Money, Obligation and Conscious Consent

I think of the decision about what we charge financially for a service as one of our boundary choices. Respecting someone’s financial boundary is one of the first ways that as their customer I can show someone I will respect every aspect of them. I cannot think of a time when I have asked someone to lower their fee for a service. And I never feel that just because I paid someone money, they owe me something or I can treat them poorly.

Of course, there is some exchange taking place, or I would not have paid them, and I do want to be treated well as a customer. If I am not treated well, I will probably choose to not be a customer of that person.

But even if I am paying someone for a service, I want them to want to provide the service and not just because they are receiving money.

On occasion I have done something just for the money, like some day jobs, and it never feels good. I don’t want to be on either side of that kind of an exchange.

What I say a lot is that life is short. So having conscious intent and consent in every situation is a priority to me. I want to consciously choose everything I do in my life and know that people interacting with me are consciously choosing and wanting to interact with me as well. It does not feel good to interact if either person in the exchange does not truly want to participate. I believe this is true even if money is exchanged.

Copyright 2013 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

Why Does a Sexuality Educator Need to Write About Children?

Well, of course, the answer is we don’t have to do anything. But it is important to me, as a sexuality educator, to write about children for this reason: if I don’t care about children, you should not trust me as a sexuality educator.

I have many children in my life. I have a large family of origin and more nieces and nephews than I can count. I also have a number of friends with children.

I love the children in my life and give to them as much as I would love and give to my own children. I have never felt any need or desire to be a parent because I believe that all the children in this world are my children and I have responsibility for all of them.

As a sexuality educator, I have been sensitive to the taboo of talking about sexuality and children. Childhood sexuality is not the main focus of my work. However, I often call my work “sexual healing education” rather than “sexuality education” because I do my work from the vantage point of knowing many of us need to heal our sexualities because of our childhood experiences. I also want to prevent more harm being done to anyone in the world, particularly children.

Preventing harm also includes letting children discover their bodies naturally. When we teach children about limits or boundaries, we should do it in a way that when they become adults, they don’t have difficulty claiming their natural-born right to pleasure. It means understanding that not all touch is sexual, so we can all get the nurturing touch we need. And children in particular can get the love, touch and attention they deserve.

If I didn’t keep the best interest of children in mind, you should not trust me as a sexuality educator. Teaching adults about sexuality can be interesting, but that is not where my primary interest lies. It is in understanding how to have the healthiest relationships and friendships in our lives and how to develop a sexuality that is not stifled or repressed by cultures uncomfortable with touch, sexuality, feelings and all else that matters.

I believe in paying attention to what happens to children as well as adults. That is why I do what I do, and you should only trust me as a sexuality educator if you know that I will care for the children.

Copyright 2013 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

I stepped on a sharp rake, and they came to see how I was doing. But when I fell on my clitoris as a very young child, no one came to comfort me.

I grew up on a farm. It is a wonder that as a child I didn’t have even more falls and injuries than I experienced. But the injury I remember today is falling on my clitoris.

Several of my twelve siblings and I were playing on a road grader. There is nothing cushiony or soft about a road grader. There is no place to sit. There are sharp points all over it, in addition to the sharp blades used to make the rough gravel roads smooth.

I was walking from the back of the grader to the front when I fell on my clitoris. It felt like falling on a knife. I got off and ran to the house screaming. My next memory is lying on a reclining chair. I heard whispering. One of my sisters who had been out on the road grader and probably saw what happened was whispering to another sibling.

I stopped crying long enough to let it sink in that it probably had something to do with what part of my body was injured. But no one came to see if I was okay.

Is it any wonder that as an adult, I have been publicly talking and writing about healing the entire body, including the genital area?

 

Copyright 2013 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

Treating Money the Way I Treat Sex

If I were to treat money the way I treat sex, here is what I would do.

I would hold on to it a little while and let it build, and I’d savor the moment with it. I would think of the freedom and choices it could give me if I got intentional and centered and intuitive with it.

I would hold it for awhile but not hold it too tight. I would be conscious of the ebb and flow, the expansion and contraction, the in and out of all things—including money.

I would be giving it and receiving it and be conscious of the relationships I am building with it.

I would honor the relationships that grow with the sharing of it and not have any more rules for how and when I share it than I do for how to have healthy, abundant friendships and relationships in my life.

