Not Opposed or Entirely Different

tumblr_mbs1lrASQV1qdartlo1_500by Lady Cheeky

Just because I am open does not mean I let everyone in

Just because I let you in doesn’t mean I do it for everyone

Just because you get a second chance doesn’t mean you’ll get a third

Just because I have some hard edges doesn’t mean I’m not soft
Just because I flirt with you does not mean we will fuck

Just because I enjoy sex does not mean I want to have it now

Just because I express my sexual self does not mean that I am taking numbers

Just because I believe every woman should enjoy her body does not mean it’s an invitation for you to

Just because I want to be wooed does not mean I am high-maintenance

Just because I sleep with you does not mean I will accept less than I should

Just because I want you to fuck me does not mean you can’t be a gentleman

Just because I take charge does not mean I don’t want you to

Just because I want to be treated as a whole person does not mean I don’t like you

Just because I want to be acknowledged for my other charms does not mean I don’t want you inside me

Just because I accept you between my legs does not mean I am “easy”

Just because I’m attracted to you does not mean you can be lazy

Just because I am a feminist does not mean I don’t appreciate chivalry

Just because I talk dirty does not mean I don’t like tenderness

Just because I call you does not mean you can come over

Just because I am pretty does not mean I don’t want to hear it from you

Just because I am confident does not mean I don’t worry you won’t like me naked

Just because I am smart does not mean I won’t say stupid things

Just because I am horny does not mean I don’t want to be held

Just because I speak freely doesn’t mean I give it freely

Just because I am a woman does not mean I don’t want it like a man
Just because I want you does not mean you don’t have to try

Just because I mean this now does not mean I won’t mean it later

Just because I stand up for myself does not mean it’s not scary

Just because I like you does not mean I’ll settle

Just because …

 

 

A Users Guide: How To Show Up to F*ck a Turned On Woman

I loved this when I first read it and recently went back to it again. So smart. -LC

tumblr_m6ijz9zb3H1r3s0uho1_500

By Nicole Daedone  Originally published on her blog www.NicoleDaedone.com on 8/8/12

This is what I have come to understand. There is absolutely zero context for men to know how to fuck a Turned On Woman—meaning a woman who is free, who is capable of what I call Unconditional Sex; sex that is not saddled with “conditions” such as promises of wedding proposals, dishwashers, babies. A woman who owns her sex and does not need to use it for barter, who has the wealth and luxury—both energetic and emotional—to use it for her pleasure.

A man I’ve been seeing said, “Yeah, we (men) don’t know what to do because that kind of woman is like a unicorn”.

Sex has been the purview of men, and as such its uses have mostly been masculine. Not a problem in and of itself, but in my opinion a woman’s touch is needed in the arena of what it “means.” I see a polarization of sorts, where, running from sex-as-gravely-significant or sex-for-procreation, the masculine veers way to the other end of the scale: devoid of any emotion, connection or caring; wanton, gluttonous. The only reasons for a woman to engage would be (a) desperation, (b) the “god-given” woman’s agenda (to snag a man in her snare) or, worst of all, (c) that she approaches sex “like a man.” In the present context it is absolutely impossible that a woman could maintain her femininity; still like to yield and surrender; want deep connection and love sex… with—gasp!—more than one person. (Oh, and not be salacious and therefore open to anything from BDSM and gang bangs.) Within the game as it exists, this is a total non-sequitur.

We lack gradients, we live in an either/or perspective. Either a woman’s legs are locked and closed and safe and healthy or else they are open to just about anything flying in there. In the present context it is unthinkable that a woman could both practice discernment and feed her beast. I suppose that it is assumed that she is too fragile to tame the thing. And I suppose this is because we underestimate the power of love as the most powerful trainer.

One of the responses I get most often is that it is intimidating to be with a woman who is facile in the arena of sex. Not “thank god,” not “finally we can see what this thing can do,” but “how do I compare to other guys?” Which leads me to believe that men are not liberated sexually either. Their prowess only goes so far, it is in the hunt, but the having, the devouring is beyond both sexes. There is a hungry ghost rattling around the male psyche that rarely gets exposed. When it does, it goes something like this: I am good at wanting, craving, reaching, begging, but when the food is placed on my table, for some reason I am incapable of eating it. Part of the conditioning of the male psyche is that for a man to admit that he didn’t pounce, it would mean that he was of all things a “pussy,” the worst thing for a man to be, and her sexual appetite makes her a harlot, too man-like—put your negative connotation here—the worst thing she could be.

