I can pinpoint the exact moment that I first encountered women’s breasts being portrayed in a sexual way. I was about seven years old and was in the little village post office, come newsagent, come hardware store, come sweet shop, in the very rural part of North Yorkshire where my family lived. I was having my usual quandary as to how best to spend my ten pence. I could either get a little white paper bag of 10p’s worth of sherbet pips or I could get 10p’s worth of assorted 1p sweets. Invariably I went for the latter, as I loved the whole process of choosing ten different sweets. Black Jacks, Fruit Salads and Outer Spacers were always a non-negotiable part of my mix. Whilst pondering the almost magical assortment of different boxes and jars of sweets, I looked up at the top shelf and saw the front cover of a ‘girly magazine’. I distinctly remember the photo on the front, not of the woman’s face, but of her bare breasts and the fact that her arms were above her head.
As a child my ensuing involvement with women’s breasts consisted mainly of stolen glances here and there. For example, I can remember whilst my family picked their way along Bournemouth Beach, looking for enough space to be able to unload their buckets and spades, having a quick peek at a woman who had taken her bikini straps down to get a better tan. I used the same clandestine glances in the women’s changing room whilst Mum was getting changed after her squash games. Oh and of course growing up in England in the 70s there was the obligatory ‘Carry On’ films and the mild titillation at the sight of Barbara Windsor losing her top.
The only time as a child that things went a bit further than that, was when a friend of mine found her brother’s pornographic magazines and she and I spent a few afternoons not really understanding what the people in the photos were doing but feeling a sort of excited compulsion to look anyway.
All pretty ‘normal’ stuff you may think but what I have recently come to realise is that what I also regarded as very normal and harmless was in fact neither.
You see my pubescent involvement in the portrayal of women’s breasts as being objects for sexual gratification, coupled with my subsequent choice to both look at and think about a woman’s breasts in a sexual way, condemned my view of women’s breasts to be that of fundamentally providing pleasure and titillation, (as well as the obligatory feeding of babies). I narrowed down their purpose to that of a mere speck of their original true nature, whilst at the same time narrowing down my relationship with my own breasts to that of pure function. It may sound like I am being hard on myself, I am not. I am simply laying down the bare facts. How could any man that I was with feel the deeper qualities of a woman’s body if the woman he was with saw her own body as nothing more than a vehicle in which to move her around her day, a functioning albeit living organism to transport her from A to B?
Over the last six or seven years or so, my relationship with myself has changed dramatically and as a result of that, my relationship with my breasts has also changed.
I have gone from being a woman with very little self worth to a woman who is coming to know and appreciate her true value as a woman.
The Esoteric Breast Massage has played a key role in enabling me to feel that my breasts are a fundamental part of my whole being, as opposed to appendages there for the pleasure of others. By carrying the view of women’s breasts as sexual objects I added to the global ignorance that abounds around the topic, whilst at the same time sabotaging my own ability to convey truth through a woman’s body.
All this has come to light as a result of my recent awareness around my hitherto assumed sexual attraction to women’s breasts. Up until very recently I had never taken the time to really examine my attitude and behaviour towards the objectification of women’s breasts. As my awareness grew I made a conscious effort to stop looking at or thinking about women’s breasts in a sexual way and found that in doing so, my assumed sexual attraction petered out to nothing.
What this has revealed to me is that the aspects that I consider to be ‘me’, are not locked in at all, in fact I have to permanently ‘feed’ them in order to be keep them alive.
This is absolutely colossal because it therefore leads to the natural conclusion that we are all constantly creating our reality as we go.
The world is made manifest by the energy we choose to live and move with, which then results in the quality of our thoughts and behaviours, which then, in turn further creates the world we live in. When we come to remember that energy is fuelling the quality of our thoughts and behaviours, it gives us the power to change anything and everything that we see by taking responsibility for the quality of energy we are choosing to allow into our bodies.
By taking responsibility for my behaviour around the objectification of women’s breasts I, in effect, chose to stop saying ‘yes’ to a very specific sexual energy entering my body.
