239: You Can Be Feminine and Feminist with Sahara Rose

Namaste, it's Sahara Rose. And welcome back to the Highest Self podcast, a place where we discuss what makes you your soul's highest evolvement. What's your dosha? Well, if you want to find out, I invite you to take my quick little quiz over on I am Sahara rose.com and in a couple questions I will let you know the exact percentages of the doshas in your mind and in your body and email you a free three day mini course on how to include Ayurveda into your modern lifestyle. So head over to my website iamsaharose.com to discover your dosha. Today. Are you interested in having a career focused on health and wellness? Well, if so, then the universe is calling you to become a holistic health coach. I am offering this incredible deal a discount of $1,500 off my Alma mater Institute for Integrative Nutrition, which is the world's largest nutrition school with guest teachers such as Deepak Chopra, Chris Carr, Dr. Hyman, Dr. Andrew Whale and so many others. It is split between six months of health coaching programs teaching you hundreds of nutritional theories including Ayurveda, as well as six months of business coaching. And as an additional bonus, I am offering a webinar where I will te teach you how to use social media to create a thriving career as a health coach. On top of that, I have created a private Facebook community just for the Highest Self podcast listeners who are becoming health coaches to connect with each other, meet up with each other and support one another on this journey. So if you're interested, send an email over to Sahara S A h a r aatfeelfresh.com with subject iin again saharaetfeelfresh.com with subject Iin and I will personally send you back the email that will allow you to get a $1,500 off discount as well as my business coaching webinar and the private Facebook group. I'm so excited for you to begin your journey as a health coach. If you are not following me on Instagram am sahararrose I have been sharing a lot about the feminine. This is the Year of Rose Gold Goddesses, the sacred sisterhood collective all about honoring the Goddess within. If you are new to this PODC, please head over to rosegoldgoddesses.com to learn more about this community of women around the world gathering together to celebrate their femininity and follow their dharma, their soul's purpose and support each other on their spiritual mission and to celebrate, you know, having this sensuous body and all of the things that we are able to do. So this has been the year of Rose Gold Goddesses for me, for many of you listening, and for the rise of the feminine at whole. I am people left and right sharing that they want to do business in a new way, they want to approach life in a new way, they want to approach their relationships in a new way. And this is the way of the feminine. This is the way of ease and flow and intuition and not running away from your emotions, but rather going further into them. And I shared on my Instagram that you can be a feminist and still be feminine. And a lot of people really resonated with that. So I wanted to do an episode about what that really means. So if we look at the feminist movement, it did a lot of good in society. I mean, previous to that, women were considered housewives who were supposed to just look pretty and make your TV dinner and follow the rules to keep up with the Joneses. So the feminist movement saw that women are not being respected as much as men, they are not being paid as much as men, that there is a glass ceiling above them. And if we want to be independent, financially free and abundant, then we have to be able to do the same jobs, the same responsibilities that men have. And in fact, we're going to outdo them because that's what women do. So we looked at the industries that were the most prevalent at that time, which are different from this time. And at that time it was finance, engineering, real estate, sciences, advertising. It was things that were very analytical because we did not have the Internet back then. So for you to be successful and make a lot of money, you had to go into a profession or a career which were heavily male dominated. So women looked at those careers and they said, you know what? I'm going to put my boobs away, put on that pantsuit, and I'm going to kill it. And they did it. And I'm so grateful for the feminist movement because many of us would not be in the positions that we are with it. However, the reason why many people don't identify with being a feminist, and I consider myself a feminist, but not everyone does, is because of the culture that was created around it. That culture was essentially saying that your femininity is weak. We essentially picked up the patriarchy's views of the feminine and we pushed aside our periods, pushed aside the things that make us woman, in order to be taken seriously by society. So the feminist movement essentially caused us to become the men that we were hating. Does that make sense? We became men while simultaneously hating them. So it essentially puts you in a relationship where you are just hating yourself, which is not the state that anyone wants to live in. It creates a lot of duality and separation because here you are in a female body that is sensuous and soft and wants to move. And