Free yourself from shame around sex
Do you ever suffer from a shame attack after you’ve had sex, self-pleasured, expressed a desire, or even just when you look at your naked body in the mirror?
A Mental Health Foundation report (2019) revealed that 1 in 5 adults in the UK felt shame because of their body image in the past year. Many people feel ashamed of their sexuality and desires; leading to secrets, infidelity, and a wide range of self-destructive behaviours.
How would it improve your life if you let go of shame around your sexuality and body? Can releasing shame around this help you to feel more confident and improve other areas of your life?
Do you feel ashamed of your body or sexuality? (It's normal)
Many of us are conditioned from an early age to believe that our bodies, and our sexuality, are in some way shameful or dirty.
Conditioning is the conscious or (usually) unconscious, projection of an external viewpoint into our psyche. This can be from/through family, religion, media, education system, peers and other influential figures in our lives. Children tend to absorb external opinions and internalise them, over time, as their own.
Children often explore the erotic energy in a pure and playful way, until they are shut down by adults projecting their own shame, fears and inhibitions onto them. This could be in the form of unocnsious beliefs, judgements or phrases like “don’t touch yourself there, that’s disgusting” “no, those are your private parts and no one should ever see them.” “Girls who dress like that are…”
Shame in the shadows: the impact of shame on your life
Shame and disconnection from our bodies and sexual energy deepens in adolescence. Our unique, personal exploration of our own sexuality is not supported; formal sex and relationship education is so basic as to be practically useless; teaching nothing of the complexities of emotional interaction.
Our sexual self-image during this period is often negatively impacted by the media, our peers, poorly handled and understood early romantic experiences, or assumptions about how things ‘should’ and ‘shouldn’t’ be. All this leads to shame.
Shame is an unpleasant self-conscious emotion typically associated with a negative evaluation of the self; feelings of distress, anxiety, mistrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness. All core negative emotions that impact our functioning in the world; shame is a deeply rooted emotion, and self-image, that prevents us from achieving our full potential in many areas of life.
Shame thrives on secrecy and repression; it can hide in the shadows of society, and in our psyches, for years.
Sexual shame leads to a lot of unhealthy habits, self-destructive behaviours, addictions, and can cause the rapid deterioration of a relationship.
When we can let go of shame and conditioning around our bodies and our sexuality; we recognise that these are, in fact, sacred gifts that can bring us immense pleasure, deep connection, and spiritual experiences.
How can we let go of shame?
1. Change your perspective on your body. Our bodies are not objects; only loveable under certain conditions, but rather unique projections of the soul that can teach us a lot about how we feel and what we need. They can even be a gateway to ecstatic, full-body orgasm and other spiritual experiences. By implication, when we change the way we view our bodies, we also change the way we view others’.
2. Experience sexual energy as sacred. When you can see, and feel, this energy as the creative force that can create new life inside and outside you, rather than a dirty and base energy to be repressed or ignored, you become much more free to express your sexuality. It’s no longer something to hide or apologise for, but a gift that, when used with love, awareness and respect, can make you and others blissfully happy!
3. Re-connect to that childlike state of purity, playfulness, innocence and curiosity; the connect to the pre-shame state. See this new journey into conscious, sacred sexuality as an exploration, an adventure! This can be done through conscious touch, erotic play, communicating our desires and exploring Tao and Tantric techniques for awakening the erotic energy. Through the increased self-awareness this beings, you can start to recognise that many of the shameful beliefs that you absorbed from an early age are not actually yours; they are no longer true for you. Let them go! Create your own beliefs about your body and sexuality. Now you relate to your body from a pre-shame state, you can finally love, accept and enjoy it! You can even teach it to receive, and give, new energies and new sexual experiences.
Living and Loving Unashamedly
Shame cannot survive being spoken about! Opening up to a trusted professional about your shame is a brilliant start. Releasing sexual shame is a fresh start for you, your body, your eroticism and your relationships. It is the ultimate freedom; from judgement, negative thinking/self-talk, and being impacted by the limiting views of others.
Tantric Bodywork can release shame from the genital, and even the cellular level. It also enables us, perhaps for the first time, to experience pleasure and sexual energy in a way that is profound, sacred, and not goal-oriented.
Coaching can help us to release shame and other negative self-beliefs at the conscious and sub-conscious level, whilst learning new attitudes and practical techniques that can release shame and help us to connect to ourselves, and our sexual-emotional energies, more deeply in the every day. This opens us up to experience new heights of pleasure, acceptance of ourselves and others, and love. To find out more about I can help you overcome body and sexual shame, book a free and confidential consultation here
