm just like, oh, yes, Lori, you know. Yes. Music. In our book, Understory, Wilbur says, Poet W.H. Auden once wrote, A culture is no better than its woods. And if we are like the woods of a homogenous pine plantation, our culture is doomed to fail. We simply cannot grow strong and tall and resilient only among our own.

We need diversity, not just for diversity's sake, but because we are, like the trees of the forest, mutualists. Our book club has so much diversity. Age, generation, country, religious background, family status. And so we are, as Wilbert says, mutualists. Except me. I am a selfish tree who is so bad at book clubs. I'm either not prepared or don't come or don't even contribute. But I remain. And it's because I like to listen to the group. They're stories that are different than mine.

They're insights that feel profound. Even just observing their connection with one another. I love them. Like all the food, man. I just, yeah, I love the diversity. It just like. Yeah. my soul is definitely nourished by like the older women that like live in the south and are just paving their own way it's great totally yeah a lot of mad respect for that. So gray is going to offer their story today a tree who has been battered by storms disconnected

from old roots and is trying not only to survive but to flourish and nourish and because gray and i have been in a spirituality forward book club i don't start with the basics but rather toss them this not so easy to answer question right off the bad. Like, where are you at with the concept of like, body versus spirit? Like, are those the same? Is that gray altogether? Do you feel more aligned with one versus the other? Or maybe we add like intellect to that?

I mean, I think all of it. Well, I mean, I can, I can feel them separately. Again, both as a trans person and a person with a lot of trauma in my body, like, That was a real journey to come back into and come home to my body. But so with that, I can feel that clarity. Spirit for me has been, I think, the most present in my life. Like I have, some people might call it consciousness or awareness, but connection to the divine has been so clear to me always in my life.

Coming into the material world has actually been harder for me than a connection to the divine. I would be floating out in the ether all day. If I had my way, I'd be like, fuck this material life, man. I'm just going to be hanging out with spirit. So yeah, I guess separate, but absolutely connected to one another. So Gray feels integrated, body and spirit, though they easily access the spirit part.

And one reason I ask this question is because I've been thinking a lot about what my gender means to me, especially with the past few episodes highlighting the frustrating pressures placed on those socialized as females. And I kind of get myself into this body versus spirit versus society loop. I want to pinpoint where I feel my gender lives. It may be obvious to you that it's integrated into the whole package of me. Or maybe you think about this too. But I wanted to get Gray's perspective.

Where would you... When I like intellectually try to understand it, I get in this big loop between like gender is a social construct, but like also there's whatever biological components to each of us. But also we have nurture and like, and I don't get out of that thing. I can't figure it out. So I'm wondering, where do you think your transness lies, whether it's mental, spirit, body?

And if all those questions are ignorant you can also tell me that yeah yeah yeah i well i will answer them but i think can i i have a question for you yeah which is like when you get in that loop trying to figure it out my thing is like why does it matter it matters because i'm curious because i want to understand what other people experience right obviously we have things that are similar between all of us, but then there's also differences.

And so like, I want to know what that's like, right? Like, that's why. And I don't have to understand either. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To respect and appreciate and love. Absolutely. I love the curiosity that you bring to it. And I just didn't know, like curious if there was an element of like, I need to get this right. Like that there is a right answer to it. I mean, is there? If there is, tell me. I mean, like that would be my like pushback on that. It's like,

I can talk to you about my trans experience, you know? Yeah. Okay. And so then to your questions, I... And maybe the question is about gender. I don't know. You frame it however you want to, you know? Gray is so generous. They're going to take that clumsy question and run with it. And I'm so glad that they did, because I think that my very first hidden-to-me assumption wasn't even right, that Gray's transness is the same thing as my own gender. I mean, my transness feels bigger than gender.

It lives both in my body, but also 100% in my spirit.

One of the things i love about being trans is the invitation to like it is like a middle path it just feels like the very definition of like both nuance and complexity and being able to hold like all of it at the same time so it's sort of this like universe in and of itself and that feels kind of like the spirit part for me you know for a really long time and still like the the place where i see myself most reflected is in the natural world which to me is like a very genderless yes there's

like you know pollinator like there is the gen the the sort of biological gendering of like reproduction that happens or like you know but it's just like it's just god you know and god to me when it comes to gender like is all of it like it is the like they are all. Music.

