There are great lessons to be learned, even on Tinder.

Bet ya didn't think I was gonna say that!

Well, there is. For instance, I have recently learned that if I am too direct with men about wanting sex, and wanting it to be casual. For as much as certain men say they want a casual thing, they also seem to want me to be somewhat romantic with them in order to stir up the sexual tension.

But this is not something one can pull out of one's ass. This chemistry, this sexual energy either happens or it doesn't. There are plenty of people I will have sex with, but there are far fewer with whom there will be that spark. It is not that I am not attracted to these people, it is just that there is not that electricity that happens with some people that you meet. That's just the world. I didn't make it.

So where do you go from there, when the person(s) you are casually having sex with want you to act like there is some kind of unexplainable chemistry between you? I guess it depends on the type of person you are, but for me, I just can't fake that shit. It takes way too much energy and frankly, if I put myself in the position where I feel like I need to fake sexual chemistry just to get laid, I am going to be expecting a pay off which not many people will be able to deliver.

The thing is, there isn't a lot written about this stuff. Sure, there is The Ethical Slut, and a lot of what Dan Savage says about casual sex rings true with me, but it feels different to me when I am sitting next to someone who is telling me that he can't get excited about casual sex if I don't behave as if there is more there than there is. 

The good news, depending on how you look at it, is that this is like anything else. I mean, you take the sex out of the equation and you're in yet another situation where someone is asking you to be different so they will feel more comfortable. It is the most ridiculous request to entertain in any context, but it happens all the time, in overt and subliminal ways, and if you are not careful, you could find yourself behaving in ways you would never dream of, just to make other people more comfortable.

It is the same when people tell me I am too manly, too hairy, too hippy, whatever. I never set out to be everyone's cup of tea, and it is off putting for people to expect me to be different so they can be more comfortable with me. Even more so when I don't spot it until I am in the middle of doing something I wouldn't normally do just so someone else can feel better about me. 

The secret to my happiness is knowing that I don't need other people to feel good about me. Even if it does mean I might get laid.

Tthis kind of thing can be tricky to handle, so I have a list of responses Iuse when I find myself in a situation where I am asked to be different for the sake of someone else's comfort. The list goes from most extreme to least extreme. When someone asks me to alter my behavior, weight, personality or what have you in order to make them feel more comfortable, I simply say on of these many responses, depending on the situation and the individual:

• Fuck off.
• I would do what you are asking if I was you, but lucky for me, I am not, so, no.
• It is interesting that you think I give a shit what you think. I don't.
• Do you realize that you are asking me to alter my (behavior, appearance, demeanor) so that you will feel more comfortable? 
• I hope you are more forgiving of yourself than you are of me.
• I am sure you didn't mean to insult me by asking me to behave differently than I would naturally, so I am going to point it out to you so you don't make that mistake again.
• Hey, it hurts my feelings when you ask me to be different than I am. This is who I am, and if you don't like it, you can go.
• You crack me up! You do an amazing impersonation of an intollerant dipshit!!  Oh my gosh, have you ever thought of being a stand-up comedian? 

That last one might come off as overly-sarcastic, but I find in these situations that this is the type of thing that works. The real point of this is to illustrate that it helps to have a list of things you can say to people who are incapable of accepting you as you are. Having these types of responses handy will do two things:

1. It will help you feel ready for when this happens to you, so when it does, you can handle it in a cool, calm manner, not like the angry person that might come out when someone is ridiculous enough to expect you to change for them.
2. It sends you the signal that you are fine just the way you are. When you create your very own list of responses to use when someone is expecting you to alter yourself in order to make them feel more comfortable, you are telling yourself, in many different ways, that you are great just the way you are. The more you tell yourself that, the better you feel, and the easier it will be to recognize when others are expecting you to change.

The best relationships are the ones in which you can be yourself, in which you can grow and improve. They are with people who accept you the way you are, are honest enough to tell you what they see, and compassionate enough to allow you to be who you are, even if it is shitty some of the time.

Practicing this with yourself, on yourself, will help you stand strong when the world wants to change you. Accepting and loving yourself just the way you are will condition you to expect that from others, and help you feel okay about not wanting the people who need you to change.

Life is too short to change your demeanor for another person. Your energy is too precious to waste trying to be someone else. Your energy is meant to be spent discovering, not covering, who you are.  

This week I met two extraordinary people. I know, because I know life, that these encounters are not unrelated. Both experiences have left an emotional resonance that is vaguely disturbing, and simultaneously, it feels as if a  great puzzle has been left at my door to figure out and incorporate into my life as a new and wonderful gift. The first encounter occured earlier this week.

On Wednesday, I spoke with an older gentleman about moving into a place he owns. He does not want to rent it, but allow someone to live in it in exchange for cleaning and cooking. He built this place, this cabin, by hand. Almost every piece of furniture within is something he made, and the cabin itself, except for the drywall, was all fabricated by him. It is lovely. 

He calls the building next door, the large wood working studio and office, where he lives, his fortress. He calls it that because, he told me, he does not want to let the world in. As we stood in his office, on the top floor of that building, looking out the windows he made by hand, he pointed out to the bay, the ships, and the island across the way. When he told me about his desire to keep the world out, I told him that I was just the opposite; that I was the type who worked constantly to open wider to let more and more of it in.  