Sexual energy comes from an energetic source that does not and can not contain love and anything that can not contain love can not possibly come from truth and anything that doesn’t come from truth is not part of our natural way. Love and truth are our natural way but we have deviated so far from our path that we now live in a world that is saturated with sexual energy and we see that as normal. But it is not normal, it is not normal for us.
When making love, as opposed to having sex, it’s very natural to feel sexual but these feelings are borne out of a completely different energy to the energy that impulses ‘just sex’. They are borne out of love and therein lies a world of difference.
As a result of taking responsibility for the quality of energy that I was allowing in, I stopped contributing to the fabricated belief that the only purpose of a woman’s breasts is to feed or titillate others. Not only that but by removing the false beliefs that I held around women’s breasts, I am left with the lived understanding that a woman’s body is there to emanate stillness, a silent call back to the Oneness that we are all from.
By Anonymous, Australia
For further inspiration…
Who creates the image of women?
What do you mean, do I have a relationship with my breasts? Heather explains why you’d want one.
Women in Livingness Blog 
I remember that when I was a child, I would often see posters of completely naked women in the local corner shop, on buses, and of course, not to miss-out the hardware store. It was almost as if, they were there, everybody knew they shouldn’t be there and pretended in front of us kids that they weren’t there. So one night, when the TV was on, a sexual scene came on – I was very curious to see what they were doing, I could sense that it’s not okay, just like I could sense that it’s not okay to have the posters up where they were – but I continued watching, and when my parents woke up & saw how interested I was, everybody started making fun of me. I felt quite upset at the fact, because I thought – how am i supposed to learn if my own parents are not explaining to me, or showing me a better way. Moments like these throughout our childhood can really teach us to close off and give up, but we also have an awareness which I remember very clearly thinking – “well, they’re not accurate in their response, i don’t need to let it get to me”. So, as always – it is entirely up to us to decide how we respond to life. There can be many external factors trying to crush us down, but we can always withstand it.
“Not only that but by removing the false beliefs that I held around women’s breasts, I am left with the lived understanding that a woman’s body is there to emanate stillness, a silent call back to the Oneness that we are all from.” Profoundly said thank you
It’s a great conversation, particularly as it highlights the many images we have been exposed to since childhood and the way the consciousness of the sexualisation of breasts (and women) can take up residence inside ourselves as a result. It’s also highlighted to me how the media and publications like magazines act as a vehicle to circulate these kinds of ideas. We could of course say “No” to them, so we are not victims, however the irresponsibility of promoting such images is obvious. These were beautiful words to read “to convey truth through a woman’s body.”, it changes the purpose for being a woman.
This is a very power-full blog, “What this has revealed to me is that the aspects that I consider to be ‘me’, are not locked in at all, in fact I have to permanently ‘feed’ them in order to be keep them alive.” If we allow ourselves to truly understand what is being said here we have the key to bring about the end of so many abhorrent behaviours that we deem complicated.
I agree Lucy, we are all locked into believing that we are the ‘us’s’ that we believe ourselves to be. Individuals with certain tastes, desires and behaviours but we’re not. We are the collective consciousness of God that has mistaken the ‘what is not us’ for the ‘what is us’ but’s it’s not, it’s as real as a mirage. What is real about us is the substance from which we’re all made, the consciousness of God, indestructible and everlasting.
We have all grown and developed a relationship with breasts, what breasts are and what they mean to us. Our relationship with them today is a result of all of everything we have inflicted on them since birth.
I can’t believe we are not taught the importance of developing a relationship with our breasts. We are taught the importance of checking for lumps and perhaps how to breastfeed, but the fact that as women our breasts play an important role is skipped and never mentioned. Perhaps it’s because there are so few women who have this connection that we don’t actually have the awareness to talk about it.
Or perhaps it’s that we are complicit with the fact that the world is purposefully set up to not reflect the truth.
Perhaps your’e right 😉
There are campaigns for lad mags to be kept away from the eyes of children and I agree with this because as a young girl I came across porn when babysitting and it does have an effect on those who read it. It changes us and how we view the physical form of females and males. It isn’t innocent and it doesn’t just go away.
