Any thoughts?
It seems to me that questioning oneself is what this experience relates to. It is not an identity rather a self discovery process. Self doubt, imposter syndrome, and body, gender, and identity dysphoria are the concerns of such a person, and the questioning is inward rather than outward.
I can only add my thoughts on the subject from an outside perspective because I am not trans myself. But I’ve met and spoken to trans people over the years and asked them questions like these because it is a rather unique experience.
I think, as with most things involving identity, there’s a lot of nuance to it. Some people may go through body dysphoria, identity crisis, self-rejection, or imposter syndrome and initially believe transitioning is the solution, only to later realize that it wasn’t right for them. Others experience something much more persistent and deeply rooted from a very early age.
You also have people who are simply naturally more masculine or feminine without being transgender. A girl may naturally prefer boyish clothes, sports, playfighting, and other masculine things and grow into a masculine woman/butch lesbian. But even then, masculinity and sexuality aren’t the same thing. A masculine woman can be straight, and a very feminine man can still be attracted to women.
Then you have people where it seems to go deeper than expression. It isn’t simply “I’m a masculine woman” or “I’m a feminine man,” but a deeper feeling that their body or the sex they are perceived as doesn’t correspond with how they experience themselves internally. In those cases, transitioning can feel like the way to resolve that disconnect.
The roll of the dice in becoming human can be very random. Most people fall somewhere around the typical pattern of males being more masculine and females being more feminine, but humanity produces all kinds of combinations. You can have feminine straight men, masculine gay men, feminine gay men, masculine lesbians, and people whose gender identity itself doesn’t align with their body.
From an energetic perspective, I tend to think of humanity as an alchemical concoction of masculine and feminine energies.
Most people seem to have a balance that corresponds closely enough with their physical sex that they never question it. Sometimes you get a male with a very strong feminine nature who is still perfectly comfortable being male. Sometimes you get a masculine woman who is perfectly comfortable being female. And perhaps in more extreme cases, that inner configuration differs so strongly from the body that it creates a profound sense of disconnect.
I personally interpret transgender people as one of the stranger variations that can happen when consciousness, personality, sexuality, body, and masculine/feminine qualities combine.
I also don’t think every transgender person necessarily arrived there through the exact same way. Some of it may be biological or developmental, some may involve very early psychological imprints, and some of it may involve things we simply don’t understand yet.
I believe consciousness is much more malleable than we currently understand, so I leave open the possibility that very deeply rooted patterns could be reprogrammed. But… it is unfortunately extremely rare or just extremely difficult to do. Modern psychology has not discovered a reliable way to simply reprogram someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity, and religion often only succeeds in making people suppress how they feel rather than actually removing the feeling.
For some people, questioning themselves may eventually lead them back toward accepting their biological sex. For others, the disconnect seems so persistent that transitioning ends up being the path through which they feel most at peace.
So I don’t think there is one clean explanation. Humanity simply produces a huge spectrum of bodies, personalities, sexualities, identities, and different configurations of masculine and feminine energy. Transgender people may simply represent one particularly strong form of that variation.
Thankyou Sammy for such a considerate response.
I think it means a great deal simply to be listened to and accepted with kindness wherever one is in their own process of questioning or wherever they are at.
And the experience itself of self-realisation varies dramatically for many different people.
I have been suprised to learn how many question for years and even decades without consciously coming to a full acceptance or understanding of themselves and I believe this can be informative for many aspects of life.
Any yet others experience far less resistance due to many different contributing factors
I think I had the incorrect assumption that a person who identifies as “transgender” knows who they are, when this is very often not the case until they have gone through this kind of self questioning.
And to question ones own gender is questioning something very profound about ones own identity and experience of themselves and the world. It almost takes a whole new language of thought to do so.
But I dont want to speak for other people. These are just things I have observed from being aware of such things for a short amount of time
I also dont wish to put a negative spin on things. Because although the things I said about self doubt ect exists, there is a great deal of excitement, joy, and happiness is discovering who you are and where you feel most aligned
Yeah, I think the distinction you’re making between questioning and knowing is very very important. We often talk about identity as if people simply discover a label that was sitting there fully formed, when for many people it seems much more like a gradual process of noticing patterns and slowly understanding what actually feels authentic.
And I agree that focusing only on dysphoria can make the whole experience sound much darker than it necessarily is. There are certainly cases of trans people that have intense body dysmorphia so I think it’s important to acknowledge that. The issue is that in those cases, from the outside, some people immediately approach them as though they’re simply crazy or confused, often with almost no sympathy, while believing they’re somehow defending that person’s sanity. I can’t imagine many situations where contempt is a effective way of helping someone understand themselves.
But just like there is certainly some dysmorphia, there can also be a genuine sense of relief and even joy when someone finally finds a way of understanding themselves that makes pieces of their life suddenly make sense.
