Introduction: A new option

POST #1: A new option

It was about a year ago that I realized it was time to just make a commitment.

If I had a checklist for where I was in my life, it would have looked pretty good: late 30s, living in Manhattan, freelance writer, founder of an improv school, volunteering for an organization dedicated to creating a better future, plenty of good friends – all dimensions accounted for.

Well almost. It was everything but “a man.”

I was one of those ‘date a few times and then be inseparable for two years’ people. When I moved to NYC in 2001, Sex and the City was at its peak. That show and its promise of the perfect city life for a young single woman was a factor in me moving from LA. I know, it’s sad. But it just shows how deep and powerful the desire to find — and how much fun it is to look for — that one guy really is.

And within a short amount of time, I had created a version of that life for myself … a group of girlfriends, summer nights going to the trendiest bars, wearing the trendiest couture our budgets (and credit limits) would allow … all in the name of being happy at being single, knowing we’d be happier when we found our Mr. Right, or Mr. Big, whomever showed up first. And like most of us (we know who we are), we had a lot less action with guys than our role models on the show did. Our show could have been called “Drinks in the City” or “High Heels in the City”– frankly that was more accurate. But that was fine. Because there was almost an unspoken confidence that HE was out there. Somewhere. Maybe it wouldn’t be today, it might be next week. But that was OK because he WAS out there and I WOULD meet him.

So here I am. Seven years later and on the verge of taking the plunge. I will make a sacred vow. Lay my stake in the ground and declare to the world, “Yes! I am Celibate!”

(insert record scratch)

Yes, celibate. It’s a noun as well as an adjective. And is defined in a variety of ways, from “abstaining from sex” to “unmarried”. Our friends at Wikipedia tell us a vow of celibacy “is a promise not to enter into marriage or engage in sexual intercourse.”

And while that is all true, I have become celibate for a very specific reason. And that’s why I’ve decided to write about my experiences as a celibate woman living, not in a nunnery or a cave or an ashram in India, but in Manhattan – city of infinite temptation, from material needs to models walking on the streets next to you to nearly pornographic billboards the size of Rhode Island at every turn.

The reason I’m attracted to being a Celibate is that it’s a conscious choice to create something NEW.

I am always amazed when I think that I am one of the first women in the HISTORY OF WOMEN … thousands of years, billions of women … to even have the option to not get married and bear children. Up until very recently, if I had wanted to follow this path, my only choice would have been to basically withdraw from the world. If I wasn’t going to become a wife and mother, my only other option would be to take myself out of the game and live an asexual life, basically denying my gender. And there are still many, many places in the world right now where this is still the case.

So any of us who CHOOSE to not get married, not have children, are really bucking up against a centuries-old structure. I feel it in myself. When I think what my life will be like if I go all the way with this and not ever get married, not ever have a sexual relationship with another man, not ever have children … I am aware I’m entering into uncharted territory.

But to say, “No, I want to help create a NEW OPTION for what it means to be a woman. An option that is not tied to our sexual role whatsoever — not a mother, not a wife, not a lover or mistress or asexual, uptight nun.” Well there aren’t a lot of role models out there. Not examples of strong, bright, successful, attractive, vibrant women who choose this over relationships and children. Usually when I see a woman who is manless and childless in her 50s, somewhere in me I feel bad for her and imagine she feels bad too. But what if that wasn’t the case? Imagine women who, because of our unprecedented freedoms, education, wealth, opportunity and social support, were able to forgo the path that all our foremothers and sisters took and create a NEW WOMAN. And she’d co-exist with both women and men in a brand new way, where sex and responding to all the sexual forces and motives in us wasn’t driving us, wasn’t the currency between us.

Right now, it only exists as a potential – one that I am so excited about helping explore and create. Celibacy: One small step for woman, one giant step for humankind. Preferably in a comfortable sling back wedge.

Biology and Brendan Fraser

POST #2: BIOLOGY AND BRENDAN FRASER

I walk into the room looking fabulous. Everyone sees me, struck at my appearance. I’m at a work party – normally I’m looking smart in my DKNY suits, but tonight, I’ve transformed into vision of glamour and sexiness that surprises everyone. Especially the most attractive, powerful, slightly-bad-boy-but-he’s-just-misunderstood guy in the office. Oh, and he’s rich. Well, at least that’s how this version goes. The details and time period can change but it’s pretty much the same story. And I’m guessing I may not be the only woman who has these daydreams, fantasies, and deep-seeded desires. That’s why all these commercials, TV shows, and movies work on us! And I’ve learned how this is one of the many structures in women’s consciousness that is fueled by the sexual impulse. But let me step back a sec…

This month serves as my one-year marker in my celibacy practice. I’ve taken a three-year commitment, or vow, for a very specific reason. It wasn’t a “Hey, I can’t find a decent guy, so SCREW IT! I’m celibate!” It’s a conscious investigation that, at the end of those 3 years, I may or may not choose to extend. During this time I’ve, and will continue to, learn about the deeper forces in myself that are usually unconsciously steering the ship, so to speak.