Julie I agree that things ‘don’t just go away’. Your comment reminded me of two films that I have seen in my life that had a really long lasting and detrimental effect on me. One was a ‘slasher’ horror film that I saw when I was a teenager and the other was a harrowing film that I saw as an adult. Both films continued to play out in my body for years after I had seen them, I thought about them and images from both films kept coming back to me for a long time afterwards.
I’ve also had the experience of having watched a movie which I could feel had affected me in some way. Some of the more extreme horror films I would refuse to watch because the images would come back to haunt me and like you I have seen things that you can not unsee. These films are not just innocent things we watch, they leave an imprint.
Everything leaves an imprint.
Yes, as women we can absolutely detect when a person is sexualising or objectifying. And to me, this feeling has a totally different quality to the one in being naturally sexual.
Yes, we can detect it but are we so used to feeling it that we start to consider it normal when we should be at ease with calling it out so the other person is aware they are even doing it. It is so simple but also so confronting because it just feels like we have been playing a societal game for so long.
I exhibited a sexual energy towards men so consistently that I had no conscious awareness of what I was doing, it was simply who I perceived myself to be, a very sexual person. But knowing now that there is no truth in sexual energy, I know that there was no truth in who I was being.
And that offers great freedom to surrender the facade and build a relationship with whatever is underneath the behaviour.
“The truth of a woman’s body” – is how she is with it. The quality of how I am with my own body reveals the truth of where I’m at in life.
Agreed Zofia, which is a liberating reflection when we have no body issues but is a telling reflection in light of how many women are unhappy with the way that they look.
It should come as a surprise that on the whole women are disconnected from their breasts in this day and age, yet it is our norm. There is so much more to them than a feeding unit or a fantasy agent.
‘How could any man that I was with feel the deeper qualities of a woman’s body if the woman he was with saw her own body as nothing more than a vehicle in which to move her around her day, a functioning albeit living organism to transport her from A to B?’ I’m sure this statement applies to most women and what a sad fact that is.
If we are in our stillness we can easily feel as sexual energy is imposed on us. On the moment we are aware of it it does not have to effect us. On the moment we react on it or say yes to it we get that ill energy in our body. This energy has indeed nothing to do with love but fulfilling emptiness within us because we lost the connection with ourselves and our body.
“The Truth of a Woman’s Body” – is in the way she holds the dear love for herself and allows that quality of love to move her body for all to see and to enjoy.
Love is something for us all to delight in.
How we are, what we allow creates our own reality … how very true. And it shows the responsibility we all carry to note what we allow, what we feed, what we align to and to understand that those alignments either pollute us and take us away from who we naturally are (love) or they confirm the love we are, the ‘Oneness we are all from’.
This is huge, and all children need to understand this from a young age, infact the world needs to know this, ‘The world is made manifest by the energy we choose to live and move with, which then results in the quality of our thoughts and behaviours, which then, in turn further creates the world we live in.’ We have the power to change anything by being responsible for the quality of energy we allow to run our bodies.
Yes, it is a very simple stepped approach and feels well worn.
I can relate to parts of the blog, especially the opening paragraph, I used to go and stay with grandparents in North Yorkshire, and went through the exact same process in the shop opposite where they lived. What you shared stirred memories in more ways than one, like my life became about function, ‘How could any man that I was with feel the deeper qualities of a woman’s body if the woman he was with saw her own body as nothing more than a vehicle in which to move her around her day, a functioning albeit living organism to transport her from A to B?’
‘I am left with the lived understanding that a woman’s body is there to emanate stillness, a silent call back to the Oneness that we are all from.’ What an awesome reflection for us all and the more I ditch the false beliefs that have kept me imprisoned for so long the more I am building my own stillness and reflecting that in my movements throughout the day.