you feel things, you're an empath, and you're connected, connected to the children and the earth. And then you're cutting this, like, limb of you off because you feel like that's the only way that you can move forward. And the world has shifted significantly since the 1960s, over 50 years ago, over half a century ago. And because of the Internet. The Internet is inherently feminine. If we look at the qualities of the feminine, it is free, it is community oriented, it doesn't have a hierarchy, more just moving the way that it wants to move. And that is what the Internet is. So with the Internet, there's no guy that you have to step on his toes to get that corner office and a boss that gives you a promotion and you having to get your bonus. There's none of that anymore. Anyone can share what they want. There's no gatekeepers, there's no hierarchy. There's no corporate ladder. Anyone can put up their website, anyone can sell a product, anyone can share what they want. They don't have to have the editor allow them to share their story. They don't have to wait for the TV producer to think that their story is special enough. Everyone can put their voice out there. And this is inherently feminine. So actually today, the ways that one can be successful, such as starting an online business, becoming an entrepreneur, creating a community, all of these things are actually way more tied into the feminine. So this notion that we have to become masculine to be successful is actually not steeped in the truth of today. So this is why so many women are seeing. Well, this feminist culture that has been created of just being very angry, hating men, having this rebellious streak against the masculine whole is really not serving us because we've actually come to this place of integration. And, you know, many of us, you know, we've seen the slogan the future is female, But I've also been seeing more and more the future is female and male. Like, the future is not to have these two sides of ourselves fighting because we are all masculine and feminine. And when we create a war between these two sides of ourselves, we are walking contradictions and we can never feel peace. So I believe that the future of the feminist movement is to honor the feminine. It is to honor the ebbs and the flows that we have inside of ourselves. It is to honor our intuition, honor our empathy, honor our emotions, honor our ability to hold space. You know, you crying does not make you weak. You picking up on the energy of the room does not make you overly sensitive. You caring about your customers and maybe taking what they say to heart does not make you a softie or a pushover or not fit out for business. And this is what a lot of the masculine, and this could be male or female who are vocalizing this would tell us, you know, like, oh, I don't care what people say. Like, you know, once your laptop's closed, like, don't take that home with you. And it's like, well, the feminine can't. Like the masculine can compartmentalize, whereas the feminine, it's all integrated. So the masculine, which often is male bodied people, but can also be female bodied people or gender neutral people, but those who identify more with masculine consciousness, and there's a lot of great books, David data about this, they tend to be able to separate things so they could have shit go down at work and then come home and it's like, it didn't happen. What's for dinner? Okay, what's on tv? What's this? Like they can just keep going, what's gonna happen next? Whereas the feminine is like a sponge. Like we're holding onto so many different things. So I identify with being more feminine and I am in a female body. Not everyone is like that. So if you are identifying more with the feminine, then you can't just have someone tell you some hate words on social media and then just be like, oh, la la la la. You feel things, you are connected to the all and that is your superpower. So we must not say that this makes us weak, this makes us inferior, this makes us incapable of being successful. In today's world, we can actually look at all of that and see these things as our superpower. You're able to connect so deeply with your customers that you can really feel their energy or with your clients. And that's what makes you such a strong leader. And also, even the feminine needs to have a masculine side to them. We also need to practice boundaries and practice our ability to not mesh everything together. So we all need this balance within. But what has happened in the past, you know, couple thousand years is the masculine has just become so much more prevalent. We have honored in society when someone is ambitious, cutthroat, go getter, hard working, and these are all parts of us, but these are more of our masculine Traits. And then that causes us to shut ourselves off from our receptivity, our ability to feel. And this is why so many of us, females, including myself included, have a harder time doing that. Because we have been taught, even from the time that we were children, that we won't be taken seriously or respected if we are emotional. So I remember growing up that if I would be crying, my dad would be like, I can't hear a word you're saying. I don't understand. You come back when you're not crying. So he definitely would not honor