Erik: Armelle and I just had a very insightful conversation about one of the most seductive "false idols" of the ego's world: sexual power! We realized that in our past we, each in our own unique way, had fallen prey to the trap of worshiping this idol. After our conversation, we both felt it would be Helpful to share our respective stories on this blog. Sharing it with each other, and now with you, feels so freeing in that once the "shame" is exposed, it is seen as not being shameful at all. Instead, we find that it disappears in the light of examination as just an "ingenious" trick of the ego, and we find a happy lightheartedness in its place.
In so exposing it with each other, we've also discovered how the ego can use two seemingly "opposite" forms, which seem very different from each other, to hide the fact that they are really both the same. For example, in Armelle's case, it played out with her being seemingly born with sexual power, as a beautiful woman who could date any guy she wanted, and then using that power to inflate her ego. In my case, I felt inadequate in my sex life and therefore spent many years trying to "master" that area of my life. In both cases, we were valuing this thing I'm calling "sexual power", for it seemed to serve as a way of "protecting" us from the underlying sense of unworthiness. I'll elaborate a little more about my story, and then Armelle can tell hers...
Growing up, I always felt awkward, weird, and unpopular. At school, I often hung around with the popular guys, but was like the "lowest man on the totem pole". I was picked on frequently, and often felt like I was just a complete nerd. To make it worse, I felt very socially awkward around girls, and was always jealous of the guys that seemed to date women so easily.
When I went away to college, I had a belief that I was "supposed" to have lots of sex, and that if I didn't, there was something wrong with me. And, not surprising based on how the ego wrote the victim scripts for our lives, I wasn't getting any sex except on very rare "lucky" occasions! It started feeling like a MAJOR problem to me, as it was seemingly all that my friends and I talked about and cared about. I believed that if you weren't getting sex, then life sucked, and if you were, it was great!
In my second year when the pain began turning to depression, I decided that I needed to solve the problem somehow. I therefore went on the internet and started researching internet sites that proposed to teach men how to have success with women! And I found them alright!
The first one that caught my attention was a website called "Speed Seduction" which was all about learning conversational hypnosis techniques to make women feel a subconscious attraction for you! The guy who was selling the program said that you could learn how to make ANY woman feel sexually attracted to you, and boy did I bite on that one, hook, line, and sinker!
For the next three years of my college life, and for even two more years after I left college, my primary goal was to "master the art of seduction"! Full of fear but determined to overcome it, I would go out to bars, parties, bookstores, coffee shops, or anywhere I might find single women, and practice starting up conversations with them that might lead to some kind of sexual relationship. The problem was that I never felt really sure about what I wanted. I knew I wanted sex, but I also wanted intimacy. Part of me wanted lots of sexual partners, but I also really wanted one monogamous relationship that felt "spiritual". And of course, looking back, it makes perfect sense that I didn't know what I wanted and constantly felt conflicted. I had already bought into the ego belief that my problem was some kind of physical or emotional lack, and so to keep me chasing an illusory carrot, the ego kept me in a state of confusion so I'd continue to play its game of "seek but do not find".
And I never had what I would have defined as "success". I remember taking lots of self-improvement seminars, some of them focused on success with women, and others being just about general success, and they always started by having you clarify your goals. And I can see now how helpful that really is. The problem is that when our goal is based in the world, then even if we achieve the goal, we won't be satisfied for very long. In my case, "success" seemed to be about reaching the point where I was "in control" of my sex life. I wanted to be able to feel like I was totally without fear, able to meet and attract beautiful women into my life easily, and have sex with the women I was dating whenever I wanted. And this was what the ego was telling me was possible!
But after my dreary search had continued on for many years, I began to suspect that perhaps it was a road without end. I met other guys who seemed to have what I wanted - a highly abundant sex life and lots of "success" with women - but I could begin to sense that even they were not totally happy and satisfied. I started to see that being completely in control of ANYTHING in this world was impossible, and that the way to win the ego's game was to quit playing it.
Yet there was still this strong feeling in me that I had to PROVE to myself that this path was hopeless before I could quit without reservation. After all, I had made seeming progress over the years, in terms of getting FAR more comfortable with my sexuality and with my feelings of self-worth in relation to beautiful women. In fact, I got to the point where I felt like I was actually really GOOD at communicating with women and attracting them, and yet I still didn't feel "in control". It seemed that no matter what I achieved, the ego was always holding out another carrot in front of my eyes for me to chase.
Finally, it all reached a head sometime in the seventh year of this search, when I was without a girlfriend, and feeling very strongly that with the communication skills I had developed, and with all my "positive qualities" as a man, that I SHOULD be able to go out and attract as many women as I wanted. I was SO frustrated that I hadn't yet been able to manifest an abundantly sexual lifestyle, and so I made one final goal: that within six months I would be dating at least three beautiful women all at the same time! And I was SO determined to manifest that goal that I made a bet with a good friend of mine who'd also had similar goals, that if I didn't reach my goal, I'd pay him $1000! See, I'd learned from Tony Robbins (a popular self-improvement guru) that if you really want to reach a goal, then sometimes you need to "light a fire under your ass" and give yourself a really strong reason to avoid NOT reaching the goal!
Well, after making the bet, I DID feel HIGHLY motivated for the first week or two. I was going out to bars at night, trying to meet women and get their phone numbers, etc.., but I could tell that my heart just wasn't really in it. It actually started to feel painful, and after the first month, I just surrendered to what my Spirit was trying to tell me, and I relinquished my goal in my mind. Ahhhh... liberation! Peace! Freedom! For the first time in my adult life, I could see that there was nothing special about having an abundant sex life, and that there was nothing lacking if I wasn't having any sex at all! I began to see that even if I never had sex with another woman for the rest of my life, that it didn't matter. Though I had already been studying the Course for several years, I could finally accept the Peace of God as my only goal, and stop concerning myself with the body.