So that's like on the spirit level on the body level for me again it feels like this really, and it hasn't always like you know i think i'm like quite integrated in my identity and like and where that fits for me but it does it like feels like this kind of holding of like of it all you know like i present as masculine because that's what feels aligned for me but i also like very much hold you know kind of like feminine energies when it comes to like receptivity and vulnerability and my emotional

expression like there are like i hold both which to me it just feels like incredibly powerful. No, I don't know, but I want to. Can you explain more about holding both feminine and masculine? Sure.

Some people, when they think of masculine and feminine, are thinking about genitalia.

I'm talking about masculine and feminine energies and presentations of that, which again, exist everywhere like it's not specific to biological sex necessarily i think you know it's like oftentimes it's easier to like embody that because that's what our culture has like set up but concretely right like masculine energies are about like if you think about a river like the river banks would be like masculine there is like a holding there there's a a steadfastness like a containment and the

river that is running through the banks is the feminine energy so it's it's receptive it's more wild there's like you know creativity there's like the water element, and in our society i think like if we didn't grow up with like the gender binary and such strict gender policing that many more people would be in between and holding both because like yeah, But given the world that we live in.

Cisgender women often are socialized to embody feminine qualities, and cisgender men, masculine qualities, and when people step out of line with that, there's all kinds of things that happen. Music. Does that answer your question? Yes. It makes me sad. Yes. I used to do these many years ago. I was doing consulting work around with diversity, equity, inclusion stuff. And specifically, I was working with organizations around trans competence.

And I would go in and give these trainings. And I was like, listen, like, you don't need to have a trans colleague or employee or student for this to be relevant to you. And I would walk everyone through this exercise where I would have them put down messages they received about growing up as women, like what women are supposed to do, what men are supposed to do.

And it was it was the kind of this like the generationally this like kind of like 40s to 50 year old women like I would just watch this like recognition come over them and be like everyone is harmed by this process like you know trans people might just be more vocal about it but everyone is harmed in this right everyone it's painful you know.

Everyone is harmed in the not the same series we explored how fundamentalism and the evangelical church implanted harmful gender roles and society judges our bodies in similar and different ways that leave everyone feeling less than anyway i have battled all these expectations and though as i've told you i've felt disconnected from my body i've maintained a positive view of self, Gray was raised Christian as well. So I have a very loose theory on this that I tossed their way.

I feel like I've had kind of a positive view of self. And so I've been pondering like what contributed to that. And, you know, one of the core pieces of it is just like believing that I'm awesome, not because of what I look like or what I do or whatever, but because God thinks I'm awesome. Which was, yes, we had a mixed message with the whole you're going to hell if you don't believe thing. That's a bit of a problem. But we did get the like you're loved message.

Right. And so that that has stuck with me. Do you feel like you had that deep sense that you were loved by a creator from an early age or no? Hmm i think with from the creator yes early on like you know and i again looking at my kind of like coming out story at that young i don't think that i would have kind of

like believed in myself enough to do that without that support but i feel like what happened after that both within my family of origin and then just being out in the world and i like it really crushed my spirit and i and that i think was like that was the beginning of my disconnection from god i mean it took me it's taken me most of my life to like circle back to that.

And I think just very recently having the capacity again in my spirit and body to like really feel my belovedness and like trust that and like move, move through the world from that place again. But it's, I mean, it's been a long journey coming back to that. Hmm. So yes, they felt strong in themselves and loved as a child. Then the world crushed their spirit. Now they have the capacity to trust again that they are loved as they are. But as Gray said, it's been a long journey.

In our book, Wilbert said, The work of my life was not to gloriously produce or extraordinarily perform, but to simply be who and what I am, even if it is hidden to all the world for a time or even forever. So Gray's gonna share that journey, Part of my story is that when I was five or six is when I first came out as trans, like in a mid-sized Iowan town, like in the mid-80s in a Pentecostal family. You know, and I could just say less right there. I just like said it all.

So even though I came out as trans at five or six, that like wasn't okay. What did that look like for you? I told my parents that I was a boy. Do you remember doing that? Or is that a thing like your mom told you? I mean, I don't remember the exact moment that I did it, but like I do remember doing it. Yeah. And I remember that I was trying to kind of figuring out how I could live my life as a masculine expressed person.

But what would that have meant at five? Like would it have been like games you wanted to play or clothes you wanted to wear or hanging out with your dad? Like what? Yeah. Yeah. So, yes. Clothing, you know, like at the beach, not wearing a shirt.

