Alessandra Sagredo's Blog

OK, we all know it: Sex sells. There’s nothing new in this statement, nothing shocking or mind boggling.

What many have missed, however, is that it is not only “sex” which has become a commodity, it’s our sexuality as well.  Our erotic inner Sexual selves have come up for sale. The places within where we hold our fantasies, our desires, our attractions, have been rented out to the latest corporate profit agendas.  This is leading us to a form of authentic sexuality suicide. With the onslaught of manufactured sexuality we may question how much of our true sexual nature we actually know and which aspects of our desires exist simply due to media conditioning? Conditioning such as…

“What is acceptable kinkiness?”  Thanks to certain videos, S&M has gone from a lifestyle to a dress up party.

“Who is attractive?” Check out your local magazine covers for the latest “acceptable hotness”.

“what fantasies should be filling your private moments?”  How did perfume ads turn into a romance novel?

We are inundated with suggestions of what is desirable, which can leave us reaching externally for acceptable sexual fulfilment instead of checking internally with what really turns us on. How do we ensure that our minds and identities don’t become submissive to the programming of pop culture and media? That our children are raised with an encouraged self-exploration and knowing instead of commercialization being their sex nanny?

Mass produced sexuality raises the challenge of holding on to our identities amidst the bombardment of messages.  It tests our ability to remain free of conditionings that the media and society would place on us, challenging us to not lose our true sexual identity and start to base our attractions, experiences and worth of interactions using a commercialized corporate scale rather than our own inner taste buds.

Sex can be a sensory smorgasbord, with everything served up for you. But what about your own desires, fantasies, inner kinks? My thoughts?  Sex is much better as a potluck.  When you arrive at the table, you want to bring something of “you,” otherwise you’ll only be dining on other people’s concepts.

There are some facets of this increased media sexual saturation that I do welcome; sensuality is beautiful to witness, and I celebrate our slowly evolving openness to sex as a delectable aspect of human nature. I would much prefer a luscious display of naughtiness on screen than a blood bath of violence.  My only caveat is as our society matures into a world of lessened prudishness, that we truly do move towards an embodied expression and embrace of “our genuine Sexual nature”, the sexuality that’s authentic to each of us. The challenge is finding the balance on the teeter totter of broadcasted sexuality versus holding on to our own sexual identities.

Here are a few practices to get you started on your own inner sexual odyssey. As authentic sexual discovery starts as a personal journey, these exercises are focused on you, however feel free to share them with your partner, it’s a great way to build a more intimate connection.

Media Detox

Take a weeklong break from all sexual stimulants (was that a gasp?). This detox will help to cleanse your palate and clear the clutter that’s been placed there by various media, creating space for your own personal inquiry.  In the end it’ll aid you in exploring and reclaiming the fantasy realm within your system which was rented out to your favourite sexy sites or magazines or bogged down by the influx of suggestive materials.

Your Turn-Ons
Make a list of your biggest turn-ons not just the ones you’ve seen thanks to a recently visited xxx website. Once you get to the ones that make you squirm, keep going…When you reach those that have you thinking “I can’t write that down”… keep going….When you finally touch upon those that make you blush (and may have you denying fervently that “these can’t be my fantasies!”) then you’ve arrived. Discovering and diving into our deepest sexual fantasies is a way to get to know our inner selves on a renewed level.  It brings a deeper level of acceptance to our sexual being, doing a bit of sightseeing into our personal erotic playground of the mind and learning what really turns us on.  In the end the more we know about our sexual nature, the more we’re able to explore and express our desires, which brings a new level of fulfilment to bedroom adventures.  And remember that your sexual fantasies are not the same as sexual actions; guilt is pointless.

Savouring the Reality Around Us
Enjoy the dynamic array of women and men in the world around you. During your weeklong break from glossy photos and airbrushed images, give yourself permission to admire the living, breathing individuals surrounding you. You may be surprised at who draws your eye (so you thought you were into redheads… lo and behold that raven haired woman has you taking a second look). This new level of exploring your attractions can bring deeper levels of self-awareness, self-knowing, and for those singles out there, walking with your head up and system open to new involvements may just draw in a new delicious experience.

Your Personal Sexy Fantasy Land
Allow yourself to play within a sexy fantasy land of your own making. (Yes this is a go ahead on a bit of self-loving!). Let go of any thoughts of “good/bad”, “right/wrong” that your family, friends, past, or religions may have placed on you. Take a few breaths, let your mind wander and your hands follow. Remember that list you created and dive in. Don’t judge (no one can see your thoughts!).  By freeing yourself to not just fantasize but to explore yourself during the process you’re accepting your own dreams, desires and inner authentic sexual being. This is a key element in a personal sexual revolution, it demonstrates to yourself that your lusty thoughts are “OK”, that even if they don’t fit the mold of the media (or would have you mother fainting…) they’re true to you and in the end the more sexually embracing of your authentic being you become, the more love you pass on to yourself.

