Are you man or woman? How about male or female? Just because you are male does that mean that you are a man? What if you have female sexual organs but feel like neither a woman nor a man? Who makes up these rules anyway?
Think of a scale with 0 being in the middle and 100% Male at one end and 100% female at the other. Now stand in the middle and let go. Which way do you move? How far? Are you in the same place as you were a year ago? How about 20 years ago?
Gender Identity is your sense of being man, woman, neither or both. It is a scale of masculinity and femininity which can only be determined by you and your feelings. How do you feel compelled to express yourself? Which roles are you most comfortable in? If you were to ask these questions to every person in the world, you would likely get answers all over the scale with most being near the middle of each direction and only a few at each end, but more in the middle than at the ends.
Gender is a rainbow of identity and everyone falls somewhere on the scale, but not necessarily in congruence with your body. Transgender individuals often fall within the middle 50% of the chart, but opposite of their birth sex. A person who is right in the middle would be considered androgynous.
You may be asking, “This is all fine and dandy, but how does this affect me?” This matters because it affects your relationships and how you relate to others. The person you meet at work or at the mall may appear to be male or female but in fact be transgender. Putting that person into a box is the temptation and often in our society it is the teaching. What I am asking of you here is to see the rainbow and accept it. We all are going to have a different gender identity so it only makes sense to honor the differences while seeing the similarities. You have many ways of relating to this person and gender is but one.
See what you have in common with the person you are talking with, meeting for the first time, or sitting next to on the bus. Our gender identity is expressed in the way we dress, talk, and act. If this happens to be different than you, which most of the time it will be, accept them and find out who they are before putting them in a box or labeling them.
No matter what label or box they end up in make it OK and live by the golden rule. Now that you understand gender apply the same guidelines to sexual orientation and please do not assume you know one or the other. Sexual Orientation has little to do with ones Gender Identity!
Sequoia Elisabeth
Oneness Ministry 
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