When you exercise, do you love and adore your body? Are you having so much fun you wish you were doing your workout at other times during the day? Does moving your body help you tap you’re your sensuality and feminine power?
In this provocative TEDx talk, Sheila Kelley shares how tapping into your feminine power can help you in every part of your life—including getting the body you want.
The challenge is that all women have learned to be ashamed of your bodies.
Kelley shares that every woman has a “First Offense” that brought negative attention, judgment or shame to your body.
I vividly remember my “First Offense.”
When I was 5 years old, my father told me I needed to learn how to suck in my stomach.
Me blowing out the candles on my 5th birthday
Now at age 5, I wasn’t fat. But how I interpreted his comment was that he was telling me I was fat. He was telling me there was something wrong with my body.
I was a tomboy who always had scabs on my knees from falls and crashes on my bike. Shortly after that conversation with my father I remember for the first time being embarrassed at how my banged up knees looked and trying to pull my knee socks up as high as they would go to cover them up.
For the first time, I suffered from body shame.
From that moment on, I focused almost exclusively on my flaws, and what was wrong with me. And for most of my life, I struggled with my weight.
That was just the first offence. With every criticism or judgment we receive about our bodies as we grow and mature, we close ourselves off from our feminine power.
This is why so many women “hide” behind unhealthy eating habits.
Kelley says 80 percent of women in America feel something is missing and they have no idea what it is.
That “it” is reclaiming your feminine essence and reclaiming your body.
Near the end of the talk, Kelley invites every woman to, “Step into the grandeur, the beauty, the gorgeousness, the sway, the curve, the power, the fire of your body, of your spirit, of your emotions.”
Reconnecting with your feminine power is an important step in getting the body you want.
Together we can do it!
This is a really insightful post, Hanna! It’s refreshing, honest, powerful and moving.I really enjoyed reading it 🙂
Thanks, Jane. So appreciate the comment!
There’s so much positive energy in this post! I applaud the joy of the feminine!
However, I believe it is important for women to fully understand what can be implied by dancing with a strip club pole. The majority of American males are not emotionally prepared to fully appreciate that kind of femininity. Instead of seeing their wives expressing their natural magnificence, many men will see their wives as objects to be manipulated and demeaned – in short, as strippers – and we all know that strippers are not seen as real women expressing inner beauty.
I should be writing this to Sheila Kelley instead of you, really! And I think I shall write to her.
Thanks for a thought-provoking post.
Thanks so much for your comment, Mary. My blog was focused on the power of feminine energy and the beauty of real women, and was not focused on the strip-pole aspect of Sheila Kelley’s talk. That is her means to the end, but it is certainly NOT the only means. However, it’s not surprising the idea she presented would be a trigger for you (and other women.) I do think Kelley addressed the need for this to be for and about each woman, and should be done for internal empowerment rather than any form of subjugation. She also addressed the social issues we have created for men, as well as women, by sending this part of women’s Yin into hiding. Being safe while expressing our sensual being is a real issue for women. I believe, as Kelley described, it comes from finding the balance between Masculine (for protection) and Feminine energy within, so that each woman is fully empowered in themselves. As more women become fully empowered, all relationships will change–including how society and men view us. I would encourage you to write to Kelley and explore these issues with her. All I can do is share my response to her talk and personal view, which I wrote about, of the need for women to recover the feminine energy that has gone underground for so many. Thanks again for commenting! Much appreciation. Hanna