What I am getting is that we are in one of those Chinese finger locks, both are stuck, each hoping the other has the solution. Yes, the solution is to stop pulling away from each other. It is to stand in the face of this orgasm and brave our various sets of conditioning in order to enter and meet inside of it.

As far as I can tell the biggest challenge for women is a sense of hopelessness that it will ever be “any good”, that it will ever be sex from her native land, the kind where her body can open and she can lose herself. Time and again I hear, he’s too rough, he’s too fast, he doesn’t have enough attention. When I ask these women if they show these men what to do or slow them down, they sink into the paralysis of learned helplessness with an underlying preemptive anger. (And the unconscious fear of being the deer who suddenly turns and tells the lion how to take this meal to the next level.) The assumption is that a man doesn’t want to learn. And I would say, yes, learning occurs in the brain as physical pain. Yes learning is hard. No one likes it. And ultimately it is the only thing that brings us gratification. And I sincerely have never met a man who was not open to suggestion—sometimes they feel clumsy and stupid and try to hide it with bravado (like we all do), but with care and communication, they do have a deep desire.

The biggest challenge I see that men face is the “what is in it for me” mentality, which is devastating in the arena of sexuality. Great for business, bad for orgasm. The daemon which is a fundamental sexual energy, the necessary element of self-seeking that takes her, has run a bit rampant in the conditioned psyche of man such that no matter how much he grabs, he never gets his. That is the real nature of a hungry ghost. The conditioned psyche of men in this culture is that they can grab and grab but they cannot ingest. The daemon has got a hold of them and they are doing its bidding and it will never be gratified. This is why we see masculine driven sex in this culture as empty calories; that devoid of emotion, it is based solely on consumption but not nourishment. And it is a catch-22 in that the constant craving for more that in turn leads toward self seeking prevents the actual nourishment that would bring gratification.

Women hold the counter-pose or the antidote. But dammit, we won’t administer it. We won’t administer it because to do so we would need a place to plug the IV into and that would be straight into the vein of sex. And all the things that would signify about us that we are unwilling to claim. But this isn’t mere weakness or petulance. It lies in the fact that one’s capacity to stand in truth, to not lose oneself in a sea of opinions, to live essentially in an autonomous mind, a room of one’s own, is a result of contacting one’s own daemon as one does through… you got it… orgasm. Again, catch 22— she does not have the muscle to steer sex into the arena of what she likes and wants because she is not having the sex she wants which would develop that muscle. In other words, women do not have the power surging thorough them to withstand judgment about their sex and so do not bring the “other half” of sex, that would nourish both, into the equation.

579178_10152237903185494_755372263_nBut someone’s gotta give. You can’t go to the gym to look good enough to go to the gym. At some point you just gotta face the fact that it is going to hurt. Guys, it is going to screw with your masculinity but you are going to have to be with a woman who is facile enough in the sexual arena, free of all of the signifiers that make you a man, like the agreement to play chaste and subservient. And you are going to have to reward these women for giving you an education that hurts in the receiving. And that will require you to postpone the “getting yours” because in this case “yours” is the receiving of this education which is more a marathon than a sprint and will result in you shifting into a mindset that goes from mere quantity to quality, which ultimately nourishes you and quells the craving or converts it into depth.

And women friends, you are just going to have to withstand the throwing of tomatoes. What is the alternative? Keep your orgasm tamped down for another thousand years because you were unwilling to be called a few names or forego the illusion of there ever being a savior. Yes, there is a savior and guess what— you are it. You are here to save sex from the devastating state it’s in, unless porn, and weird sex where you have to use foreign words like yoni, or medicalized sex replete with medication, is your thing.

Here’s where you start. You admit you want it. Then you determine that are going to make it good. Not that you are going to hope and pray beyond all hope that this guy will be the one to magically “get it.” You are going to insure beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is brilliant and successful. You are going to make it through the dip. The dip is where everyone quits. It’s what Organic Chemistry is to medical school: the class that filters out about 80 per cent of students because it is so challenging. And the dip in terms of your orgasm is your willingness to withstand judgment about being a Turned On Woman. If you can make it through that dip, you have earned your stripes and deserve to have access to the power that orgasm can bring. But you’ve got to earn your chops and withstand the presumptions and assumptions about what it means for a woman to be sexual and then even worse, right when you want to konk them on the head and say “are your out of your friggin’ mind?”—you are going to educate. You are going to educate people into a new way— a way where sex without conditions does not mean sex without consciousness. In the same way it is not weakness that has one able to love unconditionally, it actually stems from strength, it is not desperation that has a woman sex unconditionally, it actually stems from power.

