Vision Battlesword [00:00:00]:
Howdy, Kayla.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:00:01]:
Hi, Vision.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:02]:
How are you doing tonight?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:00:04]:
I'm feeling good. I'm feeling grounded and excited and also a little nervous. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:12]:
Awesome. Thanks for joining me for a Sacred Conversation. I've been really looking forward to this for a while. So start out with my usual question. Who are you? Kayla Rodriguez.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:00:25]:
The dreaded question of who am I? Something I've been trying on is that I am a creator of experiences that bring people into deeper connection with themselves and with others. So that's one iteration of who I am. I'm also an electrical engineer. I'm also pretty kick ass pool player.

Vision Battlesword [00:00:53]:
Hmm. That's something I didn't know about you.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:00:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. But I think I'm still, and I think probably always will be, redefining who I am and what it is I'm here to do. So.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:09]:
Aren't we all?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:01:10]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:12]:
So we decided that you'd like to have a conversation today about consent. Is that right?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:01:18]:
That is correct.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:20]:
Let's do it. What is consent?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:01:27]:
So, as I was telling you a little bit earlier, I actually looked up the literal definition of it, and there's a few different variations of this, but the actual definition of it is to agree to do something or to agree to be a part of something. It's giving your opt in, your yes to being or doing something.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:51]:
But the key to it is agreement is what it sounds like.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:01:56]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:01:57]:
Well, what's an agreement?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:01:59]:
An agreement. This is interesting, because I initially, when I said it, I'm thinking about agreement as, like, a one sided thing. And now as you ask that question, I'm like, oh. An agreement is something that comes to life between two people where they both are a mutual yes to creating, doing, experiencing something together.

Vision Battlesword [00:02:25]:
Mm hmm.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:02:26]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:02:27]:
Yeah. It almost seems like you can't have an agreement without an invitation to something. Like, what am I agreeing to? Would be a question one could ask. And it makes me think of the four agreements also. Have you read that?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:02:48]:
I have not.

Vision Battlesword [00:02:49]:
Okay.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:02:50]:
But it's interesting because I've been writing agreements for different containers I've had, and I accidentally made my own version of the four agreements.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:02]:
Really?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:02]:
Which someone reflected to me afterwards.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:05]:
You mean you rederived the same agreements as.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:11]:
No, I don't actually know what they are, so please enlighten me.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:14]:
Oh, no. Well, I'm curious. What were your four agreements?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:18]:
It was. They were honor, sovereignty, belonging, and love.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:26]:
Interesting.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:27]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:28]:
Well, what makes them agreements? The way you say them now, they remind me of a conversation I had with Connor Bell about values. They sound a little bit like, maybe core values, but what makes them agreements?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:41]:
It's the context in which it was set. So they were agreements for a container that I was holding for the weekend. So we are all agreeing to a set of values.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:53]:
I see.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:03:53]:
Yeah, yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:03:55]:
Got it, got it. But in order to agree to. To a specific. Let's just take it one at a time for simplicity's sake. In order to agree to some specific value, we have to kind of first agree on what that value actually means. Right?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:04:14]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:04:14]:
Like, so it starts with a definition. So were you the person, if you were creating the container, were you the person that put forth the initial definition of, let's say, honor?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:04:29]:
Yeah, I would say I did. I wrote out a few different lines around what it meant to me to honor and also created space for people to opt in or to add or to expand upon the definition of what it means to be honoring of. And for context, it was like honoring yourself, honoring other people, honoring the space, honoring the land we were on. And it's interesting because that a little circle here, that agreement of honor was brought in as an alternative to an agreement of consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:05:09]:
Yeah, well, that's interesting to bring it back to consent. And, well, I'm just curious now, why was honor used to replace consent as one of the agreements?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:05:25]:
So it started with, it was a container held by four people, so there was four of us leading it. And I felt very strongly that I would love to have agreements so that we're creating a container. And I originally wrote a different list of, like, five different agreements, and I brought it to the group and I said, this is what I would like us all to agree on.

Vision Battlesword [00:05:51]:
I would like to ask you to define a container. I know you and I both know what we're talking about, but I was having a conversation with someone else who I was actually, you know, inviting to a container, and we're talking about, you know, all these experiences and what's going to happen and all this stuff. And this person asked me, what do you mean by container? You know, like, I get everything you're talking about, about what's going to happen, but you keep using this word container. What does that mean? So, like, what are we talking about when we say container?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:06:21]:
I consider it very literally like a field that is created, and that field could be held in a room, in a house, in outdoors, as long as you are creating some sort of field, a gathering of people within a field that is containing the experience that everybody's agreed to have. So it's literally a form of containment to this experience that we've agreed to enjoy together or not enjoy or whatever it is.

Vision Battlesword [00:06:55]:
Yeah, I like that.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:06:58]:
I just wanted to add that it also, every time I hear the word container, it reminds me kind of. Of masculine and feminine polarity. And I think about the container as the masculine to hold the space for the feminine to flow in. So a lot of times, containers are for emotional processing or to dive deep into self healing and all of that. And that stuff can be messy. And to have a container to contain oneself within, I think, creates that feeling of safety.

Vision Battlesword [00:07:32]:
I like that. Yeah. The way I think I'd say it is a container is essentially a mental construct. It's a set of boundaries, really. It's a set of boundaries which usually are created by agreement or by agreements. It can actually be physically bounded. Like, we can have a container that occurs within this house or on this land, on this property, within this park or this festival. So there can be physical boundaries to it.

Vision Battlesword [00:08:09]:
But more importantly than that, there are, like, cultural boundaries that are created or social. Social expectations. A culture code that creates a sense of safety, typically, or at least a sense of shared purpose, shared expectations, and a common connection between all the people that are going to share some kind of an experience together. Does that sound about right?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:08:36]:
Yeah. And one of my friends just had such an averse reaction to the consent agreement. And initially, I was, like, appalled. I was like, what do you mean, you don't want to create a consensual space? There was a lot of judgment in me about that, about her resistance to agreeing to consent. And as she explained herself more, I understood it as she feels like consent is a touchy subject as well, as it doesn't leave room for, like, mystery or for kind of this, like, expansive version. So the example she gave is, if our friend comes in and wants to tackle me with a hug and, like, love me in that way, I want her to feel like she can come and do that without needing my verbal consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:09:38]:
Fascinating.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:09:39]:
Yeah, yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:09:41]:
Wow. There's so much here. It's so juicy because so what I'm noticing, and you mentioned this before we started the formal recording, that so much of what we do in sacred conversations is an exploration of language. And I'm very passionate about that because I feel, and of course, many people within our community, the sacred light community, as well as the greater conscious community, feel that clarity in our language is so important to our self programming. So that's one of the reasons that these kind of explorations are interesting, but also productive. And I also am aware of the kind of issue that you raised. And I think this might be part of the meat that we get into about this touchy subject, which is also funny to me, just in the punniness of that. The touchiness about consent and the idea that it somehow subtracts from spontaneity or that it subtracts from surprise.

Vision Battlesword [00:10:45]:
You use the word mystery, which I think is also interesting, but I'm sort of reinterpreting that as I don't want to close myself off from experiences that I might enjoy, but that I might not think that I would enjoy or that I might not be open to in a more transactional way, but I actually would be open to them in a spontaneous way or something along those lines. And, like, having maybe a. Maybe the resistance is coming from a sense of fear, of missing out on certain experiences. Does that sound right to you?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:11:18]:
Yeah, that sounds fairly accurate. Another part of it is not directly from her mouth, but from my understanding of her, is this desire for flow, this desire for kind of the feminine aspect of I want to allow what's going to happen to happen without needing these, like, strict guardrails. So kind of flowing.

Vision Battlesword [00:11:43]:
Yeah, that's interesting. And I can. I think I can relate to that, too. Personally, I believe that I have a very strong value of consent. And also I've been in situations, or, you know, we call them containers, settings, environments, wherever. Well, let's just name it. Like, the consent police show up, right, where things. Things feel a little overly managed, they feel a little overly controlled.

