This is an excerpt from Devi Ward's soon to be released first book, “Shake Your Soul-Song! A Woman’s Guide to Self-Empowerment Through The Art of Self-Pleasure.” This was originally posted at her blog,
Authentic Tantra.
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Chapter 4:
Creating a New Pleasure Paradigm with The 4 Principles of The Art of Self-Pleasure
#1 Understanding the old paradigm If you have ever watched a scary movie you know that usually the first person to get killed by the psycho axe murderer is the girl who has sex. She’s usually the bubbly, giggly, provocative one in really short shorts, who has no qualms about “going all the way," while the girl who survives the slaughter is the one who has retained her chastity, and denied the sexual advances of her male suitors.
This may seem insignificant all on it’s own. But this is a common theme that runs through the cultural media we are exposed to; from the time we begin listening to bedtime stories and Walt Disney fairytales, to the time that we read teen novels & Harlequin romance.
We receive our education or “guidance” in this culture about what is socially acceptable behavior for men & women to engage in, through our stories, television shows, movies, and other forms of media.
We are repeatedly shown images that first suggest to us preferred behavioral patterns, and then reinforce that suggestion again, and again, and again, until it becomes a subconscious belief system that we are operating from without even knowing.
Advertisers are well aware of the power of repetition, which is why the same commercials, songs, and advertisements are played ad nauseum. I am 37 years old (as I write this book), and to this day I still remember that Dunkin’ Donuts commercial from the East coast that played during the early 80’s which showed a man rising early every morning with the statement “It’s time to make the donuts!”
I have confused to many a friend and lover when I have spent the night at their house and awoken in the morning singing “Time to make the donuts!” They look at me very confused and say “I didn’t know you were making donuts this morning, wow, what a treat.” They are inevitably disappointed when I explain to them that donuts wil not be forth-coming that particular morning, and that it is simply my cultural conditioning playing out. Yes, I’m a joy to sleep with.
We are programmed from birth to accept certain behaviors, certain ideas, certain beliefs all as part of our social conditioning. And yes, this is a vital function for us as humans, part of socialization so we can co-exist with a degree of relative, if not absolute, harmony.
Yet, many of the belief systems that we have been conditioned to accept, especially in regards to our sexuality, are debilitating and harmful, and they are external suggestions that we have subconsciously accepted as our own. They control how we think and feel about our own sexuality, preventing us from innocently exploring that aspect of our humanity and preventing us from knowing and understanding the truth of our own bodies and our inherent connection to divinity that can be realized through our sensual awareness & sexual bliss.
We have been conditioned to fear our sexuality as women. The suggestion that bad things happen to “those” kind of girls. Good girls don’t, bad girls do. And who wants to be a bad girl? Cripes! Bad girls at best get knocked up and live on the wrong side of the tracks in abject poverty, raising a child or two on their own, being social outcasts. At worst, they get raped & killed, and end up in ditch somewhere, all for wearing a skirt that was too short, and having had too many lovers before.
The Walt Disney syndrome encourages all little girls to wish and dream for the handsome prince who will ride up on his shining white horse, give us the kiss of life, and awaken us to a glorious new world of happily ever after. The implications in these stories are usually
a) The girl has been living a life of relative suffering without out him.
b) She is under an evil spell and is sleeping or “dormant” (sexually dormant)
c) He is overcome with her beauty (Pretty girls always win) and gives her the “kiss of life” (i.e. again, she is sexually dormant until the big strong handsome man comes and awakens her sexually)
d) They ride off into the sunset, and live happily ever after, her arms wrapped lovingly around his waist, her savior.
What does this “fairytale” imply to my young and girlish mind?
It implies that; My happiness as a woman is dependent upon finding the right man to “save me” and life does not really begin until that first kiss. Also, my sexual awakening lies in the hands of this perfect prince, and I lie in relative dormancy until he arrives, just waiting, hoping, slumbering.
Oh, and that I of course am chaste and demure, until the “right man” comes and “sweeps me off my feet”.
