Not Gay for Nothing

It's rare when I receive an email from a gay person, particularly a young, gay person, that is not only positive but inspiring–and maybe even influential–as was the case this past weekend.  

Shaun, who sent the email, has a refreshing take on his sexual orientation.  It's one I believe would serve a lot more of us if, perhaps, we were less caught up in how we think we're supposed to feel about being gay–that is, negatively–and more in the very real opportunity it offers us.         

I want to share this with you in the hope you take from it what I did:  a different perspective on what it means to be gay, and what we are challenged, as gay people, to do with something we can use not only to our advantage, but also to the advantage of others, if we learn to embrace it.      

In part, Shaun wrote:

...I got divine validation for the way I am and that it is not a mistake or anything like that, it is actually a blessing, a gift, and I chose before I came to Earth to be this way for specific reasons on a soul level, for my own growth and the growth of souls I would encounter....

And:

I know now that I was not meant to be alone and that I actually have a lot to do…on Earth, and I've been getting the feeling my homosexuality and my music are going to somehow coincide with each other at some point, probably on a large scale and that I'll help a lot of people in the process and the Universe has been preparing me for it.  

All of this insight from a young man who is only twenty years old.  Incredible.  As I wrote Shaun, when I was his age in 1979, I did everything I could to deny my homosexuality.  And I kept denying it for many years afterward.      

Being gay a blessing?  A gift?  If someone had told me back then I would eventually look at it that way…well, you know the rest.     

But, today, I believe that being gay is special because, first, I've been able to accept my sexual orientation fully.  That's the first step for all of us.  And, second, because I use what I know to be true about it to write this blog, allowing me to connect with gay and lesbian people from around the world.  

My life has been deeply moved in ways I could never have imagined by people like Shaun, who show me through their example how far we've come from the dark ages when I came out, and what the experience of being gay can and will be in the very near future.

I hope you are able to open your mind and your heart to take in what Shaun wrote, and to begin to see how being gay just might be a blessing and a gift in your life.  

It's all in how we look at it, isn't it?