Energetically, this was a challenging week...
starting with the 100+ character attacks coming from zealots on my youtube channel;
Dealing with these posts, I had four strong take aways:
1. I’m super grateful that I’ve embraced my evil, my pathetic-ness and the whore in me with compassion and love.
YAHOOO! I feel blessed to experience acceptance of my full humanity where others have fear.
2. Deep sadness that the teachings of Christ, which I experience to be fundamentally about radical love for oneself, all of humanity, all of creation and the divine can get so twisted.
3. Profound GRATITUDE to live in 2015 in a society where these people do NOT run the show.
500 years ago in Europe – this attitude of persecution of women and magic had real power.
Now: you can be as womanly and powerful and magical as you damn well please!
Ladies, let’s get out there and CELEBRATE this new era of freedom – dance in the street, make love with passion, wear what makes you feel beautiful, experience the ecstasy of life and let’s keep building this movement so that every woman around the world has the blessing of knowing her own freedom and beauty and sexual power.
4. All of their anger helped my video go viral – hahaha!!
On top of all these comments…
… it came to my awareness that a well known “spiritual teacher” who has been engaging in predatory sexual behavior with his female students for over a decade had sexually assaulted a woman in one of his “healing sessions.”
This man has a reputation for engaging in fear tactics and bullying and has silenced countless women with this behavior.
He holds festivals and workshops all over Europe and has apparently engaged in this behavior with women there as well.
A huge part of me wanted to say “not my problem” – but another piece of me knows that standing for the sexual empowerment of women means standing for the belief that sexual abuse is not okay – ever.
No justifications and no silence on the matter.
It is the silence that has allowed it to prevail for so long.
Without lashing out, or being dramatic – and at the same time not sticking my head in the sand – I knew that it was time to effectively build a coalition to stop this behavior.
Speaking up has brought up huge issues – friends who are associate with this teacher have lashed out at me – and fear of retribution from this unstable teacher.
I need a woman to come forward with her story publicly – even anonymously – to bring this to the media and really have an impact.
But many of the women have been scared into silence.
I can’t control whether one will agree to release her story or not.
I can only do my part to open a pathway for her voice to have real power if she chooses and to support her with all of my heart and resources.
All of this was exhausting while having a non-stop filming schedule for my upcoming “Epic Lovers” course for couples (it’s gonna be freaking amazing!!!)
What I’ve been thinking about is how much I’ve learned to deal with the challenges and stresses of giving my gifts to the world…
But what really gets to me is the thousand little heartbreaks along the way.
If you are in any way sensitive or tuned in, your heart’s gonna break sometimes!
My heart breaks many times a week (this week, like a thousand times)…
…when I find out that certain teachers leading women aren’t in integrity or when I have to face up to the hatred coming at me.
It breaks when a friend lets me down or I let myself down.
It breaks for every single woman everywhere who’s dealing with the s**t from sexual, emotional, physical, psychological mysogynistic practices and belief systems.
It calls up the painful abuse from my own childhood.
I thought: how the f**k am I gonna deal with all of this?
It’s not about what I can’t control:
I can’t control if this man goes on teaching
I can’t control whether a woman decides to come forward with her story publicly
I can’t make the people who use Jesus as an excuse to hate, learn to love
I can’t stop my own heart from breaking
All I can do is keep my own little fire burning over here.
In those moments when the weight of life all feels like a little too much to bear – I remember that it’s that burning force of love in my heart – my morals, my integrity, my compassion – that’s gonna keep me going fierce at the end of the day.
My heart thrives on fire.
What I have to do is keep pouring on the fuel.
And no matter what you want right now – a beautiful relationship, a better world, more money, a great orgasm, deep healing – it takes a fierce kind of slow, soft burning love that just keeps going to get there.
So here are my three tips for feeling everyday heartache and keeping on strong:
1. Remember what you are about, what you stand for, who you are. I’m about love, baby. Over and over again. I’m about freedom and integrity and humanity.
2. Practice compassion: for everyone. Everywhere. Most of all including yourself. I find compassion to be the most powerful emotion. When I’m truly compassionate, I feel powerful. When I think of those youtube posts, I think: It must be painful to get so upset by a youtube video. It must be painful to believe in a vengeful God and fear hell, rather than a loving God offering endless paradise in the here and now.
3. Take action in alignment with your desires in a grounded way. I’m effectively addressing this manipulative teacher. I’m designing ways to overhaul the whole system to create real accountability in the sexual healing realm. I’m slowly answering the youtube comments. Taking action and getting real with life makes me feel powerful.
When I was younger I remember people saying, “You can’t change the system. Youth is so idealistic.”
Well, actually you can change the system.
Women can become presidents, institutional racism can end, sexuality and magic can be protected as human freedoms, gay people can marry, pot can get smoked legally, the whole immense beauty of femininity can get unleashed to raise the vibration of society…
Each and every one of us is an agent of change.
The question is: what kind of change are you making?
I’d love to hear from you: sharing this felt vulnerable!
So hop on down to the comments and let me know about any heartaches you’ve been feeling and what feeds your fire to stay alive.
I truly desire support for you. For me. For us together.
With Love,
Layla
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