Vision Battlesword [00:12:16]:
And I think that can. There is a sense in which that could suck the joy or the fun out of situations when, I guess if you feel, like, overly self aware or overly hyper vigilant of, okay, we've got to perform this transaction. We've got to have this special handshake, and now we can do the thing that we want to do.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:12:38]:
Yeah, for sure.

Vision Battlesword [00:12:39]:
What do you think about that?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:12:40]:
Yeah, I agree. And it's interesting. I haven't heard the term consent police in a while, but that is definitely something that happens where someone comes in and it's just like, did she actually say yes to that, or did this happen, or did that happen? And like, are. Are you asking all the proper steps? And I do think when consent is taken to that extreme, it can be limiting. When it's like, you need to verbally ask this thing in order to get an opt in, and then from there you can engage. And I do think that that can be constricting. And it's funny, the word, like nuanced has been very prevalent for me recently, noticing that almost everything has some level of nuance to it. I've been talking about consent kind of on, like, a skill level.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:13:36]:
Like, there's black belt consent, where it's like someone is very well practiced in it. Like, understands verbal and nonverbal cues and is pretty much living, breathing, walking. Consent is embodied within them. I don't think most of our society is there. Exactly. And then there's people that are, like, just branching into consent. And I don't know what the lowest level belt is on the whole karate scale, but you get yellow belts or something like that, and then there's everything in between. So I think it's really important to emphasize verbal consent when someone is just stepping into consent culture.

Vision Battlesword [00:14:24]:
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. I was thinking it's almost like training wheels. You know, there's a certain. There's a teaching and a learning aspect to it, like any skill, where it's like, yeah, we're going to practice this by the book. We're going to, you know, this is how it works. You always ask. You always receive a verbal yes or a verbal no. And that way, you know for sure there's no confusion.

Vision Battlesword [00:14:50]:
There can't possibly be any confusion. That's like white belt level consent in your. In your kind of martial arts analogy. Right. But as you become more comfortable with certain people or certain situations or certain cultures, and also, you know, kind of develop your own experience level, then that nuance can start to emerge. But we always kind of have to be careful, right?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:15:17]:
Yeah, for sure. And that nuance specifically in consent, I would call more of the realms of energetic or nonverbal consent. And just a quick example for that. Like, when I walked in, we didn't have the conversation, hi, Kayla. Can I have a hug? Or hi, vision. Can I have a hug? We didn't ask for consent. It was arms wide open. That means, yes, let's connect in a hug right now.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:15:42]:
So that was a way of us consenting to an action non verbally.

Vision Battlesword [00:15:46]:
Yeah, that's a really great observation. I didn't even. Yeah, that didn't even register for me that we didn't have a formal check in, even though we haven't really seen each other for quite a while. And I think that also brings up the point of kind of prior experience, like a comfort level that you can develop, or maybe it's more of an already established agreement. Let me rephrase that. You have an agreement with someone that becomes comfortable enough that you start to take it as a given or you start to take it as assumed until that is revoked, which is always an option. But we have had enough experience with each other for each of us, it seems, on both of our sides to expect that yes. As far as hugging is concerned, we're both a yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:16:43]:
And we also have enough experience with each other to expect that we're mature enough humans to verbalize if that ever changes. I'm not actually really open for a hug right now. Happy to see you, though.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:16:56]:
Yeah, for sure. And this is reminding me of your conversation about trust, the other sacred conversation about trust. Because I do think since, you know, we've known each other for however long, have had x amount of experiences with each other, I trust. And like you were saying to me, like, I trust that if you are not comfortable with a hug or you're not comfortable with something I'm doing, that you're going to speak up and say something to me where we've somewhat built that level of trust, or some people, including myself, have. I kind of have a baseline level that I'm trusting people to be in their sovereignty and to let me know if they're a no for something that I'm starting to do. And if I don't have that trust with someone, or if someone doesn't have that level of trust. Yeah. Getting that opt in is so much more important, right?

Vision Battlesword [00:17:59]:
Yeah, but that's kind of situational, at least for me. I think depending on where we go, we may have a sense that we're in a familiar culture, a culture of consent, or a culture of certain types of communication, verbal and nonverbal, or even energetic cues that we can read where the boundaries of consent are generally, and then use our own judgment and discernment around. For example. Okay, in this room, it seems like everyone's hugging. That just seems like what people do. So my consent program would be, if I am not open to a hug, I need to be sure to verbalize that because that seems to be the culture code in this particular gathering. But on the other hand, I don't see people taking off their clothes, you know, as compared to going into maybe a more unfamiliar environment where I don't necessarily know the culture or what the codes are here in this particular place, I may ask explicitly before touching anyone, maybe the first few times, until with that specific person, we seem to have developed a rapport to the point where I might say something like, are you comfortable just sharing touch generally right now and get a yes and say, if that ever changes, will you let me know, of course I will. Great.

Vision Battlesword [00:19:26]:
And then now we've kind of got a consent agreement that we don't have to then continue to check in on and reestablish over and over.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:19:34]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:19:35]:
Is that how it works for you too?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:19:36]:
Yeah, for sure. There's many times where I'll give people what I call blanket consent to hugs or to platonic non sexual touch or to. Yeah. Some other things of that nature. And, I mean, this even branches into cause consent, I think a lot of times is thought of as a physical thing, but there's also the verbal component of it, like giving advice or feedback or adjustments or any other kind of verbal penetration we might do into someone's field. And there's been a lot of friends that I've given blanket consent to provide me with feedback with because I value what they're gonna say and I know that they're delivering it with love. So because I trust that I'm like, okay, you can have blanket consent to do this specific thing. So, yeah, it's definitely a way in which I operate.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:20:35]:
And also, what you were speaking to before around, like, if I'm in a room where it seems like hugging is the culture, or I'm in a room where it seems like x, y or z is the culture, what that was reminding me of is attunement to the environment, to the space, to the people that you're around, and, like, operating with consent from that place.

Vision Battlesword [00:20:59]:
Hmm.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:20:59]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:21:00]:
Can you tell me more about that attunement and consent for the place? I just wanna make sure I'm following you.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:21:06]:
Yeah. So in terms of attunement, it's taking in kind of what you were doing already, like observing what is the environment that I'm in right now, what seems to be the culture, the energy, the vibe that's happening here, and taking that into account when it comes to moving oneself within the space.

Vision Battlesword [00:21:28]:
Yeah. What I'm noticing and what you said just now is that there's even an aspect of the consent equation which has to do with being received into the space itself or choosing to remove yourself from the space altogether. Is there something true about implicit consent, at least insofar as if you choose to remain in an environment, you are to some degree consenting to what's happening here?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:21:58]:
Yes, I would say yes. For example, if I choose to go to a sex positive, swingers space, something of that sort, I am. By walking into that venue, walking into that environment, I'm consenting to seeing what might happen in that space, to potentially being approached for requests of some sort. Yeah. So I would say by going into a specific environment, literally, just by entering that container, there's a certain level of opt in. And of course, there's a difference. If you're walking into something and you had no idea what you were getting into, then at that point, and this is kind of the. One of my four agreements around sovereignty, it's like, okay, I'm the creator of my reality.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:22:48]:
I walked into a situation that does not feel good to me. Now I'm going to walk myself out because this is not a container that I feel like I want to consent into.

Vision Battlesword [00:23:00]:
Yeah. And the flip side is also true, meaning the group has consented to your presence. It seems to me that consent, there's something inherently bi directional about consent or mutual about consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:23:15]:
Yeah, for sure. And this actually brings me to how I was inspired to look up the etymology of it. And it's based in Latin, the word con, which is with or together, and then sentir to feel.

Vision Battlesword [00:23:38]:
Oh, with feeling.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:23:39]:
Yeah, with feeling. So in a way, a loose translation of it is to feel together. And another little definition I saw of, like, the latin root word was something along the lines of sharing or joining an experience where you're opting into feeling or sharing an experience together. So I do think consent is nothing, a one sided thing. Like, there's always going to be the proposal and the agreement of it or the disagreement of it, but it's something that's shared and created between two or more people.