With this in mind, I thought I would give a little guide for the guys as to how to prepare to meet with a Turned on Woman. Sort of like when you are going to camp and they tell you how to prepare—this is How to Prepare to Fuck a Turned On Woman. Mind you, this is just how to prepare to fuck this turned on woman, but in holding up my end of the deal, the one where I make sure that you are brilliant and successful with me—here goes.

We can make this very easy. Set a time and show up on time. Both of us will be feeling a certain anticipation. We will be riding that edge of turn on and irritation. The more we can both stay inside the parameters we agree on in terms of logistics, the more we will develop trust and the more powerfully we can let go. I know how to manage sexual tension in my body, how to allow it to build and build. To a point. Often you hear about a woman being dramatic. Its not drama—it’s screech level anticipation. I want it to be that you show up and I am in the sweet spot—that line where I am having you and wanting you both. I cannot tell you how many guys “got lost on my way” coming over to have sex.

A context needs to be set because this is neither a bootie call nor a marriage ceremony. Alan Watts once said that life is far too serious to be taken seriously. This is as well. Again we are looking for a sweet spot where, on the one hand, we acknowledge that we are exploring together in the most charged, intense, potential that exists on the planet; and on the other, in the same way Suzuki Roshi says that enlightenment is just sitting—this is just sex. The experience begins when we agree to meet, and from that moment everything from wondering what I should wear for you to feeling a throb in my pussy when I imagine you being here, is part of it. I include everything, which makes it that much richer. It is like going to the symphony and being attuned to every note. Somehow doing this creates an experience of losing oneself. That is the ultimate experience that I am looking for with you—for each of us to lose ourselves and discover what is there when we do. =

For this reason I like it when you text or email me your thoughts, desires and hopes and fantasies about what is to come as they arise. It’s a way I get to be inside of you. In the private place. Sometimes it is like I get a whiff of you beforehand, or I will think about the night and feel my pussy swell. I want to tell you. I want to know anything and everything you want to share with me. All of it. I want to know your guts and your soul. I am an infinite player, and as such everything is of consequence. I want to know all of your wiring so that I can flick as many switches as possible. I am willing to share anything and everything with you.

Please show up sans scent. I am an animal. I need to smell you. I don’t want you to mask your fear, your desire, your lust. There is no scent to me that is better than your scent—you are in my bed because you are you and I want to know exactly what that is. This is not to say that I am in any way averse to you showering. I’m not. I like Dove, Ivory and Dr. Bronners soap on a man. And I am good with deodorant although I will not get to stick my face in your underarm pit: a favorite of mine.

I am good at guiding us so if you are nervous or tentative let me lead. I will feel for the transition points and guide with nods. If necessary I will direct you. If you feel comfortable, confident and at ease you are welcome to lead. I was born to surrender—I lead only to make it more comfortable for you but I have no particular desire to do so. I would love to be a woman in your arms. And I am happy to be a woman with you in mine.

That being said, you will determine the intensity and dimension of the experience. I once had a teacher say that the heartbreaking thing is that so much is available and people want so little. I have a similar experience. I am happy to “just fuck” or suck your cock. But you should know that there is an infinite world available. Fucking is great but flying is really what it is about. And how you fly is you open to every potential imaginable. We could fall—into climax, into an abyss, the unknown, in love. We may glimpse eternity. I have no idea what our particular configuration will animate when connected. The only thing that I know is that to the extent that we are open to every possibility—irrespective of who we are in a dimension outside this one (the everyday world with its list of preferences) the more complexity and momentum we can get—hence the more beauty we can access.

FYI, I am not freaky-kinky. If we happen to fall into a scene where it is resonant for you to be some kind of bad spanking daddy—so be it. If it is an experience that actually increases sensation and connection I am down. But my experience is that most people crank up the activity in place of the missing sensation. Were we to lie face to face lips touching barely for 9 hours and the sensation were explosive, I would be just as happy. In other words I am interested in what wants to happen, not in making something happen, not in following an agenda for hot or an instruction manual for sexy. My pussy is turned on already so I can guarantee the turn on. And the more natural and organic it is the more turned on my pussy gets. So there are a few things that every guy wants—the infamous threesome, the banging that pussy from behind and ride’er hard, the fucking her throat with your cock. I can tell you that I have no predisposition towards these—not because I am opposed but because they tend to be clunky and uncomfortable for the most part. They are far too complex to do well in most cases. But should it be that it feels right. Okay.

