Cunt. 
Such a short word and yet so strong and powerful.
Say it out loud and you see some women turn their eyes down in shame, shuffle their feet uncomfortably that this word has been spoken …
Others will allow a secret smile to form upon their lips, that is more noticeable actually, in the knowing glint of light that arrives in their eyes.
You see the power of the word, the power of cunt is what makes us turn away.
Strong, bold and accurate in its description, straight to the point.
How it sounds as it leaves our lips is purely from the intention behind it. To hurl abuse, to offend..
Or to claim. Claim our anatomy. Who we are.
We have to be able to name the parts of our bodies, the parts of our lives that we shame, deny or separate from, to be able to heal and claim them.
No longer secret pieces kept in the darkness of shame.
No name.
Or some name that skirts around the edges and does not describe what it is.
We have grown up with down there.
Down there?!
How does that make you feel when you say down there?
Personally it makes me feel like it is something I am meant to hide. Keep separate from the rest of my womanly body. To allow out into my life when seen as appropriate to others.
We then have a Fanny, front bottom, pussy, muff, foo foo, girly bits, lady garden.
But I know my front bottom is nothing like my actual bottom. And I also know that my genitalia does not meow or have its own lawn and flower border.
On the other side of these pretty little names, we have the words that come purely from a place of disrespect to women and our bodies.
Cum bucket. Piss flaps. Beef curtains, tuna purse.
Do these words conjure up deep respect, love, admiration and devotion towards your body and to women?
Do they conjure up how we wish for our daughters to feel about their beautiful, innocent, miraculous bodies?
I think not.
Vagina is the scientific term we use in the English language, what we teach our children in sex education.
How doctors approach us and speak with us about our bodies.
But vagina doesn’t name the whole of our female anatomy. It only names part of us and that part, vagina, means sheath for a sword.
Oh, how that angers me. Only naming the part of us which men enter.
Yoni. I am in deep love with this poetic Sanskrit word. Sacred cave. Try the taste of this word around your tongue. Let it pass through your lips and be spoken. It feels to me soft, feminine, flowing, devotional, cherished, honoured, profoundly honoured. Yoni sounds as it is … a devotional gift to treasure.
And yes, Yoni, describes embraces the whole feeling I suppose of our femininity, of the Goddess but cunt is the one word, the one word that describes and includes all of our female genitalia and the power of woman.
Cunt comes from the word Kunta which translates to female genitalia. Kunta also means woman in several African languages. We also have the Goddess Kunti who was very much worshipped and cherished. Kunt is from the same root of kundalini.
Such majestic power held in four letters.
And somehow we know that. It’s the word we use when we want to cause the most offence. So why not use that power instead to accurately name our body? To embrace that power in a healthy and enlightened way.
To respect its roots and therefore our own roots as women.
I get it. I know it’s uncomfortable at the start. And maybe one rainy afternoon, take the opportunity to sit with the word cunt. Roll it around your mouth and over your tongue, let it come out as a whisper, and then out loud.Shout it.
Chant it.
And observe all the feelings that arise around the spoken word. Cunt.
Witness your discomfort. Your shame.
Or maybe even your wildness that you have tried to tame or your joy that you have tucked away for another day.
For how you feel about this word cunt will reflect on how you feel about your female genitalia.
Your woman~ness.
An extremely powerful, freeing and well spent afternoon I can assure you.
Cunt is a comfortable word in my home.
I have witnessed my own shame and repulsion around this word, the why’s and the how’s.
I have re-claimed it. I own it. It’s power, it’s multifaceted gifts. It’s healing, it’s blood, it’s fragrance, it’s mess, it’s softness, it’s succulents.
It’s all mine.
My Cunt.
At first of course the children raised their eyebrows and were appalled that mum was using this disgusting and bad word. But not any more. They get it. For I have the right and the choice to receive the healing that naming all parts of my body gives.
The power of word supports us all in reclaiming and owning the parts of our lives that we choose to shame away, the whole of our bodies, our sexuality and our creativity.
To heal it, is to name it.
To name it, is to own it.
