The Paradox of Intimacy
Posted on: November 2, 2011
There’s a paradox out there regarding deep connection. To have pleasurable, nourishing relationships with others, you have to be strong enough not to fuse with them; you have to have a strong sense of who you are.
Part of this is the ability to focus inward and understand your own inner terrain.
You can explore the bigger picture of who you are through personality profiles such as the Myers & Briggs, Gallup StrengthsFinder, DiSC Assessment, or your Enneagram.
Tests such as these provide a way to navigate and understand who you are, but they are not you. You are no “thing.” When we look at ourselves we often attach to an “identity,” a way of explaining who we are to others “I am a Christian mother of two who is good at juggling multiple tasks and is afraid of spiders.” That may be an accurate description of you to others, but that is not who you are. Who you are is a much more fluid illuminated being.
“You don’t have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.” – C.S. Lewis
If you want to know who you are, you can begin with simple exercises that bring you in deeper contact with your Self. Here is one that I call the body scan:
Exercise Name: the Body Scan
Overview: This is an exercise that can be done sitting or standing. When first learning this exercise, it’s best to do alone. After you learn the ropes you can do this anywhere. Read the next paragraph slowly. Take in each instruction. Learn the concept of the exercise. Then after you are finished reading, stand up, find a quiet space and begin the exercise. It could take anywhere from 2-30 minutes depending on your focus and ability to remain present. This is not a contest or a race. Often when starting a vulnerable exercise we tend to rush through it with an “I got it… yeah yeah.” Seek to quiet that voice.
Begin: Bring your awareness to the bottom of your feet. Notice how they feel, really feel them. Can you feel a certain temperature? Pressure? Soreness? Anything you feel is worthy of observation. No judgment. No trying to change what’s there. Don’t even interpret what you feel… just feel it. Now move up through both of your feet… noticing what you feel. Then your ankles. Then your calves. Do this process slowly through your entire body. This can be done in small parts or large regions. When you reach the top of your head you can finish or continue scanning back down your body. When you decide to end, go back to whatever you were doing before, but try to keep your awareness in this feeling place rather than returning to your thoughts. Some call focusing one’s attention in this way: being in a state of mindfulness.
- In: Play!
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I’ve noticed that when we have an attitude of Play we are Open-minded, Receptive, Present in the Now, Flexible, and Loving. So why have we forgotten this essential key to a happy joyful life? Simple, we may have started listening to the wrong voices. We listened to the “What will they think?” or “How will they judge me?” or “I don’t feel like it!” (and you can throw in a foot stomp for effect,) instead of listening to that inner part of us that is curious about the world. That is where we stumble. We listen to the voice that keeps us small. For Play is about more than childhood games, it is an attitude of how to jump into life and be BIG!
Psychologist David Elkind has been studying Play. Pure play, he indicates, is motivated by pleasure. It is unstructured, self-motivated, imaginative, and independent kind, where we initiate our own games and even invent our own rules.
Maybe we tend not play anymore because we have learned to stifle pleasure? Possible. However, what if you just decided to play anyway? What would happen? Would society stop in its tracks to judge you? Probably not; more likely you would start to feel joy, and pleasure. So why not play?
Play is a direct route to intimacy because it’s a way to learn more about ourselves and our partners. Play reveals the kind of person we really are. Sean and I suggest an attitude of Play because, not only does it make everything a little more fun; when trying new things and being vulnerable, Play is a way to keep our resistance down.
In other words, Play keeps us open. It keeps things light. It keeps the risk low. So if you want more joy in your life, get out of your head and Play!
How do you bring play into your life? How do you find your playful self when things begin to become more rigid? One fun way we’ve found is to incorporate some guidelines used in improvisational theatre. Here are a few:
1. Accept all offers.
For a story to unfold in improv, you have to say “yes” to whatever detail of the story that your partner offers, no matter how ridiculous it might seem. Anything other than an exuberant “yes” prevents the action from moving forward. That’s called blocking, and makes for really bad improv.