or hold space for me when I was crying. And I learned pretty quickly, like, if you want to get your point across, like, don't cry. And at first I thought this, wow, this really served me, like, it's so great that I'm not emotional because all these other girls are crying and I'm able to like hold it in. And then I realized, wow, it's so difficult for me to cry. And a lot of that was because I don't allow myself to get there. In fact, I've created this shell, this boundary within myself, which essentially was cutting off my femininity and adopting a more masculine trait because I thought crying was inferior, that you have to be serious and say what you wanna say and don't bring emotions. You know, my dad would always say, be rational, not emotional. This was literally our mantra. And what is this saying? Be masculine, not fe. Again, these people, like my father did not know that this is what they implied. They just grew up, especially in baby boomer society where if you were emotional, you would get kicked out of the office. And he didn't want that for his daughter. Not knowing that in the future we won't even have offices, you know, and being emotionally intelligent could be your greatest gift. So there's no one to blame. All we have to do is become aware. And a lot of this comes from this deep seated patriarchy that is encoded in many females subconscious. So I want to talk about sensuality and sexuality because no conversation of the masculine and feminine could be complete without this. And I think a lot of times we try to take the sex part out, like, okay, we can talk about masculine, feminine, but like, let's not talk about sex because that's going to be, you know, too much, too risque. We don't know what to say. And I really like to approach things head on, holistically as they are. And we can't take that out because the fundamental difference between a male and a female body is their sexuality, their hormones, their genitalia their penetration. So in David Data's work, he says, you know, you identify with the masculine more if you have the desire to penetrate. So this could mean sexually, to penetrate, or this could be more energetically. Like, you want to go after things, you want to charge, you want to get that guy, you want to get that job, you want to get that raise. So that desire to shoot after something, it's like that bow and arrow that is the masculine. And we can also relate this to pitta. Pitta is the fire dosha in Ayurveda, the world's oldest health system in the sister science of yoga, based on the mind body connection, which I've written several books on. So this pitta, fire driven energy to penetrate, to ravish, to go after, to chase. This is the masculine. So if you identify with that, then just know, okay, I resonate more with the masculine. Even if you are in a female body and if you have a desire to be penetrated. So again, sexually and also energetically, you want to people to find you and tell you how amazing you are and how your work is so needed. And you want to attract things into your life. You don't want to go push after them. It doesn't make you happy when you've. When you strived it hard enough and you got that goal. Like, that's not what made you happy. What makes you happy is when you feel like you magnetized it in, when you pulled it in, when you just showed up as your most radiant self and that pulled the attention and the energy towards you, the abundance towards you. This is more of the feminine. So that feminist approach of life, that feminine approach to life is kind of the polar opposite to how most of us grew up. You know, in school, you're taught to go after what you want and keep knocking down doors until one of them essentially falls over, you know, keep going after it. And this does work. Like, we can't say, oh, this totally doesn't work. And in many ways, we do have to approach certain things in life with a masculine approach. However, we have only worked that muscle. It's like we only worked our bicep. We also have our triceps. So that tricep is that feminist approach of, well, what if we could do certain things in different ways? What if instead of me, you know, chasing every podcast to get on their podcast, what if instead I worked on my craft and became the best version of me possible and those podcasts were reaching out to me, you know, that would be that feminist approach, whereas the masculine approach is like, keep chasing, right? What if instead of going after all the clients and trying to close the sale, more masculine. What if instead I allowed them to come to me, I did a workshop, and I just showed value? And then from that place of showing value, the right people who want to work with me would show up without me having to chase. So it doesn't mean you're not doing anything. This is where people get caught up. Like, oh, so I just have to show up and people are gonna come to me like, yeah, right, that's not gonna work. No. We live in a physical world that you have to do things to get results, but you can do them in a different way. You can do them in a way that pulls in, that magnetizes, that attracts. And we all need a balance of the 2. If you're 100% on either way, you're not going to fulfill your dharma, because it does require a balance of the two. So to penetrate, to be penetrated. And