This is a blog we can all relate to, having had similar experiences with growing up being exposed to the sexualisation and resulting diminishing of our understanding and relationship with our breasts. It was fascinating that it wasn’t a will power thing to stop thinking of breasts in a sexualised way but saying no to the sexual energy that has to feed these beliefs for them to exist. Through Esoteric Breast massage I have been able to experience my breasts as one of my greatest assets. This is not because of their sexual quality but for the warmth and holding quality they energetically carry.
“I have gone from being a woman with very little self worth to a woman who is coming to know and appreciate her true value as a woman.” A beautiful and powerful awareness of the sacredness of a woman’s body.
How many of us have ever spoken to our girlfriends about the way our breasts feel apart from the moments of tension and pain before our periods? Have we ever even considered the possibility that there’s more to our breasts and shared with another woman? Perhaps that’s a way to start…
This is a brilliant sharing around how many have lost sight of the truth and power that a woman’s body holds. We all have a part to play as women to reconnect back to our sacredness and divinity and express this as being very ‘normal’ and let the world adjust to this lived truth. Natalie Benhayon is a great example of a woman who lives in the world deeply connected to her sacredness, sass, power and true sexiness and talks her walk without holding back in anyway.
When we diminish ourselves, we diminish the whole.
The normalisation of women’s breasts as purely objects for sexual pleasure and feeding babies is deeply missing the fullness and power of women in our emanation of stillness and the oneness of who we all are and the honouring of this. And is a tragedy that is time to be seen and reimprinted in the world .
‘When making love, as opposed to having sex, it’s very natural to feel sexual but these feelings are borne out of a completely different energy to the energy that impulses ‘just sex’. They are borne out of love and therein lies a world of difference.’ It’s great that you have included sexual feelings here as there is a tendency to let the baby out with the bathwater so to speak and for sex to become a bad thing, something to avoid because sex and love can’t sit together in one sentence or lie together in the same bed.
A very powerful sharing and call to reclaim the power of who we innately are as woman. The views and measures today of a woman’s body and what it means to be a woman is an outright abuse of our innate sacredness. However, the fact that our sacredness is innate, reveals the truth that it then is our responsibility to reclaim living with this quality of connection and honoring as such reflecting that this everything who we are, and we are accepting no less.
When the world presents to us that breasts are commodities – we seem to go along with it. But this is a beautiful sharing that shows how we can always come back to the truth of what we know, and how we can actually deeply appreciate our bodies and what they reflect back to us.
I remember feeling very confused also at this attraction towards breasts. Confused because a part of me knew this was completely out of character/not my true feelings towards breasts. Anything we express comes from an energy and that is able to shift and change. We are never fixed into a behaviour and cannot change.
We are so far deep as a society into the objectification of a women’s body that we let it go by most of the time unnoticed.
Yet it is there – influencing our children and harming our society.
And it continues to influence us until we choose to re-connect to the deeper meaning of our breasts and let go of the false beliefs that have entrapped for so long.
This is beautiful and, lovely that you are now claiming it, ‘I have gone from being a woman with very little self worth to a woman who is coming to know and appreciate her true value as a woman.’
I love how we can bring wisdom to any and every aspect in our lives by considering the energetic factor. It makes sense of most unexplained behaviors of us as human beings and knowing this we know also how to let go of things we don’t want to have in our lives anymore as you described so beautifully.
The body of a woman is sacred, this is a self-responsibility and awareness. The Livingness of this changes the relationship between men and women back to love.
“by removing the false beliefs that I held around women’s breasts, I am left with the lived understanding that a woman’s body is there to emanate stillness, a silent call back to the Oneness that we are all from.” I too looked on womens breasts as sexual objects or for breastfeeding, my breasts were small and I wanted to hide them as they did not fit the picture that was portrayed of a womanly body. With the understanding I now have, I am starting to reclaim my breasts and I love feeling the tenderness of self nurturing and the stillness they hold.
How can we complain or blame the men in our lives if we are not treating ourselves with the love and respect we deserve? To move with love for ourselves and the knock-on effect is that love comes our way. It’s that simple.
It is a very beautiful thing to observe the shock in a child over such things. Perhaps we always feel that same shock only we’ve found a way to numb ourselves to its intensity.