If I decided to live in the cabin, it would have to be kept in pristine condition as I lived in it. None of my things could be left around, and I couldn't use the kitchen because he does not want to have to repair any damage I do. I could sleep there, write there, bathe there, but cooking would have to be done in the big building. Even the tea I drink morning, noon and night would be made in the fortress.

I ask, to myself, to the universe, but not to him, why would you create such a sweet space in which to live, and then allow no one, not even yourself to really live in it? Why make functional items if they are to serve time in a museum-type environment without the warmth of a human hand around them?

Today, I met another man. I met him virtually, on The Tinder, but still, I met him. I can say this because in the few hours in which we exchanged information, He revealed things about himself which made me feel a form of remorse and rage I do not remember having felt before. The experiences this man endured at the hands of other men shattered me. His stories of abuse are some of the worst I have heard. I in fact was so shocked by his stories that I feel like sharing them here might also be abusive. They are not my stories, after all...not mine to tell, except to say that I am not sure I would have the will to live if I had to endure what he did. 

Yet, there he is, on Tinder, looking for love and whatever else, opening himself up to whatever heartache might want to find him next. In the time we texted, I was blown away, over and over again, that he could go through such torturous experiences and still have the guts, have the fortitude, to try and open up again.

And there it was. The contrast of the two men, staring me in the face. One, building a fortress of a life, creating objects for no one to touch, furniture for no one to use, and homes for no one to live in, and the other, a man who had been violated in almost every way possible, giving the world another chance. 

The gift of these experiences is that I can know that it is a choice. It is a choice to open up or close down, and neither is right or wrong, it is just what you choose, depending on who you are and who you want to become.

Depending on how big you want your world to be.

​So, how big do you want your world to be?

When I was 12 years old, one thought dominated my waking hours: how I was gonna get my dad to love me. At this point, I look back, and I know he loved me, but at the time, his discomfort with showing it and my inability to believe I was lovable led me to come up with some pretty drastic plans to get my dad to notice and love me. Some of these plans were even heroic, but they also involved putting my dad in harm's way initially, so I had to throw those out.

Then, one evening during dinner at my Dad's place, he asked me if I wanted to work with him at his store. I could clean the furniture in his three-story antique store and all of the stuff in his apartment at the top of his building. Plenty of work to fill a day with. That was when I saw my in. I knew that if I could show my dad what a hard and dedicated worker I was, that he would love me. He would see me as the shining beacon of a human that I was and shower me with love and attention. 

So I worked. Every Saturday, I would clean his store. I would also work his auctions once a month, and the estate sales he did on odd weekends. I worked my ASS off, hoping that he would recognize my dedication to the stuff he cared about. This did result in me seeing my dad more often, which greatly helped, even if it meant I also had to see his new wife, but he didn't really show any more affection than he had previously. In fact, there were times when I suspected he barely knew I was there. But to be fair, there were plenty of times when I actually was barely there. 

That is why he kept firing me. Cleaning furniture gets pretty boring after a while, especially if the goal you are working toward achieving is more love. So, I would spend a lot of time sitting in huge, comfortable old rockers. Sometimes I would lie on the wood floors under the old mahogany tables and stare at the amazingly intricate craftmanship of the legs and skirts. On more than one occasion, he caught me, told me I was fired, and sent me home. 

A week or two later he would give me another chance. In total, he fired me five times in five years...before he sold his store and moved to Maine. But it didn't stop there.

When I was 21, I moved to Portland, Oregon to live with my older brother, Robert, who said I could live with him until I finished my degree. I did just that, moved away when I graduated, then returned to Portland when I was 26 to go to art school. During this time, I painted his house, inside and out, did yard work for him, house sat for his in-laws, and babysat my nephews. Unfortunately, when the work ran out, so did the reason for connection. I mean, I love my brother, and he loves me, but if he didn't have a reason to call me, like needing help with his house or his kids, he just didn't call. And I didn't call him. We see each other now maybe once every few years.

At 33, I got married. I married a man I was so in love with I felt like I could burst every time I was around him. He was a carpenter. We bought a house and he said he would fix it. But he didn't. In fact, he didn't really do much in that house except build a grow room for his pot and punch and kick holes in the walls when he got angry. Over the course of our relationship, he did less and less, and I did more and more, hoping that at some point he might feel bad, join in and help. Maybe at the very least, be grateful. But I came to a breaking point before that happened when my parents died and I left him. It felt like I had been carrying a two hundred pound man up a mountain. I had to put him down.

Recently, I have been helping my fella's mom with his dad and with stuff around her house. This last summer I spent a lot of time there, helping her with some heavy lifting as well as teaching art when I could get the gigs. I love his mom. She is hilarious, stylish, and an incredibly nurturing individual. But just today, I was able to look back and see this pattern I have created of trying to earn the love of the people around me. What triggered this realization? I think it started a few days ago, when my boyfriend was telling me how amazed he is at all the work I do around his house, and then he asked, looking at me intently, with his hands on my shoulders, "you know I would love you even if you didn't do any of this stuff don't you?" I don't really remember what I answered, but it was something along the lines of, "of course I do!"

I get it now, what I have been doing. What I have been thinking! How I have treated myself. How I have treated the people who love me! All of the ways I have been wrong. I was wrong about being unlovable, wrong about feeling like I had to earn the love of the people around me, wrong for creating relationships based on my physical labor, and wrong for feeling resentful when the work (and the connection) ended. 

