What Does Sexual Liberation Mean to You?

For a very long time, I used to conflate being sexually liberated with having many sexual partners. And while promiscuity can be a part of Sexual Liberation, it isn’t the only path to it.

At the start of my journey, I was actively promiscuous and I did believe that at the time I was sexually liberated. I wanted to have sex and I had a high sex drive that aligned with this desire.

The only problematic thing about it was the way I went about having this need met. The only criteria I was using to pick my partners was if I liked them, as humans, and if I found them hot. And of course if they were down with having a sexual relationship with me.

While I am sexually monogamish, which means that I only have one partner at a time, I had no intention of being in a romantic relationship with these men. I wasn’t interested in the emotional, spiritual and financial labour involved in a fully-fledged relationship. I actively pursued situationships and if anyone tried to cuff me, I was out.

I put myself in very risky situations, health wise and otherwise. Consent was blurred and other than flirting and online sexing, I didn’t have any actual conversations about sex with my partners.

I had discovered pleasure and I was focused on riding this high.

See if I was sooo sexually liberated, why was I so afraid or bringing up the necessary conversations around my safety to my partners.

This lady just looked at me. I got the impression she was resisting the urge to roll her eyes at that declaration.

“Anyway,” she continued, “You need to get your partner in-”

She hadn’t even finished the sentence and I was already looking at her like she had lost her gaddam mind.

Yeah, I cringe at that version of myself too.

“-just to make sure that it’s all good on his end too.”

She was staring at me expectantly waiting for a reaction so I just nodded even though I knew not only was I never bringing that man to the GP with me, this wasn’t even a conversation I was going to have with him.

See, I’d already been down that road with dude.

“That’s not_”

“_Are you trying to tell me you’re fuckin’ other men?”

And on and on it went. I got pushed to a point where now I was defensive and let me tell you I am petty and well versed in hitting below the belt.

What was meant to be a well intentioned conversation turned into an argument. So I learned that if I didn’t want to fight, I took these men’s word that they got checked regularly and were fully healthy at face value.

Besides I would know if anything was up because I regularly got checked. Somebody please tell me why I thought that I was being careful.

The craziest part? I was still allowing these low hanging fruit men plug into me. If Delusional was a person, it’d be me.

Thank God I wasn’t passive with my pleasure at the very least. Which was also borne from a very problematic dogma.

From my upbringing and the religion whose tenets I was raised under, I knew fornication was a sin. If you repented, then you and God were all good. But repentance includes a component of being sorry and not going back to whatever habit, behaviour, etc. you were sorry for.

Except I wasn’t sorry for having sex. I felt no guilt. Sex was delicious, I was having a lot of it and I was sure as shit gonna do it again.

Very quickly I got to a point where I was just like ‘fuck it.’ I wasn’t apologetic no matter how much I tried to pretend I was. The only guilt I carried was based off the fear of going to hell.

So I flipped the narrative. I stopped apologizing to God for having and wanting sex. And I decided that if I was going straight to hell, the sex better be phenomenal. Otherwise it’d just be a waste of a sin.

I always asked for what I wanted and liked and if I wasn’t into something, I didn’t do it. That doesn’t mean I always reached orgasm or that there was no fumbling ever. But I never a passive participant of sex. It wasn’t just for the guy. I also needed to have a good time. I have been known for stopping sex midway, and refusing to continue because I’m just not having a good time. To this day, I’ve never faked an orgasm. If I didn’t cum, you’re gonna know.

In some ways I was liberated. But in others, I was most definitely not.

That was then. As I’ve grown into myself, I’ve had less sex. Because now my desire is attached to a healthy love and active self respect for myself. I am no longer compartmentalizing the dick from the man. My bare minimum has shifted. I require a lot more even from my casual relationships than I did before and that’s because, my standards for myself and by extension any man I allow to plug into me, have levelled up.

If I come across a person with whom I can’t have an open and honest conversation with about our sex, I’m not fucking you. You are not a safe person for me to be having sex with and I am not doing it.

I’m celibate now and I have been for the last two years and I still consider myself sexually liberated. My choice not to engage in sexual activity is not a product of circumstance, or lack. It’s an active choice of deciding that at this point in my journey, I don’t want to have anyone accessing me in that way.

My high sex drive hadn’t gone anywhere and I still get horny. Often. But I can and know how to please myself.

Eventually I’ll get back into a place where I want someone else to please me and I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.

So, what does Sexual Liberation mean to me?

It’s freedom. Freedom to choose to have sex and freedom to choose not to. Sexual Liberation is making that choice from an informed position. From a position of your own personal power independent of any pressures or opinions outside yourself. Sexual Liberation is comfortability with sex. Being comfortable with your desire or lack thereof, with the consequences of what your sexual choices and practices mean.

It is the very opposite of repression. It does not mean you need to be engaging with it. It means confidence in how you choose to engage with it, including the informed choice to not engage with it at all.

To the best versions of ourselves,

Cira J. N.

You may not have picked up any lessons, but I hope that this piece served as food for thought, or simply entertainment.

Till next time…

Cover Art is by @dorvilier.art which I found @blackartistspace both on Instagram