You heard me right, if she can’t handle me wearing eyeliner, then I don’t want to be with her. If she can’t handle me dancing feminine on my dance team, stopping to admire a flower, or painting my nails for fun, then I don’t want to be with her.

What she has is a mindset of restrictive masculine ideas that keeps little boys and men from truly being human.

If you have a problem with me wearing tights in public or getting excited at the sight of an adorable kitten, the problem is with you, not me.

You may be wondering, although it shouldn’t matter, I’m a straight cis-gendered man, meaning I am sexually and romantically attracted to the opposite sex, and my gender closely matches to culturally expected expression of my sex. For example, men should be masculine and woman should be feminine.

Now, I don’t normally wear eyeliner or put glitter on my face, although I actually love to experiment with it. Side note, I slay with it on.

What I am speaking about is a woman who has also fallen into believing strict ideologies about masculinity.

Ideologies such as: boys and men shouldn’t cry, boys and men should be athletic, and boys and men shouldn’t have strong emotions, or especially exude feminine qualities on a daily basis.

A man crying and speaking about his emotions is touching, but if he does it more than twice, then it gets weird? Why? Because men shouldn’t be "weak" or anything like a woman. They should be providers and stoic in the face of adversity. Well, yeah so should everyone.

And last time I checked, every human cries.

I remember my ex would show absolute disgust when I would walk or motion "feminine" like. She believed that a "man should act like a man."

Little boys are already being conditioned to a culture in which you need to “man up,” which means suck up your emotions, don't be a female, put your foot down, and be take what you want.

The last thing I would ever want for me or my son to be told is to “be a man.”

Why? Because if it means making my son less of a fully expressive and loving human being, I don’t want anything to do with it. For me, I surely think our whole concept of “manliness” is a ridiculous.

We are so heavily invested in this, practically ancient, strict role idea.

A man showing any feminine characteristics runs the risk of being defined as weak, frail, overly emotional, pathetic, and not “what a man should be."

See how strict this imaginary line is? How can a person be a person, if there are these guidelines pushing them a certain way?

If you haven’t caught up, these ideas of masculinity are taught and conditioned over and over again. They’re strict illusions poured into us since birth.

Let’s get some things straight: if I want to dance or hug a small dog in public, then guess what? I will.

If I want to dance to Beyonce’s “Run the World” on stage or cry over a Youtube video, then I will. Why? Because I’m freaking human.

I choose freedom and reject your "act like a man."

I reject the idea of stopping myself from acting, or being, a certain way because it’s only a “girl thing” or “men don’t do that.”

I reject not jamming out to Justin Bieber’s “Sorry,” to Demi Lovato’s “Cool for the Summer," or to Selena Gomez’s “Hands to Myself.”

I reject not having my Instagram be filled with kittens and puppies.

I reject the idea of being told to be certain way, then if I don’t, then I’m “not right.”

Overall, if you’re interested in me, just know a few things will occur: we will have toe painting dates, I will stop walking to sniff a flower, and I may ask you to put makeup on me for fun.

A woman OK with all that can have my time, as well as hug my stuffed elephant.