One of the most tragic, destructive deeply seated beliefs about sex in western cultures is that it's dirty, forbidden, or wrong. This deeply held attitude has been inherited from our ancestors, who were generally controlled and manipulated by various political and religious authorities to give up their sense of agency and free will . . . their sense of personal freedom, or free-spiritedness.
The shame associated with being physically passionate, desirous, erotic or sensual ultimately gave rise to the shadow side of erotica that we see in the explosive popularity of porn today. The shame humans have carried for centuries manifests now not just in people doing the dirty, but people doing violent, abusive and ugly acts imbued with shame and intimidation . . . in essence working out the distortions of what could more rightly be natural explorations of the infinite possibilities and uniquely personal and creative kink inherent in sexuality and sex.
Ultimately, and ironically, sex is a sacred endeavor. Not in the religious sense, but rather as a practice of meditation, self-reflection and self-awareness, compassion and attunement with the pure, universal life source. “Making love” is a physical act that offers the possibility of a direct connection to the divine in each of us. The challenge and the opportunity is to discover, sense and track your own individual autonomous inspired experience while engaged in a spontaneous improvisational exchange with another autonomous and inspired soul.
In my personal and professional experience, sexuality, spirituality, and creativity are all manifestations or expressions of a connection to the non-physical aspects of our being. If you are exploring your creativity through art or music or writing or dance or sports . . . you know the experience of being open to the flow of inspiration, the sensation of being in communion with your inner being . . . when you are present and open and following the guidance or the movement or the flow there is no analysis or doubt or hesitation or resistance. You are a channel for the expression of the life force as it possesses you. It uses your talent, your focus, your attention, your abilities to move through you and onto the page or the canvas or through your feet and hands. You don’t lose your human sense of self-regulation; you can choose to modify or moderate the flow according to your capacity or focus at any moment. It is a collaboration of energy and consciousness.
Sports and physical exercise can satisfy this human need to experience and express the movement of spirit through the body. And while “sport” and “Spirit” come from related word origins, we have effectively amputated the element of spirit from sports, in our modern approach to sports. We still encourage “team spirit,” and “good sportsmanship,” but we’ve lost track of the essential relationship each player must have to their own personal experience of spirit in order to contribute to the spirit of the team.
Nevertheless, most athletes can tell stories about being in the zone, feeling their way through a series of movements, plays or actions entirely guided by the force of presence; They can recall being so absolutely in the moment, and so secure in the correctness of their experience, that there was no thought, no doubt, no hesitation in the action to be taken. They speak to a kind of body-knowing that includes, integrates, and elevates all the talent, capacity, knowledge, and practice that has been accrued. Same for artists, writers, dancers, chefs, mothers, drivers, actors, meditators, and anyone else who has surrendered to the expression/possession of the inner being.
If you are able to allow yourself to be possessed and to be creatively expressive, you have the capacity to be expressed sexually. You may not have experience or feel that you have permission in the territory of sex, but you have the functional understanding of what is involved and a frame of reference from which you can bridge. Developing this capacity is the foundation of sexual intimacy, first with yourself and then with another, or others.
In the next few blog posts I’ll write more about sacred sexuality and sexual intimacy . . . and how to bridge between the spiritual and sexual aspects of life.
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