Power & Surrender: More than “Getting Off”

I received the most exquisite gift this summer during my East Coast tour.  Joyce came to my workshop, Pelvis Basin of Power & Surrender, in Washington, DC.  The letter she wrote me after brought me to tears.  This, THIS, is my greatest hope for people to experience sexual energy for healing ourselves and our society. Thank you Joyce for coming into my life, for journeying so deep, for writing these words, and for giving me permission to share them here.

Dear Zahava,

I never knew that this kind of work would be “for me.” I always thought it was kinda “out there” and untouchable.  But you got me right into the body, connected it with science, education, and paired it with feeling and things unseen.  I experienced a huge shift for myself not just in my pelvic sensation but a deeper connection to purpose beyond just me.  I had no idea how potent my passion and conviction for humanity is (that people feel safe to be in full self expression.) Honestly this workshop connected me to my calling. For years I have felt lost in the grind of “paying my dues” and “climbing the ladder” that I forgot who I am, what I love, what’s important to me.  In the workshop I reconnected with my original love, my clarity, my passion for service.

Usually I walk around the streets of DC with a kind of anger or “fed up” ness burning in me. I resent the people around me and how they take up the whole sidewalk, how people on bicycles do whatever the heck they want, how cars never yield. I hate the pace, I hate the rush, I hate I hate… that’s the cloud I usually have when walking around the city. Yesterday there was a shift.

I showed up to the Smith Center for the Healing Arts and was a bit nervous, but more curious than anything. I enjoyed every aspect of the workshop, from start to finish. I loved that we spent plenty of time doing introductions…name, how we heard about it, what we expect or how we’d know that we “got” what we needed by the end. I remember sharing that I originally registered because I felt disconnected from a part of myself. Last year I stepped into clothes free life, and with that clothes free yoga. A number of more tenured women in the clothes free yoga world have this whole power goddess thing about them, and I didn’t get it, I was like, “what is a goddess? all this talk about beauty and blah blah blah” I didn’t feel like I was like them, didn’t feel feminine, didn’t feel expressed in my full self. I love that you offered for consideration that sometimes people think about things in terms of femininity and how women “need” to get in touch with it, but that I might consider that maybe it’s OK to be masculine. I also appreciated your note that, in a bigger context, you named the workshop the way you did, [Pelvis Basin of Power & Surrender] because you didn’t want people to get hung up on masculine / feminine” and whatever stories they have around those concepts. That point freed me up to not “try” to get what I thought I should get out of the workshop, but to be open to whatever comes organically.

All of the exercises and conversations we did were a huge help to me, the dancing, hip opening, sound and breath work as well as the discussions on anatomy and how the body integrates and works.

I know people talk about the tailbone and sits bones in yoga, as they did in my teacher training this past year, but I’ve never actually taken my fingers, woven through my cheeks, and literally TOUCHED my tailbone with my own fingers! It took me a while to find it through all this ass!!! Your help was much appreciated, as I finally located it and was like Eureka!!!

The work we did at the end also made a huge difference for me. I remember that before demonstrating you set an intention, and I was like WUT?! Set an intention?!?! I’ve never set an intention before doing this. I’d just do it.

After taking in the demonstration, I felt really full, like there was something weighing on my heart. And so when it was our turn to work, I lied there on the floor, not really sure what to expect or what I’d feel. But I set my intention on the thing that is most important to me for humanity, that people feel safe and free to live in their true self expression.

I thought everything I would feel and experience would be strictly in the vaginal canal, but no. I rocked my pelvis about a bit, and then when you began to cue deep breathing into the belly and chest, and that’s when I started to unleash. I could feel a kind of energy rising up through my belly, and it almost felt like my ribs were gonna crack open as I breathed deep and expansive in my chest. My eyes began to flutter uncontrollably, which they’ve never done before in my life, and as they fluttered I saw flashes of 2 specific people in my life who had shared some very deep, very personal, very secret things about themselves with me. And as their images flashed so potently in me, I breathed deep into my chest, my heart exploded, and my body went into full outburst and I saw like a kind of gold river break out of my head through the crown and gush all over these 2 people, like a blessing on them to just be who they are, freely. I cried and screamed in release. I felt like I was quaking the walls with uninhibited blessing for those 2 people.

It was so amazing to me that this kind of energy could be used for more than just “getting off.” I’ve never set an intention like that before, and I thought it would be weird. But actually, I felt this amazing experience where I reconnected with my deepest passion in terms of what I want for humanity, that this experience and expression could be more than just about me. That’s what floored me, that it could be more than just “Joyce getting off” Rather a complete commitment and intention for something great and to channel my energy so powerfully and shoot it out of my crown in a golden river flooding those people with a kind of love. I felt like I reconnected to my ministry, to my passion, to compassion, to something greater than myself, to causes.

Afterwards, I found myself walking the streets of DC without resentment. Rather, I saw the people around me with new eyes, with compassion, with love, with good will and wanting only the best for them. I’ve never walked the streets here this way. It was amazing.

This morning I spent some time just kind of being with myself. I thought about what we did yesterday, and actually set the intention to be with myself, to feel my body, to be who I am. I never do that. It caused a significant arousal for me, which I didn’t know was possible, and then I had a kind of creative spark that has fueled my productivity at the office today.

It seems like I’m starting to feel more like a myself that was buried deep down. I feel more connected to something powerful inside and more fully expressed as Joyce.

So thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart, for providing that space and opportunity. I hope you have a great evening and safe travels to wherever the road goes next!

Tons of hugs,

Joyce