then in a sexual context, if you want someone to go after you, you know, dating, you want them to be texting, you want them to be calling, you want them to be pursuing you. Or if you like to be the pursuer, you like a good chase, and you want to text and call them and take them out to dinner and make the plans and open the door. That is the more masculine, the opposite is the more feminine. So again, it is not always equated to gender. So with this understanding of now, what does feminine and masculine look like in an energetic and sexual sensual contact? What I am seeing happening more, and I'll probably do a whole other podcast about this, is shaming about feminine sexuality. So we live in a patriarchal culture, and this patriarchy has taken sexuality and has commodified, has exploited the feminine body for the means of advertising, marketing, and control. So because of this, we are seeing girls with double D breasts and tiny little shirts selling beer or a car or things that men like to buy or like to go at that females typically are not even very interested in. But there's a girl with big hooter tits there, because we know that that's going to bring in the male gaze. And because of that, we have. Have essentially not honored what the feminine truly is. You know, many of those women, their breasts are enhanced with surgery. It's not even their natural breast. You're not showing a woman who just breastfed and her real titties on there. You know, you're showing some doctor altered breasts. Again, if you want to get breast surgery, that is fine. I Do want you to be aware of breast implants illness, which is a very real thing. Many of my friends have suffered from it. That is another conversation. But what it is saying is that the reason why so many of us are so resistant to feminine sexuality is because of the patriarchy exploiting it. And they're not exploiting feminine sexuality. They're exploiting a male view on sexuality, a male view on the female body. So if you look at porn, what is porn? It is a bunch of women who don't look like everyday women who have again, altered bodies. Super, super long nails. I don't even know how they're touching themselves with their nails. Like, how are you not scratching yourself? And they are pretending to like things that most women probably wouldn't like. A lot of fantasies of male dominance and just a lot of processing of the wounded masculine trying to dominate the feminine, which has essentially made women very resistant to all things sexual. Because that's what we think of now. I do have a very big problem with this, with what the porn industry has become. There is now feminine porn. You know, females tend to prefer like a good novel. If I'm gonna be real, I don't really want to watch porn. I want to read a romantic novel though. If anyone has any suggest as a let us just know. But there is, you know, beautiful French feminine porn that's happening that's very, you know, equal and loving and sensuous. So because of that, a lot of women, when they see a woman who is dancing sexually, who's moving her hips, who's moving her body, who is showing her body, we automatically equate the masculine patriarchal approach to sexuality to that. So, for example, in my Rose School Goddesses parties, we dance, we twerk, we belly dance, we dance central. It is a female only party. But I from sharing the videos, received comments such as, there is nothing spiritual about a bunch of women dancing sexually. You guys are just doing that for male attention. Which is funny because there were no men present. Twerking and belly dancing is disgusting. Shame on you. Women who show their bodies are insecure, you can't be spiritual and dance like that. Women who dress sexually are asking for it. Just be real. If you want male attention, you should just say that there's no reason for any woman to be dancing like that if she's not trying to turn someone on, et cetera. So to me, it's so fascinating when I get feedback like that because it shows how much the patriarchy is still alive and rampant and especially in women's Subconscious, because all of those messages I received were from women. So we have been made to believe that our bodies, our wombs, our movement, our fluidity, our sexuality, our yonis are disgusting, shameful, wrong, sinful. Should just be covered at. Yep, put that thing in a chastity belt, girl. When the opposite is true. To honor the feminine, we have to see sexuality as sacred because our wombs literally hold life force. Our yonis are the divine portal between the physical and spiritual worlds, literally. So yoni is the Sanskrit word for vagina, vulva, pussy, whatever you want to call it. But it is a sacred word because your yoni is literally taking a soul from the cosmos that somehow landed in your body and is now being birthed into the physical plate. It is the portal of life. And this is why you will see many temples dedicated to the yoni. And dance is sacred worship. You know, a lot of us, we think of sexual dances as you're doing it for attention, you're doing it for a music video or something like that. And I think a lot of this, especially with twerking, started because we saw Miley Cyrus twerking. I don't know when that was, like, the VMAs, like, five plus years ago. And that was kind of the first. I