by Natasha | Jan 24, 2022 | For couples, Posts, Sex and mothering, Sexual liberation |
When I was first exploring my sexuality, I didn’t resonate with using the terms masculine and feminine to describe myself — especially not when they applied to sex. I resonated with the idea of these energies co-existing, but not how having both of them could help me have a balanced sex life. Now, ten years later on this journey, I resonate much more with these terms and understand why that balance can be so helpful in sex and intimacy. At times in my explorations, I’ve swayed heavy to one side or the other, and thankfully this pendulum swing has been helpful in opening up a longing in me for the side that was missing.
I’ve always identified strongly with certain aspects of traditional femininity. I became a mother to a big family at a young age and the role of nurturing my children and husband felt at that time, like my highest purpose in life. Motherhood allowed me to tap into the soft, nurturing parts of myself that longed for connection and intimacy — through tending to the needs of others. Caring for my family became my attempt at meeting those needs in myself and yet, I often felt like something was missing. Without embodying my masculine side, I found it difficult to ask for what I wanted and needed or make decisions for myself that conflicted with my ability to care for others. My femininity lacked self-care that may have helped me feel nurtured or beautiful or comfortable in my body, and was solely focused on the needs of others. I stuffed my own needs down as deep as I could to protect this. As my children got older and built their own relationships and interests, parenting no longer met my need for intimacy, and the deep longings I felt bubbled to the surface. Slowly, I pulled them out one by one and learned that I liked to feel my body move through dance and to wear dresses and to feel pretty — for myself — and that femininity wasn’t only about caring for the needs of others.
Around this same time I discovered my pleasure in a more embodied way and the nurturing part of me that used to have sex for my husbands pleasure, started wanting pleasure for myself. It took awhile to learn how to do this, but eventually I no longer cared if he connected with me before we had sex as I’d long since been asking for. I learned that I could have sex solely for pleasure — as he had seemingly done for years and years — and that sometimes that was exactly what I needed. I learned to own my right to orgasm by making sure that, with the help of my hands, I always orgasmed in sex. I initiated sex, turned on the lights and took the pillow off of my face that I’d used for years to hide in shame. I didn’t have to feel shame to live in pleasure. It was my BIRTHRIGHT. I was doing what men have done for centuries and took ownership of my own pleasure. I’d believed my husband’s pleasure to be a given and that it was necessary for me to provide that for him during the 17 years we were together. Until I found my masculine, I couldn’t imagine believing my pleasure could be a given or necessary too.
High on this masculine energy I rode my right to pleasure as hard a cock. (see, just writing about my masculine gets me in that mode!) When my marriage ended, I continued seeking my right to pleasure in a masculine way — rarely asking for the nurturing or connection I also needed, or even discerning adequately who I was experiencing pleasure with. There are moments I remember in sexual situations where I felt almost out of body, wondering why I divorced my husband just to be back in the same situation of disconnected sex I’d wanted out of. I could orgasm just fine, but the longing for connection and intimacy and being seen, was still there.
Listening to my feminine, I started practicing discernment and realized that deep intimacy and pleasure (beyond just a basic “get me off” orgasm) happened when I felt relaxed and safe. Just “taking” my orgasm wasn’t enough anymore and I still longed for the more I craved in my marriage. I wanted pleasure yes, but also connection, softness, surrender. To have this, I had to learn to trust and to receive — both very feminine qualities. I realized it was much easier to long for these things than to actually make myself open to them, but I committed to practice. Using breath, presence and masculine confidence, I learned to soften my body like a jelly fish or sea sponge — able to absorb and feel the subtlest nuances of pleasure. Slowly I opened my legs, arms, hands and heart to myself, my partner and the universe. Allowing the feminine in me to receive and soften meant I could allow my partner to pleasure me for as long as I needed. When I felt insecure, the masculine in me was helpful as the strong voice in my ear reminding me, as it’s reminded men for centuries, that “this is my right!” Finally, the two parts were working together.
Looking back I feel that as a traditional, non sexually embodied woman — so far swung on the pendulum in that way — it was necessary for me to swing as far as I could the other way and find my masculine. I needed to own my right to pleasure and exercise it as my own, so that I could come back and own my right to embody my full femininity too. In order to surrender to pleasure, love and allow myself to be fully seen, I needed to know I deserve that. It’s my right as a human being. Regardless of gender or sexual orientation, I believe these two energies exist in all of us, as does the potential to actualize them. To know if your pendulum is swung too far in one way, you can simply ask yourself “what else am I longing for in my sexual and intimate life?” Your answer, is an invitation to explore what’s missing.
by Natasha | Aug 22, 2021 | Body Image, Bodysex workshops, Sexual liberation |
I spent a night with my friend and Bodysex® sister on the beach this summer. As soon as we found a quiet spot — we got naked, made a fire, cooked dinner, practiced peeing right where we’re sitting, shared stories and talked about how vulnerable it can feel to follow our hearts and really own it. This blog is inspired by her and my Bodysex® experiences:
Bodysex® reminds me of the sacredness of my own pleasure. That it’s my right as a human being to feel pleasure. Bodysex® reminds me that in the absence of a partner, or if I’m with a partner who’s unwilling to fully support my pleasure — I know my own body and can pleasure myself. That with this tool I never have to live a pleasureless life again — never have to have pleasureless sex again. That it’s okay to want a partner to be as good as I am (with myself) in bed.
