I’ll admit it: I, Diana Laurence, author of the “Soulful Sex” books, am the biggest goody-goody you will ever meet. I was reminded of it again this week when my husband recommended a quiz to determine which level of hell you deserved. Based on your admissions to various naughty-to-dastardly acts, the quiz told you how deep you were headed, the most innocent score being Purgatory. That, of course, was my result. It’s the same when I take Innocence Tests, Evilness Tests, anything that determines how good/bad you are: I always score in the highest echelon of goody-goodiness. This is not because I’m an angel, far from it. I’m just one of those boring, responsible, good girls who was taught to behave.

Except in the arena of sex, that is. I didn’t understand what was the problem with my going shirtless in the summer when I was five--the neighbor boys did it. I lifted up my skirt in first grade on a dare; I guess I didn’t think the revelation of my underwear was any big deal. As a senior on the Forensics team I did my original speech on sex education, which got me a lot of bad scores when the team went to meets where nuns were among the judges. I thought smoking was bad, drugs were bad, drunkenness was bad...but sex, to me, was good. It could be abused like any good thing, but it could also be really, really healthy for you.

Well, I guess I’m just one of the millions of nice girls who like sex.

Our culture often makes the mistake of lumping in the erotic with the naughty. Sex gets thrown in with those other scourges of innocence: violence, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. Things that turn you on are deemed “temptations,” encouragements to sin. You must be 18 or older so it has to be bad, right?

Eventually, that feeling of naughtiness becomes our litmus test for the erotic; if it doesn’t make you feel dirty, it can’t be sexy. This is a real shame, because it cuts you off from all sorts of happy and upbeat variations on the erotic.

Now don’t get me wrong, naughty sex can be a fun and even healthy variation on the theme, as part of a balanced fantasy life. But fantasizing about naughty sex isn’t bad, and if you convince yourself that it is, then you feel shame and guilt pointlessly. Eventually those feelings can become so closely associated with arousal that you can’t get turned on unless you feel you’re doing something bad.

Meanwhile, the association between “badness” and sex scares a lot of “nice girls” away from the erotic. For example, I’ve gotten many an email from a reader who took a chance on reading my stories even though she “doesn’t like erotica,” only to find it was possible to read about sex in a very innocent, uplifting context. And I’m not the only author writing for “nice girls” about sex. It’s simply a misconception that reading sexy fiction is some sort of nasty vice. I’ve maintained for a long time that it can greatly enhance a person’s life and psychological balance.

I suppose the reason I believe so strongly in this principle is that I’ve spent my whole life being this goody-two-shoes who isn’t the least bit ashamed of sex. Clearly my enthusiastic appreciation of the erotic hasn’t done anything to corrupt or unbalance me, or even shift me very far off my completely annoying devotion to good behavior. It has, however, opened me up to the erotic aspects of all kinds of diverse and unexpected things, as readers of my blog “Erotica with Soul” (www.eroticawithsoul.blogspot.com) know. Who else has made the claim that John Williams’ music, a walk in the woods, and baseball games are erotic?

So, fellow Good Girls, if you’ve been hiding your interest in sex under a bushel, feeling like it just wasn’t appropriate for “a person like you,” take heart! You really can find ways to expand your enjoyment of the erotic that synch with the rest of your personality.

Even reading erotic fiction!

Diana Laurence is the author of the Soulful Sex anthologies, most recently "Soulful Sex: The Paranormal Collection." Visit her at www.dianalaurence.com.