Welcome to the libido lounge where we focus on all things love, lust, and libido. We believe that fabulous sex is important to health as exercise and good food. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode on the lounge. I'm so excited about the conversation we're gonna have today. I'm bringing on today one of my friends, Jennifer Joy Jimenez, and we're gonna talk about body shame. We're gonna talk about dance.
We're gonna talk about techniques you can use to feel more confident in your body, to get into the body sensations, to actually feel pleasure in new and profound ways, which, of course, translates down into better libido, better relationships, better connection with yourself, with your partner, and so much more. So I wanna introduce Jennifer here.
So Jennifer is the founder of Transcendence, which is just a powerful movement exercise that we're gonna talk about today that is really designed to do this, to help you get into your body more, to help you feel more confident, and so many more things than I know that I'm gonna let Jennifer tell us about. And then she's also the founder and director of the health and well-being division at the Brave Thinking Institute. So welcome. I'm so excited to be here with you today.
Thanks for joining us, Jennifer. It is my absolute pleasure, and I'm super grateful to have to be here today. Yeah. Well, let's open with this concept of, like, what is Transcendence? How were you inspired to really create this? And what are we really doing from a standpoint with this type of visionary movement that is bringing us into our body, that is helping us become more full in our body and more alive?
Can you kinda just set the stage with, like, what are we talking about exactly with Transcendence? Yes. Thank you for asking. So the one of the easiest ways I have found to describe Transcendence is it's like taking the mindfulness of yoga off the mat and infusing in joyful free form movement. So what do we mean by free form? Most people when they think of the word dance, they think of Zumba, ballroom, jazz, ballet, a very technical dance. Now that is my background.
I came from the professional dance background world. But conscious dance or freeform dance is really about unlocking your inner dancer within. We're all born dancers. Have you ever seen a baby that when music comes on, they can't help but shake their little tush? Like, literally rhythm and movement and being in our bodies and being free in our bodies.
If you look at three year olds, four year olds, five year olds, as long as they've lived a pretty normal, you know, upbringing without a huge amount of trauma, they're in their bodies. They're moving their bodies freely, and then somewhere along the way, we lose touch with really living in that free, connected, embodied state. And so one of my passions controlling our bodies. Right?
That statistically it said that ninety percent of women hate their bodies, that one in three women have been abused in some way. So it is no surprise that we leave, in some way. So it is no surprise that we leave our bodies. It hasn't felt safe. It hasn't felt pleasurable or good to be in the body. And conscious dance and specifically transcendence is a set of dance opportunities, right, really where we come into the breath and we allow the inner dancer within us.
I like to say that we all have an inner physician within. We all have an inner wise being, and yet we don't give ourselves a whole lot of time to unlock that part of us that is available to heal us, to free us, to feel that sense of liberated freedom. That's probably one of the first things I have clients say in their very first class. I haven't danced like this since I was a child. I don't think I've ever felt this liberated or free. It didn't matter that I was told I have two left feet.
You know, you don't have to have rhythm. You're not following anyone else's dance steps or moves, so there's no complication in it. It really is just about feeling amazing and freeing our bodies. One of the things you get me thinking about as you're describing this is, like, in sexuality and in sexual relations, I see so many times where partners kinda get locked into, like, this one movement, right, where it's like, oh, well, it looks this way.
We do step a. We do step b. We do step c. Like, we reach the grand finale, and it's over. And so, you know, when you're talking about an infant and that movement of that's almost like free form. Right? Infants aren't thinking. They're just they're just moving. So I'm curious.
Like, do you feel like with something like Transcendence, like, if that is really kinda, like, almost unlocking more of the possibilities that is kinda break can break us out of, say, moving, not only in life, but also in our intimate relationships in a a different way that kinda gets us unlocked from those patterns. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely.
