Today’s Drifting Thoughts: The Sexuality Issue Revisited

I woke up extremely late today, so that pretty much means that I ended up skipping classes again.

So as I just decided to reach out for the papers today, something did caught my attention. There’s one article, “Keys to change” [The Star, Section 2, page 2] about a NGO called Real Love Ministry (RLM). To summarise it, basically it is an organization which basically helps homosexuals in resolving the three critical issues in their lives through a programme called The Seasons of Recovery¹. They believed that “there could be many influences that lead someone to a homosexual lifestyle, but only three specific triggers without which a person which a person will never enter into such a lifestyle.”

Quoting Edmund, the founder of RLM, “RLM is not an organization that forces people to change. If you are still gay but want to experience real love from us, we will love you. (However) Homosexuals may seem to be ‘enjoying’ it, but there is no real joy in their lives. Gay but unhappy.”

The three main triggers identified, and according to them, needs to be resolved are:

• The Self issue: There could be something about yourself that you hate, be it your gender or appearance
• The Vacuum issue: Which will be triggered when you want to ‘suck’ another man or woman into your life, and according to them, is related to a lack of parental love
• The Barrier issue: Which is either a barrier towards people of the same gender, opposite gender, or both

An interesting note is that it mentioned that “Many straight people, however, may also have any of those issues without feeling any attraction for people of the same gender”.

After reading this article through, it does gave me a lot of room to reflect and ponder about my own sexuality issue and my current situation. Well… probably due to my current situation or issues, it is really hard for me to read it without being judgemental at all, but being able to do so does gave me some sort of insight of myself. Until now, there are quite a lot of qustions floating around in my head pertaining to my own sexuality (currently bisexual, but more inclined to homosexual).

The main question right now is… Is homosexuality my own true nature? Come to think of it, up until now I can’t seem to find my answers, probably due to the fact that I firmly believe that love knows no barriers and I have pretty much ruled out sexuality from the love equation (as in sexuality doesn’t have anything to do with love, only with attraction).

But what I’m much more interested in is the attraction factor, come to think of it, it really seems that all this while I have been desiring something… something that I believe that I’m lacking of… or probably that something that I’m not aware that I have in myself. This is a quality that I always seen in men but most of the time not in women, which does makes me feel more attracted to the ones of my own gender and not the opposite. The only hint I had is that this feeling makes me feeling comfortable and secure… probably it has to do with power and assertiveness, but I don’t really get that concrete grasp of an answer.

Looking back into my past… well, honestly there aren’t many traumatic experience that I can recall: my parents and relatives have been supportive, loving and caring all the while, and I do have quite a lot of great friends. Well… it’s not that I’m not born without issues of my own. I still remember vividly how the people in my environment treated my soft nature when I was a kid. When I was a kid, I see myself more of an introvert, shy child who like to spend time alone and cries a lot. And it always seems to me that the adults always try to force “manly” behaviour in me while suppressing my soft nature (especially my tendency to cry easily); while the boys always bullied and tease me because I was seen as a weaker kind (of course, I say this from my current prespective, which in many cases, my views might be drastically distorted).

However… thinking more about it… it always seems that… ever since a child, I don’t seems to get the things I wanted easily. It’s like… my brother and sisters seems to get all the things I really wanted, be it toys, books, snacks, clothes or anything, first, and I’m always the last one to be considered. Well… it’s not that I don’t get anything at all, in fact I can say that I was treated equal with my siblings, just that I always didn’t get what I desired for the most. But all the while, I’m always convincing myself, maybe either because of fear of punishment or my own perception and views, that it’s OK: that because I’m the eldest among my siblings and I should give way and let my brother and sister have the best. And probably this has made me quite passive in many ways, giving way to others while sacrificing my own, just because I feel that it was the best for the common good… and probably has become an issue on my own, looking at it.

Fast forward through time, I can’t stop but thinking about Choon Hui, for him being the most influential person in my present life. Looking back at it, just by hanging around with him, he made me realise a lot of things. Well… If it weren’t him, probably I won’t be typing this entry because it’s through him that I’m starting to be aware of these issues that I have listed here in this entry. And slowly, knowing him better and better, I’m starting to form a deep platonic relationship (refer to the note below) with him, and this love that I had for him has become my greatest support in living my own life. Through time, I have my own up and downs being with him: from extremely engaging conversation to knowing that he’s already attached to somebody, but I have accepted that reality gradually and all I desired for… is to retain, maintain, and, if possible, improve my friendship with him.

But just after the incident when he found out about my feelings for him makes everything falling apart, just after that incident, he treated me significantly differently… and through the interactions we had I just feel like as if this deep platonic relationship has been taking away from me. And guess what RLM mentioned as the Vacuum issue does definitely ring a bell in me: it does seems that all the while I’m trying extremely hard to ‘suck’ him back into my own void. And of course this definitely have to do more harm than good.

Linking these factors together did somewhat make sense now… Probably all the while… I have been having this strong feeling that… I don’t fit in, and I really, really wanted to fit into somewhere. Somewhere which I’ll be accepted and loved for who I am. I don’t want to be the odd one out always and I really don’t want to be included temporarily because I was “needed” for a particular cause. I really… don’t want to fade into the background… as if I don’t even exist…

…

Somewhat spending an hour or two typing all these out does open my eyes a little. And I think I would really need to start to work on the more important stuff (i.e. my final year project and my assignments).

Take care!

1. Season 1: The Educational Season — The beginning of the programme in which each member is assigned to a “befriender”, a trained RLM worker who will spend personal one-on-one time with him/her. The member will be asked questions pertaining to his/her sexual lifestyle from time to time and the member must overcome the “self” issue before graduating
2. Season 2: The Celibate Season — The member must abstain from sex and romance and is to focus on deep platonic relationship (DPR) which are deep, noon-sexual friendship as the only solution to resolving her/her “vacuum” issue
3. Season 3: The Dating Season — The member goes out witho those of the opposite gender as a way of resolving barrier issue, but it is to be noted that dating is not equivalent to a long-term relationship. They can only pretend to date, but will not be romantically involved
4. Season 4: The Marraige Season — The final stage, and can only be entered only the member has gone through the first three season. In this season, a person is committed to a long-term relationship.

For the full article and the accompanying columns, you can read them up here:

http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2005/1/12/features/9448407&sec=features