feel like, big time that, like, twerking became a word. Like, I don't even think we had a word for it. It was just called, like, dance and movement and, like, shaking your hips. Like, I've been a hip hop dancer my whole life. I was on a competitive dance team. It was such a big part of my life. And we never had that word twerking. I had never heard of it, but we were, like, doing it. And then this became, like, a word and a concept. And then we equated it with Miley Cyrus doing it, who may or may not have been doing it in an uncommon conscious way. I don't know. I don't know her, so I can't say that or not. So then we are just saying that this is wrong, that people are not supposed to be dancing like this, that she's asking for it, whatever it is. So twerking was actually, you know, ancient African dance form. And it started with women just gathering in circle and shaking to release stagnant energy. You know, when you shake your body, you release all the tension and trauma and everything that you're holding onto. And it was also a birthing dance that opened up your hips to allow life to come through you. So twerking, birthing dance, belly dance. So I Was also a belly dancer. I performed at Tribal Fest. Belly dance has been a huge part of my life since I was 15 years old. That was my first performance at my sweet 16 party. And it's part of my culture. And, you know, it was never seen as wrong. Like, I belly danced in front of my whole family and they're like, woo. Like, that's just how we dance. And some reason we're like, oh, my God, belly dance is so sexual. And they're doing it for male attention. Even in middle Eastern culture now, oftentimes because of the patriarchy, they think that because of the way that belly dancers have been deemed. But that was also an ancient birthing dance. You did it to practice opening up your body and opening up your pelvis so you could naturally give life. And more than that, besides it being a birthing dance, it is a dance to enjoy the femininity of your body. Your curves, your hips, your pelvis, your breasts, your expressions, your wisdom, your intuitive movement. You can enjoy that. You know when women say, oh, well, okay, if twerking and belly dance are ancient birthing dances, then why are you doing it in front of people? Shouldn't you just be doing it when you're giving birth? I actually received a comment that said that. And, and to be honest, just think about that concept. Like, okay, saying that twerking or belly dancing should only be done when you're giving birth is like saying that you should only have sex when you want a child. So should we only have sex once or twice in our lifetimes, depending on how many kids we want to have? If you don't want to have kids, you might as well again put on that chastity belt, become a nun. You can't have sex. Sex is only for having kids. Like, no, sex creates life. You can create kids with sex, but you're also able to do it for fun. You know, like humans and like, dolphins are the only two mammals that have sex for fun. So we're not like, waiting for mating season so we can get knocked up and, like, raise our kids in the wild. Like, we have sex for pleasure. We have sex for fun. It feels good for a reason. If it was meant to be something that we only do per number of times we wanna have kids, which some mammals are like that. It would be a very different system. We wouldn't be fertile all the time. We wouldn't have sexual urges all the time. We physically wouldn't be able to have sex all the time. Which we are so saying that it can only be for giving birth is like saying that sex is only for the only times you want to have kids. And if you don't want to have kids, forget about it. Instagram told you. And to say that dancing is only for male attention is denoting the thousands of years that women have been gathering in circles to dance. So, you know, back in the days in, for example, the Middle east, women were in the kitchen, they were in the homes, they weren't able to leave. So because of that, they would go in circle and one girl would go in the middle and, like, do this little body roll, and everyone would follow it along. Another one would do, like, a hip twist, and everyone would follow along, and they're having fun with it and they're dancing, and this is how they entertained themselves and bonded. So to say that that woman would only be dancing with that for male attention is essentially denoting the history of dance. Dance wouldn't exist today if it wasn't for those women dancing by themselves in sacred circle for nothing but pleasure. And again, we see this in every culture. We see this in Africa, we see this in China. We see this all around the world. So it's not just for male attention. Dressing sexy is not just for male attention. That is a whole other topic, guys. But so many women say, oh, well, you know, if she wasn't wearing such short shorts, maybe that guy wouldn't have raped her. Women say this. This is real conversation that happens, as if we have to cover ourselves and hide our sexualities and cloak ourselves to be safe. Now, I'm not saying that there are dangerous men out there and that there are men who are perverts, but the answer is not to keep covering up our bodies. The answer is for these fucking men to change. You know, what are we gonna