I have a couple of a couple quick stories to share of of people who've I mean, I've worked with, of course, thousands of people from all over the world that tell me they not only feel more confident in their body in their everyday interactions, from the boardroom being able to stand up and really be in their full confident self, but, of course, to the bedroom where they get unlocked and freed from those rote, you know, very stagnant, very stiff, very tight
kind of movement patterns that when you live in the fullness of your being, it unlocks freedom, sensuality, connection in ways that you wouldn't even begin to describe. I would say I'm having I've been married twenty nine years. I've had one sexual partner, which is really uncommon. I met my husband when I was 16, though, so that tells you a few things. But it doesn't matter.
I've seen myself grow over all of these years from a 16 year old, very curious, and very, you know, sensual woman, but also as a professional dancer.
I got into very controlling ways and abusive ways with my body as a young woman, starvation and control and deprivation and over exercising, that whole paradigm, which is really normal in the professional dance world, to then getting pregnant with my daughter and having a fifty hour labor even though I trained for it like I was gonna climb Kilimanjaro, and I'm in the best shape of my life.
And I'm visualizing my beautiful, perfect, all natural labor in my mind every night and doing kegels and the whole thing as you, you know, you can understand where that's going. Right? So that birth was actually my doorway, though, to this work because after all that work and all that dedication to feel like I was so disconnected during that birth process. I wasn't taught to let my body lead me. Think about that for a moment.
In birth, in love making, in sensuality, it's not about telling the body what to do. Right? It's really about actually letting the natural wisdom that is the body teach you, show you, guide you. And so after that fifty hour labor and birth, I became a real sponge and a hungry student to find everything I could in my around me, every book I could find, every mentor, and that's really where I found conscious dance.
And the first whole process was me healing my own disconnect from my body, coming home to my body, even healing the trauma the birth was for me. I healed through conscious dance, and that was the early years of creating Transcendence, really pulling from some of the most famous and well known world renowned, you know, mentors of this modality.
But I'm also I was raised by a thought leader mother who taught me from a very early age that thoughts become things, that we're cocreators of our lives, that this is a we're all swimming in this universal spiritual energy. We're spiritual beings having a human experience, but she was also very much a a thought leader. You know, that gen she's 75. Right? So that generation, the Wayne Dyer and Deepak Chopra, you know, generation where it's very kind of thought driven, and I'm wired differently.
I'm wired from an embodied perspective. I wanna feel it and move it to know it. I'm a kinesthetic learner. So I was able to take all that I was learning and understanding in all of those teachings as now an adult woman, right, and how it didn't quite work just by thinking it into reality with my birth, right, manifesting that perfect birth. I was like, okay. Something was off there.
And I began to marry this mind, body, spirit connection, bringing in conscious dance, but universal spiritual principles and breathing and movement patterns that just completely open me up to this whole other experience of my own body first and foremost. I started having some of the best sex I've ever had in my life, and I wouldn't even call it sex. I would call it oneness and connection and dancing in the bedroom and just because I I was in my body, like, really in my body.
Then when I had my second two babies, my son my two sons, I had my son Joel in two hours, start to finish, my son Joaquin in ninety minutes. And there were moments I know it sounds crazy, but moments during those births where it was pleasurable. I mean, it was too. Right? But it there was this this harmony and this connection where I was dancing with the baby and allowing my cervix to open, and that led to understanding all different connection points with my body.
And that was really taking that, my own self first, right, as my own laboratory, and then beginning to roll it out little by little with clients. Now that's it's been my daughter's 24. She'll be 25 in November.
So, you know, we're talking over twenty years in this laboratory of life to codify this in a way that people that aren't natural dancers or movers or people that are, like, in the best shape of their lives, people that are older, people that are younger can come into an experience in over the course of a few minutes, really, honestly, with some basic awarenesses that this is safe. This is a nonjudgment zone.
You're not gonna be ridiculed or judged here because that's really the first thing people get defensive. Oh, I've been told I can't dance, or, oh, I need to do it in it. There's a right way. There's a wrong way. I'm gonna get judged. That's our human kind of adult paradigm, and I think that shows up in the bedroom too. I'm gonna do it wrong. You know? Like, oh, am I doing it right? Just all of that self consciousness.