Vision Battlesword [00:24:25]:
Yeah. As we talk this through more and more, I'm just kind of seeing the binary nature of all the different aspects of consent, meaning that it is an agreement. I mean, I think consent is a type of agreement, but there always has to be two parties to an agreement. But then additionally, there's both a yes and a no side to consent. Like, kind of like what we've been talking about. We've just been sort of dipping our toe in these different scenarios or case studies of, like, what does consent look like, whether it's explicit or implicit. But I think there's also, like, a positive and a negative form of consent. There's the enthusiastic yes version of consent, but then there's also the no or the, you know, the rejection, the I cancel this agreement form of consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:25:21]:
And then there's the neutral side of each of those things, which is we can assume I'm a yes until I'm a no. Or we can assume I'm a no until I'm a yes. What do you think about that?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:25:34]:
Yeah, and that's I mean, bringing up the kind of. There's the yes, there's a no, and then there's everything in between, which to me is the maybe land or the kind of. The word that just came to me is like, discovery.

Vision Battlesword [00:25:48]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:25:48]:
It's like we have all of this space to discover. Am I a yes or am I a no? So it is somewhat binary. And I. There's a lot of gray area in there. And I would even say that culturally, giving consent is mostly like, if I give my consent to you, that's typically associated with the yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:26:13]:
See, I want to. Yes. Correct. I think you're right about that. But also, I want to put my finger right on what you just said, because it's related to something I was thinking a moment ago, and I think this is a really important piece of it. There's something about the way we normally think about consent that has to do with submission, because just in the way that you phrased that statement, I give my consent to you, there's something submissive about that. There's something almost like giving away your power, giving away your autonomy in a certain way. It's a kind of a.

Vision Battlesword [00:26:52]:
It's a. There's a. There's a way that we use that word that. That makes it sound more like submit to me than consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:27:01]:
Like, when people say, like, I give you my heart, like it's. It's yours, like that kind of more.

Vision Battlesword [00:27:06]:
Like, you will do this. All right, all right, I consent. You know what I mean?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:27:11]:
Huh?

Vision Battlesword [00:27:12]:
Does that make sense?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:27:13]:
Yeah, I know. That's.

Vision Battlesword [00:27:14]:
That's an extreme example. I don't mean. I don't mean that that's the way it actually is. Like that people are being coerced or forced when they give their consent. And. And, I mean, presumably this is gonna be part of what we talked through, but presumably you can't give meaningful consent if you're actually under duress. Like, that's not really how it works. Yeah, but I feel maybe it's because a lot of my relationship with the word consent actually comes from, like, social or political philosophy, because, you know, I've spent a lot of time with libertarian philosophy, and that idea of consent is.

Vision Battlesword [00:27:52]:
Well, it's actually the bedrock of libertarianism. The whole idea that the entire philosophy is based on anything that happens without consent is not legitimate. But, yeah, this idea of. Okay, let me try this one more time. Does it sound and feel different if I say we make an agreement versus I give you my consent? Do you see what I mean?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:28:19]:
Yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:28:20]:
One feels mutual, like two equals, and the other feels more like one person capitulating to the other.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:28:28]:
I understand. I understand what you're getting at. And yeah, I do think the languaging of it is important because as I just shared about it, it's a mutual thing. It takes two or more people to consent. And even saying something like, okay, like, yeah, we are in agreeance, or, we are in consent in this realm or this topic, making it more of a we statement than a I give you this. And at the same time, I do think I wouldn't necessarily call it submissive, that statement. I would call it a. I guess it could be considered submissive as well, but I would call it vulnerable.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:29:12]:
And it's vulnerable on both parties. Yeah, I would say it's vulnerable on the part of the person, quote, unquote, handing over or giving over their consent, which, yeah, I question if it's even something you can hand over. Right. But it's also vulnerable on the part of the person making a request. Yeah, I think it's equally vulnerable on both halves. And in a way, my yes in giving consent is a gift. Like, it's a gift of connection. It's a gift of honoring and accepting your request or your proposal.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:29:53]:
So I am, in a way, giving something, and it will probably eventually translate into me receiving as well, a gift of that connection.

Vision Battlesword [00:30:06]:
Yeah, it's interesting, now that we're playing around with this language, I don't feel the same way about the phrase I give you my permission. That feels totally powerful to me, but, yeah. So maybe it's just something in my own mind about I give you my consent if I say I consent, that feels neutral, powerful.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:30:34]:
Yeah. And I think that I might have a little reasoning behind that. And I really do think it's around the societal context of consent culture and how much has been uprooted around our culture being non consensual and the fear of being out of consent. And I think that that brings a lot of charge into just the word alone. And just we change the word permission or this other thing. And that when I hear the word permission, that's when I really start thinking about, like, dominance and submission. Really, permission brings that into me. And it's also, of course, our relationship with these words.

Vision Battlesword [00:31:18]:
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I'm learning something about my relationship with the word consent right now. Like, I never. It didn't really occur to me until this moment that it does feel sometimes synonymous with submit, consent and submit. But again, that's my own programming. And wherever it is that that comes from. And it's interesting to hear that for you, you have a different relationship with the word permission, or for me, permission feels powerful for some reason.

Vision Battlesword [00:31:42]:
Like it's something that I can revoke at any time. But of course, they're basically the same concept. Yeah, but I agree with you about the vulnerability, the mutual vulnerability. I mean, when consent is working properly, when everyone involved has a respect for the concept, which basically, I want to. Let's come back around, if you don't mind, to just a definition of it, because we kind of danced on it briefly right at the very beginning. But, like, okay, so if I say everyone involved has a healthy respect for the concept of consent, what that means is we respect that everyone has the autonomy to choose what experiences they would or would not like to have. Is that fair?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:32:29]:
Yeah, I would say that works. Yeah. I feel like I could define consent in, like, ten different ways right now.

Vision Battlesword [00:32:35]:
What's another one?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:32:37]:
Another one is an honoring of all parties. They're. Yes, they're. No, they're maybe. Yeah. And then there's also this idea of a conscious agreement. I know I'm bringing back up that word agreement, but I think conscious, like something that we're actively aware that we are agreeing to.

Vision Battlesword [00:33:03]:
Here's an interesting piece of it. For consent to be meaningful, or maybe you'd say valid or legitimate, is there an element of full awareness? Because when you brought up that word conscious, making a conscious agreement, I suddenly realized I'm sort of coming back to an idea of a contract. And for a contract to be considered legitimate, there has to be consideration. And then, of course, in these last few years, many of us have become a lot more familiar with an idea called informed consent. And so I'm just curious about that. Like, can I actually consent to something if I am not fully aware of the repercussions or implications of my consent?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:33:59]:
I want to say no. And there's another part of me that, yeah, I'm gonna stick with no. I do think that informed consent is highly important. Like, to know generally, of course, you can't know every single detail, because life is unfolds as it will, and there are always variables that come in. But as much as it's within the person that is requesting your consent, as much as it's within their knowledge and their awareness, to inform you of what this act consists of, what you're agreeing to contractually, what you are binding yourself to. Yeah, I do think that consent needs to be informed in order to be consensual. Yeah. Like, I need to know what I'm opting into.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:34:55]:
And there's also the possibility, because I do this often, to actually opt into not knowing or opt into whatever may happen will happen. And I have signed myself into that.

Vision Battlesword [00:35:12]:
And you've accepted the consequences? You've accepted the responsibility for that choice.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:35:17]:
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And I will say, like, there's no way that both people in the action, or whoever's in the action, can fully know the full brevity of the information that someone, because anything can happen at any moment. Like, I can consent to something super simple that seems like a walk in the park, and then all of a sudden, I'm on a whole other ride, and I had no idea I was gonna go there. And I'm not gonna say I did not consent to having this happen. It was just something that happened as a circumstance of what I thought I was opting into. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:35:54]:
And that would be the flip side. Like, intentionally opting in to a situation with unknowns would be the flip side of opting into a situation where certain information was withheld.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:36:10]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:36:10]:
Like, I consent to unprotected sex. You didn't inform me, you know, about your medical history.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:36:19]:
Mm hmm.