If I were to treat money the way I treat sex, I would honor it and keep it safe and respect it. I would honor the power of it and the generosity of it. I would know that I could share it and give it away and there will always be more. I would honor my yes and no and maybe with it.

I would be as intentional with it as I am with all other parts of my life.

It would be a part of me but not the most important part of me. I would use it as a tool to create a life on this earth that fits with my values and helps me be creative and do what I am meant to do on this earth.

I would enjoy it by buying things and experiences that are pleasurable.

I would let go of how it comes to me so that I can be creative in all parts of my life, because nothing is more important to me than living a creative life.

And I would fight for everyone to have abundance, just as I fight for everyone to get to have empowered sexuality in their life.

Copyright 2013 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

Sex Is a Skill, Like Riding a Bicycle

I have been doing sexuality education workshops since 1989. In one particular workshop, I focused on the idea of sex being a skill. One participant reacted very strongly against that idea. It was as though sex and sexuality could not possibly be anything other than natural or innate. I’ve been thinking about this reaction for some time now and reflecting on it in light of my experiences with learning a couple of skills as an adult.

One of the things I am most proud of is learning how to swim in my 30s. As a child living on a family farm, I heard stories of children being thrown off a boat by their siblings and told to swim—which they did. To the storytellers, my siblings, that was proof that swimming was natural. I was only grateful they didn’t throw me in the water. Instead, I was taught, mostly by my mother, to be afraid that if I attempted to learn to swim, I would drown.

As an adult dealing with the intense fear messages I had learned, I didn’t find that swimming came naturally. In fact, it was a very steep learning process to release the fears and learn the skills. It is hard to float when you are afraid. I am not the best swimmer today by any stretch; I think that some people have a natural ability to float and that it would have been easier for me to learn to swim as a child. But more important are all the other factors that affect my potential to tap into a natural ability, whether it’s about swimming or sex.

The fear in my brain was the biggest obstacle. The messages I’d heard, the stories I’d been told and my lack of experience were as much a part of my learning (and unlearning) as any inherent natural ability in my body to float in the water. But knowing when to breathe and synching my movements with my breathing are skills I had to learn regardless of any innate ability to swim. When I learned to swim, I took classes and had teachers. I had to practice in real life, in a swimming pool. I couldn’t just read about it or watch a video.

To use a different example: I learned how to ride a bicycle as a child. Whether or not balancing on a bicycle is innate or learned, I will let you decide. Just as I had developed the fear of water and swimming, the fear of cars was instilled within me in as large proportion. I had twelve siblings growing up, and most of them were older. Unfortunately, drinking and car accidents were common in my family; one accident left one of my brothers paralyzed from the waist down. So once again I learned, mostly from my mother, to be very afraid of car accidents. It didn’t help to be in my first car accident as a passenger at the age of fourteen; I was left with broken teeth and a broken left wrist. Having had at least one other very serious car accident as an adult, which left me with a severe neck injury, I appreciate the damage that can be done to my body if I am in a car accident while in a car, much less on a bicycle.

Moving through the fear as an adult and getting on the bicycle in a city was and is no small thing. And just because I learned how to balance on a bicycle as a child did not mean I didn’t have a lot more to learn as an adult. There were no stop signs on the farm.

I give the swimming and bicycle riding examples because I think the same thing happens with sex. If we learn that masturbation is a sin, as I did growing up Catholic, it has an effect on our sexuality. Whatever might come instinctively as part of a sexual experience presupposes that I have body awareness and openness to sexuality. Having body acceptance did not happen until my adulthood. I know many of us have struggled at some point in our lives with being present in our minds, emotions and bodies.

So how do we learn the skill of sex? Or how do we unlearn fear of sex, as I unlearned some of my fear of water and cars? Pretty much the same way we learn anything: We can read and research the topic. We can ask our friends or a professional. We can learn from watching a video. And we can learn sex by doing—by having sex.

There are ways to learn to be present in our emotions and body that are nonsexual in nature but can be helpful in sexual situations as well. Anything I do to increase my self-esteem or self-acceptance will also allow for increased self-esteem in sex and sexuality. After all, our sexuality is not separate from our minds, emotions and body awareness. Anything I do to enhance my emotions will allow for more emotional capacity in love, relationships and sexuality as well. When I learn to communicate appreciation and care in all relationships or how to communicate through a conflict, I can use those same skills when talking about sex.

