There often comes a time in a successful business or industry when a pivot point arrives, a fork in the road where transformation needs to happen or dissolution will. The pole dancing industry had that moment this past Saturday night at Pole Show LA 2012.

I did not attend the two previous Pole Show LA events at BeSpun, the premier Los Angeles pole dancing studio. BeSpun has trained world-class pole dancing competitors and has top-of-line performers teach classes and hold workshops. I have been to BeSpun for class and I love it! The girls are friendly, the instructors are patient and helpful and the camaraderie is inspiring. Leigh Ann Riley is an owner and instructor. She is down to earth and self-assured and I feel safe in her competent hands.

At the end of the evening on Saturday she said that a lot of sweat, tears and skin rashes went into the Pole Show LA production and I believe it. I was stunned at the caliber of inventive choreography, costume design and pure technical talent. I cannot even imagine what it took to put that show together.

Natasha Wang did an eccentric routine and moved her body like a twisted black leather panther. She took command of the floor and the pole like a stretch and bend rubber doll. The “Wonderland” skit toward the end was one of my favorites and it was energizing to see the show sponsor, X-Pole’s very own Lindsey Kimura with a joyful smile on her face the entire time as she moved her hips in sensuously wide circles dressed as the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland.

Of course, Jenyne Butterfly wowed the room with her skill and dexterity. How she does that move where she is walking in mid air with her body 100% perpendicular to the pole is beyond me. She received the first standing ovation of the night.

I would have loved to see more of Josiah BadAzz Grant and my super-secret idol, Alethea Austin (guess it’s not a secret anymore). Flying Laura had my jaw on the floor as she started her routine walking on the CEILING. Yeah…you read it right.

I almost lost it though, when Zoraya Judd did her snake dance. When a big, beefy man (her husband?) walked out with a giant snake my heart skipped a beat. One of my all time favorite cinematic moments is when Salma Hayek does the snake dance in the movie “From Dusk Till Dawn” so when Zoraya started undulating with the snake, I thought, “No, she isn’t going to…” Yep. She did. She got on the pole. With the snake. Spectacular. I have now seen it all.

This night was a turning point for the world of pole not only because of all the electrifying things that went right but because of the unfortunate things that went wrong. The room opened for cocktail hour at 7 p.m. and at 7:30 p.m. there was still a line around the block and it was moving s-l-o-w-l-y. Eventually Leigh Ann Riley and a couple of other people came out and started handling the line. Leigh Ann is sassy and take-care-of business and funny. As soon as she arrives you feel like something is about to happen, and it did. The line sped up and we got inside quickly.

There were a few vendor booths and it was great to see my former colleagues from Vertical Art & Fitness Magazine, David D’Angelo, Amie Nicole, Paige Warthen and Claire Griffin-Sterrett. I also had the opportunity to meet Alethea Austin who was promoting her wares. I would loved to have seen a bigger vendor showcase.

About halfway through, the sound system went down so the audience could not hear what the cute emcee was saying and the music did not carry throughout the room. My program got lost somewhere so half the time I did not know who was performing unless I knew them personally, because I could not hear the emcee. Also, aside from the first few rows, no one who paid for floor seats could see the entire show and the large screen on the wall was partially blocked by a column. King King, the venue where the Girl Next Door pole dance troupe performs in Hollywood has similar issues. Giant columns in the middle of the room and curtains which are never pulled back all the way during a performance. Unless you pay for seats front and center your view is blocked. Frustrating as hell.

It’s clear that folks are willing to pay for tickets to see a high-quality show like this with such superb performers, so here are my humble and heartfelt suggestions for next year. Get risers or bleacher seating for the floor seats so that everyone can see. I’m 5’3” on a tall day, so even when I left my seat to stand up, I couldn’t see the floor work, which is half of the allure and often the sexiest and most expressive element of pole dancing.

I recently published Penelope In The Divine, the world’s first novel about a pole dancer by a pole dancer. The main character owns a nightclub called the Liquid Navel, which is an open space with a large stage surrounded by cocktail tables. The stage is visible from every corner of the room. I wish BeSpun could have a room like this for Pole Show LA!

The world of pole is blasting out like torrential floodwaters, which is the source of these problems. We’ve outgrown ourselves as a cottage industry, we’ve exploded outside of our corral and we are officially too big for our britches! As Natasha Wang commented on Facebook, the next Pole Show LA needs to be at the Staples Center. I agree.

I am shopping around the screenplay for Penelope In The Divine, so if I have anything to do with it the world of pole will soon be so huge that BeSpun will need the Staples Center. If it’s up to me it will be sooner rather than later.