I know, I know—its okay to confuse this with a bootie call. Perhaps think of it more like church, because if it’s up to me you will see god. Reverence is the appropriate response. You can afford to be nice—a nice you’ve never been. You can afford to be gracious. You can afford to let me in and see how good it feels, that maybe you’ve never felt like this before. I will know it all anyway, I am down in your basement, remember? The more you express it though, the deeper we can go, the less separated behind the glass wall we remain. I am willing to love you wholly and completely. I am not afraid of losing myself in you. First of all because I know my way back. But secondly because if you are so good that I get lost, then that is a place I am happy to be lost inside of. Consider doing the same.

If the sensation decreases we can slow down and talk or lie there together. I look at our relationship as an ongoing experience. I like to end on the peak so that we are left still tasting a certain hunger for each other. There is always more available so there is no need to stuff ourselves.

That said—up front and honest—how I work is that if you can have me, then you can have me. I do what I do, I do see more than one man. I know that it can get confusing as to how to be with me. I know that part of the turn on of sex is possession. In fact without it, there is no grit. So this pussy is yours so long as you command my attention. And should it be that you have the capacity to hold my attention until the end of time, I am perfectly happy with that. You do not ,however, need to demand anything of me, or try to guilt me into doing anything, or attempt to make me feel like a bad person in order to get me to love you. That one only works with a woman who isn’t full, who is desperate for love and attention. I come to you as a gift, as an offering. The way you get more is you appreciate what you get. Oh, and this one seems beyond most people—you simply ask. My predisposition is to say yes—no need to angle or cajole. If you want something, make a request and know that my desire is to say yes, and if I can I will. If I can’t I won’t. I will be clear.

I’ve mentioned it before but the bed is our island. Say anything and everything you feel and desire. We will not be held accountable for what is said on the bed. If you ask me to marry you on the bed, I will not drag you to the jewelry store the next morning. I want it to be that all things involuntary can occur. Freely. Because underneath that top layer is the really good stuff but it is usually locked down by the “things we can’t say.” By the way, I’ll be saying it too. And then we will get out of bed, put on our clothes, kiss good night and be on with our lives. When we get back in that bed, we can pick up where we left off, like picking up a good book.

about-nicole-daedoneNicole Daedone is a sought-after speaker, teacher, and author who has spent her groundbreaking career redefining orgasm from a woman’s point of view. Starting with her fundamental belief that a woman’s sex is her power, she treats supposedly taboo subjects with unparalleled humor, intelligence, and insight.

Nicole is the author of Slow Sex: The Art and Craft of the Female Orgasm (Grand Central/Hachette, May 2011) and is the founder of OneTaste, a company that offers training in orgasm, communication, and man-woman relationships through online media and in-person coaching and courses. The practice at the heart of her work is called OM or Orgasmic Meditation. OM uniquely combines the tradition of extended orgasm with Nicole’s own interest in Zen Buddhism, mystical Judaism and semantics. Helping to foster a new conversation about orgasm—one that’s relevant and real—she has inspired thousands of students to make OM a part of their everyday lives.

Her work has been featured in the New York Times, the New York Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, and 7×7 Magazine, among others, and her writing has appeared in Tricycle magazine. She is also a featured speaker at the 2011 TEDxSF conference.

For more about OneTaste and OM, visit www.onetaste.us. Nicole’s blog appears at www.nicoledaedone.com.

Vulnerability, the last taboo?

By Cyndi Darnell   Originally published on www.CyndiDarnell.com on 5/30/12

In fragile times, it’s often our most intimate and close relationships that suffer. Intimacy is the glue, the enhancer that gives us the drive to connect, and in many situations, also the factor that can be a passion killer for some and the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

I have been reflecting a lot recently on what it means to be intimate with someone, what vulnerability is and how honesty plays a role in all of this. This of course in turn affects the way we can approach sex, but of course not all of our relationships are sexual or erotic, but that doesn’t have to mean they lack intimacy. Intimacy has many faces which can be misunderstood or worse still, ignored when we only relate to intimacy as something sexual or erotic. Intimacy is the essence, the determining factor that decides how close someone gets to us and what we’re prepared to do or share to maintain it.