I do recognize some of the inherent or natural aspects of sex and sexuality. If we have the foundation of body awareness or trust in ourselves and/or a partner, we can feel pleasure and may intuitively touch a certain way or respond sexually in some natural way, such as instinctively doing a rocking motion with our pelvis. But trust may need to be reestablished if it’s been broken for whatever reason. Many people can benefit from exercises and learning to increase their body awareness, and practical information on sex and sexuality can help enhance pleasure for many people.

If sex was only a skill, I would probably not be as interested in it as an education topic. I would consider it boring and technical, and it certainly would not have been one of the main focuses of my work for over twenty years. I cherish all of the creativity, humanness, flow and spontaneity of sex as it can exist in our minds, emotions and bodies. I appreciate the art of communication and building trust, of learning to let go when alone or with another person. I value the changes and growth and even naturalness of sex. If we really believe sex is natural, one place to start to honor that belief is to support, rather than shut down, children’s innate tendency to masturbate and explore their bodies. And if we acknowledge that sex is also a skill, we can get as good at it as we choose and still honor all of its creative mystery.

First Published on Good Vibrations Magazine, June 22, 2012

Copyright 2012 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

Why I Keep the Focus on Self-Pleasuring and on the Importance of the Relationship with Ourselves

 

Many people have said that if we really want a good relationship with another person, we have to like ourselves. We need to be our own best friend and enjoy spending time alone in order to have a healthy and fulfilling friendship or sexual relationship with another person.

Many other people have said that it is difficult for someone else to give us pleasure if we don’t know how to pleasure ourselves.

When I started doing sexuality education over twenty years ago, I began with the topic of unlearning homophobia. I quickly expanded the subject to include unlearning biphobia and sexphobia. In seeing people grapple with these prejudices, I decided their root is a general discomfort with sexuality. I have come to believe that if we want to have positive change around sexuality, we need to unravel some of its bigger taboos, one of them being masturbation or self-pleasuring.

So I keep the focus right there on self-pleasuring and the importance of the relationship with ourselves. When people talk about sexual practices, I remind them that self-pleasuring is one of them. When people talk about relationships, I remind them about the importance of the relationship with ourselves. I celebrate every chance I get the brave work of individuals like Dr. Betty Dodson and Dr. Joycelyn Elders.

But the issues of importance are much broader than a focus on self-pleasuring, sex or even the relationship we may have with ourselves or another person. I want a world where we honor pleasure in all forms. When I see how we do work, pay bills, buy stuff and use petroleum products and how little we rest, relax or enjoy simple pleasures, I know I want to live in a different kind of world. When I see people not being able to be alone or settling for unfulfilling or unhealthy relationships, including the relationship with themselves, I know I want to live in a world that honors human connection and needs and values human development and growth. While I want the world to change, I keep the focus on our own self-love and self-pleasure first because even if we live in a world where there is peace and love, it won’t matter if we don’t feel them within ourselves. So when I see people struggle with self-acceptance, body acceptance and self-esteem, I know I need to keep talking about the importance of the relationship with ourselves and loving our bodies. No matter how much someone else loves us or thinks positive thoughts about any aspect of us, whether physical, emotional or otherwise, it won’t make a difference unless we believe those things about ourselves as well.

I want to live in a world where there is more compassion for ourselves and each other, and I think we need to start with ourselves in order to get to each other. We cannot own other people, our children, our pets or the earth. We cannot own our best friendships or relationships, and yes, I believe our friends are as important as any sexual relationship we may have. While we cannot own other living beings around us, we can and should own our thoughts, ideas, interests, loves, likes and time. The sense of empowerment we can feel from claiming our authentic selves is far more rewarding than trying to control or own someone else, and that includes our most intimate partners.

The greatest love is unconditional: when we truly allow individuals to be free in every way, knowing we can only receive love if it is freely given. Ultimately, we come into the world alone, and we die alone. So while we can relate and have community, family, friends and all kinds of other relationships, ultimately we are still alone. The most important relationship that affects all other relationships is our relationship with ourselves.

While we cannot own anyone else, we can take ownership of our body, sexuality, identities, history and cultures. We can own our uniqueness and imagination. By truly connecting to self, we can offer another person play, touch, love and sensuality—but only if we can give them to ourselves.

