in this vein of how you do one thing is how you do anything …

… if someone observed you making love or in orgasm, what would they infer for how you lead your life?

by O, orgasm i mean, yes, sexual arousal and sensual expansion, but i also mean: your pleasure, your bliss, your ability to relax and receive.

which sounds most like how YOU do the DO?

THE RUSH JOB:

* how long is this going to take?  i don’t have time for this!
* can’t we do this later?
* oh, ok, i’ll do you a favor.
* now i’m taking too long.

THE PRINCESS:

* you’re here to serve me, right?
* how do i look?
* am i doing this right?
* not sure how that was for you, but at least i got mine.

THE RENUNCIATE:

* sex?  orgasm?  pleasure?  what’s that?
* oh, i gave that up for lent 7 years ago.
* feel good?  i’m too busy feeling bad so i can deserve feeling good.
* enjoy myself?  i’d rather not. it’s rather messy and i might look stupid.

THE MARTYR:

* YOUR pleasure might matter, but mine?  not so much.
* oh, well, if we must, i’ll “think of england.”
* don’t worry about me, i’ll be fine.
* la-la-la-la-la (fingers in ears)

why exactly do i care about your sensual pleasure?  as much as i want for you plentiful and heart-expanding Os, what i really care about is that you as a woman are sensually expressed and sensually filled up. 

you, sensually expressed.  you, sensually filled up.

WHY?  because that’s when your  feminine genius struts her stuff.

that’s when you’re naturally shining brightest.  tapped into your calling.  brave, clear and full of moxie.

that’s when you are your tail-wagging-est, largest-hearted, sassiest self.

now, i’ve known this without a shred of doubt for years.

and over the past months, i’ve been diving into some ground-breaking medical and scientific research that can now document the PHYSICAL connection between a woman’s PLEASURE and her CONFIDENCE.

let me say that again: not just the EMOTIONAL connection (which i bet you can feel, right?), but PHYSICAL connection.  on the level of nerves, chemicals and hormones.

the exceedingly brief reader’s digest version is that the physical experience of pleasure for a woman causes her brain to release (among other chemicals) dopamine.

dopamine = sass, sure-footedness, zest for life.

want to be confident?  you need to be a pleasured woman.

i’m obviously obsessed with the exact potent combination of understandings, practices and ways of being that have women IGNITE and be the brilliant badasses we truly are.

it’s partly because i’ve been happily and myopically focused on my high-level mentorship program, which will be open again for applications in a few weeks.

it’s a cauldron in which i’ve combined ALL of those potent ingredients that truly blossoms our WomanNess.

turns out, your sexual energy is the same as your creative energy.  and, where you might have blocks sexually and sensually, there are often parallels to where you might be blocked creatively.

CREATE as in make art, make love, make business, make babies, make friends and make a home.

most women think pleasure is worse than a four-letter word.  most women pattern their own sexual energy from of man’s:

1. get hot quickly.

2. come as fast and hard as possible.

3. done.

but listen: it takes the average women around 20 minutes of playing around to even START to get aroused.  straight up intercourse doesn’t yield climax for over 80% of women.

we often have no idea what pleasures us uniquely, that it might be a different beast from his altogether.  (and any other woman’s for that matter).

men and a lot of women learn about what sex and pleasing their partners should be and look like, through porn.  which is a lot like studying a paper menu and trying to recreate the meal from the black-and-white words on the page.

bottom line: for most of us, it’s an outside-in job.

i say, our sensual lives should be an inside-out job.

i’m all for the fabulous quickie.  hard and fast Os aren’t a problem in and of themselves.

but when it’s ALL you know, when you aren’t on intimate terms the vast sensual landscape that is your birthright, when you don’t take your pleasure seriously – in and out of the bedroom – then i take issue.

the degree to which you are sensually expressed and sensually full-filled is the degree to which you feel truly alive.  

it is not only fun and pleasurable, it’s the key to your juice and brilliance as a woman.

i say it again: want to be confident?  you need to be a pleasured woman.

so maybe you’d go instead for guidelines (for sex and for life) along the lines of:

THE SAVOR-ER:

* savor.

* stop.  breathe.  feel.

* reach up and into sensation in order to feel more.

* notice urges and impulses as they come up, share them (boldly, kindly and exuberantly) with the knowledge that if you were thinking it, likely they were too.

* remind yourself: it’s good to feel good.  your hunger is holy.

* this is a great spot.  let’s linger here for a nice, long while.

* the more I’M having a pleasurable time, the more HE is and THEY are, too.

* how can we make this the most fun possible?

* there’s as much (or more!) enjoyment in the journey as in reaching the destination.  (ever notice how much more fun it can be to get ready for the party than the party itself?)

* let’s widen the aperture of our senses to drink in more of life.

* let it in.  let it come.

o, oh, O,