Unleashing the wild woman

I stood with trepidation in front of 30 of my sisters with nothing on except cheetah bathing suit bottoms, a sarong to cover my otherwise naked body and lipstick smeared on my face like war paint. 

I heard the music begin and I hesitated to dance to the beat of the drums and tribal rhythm. I started to move my body, to stomp my feet, to let myself surrender to the moment.

And suddenly it was as if someone cut a cord that kept me tethered like a puppet and I was no longer someone that others wanted me to be-quiet, tame, a good girl-I was a wild woman I’d never met before. 

I felt the energy rising up from the floor, the shakti moving through my body, a transmission from the goddess herself.

I danced wild and uninhibited, as if a feral part of me was being unlocked from a cage.

As I continued to let loose, to prowl, to scream and jump, my sarong fell down exposing my naked body and I felt alive. 

I felt free. 

My sisters clapped for me, they cheered me on, they celebrated me as they were in it with me.

Not once did they tell me to cover up, to stop acting crazy, that I was too much.

Unbounded, insurmountable joy replaced years of shame.

When the music stopped, I stood there gasping for air as I tried to catch my breath.

I was raw, vulnerable, completely stripped down with my arms wide open to receive as I met each one of their faces and saw nothing but love and admiration.

Tears streamed down my face and my body started to shake as I was fully seen and honored in my true nature-my power, my wild woman, my full expression.

When we were told in our Tao Tantric Arts training that we would be “dancing with our edge” to express a part of ourselves that we struggled to embody, on our own in front of everyone, I was wildly uncomfortable with the thought of having to be the wild woman.

Why couldn’t I be a slut instead? She needed liberated too!

I’m sure the goddess laughed at that, knowing full well that this initiation, this release of a part of me that I refused to embrace for my entire life, would be what broke me open. She knew that it would be the moment that brought me to my knees as I wept with gratitude for the beauty of life, of connection, of healing as I saw the divine incarnate in every woman in that room as they danced their own edge.

I always thought the wild woman was crazy, angry, disliked, a feral beast incapable of being loved.

But what I learned that night, as I danced fully with my shadow, as I was held with so much love, that the wild woman is FREE.

She is a fully expressed, vibrant, powerful woman who is liberated through her nakedness and expression.

Who is worthy of being loved for ALL that she is.

You wild is your liberation. And your liberation comes in your capacity to be yourself. 

It comes in welcoming the parts that you’ve hidden and repressed, letting the light shine brightly that others have tried to dim. 

Being wild isn’t a loss of control. Rather, it’s not trying to control who you are at your core, to not keep a part of you locked up behind the bars caged around your heart.

This moment was for all of the times I have been labeled as “crazy”, given away my power in an attempt to please others and keep love. For all of the times I have felt intense shame around my naked body.

This moment was for the little girl who would strip naked and run around when she was angry. (She clearly knew a thing or two that I needed reminded of as an adult).

To remind her that it is safe to be wild.