Accepting Sexuality - and not only preaching about it

I have already told you about my new friends whom I had met at the No Mind Festival in Sweden in 2006 and with whom I then stayed at their home in Stockholm after the festival. I mentioned that they gave workshops about accepting one's sexuality – and of course we had some talk about this topic while I was with them.

I actually felt that they were really living what they were talking about, not only preaching but integrating the truth of their lectures into their lives. One could notice that they were not ashamed of sexuality when entering their home: they had paintings which showed men and women naked and in fiery embrace, sculptures of men with erect penises and art that was obviously meant to show the beauty of a vagina in detail.

Of course, in this surrounding, sex also came up as a topic in our talks. The couple had been in my workshops on the festival and knew my stand on sexuality. They had also heard that I didn't like the use of the word tantra as it is used in the west, as it's origins are not at all about sex. So it seemed to me that they were a bit careful with this word and had maybe also changed their idea of its definition.

The main gist of our talk was that sexuality is just natural and that too many people have problems accepting it. It is a fact that societies around the world have made sexuality a taboo, a topic of shame and guilt. Over the course of centuries, especially religions have played a great role in this. Unfortunately even today, in a time when more and more people say that they don't need religion and rather follow their own ideas of values and moralities, the shame when it comes to having sex or to their own naked body is still present.

Although in Scandinavia there was more openness – which I had got to know in Denmark before and also this time in Sweden – the couple told that hesitations, wrong patterns of guilt and shame and outdated values were still normal there as well.

It was nice to have such an open talk and it felt good to make friends on a common basis of thought!