do next? Cover up every ounce of myself so only my eyes can be seen so you stop thinking of me sexually? If that was true, then there should be no sexual urge in the Middle east. And trust me, there is. So we can't keep hiding our bodies so we don't attract the wrong type of male energy. We need to teach men how to deal with that energy because they could see my toenail as sexual if that's all. See, women are sexy. Our energy is sexy. And that has nothing to do with our bodies. That has to do with our magnetism. So you can keep covering up our bodies and. And putting us in cloaks and wraps. That's not going to change it. What has to change is men seeing women as humans, not just as objects that have to be protected and put on the shelves again. My family comes from Iran where this is like a requirement. You're not even allowed to be on the street without covering yourself up. And guess what? The people are protesting. They're being killed right now. Hundreds of people are being killed right now at this time for protesting. I have half Indian heritage too. The same thing. Women highest number of rapes in the world is in Delhi, where I used to live. Every 30 seconds woman being raped. So if it were true that the more women cover up, the safer they are, these would not be statistics. So on top of all of this, there is nothing wrong with women dancing sexy to feel sexy. There is nothing wrong with her wanting to please or turn on her partner or a man that she finds attractive. There is nothing wrong with women choosing how she wants to use her sexuality, when she wants to use her sexuality, if she wants to use her sexuality. This is for no one to judge. And it breaks my heart to see how many women are policing other women telling women how they can and cannot use their bodies. This is just as harmful as the men telling us what to do. We can be feminists and feminine at the same time. And it starts with us loving and accepting our sisters in however they want to and express themselves. Maybe one sister wants to be completely naked in the jungle because she was born naked and it's her birthright to be in her birth suit. And maybe another woman wants to wear a headscarf. That is her right. No one can tell another person how to dress, how to behave, how to be. We have to allow upmost freedom. This is how we heal the feminine. This message is more important now than ever before because this dialogue is happening. We are coming to this realization that the feminine holds such innate wisdom that most of us, including myself, have not fully tapped into the awareness of. And trust me, I find myself doubting it too. Sometimes I find myself wondering, well, how am I supposed to get everything done if it's all supposed to be magnetized to me? Like, how am I supposed to create if I'm not like hustling? I go through these and I allow myself to have this conversation because it's literally breaking up a paradigm that I was born into intergenerationally. I've shared this with you guys on my podcast, but my grandmothers and all of my ancestry comes from child marriage, you know, 11 year old girls being married. So that's a lot of ancestral wisdom to break free. And on top of that, just growing up in a day and age that has told us that striving, being ambitious, being this like hard, bad bitch is the way to go. And part of us is like, yes, and part of us doesn't want to be that way all the time. And we have to make space for both. Because some days I want to be a pitta and I want to be a boss and I love, you know, making businesses and making money and talking about that. Like some days that's my freaking jam. And then other days I just want to be at home decorating and watering my plants and cuddling with my puppy and being so in my softness and so in my feminine and why should I judge either side? So, so I hope this episode opened your mind, opened your awareness, maybe reaffirmed something you knew, maybe contradicted something that you knew or you believe. And that's all okay. We're all here just engaging in dialogue and this is how we expand our consciousness and bridge this new paradigm. So I have more about this on my Instagram amsaharrose. If you are not following me there, check it out and I have an entire community dedicated to all the it is called Rose Gold Goddesses. We are opening doors back up in January for a week, bringing new members in. There are monthly Goddess circles. Each month is dedicated to a new goddess that we're working with. You know, Saraswati for creativity, Lakshmi for abundance, Yemaya for flow. We'll see who next month's is and we have expert calls and community and live events and just discussions on all these sorts of things. So head over to rosegoldgoddesses.com to learn more about that. Thank you so much for being part of this conversation and I look forward to seeing where it brings all of us. If you loved this episode, I would love if you could leave me a review in the iTunes store and as a free gift, I will share with you the first half of my unreleased book, Eat Right for your Mind body type. Simply email a screenshot of your review over to SaharaAtfieldFresh.com again, Sahara S A H A R A@EatFeelFresh.com and I will send you over the first half of my unreleased book, Eat Right for your Mind body type. Thank you and namaste Ram.