I am not the Better Man...Now What?

At age 4 my family moved into our first house…a real fixer upper. To my young brain, my parents poured all of their energy into the house while ignoring me. One weekend my grandparents came over and everyone was painting not paying attention to me. Mid afternoon I exited the house, approached the step ladder my father was working on and kicked it with all my might while saying, “Daddy has poop in his pants!” To my four-year-old brain this was the worst accusation you could ever hurl.

Note I did not say/do this to my mom, grandma or grandpa.

Though, I was not aware of the cause and effect at the time…my mom and dad realized that they had not bought me any new toys in a long time and took me shopping. In short, they rewarded me for saying the meanest thing I could think of because they wanted to make me happy.

And thus an entitled princess was born.

My parents, inadvertently, taught me it is okay to be a bitch and more importantly sometimes it gets me what I didn’t even know I wanted. Through the years, I relied on this to produce results. If I was nasty enough, distressed enough, or offensive enough the people (particularly men) I am closest to would give me what I wanted. And it worked. Except when it didn’t. And when it didn’t it really didn’t. Silent treatment, break ups and domestic violence are just a few examples of it backfiring.

I now see the damage that I have done to those around me. To my mom, my sister, my dad, my past boyfriends and my current boyfriend I am sorry for those times when I have not empowered you. When I did not trust you to provide for me or make me happy without my demanding or cajoling you into it.

I am not alone. Girls/Women are trained that this is acceptable behavior. Many times, I was rewarded or at the very least indulged. Books, most written by women, tell us to act this way if you want to catch and keep a man. Look at two very successful relationship books THE RULES and WHY MEN LOVE BITCHES.

Inarguably, I can be a princess. I tried to be a rules girl and I have no trouble being a bitch. All in my attempt to be a better man and win at whatever competition in which we were participating. My inner feminist must do this to not be dominated by men. In part, my move to California was my effort to prove I was a better man. I think it is time to try something new. To stop striving to be the superior male and to be a women.

Being a woman, a scary possibility, is unfamiliar to me. An inquiry I am engaged in and terrified to not rely my prior skill set. I would like to know from you, what does it look like to be a woman? What are feminine characteristics and qualities?