A New Understanding of Intimate Relating -- Part II of III

--Part II of II

Modern Changes Which Have Allowed the New to Happen

One of the many factors underlying all of this change is the woman's growing autonomy. In many cultures, never before has a woman been able to be so self-sufficient. The economy provides her ways to earn money, thereby alleviating the need for her to be in a rigid relationship with a breadwinner (man) to meet her economic needs.

This single fact alone is a profound and deep change, and the implications for relating have yet to be fully and deeply understood and integrated.

The physical security of the woman is also shifting in Western society. Men have always on average been the stronger sex physically, so if a woman had a man "on her arm" she was safer: her man could protect her. Now the police have things largely under control in many areas. Rape laws and sexual assault laws are stronger. Women have access to equalizing technologies: pepper spray, guns, and the martial arts. Nowadays, a woman can be safe without a "hubby" protecting her.

In the past, a woman had to be cautious about sharing her love in a sexual way because of the risk of getting pregnant. With birth control, this restriction on sharing sexual love energy is gone.

This is a huge change! This means that when a woman wishes to have sex with a man, she does not have to evaluate him as a potential long-term mate and father! This de-coupling of man as love-sharing partner from man as breadwinner, father, status-bringer, and protector is so important I will address it more fully below.

In the past, sexually transmitted diseases could be serious health risks. Now, with the exception of AIDS, most STDs are curable by modern medicine. Herpes is forever, but it is not life-threatening, and with clear and honest communication, a person with herpes can have a juicy sex life.

A woman's economic self-sufficiency, newfound physical security, and access to birth control and modern medicine have created the conditions for a new kind of relating: a relating based solely on the sharing of and creation of love.

Tearing Up the Laundry List

I wrote about the "romantic dream" which we have been conditioned to want. In the first ten minutes of meeting someone, most of us are running down the laundry list of qualities we want in our Prince or Princess. Income bracket? Hair color? Body type? Intellect? College degree? Car? Social consciousness? Religion? Sexual predilections? Reliability? Position in society? Interior design taste? And so forth.

One thing that needs to happen is a de-coupling of these things from each other. Each person in their head needs to separate income from status in society from sexual intimacy because each person can attain to each of these things autonomously in modern society. If a woman wants to be rich, great! Let her go out and get rich. This desire does not need to keep her from acting on her sexual energy if she is attracted to an economically poor man.

Here is another way to think about it. When you go to a lawyer, you get legal advice. You don't expect to have long personal conversations, or to buy a house together with the lawyer. A doctor gives you medical help, no more and no less. Many people have tennis friends or golf friends: they play a round or a match, shake hands, and say good bye. When you go to a massage therapist, you get a massage. And some people go to a Reiki healer: there they receive a Reiki (energy) treatment, and go home, no strings attached. My question is this: why can't an energy/touch/sex partner function in the same way? Why in this case (which is arguably not so much more intimate than a massage or Reiki session) is the relating linked to a laundry list?

Add to the afore-mentioned de-coupling the removal of the stigma of "slut" if a women shares her love energy and sex with many partners, and we have finally created the conditions for the free sharing of love and connection. Each person can create a loving connection with a person who s/he is drawn to in the moment, without worrying about "linkage" to every other area of life.

The New Paradigm of Relating: Conscious Connection

The changes mentioned above have created an incredible opportunity for women and men alike: an opportunity filled with love and delight. Dropping the old patterns and scripts gives way to a life potentially filled with unimaginable bliss.

How do we -- men and women -- prepare ourselves for this new way of relating? We are all carrying the conditionings of the old paradigm. We need to see and dissolve these conditionings. Most of us also need to develop new relating skills, and a greater awareness of what we are bringing to a relating in each moment.

I use the term "conscious connection" to refer to any energetic or physical meeting of two or more human beings during which there is much presence, awareness, love and attention.

Often in a massage therapy session there is conscious connection. Two people in love, holding hands on a bench, can be in conscious connection. A man and woman making love can be in conscious connection. A (hopefully) large percentage of the activities which fall under the headings of tantra and/or sexual healing work happen in conscious connection. It is also possible for two people to be in conscious connection without actually touching physically. Reiki healing would be an example of this type of activity.

It is probably not necessary to point out that in all of these scenarios, it is a possibility for the people relating with each other to NOT be in conscious connection. A few examples will help illustrate the new definition.

At times I have been in a massage session where the therapist slowly brings her hands closer to my back, to begin the treatment. Before her hands physically make contact with my skin, I can feel her "touching" me. In this moment, conscious connection is happening.