And thus, how many women are still waiting for the “right man” to find happiness? How many women found “prince charming” only to have him leave her for another woman 10 years and 2 kids down the road? How many of us kissed man, after man, after man, desperately hoping, wishing and praying that he would finally be THE ONE? We could finally be happy with the search over; life has now begun!
The point I am trying to make with all of this is that from the time we are little girls, we are overtly and subtly conditioned through various types of cultural suggestion to believe that our life happiness and pleasure lies in the hands of a man, our handsome prince, THE ONE.
We are dissuaded from consciously exploring our own sexual pleasure, beyond a clitoral orgasm here and there, and many times not even that. I have had many women share with me that they have never self-stimulated in any way, and felt very uncomfortable with the thought of doing so for themselves. As if giving ourselves sexual pleasure somehow takes away from our partner.
I remember thinking for most of my life that the inside of my vagina was “his territory” to be reserved for men, or “the right man” to explore.
I was horrified at the thought of sticking something inside of me for my own pleasure, and did so with great reservation and quite tentatively at first, as if I would somehow damage the sanctity of my vagina by daring to venture into that territory on my own.
This fear of owning, knowing, exploring, understanding our own physical-sexual pleasure keeps us fragmented, helpless, weak, confused, & disempowered in life. This fear keeps us disconnected from our intuition, and the inherent knowing that arises from being deeply connected to our bodies and the visceral responses that they give us as guidance. The body knows what it wants. There is a deep instinctive wisdom that we can tap into when we honor the information that it gives using the form of sensations. Pleasure/happy=good, pain/yucky = bad or dangerous. It is that fucking simple.
When we remain ignorant of the most basic understanding of how we feel, we offer up control of our not just our own pleasure, but our own clear wisdom and choices into the hands of another person- usually our male partners.
Which is also disempowering for them, as they are now charged with the task of being responsible for our pleasure & sexual satisfaction, without any real guidance of how to do so.
I believe The Walt Disney Syndrome contributes to sexual dissatisafaction for both men and women, (and partners of all genders) by encouraging unrealistic expectations for both parties. Women believe that the “perfect man” will know how to kiss her perfectly, and fulfill every sexual longing she has ever had (all of our sexual longings being fed to us through media, fairytales and romance novels).
Men know that this is our expectation, for they receive their own cultural guidance about what good girls do & don’t know. So they have to deal with the pressure of “being perfect” and responsible for our sexual pleasure, even though they receive absolutely NO guidance or education about how to give us pleasure, outside of mainstream porn. I think porn has it’s place, but not as our cultures main form of sex education, as it too sets up unrealistic expectations for both men & women.
One of the real problems that I see in this scenario is that because both men & women have this expectation that he is supposed to "know," both people are afraid to talk to each other, and communicate about their pleasure. Because of this unspoken agreement that the man should lead, he “should just know," good girls are just supposed to lie there and give encouraging moans.
This is NOT intimacy. I find it absurd that sex is the most physically intimate act two people can engage in, and yet we are terrified of talking to each other and asking for what we want, largely in part to our cultural programming, and The Walt Disney Syndrome.
Devi Ward passionately believes that the key to accessing personal potential & soul empowerment lies in the full integration of human sexuality with spiritual consciousness. Her instruction contains some of the most powerful, lineage based, authentic Tantric sexual & non-sexual teachings available today, Taoist sexual yoga, and Sacred Erotic Dance.
She is the Founder of Feminine Emergence and Co-Founder of Authentic Tantra™. Devi calls upon her own experience of sexual healing & personal transformation to empower women in fully embracing their sacred sensuality. She specializes in using sensual awareness as a vehicle for personal transformation, life-empowerment, and spiritual growth. Her first book “Shake Your Soul Song! A Woman’s Guide To Self-Empowerment Through The Art of Self-Pleasure” is scheduled for release in October 2012.
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#2 It heals
Devi Ward is an International Authentic Tantra Educator & Sensual Empowerment Coach. Devi has been on a path of Erotic Awakening and Spiritual Embodiment since 1993, studying meditation, holistic healing arts, and alternative forms of erotic expression. Devi has been a Professional Sensual Movement Artist since 1992.