I put myself in a position of being less than, and in so doing, proving to myself over and over again that I am unlovable. 

It is interesting how simultaneously painful and wonderful these realizations can be. I know I must stop this, this self-fulfilling prophecy behavior. I can't afford to build anymore relationships based on my physical labor, I am not strong enough, physically or emotionally, and I have a suspicion that relationships built on other kinds of connection, like love, trust, and respect might just be more gratifying.

Weirdly, I am not sure how. I mean...I have always believed that I had to work for love. I have worked my ass off for love, and now, I am just supposed to trust that people will love me just for being me? It seems like a huge leap of faith to me. It seems like a lot to just go cold turkey. 

I mean...if I am not intently straining towards love, how can I be sure that it will come to me? 

I can't, in fact, I can't be sure of anything, except that I have to stop treating myself as if I am unworthy of the love I say that I believe in.

​ 

"I have gained 15 pounds! I feel like a slug!"
"Don't worry, babe, you lose weight quickly, anyway, how do you know you have gained that much?"
"I have a scale!"
"But do you feel strong?"
"Well...yes...I really do."
"Then what are you worried about? And anyway, this seems counter to what you preach every week on your blog."
"I know. I am kinda a hypocrite...only not all the time."
"Well...no one is a hypocrite ALL the time..."

That is a text conversation which happened between me and my fella not two weeks ago. Interestingly, if I think back, I remember that I was 125 when we met. I am 125 now. I just happened to magically lose 15 pounds quite by accident when I was eating cake for breakfast every morning...so...I got used to that body...I LOVED that body! Mostly because I really didn't have to work that hard to get it...

But now I think about working hard to get back to 110 and I just get tired...and I know it is just a number...and I know I actually do feel great in my body...just as it is....AND I know that complaining about this makes me an insensitive twit. Believe me...all this, I know. But there is something about it....something about feeling that light that seemed different. I definitely could do more pull-ups...but that is not really what I would call a valuable life skill.

The life skill that is important, and why I have put you through this incredibly boring and shallow rant, is understanding what is meaningful. Knowing that the number reflecting up at me on my scale is random. Knowing how I look in my jeans is superficial.

The relationship I have with myself and with others, this takes precedence. So when I start going down the "I weigh too much" rabbit hole, I think back...when have I been the happiest, and why? Every time, I come to my relationships, with my friends, my family, with myself. Because that is what fills me. My connections with the people I love.

When I was 110, I was having intense flashes of rage that would come on and I could not explain them or control them...until I went to my naturopath and found out it had to do with my hormonal balance and lack of salt in my system...so, in a word, I was not happy. I was pushing away a man who really loved me because I could not control or understand my temper. Over time, I worked on my health and my angry flashes all but disappeared. So...was I happy? Well...actually I was kind of a nervous wreck a lot of the time...so...no. And because of that....my relationships were not as good. In fact...the most important relationship, the one I had with myself was full of hate speech...not because I was unhappy with my body, but because I was so ashamed of my behavior. It was so hard for me to even admit I was capabe of such things, let alone work through them.

Now I can say I have never been happier. My relationship with myself is solid, pretty honest, and I keep attracting new friendships which feed me, all the while letting go of the ones that have been damaging. As soon as I look at all this, what I have in terms of the people in my life, my weight, the tightness of my jeans...all that stuff kinda fades away. It starts to look like a distant spec on a horizon of thought I only glimpse on occasion.

So the question I come to is why the fuck do I do this to myself? I know, logically, that I am not less of a person. I know that whatever I weigh does not really matter in terms of the amount of joy I have in my life. I have to admit to myself, and now, I guess to you, that I am worried that sexually I will not be as desirable. I have long valued sex and sexual experience, and I decided when I was in my twenties that I would always attempt to put myself in a position where I could have lots of sex...until I couldn't. And when I gain weight, this is my fear. It is not really valid. I have never noticed any drop in sexual activity or attraction when I have weighed this much. Or, frankly even more. 

But I, like so many of us, have been affected by the machine that tells me what I must look like to be seen as sexy. My experience tells me otherwise; that I am attracted to smart, funny people, often no matter what they look like.  People have never complained about my body while engaging in any type of sexual congress with me, the most enjoyable sex I have ever had was with people who were confident and comfortable in their skin, and finally, in general, I don't value people according to their looks, but by the capacity of their hearts and minds.

All this, all of this experience I have had, and still, that freak out creeps in. If I am conscious of how it happens, I know. My thoughts do not lead to my feelings, but my feelings do lead to my thoughts. Very often, I feel the anxiety first, then my mind races to find something to be anxious about, and it can be anything. It can be my fella, my ass, my dwindling reserves of cash, it can be the state of the middle east, where my tax dollars go...but let me be clear, I have become acutely aware that my physical feeling of anxiety arises before my self-doubt.

So...what is there to do? Normally, I suggest the exercise I posted last week. But today, as I write this, I have recognized that all it takes on my part is simple recognition and a review of how much I actually care about how big my butt is or how much my thighs rub together. Not much. The only things I care about, truly care about, body-wise, is that I feel strong and healthy, and that can look like many different versions of Sara. All I have to do is recognize that the thought is my mind's way to explain a feeling, and then, excuse that thought and explore the feeling.