And what I found is when you have these types of modalities that teach you there is no wrong way. And, actually, when you live in your body, you can sense the other person and what's going on with them energetically without words in ways that you've heightened and opened up this sixth sense. And so two quick stories for about clients. I mean, I have, like, so many stories, like, hundreds and hundreds of stories, but two that came to my mind.
One is a woman, and she hadn't had sex for over a decade. She came into my transformational coaching and retreats and classes and all kinds of things that I do. And transcendence is really this, like, key piece that I bring into that work to help women come into their bodies. So the big thing she wanted because she ate really well. She was basically pretty healthy, but she wanted to reignite things in the bedroom.
And what we found very quickly was she was running a lot of unconscious masculine energy. And when you're running as and this is really common. I'm sure you see it all the time in your work. Right? And it's really this default mode a lot of women have learned to operate in this very, you know, western world that we're in, and it's really not their fault. They just haven't learned to soften and how to run Go energy and then how to soften into receiving energy. There's this opportunity for that.
So taught her a few tools within the first less than three months of the program. I wanna say it was probably within the first sixty days. She's in and her thing was she wanted to be whisked way into the bedroom. Like, she didn't wanna initiate. He hadn't initiated in, like, a decade, and I'm thinking, oh my god. Yeah. I can't I can't even imagine. You know? Like, I just yeah.
I just my my heart just felt so much for her and wanting her to have this experience, but allow it, like, to help her blossom and soften into this feminine energy that is magnetic. It's like the flower that attracts the bee. The flower can't be running around telling chasing after the bees. The flower just blossoms, and the bees come. Right? So, anyhow, she I remember one of the coaching calls where she came. She was like, Jennifer. You're never gonna believe it. He comes home from work.
He grabs me in his arms. He whisks me off into the bedroom, and, you know, they had this really amazing intimate experience. Now she also needed some support because it'd been a long time. You know? So she needed some tools and some support around really making it as pleasurable as as it can be after at her age and after so many years, which we solved that as well just to be real. You know what I mean? But the but the point of her attracting him in that way came from an embodied experience.
You know? And then Benjamin, my my other client who basically talks about like, he was just, like, really introverted, so clumsy that he would bump into things. You know, those people that just are like they they don't even know where they are in space. And think about how that might translate into the bedroom. Like, you're not it's just really hard to get into a rhythm. You know? And so two left feet bumping into things, like, super self conscious and told his whole life he can't dance.
But yet, I think inside of all of us, there's this, like, five year old that just doesn't give a crap. You know what I mean? Like, that just we're at the the the summer concert, and we're just having fun and running around and twirling around and hopping and skipping and that part of us that just wants to be allowed to just be as we are. So he comes into the work, starts doing these, you know, transcendence practices and has completely blossomed.
Totally super, you know, confident, can be on stage in front of a hundred people at an event just moving and dancing, and it's translated into his work in the world. He's increased his income. Like, so much can open up for people when they really come home to their bodies. So a few stories. Yeah. Thanks. I one of the things that I really wanna emphasize and and what you've said here is that concept, right, of guiding and of, like, let the body guide you.
Because I do think that it's so common, right, that people get into this almost as, like, duty sex type of thing where it's like, oh, I'm just going to do this thing, and it's it's almost mechanical. Right? And oftentimes, I, like, I taught a class last week on having the right kind of sex. So people are like, well, what is that kind? Well, it's the kind that actually is exactly what you're saying.
It's the kind that is body led, that is allowing your body to actually feel into this is what I like. These are the way my body responds. This is how my body is led.
And and another thing I like about your work and and what I've experienced experience with it when we've been at conferences together and you've led, you know, activities this way is this this concept that I've seen with all the dance I've done over the years of this sense of allowing various body parts to almost lead where it's like, oh, what is it like? And we can take that into the bedroom. Right? Like so, like, what is it like?