One discovery has been that although the sexual force in its obvious form of “I must have sex!” can been seen pretty clearly, the more subtle and stronger force I see in myself is how it manifests as the whole romantic universe – the perfect man, the amazing adventurous, exciting, satisfying, sex-filled life we lead together….and on and on. It’s actually quite scary to see how deep this runs. The emotions are intense, the storylines and images can be convincing and compelling.

For example…recently I was on a plane watching a very silly “rom-com” with Brendan Fraser. It didn’t take much more than a few bars of the “I’m so in love with her” montage music to start up and scenes of the overly-confident guy smitten with the perky, independent girl before I was “in”. The pit-of-my stomach ache, the deep lack-of-true-love ennui. Something is missing…and it’s a big problem that it’s missing! All I know is “I WANT THAT!” The world gets very small – no sense of economic turmoil or global warfare – just the need to find Mr. Perfect and fall in love…NOW! And stay in love. Forever. It feels so important to me and that nothing else will ever come close to filling the vacuum and ease my romantic pangs. I’m staring out the window for about 3 minutes, lost in that universe, before I catch myself. I was amazed at how quickly the wave hit and even though the temptation is to stay in that fantasy a bit longer, I ‘renounce’ the whole thing…I let go. Just let it be. Don’t push it away but also don’t focus on it and feed the story line. Within a minute or two it passes. My focus is freed up, the ‘real’ world floods back. And most astonishing is the pain of wanting, lack, and need are gone. I saw how constricted I’d become, how wound up and caught up in the yearning for love I’d been. And the scary thing…it isn’t even REAL!!! Meaning, as this wave of deep wanting passes, I saw that everything I thought was important and true just isn’t.

What I’m learning, firsthand and over and over, is this romantic drive is programmed to get me to, in the end, procreate. Make babies. Carry on the species. And that’s REALLY all. Not everyone likes to hear that. But think about it…where does following this whole fantasy lead? Not to just holding hands. Find a guy and get to it. Candles, wine, French Riviera…whatever, just get to it. As far as I understand it from my celibate men friends, their version bypasses the wine and candles and has a raunchier, x-rated storyline compared to ours (in general). But again, the end result is the same. Get to it. It’s a fascinating thing to watch happen in oneself. And our current culture plays right into it because we really hold this whole sexual/romantic ideal as sacred and giving our lives meaning. Is love a sham? No way. But is this extreme focus on the ideal, romantic love the end-all, be-all we hold it to be? I’ve seen, again and again, that it isn’t. Love, relationships, commitment – I’m all for them and not insinuating that they’re fake. But celibacy practice is showing the whole romantic, ‘what is missing from my life is my soul-mate’ world is a product of the very strong and very persuasive sexual force that has ONE motive.

So when someone asks me, “What happens when you watch a romantic movie?” I say, “The same thing that happens to you.” But it’s the relationship I have and am cultivating to it that is different. Not lust, not fear, not disgust — it’s to have NO relationship to it. And in that, there is freedom. Freedom FROM the illusion that any of that is real…and freedom TO make the kind of choices I want to make CONSCIOUSLY, not from my biology. And one day, that choice may include no longer being celibate. But once the illusion of “my dream life with Mr. Perfect” is seen through, I know for me, I don’t ever want to go back and act as if it’s real. That’s always been the goal of any spiritual path and practice…waking up to what is MORE true and living according to that. How can ‘woman’ change, grow, and evolve if she’s still acting out mainly her biological function? When we get caught up in that storyline and are convinced it is real, are we really acting freely or are we just carrying out a biological imperative? It’s a HUGE question…one that I want to get to the bottom of. Who is really ‘driving the car’? My freedom of choice or my conditioning as a woman that is tens of thousands of years old?

And what is on the other side, much to my surprise, are relationships with both men and women that are deeper, with more ease and intimacy…free from pretense, manipulation, and neediness. Not a world where the love and attention from one person means everything…when that isn’t even really possible or a rational demand (hence the increase in divorce rates, percentages of people who cheat in a relationship, and shortened length of relationships). To me, it’s time for a new storyline to start being told and stop perpetuating an old one that is no longer relevant, useful, or true.