Sounds like a lot of work, doesn't it? Sounds scary. Sounds like something that will take time. These arguments are all valid, but then I think about the alternative. I think about being controlled by untrue thoughts. I think about beating up on myself for no reason. I think about the time I waste trying to assign blame when I feel something, instead of just feeling it.

That is why I can do this. Because I know the option is a path that leads to more time wasted, my self-abuse, and inevitably, a calling back to myself to connect with my right mind. 

So for me, it becomes a matter of what I would like to spend my time doing. I would much rather sit quietly, exploring my feelings than quickly blaming some external bullshit for their existence. I would much rather sit and get to know myself than damn myself to the hell of self-hate. 

I would much rather allow myself to be human than shame myself for not being perfect.

How about you?

How do I know?

I have had a hard time letting go of who I used to be. I am attached to that person, all comfy and cozy with who I was, what I looked like, what I did. I never quite know who I am becoming. Generally speaking, I have been moving toward being this new person gradually, but when the change takes on its physical form, it freaks me out. 

Our society does not help either. I was not taught when I was young how to handle my body changing, my life changing, my friends changing, my preferences changing. I wasn't even taught really, to pay attention to this stuff. In fact, I was taught to ignore it or wait for it "to pass." I was more than anything, trained to be a constant. A narrowly operating variable in a world of other narrowly operating variables. But that is not how lives go. That is not what life is about.

We do change. Humans evolve. This is science. Some call it biology, some physics, I call it The Great Secret. Great because generally speaking, if we master change, if we can harness it, we will become great. A secret because no one believes this. We are not taught this. So what do we do when the world shifts beneath our feet? What do we do when our clothes, our friends, our homes no longer fit us? 

We dig deep. We look within. We find ourselves again. We move forward. At least, that is what some people do. Others, we look back. We lament the past. We regret. We cling to old truths like the last roll of toilet paper. We look in the mirror, sad for what was, not understanding that we are now missing out on what is. And in doing so, miss the magic that is a changing and evolving life. Yes, change can be painful. It is confusing. But so is birth. So is puberty. So is the sudden realization that you might have grown beyond the shell that holds you. 

Earlier this week, I was with a man who was lamenting his figure. He was greatly disappointed that he was not the fit young man of his thirties. Simultaneously, he was experiencing a sexual awakening. His sexual world was in the process of opening wide for him, due to his bravery, his nerve, his humility, and he was looking down at his gut, and thinking that losing it would make him more sexy, completely ignoring the fact that he had become exponentially more sexy while carrying this weight around. That he had the nerve to explore himself, be honest about his fear and desire, all with extra weight on him. This wonderful man was not focusing on his revolution. He was focusing on something that made him feel badly. The man should have been planning a parade, but instead he was planning his next work out. 

We do this all the time. We walk through fields of flowers that have taken us years to cultivate, and complain that it looks like it's going to rain. 

We have been taught that more than anything else, our physical appearance is what is important; that the toxic water is fine as long as it looks good. We have been brainwashed into believing that it is better to look good than to feel good.

I bet you know what is coming next. The part in almost every post where I exclaim, THAT IS BULLSHIT.

All it takes is the understanding that what you must strive to do is feel better. Some of the most beautiful people in the world hate their bodies. It is not because they hate beauty, it is because they cannot feel their beauty. It is because they do not feel good about themselves, and very often, they don't know why. Or maybe they do, but they can't do anything about it because they are not looking within. They are not feeling themselves out. They distract themselves with the surface, with the external. 

I have a simple little trick that I do whenever I am not feeling good. This trick has worked for me every time I feel anxious or depressed. I cannot tell you that it will work for you, because, well, you are you, and yes, I am me, but...it is worth a try and it only takes five to ten minutes. 

Do this whenever you feel like shit. Or something worse.

• Sit down in a quiet place.
• Close your eyes
• Breathe deeply and slowly. Five second in, seven seconds out
• Do this for about a minute
• Become aware of where in your body you feel uneasy, anxious, or hurt
• Breathe into where you feel uneasy or pained
• Focus on relaxing around your pain until it fades
• After it fades continue to breathe deeply for one minute at least, thinking about something you love

Sometimes, our emotional traumas get stuck in the form of physical pain. We carry them around with us and create an even greater problem in our bodies. If we are not aware of this, we can very easily carry pain around in our bodies without even knowing it...until it is so backed up that we just want to curl up on the floor in a puddle and wail.

That said, I am not a doctor, and if you have some kind of indescribable pain, go see one. Try the breathing thing first though...if it is of an emotional nature, it should clear it up.

In order to move forward we must stop looking back. We must stop wishing we could be who we left behind. That person had her time, and it was wonderful. But who we are becoming is greater and that process of change is an opportunity. The time of change is a gift. A gift we have been working toward, or our bodies have been working toward, and one which we must receive with reverence. With gratitude. 

The next time you notice a change in your body that you do not like, before you judge and beat up on yourself, ask yourself first, "Self, what amazing and wonderful change came along with this physical change?" Think hard. Better yet, feel hard. You might see that other parts of you have changed; maybe your intellect, maybe your skill level, maybe your emotional openness. On the other hand, your pain might be something that needs to come out. It might mean that you are ignoring something, hiding something that should come out in the open.

But make no mistake, your body is the best communicator you have, and if you do not listen for the message behind the symptom, you will never see or appreciate the progress you are making. 

The point is, you will never know what you can become if you don't start listening to your body. Your body knows your secrets. Your body knows more than you could ever expect. And all you have to do, is listen. All you have to do, is sit quietly and ask. It is that simple.