I am already looking forward to Pole Show LA 2013 (at the Staples Center) so thank you to Leigh Ann Riley, Amy Guion, Kelly Maglia Couture and all of the visionary performers who uplift the alluring sensuality of pole dancing to the level of art and beauty.

Isabelle Theresa Davila Schlee

I had a profound psychic event in the wee hours this 11/11/11 morning and “The Powers That Be” have told me I need to share it, so here goes…

I was reading Get Your Woman On, mostly because a good friend of mine, Albertine Phan wrote a chapter, not because I was particularly interested in the book. I don’t like the cover, blah, blah, it didn’t appeal to me overall. However, once I dived in, I was blown away by the stories of transformation. It is one of the most important books I’ve read and I highly recommend it.

A couple of the stories touched me deeply for various reasons, but one in particular got to me. It was Suzane Piela’s story, “Sacred Passage,” about her experience caring for her dying mother. I’ve been missing my own mother a lot lately, and earlier in the evening yesterday, that loss was pulling on me painfully. Before I went to sleep, I read Suzane’s story and again, deeply felt the loss of my mother.

As I was releasing deep emotion (i.e., sobbing) about it, I heard my mother’s voice. She said the name of someone who recently came into my life. I understood in a flash that this person, who had brought me unexpected happiness and healing was a gift from my mother.

In the story, Suzane says that she ushered her mother out of this life just as her mother had ushered her into it. This reminded me that I fed my mother her last meal, just as she had fed me my first. And then my mother’s voice said, clear as a bell, “I took (something) away from you when you were little and now I’ve sent this person to you so you can get it back.”

I felt so much love from that incredible healing. The incident that had plagued me and negatively shaped so much of my life was now bathed in love. To think that the woman who was so repressed and raised me to be the same could reach out across time, space and matter and offer me healing through a person in the third-dimensional plane is extraordinarily profound.

The enormity of the fact that I can receive healing through the cosmic net of the Universe is hard to grasp with my little brain, but I do feel healed in the deepest way. Healed for my mother, healed for her healing, healed for her release into the great cosmic consciousness, healed to know that the physical body is really a system of light stretching across time, space and matter, connected to our ancestors and across dimensions.

There are no limits, no finite blocks or boundaries. We are all one source of love and our healing, growth and transformation is an ongoing process reaching out to us from all corners of the galaxy if we are prepared to receive it.

I don’t know what else to say except that this is the most important thing I can teach, so I will keep speaking it. This information is at the core of my novel, Penelope In The Divine.

Enjoy.

P.S. If you have no idea what I’m talking about and think I’m whacked in the head, but are curious to know more. Get in touch with me. Let’s talk.

Here’s my tip for the day on how to end the battle of the sexes and live a much more passionate and joyful life.

There is a cosmic force of power inside of every woman, something I have termed the Feminine Creation Vortex. This vortex spins whether we are aware of it or not. It is the force that creates life and it is the seat of our creativity. It is also the powerful energy that we can use to MAGNETIZE our hearts desires to us, IF we know how to use it properly. Unfortunately, it is the same force that can destroy everything it comes into contact with when it spins inside of an unhappy and unfulfilled woman operating out of anger and victimhood.

Are you wondering why your boyfriend, husband or significant other just isn’t treating you right? Do you feel like you’re missing something, but can’t quite figure out what it is? Are you wondering why, if you’re such a nice person, you don’t have any luck with men?

You can’t talk like a man, walk like a man, think like a man and behave like a man and then be surprised when your man doesn’t treat you like a woman. You can’t talk about how dumb men are and then wonder why they are so insensitive. They are not dumb! They know when they’re not respected and appreciated and their guard is up. They are far more intuitive than women give them credit for. A man doesn’t want to be with another man. He wants to be with a woman. Two male energies in a relationship create neutrality and kill passion.

The problem is, in our effort to get what we rightfully deserve, most women have either been trained to be doormats or to be masculine, so we honestly don’t know how to accomplish tasks using our feminine energy. We don’t know how to appear feminine AND credible. We only know how to work in a masculine way as we push toward equality. It IS possible to shatter the glass ceiling, get equal work for equal pay and be respected without losing your feminine essence – the true source of your power – in the process.

If you are interested in finding out more, visit my Feminine Essence Coaching page. I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Flickr Creative Commons Photo Credits: http://www.flickr.com/photos/marianoluchini/

There is a new book available by the lovely and talented Claire Griffin Sterrett. Her book is called The Pole Story and you must read this book. Why? Because it is a group of essays on the power of erotic dance and it will knock your socks off!

