Welcome to the first article of A Beautiful Soul. In this column, we will be sharing coming out stories and what it's like being in the community. Maybe it will help you in your own journey.

What does LGBTQ+ mean to you? For me, it means finding myself. In uncertain times, it has been a family to hold me up when I couldn’t stand. They have helped me onto a path when I was lost and no one cared to come find me. I owe so much to the community that has welcomed me with open and loving arms. How many others do that and with compassion? I can’t think of any.

I’d like to share with you stories of the community. Our first of many beautiful guests - please welcome Tanja. Now, Tanja, please tell our readers about yourself, your story.

(T) - I knew I was different at a young age. I didn’t feel like I fit in, not into any clique. I fully believe my identity had something to do with that. I am a bisexual-demisexual woman. For years, I fell into a pattern. I didn’t make friends because most didn’t accept me being bi. Kids can be harsh, as many of you know. I could never make that connection that my demi-side needed. I didn’t understand this until I was older. I was bullied by my peers, and I eventually caved. I went down this dark path for many years until I met a woman who understood me. She was bisexual and opened an entire world up. She showed me how to love myself and understand what I had repressed for years at this point. That’s something I would like to help others in our community with as well. You are valid, you are loved, you are important, and you are beautiful. Whoever tells you otherwise, you don’t need them.

Well, thank you, Tanja, that was beautiful and very insightful. I'm so happy you found someone that let your true self come forward! We have one more story to share. This person asked to stay anonymous so we will be calling them (A). The floor is now all theirs.

(A) - Thank you for letting me share my story. I am bigender, assigned female at birth. It took me many years to learn what the word bigender meant and that what I was feeling was normal. No one accepted that I identified with both genders at times. They said I was misrepresenting the LGBTQ+ community, that I wasn’t normal and needed to seek help. I'm sure many others were told the same. Bigender is identifying with both genders. If I remember, it's in the same family as gender-fluid, which negates everything I had ever been told. (Yes, I cut all of those toxic people out of my life.) One day, I was talking to someone I barely knew and she told me I was bigender. Just like that, I felt a sense of relief and purpose wash over me. I was validated again. Over two months I researched what it meant to be bigender and decided it was a path I was going to walk down. For the first time in ages, I felt like I belonged. What does being bigender mean? I don’t identify with one gender and identify with both. One day I feel masculine and embrace it, the next I’m feminine and loving it. My assigned gender doesn’t define who I am. One day I am (female name) and the next (male name). I’m also into drag but haven’t come out on that one. Bigender is very open and freeing for me. I’m no longer restricted by what is deemed of me.

Thank you for sharing your story with us, A. Bigender was not something I was aware of and you definitely opened my eyes to a new world. Stay strong and keep being the amazing person you are.

Many of us have similar stories. We’ve shared heartache, spiraling, and even laughter in dark times. Each and every one of you is beautiful, no matter what. You each have a life that is precious and should be celebrated. I would love to hear from you, my dear readers. Share your stories with me. I would like to help others so let us share and ask questions. In OUR community, only we can help ourselves. There are those trying to find themselves like Tanja and A were, let's be that woman who showed Tanja kindness and love. The person who showed another that they were valid and mattered.

Until next time, my loves, keep your head high, beautiful soul!

- Sal

Hello, and welcome to this adventure through the acronym! So glad you could join us for the journey. Please grab a snack and/or a beverage of your choosing and make yourself comfortable. Each issue, we'll take a letter from the LGBTQIAP+ acronym and relate it to a topic using the most tenuous, flimsy links we can find. For this inaugural edition, we’re starting at the very beginning (a very good place to start) with the letter "L".

Given that this is the debut of this wonderful publication, it only seems fitting that we discuss the most prominent figures throughout history. So sit back, relax, and prepare to explore world leaders that you probably didn't know were part of the community in some way! Unless you’re a historian, in which case just enjoy the mild wit sprinkled into my writing or something, I don't know.

