The middle way - Freeing ourselves from the two extremes

Dear all,

I was not active in my blog for a while because I had been busy in my real life. Anyway, a part of me belongs here. My feminine heart brings me back!

I have received emails from several cross dreamer friends who went through the struggle I had to endure. (I have written about the struggle I went through in my first post in this blog which can be read here). They are worried that their "love for themselves in feminine image" is taking over their lives. They have strong urges to be a wife/girlfriend to a man, they are not able to relate themselves as a man to women etc. While, I humbly accept that I am not a psychiatrist to give an expert advise, I would still want to write down some words of love, just assuming the role of a sister.

I would like to begin with a story. When Buddha was in the middle of his search for enlightenment, he once happen to listen to a music teacher, who was demonstrating a musical instrument to students. He was showing that if the strings of the instrument is too tight, then the instrument will not play harmoniously. If the strings are set too loose, the instrument will not produce music. Only the middle way, not too tight and not too loose, will produce harmonious music. The story says that this gave a flash of insight to Buddha and he recognized that the right spirituality is a middle way between the two extremes of life. The extremes being - One : Over indulgence in worldly pleasures neglecting morality and Two : Total asceticism in which the saints sacrificed all their worldly pleasures to live ascetic lives in deep forests.

Sorry for being a little off-topic. But, being a silly girl, Jaya maintains the right to talk endlessly over anything (something my male self would not do). LOL.

Anyway, translating Buddha's discovery in our context. We can also try to free ourselves from the two extremes.

First extreme :

• Hating yourself for having girly fantasies.
• Hating yourself for not feeling masculine enough.
• Being anxious of the inability to relate with other women as a man.
• Fear of disgrace. 
• Attempts to forcefully emasculate yourself by affirming you are a man and ignoring the existence of feminine feelings within you. 

Second extreme:

• Indulging in the fantasies in which you are a girl/woman (while truth being that you are a man) for a major share of your private time
• Ignoring the real life challenges that needs to be dealt with, so as to find time for cross-dreaming, and thus letting this be strengthened as a habit
• Keeping yourself away from social situations
• Relating the normal activities in your life in terms of your feminine fantasies and thus developing an false perception towards life

My recommendations for a middle way

• Accept that you occasionally have feminine feelings and fantasies. Love your own feminine side. Don't be shy. Don't hate yourself for her existence. Embrace that sweet girl within you. Love and accept her as a part of your life. I have written a post Acknowledge your truth - Unchain the Princess within! which could be helpful. The point is to love the girl in you totally, and still making a decision to move forward in your life as a healthy, reasonable individual.
• While we love our girly feelings, we should not hate our male selves as well, because it is the male self which represents us in the society and deals with the matters of our real life. Let me point to another blog post Let's not hate our male selves! on this topic. The point is, our love for our feminine self should not stop us from building the skills that are required by a man to move on.
• Do not ignore any of your real life challenges so as to find time for the dreams. Deal with all of them. 
• Be dynamic. Life is movement. Be that "bubbly girl" :-). Do more physical activities. And keep going. 
•  Life will bring alot of triggers before us. You may have a girly dream in sleep, someone may tease you for being feminine, you may see a beautiful woman and will want to be like her. Accept these feelings. as part of you. Smile at yourself, and tell yourself what a cute adorable girly kitten you are. But, if you are in the middle of something that is important, keep moving on with that.If you let your inner feminine feelings take over your normal functioning, that will cause frustration in long run.
• Find a creative outlet for your inner woman to express herself. You could do this through art,writing,discussing your feelings in online forums etc. (This blog is an outlet for Jaya to speak out her feminine heart!)
• I have found that it is useful to shut down yourself from crossdreaming for a while, especially if you have been doing excessive cross-dreaming for a while. Do this for any number of days(or months) that is possible for you. When we do this, I have experienced that my thinking patterns are getting realigned (like my brain is getting re-wired), and I am able to get back the natural male confidence, which was weakened by over indulgence in fantasies for a long time. This is purely my experience, and I am not sure whether it will work for everyone.   