Although mass produced sexuality can bring some interesting new ideas to our sexploits, they can also overtake our own authentic desires. Hidden behind the veil of those conditioned concepts and “officially” recommended attractions, when you let go of others’ ideals and (re)discover yours, you’ll regain a more stunning connection with yourself.  You’ll embrace your own unique sexuality in a new way and…to top it off you may discover the most mind blowing orgasm you have ever had. Why? Because it comes from the depths within you, from those things that don’t simply turn on your mind or body, but your entire being.

The post Mass Produced Sexuality: Committing Sexual Suicide appeared first on Soulphoria.

From Soulphoria,Part 5: Becoming a Mistress of Mysticism

The Divine I

“Hey, you, beautiful, down there on your knees…

What are you doing?Who are you talking to?

Why are you kneeling?” Spirit asked.

“I’m praying,” replied the woman, eyes meek.

“Ahhh… praying… so you’re talking at yourself?” the Spirit asked,head tilted.

“No, I’m talking to God.”

Spirit looked perplexed.“Are you not a Goddess? Are you not a Creator?”

The woman looked up at Spirit stunned, stressed, embarrassed.“No, I’m just a human being.”

Spirit nodded as it turned away from her.“And thus you will stay until your eyes open, and you finally seewhat you could be.”

The woman got off her knees and followed Spirit. “I am what I am,” she called to it.”

“No, you are what you believe,” it called back continuing to moveaway from her.

“Stop,” she cried, panic filling her body as Spirit continued to fade quickly.

Colors swirling, Spirit turned and looked at her, waiting.

The woman whispered “I want to be what you want me to be.”

Spirit smiled and looked closer at her,

“Don’t you recognize me? I am you.”

All your life she has been waiting for the moment you’d remember her, you’d remember you.

From Soulphoria, A Provocative and Practical Approach to Spirituality. Part 5: Becoming a Mistress of Mysticism By Alessandra Sagredo

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From Soulphoria, Part 3: The Spiritual Striptease

Around and around we go, where we stop, only our fears will know. The spinning, twisting, whirling, of the spiritual ego. The ego can take truths and spin them around until they sound like lies.

Let’s take honesty. Lies stem from the fear of telling the truth. When someone lies, they’re usually hiding a deeply buried fear of facing something about themselves, so they craft a well thought-out story in self-preservation.

Regardless, lies are born from fear.
We know we cannot heal another person’s fear. In fact, the more we coddle them and allow them to hold that fear, the more they will nourish that fear creating space for it to grow.

Yet, fear is our responsibility. When you clear your own fears and blocks, you can free yourself from the teachings that would lead you astray. You can escape the hamster wheel and evolve yourself.

If you want a healthy body, your brain must communicate clearly with your cells.
It’s a living breathing organism which must work as a unit.
If we want a healthy relationship, we must have honesty.
The same goes for spirituality. Foster that inner alignment and don’t get caught up spinning lies to yourself. Your own or anyone else’s.

When you hide the truth, you take a choice away from
another being. You remove their right to make a clear decision due to your fear.

You block that person from growing with their true experiences and expanding themselves. You remove the right with your deceit. Why? Out of fear.

You don’t have to untangle anybody else in order to free yourself. Any spiritual teacher can twist and turn their own agenda or cover it in wordy icing to make it sound like they know the truth. However, when you trust your inner authority, you’ll be able to see through all that.

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From Soulphoria, Part 1: Flirtation of Cosmos

Take a moment and list out three times you’ve experienced synchronicity (positive or negative). When you start to appreciate what shows up, more and more will come. You can pull more positive synchronicity into your life:

1. Recognize when you have an experience that could be synchronistic.

2. Recognize the positive impact it has had on your life.

3. Thank the universe or element or guides (whomever you work with) for this gift.

4. Make space within your energy field to receive more.

Often the most forgotten is number 4. The ability to make space in your life and allow the universe to do the work. If you’re like most people (including myself) you probably feel like you need to be going, going, going – forgetting that rest is also part of the formula. It’s important that we allow the Universe to do its part, and we know and embrace that it will all work out.

Letting go of how it will all unfold is necessary too since, if we hold on too tight to how it SHOULD look, we are not giving free rein to the Universe to weave its magic. Making space can be done by doing yoga (imagine each stretching sensation is creating space within you), deep breathing (with every exhale, release), and being in stillness(or meditation), feeling yourself opening, softening to receiving.

The Cosmos are flirting with you (perhaps even right now), so start flirting back by seeing the synchronistic events happening in your life and blowing them a kiss to say thanks.

