In 2010 I had a spiritual and sexual awakening that led me into the field of Tantric Healing and Holistic Intimacy Coaching. I’d like to share 10 insights with you, changes in intention that helped me shift sexually negative or indifferent experiences, into sexually positive and beautiful ones.
1. Learning the true cost of faking
I’d spent years buying into the idea that if my partner was sexually satisfied, and believed I was too, he would both love and stay with me. I faked an awful lot of orgasms under this very misguided notion! When I woke up and started having experiences involving real orgasms, I had a huge realization: If you fake, you short-circuit your own pleasure process.
Your body can never relax enough to become fully orgasmic. Making the decision to change the intention of sexual interaction to pleasure instead of achieving or pretending orgasm, revolutionized my sexual experiences.
Finally, all of my sexual interaction was about the fullness of pleasure, with or without orgasm.
2. Being willing to face the possibility of anger
Often, the decision to back down and keep the peace seemed preferable to discussing honestly what I would like sexually, especially when expressing any sexual change brought up challenging emotions for my partner. Until I realized I cannot take responsibility for someone else’s emotional reactions. When I learned to consciously express myself, with honesty and love, when I stopped trying to anticipate what I believed the reaction would be, before I had even spoken my truth, everything changed.
Yes, I’ve faced a lot of pain and anger. It’s been worth it, because now I’ve also expanded my communication into a really positive and honest intimacy.
3. Having boundaries
As I ventured into the (Neo) Tantric field, I kept berating myself about feeling uncomfortable with certain sexual experiences.
I had this belief that to be truly “Tantric”, I needed to do everything, and be everything sexually.
Until I realized that being that way does not work for me.
What gives me safety and the ability to “sexplore” in a really positive way, is knowing exactly what an experience involves. Even if I choose to be naked in a room full of other people having sex, it does not mean I have to interact sexually with others. It’s still my choice.
Being clear about what can and can’t happen in your body space is hugely empowering, and gives you the safety to experience something new.
Instead of a destructive free-for-all, it becomes a free-to-choose.
4. Reclaiming my body
For years I believed that if my body was only beautiful if others deemed it so. Continually relying on the affirmations of a partner, or friends, was exhausting for everyone.
Because it was never enough.
Until I started to believe it, it didn’t matter how many times it was repeated.
So, I started learning about my bodies’ capability for pleasure, the techniques to be able to do that on my own.
And I was amazed at the response! When I took the time to actually focus and concentrate, spending the time learning about my body, so much shifted. I greeted my vagina. I made friends. I stopped focusing on what I didn’t like, or what didn’t meet an idea of how I thought I should look, and began to truly express physical love and affection to myself. I researched vaginas, and saw the varieties are endless. I finally saw my vagina as unique, and as mine, not just there to be given to others. Reclaiming my body, experiencing more pleasure in the way my body could feel, changed my mind about what my body “needed” to look like. After all, no matter what I looked like, my body gave me pleasure!
5. Accepting my sexual imagination
In 2011 I read one of Nancy Fridays’ compilation books on women’s fantasies. Some fascinated me, some repelled me, some owned me.
My biggest realization was how many of the themes and fantasies were shared by women worldwide. This allowed me to feel connected to other women, and to release the shame, embarrassment and guilt associated with having, and expressing my fantasies.
6. Releasing sexual judgement
As open minded as I wished to believe I was, I knew I was still operating with beliefs about what was “right” or “wrong” sexually. The moment I made a decision to begin observing and researching sexual practices that did not appeal to me, the more I began to understand societies’ layering of fear and guilt on any sexual practises that it deemed fetish or unusual.
I took a deep breath, and went to an extreme bondage evening. I even chose to have a gentle bondage experience of my own that blew my mind. The way the body reacts to pleasure and pain is very similar, it’s the mind that differentiates. I had absolutely no understanding that light pain sensation followed by pleasure sensation, heightens ALL sensation. (We teach this in Holistic Intimacy Coaching as "Skin Activations")
I went with a judgement and erroneous perception of what bondage was, and walked away with a better understanding of how the body works, and how deeply respectful the folk in the bondage world are with one another.
7. Asking for what I wanted
I never felt brave enough to ask for what I wanted to experience. So, I gave in order to receive. Sexual pleasure was not a gift, but an exchange.
I spent a lot of time being very frustrated.
Because men cannot mind read. Even those that have psychic ability cannot know that behind her “No, it’s really OK that you’ve had an orgasm and you want to go to sleep” is a woman who wants more sensual touch and sensuality in general, beyond sexual touch
You have to ask. You have to set an intention.
I learned that the world does not implode when someone says no. It stings in the beginning, and I learned that it’s not really about you if they choose to refuse. It’s about where they are, and how they feel.
And since I started asking, more often than not, I’ve gotten more of what I would like.
The odds are so much better than just hoping it’ll happen…
8. Taking the time to integrate
Even pleasurable, fantastic sexual change or experimentation can create emotional upheaval. For me, understanding that huge sexual life changes need time to integrate, was very confusing. I couldn’t understand why experiences that were so pleasurable, chosen and conscious, kept opening and releasing feelings that were so hard to deal with.
Until I stopped dealing with them, and just FELT them.
It took time. Emotional shifting and growth does. Exploring your sexuality often challenges your core beliefs. I learned to set an intention of just feeling the emotion, letting it take the time that it took, not to judge it as good or bad.
9. Not rushing through my sexual possibilities
Often, making the decision to have a sexually positive experience that’s new or different, is just the first step. I kept trying to do everything in the very first experience. It led to an awful lot of frustration, because some things cannot be done in 3 hours!!! Setting the intention to go slowly really helped me get the most from each experience!
"If you rush, it’s a little bit like trying to eat every food type in one meal, you miss out on the nuance"
10. The gift of pleasure
As I learned that I didn’t have to have sexual intercourse to have a positive and pleasurable sexual experience, I began to be able to fully receive sexual pleasure as a gift. I’d never had the singular experience of just giving, or just receiving, and often during a sexual experience I’d felt it necessary to immediately reciprocate. When the intention is pleasure, and it’s given without “sexpectation,” it’s life changing. That’s what bringing the principles of Neo Tantra and Holistic Intimacy Coaching with joy and beauty and pleasure to all of my sexual experiences has done. Changed my life.
Becoming sex and pleasure positive does that!
A.Clulow
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