I wish good luck to all of my sisters, and would like to remind you that all of you are princesses of your own inner world!. Rejoice, and still move on in your real life.

If my post looked like an article from an expert, I would like to humbly declare that I am not one. I am still just a beginner in my journey to know who I am. I am writing about a very tricky topic, and I might be wrong as well. I am always the silly girl Jaya, your sister :-)

Love and Hugs,
Jaya

Let's not hate our male selves!

Last post was about accepting our feminine feelings, and never feeling guilty about it. But considering the full picture of life the other side is also important. That would mean, to accept our male selves which is the actual physical reality!

Many of my crossdresser/crossdreamer friends fall for depression not because of their attachment to feminine feelings, but because they are disconnected from their male selves. It is a physical reality that we own a male body. Sisters, let us accept it. I know there are many of you out there who proudly proclaim that you hate your male body. But well, I disagree! (Oh, my sisters...Don't be angry with me if you disagree. I'm still the same little kitten...Your silly girl :) )

I do feel that, to embrace our feminine self, we do not need to hate our male selves. Let us accept that we have a male body. This is the body that is given to you. You will live with this body (Well, unless you are planning for SRS). It needs your love. It is tender. It is a gift. Let us love our bodies. Let us love our male organs. Even if you feel as an inferior male while you do that, it is okay. It is okay to be a man who is not manly. It is okay to be a man with a soft side. Accept your male identity. And let that acceptance come from your tender feminine nature of love and surrender. (Yes, what is more feminine that loving someone in total acceptance. Why don't you give that to yourself first?!)

Love yourself as a woman. And love yourself as a man! That will bring a little more peace to your life. Take it as the word from a sister !

With lots of love,
Jaya

Acknowledge your truth - Unchain the Princess within!

Yes, your inner woman deserves freedom! You have been judging her, hurting her, imprisoning her in the dungeon of guilt, making her yearn for self expression, forcing her to suffocate and plead for fresh air and warm sunlight. Let's end her suffering today.

Crossdreamer sisters, All what I want to say is this - Don't ever be guilty. Don't resist who you are. Have compassion to yourself. Your feminine psyche needs your loving attention.

I am not advocating crossdreaming addiction. It could affect your life badly. All I say is to accept that you are a crossdreamer, without resentment or guilt.This is the first step, if you want to move on in life just like other men.

Let us unchain her today, my friends...

Put a smile on your face and repeat after me! Remove whichever statements that are not applicable to you. If you want to add more, feel free to do so:
"I accept that I am a crossdreamer. I love to imagine myself as a woman. I love being a magnificient beauty admired and respected by everyone. I love to feel loved by other women as a sister. I love to be the beloved lady of a brave,strong,masculine man. I love to experience all aspects of femininity. I love to feel the softness and suppleness of a woman within me.

I accept the fact that I have all these fantasies, and I still love myself. I am always there for myself, however I feel (whether happy, sad, excited or depressed). I totally embrace my identity as a crossdreamer. I love myself! 

Eventhough I have all the above fantasies, I love myself. I love my life. I love my life so much that I am determined to live a happy, meaningful and successful life like any other man. I have my priorities in the real world. I have my goals and I have my loved ones who need me. Since I love my life so passionately, it is very important for me to make sure that my crossdreaming does not come in the way of my life's goals and dreams. While I love and accept my feminine fantasies compassionately, I will never let this as a reason to feel sad or depressed. I am grateful for this life I have, and I will take care of it. For accepting and enjoying my crossdreaming side, I don't need to sabotage my real life. Yes, I am a Princess. I may blush on that thought, but I will move on!"


Happiness to all!
Jaya

Attracted to a man? Read this!

There are many crossdressers and crossdreamers who dream about having relationship with a man as an expression of their femininity. I would like to share my view point about this. If you have that fantasy, I would like to invite you to take a deeper look into yourself. 