Vision Battlesword [00:36:21]:
Why was this topic. Why did you bring this topic to the sacred conversation? Why has this been top of mind for you, or that you're curious to explore it?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:36:34]:
Yeah, well, I've been in and exploring conscious sexuality for six or seven years now. Some in the kingkimedia sun scene, some in the tantra scene, some in other spaces. And consent is always a huge topic. And recently, previously, I would say maybe about a year and a half ago, I would be hardcore verbal consent all the way. Like, we need to have the conversation. I need to make sure I check all of my. My little boxes, my sexual paperwork, whatever this is. And I would also be asking for consent, like, along the way, which I think is also important at the white belt level.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:37:23]:
Right. Like, oh, I'm going to do something different. Let me check in with them. And as I've grown in these fields and specifically with tantra, like, the energetic fields, and have been in different containers around this, I've noticed that verbal consent is not the only way. And it just feels like it's coming up again and again and again. It's just being repeated. These conversations around energetic consent and around. It's interesting that you mentioned, and I'm happy that we did go into this whole conversation around group consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:37:58]:
Like, is the group consenting to me be here? Am I consenting to being in this group, because this topic of consent can come up in that group field. So, like, if someone's in the container that someone else in the container doesn't feel safe with and doesn't feel like is a consensual human, then. And they voice it for some reason to the group, and now it's like, oh, okay. Now, is this container still safe? And that was kind of the big thing that, like, brought it up for me, and I was like, whoa. And also thinking that there's many unknowns and many factors and always two sides to the story as well as the retelling of the story.

Vision Battlesword [00:38:43]:
So just to be clear, this would be the type of situation where there's a group and there's two people in the group, and one of them feels or thinks that they have had an experience where their consent was not respected by someone else. Is that right?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:38:59]:
Yes. Therefore, questioning the safety of the container.

Vision Battlesword [00:39:03]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:39:04]:
You've let this person in that I, from my personal experience, have deemed them to be unsafe. Now I'm in this container that's supposed to be a safer space to be in. But how do I, as an individual, maintain my safety while in the presence of someone I feel unsafe with while in this greater container of safety?

Vision Battlesword [00:39:26]:
Well, I figured safety was going to come up sooner or later.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:39:28]:
Here we are.

Vision Battlesword [00:39:30]:
So when you say a safe container, I think I intuitively know what you mean. But that's why we're here, right? We're here to, like, flesh every single thing out and see where it all goes. So when you say safe container, do you think that means people have an expectation that there's some organizer or authority figure in the container that really is the consent police? Like, for real? Like, the person that would say, whoa, whoa, timeout. That's not allowed here. We have to ask you to leave, or whatever that remedy would be that makes the container safe? Or is it more about a screening process that says, hey, we've got a really strong culture code here, and we verified that everyone really is in alignment with our container agreements or our container values or philosophy or whatever. So we just have a general expectation that everyone here is on the same page and that we're not, our consent isn't going to be violated or a little bit of both. Or is there something else that also makes a container safe?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:40:37]:
Yeah. The first thing I'll say is that I never call containers safe containers. I always call them safer, safer containers, safer spaces, safer experiences, because I truly, at the deepest parts of me, do not think that we can ever guarantee anyone safety. As I said, the unknown happens all the time. And I, as a facilitator or as a supporter or holder of a container, I'm not going to guarantee your safety. I can say that we are curating a safer space for you to be fully expressed, to explore these new, edgy places of yourself. And in doing that, there can be many of those things that you mentioned. So, screening processes, applications, things where we're checking with people's intentions in coming into the container to make sure that they align with what we are trying to cultivate or provide as a service with that.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:41:38]:
There are also, and it's interesting, I think that some people go into safe containers thinking, and I also think that some facilitators and people market it as like, this is a place where your consent will be honored and this will happen and you will be fully held and safe in this container. And I think that's amazing. I also think that it's an unrealistic expectation to set for people because, um, this is the pessimistic view. I don't truly, deeply at my root believe this, but the world can be an unsafe place. Like, there is truth in that, and that's not the truth that I walk around with every day, but there is truth in that. And, um, anyways, getting back to this idea of like, what makes a container or a space a safer space is number one. Like, we're all coming in here under the common. Some level of common intention, some level of common purpose.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:42:40]:
And when a bunch of people gather under a common purpose with, well, intentions, intention, then I think that that tends to create a field of safety. I'm here among like minded people that are wanting to achieve a similar thing that I'm trying to achieve. So that's one piece. Another piece is creating a field of agreements. Okay, we're all here. We're doing our opening circle. We're going to agree to these basic things so that we can all relax and let down our vigilant walls and guards and protectors so that we can be here and dive into this experience. So those are some of the things.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:43:22]:
I think the idea of putting it on someone that's holding or creating space to make sure that you are safe is the word that's coming to me, is absurd because I will not know what the exchange between two people happening. I will not fully know what's happening in there because I'm not part of the experience. They could be having an engagement that looks non consensual to me, but they've actually both consented to doing that, and I have no idea. So what am I going to do? Go stick my nose in there and be like, you're nothing. Consenting, but I have no idea. So this is kind of where the topic of sovereignty comes in. It's like I try to create spaces that empower people in their sovereignty to speak into their yes, to speak into the no, to be the change that they want to see in the environment and be the conscious creator of their reality. Like, you and angel were talking about manifestation.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:44:24]:
It's like, how do you create the reality you want to see yourself in? And how do you. Yeah, how do I implore this felt sense of safety within myself that I know. I know my boundaries, I know my yes, I know my no. And I know what that feels like in me to be able to communicate it. And that's a skill that's generated. Like, it's not a skill that people are just walking around with every day, knowing their yes, knowing their no, knowing how to state their boundaries, knowing how to communicate. And that's why we create this safer space so that you can fumble and fuck it up and figure it out along the way and advance from white belt to yellow to green. And, like, start making your way to a level where, like, there are some people that I also consider black belts in consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:45:18]:
And I'll just look at them and it's just like we just had a whole conversation, and now we're engaging in some sort of act together, whether it's a dance or a this or a that. And no words were exchanged. It was all energetic. It was all feeling for our mutual yes in connection. In the present moment is the other thing, because consent can always be revoked. Your yes can always change to a no. Your no can always change to a yes. And, yeah, that was a mouthful.

Vision Battlesword [00:45:55]:
Wow. Yeah, there was so much there. I mean, as you're talking, all I can think in my mind is, I want to ask the question, what is safety?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:46:06]:
Go ahead.

Vision Battlesword [00:46:07]:
I'm not going to ask you right this very second. You also brought up boundaries, which I think is such a critical concept or such a critical aspect of this whole concept or this whole topic.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:46:18]:
It brings a question I have for you.

Vision Battlesword [00:46:20]:
What's that?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:46:21]:
Which is, what's the difference between boundaries to create a container and agreements to create a container?

Vision Battlesword [00:46:30]:
I love this question. Well, this brings up my philosophy. I think, of boundaries in general, and I think that could actually be a conversation in and of itself, because I can go on at great length about it. I've got a lot of thoughts about it. You know, it's hard to say what exactly the difference is between a boundary and an agreement. A boundary, I guess, is. Well, either whether it's physical, emotional, psychological, or energetic, a boundary is a line that we all choose not to cross, or that it's a line that is established where crossing it has consequences. Let's put it that way.

Vision Battlesword [00:47:23]:
I think that's exactly what a boundary is.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:47:25]:
Yeah, this is. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [00:47:28]:
And an agreement is slightly different than that. So I think we create boundaries through agreement. I think sometimes we can create a boundary with a unilateral agreement, which is to say, that would sound like I have a boundary here, and I am going to stay on this side of this boundary, and if anything crosses this boundary for me, I'm going to move away from it. I think that's kind of what a unilateral agreement would sound like, or a mutual agreement would be something along the lines of, we agree not to leave these premises for the duration of this event. There is an actual physical boundary here. We can see it. It's the property line. And we all agree that we're not going to cross that boundary.