Intimacy comes from sharing and bonding. People share and bond in hundreds of ways; from a drink at the pub, to a long, lazy dinner , to a friendship that has been cultivated over years, a cry on a shoulder, a rewarding hug, a sporting win  or a love of the same activities, revealing a truth about yourself that you trust another person to take care of, asking for help , asking for attention or allowing yourself to be seen as you really are, flaws and all, in the hope that you won’t be judged for it.

Whilst most of us have these requirements at different stages in our lives, very few are able to acknowledge this need within ourselves, let alone share it with others. It can often be the core of a nagging internal voice that manifests as only a hum or faint murmur rather than bolt of clarity. It can also be the trigger that releases aggressive outbursts, where words said, are later regretted because it’s easier to cast the uncomfortable sensation / feeling out and onto another, than to claim it as our own. It’s easier to blame others than to take a little agency, and while at times this is effective; what is the long-term cost? When this is the perpetual default setting, there is no recourse.Your default setting is powerlessness.

The rise of anxiety among not only Australians, but Westerners in general as a primary emotional default saddens me, but does not surprise me as we become less and less intimate, less and less able to acknowledge our own feelings and thus less able to share with others or learn how to listen to others without judging, being judged or feeling attacked.

While I generally tend to avoid binaries of any kind as a measure for looking at the world, it seems when it comes to emotions, we have only two options. We either allow them to be there, accept them, in all their discomfort and learn to work with them rather than against them; (thus having control over them or even better still, a relationship with them); or we can ignore them. (The latter in my experience can only last for so long before manifestations of ill health become apparent; excessive anxiety, delusion, sleeplessness, depression and a general corrosion of relationships as a result of any one or all of these things.) Shakespeare grasped the ultimate quandary: To Be or Not To Be, that IS in fact the ultimate question, the question that hundreds of years later we still philosophically ponder, but most of us avoid for the sheer terror of facing our internal truth, our shadow, that which makes us vulnerable.

So what is this vulnerability that can make even the most mighty a quivering wreck, or the mostfeeble a guilt-ridden avoider, keen to maintain the facade or status quo at any price, even their own well-being?

Vulnerability for many may be the shadow, the hidden that which dare not be revealed, OR it may also be the default, wherein manipulation and carelessness can take centre stage to avoid speaking a truth that is more confronting, potentially freeing but also downright terrifying to the inexperienced.

The vulnerability I am talking about here is the genuine kind, not the ‘’tantrum’’ or ‘’drama’’ kind where the protagonist is actually quite capable of helping themselves, but prefers instead to use manipulation or passive/ aggressive tactics to get their needs met consciously or unconsciously. True vulnerability here is acknowledging what is actually going on in the relationship in question, whether the relationship is with the Self or another. Vulnerability is a resource to actually achieve a mutually beneficial outcome rather than as a tool to wage messy, dirty conflict.

Vulnerability needn’t equate to meekness Being vulnerable is actually one of the most assertive things I for one have ever done. Having the gumption to tell someone I love them, to tell them I miss them to tell them I am angry with them is absolutely fucking terrifying when I don’t know whether or not I will be heard or acknowledged. (This of course requires that such statements are made as declarations rather than ultimatums or any kind of manipulation.) Acknowledgement of another person’s feelings is a vital part of communication and creating intimacy through vulnerability. If / when you acknowledge that you are actually valuable in another person’s life, you are then compelled to be responsible for your own responses and behaviour toward them. Acknowledging responsibility is an act of both vulnerability and power. Pretending it doesn’t matter that someone you’re close to just told you how they feel is not only inharmonious it’s also a form of rejection and an inhibitor to intimacy. They wouldn’t have been close to you in the first place if you didn’t actually care about them.

For example, we can all think of situations where for one reason or another we have wanted, or even needed to be taken care of in some way, shape or form, to be soothed if you like, or just supported and appreciated for a day, a night, a month, a life time. Where a need to be understood was crucial, but where the ability to recognise that need was impossible because the mere thought of allowing such a realisation was too much to bear. It was only with hindsight that we realised what we needed, but were too fearful to acknowledge it; instead judging our own feeling for example as ‘’weak’’ or ‘’inappropriate’’, rather than seeing it for what it is, a basic human desire to be understood and acknowledged. Somehow to admit our humanness is weak, is animalistic, is dangerous. My belief is that not acknowledging our feelings is far, far, far more dangerous. As my dear friend Cath says: What you resist; persists! I can think of few cases where this is not a universal truth. When your strongest motivator is actually also your blind spot, communication can get very very messy.

