There’s a lot of confusion in the world about what it means to be a sexually empowered, enlightened, or even free human being.

“People don’t ask Jay-Z to take his shirt off when he rhymes. Showing my skin is not what makes me sexy. I like skirts and dresses just like everyone else, but I had a message to put out there. It was up to me to show people and young girls there was another way.”

~ Janelle Monae

Some schools of thought teach that sexual liberation is found in the ripping off of the chains of monogamy and marriage, both of which are viewed as outworn remnants of a puritanical period. In my San Diego community, poly-sexuality (though, oft times mistakenly referred to as polyamory) is worn as a suit of pride as it is boastfully demonstrated as an example of a new way forward. An opposite swing of the scales veers away from the rigidity and conformity of institutionalized relationships, and it promotes love and communication as its foundation while it also subconsciously perpetuates sexual objectification.

In my mid-20s, I challenged myself to acknowledge that just because I found someone physically attractive didn’t mean he or she actually was. Without conversation, interaction, or anything else that could help me to understand how this person moved through the world, I could not actually know whether or not this person was attractive.  Likewise, I disciplined myself to stop examining the bodies—especially the butts—of women (and men, in some cases) who walked by me on the street. And, I quit checking out my own reflection in every mirror I passed by because how I appear is of little consequence to me. Rather, I began to trust that by simply being myself in as many moments as possible, my true beauty would shine through.

As time passes, I care less and less about being viewed as “beautiful” by others. Sometimes, I just want to be ugly, angry, sad, or tired because it’s the truest to exactly how I am feeling. I no longer waste my time on trying to make another feel any thing; my job is not to make you feel good. You are responsible for yourself. My job is to be as ephemeral and fleeting as the moment—allowing my emotions and life to ebb and flow, to rush in and to fade away like the tides.

Who I am is not a fixed, two-dimensional commodity that can be defined, labeled or branded. I am not a corporation to be cut up and sold on the chopping block. I am not a slave, nor a whore; I am not here for your service or your enjoyment.

I am here for me.

And, in tending to my own highest good, I affirm that your welfare, as well as the wellbeing of our planet, is of equal importance and value.

Living in the spiritual mecca of Encinitas, California, I am surrounded by progressive peers who erroneously sign up for strip club dance classes as an attempt to reclaim their sexually expressed selves.

Seeking an antiquated vision of economic self-worth, they pay for lessons that encourage them to show copious amounts of vulnerable skin, to buy unwieldy six-inch stiletto heels, to uncomfortably contort their bodies so that their breasts and butts are presented in a certain light, to compare the size of their asses to one another, and more. As for pole dancing, it is the sport of a highly athletic individual, but it says nothing about someone’s sexual empowerment.

In response to all of it, I just want to cry out, “Honey, being human and uninhibited, your hair big, your ass wide, your natural body functions unloosed as you climb and crawl your way through life is liberation.”

Self-consciousness about how you look and what others think about such a trivial and fleeting matter only drains your life force and makes you hard in the end. The Dark Feminine has risen and She is a soft and powerful Wild Woman.

Now is the time to roar at anything that attempts to parcel any sentient creature into chattel.

Sexual empowerment is the essential awareness (as well as the action upon) the Universal Truth that you are not an object to be desired, lusted after, or even paid for. Sexual enlightenment is the adult recognition that as human beings, we all have sex. Not the act itself, but the ability to experience pleasure. What someone looks like is of little regard to intercourse, for the birthright of all bodies is to feel good and to impart gratification. Don’t waste your precious energy crafting an appearance or an identity, for the sands of time will wear you down and wither you away.

True sexual liberation is discovered in freeing yourself from the self-consciousness of being viewed as anything other than human; we all eat, shit, fart, laugh, love, cry, and die.

Allowing yourself to be seen in your raw humanity—naked with your “flaws” (flabby skin, poochie belly, varicose veins, cellulite, boogers in nose, gas moving out of your orifices, etc.) exposed as you chortle with glee at the blunders of being present in this exact moment is freedom. Likewise, releasing any fears you hold about what your actions could relay, or what touch between yourself and another human being could mean, is also embodied liberty. Let Go. Just be.

“Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose,
Nothing, that’s all that Bobby left me, yeah,
But feeling good was easy, Lord, when he sang the blues,
Hey, feeling good was good enough for me, hmm hmm,
Good enough for me and my Bobby McGee.” 

~ Janis Joplin

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Editor: Jenna Penielle Lyons

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