I find myself standing in the middle of a strip club across from the U.S. Pentagon of all places. And I'm here to dance. I'm here not just to claim my own freedom, but to send this freedom back to my ancestors and oppressed women across the world.

Of course, backstage is a really interesting story because the women here can't understand why I am so happy. While many are exchanging their sexual energy for money and feel trapped, I am coming from a childhood of not being able to feel the sunlight on my legs. So yeah, I'm happy.

I grew up in Iran until I was 13. I'm a child of the Revolution. Wars and bombs were the landscape of my childhood. I remember wondering what it was like before because I've been wearing this since I was three years old. And as long as I have been alive, the sound of a woman singing has been illegal in Iran, because it is considered so beautiful that it will seduce men into acts of evil. I know what oppression does to men and women.

So yeah, it's Friday night. The club is pumping. The music is practically shaking the building as I approach to take my dance. I choose my song, something slow and sultry, and I take the stage and I begin to dance for my own pleasure. Breathing and moving, I slowly take off my dress. But you see, my dress is not just a dress. My dress is the shackles of a thousand years. And I'm free.

As I go into ecstasy, I look around and my stage is lined with the most powerful men in Washington. And sometimes I catch one sitting like this, as if he has come to pray and to worship. So I look into his eyes and I smile, as to say: it's okay. I let you see me in this state of ecstasy. And I watch him exhale in relief. No shame.

There is this deep space of permission that can only be created with me being mostly naked, going into ecstasy on stage, and feeling really good about it and him seeing it, enjoying it, and not being shamed for it.

Does this make you uncomfortable? It's okay if it does. This is the sea we're swimming in, the sea of shame and oppression, compliments of the patriarchy. By no means exclusive to the Middle East. We have bought into the shame of our sacred primal energy, and we have actually cut ourselves off from its life-giving wisdom.

You know, we are the only animals that live with and experience shame of fornication and we are the only animals that are destroying the environment which sustains us. This life-giving force that lives in our bodies has become something, by design, to possess, oppress, or commoditize. When all we are longing for is the space of permission, a space of unconditional love, where yes, our lust, our desires, our hunger for life, our rage, our joy are allowed the full spectrum. Where we are truly okay to be as we are.

Except in this free Western society, the only place I was able to find that was in that club.

What is important is that in the depths of primal energy lives great wisdom that we actually need to survive and to thrive.

The patriarchy, the fear, scarcity, and separation that are sourced in the mind, are so deeply embedded in our existence we have become nearly numb to the fact. Did you know the word "patriot" comes from the Greek root word "pater," meaning father? So to be a patriot means I am loyal to my fatherland. Why not my motherland? How many wars have been fought in the name of patriotism?

I'm not here to say patriarchy is wrong. I am here to say it is killing us by shaming the very thing that makes us alive. People who are enlivened don't rape and pillage the earth and each other. It is deep self-hatred and shame that do that. We are a civilization who have forgotten we have a mother.

Imagine you're sitting on the rocks by the ocean, and the sound of the crashing waves drowns out all doubt and worry, as drops of water float their way to your face. Imagine you're standing on a mountaintop, the feeling of the sun on your skin, the scent of the pine trees, the feeling of the dirt beneath your feet. Here, a simple peace is allowed. All is allowed. Nature is so good at being herself that we get to be ourselves in a way that is unique and unconditional.

Guess what, nature is not just out there. It is also in here.

Most people think the rise of the feminine has to do with a higher percentage of female leaders within the current system. No. It has to do with reinventing the system from the wisdom of our primal bodies, the wisdom of nature. The wisdom lives in our bodies. And if we want to free ourselves from oppression, then we have to stop the commoditization of it, especially in female form.

If we want its gifts to help reshape our civilization, then we get to come into right relationship with our own primal desires and learn how to be in a state of being turned on and be witnessed there. What's it like to be seen as one who has come alive?

How much permission could you give to your friends and your neighbors to trust their own desires over patriarchy's cold grip of shame and scarcity?

How do we move ourselves out of oppression and come to harness this force for good?

For the women, it is time to question everything. Question your allegiance, my sister. With what system of thought are you aligned? Is your idea of a virtuous woman given to you by a patriarchal paradigm or a male God? Patriarchy banks on us not questioning any of it.

And for the men, for my brothers, there has to be a learning in how to witness the sacred primal energy, especially in female form, and recognize that your desire to want to possess it or oppress it is the seed of patriarchy in you. And that's okay because you can choose to breathe, and be turned on, and have no shame, because you trust yourself.

What is this going to take? Radical self-responsibility. Facing the places where we would rather be comfortable over doing what it takes to be truly free. Learning to trust our aliveness and committing to living lives that demonstrate this and not an allegiance with shame and scarcity.

Because this, this is what will send the freedom to those who don't have the opportunity to raise the bar of freedom for themselves. Because those of us who do get to feel the sunlight on our legs, we have a responsibility to step out of shame.

And when we do step out of shame and embrace our aliveness, there will be genius and creativity and life-affirming legacies that will express through each and every one of us. And then together, we will create a tapestry of true freedom for the generations to come.

Thank you.