Notice that the world around you is making you “offers” much of the time. It might come in the form of noticing the people around you and talking to a guy in line at the coffee shop. The “offer” might look like noticing some new way of doing something you never thought you’d do.
Practice hearing and saying “yes” to “offers.” See where they take you. Just like in improv, you might want to play it safe, stay in control, and not allow yourself to be vulnerable. But the rules of improv encourage you to just “go there.” Notice what offers your partner is putting out there. How might you say yes and see what happens.
2. Focus on the present.
In improv, the focus is on whatever happens to the players right there on stage, not whatever the characters might have gone through in the past or future. You have to listen to what’s said and not said so that you can react. The sly look, the angry tone, the suggestive touch each require the player to ask, “How does it make me feel and how can I express that onstage now?” Likewise, when you are walking through life with a playful attitude…you have to be here now…noticing, taking it all in…this is where the play happens. Not in the past or the future…play happens in the now.
3. Let go of the inner critic.
There’s no time to think about what to say or do in response to your partner in an improv game. You have to simply react and be spontaneous. The surprise of what comes out makes improv fascinating to watch just as the surprise of what comes out in play makes for unexpected and possibly delightful experiences. There’s no “wrong” way to do it…let go of the critic and play.
4. Make your partners look good.
Improv is a team activity based on collaboration. When you take the focus off of yourself and focus on helping out the other actors, the acting comes more easily, and the scene is more successful.
When you’re moving into an attitude of play, take the focus off of yourself. Flip that “I” thinking around and ask, what impact can I have on my partner? There are so many ways to contribute…. focus there and play will naturally emerge.
5. Be changed.
For improv to be interesting, the characters in the scene have to experience some type of change. You have to allow yourself to be changed, and let the other actors change you. You’ll go on a journey, get into trouble, experience the consequences, be surprised by a turn of events, and have an a-ha moment.
The path to finding your play is an exciting one if you let it be. Be willing to go the shadowy places that you’ve been avoiding and the glittering places where fear comes up too. Being vulnerable and open to possibility allows you to be changed.
“What do most Nobel Laureates, innovative entrepreneurs, artists and performers, well-adjusted children, happy couples and families, and the most successfully adapted mammals have in common? They play enthusiastically throughout their lives.”
– Stuart Brown, Institute of Play
Some people hesitate in the face of intimacy because deep down they’re afraid of becoming unmoored and losing themselves. Some falter because they don’t want to go outside their comfort zone; and some just don’t know how to be more intimate.
We are going to suggest an alternative. There are many ways to view something, many angles and many lenses to look through. To gaze at something, pick an interpretation, and then imagine that how we see it must be the “right way” is problematic.
Explore with curiosity, wonder, and an attitude of play. Remember exploring as a kid? Looking around for clues to tell you what might happen next… what might be possible? As a kid we saw everything with new eyes. This blog is about experiencing an intimate life with new eyes.
It is also a place to read about ideas and exercises that increase connection and communication with your partner. And while it’s meant to increase the pleasure in your relationship, these topics can be translated to other areas of your life. You could even say it’s a road map for a mindful, sensual life.
Welcome to a space for couples that is meant to increase self-knowledge, intimacy, and joy. Welcome to SXCoach.
- Colleen and Sean
“Though oneness is the essence of love, the vitality of love comes from the partnership of two whole, in-the-flesh human beings who respect each other’s separateness. Ultimately every facet of human existence is reflected in the reconciliations of oneness and separateness.”
–Kaplan, Oneness & Separateness: From Infant to Individual.
- In: 15-Minute SX | Attention OUT | Clearly Communicate | Couples Course | Focus IN | Play! | Touch
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The Couples Course on Communication, Intimacy and Play!
supercharge your desire, and open up to intimacy
Price: $295 $195 per couple (limited scholarships available)
Date: November 5th, 10am to 4:00pm
Course Description: Designed for those curious about how to increase intimacy in their lives, our signature course walks you and your partner, step-by-step, through five different ways to center yourself and connect with each other; providing a road map for a mindful, sensual life.