Claire is an articulate, educated woman with an MA in Somatic Psychology, which is a field of study that bridges the mind-body dichotomy. What is so awesome about this intelligent book is that it gets to the heart of why such profound transformations happen when women learn the art of pole dancing.

When women dive into their own sexuality in a safe setting and claim the right to express it through the entire bodymind, their world is transformed. We have gone too long living with a mind-body split, too long living with a madonna-whore duality. Feminine sexuality is the seat of a woman’s health. It is the core from which her joy can be expressed. Eroticism is not just about sex and intercourse, it is about communication and creative expression. As vortices of creation, women become their utmost, divine selves when they are free to express. Erotic dance will do this for you. Trust me, I know.

And so does Claire, which is why her book is so successful. Luckily, there are lots of opportunities to get The Pole Story. Click here to get your copy, and if you’re free on Friday, October 14th, you can meet Claire in person. She will be signing books and reading selections at Movement Studio LA, in Los Angeles. The book signing starts at 6:30 PM and includes nibbles, free martinis and champagne, as well as a gift bag of deluxe goodies. There will also be a gorgeous pole performance by The Flying Vs and the opportunity to win lots of prizes.

A portion of proceeds from ticket sales and 100% of proceeds from the raffle will be donated to Young Survival Coalition: 
Young Women Facing Breast Cancer Together.

RSVP: call 323.424.7924, or go to www.movementstudiola.com and click on Class Schedule/Events. Order by October 9th for reduced ticket price.

Hope to see you there and remember to READ THIS BOOK!

I recently had a conversation with someone where I had to define my version of the Feminine Divine and our exchange has been rolling around in my head, so I thought I would elaborate here.

Traditionally, we are used to seeing the roles of the manipulative sex kitten vs. the earth mother, the madonna vs. the whore, the temptress vs. the nun. In other words, there is a belief in modern society that a woman either has full access to her beauty, sexuality and sensuality and uses them to put herself first in order to manipulate others (mostly men) to get what she wants, or she is the altruistic giver and nurturer who only thinks of others and of sacred service and rarely satisfies her own needs.

The hormones that crash through a woman’s body during pregnancy and for the first year or so of motherhood support this duality, which is probably how the conflict started in the first place. New mothers are biologically programmed to put their infant’s needs ahead of their sexual needs, which is logical. Unfortunately, it is easy to see why one could extrapolate that across the board, motherhood and sexuality are not compatible.

Sadly, women restrict each other to this misinterpretation and these limiting beliefs are passed down from mother to daughter, generation after generation. Society and the government also reinforce these roles. Men, being biologically driven to protect and provide, respond to these roles as well because it’s easier to believe that the woman you are “responsible for” is not out radiating in the world, but is instead hidden at home and focused on raising and caring for the progeny. Besides, when it comes to a man being provided with food and sex, gettin’ some (even if it’s from a tired and diminished woman) is better than gettin’ none. And so, the cycle continues…

The Feminine Divine however, is the melding of these two forces into one complete woman, one complete energetic force, which I have coined The Feminine Creation Vortex - the cosmic source of power, manifestation and magic organic to all women.

The Feminine Divine then, allows women to be their own erotic creature, their highest sexual selves while operating out of open-hearted compassion for others (including men), thereby supporting life in all of its expressions. A woman who has claimed the right to embody her organic sexuality, sensuality, beauty, intuition and magnetism and use them from a place of open-hearted compassion to serve herself, humanity (again, this includes men) and the Divine is a full expression of femininity. She is a symbol of consummate freedom of expression as well as emotional and sexual self-sufficiency.

I purposely use the word “claim” here. We must claim the right to be our own erotic creatures, to dive into our profound and mysterious, health-giving and life-embracing sexuality and radiate it out into the world while at the same time, being open-hearted, compassionate and powerful. Modern society does not support this full expression because there is no basket to put it in! The media, religion, government and cultural stereotypes support duality and the battle of the sexes. I chose to put down my weapons and armor a couple of years ago and I have been moving toward the Feminine Divine ever since. Sheila Kelley’s S Factor is my experimentation lab, the place I go to claim the gifts of my fully-expressed sexuality: health, passion, happiness, beauty, emotional and sexual self-sufficiency.

