Iceland Turns Frigid ~ When did pro-feminism become anti-sex?

I read an article this morning by Julie Bindel from the UK’s Guaridian reporting that Iceland has passed a law that will result in all of the strip clubs in their country being shut down citing that no business be allowed to profit off the nudity of its employees. In my early college feminists days, I would have waved my high toting feminist flag while wearing my hair back and up in what my boyfriend of the time referred to as my angry scarf. I would have pounded the pavement with my other angry feminists sisters and fellow women’s studies majors in hi-laced combat boots or Earth mama Birkenstocks celebrating this moment as a movement on behalf of the rights of women. But this morning, eight years later, I cringed. The article and law reeked of outdated second wave feminism ideology suppressing an equally powerful uprising force, women’s sexual freedom and empowerment in all its shapes and forms. I also cringe at this article today, knowing that the more liberated, whole and healed I become as a woman, the more I celebrate my sexuality, nudity and the exchange of energy for my work which includes at times both nudity and sexuality, for money.

I make my profession, fulfill my dharma and live out my soul’s purpose on this Earth through unfolding both men and women to the beauty of their bodies, their sexuality, their wholeness. I am one of those people who Iceland’s feminist prime-minister Johanna Sigurdardottir’s ban would have affected in an anti-feminist AND anti-sex way. Today I reflect for a moment on how grateful I am to live in the country where I live, how grateful I am that women are in positions of power and that feminists have paved the way for me like Johanna Sigurdardottir to be the empowered woman I am today. I also stop to ask questions such as “Is it so hard to fathom that a woman might, Goddess forbid, be empowered by her sexuality enough to want to strip?” Is it so preposterous to think that sexual surrogates might actually be called to do what they do because it’s healing for both them and their clients?

To this, I address the Sex Industry Entry Point for Women:

There are three avenues a woman enters the sex industry, by force, by circumstance and by choice and ultimately it would be useful to have laws and systems taken into account for all of these entry points into the industry. The trafficking and exploitation of women and children in the sex industry is a rape of our planet and our humanity and effective laws are absolutely necessary to support healing and transforming both the women who have been exploited and the men who are doing the exploiting. But what does a whole healed woman look like? Could she look like a stripper? At this point Johanna Sigurdardottir’s administration has not taken into account women’s’ entry point into the sex industry where intention and empowered choice become a catalyst for healing and transformation.

I propose to Iceland’s administration a quite miraculous model Eve Ensler has moved forth onto the planet – using her Award Winning women positive and sex positive play The Vagina Monologues to raise awareness and benefit causes that promote ending violence against women. Couldn’t this massive, lucrative, mostly male run and female employed industry be better served if a portion of the proceeds went in fact to rehabilitate persons who had experienced their time in the sex industry through circumstance or force rather than by pro-active conscious choice and also create more structured laws in place to unionize dancers rights?

In responses to the new law recently passed where no business can profit off the nudity of its employees, Miriam of feministing.com responds: “A feminist victory, in my opinion, would be a highly regulated industry that made sure dancer's rights were protected. One where workers were paid good wages, were able to unionize, had full benefits, were able to set boundaries with customers and have those boundaries protected. One that ensured that these immigrant women were not being brought to Iceland against their will.”

I think we all know from past experience that beyond stripping, the oldest profession will always be that, the oldest profession and will eventually push these communities underground which endanger most of all the women workers and not the men who have been doing the exploiting. By alienating our men from having the opportunity to rise up and support women and their sexual empowerment, we have created an even deeper and oppressive shadow by creating separation and isolation rather than mutually beneficial activism.

I personally extend an invitation to Johanna Sigurdardottir and Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir who first proposed this ban, to attend any Naked Yoga class, Clothing Optional Holy Body Interfaith Worship Services, or Sensual Shaman Session free of charge to witness what whole, healed sexual people look like in a consciously nude, celebratory and symbiotic environment. Johanna and Kolbrún, I await your response.

Guardian UK writer Julie Bindel guardian.co.uk writes:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/mar/25/iceland-most-feminist-country

Miriam of Feministing.org

http://www.feministing.com/archives/020546.html

Sexually Transmitted Spirits

This is an amazing article about Sexually Transmitted Spirits. I encouraged everyone to read about it and if any of this resonates with you, to seek out a soul retrieval and shamanic cleansing ceremony. I have encountered a handful of clients in my practice who have greatly benefitted from soul clearings from loose spirits or exorcisms. Exorcism is a loaded word and I, like many of us, can't help but flash back to the 1973 Linda Blaire movie. I'm afraid most exorcisms are not so dramatic as Hollywood would have us believe they are and seldom occur with a 'bad, evil or demonic' spirits but mostly just a lost spirit who needs a host because it cannot find its way home. That said, spiritual possession can be incredibly disorienting and confusing for the individual and may involve energy draining, identity confusion and acting out of a place that seems uncharacteristic of normal behavior.

In my own life, I had a similar experience this past year where an egg from my egg donation procedure in 2004 was fertilized in another woman's body in 2009 and the spirit of the baby tried to incarnate in my body because I shared its biological blueprint. What did that mean exactly? Phantom pregnancy. My body began to mirror the systems of a pregnant woman and I began making decisions from a place in my being including the attached spirit. My symptoms began with acting over motherly and taking precautions not to engage in vigorous or stressful activity. I also began actively seeking out pregnant women to converse with and began to distance myself from my friends who did not have children or families and began seeking out new groups of friends who did. Thanks to the support of a few close healing friends, I was able to successfully release any contracts I had with this being and guide its spirit to its birth mother who was creating a home for it on Earth. Egg donation is a dicey business. Still exploratory at best and lets just say in 2004 when I signed up to donate some of my eggs to help me pay for yoga school, the last thing I was concerned with was years later being possessed by a spirit baby.

