Hello, dear soul, and welcome to the Light Bears Library. My name is Kate Harmony. In today's journal entry, I want to talk about why the gender war is so exhausting for us as INFPs, INFJs, and highly sensitive people. Now, the biggest reason is because we're just emotional sponges, right? We take in the feelings and the energy of the people around us. And when, you know, I'm not on social media, but even not being on social media, I can feel the stuff, especially having done a few videos now on highly sensitive men. And in the comments from men, from women, um, I can just, I can feel it. I can feel the the collective rage that's going on around this this topic. And it can be sort of physically assaulting to our nervous systems and to our souls, right? There's this this deep sense of grief, at least for me. And this is my journal entry, so this is my perspective as an INFP woman and my husband being an INFJ man. Um so I just feel like in this argument that is going on, we've lost the humanity, we've lost the the looking at each other as individual souls, you know, that we, you know, that we as INFPs and INFJs, we see, we see the human, we see the individual human, and then we see the category that every human is in. It's like, oh, this human belongs to the man category or the woman category. And it's like, but we don't see the world in this this black and white kind of way. You know, we we want to see the nuance, and for INFJs, it's like, why is it like that? And you know, like the the sort of the the more yeah, the why, I guess. And for me as an INFP, having grown up reading, reading novels and books and fantasy, it's it's just like we see all the different perspectives of all the characters, and we know that there's things that each character has that makes them unique, and that each person has carries suffering inside of them. And so when we say it's like, oh, men are like this and women are like this, we know that we know that that's not true, and that's a ridiculous statement because it's like the identity politics, right? Just I'm specifically talking about the you know, the men and women here, but you know, there's identity politics in all sorts of ways, you know. They're like this, they're like that, and it's like, oh, and sometimes I'll hear myself saying, you know, oh, you know, whatever, and and like a group, and they're like this. Even even just this video, right? Saying INFPs and INFJs. It's like, okay, seriously, but me, I'm an INFP from my perspective, right? So, um, but yeah, it's silly. It's silly. We're all just unique, unique souls. And so this kind of this gender war is it just feels so inauthentic and and unreal because I'm seeing like the suffering that's happening on both sides. And I wanted to share a little bit about my own story with this because it'll help to shape or to to understand my own perspective. It's like I grew up in a family with an ESTJ mom and who was, you know, on the feminist leaning spectrum, you know, quite, you know, she wore the the pants in, you know, and she was, you know, brought in a lot of the money. She had a better, well, maybe, maybe a better paying job than my dad. Um, you know, and then she also put us, you know, got us ready for school and all the things. So she was the organized one being an ESTJ. But, you know, um, and then my dad was an ESFP. So he was a feeling, a feeling man, and um, but he had an unpredictable temper. And so there was that aspect, and you know, they ended up getting divorced. So, you know, and then I went to univers, um, well, I guess in high school I I hung out with all mostly guys, and all the guys that I knew were really lovely humans. I mean, I'd gone to school with them for 12 years, and so I knew them pretty well. And so I never I never experienced any I never had any bad experiences with men in my life, and I'm very lucky. Um, so I realized that. Um, and then I went to university and got the university programming, as I like to say, of you know, I did a couple women's studies classes and I studied history, but you know, you do electives, and I volunteered at the University Sexual Assault Center, so I got um deep training on what actually happens around campus and you know, the stats, and it's pretty it was pretty horrendous, you know, listening to some of the stories that um women came to the center with and what had, you know, what had happened to them. So I, you know, there was a bit more bit more maybe of a creation of of men and women. But I guess the thing is is that uh for the most part the the men that I've been in relationship with in my life, all but maybe one or two, were all feelers. So they were all sensitive or gentle men. Whether they were highly sensitive, that's that's they probably weren't HSPs, but they were gentle, sensitive souls. So I always had really wonderful relationships with with the men in my life, and the men in that I had in community around me were were were gentlemen. So um, did they do bad stuff in their life? Of course they did. We all do. And it's like, but I had women in my life who had done bad stuff and done hurtful things. So it's like both none of us are perfect, right? And um, but I think that we don't take into account in this conversation about you know what men go through and as well as women. And that's why this is such a nuanced conversation that we need to have, you know, and maybe we just need to have it among the INFs. I don't know, to just m build that's kind of my vision. Maybe, maybe INFs need to build that bridge between us, you know, between INF men and INF women and and just talk about this stuff between amongst us, you know. Um but it's like men go through all sorts of parental abuse, bullying in school, in the workplaces, you know, um, psychological, sexual, physical assault by by partners or by people in the workplace. And so it's, you know, and I know this because my husband has experienced a lot of abuse, both psychological and physical, throughout his whole life. And um, well, I not not since I've been with him, but you know, um, there's well, you know, we get into our stuff, you know, but but the thing is, is that it's men go through this stuff too, and we need to be aware that there's just as much suffering, especially nowadays, with this, this, again, this, this, this animosity that is between like men and women that again, I don't buy into, but you know, that's that's the discourse. And I've heard in lots of the comments on my videos that that edge to it, you know, and and it's like women are like this, or men are like this. And I just think we need to watch it, you know. I know that each person has their own experience of men in their life and women in their life, but it's probably not all men in their life, and probably not all women in their life. I hope. If that's not the case in it for you, then I I am sincerely, my heart goes out to you. And my heart goes out to everyone who's ever experienced suffering at the hands of another human being. It's it it's it's horrible. It's