After six months had passed, I paid my friend the $1000 I had bet him, but I felt fantastic. It felt good to keep my integrity by paying him, all the while knowing that it was all necessary for me to learn one of the most powerful lessons I could have possibly learned at that point: I don't need sex to be happy! Happiness comes SOLELY from being aligned with God, and has nothing at all to do with anything related to bodily comfort or pleasure. What a relief... :-)
As you might expect, when I gave up that goal of "having an abundant sex life", my sex life immediately began improving in a very natural and wholesome way, through very healing relationships that came into my life effortlessly. What a surprise, huh? Therefore, to people I meet now who are chasing after a worldly goal but getting disillusioned, I sometimes like to pass on what I learned: the only way to have what you want, is to stop wanting it! For all we really want is the Love of God, and once we stop wanting it, we realize we already have it.
Anyway, that's my story. Now Armelle will tell her story which, on the surface, appears to be completely the opposite of mine, but which is really not different at all...
Armelle:
As far as I remember, I've always attracted people to me, and when I was a little girl I already had a lot of "lovers", as a child! But still I could already experience "my" power! Or what I thought being the power. At secondary school when I started to have boyfriends, I was thinking that I could have every guy I wanted, and it happened to be true. I was kind of the most popular girl. And I remember for one guy I've waited four years, but I never given up, I had to "have" him too. I think it was part of my "success".
And it was really a goal, I can see now how much there wasn't any love in that, but just to prove to me how I was really good, and prove my value. I was really using men to show my value.
It's really the first time that I dare looking at all that like this, and that I can speak like this, without being ashamed of me, and it was really freeing to see that in Erik's story I could hear mine, and the same "shame", the same desire for power playing for me in having it since I was born but always doing everything to keep it or more again, not to lose it. A "no" of one guy could make my all world falling apart too, for it was questioning "my" power. What did I do for it not to work anymore? What did I change? It had to come from me, because I was seeming to be the one "in control" of all that game. I was always very worry about this body, having always to keep it the most beautiful possible, and hating it when I started to gain weight some years ago.
This body has always been my "temple", the most important thing for me. As sexuality was also a mean to show how good I was. And though all those years I almost didn't get any pleasure for myself in having sex. I was just acting!! I was only there to give pleasure to the man, and most of time, I didn't have any except this one. A few years ago I had a partner who told me that having sex was first for yourself, I was completely shocked! I couldn't imagine that. It was all an adventure for me, and something difficult too.
Two years ago I met a guy with whom I lived a so much healing experience. We weren't "together" in relationship, but just there for each other for the healing. I could say "no", what was a huge step for me! For all those years, having to "keep" this position in order to maintain the identity I couldn't say "no". So I often had sex with men without wanting it but just with the hope that it was the means to be loved... Which wasn't and engendered a lot of cries, sometimes. And I learnt to receive and having a place in the sexual relationship other than just being an object. What I've always project on men using me as an object. It was as if he had offered me a new virginity. It was the first time I lived something like that. And this opened a new "world" for me. He wasn't absolutely the kind of guy with whom I was used to date, so I couldn't even imagine stay with him. So still this desire for dating someone through whom I could be valued was present.
I can really see how much I was using men to show my value to the world and being recognize through them, as I didn't give me any value, nor recognition. I have always wanted to be recognized, and I have tried to achieve it that way, but also through what I was doing as job. I was always trying to be someone, instead of just being who I am. I've realized some days ago that I've tried to be recognized in the world for I didn't recognize and didn't know who I was in truth. And now, I can really say that it was the ONLY thing that I really wanted.
I was always using men for my need, whatever there were, and I thought it would have shown all the power I had. And behind that was the fear of feeling and letting all that unworthiness coming up, and all that shame, that I wasn't even aware of. This mask, this object game, this trophee woman was the most important part of the identity of Armelle!
At the point that two years ago I decided to shave my hair to stop being seen as a beautiful long blond hair woman with blue eyes. I just wanted to be seen for Who I really was. I wanted so much people just love me for who I was inside, and not what was outside, on the surface. I have always wanted to be loved for the all, and so much experienced to be loved for what I was representing. I've often been a trophee, but now I could see I was using men like that too. And how I wanted to exist like that! I went through a lot of emotions just by doing it. I didn't know who I was. I wasn't getting attention as before in the street, or wherever. It was already processing...
I was so amazed how the ego is hidding exactly the same feeling by using what seems to be opposite character types. I could see that every time that Erik was talking about his story, about trying to be a master, I was laughing, I couldn't imagine how it could be possible to be like that, to do that, and this time I was able to see and tell that I was even feeling ashamed of what he was telling, but it was seemingly "my" shame, not his. So I find that so usefull and so great to see those ego tricks, and how it seems to be played on the screen, with finally the same unhappiness.
In Mallorca I had the opportunity to go through some remark of Erik about this body and it was really horrible for me. I couldn't understand that he could possibly love me, and felt so much unworthiness, I felt being a piece of shit. Then the HS told me he was loving me as I've always wanted to be... for who I am! and now I am truly living it, and it's so great!... being loved for Who I am...
It's very powerful for me to write all that, and see how much I was suffering trying to keep that mask. I really want to release it. I see trully how much it doesn't serve me anymore. There is really nothing to value in that!
so yeah, drop the mask!!!!!!!!!! Free ourselves;-))))))))))))))))
Lots of love
Armelle
No comments:
Post a Comment