Growing up as a girl is different from growing up as a boy. I don’t think that’s a statement anyone would disagree with, no matter their views on gender roles in a broader sense. We’re constantly being fed differing instructions about how we’re supposed to function in the world– what we should wear, who we should hang out with–even our personality traits become a constant trial-and-error balancing act. It can end up leaving us feeling confused and lost about who we’re meant to be.
I think that one of the first things that we are encouraged to be as young women is caring. We’re expected to put all of our needs aside for those around us, whether that be our friends’, siblings’, or even parents’. As girls, it’s our job and responsibility to use our rich capacity for caring to make everyone around us as comfortable as possible. However, when we choose to put that care and attention into something that doesn’t fit the mold, we’re shamed by society. Girls who react strongly to things like boybands, pretty clothes, makeup, and fictional storylines are branded as shallow and ditzy. Even the women who choose to express how ferociously they love their children or their partners are shamed and ignored, and called irrational and over-emotional by the same institutions who expect no less from their wives, mothers, and sisters.
Seems like a pretty impossible situation, doesn’t it? I think a lot of young women growing up in this culture would agree. Personally, I decided very young that I never wanted to be seen as irrational or “too girly” (aka, too passionate about something that may seem trivial to someone else), so I kind of numbed myself to a lot of the things that I secretly would have enjoyed. I refused to admit I was a One Direction fan, pretended to be impartial to cute dogs I saw on the street, and went through multiple phases where I refused to show any affection towards my parents or little sister in public. Caring too much about any of those things was girly, therefore silly, and therefore a side of me that I could never let anyone see, ever.
As I got older, this made me really sad. I love pop music. I adore cute animals and love to give them treats and pets and talk to them in funny voices. And my family means more to me than most other things in the world.
I see this same thing in the middle schoolers I teach, in my peers, and even in the little 3-to-4-year-old preschoolers at the daycare I poured my heart and soul into over the summer.
During middle school and the first few years of high school, I was deeply unhappy with who I was. I felt like I had no power or control over my life, my friends, or how the world viewed me. It was only when I was 16 and COVID-19 forced me to spend some time with myself that I figured out why–I was allowing a society that would never be happy with who I was to dictate who I pretended to be.
The major shift in perspective that this brought me was that there is only one thing I can control in life, and that’s what I choose to love and care about. I am a fiercely loving person, and that’s not a weakness, but a virtue, and a vital part to who I am. And the best part? It’s 100% my choice who and what I get to love and care about.
In her song, “My Love Mine All Mine”, Mitski talks about how nothing in the world is free, except for the love she chooses to give. The lyrics of this song resonated with a deep part of me that mourns lost happiness because I let the world take my power of loving away. However, it also gave me hope. Because it’s true: my love is the only thing in the world that is totally, 100% mine.
So now, as an adult trying to figure out who I am, I try to find power in loving. I choose to love things that I used to be shamed for, like Taylor Swift and puppies. I let myself be a little bit boy crazy for my boyfriend because, well, he’s my boyfriend and I’m allowed to adore him. I call my parents almost every day, and gush about how amazing my sister is to all of my friends. And I let myself connect with preschoolers I work with everyday because I want to teach them that love is powerful and something to be proud of.
Ultimately, there’s no getting back the time I spent repressing the things I loved in order to project myself as more rational to an unappeasable society. But I can make up for it now by choosing to use my love, my greatest strength, to try and make it so that some other little girl out there won’t be afraid to take her love and own it.