Like I really wanted to like hang out with my older brother and all of his friends, like wanted to hang out with the boys I wanted to like play baseball instead of softball and play flag football instead of you know but yeah like are you athletic I am athletic yeah oh okay do you have a favorite sport I mean I enjoy watching NFL football uh-huh you're not gonna play though. No, no, no, no. But I, no, I enjoy like weightlifting and I run a lot.

And in high school and first year in college, I played tennis as well. And I played softball, like elementary through high school too. So it wasn't okay. Like it wasn't okay for me to be a boy. And that was enforced in a lot of different ways. Like my parents paid me to get my ears pierced in

fifth grade they refused to buy me any bike but the pink and purple mountain bike like it was like a real gender like coercion yeah and i was being bullied in school and like in public restrooms and like it just there were so many clear messages that i wasn't going to be supported and who i was and so as a young tender-hearted person like we need like i needed my parents in order to survive And so, you know, I learned very early on that in order to have those survival needs

met, that I needed to like stuff down this part of who I am. I like have such a lot of grief for that like that young self who like has made that decision between authentic living and survival. Music. So what did stuffing it down need to you like when you were young I mean just really trying to fit in and I was like terribly clunky at being a girl yeah.

Yeah and I you know I like hung on because I remember I like still dressed pretty masculine through elementary school and had short hair but by the time I went into junior high and I you know and you had a bunch of schools pooling into this junior high i just wasn't conscious but if i like look at my behaviors i was just like i again like i need to fit in here and so i grew out my hair i like started wearing a little makeup i like my wardrobe

change but like in eighth like what i mean is like in eighth grade like my mom was like still putting my hair up like i couldn't put my hair up myself you know i just like didn't have i like didn't have the skills you know i was like Like I was just like femininity in training, it felt like. Yeah, and I adopted this real, I think it started in junior high. Because like, you know, by the time I was a senior in high school, like I was voted class clown and like smartest mouth.

And so I adopted this real kind of on the offensive personality, like this very protective, like I'm going to be the crack up and I'm going to talk shit to people and I'm going to make fun of you before you can come at me. And so just like a real hardened shell.

Yeah, and did the thing that, I don't know, that some people, a lot of us do in high school, like I wanted to be liked and popular and was like into boys and dating and just like really trying to belong, you know, and just like kind of and like getting like further and further away from myself, like in that process. Did it work? Did you belong? Well, like at what cost, you know, like, is it true belonging if you like aren't relating from your authentic self?

I mean, I would argue no. If the relationship. Music.

But again, I think our like psyches and our bodies are just these like beautiful truth tellers. And so I started drinking pretty heavily in high school and I could just like see the ways like I had to continue kind of numbing or doing these things in order to like stay disconnected from myself in order to like make it through. Gosh, I remember like raiding a friend's liquor cabinet like in eighth grade. I was young.

Yeah. I progressed through high school and then in college, I think once I left my parents' house and there was left oversight, I just wilded out. It got really, really bad. So my junior, no, senior year of college, I dropped out and moved home with my parents. Went to outpatient drug and alcohol program. Okay. Now, was that a thing your parents like? No, that was self-initiated as a job. I aligned with the theme that I spoke about, which is a sort of choosing of self.

You know, I could essentially see that I didn't want to live. And that was like the path that I was headed down, like a lot of blackout drinking. And yeah, I like owe it to, I think, probably a handful of friends in college who probably kept me alive because I was working very diligently to not be so. Music. Was there anything that you learned specifically in rehab about yourself? No, it made me feel terrible. It was so shame based. Oh, my God.

No, it was terrible. But what it did, it like it gave me, you know, kind of pause to like, let some stuff begin to like bubble up. What I mean by stuff is like feelings that I've been suppressing, numbing.

Right. And it got me out of I think the because I was like in a small rural town in Minnesota that's why I like went to college because I got this tennis scholarship it it shifted what needed to shift at that time but and I would say it still took probably maybe another like five to seven years to really to decrease I mean how I was using definitely began to shift but when I look back Back at sort of the years that followed, I was still using,

I was still drinking a lot as a way to cope and not feel. A decade after that college rehab stint, things really started to shift for Gray. So around like 2012 is when I really began unpacking and working through the trauma of my childhood, especially as it was related to my gender, because I came back out as trans at that time. And that, I think, is when, once I really began to face what was underneath all of these ways that I was coping, was sort of the beginning of shifting those

things more permanently. How did you do that? So I was living in Madison, Wisconsin at the time because I was doing a PhD program. And this moment I do remember because it was so stark to me. I was standing at this intersection waiting to. And I had this lash, this like statement or like knowing come up in my body that just said, what if I'm trans? And it like made me sick. It like made me nauseous. And just very quickly was like dismissed it. But that I just have that memory so clearly.