From Soulphoria, A Provocative & Practical Approach to Spirituality (filled with teachings, real world experiences and practices to help you connect with and live blissfully through your Soul Self).

The post Divine Winks (Synchronicity) – A Practice appeared first on Soulphoria.

Savory flavours, amazing textures, tantalizing aromas, incredible colours. We’re surrounded by them each day, however, many of us have stopped noticing. We’ve forgotten the amazing value of five simply exquisite and sensual gifts, our senses.

Instead of noticing how wonderful the flowers smell, or our food tastes, we tend to rush quickly through life, forgetting to slow down and simply enjoy the moment.

When practiced, mindfulness can not only help us enjoy each daily moment, but also play a powerful role in the sexual areas of our lives. It’s simple practice can amplify the passion, desire and ecstasy enjoyed. It increases our awareness of taste, touch, smell, and sound, making each moment a peak of enticement and excitement.

Increasing your sensuality and stepping into mindfulness…

To begin a practice of mindfulness, try the following exercise, and remember: patience, enjoyment and relaxation, don’t rush, instead allow yourself to take the time to enjoy the experience.

Select a piece of wrapped food (such as candy or chocolate). Realizing that we hold one candy in our hand, why not take the time to really enjoy it? Taste it? We have been gifted with an amazing array of senses, and the ability to really enjoy the little (and big) things in life. Something as simple as a piece of wrapped chocolate can be a wonderful experience.

The idea is to relax, notice, taste, smell, touch, listen and enjoy that candy – taking our time, and remaining mindful of the experience, our feelings and body reactions. We dedicate 30 minutes to the simple and fulfilling exercise of eating a little candy.

1. Start with the wrapper – notice it, enjoy it, realizing that you will unwrap that candy, but for now you want to simply experience it.

2. As you slowly unwrap it, notice the smells, how it sounds as you open it. Is your body getting hungry for it? Enjoy the way the candy looks within the wrapper and without the wrapper.

3. Smell the candy and notice if your mouth begins to water, or your stomach growls. Enjoy the process.

4. Take a small taste, lick, nibble or bite it. Allow yourself to savor the sweetness.

5. Place the remaining candy in your mouth. Play with it, allow it to melt and really notice how it tastes. Take a moment to close your eyes and melt into the experience.

6. Relax with it.

Notice:

The wrapper?
Did you notice the designs on it? How did it sound as you unwrapped it? Did the wrapper entice you, give you ideas of what it may taste like?

The smell?
How did the candy smell before you even unwrapped it? Did the smell become even more enticing as you moved it closer to your mouth? How did your body react, did your mouth water?

The texture?
Did the candy have a smooth, firm texture? Or was it soft? When you placed it in your mouth did you notice how it felt against your tongue, and how it felt as it melted?

The Sound?
As you tore open that wrapper, how did it sound? Did it crinkle? As you held that candy in your mouth, did you notice the sounds it made as it moved around? Was it a hard candy that echoed as you knocked it against your teeth? Did it crunch when you bit into it?

The taste?
Was it delicious? Did it taste smooth and sweet? Was it what you expected, or perhaps it held a different flavour than you had thought? Did the taste change as it melted or as you crunched away on it?

This simple exercise can create world of difference in how your live your life. We as a society have become rushed, losing patience with ourselves, each other and life. Moving through at such a pace we often miss the little experiences that can bring joy to us. Or ignore the company that simply wishes to share love with us.

Rushing through the intimate areas of life is very common in western society. There of course is nothing wrong with quick and passionate intimacy, but when this becomes a way of life, we begin to miss out on an amazing connection with one another.

Now take that candy and replace it with the (wo)man in your life. Imagine what practicing mindfulness can do not only for every day living, but for your sexual side. Ask your partner to join you, and start with the candy. Soon enough you’ll be finding that the sweetness within that candy, is nothing compared to the deliciousness found within each other.

The post The Sexy Side of Mindfulness appeared first on Soulphoria.

As we’re coming up to the end of 2020. I’m seeing a lot of the same sentiment floating around “Good riddance to you 2020!”  Followed, bey the usual rush to create New Years resolutions and goals. 

But this year, I’d like to challenge each one of us to approach the upcoming year differently. Let’s start off with a bit of gratitude before jumping to your goals. Let’s honestly look at 2020 and share 3 positive accomplishments, experiences, changes, self discoveries that you’ve had!

By inventorying the positive things that have happened to you, you:

Show appreciation to the cosmos and your soul self – this in itself can trigger more beautiful things to come your way. Think of it this way, when you give a gift to someone and they brush it off with a “thanks but now I want”… or a “what’s next” or even a “meh”… you probably would be less likely to gift something to that person again. Cleanse yourself of the negativity – there is so much hatred towards 2020. You don’t want to carry that energy forward with you into 2021. By recognizing that there was in fact light (your positive outcomes) within the darkness (2020), you help to release on a subconscious level the shadow energy from your system which would have accumulated through the frustrations you’ve felt. My favorite!!: Recognize your own accomplishments – which will empower you and instill confidence in you as you step into 2021.