A 2024 JAMA pediatrics study found very high satisfaction and low regret several years after adolescents began gender affirming medical care, while another recent 2026 longitudinal study found that 94% of children who had socially transitioned were still identifying as transgender about five years later.
That doesn’t settle every debate surrounding transition and I am personally against younger people getting gender changin surgeries and I’m not too fond of gender affirming medical care… but I can’t quite deny that recent studies do tend to find that a high percentage of these people do end up satisfied and that it all isn’t just temporary confusion.
All that said, I think there’s something broadly human in the transgender experience even if the specific experience itself is unique. Most of us inherit ideas about who we are before we’re old enough to question them…gender just happens to be one of the deepest layers a person can end up examining.
I also like this. These are tough and controversial topics these days but I think the number of us that are still here are very capable of having mature conversations regarding the multi layered issues going around these days. I find that I can’t openly discuss these things with people anymore online so I hope we can perhaps do that here.
Body dysphoria is something almost everyone can relate to
I will say now for clarity I am speaking from first hand experience as a “trans” woman
You know
I was on vacation in Thailand recently
As I was going through a shopping mall there were some shops and it seemed a lot of the employees were trans, mostly I’ve noticed they look like guys wearing girls outfits.
Tbh you can feel over there this is totally normal. It’s so normal I didn’t even think about it. I would even say they were more funny and helpful.
I would say, let people have and make their own choices. There’s no mutual harm in it either. So why not.
Yeah I think in Thailand transness is a visible part of culture, not only visible, I think they are their own representation in media and culture so everyone is familiar. The culture supports them somehow and I guess they are valued I really dont know. Somehow the religious culture supports or allows for them to more easily express themselves. It can be a difficult conversation to have because it is easy to not have the right words and to say things that are not quite accurate but are almost accurate. But nevertheless its good to have these conversations and develop. I think their is good and bad in a lot of these things so talking about them is good
Talking about things is the most important in my opinion. Somehow nowadays lots of times people rather avoid topics. But the irony is then they make assumptions about these topics and about people - without knowledge or deeper understanding. But without talk, without communication, we will not understand one another. In my opinion, more communication → more understanding → more harmony among everyone.
This applies to any topic.
I often think that trans people face a major, challenging task in questioning our views on the importance/unimportance of gender. (Their souls taking this task into this 3D-life to teach all of us) A human being is a human being. A soul is a soul.
I even imagine a future where we do not identify with any gender at all. Trans people are true pioneers. Ahead of their time. If we all let go of the need for everyone to fit into a specific gender, it would relieve the pressure on those who feel they do not fit the biological sex they were born with. All I wish for trans people—and everyone else—is a life where one is free to be whoever one feels they are and to feel good.
Personally, I identify with the gender I was born with: woman. But my heart goes out to everyone struggling with gender identity. My heart breaks when thinking about the cruelty they often meet from other people. Though, cruelty only comes from people being afraid , with difficulties in keeping their hearts open.
I live in NYC, which is the tranny capital of the US and they are all wildly accepted here. There are about 70,000 trans in the city which amounts to less than 1% of the population (bout .57% or something like that). I see like 1 or 2 trans people every 2 weeks and I take the subway everyday.
For the life of me, it baffles me that it became this massive problem that the country decided to focus in on and make political decisions about. Smh..
I think if human consciousness genuinely evolves collectively, then yes, I can see that happening. Higher consciousness tends to move beyond rigid identification. People may still have identities, but they probably would not cling to them as tightly or feel such a strong need to define themselves through them.
What makes this even more interesting is that technology may push us in that direction too regardless if we mentally evolve. As genetic engineering becomes more advanced (getting there), the body itself may become far more changeable than it is now. Someone may eventually be able to alter their biology in ways that today would sound almost impossible. So, a trans would theoretically be able to actually become biologically female/male.
Then you add things like merging with machines, synthetic bodies, or even the possibility of consciousness existing digitally in some form. At that point, identity becomes much harder to anchor to one fixed body.
That is why I think the gender conversation happening now may actually be an early version of a much bigger question humanity is eventually going to face. If the body itself becomes fluid, then ideas like gender, age, and even what it means to be human could become much less fixed than they are today.
And I am not even sure whether that would make us less obsessed with identity or more obsessed with it. Maybe we eventually move beyond labels altogether. Or maybe technology gives people endless new ways to reinvent themselves and identity becomes an even bigger obsession.
Either way, I think the lines are probably going to keep getting blurrier. Not just between male and female, but between the self and the body itself. And once that starts happening, we are going to have to seriously rethink what we even mean when we say, “This is who I am.”
You have to remember, the truly beautiful passing trans women aren’t walking around naked.
You don’t know they are trans, you just think they are women.