So the next time you go beating up on yourself for any reason...ask yourself what you might be distracting yourself from. Instead of beating up on your body for not being the way it used to be, stop and consider what else this change has brought you. Our bodies are changing from the moment we are conceived until the day we die. Behaving as if it is a sickness or a flaw is belittling our ability to be spectacular. It is distracting us from true growth.

And that is the answer to that question, What can you become?

The answer is that it is entirely up to you.

​

"So, young lady, are you in high school or college?" I am standing just outside of the bus that is waiting to take me thirty miles south, to the temporary home I will have for the next month and a half. I look up at the man looking down at me. I wait a moment, smile up at him and reply, "Sir, I am 46. I am quite done with both." He responds without missing a beat, "yes, but you never stop learning. For instance, you have just learned that I am in fact legally blind." And with that, he turns and steps up onto the bus, leaving me grinning behind him.

These small interactions remind me that I do in fact, love people. That my father is in some ways, still with me. That I am open to the entertainment that exists within the everyday. That I can have a short conversation with a stranger and come away delighted. That what happens in a microcosm can be applied to the whole wide world.

It is only recently that I have begun to comprehend how vital it is to understand what is important. I did not come upon this realization by chance, but through decades of spending my energy and time on what is in fact, not important. What I have discovered is that doing what is important is wonderful, but it is also scary as fuck.

For the last two and a half weeks, I have been promoting my Kickstarter campaign for my Love Yo'Self coloring book. As of this writing, I have nine days left, and I am roughly 1700 dollars away from my goal, which is really not that bad. I quit my job in January because while I liked it, I was becoming increasingly aware that it was crushing my soul. Not because of the type of work I was doing, but because of the behavior of all the unhappy people who also worked at that place. Dealing with unhappy people and the shit they pull was becoming too much a part of my job, as it had been in every other job I ever held and had to eventually quit. I noticed that I too, was becoming an unhappy person, and I did not want to leave another job angry. I wanted to do something that I love, something that I care deeply about, something that I could put all of my passion behind. So that is what I did, and that is what I am doing.

Since January, I have been working my ass off trying to get this thing off the ground. Since January, my life has been a bit tenuous. Since January, I have been existing on what I am barely making to get by. Since January, I have been the happiest I have ever been in my life. And the most scared.

When I have had a job, and I tried and failed to accomplish something, it was not all that devastating. After all, it was not my dream that I was failing at, it was someone else's, and in fact, just as often, no one else's. The only person I was letting down was my boss, and that was only incrementally. Either way, having a job, in retrospect, was more safe because I never really put my heart and soul on the line for it, and while there were times I took immense pride in the work that I did, I never felt like I was doing something that was vitally important.

I am scared shitless. I know, it sounds trite. It is a First World problem. But I have come to see that this move is the culmination of a gigantic shift in my perspective and life that has happened in increments over the course of the last six years. I have developed the habit of asking myself, "am I doing what matters? Am I concerning myself with bullshit? Am I burning precious energy with people who do not truly value me as a human?" 

I look back and I see that I have come almost full circle. Starting at the age of about 15, I went through a phase where I was doing anything I could to get love, even if it was self-destructive. After that, in my late 30s, I went through a phase where I was picking people who I could keep at a distance, because I knew they had no interest in really knowing me or seeing me. I was whole heartedly choosing people to be in my life who I could easily keep away, mostly because the people I had been attracting before this time had been so damaging. 

Lately, it has shifted. I have had the great luck of attracting people who are "all-in" supporters of who I am. These people ride the golden chariot of acceptance and show me almost daily, in their actions and words, that it is a two way street. Even when it is in a fragment of an interaction with a man at a bus stop. 

Self-love and accceptance is not a destination, but a journey, and along the way, you meet many people, some who are completely blind to who you are, and some who see you and can stand squarely in front of you and tell you, "bring it." 

The idea of letting these people down devastates me. Becausw being seen involves expectation. It involves people believing that you will operate at a certain level. That you will not let them down with your humanity. I love the relationships I have developed with these wonderful souls. But I now see why I never had them before. Letting them down would be a failure I am not sure I could bear, and so it seems that not only am I being seen by those closest to me, In being seen, I am also becoming aware of my own potential. I am becoming aware that if I fail, it is only because I have held myself back.

I went to a movie the other day called Don't Think Twice, about an Improv group and what they experience when one of the members makes the big time. At the end of the movie, the guy is talking to his girlfriend, who held herself back from going to her audition for her big shot. He is trying to understand why she would do that. 

After a series of horrible events, she is the only one who shows up for the troupe's last show, and as she is re-enacting her horrible day, she realizes she feels like she is in a well, and above, everyone is freaking out and trying to pull her up, and she realizes, and tries to tell them,"I like it in the well." Meaning, she is more comfortable being in a hole in the ground where people throw coins on her, making wishes for their own lives. 

When the actress said these words, "I like it in the well," I realized that I had been in a well all my life, but had no desire to be in it any longer. I almost burst into tears because I so desperately want to pull myself out of that goddamn well.

I am just hoping that when I get to the top, the light of day does not blind me.

Today I was talking with a friend about my body positive belief system and how for me it has always naturally fed into and related heavily with my sex positive lifestyle.