Let’s make 2021 an awesome year! (full of Soulgasms!) To do that let’s start by forgiving 2020 for what it brought, and embracing any of the gems found within it.

Have a few you can think of? Share them!!

The post GoodBye 2020… You Weren’t All Bad appeared first on Soulphoria.

Had a great talk with Tricia Dycka, regarding meditation & mysticism. If you missed it check it out!

The post Meditation & Mysticism appeared first on Soulphoria.

As I pulled my yoga mat out this morning, I had a startling realization! I’ve been doing yoga (thanks to Yoga with Adriene ) for over 330 days straight!

If you are not familiar with the challenges I went through last year, take a moment to read about my experience, facing off with and overcoming brain cancer (a walnut sized was tumor growing in my brain).

This traumatic realization had me reaching for all the tools I could use to help me heal. And the Yoga with Adriene community (and Find What Feels Good app) made a huge difference for me. In fact, I will be making mention of this in my upcoming book Soulgasms, speaking to the benefit and incredible healing power of yoga! (and once again a shout out to Adriene Mishler, Benji and her team!) What an amazing gift they have given the planet!

A few other takeaways from my experience which can help anyone facing physical and emotional challenges can be found here.

The post 330 Days of Yoga? – YES! I did!!! appeared first on Soulphoria.

 A love affair in its various formats has been everything from romanticized, bastardized and even vilified throughout time.  Depending on the dynamics it can give you a chemical and spiritual high, or can cause you to feel that you are slamming into the pits of the earth faster and with more impact than a meteor (with a few bruises often left behind).

The mere thought of it can cause tingles to dance across our skin, filling us with anticipation, excitement and desire.

What we often forget is that, this thrilling experience has become mistakenly solely based on our connection with another, but there IS another more delectable option, one that can bring a love that lasts a lifetime (and even beyond).

The Self Love Affair.

Let your mind wander for a moment, imagining all the different definitions that “Self Love Affair” sparks in you.   I have seen individuals blush, grin, giggle and stare up at the sky in wonderment, all with a similar question “what does that mean? Does she mean just to love myself?  But she used the word affair?…”

And here is the key between entering a Love Affair with Yourself and the concept of self-love: the intensity, the dedication, the curiosity, the primal passion and the sheer sexual connection.

Self-Love Affairs ignite:

Intensity… a self-love affair shifts us from somewhat dispassionately loving ourselves to becoming passionate about our existence, our experiences.  We are on fire for who we are!

alessandra sagredo

Curiosity… love affairs naturally encourage intimate curiosity and when applied to yourself, you begin to become effortlessly curious about your own loves, likes and triggers.  You find yourself paying attention to your own thoughts and feelings… not because you are forced to, but because you want to.  You are loving yourself in such a way that you want to know more “of you”.

Intensity… a self-love affair shifts us from somewhat dispassionately loving ourselves to becoming passionate about our existence, our experiences.  We are on fire for who we are!

Dedication… engaging in the delectable experience of a self-love affair we find ourselves even more dedicated to our own wellbeing, we care for our bodies better (for we experience the bliss they bring us) and we look forward to time alone (because of the joy we experience from our own company).

Sexuality… self love goes beyond regular “loving of the self” to experiencing joyfully through this body, mind and spirit… including those delicious sexual moments.  We may share love with another (while savoring the experience of loving ourselves), we may make love to ourselves knowing how worthy of this sensational experience we are.  As we bring that sexual energy into our experience of self love we allow our Spirit to sing through the body and we celebrate that song… feeling it vibrate through our cells in the most physically and spiritually tantalizing ways.

So how can we dive into this divine experience of knowing and loving ourselves with the passion that we (too) often merely direct to others in our life? View how to get started here.

The post Starting a (Self)Love Affair appeared first on Soulphoria.

Lies don’t live here

While truth can’t bear to breathe the air.

Darkness mingles

Amidst the nights light.

I am fruitless

Yet my rewards are full

I am nothing

And everything speaks of me.

The wind whispers

The rain sings

The snow dances

And the waves storm

My name

I am fire

Residing within your eyes

Flowing within your veins

Dancing within your hearts

Resting within your souls

{I am your connection to all that is

I am your sever to all that be}

No one knows my name

For I have none

Yet I am known

In each breath of man

The sun bows

The moon applauds

The heavens sing

While hell dances

And in the middle I am chaos

Home in my lost space

Of time

That holds no passing

For I am only

Change.

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