Feminism, Ideals, Beauty and Self-Kindness

Lately, I've been thinking about how we date as feminist, kinky submissives in a patriarchal, sexist world.

For years, that Gandhi quote: "Be the change you wish to see in the world" felt like a reproach if I couldn't live by my ideals every waking moment of every day.  Heaven forbid that I would get thirsty and not have a full, refillable water bottle around, because buying a disposal water bottle felt like I was failing as a human being.

This led me to a lot of criticism of myself for not living up to my feminist ideals.

And I realized, my internalized feminism had become another way to criticize myself.  If I wasn't happy with how I looked, or with an element of my life that mirrored the sexism of our society, not only would I criticize myself for that, I'd also criticize myself for thinking non-feminist-sanctioned-thoughts.  Oy ee vay!

Needless to say, I didn't usually live up to my own ideals.  And in a way, it was both humble (oh, I'm bad) and arrogant (oh, if only I could resist that problems in the world, I could be the change and change the world).

Recently, I've started to see that yes, I failed at single-handed changing the world.  But the moral arc bends slowly, and I have helped bend it a teensy, weensy, weensy, teensy bit towards greater justice.

Now, I want to have more kindness for myself and for people caught in a bad system.

My mother had plastic surgery a few years ago because she was having trouble seeing (her eyelids drooped) and I supported her, completely.  I wonder, however, if I would have been so supportive if I hadn't already known her and loved her.

But I have to acknowledge the difficulties of being a female in this society.  Wanting a partner isn't a capitulation to the patriarchy.  I think it is just human.  And that happening within a context where the men have way more power (although I have more power than most women ever in history, and even though I crave to surrender a part of that, I would still control way more of my life than most women ever have) and that does confine choices for women.  A lot of men judge women by their looks.  Wanting to look good in that context isn't a stupid choice--it is the logical choice.  Even as we may want to change the system, we can't just sacrifice our lives to 'be the change.'

This has been a difficult one for me.  In the last few years, I've gotten into the cuter part of single women my age.  But I also know that based on how society defines beauty, it won't last that long.  I'm not planning on running off to have plastic surgery.  But I'm spending more money than I'd care to admit on moisturizer.

I'm also considering lying about my age.  I've had so many people lately tell me I should lie about my age.  Everyone says "say you're 32."  I actually have been carded in the last 2 bars that weren't a regular hangout for me, so clearly I don't look like I'm in my 40s.  I don't want to start a relationship on a lie, but I also wonder if, with internet dating, it makes sense to lie.  I just don't know.

Lately, either a lot of men are lying (a lot) about their age, or a lot of men my age are aging really badly.  Gollum claimed to be 47, but I'd be surprised if he was only 57.  He walked like a senior citizen and smelled old.  They used to say that women get old and men get distinguished.  But lately, it seems to me that the opposite is happened among the people I know who claim to be in their 40s.  (And I just had a 29 year old surgeon tell me he has a crush on me from my pictures.  That's nice.)