Vision Battlesword [00:48:14]:
And if we do, here are the consequences for that.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:48:17]:
Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting to bring together the. In one sentence, we agree to honor this boundary. Because when I think of agreements and boundaries, I think of basically yes and no. Like, I'm agreeing. I'm putting positive energy towards this thing, this way of being, this whatever it is that I'm agreeing to, I'm opting in. And the boundary is like, I will not do x, Y and z.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:48:51]:
So it's. To me, when I think of boundaries, I'm like, it's the no language. And then agreements is kind of the yes language.

Vision Battlesword [00:49:00]:
I love that. Yeah, that's so much cleaner than what I just said. Yeah, I think that is right.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:49:07]:
Yeah. And in a way, there's a part of me that has, don't get me wrong, love boundaries, but there's a part of me that has aversion to putting too much. No language, or we will not be doing this into a space because I think it brings in, it kind of brings in that energy in a way. It's like, oh, I wasn't even thinking about that as a thing that I might do, but now that you've mentioned it, but also, it's a boundary. Like, I don't know. This happens for me in medicine space. Sometimes a common boundary of medicine spaces is no sexual activity with other humans.

Vision Battlesword [00:49:49]:
Right.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:49:50]:
And even though I probably was not even thinking about that, because my intention is to go in and heal and create or do whatever it is that I'm there to do. My intention is not on the other people. It's still. I notice that, like, some devious part of my mind is, like, they said I can't, but I feel this energy, but they said I can't. And, like, there, it brings this, like, interesting juice into my psyche, at least. And of course, that's something to be unraveled and discovered. But I enjoy making, like, containers around agreements because it's kind of like, this is what we're moving towards. So instead of, like, we're moving away from this, let's talk about what we're moving towards.

Vision Battlesword [00:50:29]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I generally agree with you. Ha ha. This is my yes coming out. There's something in that rebellious streak of if you say I can't, then I really want to. But, yeah, I think that's right. I think boundaries are the edge of your no. And agreements are the edge of your yes.

Vision Battlesword [00:50:52]:
And whatever that space is in between those two things is the space of your discovery.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:51:00]:
Yeah, for sure.

Vision Battlesword [00:51:01]:
That's really interesting. But I like that concept of creating containers around affirmative agreements more so than boundaries and using a light touch with boundaries. I wanted to bring up the weaponization of boundaries and the weaponization of consent. Do you know what I'm talking about?

Kayla Rodriguez [00:51:24]:
Yes, I do. Definitely. Around boundaries. I might need more elaboration around the weaponization of consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:51:34]:
You see it for boundaries but not for consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:51:37]:
I might see it for consent if there were some more words.

Vision Battlesword [00:51:40]:
Yeah, well, I'm talking about. I think there's a certain slice of, like, the burning man culture where consent gets. Goes a little. Goes a little bonkers. It goes a little off the rails where if you haven't asked explicitly for, like, the most mundane, trivial experiences or, you know, or there's another example I can think of. I mean, really, even in, like, a legal situation as it pertains to the treatment of sexual assault or kind of in a me too, me too type context, you know, things. Things are starting to rotate all the way in the direction of, like, I don't want to get too graphic and I don't want to.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:52:30]:
Yeah. Can I give a shot?

Vision Battlesword [00:52:31]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:52:31]:
The weaponization of consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:52:33]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:52:35]:
I'm thinking about how explicitly, specifically after the me too movement kind of started. I'm thinking about the fear that was brought in around consent culture. Like, okay, do I have your consent? Are you sure I have your consent? And this idea that I'm getting your opt in because, and I don't know if I'd consider this weaponization, but I'm getting your opt in because I'm scared of what it would mean if I didn't, rather than I'm getting your opt in because I truly want you to be opted into this experience. And there's a different energetic of where that comes from. Is it fear or is it love? Am I doing this? Yeah. So I don't know if that touches at all what you're kind of getting at.

Vision Battlesword [00:53:29]:
Yeah, you're on the track, and maybe you're not even. I don't know. I listen to a lot of podcasts, and I probably read too much of a certain kind of news and things, but they're really, like, things have gone. Things have gone down a path with certain. There's a lot of, like, these high profile kind of sexual misconduct allegations of celebrities and political figures and these things going on. And there's certain, like, legal theories that are going down a very disturbing direction, in my opinion, with regard to consent that entertain the possibility of someone consenting and truly opting into a sexual encounter and then changing their mind at a certain point along the way, but not actually verbalizing that they change their mind. But unless they're asked with certain frequency to ensure that this consent is still valid, this consent is still valid, then, you know, they're even entertaining the possibility that crimes have been committed and things of that nature. And so that's part of what I mean.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:54:38]:
Yeah. And that's the really difficult and nuanced part of consent, actually, is. Like, someone maybe got their consent at the beginning. Like, the example you're just giving, someone got their consent at the beginning, and then time is going on, and time is going on. They're doing this consensual act, and then all of a sudden, something shifts. Like, someone is now not feeling it, doesn't want to be participating anymore, but either. Either the person, I guess, receiving said act doesn't speak up, doesn't know how to, is so many things can happen. I've been this person in this situation.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:55:19]:
Many, like, literally, even as a consent ninja that I call myself. Like, even about three weeks ago, was in a situation where I consented to an act and then, like, realized afterwards that at some point, it shifted from a yes to a no. But I didn't have the resource within me to say something about it. And mostly because there was a lot of, like, mental programming happening in my mind. Like, oh, if I stop this what does this mean about me? What is he going to think? What? All of these things that are consistently running through people's heads all the time. Yeah, it's really difficult. And I think that's why people need to learn the skills around being able to communicate that no when it comes up. Because we might say we're really good at expressing boundaries, but maybe that's while we're in a fully kind of sterile state.

Vision Battlesword [00:56:18]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:56:18]:
It's like, okay, we're having a conversation. I'm agreeing to these things. These are my boundaries. But then once you're in the throes of a situation, it might be more difficult to bring up your no.

Vision Battlesword [00:56:29]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:56:30]:
And also on the side of the person giving said act or in more of an active position, there's responsibility on both people's ends, is what I'll say, I think. And this is getting kind of into the more like touchy subjects of consent.

Vision Battlesword [00:56:50]:
I think this is where we're at.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:56:52]:
Let's touch. We're going in there. Yeah. So there's responsibility on both ends, in my opinion. So there's a responsibility on the person in more of a passive role to state and own their no when it comes up and they notice that something is no longer a yes for them. And there's also the responsibility on the active role to have a level of attunement or awareness or presence and understanding on the situation to notice when something shifts. And it's not one sided. Like this person that is doing whatever act they're doing.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:57:30]:
They are not a mind reader. They cannot fully tell if you're still a yes or you've shifted to a no. But they might be able to sense that something's off.

Vision Battlesword [00:57:40]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:57:41]:
And it is the responsibility of whoever. So let's say it's two people attracting whoever notices that something is off first. It is their responsibility to pause. To pause the situation, to say something. And it doesn't matter who it is, it's just, hey, something feels weird here. Can we take a moment? Can we check in with each other? How is this for you? And to do that. And it's really difficult when it comes to, like, the legal sense that you're talking about. It's like, how do you actually make laws around two people's experiences that they are just having together? First off, anyone outside of that does not fully understand what's happening in there.

Kayla Rodriguez [00:58:24]:
And even the two people, if they are not literally telepathically linked, don't fully understand the other person's experience of what's going on. So it troubles me that I don't know a lot about what's being created in the legal system, but it troubles me that it somewhat troubles. And then another part of me is like, yeah, but we need things to do this as well.

Vision Battlesword [00:58:49]:
Yeah, well, I'm not trying to take us down the rabbit hole too much of current events and legal stuff and whatever, but I think it's gotten us to the heart of the matter, which, which I'm more interested in. This is what I'm really interested in is what's actually happening between people. And there's a problem. There's still a problem. You've even identified that it's happened recently for you. There's still a problem happening here, which is that people are not feeling safe to fully express themselves in terms of their preferences, in terms of what their true yes or what their true no is, or to have that conversation in real time. And there's one side, one extreme, you know, of this, you know, this overall situation, which is hopefully the. The kind of thing that we're evolving out of or the thing that we're moving away from, which is this, you know, a culture where there's a lot of violations of consent and, you know, outright, you know, outright violation or just true violations of people's bodily autonomy and stuff.