So where do we go from here? The concept of acceptance has been around for ages, thousands of years in fact. Buddhists cottoned-on to it yonks ago, and have been its greatest advocates ever since. Recently psychologists have decided it’s OK too, even beyond OK; downright effective! Good stuff! So we finally have science and spirit intersecting. (For the atheists who walk among us, substitute the word ‘spirit ‘for ‘feeling’ instead). So, what does this mean for us lay-people? It means two things that I can see so far. One is, we have one of the most powerful tools available to us to give ourselves the leverage to get a bit real with ourselves and stop pissing-about on the edges, and Two, it enables us to understand that being honest with ourselves first, and then with others (whilst being a bit scary at times), is actually a very assertive practice, and at times, a whole lot harder than running in on the defensive, but ultimately more fulfilling and anxiety reducing!

Are you more powerful when you act or re-act? Who is more powerful,  the initiator or the reactor? When it comes to relationships (not just sexual ones, remember?) the most effective work can be achieved when we take action, rather than just re-action. When our default is thoughtful, emotive and inspired rather than an act of defence strategy and one-upping, we are operating from a place of creativity and agency.

Here’s the thing; a wise teacher once asked me and I will ask you; Do you want to be rightOR Do you want to be close? Depending of your values, you may struggle with choosing between what may seem to be opposing alternatives. Sometimes (but not always) you can’t be both. Sometimes you just have to accept what is there, without judging it. Your answer to that question may actually be a cause of vulnerability for you…………… and so the cycle starts again.

The old adage we teach what we most need to learn rings absolutely true. I have spent years working through issues of accepting and embracing my vulnerability. It’s still a challenge for me, but I’ve been practicing for years and it gets better and easier. Believe me. I spent years feeling nervous, anxious and profoundly deranged trying to keep all the plates spinning, while trying to look cool as a cucumber. Will I ever have it totally mastered? Probably not! But then again, I don’t know that mastering emotions is the kind of goal I am looking to achieve anyway. Emotions by their very nature are erratic and arousing. Some are pleasant, others are not. But emotions in their essence are a necessary part of life, as necessary and water, air, food and sleep, yet these things are not judged as invalid, in the way that emotions often are. Feelings add value, colour and texture to what would otherwise be rather rudimentary and cardboard lives. Why would anyone want to dominate the one thing that gives their life its authenticity, its spark and its vigour. Conversely, being a slave to one’s emotions is also unsavoury and potentially deadly. Common Sense is calledcommonsense for a reason. It’s everywhere and everyone has access to it………. in theory at least! Learning to allow access to feelings, process them and foster acceptance is where the magic lies. Find the edge, find the distance you’re prepared to get to, wait and see. Don’t judge it, don’t push it. Just wait and see. …………………. What CAN you see? Let me know.

Cyndi Darnell: I have always been a pleasure enthusiast. For as far back as I can remember, my fascination with pleasure and sexuality has been part of my identity. Having travelled the world extensively in my 20s in the pursuit of self-knowledge and then my 30s exploring more introspective wonders and delights, I have come to embrace the understanding that sexuality and pleasure is not something separate from our lives, but part of our lives as a pathway to genuine wholeness, contentment and wellbeing.

My pursuit of quality sex-knowledge has led me down a variety of avenues to get the expert and diverse know-how I have today. From the dedicated hands on approach I took during the 1990s through workshops, seminars (including Sexological Bodywork and contemporary tantra) and good old fashioned trial and error; through to the academic and clinical studies I have completed in the 2000s in both general counselling and specialist clinical sex therapy, I am thrilled to be able to bridge the world of sexology from a variety of perspectives and approaches that embrace, understand and challenge the diversity of human sexuality.

I am also the founder and creator of Pleasure Forum Australia , a monthy  adult to adult sex education program where the emphasis is on pleasure and practical education, not sleaze and clinical theory. More recently my educational and therapeutic skills have been heard on Australia’s Triple J radio program The Hack for Sex Week, as well as working with Australia’s most outspoken darling,Catherine Deveny, on a series of free-to-air educational podcasts about sex, pleasure and the human condition. I am a mentor for the Minus 18 Sex Gurus, a queer  sex and health project for young queer identifying and gender questioning people. I work predominantly in Melbourne, but also offer my workshops and therapeutic sessions across Australia and globally via Skype.