And then kind of like slowly after that, like I began like kind of testing out like identifying as genderqueer. Because at this time I was like identifying as a lesbian. But I don't know, I just like kind of like began creeping towards this, what would it mean to, you know, genderqueer and then from lesbian to queer. And then I did, I joined this beautiful queer activist writers group. And I think, yes, being around, gosh, that group was such an important part

of my sense of community in Madison. And really, I think I felt really held by that. And, you know, if we look from like sort of somatic or healing model about how healing happens, I felt safe enough that the stuff around the gender trauma and coming more into my own, like I felt held enough that then I could begin kind of unpacking some of those things with, you know, through my own writing and with this group and in therapy.

One thing why i love the body so much is so wise i wouldn't have been i didn't have enough resource before then to hold what was going to come forth like what needed to be expressed it would have overwhelmed me yeah that's what i both remember for myself and the folks that i work with which is like you know maybe shit feels harder this stuff's coming up but a really beautiful thing to remember is that it's because like you feel held enough to do that.

Like there's something in you that feels safe enough to feel this now. Music. What does held mean to you? I mean, that can look a lot of different ways. Supported, and that can be by, you know, other humans or a healer, held by God. I think for me it's, there's some semblance of safety that my body feels. That's what, In service of understanding the capacity our bodies have to tell us truths, I want to dwell on this feeling Gray is describing for a minute.

What is your body telling you or what is your mind telling you? Like, what does that feel like and taste like? Yeah. Where you feel safe enough to acknowledge this part about yourself and, like, move forward in that new truth, you know? I think some of that is unconscious that happens.

So this is a really easy way to identify safety in your body right because we like think it's this heady thing it's literally happening in your body so if you just take a minute and like come into your body a little bit or like as much that feels accessible in this moment so if you like notice or like can notice like if there are parts in your body that feel like constricted or like a titer right now. Okay, we're doing a thing right here. Gray just snuck it into the interview.

So follow their prompts as I am. So maybe there's like some soreness or tension or stress there. You have like a sense of that? Yeah. Okay. And then maybe notice some other parts that like maybe don't have sensation or you feel some numbness there, like maybe or just neutrality, feel nothing and then are there any spots that feel open or spacious or relaxed yes there's your safety i like it oh yes and a good stretch look at that yes that's beautiful thank you i feel like Yes.

Your body just like literally did this beautiful expression. I love that. I leaned back in my chair, raised my arms over my head, and had a nice stretch. I felt good. Yes, because we had done that pause and focused in on our bodies. And because I felt safe in this conversation with Gray. So that's how Gray felt in the queer writing group.

And how they reconnected with some things about themselves that had been stuffed down for a long time. and labeled and relabeled, and then landed. Gray mentioned it at the beginning, but I asked them to explain what trans mask means to them. I'm a trans person and I'm masculine presenting. Like, man does not resonate for me. Like, I'm not a man. I'm a masculine person and I'm trans. Like, my transness feels really important to me.

And they, them feels accurate of how I feel inside, which is not binary. But and i'm a masculine person which is so i'm a trans masculine person that's what it means for me, and you know looking back when i did like say i'm a boy to my parents like you know i was that was the language i had for as a child right and that was like a developed prefrontal cortex, capacity for more nuance so trans mask is where they landed and lived into and this too turned out to be not okay.

So I'm estranged from my biological family. I'm not in connection with them.

I've been not in relationship with my parents, gosh, it's been eight years now. And then my siblings were a little while after that.

But, yes. What's the source of the disconnect? Oh. Complex i mean the boundary with my parents was around was around my pronoun usage, they like just would not could not would not do the work to to honor the pronouns that i asked them to use for me and given our very um we just have a there's just a long history of hurt from them and some unhealthy just dynamics with all of that underneath that that was just kind of the catalyst and I was just like you know I asked

so many ways I've like you know I really did the work to like I was doing a lot of emotional labor to try and get them to meet me where I was yeah I just again I like chose myself I like love myself too much to like continue being harmed so that was that. Music. How do you feel about it now? It's like not being connected to my biological family like is the greatest heartbreak of my life.

And I think that for folks who don't have any like reference point for that, it's a really hard thing to explain to people like that level of grief. But if you think about like being disconnected from your like root system.

