Ispeak from direct experience as a, once, straight woman who for the past forty years has lived a lesbian lifestyle. Who I’d been as a person was immediately erased on the day I stepped out of the darkness to declare my awakening to the lesbian who had for all my thirty-four years been sleeping within, all the while undergoing a silent metamorphosis that eventually freed my authentic self, much like the butterfly that emerges from the cocoon.
Once the truth was revealed, unlike the butterfly, the beauty of me as a person held no significance. I was immediately labeled a “lesbian.” The person of Sidney Andrews became lost in a word designed to define me and others like myself.
Kate, my partner of almost forty years, and I quickly realized that if we were going to be defined in any way, shape, or form, it wasn’t going to be in a manner that would imply, restrict, or deny us the freedom of living our authentic truth. We understood early on that we couldn’t allow the world beyond our eyes to define, manipulate, or demand conformance to the status quo.
Each of us is responsible for creating and charting our own course, for living our authentic truth and best life. If we don’t make the choice for ourselves, others will make it for us. And to live under anyone else’s shadow, expectations or judgment is to relinquish the being that you and I were designed to be or become.
You and I were meant to be self-propelled, believing, daring and unafraid on this journey through life. Moreover, your thoughts are the makers, breakers, shakers, and moving force behind living your authentic truth and best life. The choice is yours to make; your life is yours to shape; your dreams are yours to fulfill, and your best life lies in front of you!
Sure there are obstacles, or opportunities in drag, as I like to call them. These problems or obstacles act as a measuring stick for accessing our spiritual growth, much like a scale measures weight.
To all my GLBTQ counterparts, you were meant to be here. You and I have an opportunity and a responsibility to live our best lives by being an authentic example of what it looks like to live from spirit. You are spirit made visible. Your opportunities for living your best life are endless. Walk tall, be proud, love deeply, live with passion, and allow the gift that you are to brighten the world a little more each day.
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SIDNEY ANDREWS is a lesbian author, public speaker, freelance writer, retired nurse and the mother of three grown children. She is the author of two books, Journey into Thought: Awakening to Spirit
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