 

Jada Pinkett-Smith: “The War on Men Through the Degradation of Women”

 

From Intentblog 12/6/12

After speaking out against critics of her daughter Willow’s new haircut, the mega-articulate actress and activist Jada Pinkett-Smith earlier this week used her Facebook platform to bring awareness to a much larger issue: how the degradation of women in the media negatively affects both men and women.

Talk about a woman who knows how to use her words as a weapon for justice and equality. We’re with you, Jada.

“How is man to recognize his full self, his full power through the eye’s of an incomplete woman? The woman who has been stripped of Goddess recognition and diminished to a big ass and full breast for physical comfort only. The woman who has been silenced so she may forget her spiritual essence because her words stir too much thought outside of the pleasure space. The woman who has been diminished to covering all that rots inside of her with weaves and red bottom shoes.

I am sure the men, who restructured our societies from cultures that honored woman, had no idea of the outcome. They had no idea that eventually, even men would render themselves empty and longing for meaning, depth and connection.

 

There is a deep sadness when I witness a man that can’t recognize the emptiness he feels when he objectifies himself as a bank and truly believes he can buy love with things and status. It is painful to witness the betrayal when a woman takes him up on that offer.

He doesn’t recognize that the [creation] of a half woman has contributed to his repressed anger and frustration of feeling he is not enough. He then may love no woman or keep many half women as his prize.

He doesn’t recognize that it’s his submersion in the imbalanced warrior culture, where violence is the means of getting respect and power, as the reason he can break the face of the woman who bore him 4 four children.

When woman is lost, so is man. The truth is, woman is the window to a man’s heart and a man’s heart is the gateway to his soul.

Power and control will NEVER out weigh love.

May we all find our way.”    ~ Jada Pinkett-Smith, via Sinuous Magazine

Anal Sex: Science’s Last Taboo

A new — and almost entirely unreported — study about anal sex and pain shows how little we really know about it
BY DEBBY HERBENICK

That anal sex remains taboo may explain why a study about anodyspareunia – that is, pain during anal penetration – received little attention when it was published in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy. The study should have turned heads: It was the first research on anodyspareunia among women; it was conducted by a well-respected scientist (Dr. Aleksander Stulhofer from the University of Zagreb); and it was centered on young women and sex. That’s often the kind of research that attracts media attention (Young women sex! They get pregnant! They give oral sex! You get the picture …). However, anal sex remains such a strong taboo that this otherwise important study barely turned a head.

Except it did turn mine. Here’s why. In an incredibly short period of time, anal sex has become a common part of Americans’ sex lives. As of the 1990s, only about one-quarter to one-third of young women and men in the U.S. had tried anal sex at least once. Less than 20 years later, my research team’s 2009 National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior found that as many as 40-45 percent of women and men in some age groups had tried anal sex. With its rising prevalence, I felt it was important to devote a chapter of my first book, “Because It Feels Good,” to anal health and pleasure — only to find that a magazine editor wouldn’t review it because the topic of anal sex was “not in the best interest of our readership.” Even though nearly half of American women in some age groups have done it! She added, “In the correct circles, I personally will be suggesting the book to those with whom I can share such a resource.”

Hmm. The correct circles. Which ones would those be? The ones where scores and scores of women openly sit around talking about anal sex between glasses of wine?

So taboos persist and anal sex remains hush-hush even though more people are doing it. What changed to make it more common, anyway? It’s not entirely clear – after all, rates of masturbation, vaginal sex, oral sex and other sexual practices don’t seem to have changed too much. However,  it’s commonly thought that the widespread access to porn played a role. Some research has found that anal sex was shown in 56 percent of sex scenes studied even though national data of real people’s sex lives show that fewer than 5 percent of Americans had anal sex during their most recent sexual experience.

Honest, evidence-based answers to questions about anal sex are difficult to come by. You’d think we would know more about a behavior that’s become a common part of Americans’ sex lives – one that, for all its potential pleasures, remains among the riskiest sex acts when it comes to spreading sexually transmissible infections (STI) including HIV. Yet there is strikingly little scientific research on anal sex. The list of what we don’t know about anal sex is far longer than the list of what we do. This makes it difficult for sex educators to feel truly confident in answering people’s very real and important questions.

This is also what made the recent University of Zagreb study so valuable. They surveyed more than 2,000 women ages 18 to 30 about their experiences with anal sex. Building on limited early research about anal pain among men who have sex with men, the researchers asked about women’s experiences with pain. This was critical because, as much as we often talk about anal sex possibly hurting, and lubricant possibly minimizing pain or discomfort during anal sex, there is almost no research on women’s experiences of anal sex. One exception is a study that I conducted with my research team at Indiana University in which we gave six different lubricants to more than 2,400 women and asked them to use them during their masturbation, vaginal sex and/or anal sex activities. Among our interests was whether using a lubricant helped to make sex – including anal sex – more pleasurable, more satisfying and less painful (it did).