Like even if it's, you know, like there's some like unhealth there and you know, I just, it's to be uprooted from like the very thing that like all of us sort of come into this world with yeah and i mean there are times when it's like deeply painful i'm sorry thank you yeah and it's the like again the trade off is like like which pain like what hurts more to be in relationship with them or to be separate from them and it was more painful to be in relationship

with them and so that's that i think Like part of my orientation to the world is that like my heart isn't ever closed. Like I like, I don't know if some relationship from however many years ago, like came back to me and like had the capacity to do the repair work. Like I love repair. Like I'm here to do the hard work with people, but like I will not carry, I will not carry it for us.

And that's like a real lesson I've had to learn in this life which is to to stop to stop at my lane you know and let people either take responsibility for their half or not, And yeah, and my parents have not. And so there that is. I think that my prayer is like God, you know, like be with me through the grief. Like when that arises, like, you know, like birthdays are hard.

Holidays are hard. Like in these moments that are hard. so be with me in that connect me to like bring me the relationships where I can be full of myself and loved in them and the kind of folks who can show up for repair who value me enough to or have the capacity to do that that's what I pray for and then like continue to work my heart and to like work my life that if that's, like where my heart leads me or where life leads me and reconnecting with them that like that I'm ready for that.

I mean, that's, like, those are the prayers. And, like, the rest I just give over to God. You are sadder than any child should be. Music. Come into my arms, Come into my arms This is one of Gray's prayer songs they wrote when going through a stretch of deep healing. The repetition of verses, melodies, and harmonies feel prayerful and bring them into communion with themselves, others, and God. Sweet peace, sweet peace, sweet knowing I am here. Music.

Yeah good, how can they not want to be with you like you're so delightful thank you like maximum delight I don't know, that's... Okay. I do know, yeah, I... Yeah, I don't know the answer to that.

I mean, that's been a, like, it may have hurts my heart, you know? And yeah, this is where it gets complex, because, you know, I feel like if you ask them, they would probably say they do want to be with me, but do they have the capacity to, like, love me and care for me in the ways that, like, I would need to be.

To be in relationship with them. You know, that's the question. I asked Gray what the block is for their parents, and the response was their own stuff. But Gray has seen parents who are able to get past their blocks. It is possible. I worked for this small nonprofit in St. Paul that provided mental health services to Queen and Trans Youth, and I was their training and outreach person, and I also, like, answered the phones, and what was kind of the first point of contact.

And I would get calls and emails from parents all of the time. Like a child just came out. And it just, it like was both healing and heartbreaking at the same time because this parent would say, I don't understand this, you know, and often would maybe mispronoun them, like wouldn't use their name, like all of these things.

But the thing that like was so beautiful to me is that these parents, they reached out because they like, there was something like about love that was like guiding them enough to say, this person is important enough to me to figure this the fuck out. Like I'm messy in this. I'm going to get it wrong. I don't know. But like, this is my role as a parent or caregiver is to, to work through my own shit in order to love this person the way they need to be loved.

And so I don't know the answer to that question. It's to like watch parents repeatedly be able to do that work. Yeah. Like it's a possible thing. It's a really beautiful thing when people do that work. I think for a long time, I was asking that question, you need to know. And it brings me more peace to let it be their issue. Yeah. And it's not your work to figure it out. It's their work. And or the Holy Spirit. That's what I'm saying. That's between them and God. Them and God, you know?

In our book, Understory, Wilbert says, Make me like a plant, I am learning to pray. Give me courage to mourn what is sad and also to press down into the soil of the life I have and feed what lies beneath in the dark matter of earth. Help me hold what is beautiful in the world. And even though it contains unexpected ashes and terrible tears, remind me that it also holds the source of life. Now Gray uses the practices they've learned to guide other people.

Stoma is the body. And so somatics is just of the body. You know, I've been in therapy for more of my life than I've not been, but it wasn't until I started doing body-based modalities that things really started to shift for me. I mean, I'm talking like two decades in before I started doing somatic modalities. And so I've just been doing them, I don't know, for the past about seven years.

So I use what I, like, the mastery of my own, the ways that I've healed in my own body in those practices. And then I also, like, one of the communities I'm most connected in now is this online somatic community where people are, this is the lens through which we are, like, moving through our world and our life. And so just, like, really immersed in the work and in the conversation always because I just, it's changed my life so much.