This is a 6-hour, One-Day immersive experience, designed to increase intimacy, reduce shame, and heighten sensation throughout your body.
Through this workshop you will learn how to:
- center yourself, notice and identify sensations in your body, and elevate your self-care
- develop meaningful relationships outside of your partnership, and why that is healthy for both of you
- notice what is really happening in your relationship, as opposed to the judgements you have
- cleanly and clearly communicate with your partner without blame or agenda,
- express your desires without shame, and pursue those desires without becoming slave or addicted to them
- tap into your inner-child and learn to play with each other freely
Agenda:
- 10am Introductions and Lecture
- 10:30am Focus IN
- 11:30am Attention OUT
- 12:30pm – 1:30 Lunch
- 1:30pm Clearly Communicate
- 2:30pm Touch
- 3:00pm Play!
- 3:45pm Explanation of 15-Minute SX
- 4:00pm Q&A Course Ending
Prerequisites: A willingness to be curious
Limitations: You must register as a couple for this course. The Couples Course is open to female-female & male-female partnered relationships, as well as those who wish their friendships to cross normal societal boundaries.
Space is limited. 10 Couples Maximum.
info@sxcoach.com for Scholarship Inquiry
About the Couples Course
Posted on: September 2, 2011
In order to explain the Couples Course, and how it was developed, I am going to tell you a story; the story of me.
I was doing everything I was told to do. I went to the right schools. I had the right job. I dated the right people. I had acquired all the right stuff, and I had the right life. So why did I not feel “right?” In fact, why did I feel so profoundly wrong?
Surrounded by people, I felt alone. In the midst of the vibrance and the color of life, I felt grey. Not only that, but I resented those who seemed more colorful. This was not a healthy way to live.
Even though I couldn’t touch it, I knew that there was something else, another way to live, even if I didn’t feel I could have it, I knew it was there. If only because the alternative was too depressing to think about.
I began a journey to discover what was missing, and in the midst of that journey, in all of my research, in the years of studying intimacy, one thing kept emerging; Touch.
Those who felt connected to those around them were free with their touch, whereas to those who felt disconnected, touch seemed confusing, and in some ways annoying to them. They pulled away from it, sometimes subtly, other times violently. Their hugs were two taps on the back and separate. Their physical boundaries were rigid.
And I… was one of those people.
And so, I started to practice how to touch others around me; to see how it changed me. And then, there was an opening, and then another, and another. I shut down after some, and some were so expansive I felt I was lost. Throughout the process, in through those openings, feeling flooded into me. I felt at this deep instinctual level what it was be to HUMAN. HAPPY. ALIVE.
We have been taught by society to believe in logic over feeling, to believe thoughts of sensual pleasure are wrong and we are deviant for having them, and to believe that love is some mystical force you cannot understand. These beliefs have been taught to us because the society that teaches us has shame around them. But we are not a society, we are people, we are human.
The good news is that you can not only learn to eliminate the guilt of sensual pleasure, but do it in a way that is in integrity with who you are. Granted, it took me 5 years, intense inquiry, and a boatload of missteps and pain to not only find that out, but to develop a way others could follow without having to step in all the thorn bushes I did along the way.
When it comes to intimacy and relationships, regardless of our fear or bravado, there is a process you can learn that helps you create the life, and the relationships you desire.
Designed to address various levels of resistance to intimacy, I developed a fivefold framework, and created the Couples Course to walk you through that process, step-by-step. This framework, Focus IN, Attention OUT, Cleary Communicate, Touch, and Play! facilitates connecting with others in a way that is pleasurable, and provide you experiences to use as a basis for further exploration and inquiry.
