And Imara has our first takeaway, which is - there is no one-size-fits-all to your gender journey, aka you get to pave your own way. Imara said her transition led to alignment in her life, which she says is the key to freedom and liberation. Imara is a trans woman who started TransLash Media, an organization that creates content to shift the current culture of hate towards trans people. She's one of Time Magazine's most 100 influential people of 2023. And I'm using cisgender for people who gel with their gender assigned at birth.Īt the start of the episode, we heard from Imara Jones. And I'm using that word as a general term for all various and multifaceted and sparkling identities that fall under it - identities like nonbinary and gender expansive. My heart is cheerleading with you and for you.Īnd I'm going to use the word trans in this episode as shorthand for transgender, because that's how I talk. Committing to knowing yourself in deeper ways is really frigging special. Wherever this finds you, congratulations. For others, that inkling that your gender might be bigger than what you've been taught can be brand new information. Also, can we put that quote on a T-shirt?įor some of us, exploring our gender is reaching back into our childhood and returning to a young self-knowledge. It's been one of my favorite quotes for decades because that place of not knowing - it's so real and tender. And his teacher says, not knowing is most intimate. It comes from a Buddhist story where a monk is going on a pilgrimage, and he's not really sure where he's headed. There's this quote I love - not knowing is most intimate. We're going to share some tools in this episode that can help you explore your gender and identity before you even consider things like medical changes and will help set the stage so you can find your North Star and move forward into the galaxy of yourself. The journey for me was a series of steps where I insisted on centering the love I had for myself and the lifelong knowledge I've had of myself. And honestly, that's my wish for every human being on the planet. The way I do explain my experience is by saying I embraced my authentic self and began to make my body a home. It makes me think that I started life as one person and morphed into a totally different human being. I transitioned at age 40, and I'm using air quotes over the word transitioned because I don't use that word for myself. And I'm a guy with an untraditional beginning, aka a trans guy. I'm an audio storyteller and producer and reporter, and I teach teenagers how to tell stories on the radio. NORRIS: Do you consider transitioning coming into alignment for you? JONES: Because one of the things that drives discomfort, sadness, rage, a whole host of things, is the sense of separation or parts of ourselves being at war with each other or the world. Amara says we can suffer when we don't have alignment in our lives. She says alignment is the connection between who we are, what we do and how we exist in the world. And alignment is what makes life rich, right? IMARA JONES: I think that whenever we can be ourselves fully as human beings, that it's always healing because it's alignment. This episode is a love letter for any adult who wants to explore their gender and identity because the journey to know yourself is intimate and worthwhile. MARIELLE SEGARRA, BYLINE: You're listening to LIFE KIT from NPR.
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