Some of you are attracted to men because that boosts your self image as a woman. The thought of being in a relationship with a man (being his girlfriend or wife) pushes you into a peak feminine experience. So, you are easily able to imagine and accept yourself as a woman. Now, this is the bold statement I'd like to make - You are not attracted to that man, but you are attracted to your own image as a woman. Relationship with the man looks attractive, because the thought about such a relationship facilitates your feminine self image. Here, your love is not to the other person but it is directed towards yourself. To be precise, you love your feminine self image at that time.

Another struggling question is whether you are a gay or not. I'd like to put it this way (This is just my opinion). If your attraction falls into the above mentioned category, you are not necessarily a gay. Because your attraction here is just to your own self image and not to the man's physical features. Most crossdreamers have fantasies about having relationship with men, but they don't care how their fantasy hero looks like. So they aren't necessarily gays. But I agree that there could be crossdressers/crossdreamers who are actually attracted to the male physical features of the other man. This post is not about them.

Coming to my world, one of my crossdreaming fantasies was to imagine myself as a  wife! I used to dream of myself wearing a traditional Indian saree, ornaments etc and be a traditional, submissive Indian wife - Cooking food for my hubby, washing his cloths, being very polite and submissve to him always even when he scolds me, surrendering to him always and never challenging his ego. One extreme masochistic fantasy I had was that my man gets angry at me and slaps my beautiful face. Then I weep like a helpless woman covering my face, tears rolling over my cheeks.(Ah...that hurts. But I loved it!). Well...that's it. The core aspect of all of the above fantasies was my own experience of myself as a submissive, polite, obedient and helpless woman. Due to society's stereotyping, these qualities -submissiveness,politeness,obedience,helplessness etc appears to suit to women more than men, so if my own feminine self image has these qualities, then my feminine experience becomes stronger. So the deeper psychological intention behind my "Wife" fantasy is to boost my feminine self image. My attraction is to my own image as a wife. Not to the husband who comes in the dream.

I guess I have made my point. If you are a crossdresser or crossdreamer, and if you feel attracted to a man, do a deeper reflection. Chances are that your attraction is to your own feminine self image. At least some of you, in the surge of emotions, might interpret this as a deep love felt towards the man and you might even act upon getting into a relationship. I am not here to condemn doing that, but I'd like you to reflect upon this point before doing that.

Love,
Jaya

Crossdreaming - Add this word to your dictionary!

Many times, when I chat online with people who describe themselves as "crossdressers", they tell me that they actually don't crossdress much. What they are really attracted to is the idea of "becoming a woman". They have tried crossdressing as part of actualizing this dream, but crossdressing is not their ultimate propelling force. Here, crossdressing is the expression of a deeper and subtler part of their inner self. But still they call themselves as crossdressers because they don't have a more suitable word to describe themselves. This is logically justified because they do crossdress sometimes.

There is a psychological trap here. If you are a guy who likes to visualize yourself as a woman but not much crazy about physical crossdressing, then if you label yourself as a crossdresser, that prevents you from going deeper into yourself and understanding your real inner nature. So I am, advocating the use of the words - "Crossdreaming"  and "Crossdreamer" !!!

Crossdreamer is a man who likes to imagine himself as a woman. Or a man who dreams of having a female body or female attributes (Please note that I am writing here only about male to female crossdreamers. There are plenty of female to male crossdreamers, but my experience restricts me from writing about it.).

Considering my experience, I never had a big urge to crossdress. I loved the idea of being a beautiful, humble, caring woman. I was the heroine of my own dreams. In some of my fantasies, I was a beautiful princess who is admired and loved by everyone. Sometimes, an evil witch comes and abuducts me and makes me her maid, with the intention of sactificing me at the end. Sometimes, the witch shows kindness to me seeing my feminine helplessness. But sometimes, the witch stays cruel and a prince charming comes and rescueues me!

Oops, I'm chattering too much into my fantasies (Silly girl, I am!). The point I wanted to make is that even though I had these fantasies, I was not attracted to wear female dress. I have done it a few times, just to appreciate myself as a woman in the mirror. But the source of joyful feeling did not originate from wearing a female dress, but it came from my mental image of myself as a woman. Because of this, I did not want to use the label "crossdresser" for myself, but liked to describe myself as a "male with a feminine side", until I read about the term "Crossdreamers". So, now I can say that I was a "Crossdreamer" !