I have found that one big challenge of being sex positive is that we are taught to be ashamed of our bodies, and the arguments I have received from friends, relatives and others about my lifestyle is very often related to body shaming. Here are a few arguments I have received that seem rooted in science or what have you but are actually more rooted in a Victorian body shaming women-as-chattel philosophy:

• Women naturally attach when they have sex. It is chemical. It happens with every woman. If you are a woman, you cannot have sex without attaching.
• You are giving part of yourself away to people when you have sex with them. A part of you that you can never get back.
•  When you do not develop a loving relationship from a sexual one, you are damaging your soul forever.
• Any woman who would sleep around most likely does not have very high self-esteem
• Women use sex to get love, men use love to get sex.

A great and wonderful part of the human experience, in fact, one of the best parts, is to figure out who you are; what you like and don't like, what you are good at, what drives your passions, and what makes you happy. Some of us are lucky enough to have this opportunity. It is a luxury many people all over the world do not have because they are too busy wondering where the next meal or bit of clean water will be coming from. It is a unique luxury to have this human exploration yet so many of us miss out on it because we believe what we are told about "all women" or "all men" or "all homosexuals"  or "all muslims" or "all latinos." We believe things we have been told about ourselves and each other, though it might not ring true.

So we are fed these fables of who we are and who others are supposed to be, because the unknown is scary. I feel much safer if I understand that a whole group of people is cheap, or a whole group of people is racist, or a whole group of people is  slutty. Why do I believe it? It confirms my suspicions about how scary the world is. It makes me feel superior. It gives me a "short-hand" to go to when I am dealing with individuals from that group. If I can put a whole group of people in a box, all figured out, I can very easily tailor my behavior to deal with "all of them."

When I tailor my behavior to deal with a whole group of people, I too, am putting myself in a box. It is the box labeled, "brainwashed."

The whole reason science is valued is because it is capable in many situations of objectively measuring the functions of the world and its inhabitants, but too often, it is used to measure something which cannot possibly be measured; the human spirit. There has never been, nor will there ever be a device that will be able to measure something as wild and uniquely wonderful as the spirit that drives each one of us.

The more we understand and know our own depth and complexity, the more we can accept it in others and feel less of a need to put entire groups of people into convenient boxes. The more that we explore ourselves, the more we feel that other people might be worth exploring too. 

But if we believe the lies we are told, if we disregard our drives, our passions, our very selves because we have been told and then believe what someone else thinks we should be, then our lives become less about the exploration and more about endurance. Just getting through another day. Just getting to retirement. Just getting through...fill in the blank.

If we believe the lie that we belong in boxes, our sometimes angry and even violent reaction to people who are living outside of a box springs from our resentment of having put ourselves in one and stayed there for far too long. Our anger at the perceived freedom of these limitless individuals is the anger at ourselves turned outward. It is the frustration borne of towing the line, behaving in a way that we have been told to, which has been in fact, killing us slowly.

In this sense, this luxury of self exploration starts to look more like a duty. It starts to feel more like a responsibility. It starts to appear as if we are bound to this opportunity by what it could do for the world as a whole if we commit to it.

We owe it to ourselves and each other to discover our limitless potential. We cannot let those who fear us define us, and we cannot fail the people all over the world who are not afforded this great luxury.

It is time, finally to stop believing that the answers are outside of us. It is time to understand that no one outside knows better than the person on the inside. It is time to block out the bullshit and become limitless.

Limitless, fortunately, is the only label that does not require a box.

"So am I allowed to contact you?" This is the message I read on my phone screen shortly after I told a gentleman that I had been texting with for a while that I was no longer interested in sex with him. I had never had sex with him, and over the course of the past several months, I had gotten a weird feeling about him. I couldn't really explain it, except to say that something about him was not sitting right with me.

This is the advantage to having dated on-line for over ten years; at this point, I know innately who I should wait to have sex with, and I know with who I can go ahead and jump in to sex with both feet. Very often, when I wait, the gentleman in question will self-select themselves right out of the running. I am sure if I had some sort of scientific instrument to measure my impulses, I would be able to quantify my decision making around my sexual endeavors. For now, suffice it to say that I have honed this sense to a fine and cutting edge. (Toe pick!)

I responded to his message by telling him that he could in fact contact me, as long as it wasn't about sex. It was at this point that my vague feelings of mistrust proved to be spot on. He went off on me, telling me I should find someone else in my town to take my anger out on, telling me I was accusing him of things he wasn't doing, then finally telling me that I shouldn't send him naked pictures if I am later going to decide against sex with him.

This is not the first time I have experienced post-rejection rage from a fella who was hurt, and really, none of his barbs bothered me until I read the last comment. I think it is because his sense of entitlement was the red flag I had thought I spotted on the horizon, but could not be sure of. What's more, his sense of entitlement was a vivid reminder of the blatant misogynistic behavior I have witnessed almost daily ever since I became aware of it in my twenties. 

I have dealt with men behaving as if I owed them something because they either bought me dinner or got a kiss from me, or asked me for advice over beers. But I am tired of it. Dealing with this behavior feels a lot like dealing with a five year old throwing a tantrum, except the five year old is a full grown man who can take his anger out on you in frightening ways. I am sick of having to be careful of what I say for fear of this type of backlash. I am tired of having to tip toe around a full grown man who should be able to handle his emotions. I continuously wonder why I am the one who must be extra sensitive while he is allowed to go ahead and be insulting and threatening. 

