I am Shakti

Two memories from when I was around fifteen still echo inside me.
In one, I remember being enchanted by the idea of my future self at thirty — single, living in New York, and wildly sexually expressive. It was something like Sex and the City, years before the show even aired.
In the second, I was overhearing a group of teenage boys talk about a girl who was “boring in bed” because she just lay there.
In that moment, I made an inner vow: I will never be like that. I will be amazing in bed.

Looking back, I realize that even at that young age, my thoughts about sexuality were already shaped by fear, shame, and longing. Before I had ever experienced sexuality, it was already tied to pain and performance.

The Beginning of My Healing

At 25, I was a young divorced mother, lost and unsure of what came next.
In a bold, almost blind leap, I enrolled in a massage course — not yet knowing that this would become the first step on my healing path.

During that time, I worked at the pool of a luxurious wellness hotel, surrounded by lush tropical greenery and overlooking a mountain view.
There was a sense of magic in the air — the gentle sounds of water, birds, and wind, and the calm presence of spa therapists moving gracefully nearby.
The atmosphere was serene, almost sacred, and it awakened something deep within me.

I would often talk with the therapists working in the spa, eager to learn whatever I could from them. One day, I shared with one of the older therapists that I was reading a book about Tantra and felt deeply connected to the world of Osho and the ashram life described there. He looked at me and said, with a smile, that he himself had lived as a sannyasin in Osho’s ashram many years ago.

The book I was reading was Tantra: Tantra: A way of living and loving by Radha C. Luglio — a book that would become a companion to me later in life as well.
It wasn’t focused on sexuality, but on awareness, meditation, and the essence of the tantric way of being.

Something about that moment moved me. It was as if the quiet beauty around me, the repetitive tasks I was doing, the sense of devotion I was beginning to feel — all found a place inside the story I was reading.

The ashram life described in the book began to resonate with my everyday reality.
I wasn’t just working a job. I was learning to observe, to be present, to bring awareness into simple actions.
Slowly, I began to experience a subtle shift — a new kind of presence. A sense that Tantra was not something far away or mystical. It was already beginning to live in me.

Years of Experience… and Still Lost

Fast forward to age 35.
I’m a woman, a mother to a teenage daughter, and an experienced holistic therapist.
My resume includes ten years of study and work in body-mind healing, touch therapy, awareness, and personal growth.
I’ve also had over twenty years of sexual experiences — trial and error, love and heartbreak, intimacy and detachment.

And still, I felt lost. Disconnected. Confused.
Something inside me was still aching for truth and connection.

That’s when I joined an integrative therapist training course.
The learning style was unlike anything I’d known — slow, subtle, spacious.
We sat in silence, sang with our eyes closed, breathed, smiled.
Each session included giving or receiving a therapeutic process, along with daily homework for self-practice.

And slowly… something began to shift.
I started reconnecting to the deep root of who I am.
Clarity began to rise. My heart opened. I felt stronger, freer — but at the same time, my sexual experiences were becoming more disappointing.

Despite the powerful inner work I was doing, my sexual encounters left me feeling empty, unloved, and even hurt.
The gap between the transformation I was experiencing and the lack of intimacy in my personal life was deeply confusing.

A New Kind of Invitation

At a festival, during a casual chai-shop conversation, I shared my frustration with a yoga teacher friend.
He gently asked me, “Do you pleasure yourself?”

I realized… I hadn’t touched myself in a very long time.

He invited me to begin.
Not to chase orgasm — but just to offer myself loving, nourishing touch.

When I shared this with my teacher, he immediately gave our whole group a new assignment: daily self-pleasure practice.
So I began.

It wasn’t easy.
Mostly, I avoided it.
Avoided the pain, the boredom, the disconnection.
I escaped into quick orgasms, sleep, distractions — anything but actually meeting myself.

But even in the avoidance, I started to feel a deep longing: a longing for sexual healing.

And I knew — if I want to live fully, I must walk through the wounds.
No bypassing. No skipping steps.
My healing will only come when I meet the places that hurt the most.

Shakti Awakens

Shortly after, I read Making Love: Sexual Love the Divine Way by Barry Long.
The book became a lighthouse for me. It described exactly the kind of sacred, connected lovemaking I had been longing for.
At the time, I hoped to experience a glimpse of it through my relationships — but it hadn’t yet come to fruition.

What I’ve come to realize is that healing is not a destination — it’s a path.
And this path is still unfolding, layer by layer, breath by breath.

Today, I no longer feel lost.
I feel connected — to myself, to my body, to my truth.
There are still moments of confusion, still places within me that call for tenderness and healing — but I meet them now with compassion, not shame.

The longing I once had for someone else to bring me wholeness has transformed into a quiet power within me.
I am no longer waiting. I am living.

This is the journey of being Shakti — a continuous dance of awakening, reclaiming, softening, expanding.

And I know this: it’s possible.
Healing is possible.
Pleasure is possible.
Coming home to yourself — it’s all possible.

With love,
Shakti