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Consent usually gets talked about as something between you and other people. Did you ask? Did they say yes? Did you listen when they didn’t? All of that matters, and it sits at the centre of every temple night I run. It also rests on something earlier that hardly anyone talks about. Can you feel your own no?
Like a lot of people, I grew up with shame around sex and very little honest talk about it. ISTA was the first place I saw this held with real care and clear consent. A lot of that care came down to something plain: people being able to say what they didn’t want, out loud, and being heard.
When yes is a habit
Plenty of people say yes on autopilot. You say yes to a dinner you didn’t want to go to, then spend the evening checking the time. Someone asks “is this okay?” and you say “yeah, fine” before you’ve checked. You only work out the next day that you didn’t want that at all.
That doesn’t make you a pushover or a bad partner. Plenty of people were taught to keep things smooth rather than notice what they wanted. If you’ve spent years being easy to get along with, your no can go so quiet you stop hearing it.
And if you can’t hear your own no, it’s hard to trust your yes. That goes for you, and for anyone you’re with.
Where a no shows up first
A no usually shows up in the body before you’ve got the words for it. You go quiet. You laugh when nothing’s funny. You lean back a little, hold your breath, or your shoulders come up. You change the subject. They’re small things, and they’re easy to override when you want to be liked.
In coaching and at temple nights, people practise saying yes, no and maybe out loud, until it feels ordinary. It sounds simple. For a lot of people it’s harder than they expected, and it’s the part I’d least want to skip. The agreements are plain. Any contact needs a clear verbal yes first. Silence is a no. A maybe is a no. A yes can be taken back at any time.
Hearing someone else’s no
The other half of this is what happens when someone says no to you. If your own no has been quiet for years, other people’s can land hard. You hear it as rejection. You start explaining, or you go cold, or you ask again in a slightly different way to see if the answer changes.
A no is information, not a verdict on you. The simplest response is “thanks for telling me”, and then leaving it there. That’s harder than it sounds when you wanted the yes. It gets easier the more you’ve practised your own, because you know what it costs to say one, and you’d rather people told you the truth.
Practise on a cup of tea
You don’t need a partner or a workshop for this. Today, when someone asks you something small, like whether you want a cup of tea, whether you can take a call, or whether you’re free on Thursday, pause before you answer. Let one slow breath out. Notice what happens in you when you hear the question. Is there a lean towards it, a pull away, or nothing much?
Then answer honestly, even if it’s “not right now” or “let me think about it”. Low stakes is the point. A no you’ve practised over a cup of tea is a lot easier to find when it matters.
If this brings up something hard from your past, take that seriously. I’m a coach, not a therapist, and some of this is better worked through with a therapist, first or alongside.
How I hold this work
Everything I offer in this area starts from the same place. Temple nights are small, screened and sober, and for adults only. Everyone applies first. Clear agreements on clothing and touch are set before the evening starts. Every exercise is optional, and you can sit out any part of it without explaining why.
If you’d rather start one to one, sacred sexuality coaching is slower and more private, and your own yes and no are where it begins. You can book a free 30-minute discovery call to talk it through first.
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