#33 Sleepover modesty question

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Gabby
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#33 Sleepover modesty question

Post by Gabby » Wed Dec 17, 2008 11:16 pm

#33 Sleepover modesty question / Not in communication with friends

Dear Annie: I am a 12-year-old girl. My friends and I have lots of sleepovers. Here’s the problem. When it comes time to go to bed, they change their clothes right in front of me. This makes me really uncomfortable.

I never say anything, because I don’t want them getting upset with me. I simply change in the bathroom. They think this is weird. They say, “We’re all girls, so it’s OK.” Am I being weird? Prefer Privacy in the Northwest.

Dear Privacy: No, you aren’t being weird. A lot of people, your age and older, prefer privacy when it comes to undressing. Your friends’ lack of inhibition is neither right nor wrong. Do whatever is most comfortable for you. You don’t have to please anyone else. —Annie

Gabby's Reply
 
Hi Privacy: Weird? Yes. Of course! But no more so than the rest of us. Now is a good time to choose to act weird from time to time so that you don’t spend your life trying to be cool.

Let’s clean up two lies. Did you know that even unconscious lies have an undesirable effect? One of the benefits of hanging around sharp (conscious/awake) friends is that you can have lots of fun catching each other lying and in so doing keep each other awake. The main bennie is that if you start catching yourself lying now you’ll save yourself the consequences of thousands of perpetrations that accumulate during the lifetime of most adults. A lie caught and acknowledged releases its karma. For example: "I'll be with you in a minute." And more than a minute passes. "I get that I took longer than a minute. Thanks."

Lie #1: “This makes me really uncomfortable.” We don’t know the source of your uncomfortableness. What we do know is that something triggers it. That is to say, it’s there, lying dormant, waiting for just the right stimulus to trigger it. The way you describe it you make it seem as though they make you uncomfortable. This is called blame. The truth is the uncomfortableness is left over from some other event. It’s called an incomplete. Described responsibly it would read, “I experience uncomfortableness when….” And, we’ll stop here because you will have to look and see at what moment in time (age, date, the exact incident) the uncomfortableness began. I’m guessing it began even before any undressing. Possibly just at the thought, the realization, “Oh oh, it’s time for bed, it’s time to…” triggers it. It could be that you father looked at you in in a way that caused you to have a flash forward premonition of where things could go if you didn't stop the sensations that come from another looking at you in admiration. Families that don't communicate openly, honestly, and spontaneously, words such as breasts, tease, and flirt, are not bantered about and as such everyone is suppressing thoughts resulting in bound up emotions.

Lie #2: “I never say anything, because I don’t want them getting upset with me.” It’s true, you might not say any words but you sure do communicate something. And, if truth be told it does upset* one or more. The way some people handle upset is to attack. We know because they get it and comment on the way you communicate your uncomfortableness. My sense is that they joke about it not because of your modesty but because of the way you draw attention to yourself by not saying what’s on your mind. Also, the reason you give is only your reason, it’s certainly not the truth. There is so much more going about this. What do you fear? What are you afraid might happen if they really really got upset with you? —that thought is much closer to the truth. Fear of being alone causes many teens to succumb to group pressure. You are to be acknowledged, that you have not given in to peer pressure. Many adults did as teens and now they have perfected their “comfortable acts” but underneath their act is uncomfortableness. Some individuals never get to tell the truth about their uncomfortableness about their body until they divorce and remarry someone who is a safe space for the truth to be told.

One pitfall to your embarrassment about your body is that you can use coy and naive and innocent as a flirting tool which works incredible well for a certain type of boy, one addicted to helping. They will seek you out so as to awaken you. Their game is over once you're able to act like whore. Then they move on to a new project another virgin. They are addicted to women who act naive. This would be a good reason to handle your embarrassment issue now so that you will attract mature partners.

Now let’s see what this is really about. It’s no accident that you reached out for advice. It's the beginning for you of discovering, what few adults have yet to learn. A problem persists because there is a lie somewhere. You have a problem. It persists because you have yet to tell the truth as to what it’s about. You have already revealed it. You have fear in your relationship with your friends. You have been afraid to communicate spontaneously, “I’m uncomfortable when I…. And I don’t know why.” Those two statements communicated into the room would transform your problem and your relationship with all of them. If they are sharp, one of them would say, “Why?” You’d probably try to brush them off saying, “I don’t know.” The most conscious/enlightened one would reply, “Duh? Of course you don’t know, that's why I'm asking. What’s your uncomfortableness about?” Or, "When did it begin, what age?" Asked with intention to get to the truth, it would open up the space for all of you to share what’s so. Based upon the way they make you wrong for changing in the bathroom, it’s a given that none, I say none, are comfortable with their own nudity in front of others. They have developed their “I’m cool act.” They do this so as to keep everyone’s focus away from themselves, on you. Else, they also would have to share all sorts of thoughts such as, “I’m embarrassed because of my small (or big) breasts.” “I’m embarrassed because of my skinny legs.” “I’m embarrassed because I’ve had the thought of what it would be like to snuggle next to another girl’s body, but I didn’t want to say it because I don’t want anyone thinking I’m gay.” “I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t dare look at anyone’s breasts too long even though we are all nude.” etc. etc. By the way, once you tell the truth about the source of your uncomfortableness, you’ll then have a choice. Now you are what some would call an automatic prude. You operate from a decision to change elsewhere. Better to choose to be modest than not have a choice.

It would work for you to recall the time, place, location, person(s) involved, the incident in your life from which you made a decision to not say what’s on your mind spontaneously. Once remembered share it with someone. That unacknowledged incident is serving as a barrier to you being open and honest and having those conversations with your friends. You are so lucky to have such wonderful friends. Use each other to talk about all the taboos, the uncomfortable thoughts stuck in each other’s mind. Make an agreement with each other to master open, honest, and spontaneous communication—zero thoughts withheld from each other. It’s an awesome game. With aloha, Gabby
 
* Upset meaning: One's mind is preoccupied, going along in a particular frame of mind, in a direction, on a path (mental or physical such a cooking or reading or thinking) and something happens (usually unexpected or unusual) to interrupt your process, your direction. It enters the mind unexpectedly, it upsets the process. An upset doesn't always trigger anger, sometimes it's only minor irritation or uncomfortableness; it's just an incident that disturbs the reality of the moment. It can be as innocuous as interrupting another before they have completed speaking or behaving differently than expected. Except for when there is a coaching agreement both the upsettor and the upsettee are equally unconscious.
 

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