If the massage therapist, while working on a client, is thinking about what she needs to buy at the grocery store after work, and the touch feels like she is kneading a ball of dough, we can be fairly certain there is not much conscious connection happening.

I have sat across from another person many times, softly gazing in their eyes, and I have felt a deep and conscious connection with the person. I have also had meetings with people when I am totally in my head, feeling defensive or shut down or distracted, and totally without a connection to the person.

In short, if the goal of life is to create more love and awareness in each moment, then engaging in conscious connection is an effective means to attain to this goal.

The In- and Out-Breath of Relating

One piece of self-awareness each person needs to develop has to do with the readiness in each moment she feels to connect. In other words, in one moment, a person may be feeling open and alive and ready to dance with another. In the next moment, a person may be feeling like she needs to take care of herself, to nurture herself, to be with herself. A person needs to see clearly where she is at in any given moment, and to be able to communicate this to others.

This being said, I think we as a group need to begin more often with a "yes!" When I walk through the supermarket, most people I see are so closed off they will not even make eye contact or return my smile with a smile in kind. What to say about a hand shake, a touch on the arm, a hug, or more?

What if instead of our starting place being "no," it was "yes?" With the understanding that the details of the "yes" are always open to negotiation. What if the social convention was that it was expected that you have some form of loving exchange with every person with whom you crossed paths? Imagine how much more nourished we would all feel.

Safety

These days there is a very practical way to deal with the initial safety issues which may arise when seeking a connection with a new person. There still exists "the creep factor" -- there are plenty of people out there who don't have the relating skills to play the kind of game I am describing.

There are all kinds of workshops which allow people ready to play in this arena to meet and to grow the skills needed to go deeper. Cuddle parties; snuggle parties; tantric pujas; and many others. In these workshops it is very easy to determine who has the skills to play one-on-one, and who needs a little more practice in a group setting.

It is also easy in these seminars to discover who you vibe with -- each person is in a different stage of purification; each person has physical preferences; and in these groups it is easy to scan the members and see who potential "dance" partners are.

If I was king of the world, I would mandate that every person needs to attend a number of these workshops. They teach communications skills, setting boundaries, knowing your "yes-es" and "no-s," negotiating from a "no" to a "yes," asking for what you want, and all kinds of other skills needed to enter an intimate, loving relating.

After playing in groups, the next step is simple. Pick up the phone and set up a one-to-one meeting with someone. Because the scripts are dropped, it doesn't have to be your Prince Charming or Princess Lea. No one is seeking to fulfill the romantic dream of a marriage, white picket fence, and two-car garage. We are each self-sufficient humans, coming together in the moment to engage in healing / purification exercises. We are coming together to share and to make love.

The Emotions

It has been said that before a woman can feel safe getting involved physically with a man, there are certain emotional needs that need to be met.

A quick perusal of the top ten Google results on the subject suggest these needs may include: the need for affection (the expression of care which symbolizes security, protection, comfort and approval), conversation (being listened to), honesty and openness, financial support, family commitment, to not feel used, to not feel pressured into doing something the woman doesn't want to do, to feel understood, balm for abandonment issues, balm for jealousy, to feel cared for and loved, to be respected, devotion, validation, the freedom to feel a range of emotions, and to have her inner child attended to.

Whew!

I likely do not need to point out that many of the items in the above list are not emotional needs. Clearly clarity is not a requirement to make the top ten in Google.

But more to the point is the necessity to go beyond the psychological approach to needs in general. There are two pieces to the Buddha-like approach. First of all, I need to see that when I feel an emotion, it is not "my" emotion I am feeling, for the simple reason that there is no "I" in the first place. Emotional energies move through the body-mind; they shift and change all day long, but they are not "mine." The disidentification from the emotions is developed by strengthening the witnessing consciousness, and one super way to do this is by practicing a meditation technique of your choice.

I've already alluded to the second piece of the Buddha-like approach to emotions. I need to come to know that emotions are simply one frequency (or flavor) of energy, just as thoughts are another flavor and certain physical sensations are a third flavor. When I come to know the truth of this statement, and I start playing with conscious connection and tantric sex, the energy generated will "meet the emotional needs" in a much more direct, nourishing fashion. I will feel fulfilled with no labeling or discussion necessary!

Therefore, I would argue that the initial supposition of this section is actually 180 degrees off from the existential reality. If a woman (or man) seeks to "have his/her emotional needs met" (that is to say, if a person seeks to alchemize the energies stuck in the emotional dimension near to their body-mind) a high-octane way to do this is to go *directly* into conscious connection and sacred sex, after having learned the necessary communications skills as mentioned above.