Vision Battlesword [01:00:00]:
But then the other flip side of the extreme, where I think the pendulum swings all the way 180 degrees in the opposite direction, is this kind of quote, unquote consent culture, which is not what we, I think you and me mean when we talk about consent culture, but the kind of thing that happens in the kind of the more left leaning progressive space where someone can feel violated or someone can perceive themselves to be violated, when maybe if we look objectively at the facts, it's hard to see that anything wrong happened. And this kind of brings me back to what you were talking about in the group setting around people being safe or feeling safe or perceiving themselves to be safe because, well, what is safety? What does that mean? Are we talking about things that can actually be seen and touched and felt, like the things that happen in the physical world, or are we talking about an emotion that I feel? Are we talking about the way things are affecting me psychologically? So people throw around this word safety. I think there's also a weaponization of that word that I've noticed or that I've experienced. And it really bothers me because I take that word very seriously. Like, to me that means that's like, well, many people will tell you that I am captain safety. Actually, I maybe take it a little too seriously sometimes, but it really, really, really bothers me when I'm in a situation and someone declares, you know, I don't feel safe with how you're speaking to me right now. It's like, so, you know, sometimes I feel like that that word is. Is used as a weapon, but it's also dishonored.

Vision Battlesword [01:01:45]:
The word itself is dishonored when we use it inappropriately. But anyway, what's interesting to me is these situations that you're talking about, and what do we do? How do we cultivate a mature, healthy relationship with consent, where everyone does actually feel safe and comfortable and open to communicating what's working for them, what's not working for them, what they'd like to do, what they wouldn't like to do, what they'd like to continue or not, and kind of move, you know, move beyond both of these extremes of this paradigm.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:02:24]:
I have so many things that I want to respond to, but I will respond to the question on hand. The thing that's coming through for me right now is that all of this, all of this is so rooted in the individual and their capacity to feel safe, their capacity to. I'll just speak for myself. My capacity to feel safe within myself and my own being. Like the walls, the containment that is like my skin, my capacity to express myself, whether that be desires, boundaries, anything else. I really think it starts inside, and I don't think that. So I say it starts there. I think the cultivation of being a being that can walk in the world safe and consensual, I think it starts inside, and I think we need reference points for it first before, like, I can do my inner work.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:03:28]:
So it was recently, I recently reflected to myself that I generally feel safe everywhere I am. As a general baseline, I feel safe. And that was not always the case. And I realized that I think I've cultivated the sense of safety within my own walls, of my being through being in safer containers. So being in different spaces where I could express myself and not get the backlash or the feedback from the outside society that I might get if I did x, y, or z things. So having a space where I was free to fully express myself, free to share my desires, my boundaries, everything that needed to happen, that maybe from the time I was a kid, was suppressed. So I think it started for me there, getting a reference point from other people, from containers, that, oh, okay, I'm safe when I express myself, at least in these containers, and then taking it out into the world. And practicing it in the not set container, it's like, okay, like, I've set my own container now that's just around my little person, and now I'm going to go and engage with big, bad, scary world and see how I feel.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:04:50]:
And sometimes I felt unsafe and I moved away, and sometimes I was able to do it and I felt more safe and just gradually got there. But I do really think it's an individual process, because we all have different triggers and things that make us feel unsafe, and there's no way to one size fits all with safety or with consent or with desire or with any of these things that make us a unique human.

Vision Battlesword [01:05:22]:
Mm hmm. But not to engage in a non sequitur here, but I want to, like, kind of teleport us right back to where we were in that conversation the last time you finished speaking. When we're kind of, like, evaluating a situation where we've got two people, let's say, let's just. We'll go right to the touchy. We'll touch the subject directly here. Like, we got two people that are engaged in sex, and you had just presenced. Hey. And we'll keep it simple.

Vision Battlesword [01:05:58]:
We've just got two people. But, you know, hey, I. Both people, you know, everyone in this situation has their own responsibility. Right? And that's how I've often felt about it. This whole conversation is very uncomfortable for me and a lot of people because it's just. It's just so disturbing, you know, to think of people's consent being violated. Think of people's bodily autonomy being violated is very disturbing to me. And it's also disturbing to me, you know, the other side of the equation as well.

Vision Battlesword [01:06:29]:
To feel like going scared through life because I don't know if what I'm doing is secretly hurting someone and they're not telling me or whatever. So I've often kind of been on the side of this thought process of, it really is everyone's responsibility to say no if they're a no. Like, to verbalize that, to give. To give very clear cue and signal. And it's not inappropriate to assume that if someone was a yes, that they're not still a yes if they're appearing to be a yes, or if they're at least not protesting or not revoking their consent. But at the same point, I have become more and more and more sensitive over time to the reality that for many people, but especially women, not only women, but particularly women, something different can happen. You can be in a situation and actually not feel safe or feel comfortable or feel worthy where you actually would prefer to allow the thing to continue to happen than to go through whatever you believe is going to happen if you stop it or try to stop it. And also, I find myself to be a very intuitive, perceptive, sensitive man.

Vision Battlesword [01:07:58]:
I think I'm pretty good, generally speaking, at reading signals of, like, are you really still into this? Are you doing all right? Is this okay? Like, are we cool? And it doesn't have to be, you know, the five minute check in of. Do I have your consent? Please give me a verbal yes. You know, but, like, sometimes it's pretty obvious. I mean, I think it. I think a lot of times it's pretty obvious. Now, maybe with the kind of stuff you get into, it could be less obvious. I think that's entirely possible. Right? Because there could be role plays of things that look a lot like non consensual stuff or whatever, right? So I can see it from all sides.

Vision Battlesword [01:08:39]:
That's what I'm trying to say. It's like, on the one side. On the one side, I'm like, hey, if you're a no, say no. And a lot of this is on that side of people not actually saying no when they're a no. And then I can see the other side, which is, dude, you know, you're not dumb. Like, do you just not care? Is it actually you actually kind of like it? Like what? Like, you know, if you. If you can tell, then why. Then why don't you check in? Or why don't you stop? How do we help people to be more empowered to do both of those things?

Kayla Rodriguez [01:09:18]:
I feel like I have the same answer. I really, truly think that on the end of being able to express a no in the moment when it's happening, even in the face of all of the conditioning, all of the fantasies going on, all of the ideas of what might happen if I say no to empower individuals to do it anyways, even in the face of all that might go wrong, quote unquote wrong, it's all really kind of a fantasy that I'll speak for myself, that I play out in my head. It's like, oh, if I do this, then this whole cascade of events is going to happen. But it's. Yeah, I think it's really empowering people and also on that end as well, getting, again, reference points and, like, validation that when I say no, and this is really important, when I say no, I will be listened to and I will still be loved, is actually what it comes down to. Because I'll say that's the core of my fear with saying no, is if I say no, they're going to take that as some level of rejection or whatever it is, and then they're gonna disconnect, and then I'm gonna be left here disconnected and unloved. So I really think on that end of owning the no, it's really around getting evidence and validation that I can say no and still be x, y or z thing. Loved, care for, honored.

Vision Battlesword [01:10:59]:
So in other words, actually receiving, modeling of healthy interactions, building up life experience of, okay. I said, hey, I'm actually not really. I thought I would like this. I actually don't. I'm not really into it. And then receiving. Yeah, that's okay. You know, I'm a little disappointed, but I'm still really enjoying being here with you and dot, dot, dot.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:11:23]:
Yeah. And, like, seeing that modeled externally. Right. From, like, other people and being like, oh, wow, that's possible.