I know I literally just talked about wit, but I do have to quickly mention something serious for a moment, sorry not sorry. This article is not a comprehensive list of all the LGBTQIAP+ world leaders out there, although every effort has been made to create the best cross-section possible of identities and locations around the world. Please bear this in mind when reading, and feel free to do your own research if this topic interests you!

Without further ado, let's take a look at these leaders, shall we? To start off, we're heading all the way to Ancient Egypt. Specifically to the year 1350 B.C. where the land was ruled by Pharaoh Akhenaten. Although some artifacts have shown that Nefertiti was the man's lover, others have also depicted the Pharaoh kissing an unnamed man sitting on his lap, and Egyptologists have mostly agreed from all the available evidence that Akhenaten was most likely bisexual. His status as Pharaoh definitely earns Akhenaten a spot in this article, as well as making it through the bi-erasure of history.

Speaking of bi-erasure, another rumoured bisexual leader who ruled over an entire empire was Ai of Han. He ruled in the Chinese Han Dynasty roughly from 7 B.C. to 1 B.C. His reign was both short and full of controversy, which coincidentally describes me as a person. He was married to Empress Fu for the majority of his life but it was well documented that he had a male lover as well, named Dong Xian. In fact, there is even a story in Chinese lore based on this relationship known as "comrades of the cut sleeve". Rather than risk waking his lover who was asleep in his arms, the Emperor chose to cut off his sleeves. If that isn't relationship goals, I don't know what is.

That links me nicely into our next featured leader, whom many of you will probably have heard of. Alexander the Great. He expanded on, and ruled over an empire that stretched from Greece to India between the years of 336 B.C. to 323 B.C. Although not official, it's widely accepted that Alexander was homosexual, being in a close relationship with his top general, Hephastion. In fact, the two of them were so close that they were described as "one soul abiding in two bodies" by philosophers of the time. These same philosophers also provided another quote based on the two of them, perhaps the greatest sentence I've ever read - "Alexander only suffered defeat by the general’s thighs."

Fast-forwarding slightly, we head to Ancient Rome in the year 218 where a fourteen-year-old Elagabalus is coming into power. Perhaps my favourite member of this list, this Emperor only ruled for four years but in that time committed so many violations of taboos at the time that they were murdered by their own guards. Iconic, honestly. Elagabalus was most likely somewhere under the transgender umbrella, as they wore female clothing and reportedly sought a physician to alter their physical anatomy. Perhaps most iconically of all, they used the Praetorian Guard to find the most well-endowed men in the land, purely for personal purposes. They were married no less than five times during the four-year reign, and often referred to themself as the "wife" of their final partner, Heirocles. I could honestly make a whole article on Elagabalus but alas, we must move on.

We're jumping forward again and over to Sweden now. The years spanning 1644 and 1654 saw the reign of Queen Kristina (formerly Princess until she reached the age of 1. She was a (rumoured intersex) lesbian who stunned the whole of Europe by giving up her position on the throne after only 10 years. She reportedly wore masculine clothing and forwent maintaining her appearance, preferring to focus on reading and learning instead. She also had a penchant for spending money on extravagant items, and her spending actually nearly caused a public revolt when it brought the state into financial ruin. I mean, who can honestly say they haven't at some point brought financial ruin upon themselves by buying things?

Finally, we come to modern day. Thankfully, we live in a world where LGBTQIAP+ people are making more strides than ever before, and there are many people I could include here. For the sake of not writing an entire novel though, I’ve narrowed it down. In 2006, a huge step forward was made in India when Manvendra Singh Gohil, the Prince of Rajpipla, came out. Unfortunately, his family has since threatened disinheritance and friction continues between himself and other royals, which is incredibly saddening. However, his story highlights that members of the community can show up anywhere, in all classes of society and he has used his platform to be an activist for the community. On the flip side, there are countries that have actively embraced an LGBTQIAP+ leader. Take Iceland, for example. In 2009, they elected Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, the first openly lesbian prime minister in modern times.

That brings us to the end of our adventure through the acronym for this issue! I hope you've learned something you maybe didn't know before, and that you'll go and research the icon that is Elagabalus (or any of these leaders). See you next time!