Bodysex® reminds me of the familiar softness of a woman’s body and why it’s beautiful to look at and to touch. It reminds me that we all look better without clothes on, that the jiggles are super hot and fun to play with, and why our lovers are lucky to touch and make love to us. We feel so good. We, as everyday women, are goddesses.
Bodysex® reminds me of why women were persecuted for being “whores” and “witches.” That in our embodied pleasure we are magical, mystical beings that would obviously cause fear in insecure men. When we realize our magic, we can no longer be oppressed and, for those brave enough to love us, we share our magic with them.
Bodysex® reminds me why I need in person connections to feel seen. I’m a multidimensional woman and I want to be seen as that. I’m sexual, yet not just that. I’m motherly, yet not just that. Sometimes I do great things, but I’m not only that. Sometimes I do shitty things, but I’m not only that. I’m like a quilt with many different squares and colours and sections torn and frayed while others are intact. I want to be seen as all of that.
Bodysex® reminds me through stories, body language, eyes and sounds of our pleasure that we are all of these things. Sexual, soft, magical, multidimensional, goddess, witches. What is better than that?
by Natasha | Jan 1, 2021 | Awakening, connection, Sexual liberation, Vulnerability |
I woke up this morning in my quiet house with my children still sleeping. Drinking tea with the sun shining through the window onto my bare legs, this story — which had just been seen and felt in parts throughout the last year — flowed completely through me. I wish I could read it to you, so you could close your eyes (as I like to imagine you would) and with each word feel the river touching your legs and teasing you forward in it’s flow. But this will have to do.
I see myself floating down a river, the wind softly blowing my hair, sun on my neck, holding hands with someone I love. The flowing water is as clear as a mountain spring and under it are rocks which sometimes jut out, causing us to maneuver our bodies around them so we don’t get hurt as we float. The banks are high enough on the sides and I smile when I see animals have made houses in the dirt along the edge. There are branches sticking out from the banks — some worn smooth by the water that flows over them at times, and some so sharp that we need to duck at just the right times to not get hurt by them. There are some shallow sections in the river where we often stop to play, laying half in and half out of the water, feeling the slight lull of it flowing over our legs as the sun warms the rest of our bodies. Sometimes we choose to spend days in these parts of the river exploring and being with the flow but not moving very far at all. In these places — between fully floating and totally stuck — we often find the best treasures, difficult to explain to anyone after, but nevertheless treasures that deeply impact the way we float on.
Inevitably as we choose to continue on, the river changes again and we float together, until both of us get caught in a pile of branches that’s pooled along one side of the river. On my side the branches are less thick (this time) and I carry on with only minimal effort to free myself. The force of us getting caught though is enough to tear our hands apart and, while I notice the disconnect right away, it takes me a minute to stop because I’m still flowing along with the river. Stopping myself is difficult and it requires a great deal of energy to push backwards against the flowing river. I do it though, because I chose to float the river with this person and I’m not going to leave them behind just because they’re “stuck” in the branches. I want to keep floating with them. So I paddle against the current, breathing heavily as I slowly move back wards towards where they’re “stuck” in the branches. Once I get there I grab onto the pile and use it to pull me around closer to them and then, still unable to reach them in their pile, I choose to tread water alongside them while we try to figure a way to get them out.
I love being beside the people I love at all parts of the river – even if they or I am stuck in the branches. Yet at some point, often after days of trying to figure out how to get them unstuck, I feel a deep hole of fear in my belly and hear a little girls voice telling me that “I need to get them out, or I’ll lose them.” Already tired from days of treading water to stay in one place against the current, I franticly try thinking of other ways to “help” them. If I can just lift one arm out to grab the branches and toss them down the river maybe I can free them. So I try this, constantly being forced forward each time I lift an arm out to grab a branch, toss it and then swim back against the current to where I was treading water beside them. I do however manage to remove a few branches this way. Sometimes the branches are tangled up too much though and instead of the easier task of just grabbing and throwing them, I have to hold onto the pile and work to untangle them while fighting against the river seemingly wanting to pull my legs forward to see what’s around the next bend. The top half of my body is pulled backwards as I work to untangle branches and the bottom half is pulled forwards with the flowing river — I must appear to be in such conflict with myself. But “I’m not!” I tell myself in a strangely child like voice. “I’m simply “helping” this person, whom I love, become unstuck so we can once again float the river together.”