Because some of your work sometimes, I I believe you do things like, okay. Well, now lead from this part of your body. And so even in the bedroom, like, what is it like if I lead from my heart? What is it like if I lead from my yoni? What is it like if I lead from my bosom? Right? So you can say more about almost, like, tuning in to those different body parts like that. Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love that.
Well, what came to my mind was actually my own process of getting to know my pleasure centers, which aren't only just my, you know what I mean, my sacred center or my yoni or my breasts, but, like, the inside of my elbow. You know what I mean? Or the inner part of my wrist to be kissed there. And actually, commune first of all, knowing that at all is my responsibility, and I'm sure you teach this, Diane.
You know, it's not it's not anybody else's job to know what it feels like to be in my body, what I like to feel, where I wanna be touched, and when I wanna be touched there is the other thing. So as I've so this conscious dance practice, one of the the stages there's 10 stages in transcendence.
One of the stages to help people come home to their body is stage four, which is the dance of self, and you do that exact thing through a very kind of sensual, you know, type of a song usually we're we're working with. And we literally will just start to kind of meander through the space, walk through the room, and feel the whole space. There is no front to class. There's no mirrors in a conscious dance class, which is great because you're not worried about how you look.
You know, usually over time, you get better at that. But you just start moving your head and moving your shoulders, and literally you move towards pleasure, which is so counterintuitive for so many people. So much of our, at least, Western fitness world is this no pain, no gain. It you've gotta work really hard to see the results, and your body has to look a certain way to be pleasurable and beautiful and good enough, thin enough, curvy enough, whatever the enoughness is.
So you just let all of that judgment out, and you just love moving your body, and your body loves to move. And as you open up to that movement, it does feel good. And you start to feel pleasure in your body, and you go, oh, this is what unlocks the sense of aliveness and pleasure. And I would say that's probably the most important shift for me in moving from a dutiful feeling of, like I mean, because my husband's from Mexico. He's a Latin literally, like, a Latin lover.
Sexes and sensuality and connection and intimacy is one of the most important love languages for him, and he has no problem going straight in, you know, like, right to the central parts. You know? Doctor I love doctor Christian Northrop's books, women's bodies, women's wisdom, and secret pleasures of menopause.
These are really great books because they just really open us up to there's so much more to look forward to even in our postmenopausal years as women, and I'm right in that transition as a 49 year old woman. You know? And one of the things that I learned even through reading her book is our energies are moving outward. Right? And men's energies are moving inward, so they just wanna go straight in. So I can't tell you how many times I've had to remind him and and be patient with it.
Let it be okay that he wants to go straight for those parts. You know? And I'm like, hold on. Hold on. Kiss me here. Kiss me right. You remember, honey? It's like I'm like, we've been married twenty nine years. You should know this, but this is okay. I I don't mind. You just right here. It's right there. You know? Or right here and, like, help support. It's not anybody else's responsibility. It's my responsibility to live a turned on life so that I am living in this pleasurable living place.
From that place, I can come and bring pleasure and sensuality. One of my favorite quotes is that the turned on western woman really will save the world. Right? But that's a really important piece, isn't it? You know, Diane, the turned on woman and that we're responsible to live this turned on life. It really is. And I think so many times because of, you know, patriarchy versus matriarchy and just societal influences over the past many centuries, really.
It has been this thing around like, oh, this pleasure, this feeling, this asking for what we want is either, like, bad, and they should just know. And I think finally, we're at this phase where, like, getting away from just, like even, like, just things like like you said, like, getting away from the thinking body into the feeling body and really making it safe and culturally acceptable and not only culturally acceptable, but culturally encouraged to say, hey.
Actually, yeah, we do have to to voice our pleasure. We do have to really let our partner know. And after twenty nine years, still remind them because it's not that anybody's doing things wrong. It's that literally our brains work differently, and that's all it is. There's no other meaning behind that. And so we do have to take that personal pleasure, that personal responsibility.