Vision Battlesword [01:11:30]:
I see.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:11:31]:
Like, seeing it modeled extraordinarily, but also having felt sense of it happening within yourself. So putting yourself in even sometimes, like, experimental containers. Like, hey, I just want to practice my. No, like, how many containers. Containers. That word's starting to sound funny to me now. How many experiences containers I've been in that we literally just spent a whole day practicing those because it's not really something that people practice often, and it is honestly one of the best tools we have. Yeah, but, yeah, that's on the side of owning the know, being able to give it regardless of circumstances that might be happening, and then on the side of awareness or attunement to another person.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:12:23]:
I think there's a few things here. One thing that I guess I do in terms of quote unquote safeguarding is asking for, like, active receiving from someone that I'm engaging with. So it's like, I would really love to, like, in your expression, whether that is, uh, facial expressions, your vocalizations, um, your words. Like, if you're feeling a yes, like, I want to hear that. And if you go silent, I'm going to come check in with you because I'm going to assume that, I don't know, something might be off. So, like, putting kind of like, safeguards in place that it's like, hey, like, I want to know when you're in your yes. And, like, actually feeling enthused about that as well as getting feedback. So I'm specifically talking about sexual context right now, but, like, something I love to do after a sexual thing is like, debrief the situation we just had.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:13:34]:
It's like if I, as a receiver, had, like, a moment that, like, something did feel off and maybe I didn't say anything in the debrief, I'll be like, oh, yeah, there was this moment wherever this thing happened. And that reaction you saw on me was something feeling like a no. So, like, giving the person feedback around, like, what? A no actually looks like energetically nonverbally, all of that. But again, both of these things, I think, just come with practice. And I think this is the important of practicing in container, because when we're new to something, we're going out there. Like, it's good to practice in container because you're gonna fumble around, you're gonna fuck it up, you're gonna like, things are gonna go wrong. And at least if you're held in a container where maybe there could be mediation, maybe there can be, like, these other things in place that support the action. That's better than just fumbling around and trying to figure out in the world where you might be really, like, really hurting people.

Vision Battlesword [01:14:39]:
Yeah, yeah. Or putting yourself in an unsafe situation.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:14:42]:
Exactly. Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:14:44]:
So I love all that. That makes a lot of good sense. And I'm also just kind of thinking about the specific kind of circles that we roll in is, I think, a small percentage of the overall human population, or maybe even the overall american demographic, if you will, this kind of, like, conscious community. The sort of people that know what you mean when you say container are thinking of like, oh, like, you know, like an open container. So I'm just thinking about how many people, I mean, before, like myself, even before I discovered this whole world of this kind of transformational culture is, I guess, really what I'm referring to when I say world. There's a lot, a lot of people, there's a lot of towns, there's a lot of cities, a lot of societies out there where people aren't going to have that kind of opportunity to get this kind of modeling in such a structured and educational way. Where my mind goes is we each have a responsibility not just to model this within a container, like sacred light, which is non sexual, but, you know, we model consent culture in various ways in there, or like Ista or like, you know, any of these other, you know, facilitated experiences, like what we're talking about now, but like, in our own daily lives and with all of the people, with all of the people that we encounter. Because I just feel it's so important for people to have an opportunity to have these kind of experiences and to witness these kind of experiences with people so that we, like, can diffuse this culture through our society and hopefully have it trickle out and hopefully have it trickle down to, like, the people that really need it.

Vision Battlesword [01:16:40]:
The people that really need to receive it. And I also look at it as like a real sacred, masculine, divine, feminine responsibility for us to, like, take care of our own, you know, like, men take care of men, women take care of women. Meaning if I see somebody, one of my brothers, that's not, you know, not doing it according to the culture that I truly believe in, but that I think is really universal, at least as far as respecting people's rights and autonomy and, you know, not violating people's consent against their will, that we take care of that. And the same goes on the other side as well. You know, helping your sisters to find their. No, I feel like that's so important, you know?

Kayla Rodriguez [01:17:29]:
Yeah. And that's really, I know what this makes me think about is that's like the best friend that you could have is someone that's going to say like, hey, I notice you're shaking your. No. Do you want, do you want to work on that? Yeah, like, I love you and I want to see this better.

Vision Battlesword [01:17:47]:
Yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:17:48]:
And, yeah, this reminds me, like, you bringing up this part, which I would usually call, like, the ripple effect of the work that we're doing in these communities is the way that we, you know, like, I don't just act like this when I'm in connection with, with someone else. That is a fellow transformation community member. The way that we impact the world with this is by going out to the grocery store or to our families or to wherever it is that people might not be doing this work and really transmitting the essence. And it doesn't even have to be done. Like, it's not something that needs to get done. It's really, how is my being transmitting this frequency and the actions I take in the words I speak? How is this influencing the people around me? Because it has a huge influence. One of the ISTA facilitators, Bruce Lyon, said at the end of a training I did with them, he said, not everyone needs to come to IsTA for the frequency of ISTA to get out. Each person that feels called to this training is a beacon in their own way, shape or form in their community to transmit this to the people around them.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:19:11]:
And so not everybody needs to come into this conscious transformational field. It's the people that feel called to. The people that feel passionate about it will come, they will learn the lessons and they will go out and spread those lessons to other people that may not be willing to come and do the deep dive that some of us are really honed in on doing.

Vision Battlesword [01:19:37]:
Yeah, that's beautiful. Yeah. We're each emissaries and ambassadors of our, you know, our particular little slices of the transformational culture and. Yeah, little by little, you know, hopefully we're making a difference. I think we are. But I just. I feel so, so strongly about that because it just. It breaks my heart.

Vision Battlesword [01:20:00]:
It really, really breaks my heart how much pain and suffering and the generational repetition of the abuse pattern. I've gone through so many different phases of my emotional relationship with it in my life from just anger and frustration, sadness. It's up to each and every one of us. The pattern continues because we don't do anything. Because those of us that can don't do what we could do, you know? And it's more than just not being on the wrong side of the equation. It's more than just not being a predator. It's more than just not being a victim. It's about addressing the predators and helping the victims.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:20:51]:
Yeah. And choosing something that might be radically different than what I may even have done in my past or what my neighbor might do. It's choosing the path that is radically different in a way that's going to support what we want to come out of it.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:08]:
Yeah. What's the most important thing about consent that you've ever learned?

Kayla Rodriguez [01:21:13]:
I think the most important thing about it to me is that, yeah, I can change my mind at any moment. I think that's been the most impactful thing, like giving me the agency to change my mind at any moment. The power in that is so. It's profound.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:36]:
So kind of having the realization that you really are in control of your own experience.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:21:42]:
Yeah.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:43]:
Anything else coming to mind?

Kayla Rodriguez [01:21:44]:
There is something else, but I'm wondering how deep of a rabbit hole it.

Vision Battlesword [01:21:47]:
Is we can stick our heads down there and see.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:21:51]:
Okay. When we talk about. Because we kind of went down this path of like, people being victims in a way, to non consensual acts. And what kept popping up in my head is this idea of victimhood. So to make a distinction here, I think that there's victim consciousness and then there's actually. Your sovereignty was stripped away from you.

Vision Battlesword [01:22:23]:
Totally.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:22:24]:
Yeah. So I think there's a differentiation there. And when you talk about, like, the weaponization of consent culture, I think that victim consciousness plays a role in that. Definitely in that. Because I finally got to, after a few roundabouts, what you meant by the weaponization of consent. It's like, oh, well, I didn't give that person my consent, so they're horrible and terrible and cancel them all of this stuff.

Vision Battlesword [01:22:54]:
Right?

Kayla Rodriguez [01:22:55]:
Yeah. So I finally got around to realizing what you meant, and I think, yes, it can be weaponized, but I also think it can be somewhat unconsciously weaponized, where someone is so deep in their own victim mentality that the world is happening to them that life is just. Yeah, that shit's just happening to them all the time, and they have no control over it. They have no choice. Like, no sense of sovereignty. And this is going off the rails from what I thought I was going to talk about. But there's a part of me that feels some level of compassion for individuals that are unconsciously in victim consciousness or unconsciously in. In anything kind of on the drama triangle where it's like, I didn't know that I was a master manipulator until it got brought to my awareness that this thing is happening.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:23:53]:
So it's like, I notice myself have a lot of judgment around people being in victim consciousness, but then forgetting about that, it's not actually conscious. Like, they're not choosing to be in victim consciousness. They just don't know what they don't know. And, yeah, it's an interesting thing to navigate. Just, like, how do people pop into awareness and consciousness around the patterns that are playing out?

