#whitneysparks

Because you are. If you’re reading this and you’ve been following any of my blogs, chances are you’re interested in magic– imaginary fantasies or practical transformations or both. It is my duty, then, to tell you that, whether, because of or as a sign from your interest, you already embody that power of magic.

Before I begin to try to explain what is the power of magic– realistically, it is either safer or more powerful or both if it remains somewhat mysterious– let me cut to the chase, and say it lies largely in your interest– in your fascination, your desire to learn more. After that impetus or instinct, innate or cultivated through experience within you, the magic power is your ability to believe in yourself. Therefore, believe you’re magic!

You are magic. Even if you choose to take an ultra-realist approach, birth is pretty miraculous. So is growth. For what is magic but the effective yet previously unknown outcome of private workings? Failure, triumph– taken from any broad lens, whether scientific or spiritual, life, and yours in particular, can be and has been frequently astonishing.

The problem is, because they’re so mind-bogglingly and/or awe-inspiring, some facts of life are simply difficult to thoroughly accept. And these facts or events add up. It becomes hard to believe. But here’s one thing we can all believe in; we can believe in our enduring selves. Believe in your awareness of this, of everything. Just your ability to perceive, on multiple sensory levels is magic and powerful.

I admit I often have trouble believing in myself. I have battled with my inner demons for years. The upshot of dealing with these doubts is that I’ve come up with lots of ideas for how to begin overcoming low self esteem and depression, to boost confidence and productive aliveness.

The answer, in short, is self love. But the answer of how to, or better, how you love yourself is the magic.

The truth is, this magic I speak of, the magic of loving yourself, is powerful shit! This magic is power, and, as such, requires responsibility. In order to use your power responsibly, you need to know it. In order to know the power of you, you have to believe it.

And you can. (Just don’t ever stop!)

Thesis: If people, could learn to treat each other as friends– instead of worrying so much about love or if it's love or not– then we could perhaps more easily achieve what we call love (of any variety).

What if men treated women as their friends and not as their trophies or objective symbols of maturity ("possessions" compensating for their own lack of behavioral maturity)?

What if women treated men as their friends instead of as their lifeboats (another form possession just as bad for everyone involved)?

Sure! you say, I have both men and women and possibly other friends. Sure you do... But bear with me and consider that maybe you actually don't treat all your friends equally or the same way. Even based on gender. Chalk it up to overlooked societal conditioning (which, news flash, we all have!). 

I want nothing to do with betraying sisterhood and the importance of women's friendships. Conversation and camaraderie between women, from Lucretia Mott and Susan B. Anthony to Lorraine Hansberry and Nina Simone, perhaps to you and me, has the wonderful property of frequently evolving into a space where the personal becomes political, experience turns into narrative and/or ritual, creating an alchemy for social change.  

That said, somewhat curiously, women (at least in my experience and observation) tend to treat their female friendships as both full of potential and also as possibly temporary. Consider how women you know treat their friends, especially their women friends, as opposed to their lovers.

We go with the flow of each other. Women are not overly attached to other women in our lives, unless they are or have become family to us. We could be besties all through grad school, but then move to different cities for work and lose touch for years– without any hard feelings or accusations. Imagine if more women entered into romantic relationships, particularly with men, with the same ease, confidence, and conspicuous lack of neediness! I wonder if It would affect men’s notorious discomfort with commitment... rather than being scared off by "stage 5 clinger"s ...

Just as crucially, on the flip side: how do men you know treat their friends, especially other men, as opposed to their lovers? To me the difference is often even more pronounced! Like night and day. But what is the root of that difference? I'm not just talking about attraction. There’s a whole altered way of interacting, an ease (with men/friends) vs an artifice (with women/lovers).  I think this core shift in behavior is one of judgement. Men, in general, feel no need and no point to judging their friends.

Yet it is as if dudes (and let's face it, chicks too) must compulsively rate chicks, especially those with whom they want to be or are in a relationship. This judging includes holding women up on pedestals of their standards (which vary in height). Here lies the basis of women's constant battle with being objectified. It includes the madonna/whore complex, of course, hypocritical slut-shaming, and emotional insensitivity along with general insincerity/superficiality.  

Male judgment (and/or evaluation) of women has a lot to do with society, in general, and how men seek approval from other men– not for their behavior or actions or choices so much ("to each his own") but for their possessions, including, traditionally, their lovers, women/wives/mistresses, their houses, cars, and children’s future professions, etc. Men’s tastes specifically as expressed through appreciable objects, forms, numbers, values, and illusions have hijacked Western culture for far too long!

Even when not actively objectifying a lady-friend, it is so predictable how men will look ever-so-scrutinizingly for any faults or defects in a person before they are willing to "commit." I put “commit” in quotations because it’s about more- (or actually less?)- than a relationship, per se. I’m talking about a subtle agreement to be more consciously involved with a person rather than just fucking (over) her body or conceit. Which fucking, without being minimally consciously involved, is basically like masturbating using another person's genitalia as an extension of one’s hand... In my opinion, it sounds like vaguely consensual slavery.

We are human beings! Of course there will be defects! We have defects, you have defects, women all have them, and all men do, too. On top of that, there will even be unexpected changes to those defects. So get ready. In fact, either get over it, or...(with all the love in my heart and no offense) go fuck yourself! No person is a plaything... Unless s/he says s/he is (and even then beware).

Respect is a human right. Stop judging, stop grasping, stop posing, stop using, stop procrastinating, stop pretending, stop insisting. Start asking, start listening, start understanding, start committing, start caring. Be willing and do what it takes. Start to get it, and then get some!

Hell, you can have all you like, then! ...’cause our Friendship > Love.