There are genuine crossdreamers out there in the online world who wishes to share their fantasies and express themselves. A good reference would be the website http://www.crossdreamers.com/. Also, there is a genuine forum of crossdreamers - http://www.crossdreamlife.com/

Before concluding this post, something needs to be mentioned about a major psychology work in this area. An American psychologist Ray Blanchard introduced the term "Autogynephilia". He defined Autogynephilia as a condition in which a man is turned on by the thought of being a woman. Further information and criticisms of this theory is available out there in the internet.

Concluding, my attempt was just to invite the attention of readers to the concept of crossdreaming. And to suggest that some of you who consider yourselves as crossdressers may be just crossdreamers. I accept that there are genuine crossdressers who are passionate about wearing female dress. They are correct in describing themselves as crossdressers. But those who don't have a great passion for crossdressing but still have fantasies of being a female, could consider freeing themselves from an inaccurate label :-).

As I mentioned, the purpose of this blog is to share with my readers some of my humble thoughts and reflections from my inner journey. Identifying myself as a crossdreamer was a step in my journey which helped me look deeper into myself. I'll write more in the coming posts.

Regards,
Jaya

Purpose of this blog

Hi Readers,

This blog is dedicated to all men who have a fantasy of becoming a woman. Some of us try to actualize this fantasy by crossdressing. Some are brave and lucky enough to come out as a woman in public, and even to get a sex reassignment surgery. They are the brave ones for whom expressing their femininity is their destiny in life. They are brave enough to stand the intolerance of society and follow their dream. I have my admiration and respect for these brave girls!

But, there is a big majority who comes under my category - They have feminine fantasies, but they don't wish to reveal this to anyone. They don't want to come out as a crossdresser in public or do surgery to change their gender. One reason is that they have big responsibilities in life and fulfilling these responsibilities require them to be men. Eventhough they like the idea of imagining themselves as females and crossdressing occassionally, they have higher priorities in their life which demands them to be males. These type of people might end up in serious depression in long run, unless they deal with this emotional problem. They might become guilty about having these feminine fantasies. They might get addicted to these fantasies and lose focus on other areas of life.

I belonged to the second type mentioned above. I crossdressed occassionally, and dreamed of being a beautiful girl. I became addicted to these fantasies. But then these fantasies started making my dry out. I started feeling depressed for not being born as a girl. I started feeling that I am inefficient in my life and responsibilities because society expected me to be a true man. But I had my priorities in my life. I never wanted to cause any worry to my parents. And there is a girl who loves me very dearly, and I wanted to be the man of her life and make her happy. Also, success in my studies and career was a high priority for me. So, I was determined to find out how to make my life happy and not to let my feminine side make me feel guilty and inefficient. Then I took over a quest to find out ways to incorporate my feminine side into my normal life in a healthy way, so that it makes me a better person. I researched in web, did some thinking and reflection about myself and chatted with some CDs/TVs/TGs in the online world. My research took almost 3 years, but now I can confidently say that I am not worried about having a feminine side. I am not addicted to the feminine side either. Instead I have accepted that this "Inner woman" is a part of me and I am able to move on in my life.

This blog is intended to be a helping hand for all "men with a feminine side", who are going through the struggle I went through. I know many people are out there struggling in frustration and disappointment - trying to escape from real life, taking shelter in fantasy.  In the next posts, I will write down some helpful facts, information, web resources etc. which might be helpful. Also, I'll share some thoughts and reflections based on my experience.

One important thing is that I am not a psychiatrist or counselor and hence these posts should not be taken as "expert advice". Whatever I am writing here is purely based on the experiences I picked up during my personal journey of self discovery.I would be very happy if some of my struggling friends found the information in this blog helpful.

Wishing all of you a happy life!

With love,
Jaya