Culture and Psychology W07 2.17.22

People who know me know that I am not very good at conforming. I am not very good at staying inside boxes and moreover, I strive to be an agent of change in the lives of people around me. For a very long time I was very insecure about myself for a huge variety of reasons, and some of those things still affect me to this day.

I grew up with my three brothers wanting to do everything they did. I would do just about anything for their attention and I went along with whatever game they were playing. We mostly grew up out in the desert outskirts of Grand Junction where we had to deal with scorpions and snakes and coyotes; we lived on a cistern and had to haul our water in an old truck. I was not particularly 'girlie' but I didn't really notice that I was any different than the cultural standard for girls until we moved over the Rockies to a town outside Colorado Springs. 

This was a much more urban setting; we lived in a cul-de-sac and had neighbors on every side and there were way more students in the district so I rode the bus to school; it was a total change and it was made very apparent to me very early on that I did not fall under the cultural norms that I should have.

My very first day of school in a new elementary school, somebody behind me on the bus mistook me for a boy because my hair was short. I was way taller than everybody my age (for context, I am 5'11" now, my dad is 6'5", and my brothers are all over 6'2". I grew up amongst giants) and I had never really been interested in most of the things the girls at school were interested in. I spent probably until the 7th grade trying to fit in. I hated being told I was different; I hated thinking that I was different. I hated being tall, I hated having short hair; I hated not fitting in.

I still feel that way sometimes. I still wish I didn't feel quite so looming and huge in comparison to my friends; I experiment a lot with my hair, but I am constantly wishing I could have long, highlighted hair like so many other girls... even though I don't really like maintaining long hair. I don't dwell on these things for long, but they creep up occasionally.

I've been so fortunate to have people in my life who have encouraged me and taught me that being different does not mean being less than and that the cultural expectations and standards around me are entirely made up. 

I don't know when it was, but I know there must have been a moment when I realized that I didn't need to change myself; that I was not created to be the same as everybody else, but to develop and take advantage of my differences in order to create a more whole society overall, and I've tried to maintain that attitude. I find, especially with how prevalent beauty standards are in the US, that the attack on my psyche is constant and if I am not constantly fighting back and reassuring myself and others that differences are beautiful, I fall into a mental depression that is not always easy to escape. 

Culture truly does create false problems, and the effects can be devastating on the human mind, but what can we do? It truly feels hopeless at times. There are so many people with so little cultural awareness; so little self-awareness; so little desire to break the mold... but that is where growth happens. There, and only there, is where our limits are tested and where we are free to become our true selves; exactly and precisely as Heavenly Father intended us to be.