One of my favorite topics is the topic of letting go. I’m intrigued and awed with how it is such a common denominator in so many human experiences, pleasurable and painful. We have to let go to experience orgasm. We have to let go of our worries about what people think in order to really enjoy life as our authentic selves and how we choose to be in this world. We have to let go when someone dies and let go of fear to experience the moments of our lives fully.

Let’s enjoy the person we spend the most time with: ourselves. Let’s live in each moment as fully as we can, knowing there is no guarantee we will get another moment with ourselves or another we love. In addition to taking action with our words, time, energy and money, we can change the world with self-love, self-esteem, self-compassion and self-pleasure. We cannot give to someone else what we cannot give to ourselves.

First Published on Good Vibrations Magazine,  October 11, 2011

Copyright 2011 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.

Consent in the Doctor's Office

When I was in my late teens, I had barely formed friendships with other youth, much less developed a sexual relationship with anyone, male or female. So I had little awareness of sexuality, much less any need for birth control, and had never had a pelvic exam. Once I entered college, my parents pressured me to get a job. I had a female friend who was in the National Guard Army Reserves and popular and extroverted enough to do well with its male-dominated atmosphere. Her example combined with the appeal of making money for college convinced me to follow her into the National Guard. Before I knew it, I was in a Guard-arranged doctor’s appointment having my very first pelvic exam.

Twenty years later, I worked as a reproductive health counselor in a women’s health clinic. I explained to countless girls and women what happens in a pelvic exam and the necessity of relaxing the opening to the vagina to minimize any potential discomfort. Twenty years later, I was also paid to be a gynecological teaching associate, letting hundreds of men and women, future health care professionals, practice pelvic exams on my body and giving my consent and taking responsibility to relax my vaginal muscles to avoid pain. I explained to those future providers how they could help any woman—not just me—feel comfortable, safe, in control of the exam and able to stop it if needed. But twenty years earlier, as a young woman who knew little about my body and sexuality or anything about pelvic exams, I lay on the exam table in the doctor’s office without any idea what was going to be done to me.

I can’t recall the doctor’s face. He never looked up, slowed down, or stopped as I screamed out in pain when the speculum, which felt like a steel rod, opened up inside of me. But I do remember the look on the face of the nurse in the corner of the room: she was expressionless. I have no idea what was going through her mind, but certainly there was no compassion to speak of.

I compare that experience to how, as a reproductive health counselor, I held the hand or touched the shoulder of each woman, coached her about breathing and reminded her to relax the muscles at the opening of the vagina. With my eye contact, I would show all the compassion I felt for her. When the pelvic exam or inserting the speculum didn’t go painlessly, I was the first to say, “I am so sorry that it hurt,” and I often tried to talk it over with the woman after the exam, explaining that I knew it could be difficult to relax sometimes but there was hope that the next time could be painless.

During one patient visit, I knew the doctor was ready to insert the speculum, but I could tell the woman was not ready. I put my hand between the speculum and the woman’s vulva and said, “She’s not ready.”

Today, as a sexuality educator, I believe that if consent in the doctor’s office is not important, then it makes it less likely that it will be taken seriously in every other part of our lives. Consent is not just important when our genitals are being touched. It is important when we are being touched anywhere on our bodies. I’ve worked for over five years as a caregiver for individuals with HIV/AIDS, and it has always been my belief that any touch—touching someone’s arm or putting lotion on a resident’s legs or helping clean someone’s entire body with a shower or bed bath—is a significant intimacy to pay close attention to, in order to ensure respect and consent. I also believe in the potential sacredness of interactions that involve no touch—whether talking to or just being silently present with someone during a moment of their living or dying.

I have explored touch, intimacies and healing modalities of all kinds with a deep desire to embrace all aspects of myself (sexuality, emotions, thoughts and spirit) as part of my own personal healing as well as to facilitate my writing and sexuality education activities. I can say unequivocally that it matters less where we are touched than how we are touched. I will also go on record to say that my experience in that doctor’s office decades ago felt like rape. Being an advocate for consent in our sexuality, relationships and all parts of living and dying, I affirm that consent matters everywhere and every time in our interactions at work, at home, in the street and in the doctor’s office.

First Published on Good Vibration Magazine, July 11, 2011

Copyright 2011 by Susan Miranda.  All rights reserved.  No part of this writing may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder. For reprint permission, email miranda_susan@yahoo.com.