The Zagreb team found that about half of women (49 percent) stopped their first experience of anal intercourse because it was too painful to continue – not surprising considering 52 percent of women report not even using lubricant when they first had anal sex! An additional 17 percent of women also experienced pain or discomfort during their first anal sex, but didn’t stop their partner. Only about one-quarter of women said their first experience with anal sex was pleasant.

That said, nearly two-thirds tried anal sex again (hopefully this time with lubricant), continuing on another occasion. Those women who found it positive, pleasurable and pain-free were more likely to try it again. About 9 percent of women who had anal sex at least twice in the past year said that they experienced pain every single time. Based on what I know about women who experience pain during vaginal intercourse, my guess is that chronic pain during anal sex is even more common – perhaps hovering in the 10-15 percent range – once the women who actively avoid it because it always hurts are taken into account.

This 9 percent figure is important. It tells us that a similar proportion of women experience pain consistently during anal sex as experience pain consistently during vaginal penetration. That’s right: Somewhere around 10 percent of women experience pain during vaginal intercourse or even during daily activities like sitting down or riding in the car. The 9 percent number is also close to the 10-14 percent range that’s been identified as the proportion of men who have sex with men who experience pain during anal sex. And though the Zagreb study asked women what sense they made of their pain (most blamed themselves or their sexual practices, suggesting their pain was linked to not feeling fully relaxed, inadequate anal foreplay, or not using sufficient lubricant), the fact is that we still don’t know clinically what’s causing their pain.

It may be that, like the vagina and vulva, the anuses of some women and men respond to touch or penetration in painful ways and for unknown reasons. It may be that some of these women and men have skin disorders, such as lichen sclerosus, which can affect genital skin (including anal skin), increasing the likelihood of discomfort, pain or tearing. Certainly lack of information and education is at the root of some people’s pain, but it’s probably not the primary cause for everyone. Some women and men do everything “right” – they use gobs of lubricant, they start out slowly, relax, communicate well with their partner, avoid desensitizing or numbing gels/creams – and yet it still hurts. Do they have an underlying medical condition that’s contributing to the pain? Wonky nerve receptors that scream in pain rather than perceive penetration as neutral or pleasurable? We don’t know.

In case you’re wondering, we also don’t know much about the long-term effects of anal intercourse. Certainly enough people have been having anal sex over enough generations that if anything were seriously dangerous about anal sex, we would know it by now. But as for questions about how regular anal sex, rough anal sex or insufficiently lubricated anal sex might ultimately affect the likelihood of a woman experiencing rectal prolapse or of a woman or man experiencing various anal or rectal health issues, we don’t know because no one has studied these kinds of things. It’s 2012 and pretty much all we know about anal sex is that lots of people have tried it, there’s a higher degree of risk for STI/HIV transmission (compared to vaginal sex or oral sex), many people have found it painful on occasion, many people also find it pleasurable sometimes, and about one in 10 women and men experience pain during anal sex on a regular basis. Much of the research involving HPV and anal cancer is focused on men who have sex with men – which is needed — even though more women in the U.S. have received anal sex than the number of men who have received anal sex. That’s not to say that anal cancer isn’t important to study among men – it very much is the case – but women get anal cancer, too, and we need to know more about risk and protective factors (related: check out this I Have Butt What? blog by a brave anal cancer survivor named Michelle).

Knowledge gap, anyone?

Even though most people who have had anal sex engage in it only occasionally, anal sex is a fairly common practice. And if people are going to engage in sexual behavior, then they deserve enough information to help make that behavior as safe, pleasurable and satisfying as possible. To do so, science has to catch up and taboos have to dissipate enough so that more people feel comfortable talking about it and sharing their experiences.

Debby Herbenick, PhD, MPH is co-Director of The Center for Sexual Health Promotion at Indiana University’s School of Public Health-Bloomington, a sexual health educator at The Kinsey Institute, and author of five books about sex and love. Her most recent is Sex Made Easy: Your Awkward Questions Answered for Better, Smarter, Amazing Sex (Running Press, 2012).

Check out this TEDx Talk by Debby Herbenick  “Why Your Bed is the Ultimate Treehouse”