In the Couples Course you will learn how to:
- center yourself, notice and identify sensations in your body, and elevate your self-care
- develop meaningful relationships outside of your partnership, and why that is healthy for both of you
- notice what is really happening in your relationship, as opposed to the judgements you have
- cleanly and clearly communicate with your partner without blame or agenda,
- express your desires without shame, and pursue those desires without becoming slave or addicted to them
- tap into your inner-child and learn to play with each other freely
What’s the SX? of SXCoach?
Posted on: September 1, 2011
SX is me; they are my initials, and I am the founder of the Couples Course, a path to deepening your connection with those around you, and 15-Minute SX, a mindful sexuality practice.
I have been going by those initials for years when teaching courses or coaching students and couples. As someone once told me, you can pronounce it “sex,” and that made me laugh. I found it one of those rare serendipitous moments… and it stuck. I’m Sex (SX) and the site is Sex Coach (SXCoach) Get it?
OK, I think I just threw up a little in my mouth. I hope you are laughing at little at that, because I do not take myself too seriously. I have been asked to “grow up” several times. My response has always been the same “Why?” At which point those who ask truly struggle to find an answer. What is “expected” is rarely fun, and I am a firm believer in the joy and play in life.
In the Couple Course I could talk about psychological archetypes, the shame society places on sex, and Buddhist philosophy as it relates to Prana, our sex, and our connection with others. However, you may fall asleep while I did so, and I may fall asleep right after that.
And that is why the Couples Course is fun. Integrating who I am in my life is so essential to my teaching others.
So why do I believe I can help you connect in a deep and visceral way with the world around you? Why do I believe that I can help super-charge your sex life? and help enable you to have deep meaningful relationships?
Because I, am you. No, scratch that; I was in worse shape than anyone who will ever read this. Before I woke up and discovered I could live the life I wanted if I just got rid of everything I expected it to be, I was living the blissfully ignorant life of the unconscious. And then, in sequence of events I had a stroke, my father died, my fiancee left me, and lost my job. The entire decade of the 00′s was, one big long implosion.
However, and this is where it gets good, I started to question everything I had learned, every little societal lesson, and I went back to square one. I took every self-help, development course that existed, from Landmark Forum, to crazy whacked out sexuality practices. I was searching for something, some answer, something external to me, and then, I woke up, and looked inward.
There were reasons that all of this happened. I’m not talking about big cosmic reasons, I am talking instead about looking at the world differently. Not as if things were being done to me, but realizing and accepting my part in all of it. I learned to take 100% responsibility for my actions, and my part in relationships. And I learned with open eyes and an open heart for the first time.
Why can I help? Because unlike some people who are born open-hearted and easily connect with others, I had to build those skills step-by-step. And when you have to build something this way, you begin to understand how it is put together in a way others, who just receive a gift, do not know.
The process was so transformative for me that I wanted to help others feel the same sense of freedom. To help men and women, who may be shutdown around sexuality and touch, connect with their bodies and each other. To enable clear communication, without all of the blame, story, and suspicion we have been taught.
Over the years I developed a fivefold framework as way to help guide students in a more structured manner through the minefields of intimacy and connection.
A fivefold map, the Lotus framework was developed as a way to help guide students in a structured path through the minefields of intimacy and connection.
Welcome. It’s an amazing journey you are are about to undertake… and it all begins now.
If I said “You can have everything you desire,” you probably would not believe me. But it’s true. There is no “trick.” It is really just a matter of wanting to change, and a desire for something more in life.
Unfortunately, most of us have a vast array of self-sabotage skills to prevent that from happening. It’s risky to change, so we sabotage ourselves under the mistaken belief it keeps us safe; it does keep us safe, and lonely.
I use the word “lonely,” because it is so much different than “alone.” I have worked with many couples who were not “alone,” but were profoundly “lonely.” We teach workshops to help you reconnect with your partner in a deeply intimate and sustainable way.
If you are interested in learning more contact us at info@sxcoach.com