My efforts feel fairly grand, so grand that at times I imagine that this is the point of the story (if there was one) where the narrator would describe me in heroic ways. Pausing to think of how heroic I am, I look at the person in the middle of the branches and see that they’re not sweating or panting at all. They’re merely sitting — what looks like – comfortably amongst the pile of branches. “But they can’t be content to stay here I tell myself,” feeling that awful hollow hole of fear in my belly. “They MUST want to come along. They always said they wanted to do this and when they got stuck they called for me to come back. They must still want it.” Conflicted by this I grab on tighter and watch them, waiting for a sign that they do want to come with me. In this pause I notice how deep the hole feels in my stomach and how hard the river is pulling my legs forward and how much I want to allow it. But “I can’t just leave them here” says the little girls voice in my head. “Good people don’t do that. Good people stay and fight no matter how hard the river is pulling them forward. It’s for them that I’m doing it!”
In this moment — the moment in the story where time stands still and the whole scene seems so perfectly clear — I feel the irony in my words and hear a woman’s voice speak over the little girls saying “Just as I have the choice to let the river carry me, they have the choice to stay. Both are choices and regardless of whether one is to stay and one is to go, it doesn’t mean anyone is leaving anyone.” Paused in time for a second while I contemplate what she is saying, I notice that the hole of fear in my belly is gone and……. just like that I let go. Like the most beautiful orgasm in the universe I’m carried forward, swept into the ebbs and flows of the current and the wind in my hair and sun on my neck. I look back for a second and see the person in the branches, right before I’m swept into another orgasmic current, smiling at me lovingly and experiencing life in the way they are choosing. I smile back at them with a smile full of absolute love, then close my eyes and float on with the life I am choosing carried forward with the sound of the woman’s voice whispering softly in my ear “It’s all choice. We all choose each day to flow or to stop flowing. The only way I will lose them is if I stop my own flow.”
**** Dedicated to one of the many partners on my river :Justine. Thank you for reminding me of my own choice and my own voice. <3
by Natasha | Aug 25, 2020 | Body Image, Posts, Self loving/masturbation, Sexual liberation, Vulvas |
I’m sitting in a farmer’s field about ten minutes from my home, naked, leaning against a hay bale.
The wind is blowing my hair in crazy directions, and I imagine myself as one of those women in books who looks wild and free and you can just tell by her wind blown hair that she had some great orgasms that day …… and every day.
My skin is brown from all the summer sunshine, and when I turn my legs towards it, I can see my blond thigh hair, shimmer like gold.
A tampon string dangles from my vulva and I take it out, happy that I don’t need to worry about staining any sheets in this field.
There are two tummy rolls at the bottom of my stomach and I place my hand over them, tracing the stretch marks that make a spiral pattern around my belly button. I think back to the words of the surgeon I went to years ago, who asked me why I wanted to change this part of my body. Closing my eyes and feeling the texture that the stretch marks offer my fingers, I give thanks that I didn’t —and imagine my beautiful children growing inside my belly — pushing and stretching my skin with their long limbs.
My eyes move down to my vulva and I see my lips like the petals of a flower blooming in the morning sun. Encouraging them to bloom some more, I move my hand towards the petals and feel their softness. Years back I used to feel ashamed of how fully I bloom. Today, I don’t think there is a part of my body as beautiful as my pussy, and I promise to give her thanks every day for the plentiful gifts she offers me.
I pleasure myself in this field — against the bail that I imagine the farmer put there just for me. A mom of 5 on her evening walk, with her dog who’s off chasing geese.
I laugh as I cum, and afterwards, stand up and put my clothes back on to go back to the city, my home and my family. Seeing the wet spot on the ground I think with a smile, of the abundant crop the farmer will be blessed with next year.
*****My orgasm and my words are dedicated with endless love, to Betty Dodson – my mama of pleasure on her 91st birthday today.
by Natasha | Nov 15, 2019 | Awakening, Self loving/masturbation, Sexual liberation, Vulnerability |
I often get asked what my self pleasure and orgasms are like after the last 4 years of doing Bodysex and Orgasm coaching. The truth is I’ve spent countless hours and days practicing, playing with my body, breath, sounds, positions, hands and toys. I’ve charted my orgasms everyday for a month to see what I’d discover and the most quantifiable data I found, was that my pleasure is best when I take the time to make love with myself using my hands — savouring my entire body. Quickies have their place and can turn around my day when it’s headed in the wrong direction, but what I really love the most is to “edge” my orgasms. Edging means I build my pleasure using my hands and my breath right up to the place where pleasure and orgasm meet. Instead of crossing into that though, I continue stimulating myself while grounding my breath (breathing low into my belly) to stay there, savouring every moment of the pleasure. When the pleasure becomes less intense, I build my pleasure higher with my breath (breathing up into my chest) until I reach another height of pleasure. Then, when that level becomes less intense, I once again use my breath to reach a higher one, and so on, until finally I’m up so high that I can’t see what’s down below and —inevitably fall over the edge into orgasm. The orgasm at this point comes not only from within me, but also from above me — like stars falling down on me while fireworks explode from inside me. It’s long, comes from my whole body — it’s an accumulative celebration of my whole self. This conscious, sensual and intimate practice helps me honour myself and, apart from time in nature, is my spirituality.