Vision Battlesword [01:24:23]:
Yeah. Wow, this is so rich. Like, everything you just brought up. It's like, I feel like you from earlier in the conversation. It's like I got a million different thoughts coming up. But one of them is, it's just so important to have empathy for everyone and wherever they're at. And especially, it's so easy to slip into that place of judgment and self superiority and then forget that you were almost certainly right there not too long ago. I mean, I've certainly done my dance with victim consciousness in my life, or unconsciousness, if you want to call it that, in my life.

Vision Battlesword [01:25:08]:
But I think you're right. I think, yeah, gosh, it's so rich. It's like that whole concept of victim consciousness or unconsciousness is all across the spectrum of people who either have or allow their consent to be violated. And again, to your point, this is distinct from someone who has their sovereignty ripped away by force. But outside of that, there's a whole spectrum of people who fall into that. People who fall into a. A self fulfilling prophecy of victimhood, because it's what they actually believe about themselves. And, you know, on the one side, there's this kind of.

Vision Battlesword [01:25:54]:
Kind of new overreaction to violation or loss of consent, which is this, like, weaponization of something that's not really victim, not true victimhood, I think, in my belief system anyway. But there's a big swath of territory there in the middle, which is, I think, where we've got our biggest problem. We've got people that are intentionally pushing on the boundary consent and are more than happy to go with it as far as it goes until they get a hard stop on the one hand. And that's a problem that's not okay. You know, that's a sort of a machiavellian or law of the jungle kind of win or loser mentality to life of like, well, I'll take as much as I can get until someone stops me from taking some more. And that has actually helped some people go through life. But then on the flip side of that, you've got that victim state, which could be anywhere on a spectrum from people pleasing all the way to, I secretly think I deserve this, and all different shades in between. That's what I'm really talking about when I say we've got to work on this from both sides.

Vision Battlesword [01:27:08]:
I think real psychopaths, real sociopaths, real violent type people on one side is still a problem in society, of course, that we have to figure out how to deal with. And I think that this kind of cancel culture over correction, of tendency to be offended and insulted and play the victim in that sort of way all the way on the other side. But there's this big, big swath in the middle where we really have the opportunity on both sides of the house to kind of level up our consciousness and level up our behavior and really come into new models of where true communion can happen with consent.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:27:47]:
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And as you kind of labeled out those two things, I was noticing because I did mention the drama triangle earlier. Are you familiar?

Vision Battlesword [01:27:58]:
Oh, yeah.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:27:58]:
Okay. I was kind of seeing these two things and kind of like that triangle in the center of it in terms of, like, the. I don't know, for lack of a better word, like the problems is people just continuously being in that cycle of victimhood, persecutor, rescuer. And that's the biggest issue I've had with cancel culture and the hash metoo movement. There was a lot of that drama occurring. And I'm really seeing in what you're painting of how do we bring these two parts into more harmony with each other, essentially is like the flip side of the drama triangle, which is like the empowerment triangle. How do we bring people more into the conscious creator of their reality? How do we bring people more into the healthy challenger? How do we bring people more into the coach or the person that's going to support someone to create their reality?

Vision Battlesword [01:28:55]:
Yeah, I'm so glad you brought it to that because I feel like that is such an important part of the solution. As you were speaking, I was actually just remembering an experience that I had a few years ago at a festival where there was a drama that happened around a question of consent and something that happened in a tent one night at the festival and stories that were told and a question of, was it consensual? Did someone say no? Was a boundary pushed? Was a boundary actually broken? Was a boundary ever even actually set to begin with? And how would one actually know? And there's this big, big, big drama that happened.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:29:42]:
Like, how many people were discussing this situation?

Vision Battlesword [01:29:46]:
Several. Let's just say it kind of became a big deal, which is, I mean, in a sense, is great that at least it's being talked about, and that's got to be the first step. You know, I mean, people. People telling the story of what happened to them has got to be the first step. But then also, I think it would be good for us to have some level of sophistication and nuance in terms of how we evaluate these things and really asking these tough questions of, like, well, what actually was said, what actually did happen and who took what action and these sorts of things. But at the end of the day, bringing it back to what you were just saying about the empowerment triangle, I think it's really important that if, you know, if anyone's going to take a message from this of like, yeah, you know what? I need to speak up or I need to say something the next time I see something or, you know, whatever that is, or I'm going to. I'm going to be part of the solution and take care of my brothers or take care of my sisters or whatever that may be, that we make sure we're not on the drama side of the drama triangle and going into a persecutor or rescuer mode or going out looking for victims, et cetera. But, you know, the way it was handled, there were certain ways at that festival of the way it was handled that I strongly disagreed with, that I didn't think were productive or helpful at all that leaned more on that kind of woke, cancel culture side of the house.

Vision Battlesword [01:31:06]:
But then there was also some really cool, like, highly conscious, like, responsible actors within the actual festival community itself. And I feel like I was one of them that tried to model, or maybe did model an empowerment triangle approach to how to solve that. And I really think that that kind of coach or challenger approach could be really helpful. Like, on my side, it was actually taking the dude, taking the guy aside, not making a big scene, not in front of everybody, but taking him off to the side. Hey, let's go for a little walk. I want to chat with you. You know, just kind of talking them through, like, you know, this is what I've seen. This is.

Vision Battlesword [01:31:47]:
This is how my interactions with women have gone. Like, I've noticed these kind of cues and these kind of signals. Like, what were you seeing? What were. What was happening for you? Did you ever think that maybe had it ever occurred to you how she might have felt? Maybe she's had past experiences that were not pleasant for her and just kind of walking them through the thought process and coming out the other side of, like, what felt like a really productive conversation and saying like, shit, you're right. Like, I really didn't think of it that way, and maybe I was a little too pushy and hopefully accomplishing some level of moving the ball forward, you know, at least for one. One dude in one festival.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:32:26]:
Yeah, for sure. And, yeah, I like that you brought it to this. Like, reminding people, reminding myself, actually, even that, like, stepping into those roles can have a huge impact. And one of my favorite things in regards to the drama triangle is there are no victims without rescuers. So, like, if I'm not walking around seeing, like, oh, they're doing it wrong or they need to be saved or they need my help, like, that energy creates the victimhood in someone else. And if I actually walk up to someone thinking, okay, we're all human. We all fuck up, and how can I see this person creating the reality that I know that they really want to live in and just, like, empowering that. And, like, not seeing people initially as victims, even someone who has actually been in true victimhood.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:33:28]:
Like, I have friends that have been raped and have been in, like, different scenarios of, like, what I'd consider, like, sovereignty taken away from them. Victimhood and the evolution that they have demonstrated in front of me around how they've gone from victim. Like, yes, they were actually a victim, and they were in victim consciousness around it. And how they shifted into essentially taking their power back, like, owning their power, and shifted into being the creator of the reality. It's like, okay, this thing happened to me, and these are the steps I'm going to take moving forward so that I can help other women or so that I can do this or I can do that, it's like, okay, let's shift. And, like, how can. Yeah. Like, how can I be supportive to that?

Vision Battlesword [01:34:22]:
I think that's the perfect place to bring it to kind of close it up, because, yeah, it seems to me that where we've landed is really at the heart of consent. Is that creator consciousness really having a true, healthy, mature sense of your own boundaries? Your own yes. Your own no. What you want to agree to is coming from that place of creating your own reality, having a sense of agency, autonomy to choose your own experience. And we can model that in our own lives as much as we possibly can, but then also we can help to coach and or challenge people and challenge ourselves, frankly, by pushing our edges and really finding out, you know, where are those mysterious, surprising discoveries in that middle space between the yes and the no. Beautiful.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:35:18]:
Perfectly said. Great summary.

Vision Battlesword [01:35:21]:
Well, I think you said it. I just kind of tied it all together. But, yeah, that was really fun. Kayla, I would love to explore this or anything else more with you later on, for sure.

Kayla Rodriguez [01:35:33]:
There's lots.