Spirit possession doesn't always happen from a procreative place, but because so much power and energy is held in fertility and the act of sexuality that it is one of the easiest times to transmit spirit possession from one person to another. High ecstasy, acts of violence, especially sexual violence can transfer spirits from one being to another or a person can open up to a loose spirit because it may seem to be an ideal host in the moment. Many victims of rape, sexual abuse and assault suffer from spirit possession because the body's energy system becomes compromised. There are helpful words of wisdom in this article.

I hope you find it useful and for those of you who this strongly resonates with, please seek out assistance from a shamanic practitioner.

In Love & Light,

ISIS

http://www.shamanictantra.com/media/Files/pdf/DoortoSoul.pdf

Sensual Shamanic Yoga

Sensual Shamanic Yoga -

(image by Susan Seddon Boulet)

It was an intimate gathering this past Monday evening, the final class in Sensual Shamanic Yoga. Five of us gathered and held space for ourselves and the practice. I had been getting the hit for a week now to move deeper into animal spirit energy with the class. We began our class by heightening our five senses and moving deeper into scent, taste, skin sensation, sight without eyes and acute awareness to the subtle frequencies of sound.

We then journeyed to receive the animal that was most useful to merge with during the first part of class. Mother Spider appeared to me. We bowed and acknowledged each other and then merged into each other making the connection, linking our nervous systems. My legs spun inwards and energy surged up through my eight limbs and deep into the spindles of my belly. My hands were delicate but strong and four additional etheric legs spun out of my body giving me supreme balance held up by an octahedron of energy and many eyes. The animal body is confident and aware of the totality of her presence at all times. She never ceases to exist in any part of herself. There is never a removed sense of consciousness from any part of the body, she and the body have become one. Nature demands this unwavering presence for survival – to merge fully with the body, to align the body / spirit relationship with nature because the elements and the food chain demand existing in a constant state of oneness. The animal kingdom exists in constant meditation, fully in every present moment and hyper-aware of everything around it. It does not forget how to find food or build nests or migrate to warmer climates. It remembers; it opens to its truest state of being.

Shamanic Yoga Journey:

Getting in touch with the animal body ~

Tools, eye coverings, yoga mat, blanket

Lie down on your yoga mat in an area of your home you consider sacred and that allows for movement. Feel your body against the Earth. Begin to deepen your breath and settle into the body. Once you have settled begin to visualize yourself in place you feel to be sacred. This could be the room your are currently in, a place from your childhood, a place in nature or a magical place you’ve just created. Feel yourself in this new surrounding. Once you feel in a calm space in your new sacred surrounding, put out a call to your animal spirit, holding the intention that the animal spirit most appropriate for this embodiment journey will appear to you. Be open to receive whatever animal spirit shows up without judgment. Acknowledge each other with a bow and ask permission to merge with your animal spirit. When permission is granted feel yourself inside its body, its legs, its eyes, its heartbeat, its energy. Once the connection has been made, slowly begin to rise up off your reclining positioning on your yoga mat and move to your hands and knees maintaining the connection with you animal spirit. Begin to allow the freedom of movement and the merging of your energy inside the animal blueprint of energy to influence how you move.

If you have a yoga practice try two rounds of Sun Salutes in the energy of this animal to give your movement structure and be open to how the animal’s energy influences your yoga routine. After the Sun Salutes return to a gentle movement meditation on your mat in your animal body. Allow any new or intuited yoga poses of this animal spirit to rise up form within you and express themselves through movement and sound on your mat. When that feels complete, come to a resting pose and release the connection with your animal spirit. Ask your animal spirit if it has anymore information that is useful to share with you at this time. Acknowledge your animal spirit with a bow or other gesture of gratitude and journey back fully to your human body. Move through two rounds of Sun Salutes on your mat intending your human body and human energy. Close your practice with Savasana or seated meditation.

Earth My Body

Earth My Body is a sensual movement meditation on the physical body as a microcosom to the Earth Body Macrocosom. The low phonations pitches in the music were channelled when directly connecting to the Earth Bodies internal moans. May we continue to expand our understanding and deepen our awareness and relationship with our holy bodies and Her holy body.

Click HERE

Earth My Body ~ A Sensual Movement Meditation

Love & Blessings,

ISIS

The Keening

The Keening is a movement meditation on Grief; a journey from heartbreak to healing. It is only when we can fully sit in our grief, to embody and feel it completely that we can then move through it. Without conscious acknowledgement and embodiment, grief lurks in the collective shadow and clings to us mercilessly. A week after the Haiti Earthquake, I was attending a yoga class at the studio in midtown I frequent. I was on my menstrual cycle, usually a woman's most psychic, powerful and empathic time of the month. As such, I had been offering healing meditations to people of Haiti earlier that day. When we sat in the beginning of the yoga class, our hands in prayer pose to join in the sound of Om, my wrists began to experience pain they had never felt. The pain was so severe that tears began to stream down my face as we chanted. I felt the grief of Haiti in my wrists. The heightened empathy of my menstrual cycle plugged me into the collective pain body and global suffering from the Earthquake. A week after the quake, I felt our disjointed movement of aid, hands giving and hands unable to receive, the disjointed flow of energy as mothers reached for children, children for parents, long distance relatives for missing family. The flow of life form one hand, not reaching the other. A flood of grief moved through my body. I felt the desperation of the Haitian people, the grief of those trying to support a community in chaos and the grief of the Haitian people not being able to receive aid due to the unstable environment. I offer this short film as a meditation. To move through the places in the physical body where grief is being held and to move through the collective pain body where our ancient and collective grief is held. May we all experience universal healing.

The Keening