Sometimes, parts of my pleasure fall over the edge a bit too soon leading to tiny bursts of orgasm and I feel like I’m cheated on both ends. I don’t want to edge or surrender with only a part of me — I want all of me there. With more time on this edge I’ve discovered that parts of me fall in pieces when my breath doesn’t go deep enough into me — allowing me to be grounded at the same time as I’m climbing. This need to feel I’m on the ground while reaching such great heights of pleasure is a big one, as it’s really only with my feet on the ground that I feel safe enough to fall. I see this need in many men and women I work with and it reminds me how essential it is to feel safety and trust (within ourselves first and foremost) in order to fully experience pleasure.
In this “edge place,” the pleasure in my body creates a fantastical image in my mind of……
A woman on the edge of a cliff in Nova Scotia. She’s wearing a long white dress with an apron, a basket in her hands and a straw hat on her head. The grass around her is green and lush and her surroundings — from the waves crashing onto a cliff opposite her, to the wind blowing onto her — are a scene of immense pleasure. The woman has walked long to get to this edge, slowing down and even stopping at different times on her journey to enjoy the beauty of the world around her. At these times she closes her eyes, leans back and absorbs everything she can of the sounds,smells, and tastes of the scene around her. When she is satiated in the experience — but not tempted enough to stay, she moves on until she is overcome once again with such pleasure that she needs to pause and absorb it. On and on she goes until finally, after quite some time, she stops at the cliffs’ edge. The edge of this cliff is the most beautiful place the women has ever been and yet that surprises her because she can’t see what’s down below at all— she simply senses its beauty from deep inside her.
Eyes closed once again she spreads her arms out and lets the wind and the splash of distant waves touch her face and lightly wet her dress. Teetering on that edge her hat falls off, down, down below to the place of beauty she hasn’t yet seen and still she holds on — not wanting to let go of the beauty up top. Slightly disappointed that part of her already let go, she focuses on the fact that her hair is free now to blow with the wind — making the pleasure even more exquisite. The wind, sensing her pleasure building, increases its strength until her basket too falls — leaving room for her arms to spread out wide in full reception of the pleasure around her. Caught off guard by her basket falling, she reflexively opens her mouth causing her to breathe in more life through the wind, while her body is drawn to pull and sway along with it. Standing there swaying, mouth and arms wide open on the edge of the most beautiful cliff in the world, the woman wonders for a fleeting moment if she wants to leave this beauty for the unknown beauty that’s over the edge. The wind seemingly hearing her fear, reassures her by breathing more life into her — causing her to inhale deeper — bringing air right down into her feet until she feels the dirt under the grass between her toes. As soon as she feels the earth below her, her mouth opens wider, and she allows the wind to breathe her breath upwards this time bringing with it the most exquisite pleasure she’s ever felt in her life. In this moment of pure ecstasy, the woman forgets to hold on and, like a leaf falling off a tree, lets go — blessed by the wind and the waves……. into the place she can’t see but feels already in her heart.
by Natasha | Jun 29, 2018 | Body Image, Posts, Sexual liberation |
Freedom is…
never brushing my hair,
biking without a helmet,
sun on my pussy,
sand in my ass crack.
Freedom is…
accepting my self as I am,
preferring my bare skin to clothing,
letting my stretch marks show,
my abundant lips dangle.
Freedom is…
experiencing my sexuality through my;
open body, open mouth, open eyes and open ears,
and realizing that these experiences can happen all day everyday,
with or without my genitals.
Freedom is…
listening to my body and
trusting that by simply breathing, I can handle everything I feel.
Freedom is…
choosing feeling over avoidance — even when it’s painful.
Freedom is…
Having sex with the lights on,
talking dirty,
fantasizing without shame,
saying “I’ve got one (or two or three) more in me” even if my lover is done —
and not apologizing for it.
Freedom is…
being vulnerable with people that I love,
knowing that in my vulnerability I create an opportunity for deeper intimacy —
whether they meet me in it or not.
Freedom is…
being brave enough to ask for what I want
and not taking it personally when I don’t get it.
Freedom is…
knowing what my core values are,
choosing to live a life that is in alignment with these core values,
and recognizing the freedom that this alignment gives me.
Freedom is…
Me.
**photo credit goes to Stiina