Yeah and so then i specifically work around relationships and bring the somatics into that because you know i don't know we like read a lot of books or listen to podcasts about healthy communication and healthy relationships and all of that but like we're so it's like you know here up and as the exercise right the exercise we just did together like they're at most of how we move through the world is coming from like here down unconscious.

Behavior that we engage in comes from our bodies there's a lot happening a lot happening below you know, And so we begin to pay attention to, you know, if you have, if like you're working on setting boundaries or like people pleasing is a hard thing for you, boundaries is a really easy one because as like teaching people how to set boundaries from their bodies is like a beautiful practice because your body, it's already feeling it and telling you about like when someone feels too close

or that they've overstepped a thing. But again, we're so disconnected from that. We don't know how to listen to it or we feel it happen. And we don't know how to translate that into behavior change. Then people just stay stuck because you can't cognitively, you can't think your way out of it. you know? Yeah. I mean, that one is like the most clear to me is like the fear response, that like your heart starts racing.

And I really feel that in my body. Are there other examples of that of, I don't know, other situations where you would really get a message from your body like that?

I mean, everything. Everything. Yeah. So that's kind of a bigger threat response, but we're feeling you know what i don't know what what is that quote that we our mind thinks like 40,000 100 whatever that like thousands of thoughts a day right like our bodies have like have a response to almost all of them and so there's so much happening all of the time for example this didn't happen but for example like in this conversation let's say like back

when you were first talking to me about transness right if i had and i have had but i don't feel it any longer but let's say that i have a history of people either fetishizing or kind of taking my trans experience and like making it about that like doing something that doesn't feel good relationally with it right, So let's say you asked me about that transness question based on my history with that. My body has a response to that.

So if I'm disconnected from that, one response that could happen would be the father people pleasing response. Where I sort of like laugh along with you and then go ahead and talk about my experience because here I am in this podcast and you're like a newer friend relationship. And I want to make sure that I keep like you see what happens. Like so much is happening there. Right. Rather than, so I said that that did happen. And I like felt that happened.

I could just like take a moment and pause. Because the more you do this work, you know, I can like sense that that happened. I can take a moment and be with that. And then I can choose that there's some agency there as to whether or not I say to you, I really feel comfortable talking about that in this moment. Right. Yeah. So you can choose the way you want to respond to what your body is saying in the moment. Yes. Right. But to get there, you have to be aware.

You have to be able to identify the sensations and what your body is saying to you. And that's kind of the beginning level with most people who don't do this work is to even be like, oh, like I have a body. Right. Yeah. And that it will tell you that something is wrong or right before your mind well. 100%. It is so wise. It's so wise. Music.

Gray has found it hard to find community in Minneapolis, tried different avenues in unsuccessfully, and over the past couple of years have had some painful disconnects from previously solid relationships. So what's your social life? Like, do you have tight relationships elsewhere or not really?

Um, tight, like what do you mean? Who's your best friend? Who's your bestie? Um, my best friend is God. Oh my God. Stop it. You think I'm kidding too. I'm not. You know, I'm on board with that. I'm totally cool with that. I'm like totally blushing. I love this for me. While in Minneapolis, they created a meetup called Heartbroken Open Mic that they ran for about a year. And so the heartbroken piece felt really important to me. And it was really resonant. Like I was kind of coming out of my own.

I just had a really hard two years. And so it just, like, I think both to provide the space and it also was for me. The tagline of it is Naming the Truth of What Hurts. I mean, based on so much of our conversation here today and like it's you can't really heal until you can name the truth of what hurts.

And I think that our culture doesn't do a very good job outside of one on one therapy, creating spaces where people can say this thing that happened to me was fucked up or this person really hurt me in this way or like I feel incredibly lonely. The truths that like live inside of us that like want to be witnessed.

That's the premise of it is for folks to bring you know their heartbreak from however they define that for me heartbreak happens when we are anytime we're in an environment where we're expecting to feel a sense of safety and belonging

and care and those needs are met so that can you know it's a wide range yeah I'd folks show up who are like going through a divorce and people processing their childhood trauma and a lot of, yeah, just a lot of relational stuff. Cause I, cause that's so universal. Like we're all mucking our way through relationships. Yep. And now, you know, cause I, as we do, like things are shifting and I,

this year, so much of my own My inner work has been about remembering my belovedness and really wanting to teach and hold space for maybe more wholeness, not that there isn't wholeness in heartbreak and pain and grief, because it's like all of it. Music. Yeah. And then like a little challenge because I feel like God wants me to like talk about God more in my work. And I'm like, I know. I'm trying to like, yeah, figure out how that wants to like express.