Something about pole dancing makes all of this possible. In part it is because as I surrender farther into my femininity, I honor, respect and celebrate men more. I mean all men, from my father to my brother, to the UPS guy, to the janitors at my apartment building, to the grocery checkout guy and beyond. Choosing to stop the battle of the sexes within myself has transformed my life and allowed me to experience the Feminine Divine, and for that I am deeply inspired and grateful.

The Feminine Divine exists inside of everyone, as does the Masculine Divine. It is up to us to honor, celebrate and cherish these aspects of ourselves in this modern world of distractions. The Divine is not something that sits mysterious and unreachable out in the stratosphere. Claiming the Divine starts inside of you.

Flickr Creative Commons Photo Credits: www.flickr.com/photos/shannonarchuleta

I gotta admit, I’m having a love/hate relationship with P90X, the 90-day fitness program, but not for the reasons you might expect. I’ve been posting about my P90X journey on my Facebook Page.

I started P90X because I injured my arm last December and for the past five-plus months, I’ve not been able to progress as much as I’d like with my beloved pole dancing. I’ve had to stay off of the tricks and inversions and focus mostly on transitions between poses.

This hasn’t been such a bad thing because the transitions are where you can truly explore your curves and expand the sensuality of your movement. As an interesting side note, last fall I asked my teacher how to improve my transitions and she said, “Keep dancing. It will come.” Be careful what you ask for…

In any event, P90X is designed as 90 days of extreme (hence the X) fitness. I thought it would be a fun way to build my upper body strength now that the arm has healed. I am impressed with the consistent flexibility built into the program and the diversity of the exercises nips boredom in the bud.

What I can’t stand is how MASCULINE it is. Now, don’t get me wrong, I am a huge fan of masculine energy. In my daily life I have oodles of fun interacting with men, those fascinating creatures. I adore them and consistently learn from them. However, my healing, my strength and my fit body has come from feminine movement. All of the masculine exercise, music and visual space in P90X is too overpowering for me in this stage of my personal evolution.

It is spectacular to make this realization and know that I can do something about it. In the end, the path to transcendence is through FLEXIBILITY of behavior. It is not beneficial to be all feminine all the time, nor all masculine all the time. The trick is to know when and how to flow back and forth between the yang and yin, the shiva and shakti.

I decided to get back to my slow, meditative runs and my daily sensual dance, which are the core of my fitness plan. To that, I’ll add P90X for the masculine strength building. Pole dancing is about strength and flexibility and so am I. It’s good to affirm once again that I’m in charge of my own sensuality, my own flexibility and my own strength. I can be unapologetically feminine and sensual, as well as strong and self-sufficient. This is the new paradigm.

Namaste.

To learn more about Feminine Essence Coaching, contact me!

As many of my readers know, I am completing a novel and screenplay called “Penelope In The Divine.” The main character is Penelope Ariel Quadangeli, a sensual woman born with special powers who journeys through the world of pole dancing and toward spiritual transcendence.

At the heart of the story is divinely activated sexuality, or what I now call “The Feminine Creation Vortex.” The Feminine Creation Vortex is the cosmic source of power, manifestation and magic, organic to all women. It is the intensity of energy that creates worlds and destroys them. It is the power which, when activated and channeled toward higher consciousness, will point you toward your divine path. How did I figure this out, you ask? Well, to be honest, I lived it.

I was raised believing that femininity is weak. It took a lifetime for me to accept that I am a striking and dynamic feminine force, and a lifetime to understand that my innate dynamism is not a directive to behave in a masculine way. In the meantime, I offended people and pushed men away. I didn’t understand why this kept happening until I understood what true feminine power is and how to wield it gracefully and with love.

It is true that male and female, Shiva and Shakti, yang and yin exist inside of everyone. Still, women and men have inborn qualities unique to their genders. For women, these qualities make up the sizzling voltage of the Feminine Creation Vortex.

Modern women are not taught who we really are and the potent magic we possess. We are taught that our sexuality is designed only for intercourse and this is not the true story. The full spectrum of feminine alchemy was suppressed thousands of years ago, so how can our society know anything different? I certainly didn’t. It took being close to death for me to wake up out of the stupor I had been living in.

In February, 2010 I started writing “A Pleasure Manifesto” at the beginning of the long and excruciating process of healing from severe adrenal fatigue. After three years of seeing a dozen practitioners, taking mountains of supplements, and experimenting with pharmaceutical drugs for relief, I fired everyone, trashed the supplements and decided to make pleasure and fun my number one priorities. This decision is what started me on the road to health and my manifesto stems from my commitment to change the world based on what I learned from that arduous experience.

