Who “Owns” your sexuality?
I was listening to the magical Esther Perel speak the other day on a virtual conference and I heard her talk about the concept of Erotic Autonomy. This notion that to fully enjoy our sexuality, to fully enjoy our erotic nature, we must feel and truly know that is ours to enjoy. It seems like a simple concept - but very profound when we ask ourselves - who “owns” my sexuality? Who governs my sexual behavior? Who has a say in how I show up in the bedroom, with whom and over what we do together? For many humans, especially women and marginalized folks of all sexual preferences and racial backgrounds the answer is often - everyone but me. When we are small the adults in our lives are so squeamish about sexual pleasure that they don’t even bother to let us know that our bodies were made to experience sensual delights of all kinds. Sex is for making babies - and it’s dangerous. We are often not trusted with the information we need to make decisions about our own bodies, to care for our bodies, and to respect the bodies of others. Our parents control our sexuality. If we grew up in the church or in a culture or society with very strong sexual taboos then these institutions own our sexuality. They limit a person’s ability to express themsleves fully as gay, bi, trans or whatever identity they inhabit. They have many opinions on what a woman should or should not wear to stay safe. And they have rules about who we can marry, and when and with whom we can become sexually active. For many women that mark of acceptability is marriage. But then her sexuality is for him. It’s for his pleasure, for his desire. It’s about what he wants. It’s about performing for him. At various points in our lives our parents, school teachers, church, society and partners end up with a say about our sexuality. So where does that leave us? Totally shut down for craps sake. It’s no wonder women don’t want to share their sexuality - they’ve never felt it was theirs to offer to begin with. The truth is your sexuality is first and foremost for you. It’s a critical part of your identity, of how you express yourself in the world, how you love, how you touch and interact with other humans.
Ignoring it is like pretending you don’t have a heart. You can’t operate fully without it. And yet so many of us do. So many of us operate with big chunks of our identity hidden away, squished into boxes for the comfort of others or for our own safety. We have to change this. We need to break down the sexual taboos that judge and shame. We need to break these chains and reclaim what is ours - our right to pleasure, our right to be fully ourselves. How do we do it? We fight the system one deliberate orgasm at a time. By becoming aware of the stories that have highjacked our erotic autonomy. By loving who we want to love. By taking back our bedrooms. By becoming better allies. By rewriting the scripts that say his pleasure matters more than mine - mine takes too long and it is too fickle. Instead we say my pleasure is perfect, my body works like this and this is how you pleasure her if you are giving the chance, my pleasure is mine and if you are worthy I may offer some to you but it is never never yours to claim. My pleasure is mine.
Much love from me to you friends. Be brave out there. We’ll do it together.
Xo - The Happy V
PS - if you want to step into owning your sexuality you gotta start by making space for it and understanding it. Join me in the free Light Your Fire 5 Day Libido Challenge and do just that. 5 days, 15 min a day dedicated to you opening up this conversation with yourself. Sign up here. See you soon.