On the eve of a new year I am reflecting on what a BOLD year 2007 was for our locations (the photos are me with the BOLD Maine cast and the BOLD Santa Rosa, California cast!)...and how much BOLDer this movement is going to get in 2008!
I went to a screening a couple of weeks ago of Debra Pascali-Bonaro's BOLD new film, Orgasmic Birth (www.orgasmicbirth.com), which got me thinking about the current tsunami of movement pointing in the direction of mother-friendly birth. Not only does Debra's film BOLDly take viewers into a topic that needs to be addressed it also puts out an energetic signal - birth and pleasure - that I think is needed today if birth is going to improve for mothers and babies. The law of attraction. What we focus on will grow. How exciting it was to see a film that puts out a positive, hopeful spin on birth, pointing out how birth and pleasure are actually quite synonymous if you think about it. The same hormones activated in love making also activate when a mother is giving birth naturally which is important and transformational on so many levels.
This is my wish for birthing mothers in 2008 and beyond - to have a birth that's important and transformational.
Okay, I hear you - or at least I heard the many women I interviewed before I wrote my play - that you are not looking for an important or transformational experience. Many mothers today have quite bluntly told me: I want a healthy baby. But I wonder, if mothers started gathering at BOLD Red Tents, perhaps sitting in silence more often, listening to their soul, if that's really the only thing they want out of their birth experiences.
My question is this: when is our society going to start giving mothers permission to experience pleasure? When is it going to be okay to say: I want a birth that's transformational...that's orgasmic? What kind of faith is going to allow mothers to access their inner goddess?
With birth images on television and the media so devoid of love and pleasure no wonder women don't think think they deserve it. They don't even know it's available. That's where Orgasmic Birth and what I think will be a tidal wave of birth and pleasure literature in the future is important. Put it out there and people will respond.
The other day my 8 year old son was looking through the things on my desk and noticed the cover of another new film, Birth As We Know It, showing a woman sitting on a rock near the sea holding her newborn. I told him the film showed 11 births that took place in the sea. "How many of the babies died?" he asked innocently. None, I told him. Birthing a baby in water is not dangerous. He was amazed and while I'd like to say this was because of his youth again and again when I show adults waterbirths I get this same reaction. Can that really happen safely? Is it possible to have a birth experience that's so good?
In 2008 I'd like to BOLDly ask all of you around the world to open yourself to the idea of birth and pleasure. Set it as an intention...and watch it grow!!!
