My Journey To Removing Shame From Sex

From a very young age, I had a peculiar curiosity and fascination with sex. Even though I was shy and socially awkward, I felt driven to explore and express this side of myself. It always seemed exciting and magical, and as someone with a Scorpio north node, it still does. The underworld and all things shadowy and “taboo” feel like fertile ground for growth and alchemy.

I grew up Catholic; hence, some very deep-rooted and ancient programming around sexuality being shameful (especially female sexuality) was passed down to me. Sexual shame is so pervasive in the collective shadow and buried so deeply in ancestral lineages. As a teenager and young woman, I never learned how to accept my sexuality and express it in a healthy way.

I indulged in my sexuality as a teenager and throughout my adult life, enjoying many sexual partners and experiences. I think, in a sense, this was my way of both exploring my curiosity and attempting to transmute the shame I had around sexuality through rebellion. However, there was still an underlying subconscious belief that it was “bad” and “wrong” to behave that way. I would often feel isolated and ashamed after a sexual experience, sometimes even regretful of my behavior.

Even now, in today’s cultural landscape of embracing sexuality and female liberation, shame finds sneaky ways of embedding itself in the collective messaging.

I’ve noticed in the online niche of spirituality a “purity” mindset in some of the rhetoric, along the lines of avoiding having too many sexual partners and treating sex as a sacred act, only to be done with magical soulmates.

Of course, it’s important to understand that sex is an energy exchange, and we should be discerning in the sense that who we choose to partake in it with is someone that we feel safe and comfortable around. But I find myself wanting to reject this idea that if you are a spiritual person, it means that you must only treat sex as a holy and sacred act and not be a slut.

As a highly sexual being and a sensitive and spiritual being (sex is spiritual, by the way), I am not a demisexual. I don’t need to have a deep soul connection with someone to want to have sex with them. Just a certain level of safety and comfort. I also don’t always need to have an elaborate pre and post-sex ritual in which I prepare my body and my energy.

Sometimes, I just find someone attractive and interesting and want to have a sexual experience with them. And I’m rejecting the idea that that makes me any less spiritual.

Sex in and of itself is a sacred act, whether it’s done on a first date in the back of the car or in an enchanted, intentionally elaborate setting with a soulmate. What makes us human is also what makes us spiritual. It took me a few years of being on a spiritual path to fully realize this – after I got past the spiritual bypassing phase of my journey.

Through recent years, and the past year in particular, I’ve begun the alchemical process of transmuting sexual shame into powerful self-expression. This is part of a larger journey for me of embracing all of what makes us human and recognizing that there is beauty and sacredness in our most primal aspects and the darkest corners of our psyches. I feel strongly that it’s critical to celebrate being human and fully embrace it rather than trying to repress or transcend it.

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Happiness Is A Choice I Get To Make Today

I began pole dancing in November of last year, and it has been a powerful healing practice for me in reclaiming my sexual power and expressing it creatively. Sharing that part of myself openly and publicly was scary initially, but I did it anyway.

I remember speaking with a therapist about a time when I was made to feel like I should hide that part of myself from certain people and how I openly rejected this idea. I decided I wouldn’t hide parts of myself for other people’s comfort anymore. Their own shame around sexual expression would no longer hinder me.

When I expressed that, my therapist said, “You stopped shame in its tracks.” She went on to say that I stopped it from landing in my body and my energy field. This way of conceptualizing how shame can take us over – and how we can prevent it from doing so – really landed with me.

That moment in therapy filled me with such a profound realization that all the inner work I had been doing was becoming tangible in how I thought about myself and how I responded to the outside world. I am learning to love all parts of me, and it is the most freeing and liberating experience. This feeling of freedom and liberation is grounding me into my body, helping me to feel more connected to myself and my pleasure, both solo and with partners. It’s allowing me to have conversations with people around sexuality that light me up now that I have less fear of judgment and can communicate without sticky layers of shame getting in the way.

There is infinite beauty and depth to explore in sexuality and the realm of the taboo; so much that we can learn about ourselves, each other, humanity and the divine. To cut ourselves off from that is to cut ourselves off from the divine. And to embrace it, I believe, is one of the most potent acts of self-love and spiritual growth.