Just in case there is anyone out there reading this that is unsure of what I am saying, it is that it is never okay for any person to behave as if any other person owes them anything in a consensual sexual context. It is always okay to say no, even if you are standing in front of the person naked. It is okay to say no even if you are underneath them. It is okay to say no. It is okay to say no. It is okay to say no.

Oh how I wish this topic was unnecessary to write about yet again, as I have written at least twice on this blog about this to this point, but unfortunately, it is not, and seeing as the people who behave this way very often cannot be reasoned with, the best I can do is tell the people being treated as if they owe: You do not ever have to hesitate about no. No is the word you must learn and love and live with comfortably. Do not ever feel guilty about no. 

The good news is that "no" for someone else then results in a "yes," for you. For when you say no, you are giving yourself the unlimited love and care you deserve. When you listen to your intuition, or your gut, or your heart and it is telling you no, and you act on that, you are sending a big lovely yes right back, to you. You are loving yourself with yes energy. You are putting yourself first, and for that, you are reinforcing the mechanism that keeps you safe and sane. Remember that though it is sometimes hard and scary to say no, the reward you receive from this action is love and compassion.

This is you putting yourself first, right where you should be, even if you have been taught not to, even if you are afraid to, even if society tells you not to, it is your job to put yourself in first place every single time. Do not sacrifice any part of yourself so someone else can be more comfortable. It is a very hard habit to break once you start. After a while of doing this, you barely notice that you are doing it. So be conscious. Start to really tune in to what you want. What you want is vital. In sex, as in all other parts of life, your needs and desires are paramount.

Sexuality is a huge part of the human experience, and if you are living this part of your life for anyone else, you are missing out. If you are living it for you, you will grow. You will expand. You will learn to trust yourself in ways you never thought possible, and you will learn things about yourself that just might surprise you.

When will this topic be a foregone conclusion? When rape culture disappears. When people like one of the presidential candidates are no longer seen as a viable option as the leader of the "free" world. When the oppressed do not have to be patient with their oppressors and try to explain calmly why their behaior is damaging. This topic will be old news when women no longer get the message from society that their sexual desires should only be to attain and serve a man.

Until then, you must be vigilant with no, if for no other reason than your sex life should be vibrant and wonderful and exciting and a place where you can really be yourself, whoever that happens to be at that moment.

So, once again, say no whenever necessary, by any means necessary. There is no more important word to know and use. No matter who tells you otherwise. And then, go have the awesome sex you want to have with the person or people you really want to have it with. The sexual experience alone will be enough to reinforce your ability and desire to say no with confidence and courage.

This morning when I got on the scale, I noticed that I had gained about 16 lbs. My clothes are fitting more tightly. My butt has more bounce than it has in many moons. 

I have been noticing this somewhat gradual shift in my physique since about March. Less biking, more non-organic food eating, and more sitting while writing and drawing has all contributed to Sara being a slightly bigger version of herself.  

Yes, I freaked out. That is still my impulse, though I work on it every day. I worried about what it meant. How I looked. What clothes would not be fitting me this week. Then, I saw my smile and other curves in my reflection in a window; soft, round and juicy, and I completely fell back into my own feet.

These are the confident and steady feet that don't give a fuck what the number on the scale says. These are the feet that have taken me on all kinds of adventures, and understand completely what a life well-lived looks like. My feet remember that standing on a scale is one of the least important places in life in which to stand. My feet remember that a life cannot be quantified in pounds or inches. 

A life is quantified in love, in kindness, in compassion. My feet remember. It is unfortunate that sometimes my head has to work to get that message. But that is what happens. My body remembers, and waits for my brain to catch up. It doesn't take as long as it used to, but still, my body waits. Patiently.

But my brain is making strides. Yesterday, I became very angry because I found out quite publicly that my sweet fella had been keeping some vital information from me. As I turned to him in anger and inquired exactly what the fuck was going on, I could feel my heart pounding, my nerves on fire, and my scalp atingle with rage. Then he replied, "before you get angry, just hear me out." 

It was instant and almost magic, I heard my heart say, "you can trust him." AND MY BRAIN ACTUALLY LISTENED!!! Yes. I was immediately relieved. I had no anger whatsoever within me and my body relaxed completely. About a half hour later, when he explained, I still had no anger or hostility within me. Just an overwhelming joy that I had let my past stop influencing my present and future. It was a huge moment for me, as I have been working on this one issue for roughly 27 years. 27 years of watching my fear of abandonment and neglect snatch my happiness from me as I pushed whoever I was close to, away. 

I know it is something I will continue to work on, but I also know without a doubt that I have finally let a lot of unimportant shit go. I have finally opened myself up and my brain is allowing it. This feels like progress in a way that losing pounds, inches or whatever other bullshit standard society would have us measure ourselves by, does not.

A lot of this work had to do with patience, because when you feel something uncomfortable, you just want it gone, like a splinter or a blister or a rock in your shoe. You want it to be eradicated immediately if not sooner. But unfortunately, that is not how trauma works. Very often, when it has accumulated over many years, it takes just as many, if not more, to get past it; to do the work needed to let it go and not allow it to steer you away from goodness. 