By the time I fired the practitioners, I was rounding out the second draft of my novel. Looking back now, I realize that I began the novel in 2008 to wake up my long-dormant second chakra. For several reasons that I don’t have the luxury to go into here, by this time, my sexuality/sex drive/creativity had been shut down for years. I now understand that this was the root of my health issues, but I came to this conclusion on my own. What practitioner had the skills to diagnose that? Not a single one.

When a woman shuts down her sexuality, she shuts down her sacred spiritual/creative force. What does this mean? The Reader’s Digest version is that a woman’s health is tied into her sexuality, sensuality, beauty, magnetism and intuition, for starters. Regrettably, we take these qualities for granted and often label them unimportant.

I’ve been working with the Science of Personal Energetics and IlluminEssensce® for five years and I am the world’s first and only Personal Energetics Coach. What I learned from IlluminEssensce is that beauty is one of the highest vibrations on the planet. As IlluminEssensce founder Taylore B. Sinclaire says, “beauty is truth.” Women are internally geared to search for beauty, but when men, society and women’s own limiting beliefs restrict beauty, they are in conflict with the core of who they are. They end up stuck in a fruitless and never-ending search for aesthetic harmony, remaining unsatisfied and frustrated.

As I became an expert at dressing in my Harmonic Tone® and focused on my authentic beauty through IlluminEssensce, my long-suppressed creative drive re-awakened and led me to start “Penelope In The Divine.” As my creativity re-awakened, my entire second chakra vibrated out of its hibernation.

I created Penelope because she is what I’ve always wanted to be: powerful and comfortable within her sexuality, sensual, bodacious, self-assured, a dancer – my lifelong wish for myself. I did not know that I as I wrote about Penelope activating her Feminine Creation Vortex I was activating my own.

I was raised to believe that my body was a vessel for sin, rape and shame, so I spent most of my life suppressing my fervent sensuality. Strippers and exotic dancers have always fascinated me because they appear to be so fearless with their sexuality. I wanted to be like these women, without the emotional drama many of them seem to go through.

For years I looked for some kind of class to teach me what these women did so I could do it in the privacy of my own home. I wanted to liberate myself! When after years of searching I finally found a studio that could teach me those dancing skills, I dove right in. I had no idea that the experience would unequivocally change my life.

I have been working on this manifesto for a year now and it’s still not quite right, but I’m going out on a limb to publish it – now is the time. However, I reserve the right to make adjustments as I learn what I need to learn as I continue to live my AUTHENTIC LIFE.

This blog post and the manifesto sound like they are geared toward women, but they really aren’t. Women’s difficulties coping with modern life are out-picturing as hormonal imbalances, and I’m sure there is an equivalent for men, but I haven’t gotten clear on it yet. I am guessing that it is issues related to the heart and blood pressure, but I’m not certain. I’d love to get some feedback from men out there…

Expressing and communicating actively, regularly and honestly to vibrate as your authentic self is the equivalent of a balanced endocrine system. What does this mean? Is this just Theresa talkin’ crazy again?

NO!

I suffered from severe adrenal fatigue for over three years until I figured out what the REAL problem is. Medical tests, bio-identical hormone replacement, doctor visits and/or accepting that you’re “just a wreck” or “going into early menopause,” “aging” and/or accepting that you really don’t need a sex drive after all, are not the answers.

The ANSWER is to recognize that there is NO difference between your mind, your body and your external life. The answer is to bathe yourself recklessly, endlessly and consistently in buckets and buckets of juicy, juicy PLEASURE. The ANSWER is to love yourself with abandon. Love every single square inch of your body from the tiniest nucleus of each and every cell to the largest organ of your body: the skin.

Revel in yourself, love yourself, know your authentic self. Please yourself FIRST, then all goodness follows. When you love yourself, addictions are lifted, compulsions dissolve, you vibrate joy and compassion and everyone in your orbit benefits.

Click here to view A Pleasure Manifesto: February, 2011.

For more tips, please view my video below.

Be brave. If it feels good, do it.

Namaste.

Theresa’s Tips 4 Transcendence: If It Feels Good, Do It! from Theresa Schlee Valenzuela on Vimeo.

2/2/11

Ghost

I draw the line at thinking of you.

No thoughts such as these

bear logic

or promise.

They weigh heavy on me

a limitless line of days

waiting for relief

for release.

One glance from you

means more to me than a thousand tiny stars.

But you’re not a very giving lover

so I sit illuminated by what I care little for.

What stars can ever shine as brightly

as your eyes upon me?

None

I fear.

None.