This post is part of The Beauty of a Woman BlogFest VII! To read more entries and potentially win a fun prize, visit the fest page on August McLaughlin’s site between today and 11 pm PST on March 9th.
What makes sexuality beautiful?
I consider myself pretty open-minded. I am unapologetically sexual, so talking about sex is easy for me. I wielded the pussy sword before Ashley Judd recited Nina Donavan’s Nasty Woman poem.
I’ve been nasty for as long as I can remember.
Sex is natural, and life is sexually transmitted… literally. So sexuality should be beautiful, right?
By definition, sexuality means “capacity for sexual feelings.” The definition does not imply sexual orientation or gender identification. Sexuality is not measured by orgasm achievement, length, or girth.
It is not quantified by the number of partners or how many pumps it takes to get to the center of ecstasy. Sexuality is not determined by breast size or pussy depth. It cannot be summed up in minutes or bedpost notches. And it is undoubtedly not about penetration (that’s only one kind of sex).
Simply put, sexuality is about the ability to experience and understand feelings of a sexual nature. At least that’s a textbook definition, and I agree with it, but the definition doesn’t leave much room for beauty.
What makes sexuality beautiful is not the ability to do it because just about anyone can do it, with or without good intentions. The beauty of sexuality is almost entirely void of sex because what makes it beautiful is acceptance.
I didn’t understand the concept of acceptance of sexuality, not at first.
I am a woman of a certain age, so I was born in the keep-it-in-the-closet era. We were the don’t-ask-don’t-tell generation, so acceptance meant that men and women were allowed to have sex, same-sex attraction was curable, and women were allowed to be sexy (but not sexual).
In layperson’s terms, sexuality was one size fits all. That meant everyone was expected to be heterosexual, and anyone who did not fit in that box was an outcast.
I disagreed with that ideology. Judging someone else’s sexual preferences never made sense to me. But acceptance was still not a notion that I fully grasped.
I didn’t get it because I never had to. Sure, I understood it in theory, but I had never had to put it into practice.
Whenever someone asked me if I was bi-sexual, I always replied the same way, Not yet…”
Not yet, because I’d never experienced sexual attraction toward a woman, but I cannot say with any certainty that I never will. How I relate to my sexuality is constantly changing; therefore, what and who I am attracted to is becoming increasingly fluid. But even knowing that truth about myself, I still did not fully comprehend sexual acceptance.
At least not until him…
I met someone that challenged everything I thought I knew, and my perspective changed. It changed because he changed me. As it turned out, my open mind was not as open as I thought. And I was also not as bright or judgment-free as I thought I was either.
Meeting someone who did not just talk about acceptance but lived and breathed shifted my entire being. He wore acceptance as naturally as he wore his own skin.
He did not pretend to be colorblind.
He did not form opinions based on class or religion.
He did not erect barriers to keep intimacy at bay.
He did not hold back feelings or mince words.
He defined sexuality by feeling, not parts.
He loved in real-time, not realistically.
He accepted everyone as they were, not as he wished them to be.
He taught me the beauty of sexuality… acceptance, by being himself.
I finally get it.