And, you know, this book that we're reading, it's like there is this gosh, the whole thing around flourishing and just like I'm I think the invitation right now is like, how am I like my most magnificent self? And part of that, like, is this, like, I'm, like, a deeply spiritual, God-loving, you know, outside of any denomination, like, it's just part of my story and, like, how I move through my every day. How could I not bring that into my work, you know?

People are going to feel that for me, and I'd rather be explicit about it because it's been part of my, it is part of my beingness and how I think we can be held in our healing. You know, again, whether that's like a Christian God or a universe God, but it's something bigger than us helping us hold what we like just can't possibly hold on our own. Yeah, I've been like feeling that draw lately, too, and I'm not sure what to do with it.

I'm not through it to the other side yet, but yeah, I have not been a talk about God kind of person for like at least a decade. I mean, with my close friends, maybe. Right. But I haven't like put that on front street or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know. There's been a bunch of things that have kind of led me to think about that differently.

One of which is I have a friend who's in the Episcopal church and she wants to start like a new Episcopal church, but that's like focused on healing for ex-evangelicals. Like again, creating a safe space for people coming out of that and any expression that might be similar to, So she asked me to be part of the core team, and it led me down this whole kind of mental rabbit hole of like, would I feel comfortable doing that?

Would I feel comfortable with people knowing that I'm participating in such a thing? But I in some ways feel the same way as you. Like, this is part of me. Like, I do believe in God, and that's important to me. Anyways, so I have many of the questions I'm hashing out right now. Yeah. You know, as a person who's come out multiple times, it's just, you know, in you even naming that.

And I have felt that for myself. It's like, what is this? Like, it feels similar to like outing myself as someone who loves God. And like, what a funny, it just, it feels funny to me.

Or it's like, yeah, like, what kind of cultural corner have I backed myself into? where that's a thing where I'm afraid that I won't belong because I express that I am a beloved child of God. Right. Yeah. And I know that part of my hesitation is because I recognize the harms of religious institutions. And I know people may associate me with that, and I don't want that.

But on the other hand, I also know that someone like you, someone like me associating with spirituality also helps break down and create new things so, it's hard yeah yep absolutely yeah i guess it's like this sort of like misunderstood. And i want to be seen as sort of like evangelizing which is like part of my childhood and trying to like save people which is oh my gosh um like i mean that's interest in that no and no and i just want to be very clear that the Episcopal church doesn't do that.

So that's the only reason I would consider participating. Totally. Yeah, that's really, that's, that's funny. Music. I guess with this show, Gray and I are outing ourselves as people who are into God. The big asterisk is that we are not trying to convert anyone. Just be honest about ourself. In Understory, Wilbert says, this is the difficult part of looking at our lives for what they are and braving what it takes to look beneath them. It is courageous work. It is hard work.

It is the work of remembering what it means to be magnificently oneself. Music. Just this year, Gray started going to a Methodist church. They do have a longing for a church community, like the extended family they had as a kid. But coming from that Pentecostal background, the service is a little boring. And this takes us, unexpectedly, back to the body versus spirit conversation. I miss kind of that charismatic spirit that I grew up with.

Well, yeah. I mean, they read prayers down. It just is so rote to me. Totally. But yeah, you all are reading like this doesn't feel like of the spirit at all. Right. Okay. But what? So my husband and I debate about this all the time. He is also deconstructed and maybe further along the agnostic path than I am. And he was in church worship team, his whole like growing up into his 20s situation.

So we have a regular debate about like whether you're feeling the spirit during church service and music or whether it's just emotional response of your body. What do you think? Oh. Or is it the same thing maybe? Right. I was like, yeah, what's like, why does it need to be separate? Like, what if belonging and safety and the other emotional response that comes up, like, is the spirit? Oh, my God. You just blew my mind. Like, that is God. Oh, my God. Okay. Music.

Okay non-church people please accept my apology because we're going to get a little theological right now but i love the connection gray made between that feeling of belonging and what the physical emotional response feels like but we think of the whole we meaning, evangelicals because that's the part i know but pentecostal is like right in there you know But we think of the Holy Spirit as being so separate, like this being that like descends on you and then leaves, right?

So it couldn't be yourself and connection with others because it's the Holy Spirit is separate from you. Right. That's like the concept. Right. But the again, back to this book and also like, but like we are of God. The God parts, the spirit that lives within us. Because I don't know, like there's something about this idea that the spirit comes in and leaves. Like, where does it go? And like, does it only come when I like it?