Patience is a bitch when you are feeling the pain of years of trauma. But if you can fight the urge to flee, or fight, if you can sit with that pain, and accept all the parts of yourself that hurt from it, this is when your cells can begin to let go. This is when your heart can relax into your body. Much like any pain you encounter in another, if you do not acknowledge it, if you deny it, it festers. It grows. If you do not have the courage or the strength to sit with a person who holds rage, it is a sure signal that your own pain and rage is being ignored. 

But damn, when it disapates! Your body and heart and mind rejoice, because they all know you have done the work. They have all been waiting for you to acknowledge and sit with them, whether or not you were responsible for the original torment, they have all been desperately waiting for you to acknowledge and sit with them until they felt ready to let it go. And the gentle release of this cannot be overstated. It is a liberation that feels like flight.

That is why when I get on the scale and notice I have gained pounds, the anxiety around it quickly dissipates. I understand on a basic level that this is the weight I can afford. This is the weight that I would much rather carry. This is the weight of mechanics, and while it might be slightly uncomfortable, it is nothing like the emotional weight you carry when you do not acknowledge your own pain. This weight is immeasurable and does more damage than any extra poundage you might carry ever could.

That is what I celebrate today. There is a weight I will carry, and as of very recently, a wait that no longer burdens me. 

At a certain point, I had to ask myself, "what can I do?" I mean, the world seems to be going in a violent and oppressive direction. Many things which occur as a matter of course erodes my confidence in humanity on an almost daily basis:

• My tax dollars fund large corporations, military action in other countries (read: killing of innocent people) and funding PACs
• The amount of racism, sexism and homophobia which seems to be acceptable in this world is suffocating (read: any is unacceptable)
• The political system is completely screwed. The government is owned by corporations
• People all over the world are starving; starving for food, water, education, and opportunity
• Many people in this country are supporting a candidate for President who is as stupid as he is hateful

I am not saying that these are new developments. I know that through history, this has all been going on. I am saying, why are we no closer to eradicating these things? Why are the people of the world not rising up and collectively saying, "enough?"

Well, I know I have no power. But, as I said, at a certain point, I asked myself what I could do with the skills and abilities that I have, to help people. For over a year, I have been writing and making art about self-love, body confidence and sex positive philosophies. I have been mentoring young people, and coming up with creative ideas to communicate to people that they are not as powerless as they think. That they are not as worthless as the media and The Man would have them believe. That everything they have been taught about how to move through this world is to a great extent a way to keep them under control.

So far, I think I have been pretty effective at starting that conversation.

I believe, more than anything, in the ability of humans to rise above. I believe that if people are given the opportunity, they will do the right thing. The problem is, people in this country have been brainwashed into believing that they are not exceptional. That being normal is something to strive for. That fitting in is most important. I want to encourage people to stand out, and further, encourage others to support that.

Right now, so many people believe that being "normal" is the goal, and this creates and angry and sometimes violent reaction in them when others have the nerve to stand out or be different. Because they have allowed themselves to be beaten down into normalcy, they take it upon themselves to beat others down. It is a sickness that must stop. We must stop beating each other down. We must take our own experiences with mind control and turn it around. We must be strong in the face of this ridiculous oppression. There is simply no other way.

And this, I now ask of you: celebrate the people you know who are taking risks. Share THIS news on FB or Twitter or whatever the kids are doing these days. Celebrate the people who are willing to take a stand for humans. It is clear that there is nothing I can do about our twisted government or the oppressive nature of international dynamics. But I can inspire people to love themselves in simple ways, so that is what I do. I tell people in no uncertain terms that if I could do it, if I can struggle every day with my demons and get to a place of love, that surely there is hope for them. 

I tell people that if I can open my heart after the heartbreak, they can too. If I can forgive the hateful and abusive nature of some of the misguided individuals I have come into contact with, they can too. And finally, if I can find the courage to openly love my body, and write about how that affects every part of my life in crazy beneficial ways, then yes, they might be able to find the courage to work on that themselves.

I beleive that as a group, humans are not realizing our potential due to the fact that a small group of people for so long have needed control for whatever reason. I know that on a certain level, I cannot be free; I will always have to operate within a system whereby the fruits of my labor go to kill people in other lands. I know that my source of income will most likely stay the same as the cost of living rises, making my life smaller and smaller in some ways. But, I also know that there is one place where I can have absolute power, and that is how I feel about myself. This is where I draw the line. I refuse to let the government, the media, The Man, or the people around me dictate how much love and respect I will give to myself. I acknowledge that it is a brainwashed system, and many people do not realize the damage they do, but this fact does not in any way matter to me.

I am the most important person in the world to me, and while I have to do many things that make me profoundly conflicted, there is one thing I will not feel conflicted about; how truly lovely I am, and how truly lovely humans are. I will always keep my faith that people will be better, that people will improve, if they can wake up to their greatness and manage to shut out so much of what tells them otherwise. 

Yes, I have been worried lately about humans. I have moments where my faith feels shaken. But then I remember. It really just takes one. If I can be the change I wish to see in the world, if I can keep my integrity and speak out against the bullshit that is dividing us, then surely, my actions might influence others to do the same thing.

Lots of people want to get behind politicians who seek to change the system, and I think that is fine, but a more profound way to change the system is to change the people which the system seeks to control. Show them their light. Show them their potential. Encourage their growth. Demonstrate that even within a system which seeks to control them, they can be free.

How much are we willing to do to save ourselves and each other? That is the revolution I want to be a part of. That is the revolution that I see as having the potential to change everything.

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