Grammy-winning singer Alicia Keys said in an Instagram video that she was “frustrated” that her 4-year-old son didn’t want to be seen in public with a rainbow manicure and lamented the “judgments” and “stereotypes” that are provoked when men want to express their “feminine energy” and vice versa.

“He’s in the chair and he’s like ‘I want rainbow.’ So he tells the lady that he wants rainbow colors on his nails,” Keys explained. “And after he painted his nails, he looked at me and said ‘Mommy, I don’t want this on my nails.’ And I was like why? You were so sure. You were good. And he was like, ‘People are not going to like it.'”

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Been thinking about how over labeled and over judged we all are… can u feel me??

A post shared by Alicia Keys (@aliciakeys) on

Keys was shocked that her young son worried about being seen in public with rainbow nails.

“Can you believe this? Four years old! He’s four and he already understands the concept that someone’s going to judge him because he chose rainbow color on his nails,” Keys said, explaining that she encouraged her son by telling him that “so many” men paint their nails.

“And I said plus you know a lot of guys paint their nails. This is not like some strange thing that you only do. He was like really? I was like yeah– so many. So many. And that made him feel better, but it just got me to thinking about how completely judged we are all the time,” she said.

Keys explained that she believes men and women possess both masculine and feminine “energies” and noted her concern that “we can’t just explore these different sides of ourselves.”

“You know, these different energies that are within us. And even for me myself, I oftentimes express the masculine energy that is inside of me. And it’s very natural to me. That’s how I feel and all the time if that happens there’s judgments and there’s the stereotypes and there’s all the energy that comes toward that and for my boys — similar,” she said.

“If they want to express the feminine energy that’s inside of them, there’s all these judgments and all these rules and stereotypes and vibes, and it’s really frustrating to me,” she continued.

“I’m actually really really frustrated about it and I ask myself why is it that? Like why can’t we just express the different energies that are inside of us?” she asked, calling it a “normal,” “ancient,” “powerful” and “spiritual” understanding.

Keys has not refrained from articulating her ideological leanings in the past, appearing at the Democratic National Convention in 2016 and dedicating her performance to the mothers of the Black Lives Matter movement.