Let's talk about sex, baby

"Why are we not open about our enjoyment of sex... and why do we feel ashamed for wanting to enjoy it?"

This is a great question that I recently came across... I'd like to share some answers that I came up with.
It's a subject that deserves a deeper analysis... but here's a short answer for the moment. Perhaps it will spark off a discussion that will provide an opportunity to go deeper into the question.

Where to begin? There are so many reasons why people feel ashamed about wanting to enjoy sex.

For example, people feel that they are being selfish or indulgent when they receive great pleasure.
We are taught to believe that life is a struggle and that if we're enjoying ourselves then we're probably being childish and immature... (This isn't explicitly taught in these words but our 'education' leads to this conclusion as far our emotional logic is concerned.)

We are also taught to feel guilty about sexual pleasure in our religious education, which influences us even if we do not consider ourselves to be part of a judgemental religion and don't believe in a judgemental God. Religious education has HUGE after-effects, regardless of what we later adopt as our official philosophical-religious-spiritual position.

Also we are sometimes unconsciously afraid of what others will think of us for indulging in sexual pleasure, because we want to be seen as responsible adults who are self-disciplined and who have great self-control. If we wish to keep our job and to be invited out to dinner with our peers and be trusted then we feel that we have to be able to be 'above sex' in some way... This creates a rigid, socially-acceptable persona... Then we end up feeling unsure of whether or not we can drop this persona when we're with friends or family... or even with our partner or with someone with whom we are seeking to become intimate, and ultimately even just by ourselves - hence the feeling of being 'ashamed for wanting to enjoy sex' regardless of anyone else's judgement of us.

I'm sure some people will read this and say, "I don't feel ashamed about wanting to enjoy sex, and I don't care what anyone thinks of me enjoying sex, it's none of their business anyway... and besides, I don't need to be open about it precisely because it's nobody else's business... so why would I want to be open about it?" Also, some might feel that this doesn't apply to them because they're in a fulfilling relationship and so their 'sex-life' (you see we speak of it as if it were a parallel life to our 'normal' life) is shared with their partner, so they're not feeling like it's a secret that they have to keep only to themselves.

All of the above is fair enough :o) Sure, it's nobody else's business and sure we don't have to talk about sex openly and sure, if we're in a fulfilling relationship we probably feel that we don't have to share our 'sex-life' with other people...
But it seems that most people are truly trapped in their conflict of emotions - they feel a pressure to keep their sexual desires and their 'sex-life (or lack of it) to themselves while they're aching to feel deeply sexually liberated and fulfilled... This is one reason why we play unfulfilling games and sometimes don't ever come out and say what we feel to the people that we love, or share what we're feeling with our closest friends or family. We try so hard to be accepted and loved... sometimes we don't even see how hard we're trying - it just becomes a habit, a posture that we assume as part of our self-image.

So... I'm not saying that people SHOULD talk more about sex or be more open about their desire to enjoy it... I'm just saying that we would feel much more liberated if we recognised the conditioning that we're holding onto in this area.

I also believe that we are actually afraid of Life itself. We are afraid of the unknown... and therefore we are afraid of life.
Sex is a raw manifestation of Life's energy so we try to control it so that we can handle it and not be overwhelmed by it... So what happens is that we don't have sex in a way that feels completely fulfilling (we don't let go fully) and that also leaves us feeling guilty because - again at a subconscious level - we feel the awesome power of sexuality and actually know that in some sense it is deeply sacred... so we feel guilty for not doing it 'right'.

The mystery of how to enjoy sex fully in a truly liberated way is one of the keys to health and happiness :o)

To be continued...

And by the way, yes, I'm well aware that I've not talked about 'love'... only 'sex'. That's the point. Perhaps we believe that we live in a sexually free society, but actually it is almost taboo to talk, in 'spiritually-polite company' about sex without talking about 'sex with love'... so 'perhaps in the next instalment we'll talk about 'Tantra' - What it is... and what it isn't.
Anyone interested?

Peter Littlejohn Cook