horrible. So speaking specifically to men in this, in this conversation, this, this, this gender war and why it's so I think exhausting specifically for them is that they're not, they're they're kind of we we we we miss out on their perspective, I think, is what I'm what I'm starting out to say, is that you know, by labeling them as like men, we we label them as the other, and then we we're not listening to the stories that are there. And in the in the gender wars kind of scene, men are like this cartoonish masculinity, masculine macho man. And it's like they're that's mostly kind of the target. And sensitive men, gentlemen, don't fit into that that you know cookie-cutter way of being. And so it kind of the gender war, I'm using war. I I don't like that term anyway, but this this animosity, whatever, this politics ideology, I don't know. Um, but it's it ignores the sort of the sensitive, gentle, soulful, emotionally intelligent man who doesn't fit into that category. And it's like, but they're often the men, you know, or they're often the ones that are told, you know, that they're part of the problem simply because they exist in that category. So they're they're put in that category, but they don't feel like they belong to that category. So not only are they isolated from the category of of men in general, that they're also isolated from being part of culture as themselves, as sensitive, as sensitive men. So it's kind of like isolated in in in both ways, and then they're mistreated by women and women and men on both sides, because they don't fit into the masculine, like into traditional masculine roles or whatever, not roles. You know what I'm trying to say, right? And then and then they're and then they're you know mistreated by women on the other hand because they're a man. It's like, oh my goodness, it's silly, it's so so silly. Um not that sensitive men don't do stuff and gentlemen don't do stuff to women. That's not what I'm saying. It's it's nuanced. That's what I'm saying. And so I think that as INFJs and INFPs, we can be we can act as the the the bridge builders because I think that we need to move on from this, from this, this thing, like that we've been entrenched in. It feels like, you know, I'm a millennial, older millennial, and I feel like my whole life has been sort of the, you know, the the movies that we grew up watching were all like this the feminist programming. And it's like I even watched my my aunt sent me a video clip of like a 1930s movie, 40s, 50s. I don't know. Don't call me on any of that. But it was like it was intense feminism going on in that. So it's been many, many, many decades. Um, but we've been programmed with that. And um, you know, I think that we can need to get out of that. So we can act as the bridge builders because, you know, INFJs with their FE, they're constantly wanting to create harmony. So if we can work together, is what I'm saying, to offer compassion to one another and the suffering that we've been through, you know, here on my on my channel. There's just been such beautiful, beautiful sharing from sensitive men about their struggles. And I am so grateful for each one of them who has shared their story. It's helped me to even drop any kind of stuff that I may have still been holding on to. I I don't think I was, but um my my heart just feels so full of compassion for for men. Kind of like I said before, they're just invisible. They're stuck, they're in a in a space that um, you know, is maybe not quite seen. But I think that they're some of the most important in this conversation because of, you know, yeah, they're kind of maybe in the middle, so they can be the bridge. But us as INFPs and NFJs, I think, have the responsibility to be that and to heal those those bonds of human like of humanity of I just I feel so much sadness that it's like we're fighting against one another when when our culture and our society really needs us to come together and create a vision, a better vision for for where we're going, because things feel not not it's not going well. Um so but I think that I think it can be it can be hard to be a bridge or feel like a a healer or wanting to be compassionate because there's this sense that like we're either weak or we're complicit. Like for me, talking about you know, honoring sensitive men, it's like women can look at that and be like, oh, you're on men's side. It's like, oh, so you don't, you know, support women. And it's like, no, no, that's not what I'm saying, you know. So it's we we can, you know, the name calling can come in and um and then we get into a free state where we just do nothing at all and we we we just kind of shrink and shut our mouths and bow out. And I don't think I'm not willing to do that anymore. I've done that, and I think it it it feels like I'm not honoring my own soul and my own my own feeling and and vision of the future by shutting that up. So it's kind of like a catch-22. Either we take we we we we shut ourselves off or we take it out there and potentially get a bit battered and bruised. And I guess I've chosen the latter. Um, but I think that we, you know, isolation and loneliness is not is not worth shutting our mouths for. So I think we're the bridge. We can I think see through the tangled, the tangled mess that's out there and we can we can pull it all, pull all the crap out, and we can see each other as as beautiful, beautiful souls that are all really hurt and suffering inside. And I think if if women listen to men and their suffering and truly heard them, and men listen to women it and their suffering, which I think has been more of what's happened because women there's been a lot of a lot of vocal storytelling around that, you know, and like I said I said, you know, but so it's hard. I know. I just feel like it's hard, but I feel like the most radical thing we can do is to humanize one another and love one another and be stubbornly compassionate, stubbornly empathetic, and you know, get over this whole labeling of like men are this and women are this, and stop traumatizing each other with these hurtful words um and these hurtful assumptions about one another that are just not true. So that's what I have to say today. I I just I would love to hear from you in the comments about how this has touched your soul, how this how it feels to you as an INFP or an INFJ to be in this in the midst of all of this. Whether whether you're a man or a woman, I'd love to hear from women, like have you heard the suffering of men in your lives? Like, and and and I just I feel so much deep pain around all of this because I I I know lots of men are in a lot of pain and they deserve better, and women are a little in a lot of pain and they deserve better, but I think we can heal, I think we can only heal when we come together, is my whole vision for us. So I don't know. Let me know your thoughts. I hope this was insightful or I don't know. Anyway, I'm wishing you so many blessings. Thank you so much for being here, and I will talk to you soon. XOXO Kate.