To me, it kind of fits that the theology that I grew up with, which was like this conditional thing where it's like, well, the spirit's going to come to me if I'm practicing in the right ways or if I'm good or if at night I like ask for forgiveness for my sins rather than like, like even in all the things that like feel unholy or like not sacred. Like to me, the spirit can absolutely show up in that, you know, and I think is present. I think that that's an unuseful, I don't know if it's

like a dichotomy or like a splitting of, they're either here or they're not. It's bullshit to that. My thing is, what's your capacity to receive the spirit? Can your body receive it because it's there all the time? That feels like a bigger question to me, more important question. Are receive and hear the same to you? Yeah. Let's say like, you know, here I'm looking at this beautiful window. So it's been a lot of rain here this season in Minneapolis. It's just so green and so lush, right?

So all of this abundance is here already. Can I, in my body, feel that lushness? It's already here. Can I receive it in my body? Can I feel how whole it is? Two different things. Spirit's here. Can I feel it and receive it, be moved by it? Music. Gray has a lot up in the air now they're not really connecting in that church and heartbroken open mic is on hold so they're pondering the idea of moving somewhere else tbd, you should just move to california i mean i did have a an astro cartographer

who told me the same thing once so okay well now you've heard it twice and i'm pretty sure the spirit is here yeah, that's three yeah good play abby good play. Music. We're almost to time, but I have like many more things I feel like we could talk about. Where's your mind at? Like, are you like, oh, there's this thing I really want to talk about related to the body or just want to tell Abby? Yeah. Okay. Let me give me one second. I'll see. Feel it out.

Gray and I sat in silence for a full 30 seconds. I mean, I feel like the conversation we were just having about my capacity to receive spirit or God, like feels important. And it's, for me, someone who is strange from my biological family. I'm not in connection with them. I'm also a trans person, so my body hasn't always felt like home. There's this overarching theme about belongingness and home. And I think the body, when we find safety there and can anchor into this, I don't know.

Yeah and in combination with this relationship we got it just feels like this like the belongingness is already there like it's a really just the ability to like open to that and have access to it i don't know that's just like what arose when i was like paused there just feels important to that's kind of like the root the like roots of the work that i do and then like i could just geek out and then i just geek out about relationships and if you think about that within relational context, then,

I don't know, like if we have conflict or if I need to like ask for a need or like whatever comes up relationally, there's just this, like, I already belong to myself. And so like, I'm less threatened that you're going to leave me. Or if you do leave me, like I'm going to be okay. You know, I like my, you know, I'm going to feel all the feels about the grief and all this stuff, but like, I don't know. Again, it's this like resource that's already there.

Maybe you're inclined more toward the body, towards the physical realm. Or maybe like me, you're more heady or more into the spiritual side. But Gray's point is that there's safety inside yourself. There's belonging inside yourself that can sustain you if the turmoil outside doesn't feel safe and welcoming.

I feel like a theme in my life. yeah like if you know there were kind of stakes that kind of defined like through threads like is this devotion to myself and choosing myself without knowing what comes next like it's a real, i mean it's just a real love that like even though i don't know either why yet or like what comes next or how this is going to look yeah there's just like a willingness to kind of risk knowing that there's a better way, a better relationship,

something that resembles like true love than like what currently is present. Being gray, the real and authentic gray, costs them a lot. Relationships, roots, believing that people would stand up for you, a sense of safety in the world, but their understanding of themselves as a beloved

being was so clear from a young age and they've held on to that. Wilbert said, flourishing is being magnificently oneself. Music. Something about the kind of like purity of my spirit in that moment of being like, this is who I am. It's so clear to me. Like, I am of the, like, my divinity was just so clear to me, so young, standing behind that.

That's been lifelong. I feel like the work around that has been to grow capacity for the grief, the immense amount of loss that comes, and like, standing in one's authenticity or being true to oneself. Bye. Music. Oh, my God. Yeah. Do I look good? Do I look cute? Yeah. You look great. I can at least put it in my story. I'll just say that we did our interview today. Okay. Good idea. Okay. Cute. Cute. Cute. We're cute. And we'll also have to tell our book club people to listen in.

Oh, yeah. I'll talk to them to, like, you know. Oh, my gosh. Yes. Okay. Well, if I don't talk to you, then I will see you at book club. Okay. Sounds great. Thank you, Abby. Thank you, Gray. Appreciate it. Bye. Music.