And part of that is learning our body and learning our feeling and learning all of those things, which is, you know, one of the reasons why I wanted to bring you on because, like I said, my own personal experience has been that the sensual dance types of movements and courses and classes have been the one of the most fundamental things for me for getting in my own body and being having that confidence. Right?
We talked about that offline around, like, the confidence that these classes and these courses give us around these movement classes to have the confidence to say those hard things. So I know we're, we're about to wrap up here, and I do wanna make sure that everybody knows that we do have an amazing gift that you're giving away, which is a free class.
So you're you're offering the audience a way to try this and experience this and get in their body and waking up their sensuality, but waking up their confidence and all the other amazing things that you mentioned in your stories that come with this. So thank you so much for that. And is there and we'll have all the information on how to get ahold of Jennifer and work with her in the show notes, you guys.
But I wanna ask a final question, which is, like, is there anything else you wanna leave our audience with? Is there anything that you just feel is so important that they're remembering in the context of movement, of dance, of getting inside of their body, of you know, really having that confidence to take charge of their own pleasure. Anything to live leave us with today? Say probably the biggest message is it doesn't have to take a long time.
That was probably one of my biggest learning coming from the professional dance world. I used to dance eight hours a day, and I had this paradigm that I had to do it all in a certain way in a huge amount of my day.
And as I became a mother and a entrepreneur and all the things that I do, truly, and I know this is probably you know, we hear this over and over and over again as sitting as the new the new smoking because our lymph system literally can't move the toxins out of our body unless our muscles are moving. Right? So literally standing up from our desk, putting on a song that just ignites joy. And we all have that song where we're driving in the car, and it comes on, and you just can't help it.
You're singing in the car. Your toes start tapping. So it's that kind of a song that just ignites those happy hormones, and there's so much science. We haven't even gotten into the health benefits of dance. And we talked all about the sensuality, but, I mean, it increases your circulation. It increases your mental acuity. It literally gives you an emotional boost. It's our best antidepressant out there. It also helps our muscles and our bones. I mean, I could go on and on and on.
So just a few minutes of dance. Everybody really is your best friend and, a daily dance of of daily dose of dance can really keep the doctor away as well. So, my encouragement is just dance. Just dance. I love it, and I love that orientation too. It doesn't have to take a lot of time because I think so often when it's like a new habit, it's like, okay. I'm gonna commit to an hour a day, and that lasts for about three days, and then we realize we don't have time. So it doesn't take a lot of time.
And and I have found in my own life, like, I dance all my emotions, and that's one of the things I've got at essential dance practice where it's like, if I'm angry, if I'm sad, if I have fear, if I have anxiety, if I'm happy, all the different emotions, you know, the light ones, the dark ones, the hard ones, the easy ones, bring it to dance. And it's amazing. Like, I have my special songs where it's like, oh, I'm feeling angry, and I gotta get it out. And the songs I go to.
And all those things are just it's just you're right. There's so many health benefits. And I wanna remind all of our listeners that this year in 2024, we're doing these short, you know, short twenty minute episodes. But for those that have for the people that have the largest downloads, the best shares, the, you know, the highest level of all those things, we're inviting them back for a deep dive. So please, please, please download this show. Share it with your friends.
Let's get Jennifer back so we can do a much deeper dive on all of the health benefits because all these health things are actually related to libido and those things. So make sure you download this. Make sure you share it. And remember, this is sexy season. And in sexy season, we have a lot of raffles going on. So if you review us, send us a screenshot of your review. We're gonna get you listed in or enrolled into our raffle.
We have almost 20 different giveaways, our courses, courses by Susan Bratton, tons of information, tons of free content for you guys for supporting us. So thank you all for listening. Thank you for being here on the lounge, Jennifer. It's a pleasure. Thank you for coming. Thank you for having me. So great to be here. Alright, everybody. Well, that's a wrap. We'll see you next time. This is doctor Diane, your libido doc, reminding you to always feel sexy, be classy, and stay a little badassy.
See you next time.