Sexual Energy

[Steven Barnes]

We've been talking about sex, and this is a subject that people are pretty shy about. But sexuality is second-chakra stuff, second only to core survival in the ability to raise your energy. A kink in this chakra can cause ghastly damage. Rape, abuse, premature sexual experience, sexual guilt, etc.--all can cripple your energy. If we are going to be fully alive and aware, the proper use of this energy is critical.
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I thought I would ask you guys what exactly sexuality is to you? To begin to define the arena. There is so much here, including questions of when sex is and is not appropriate. Was sex appropriate between a President and an intern? Between strangers? Between children? I think that we all have our rules, and it's important to have those rules operating at conscious levels.
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For me, sex is appropriate between adults (those who support themselves) when there is genuine honesty about what the reciprocal obligations and communications. Both people must understand what sex means to the other. For instance, there are many people for whom sex means love. No matter what they say, no matter what the context, if you have sex with them, they think it means "I love you." And you had bettter understand that, or you are going to run into real problems.
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For me, sex is communication, entertainment, stress relief, spiritual connection, comfort, intellectual adventure, and physical art form. I (almost) never had sex with anyone I wouldn't have been willing to take a call from at 3 in the morning if they were in trouble. I always tried to treat my partners as I would want someone to treat my sister, my mother, or my daughter. And I've made mistakes. There were times I wound up in bed with someone who was more damaged than I anticipated, and the results were pretty gruesome. But with perhaps one exception, I am still on friendly terms with every lady with whom I've shared intimacy, and treasure each and every memory.

Definitions for you guys?

[soussans]

okay steve
I'm going to step in here
because no one else is coming forward
and I can't believe it's because
there's nothing to say about the topic
at hand (you should excuse the expression!)

I find it difficult
to separate "sexual" from sensual
and sentient
and sacred and spirit

in the best expression of sexuality
it contains all these
and communicates them

gives of them
and takes them in
from any sexual experience

in this cronish period of my life
that is how I have come to view sexuality
and how I have come to experience it

and quite frankly
this comes as a totally stupendous
surprise to me
given what we are told about aging

I have been known to say
that my spirit dwells in my thingy

and I say it
because well
it's true

and it's an imprtant thing about
my Self

I don't think this is
a stuck at that chakra thing
I think this is more Tantric than that____
though I'm definitely not an expert
on the underpinings of Tantra

the matter of using the healing power
of sex is something I promised to write up
for you a week or so ago
and while there are so many other things
I want to say
taking off from what I've said above
I'm going to do this one first

so here goes:

I have a friend
let's call him CC (for captain courageous)
who wandered on to my blog
shortly after I started it
and over the course of some private messaging
I discovered that CC was
pretty much wheel chair bound
He was 48.
And disgnosed during a football injury
when he was 16
(count 'em that's 30 years)
with Spondylolysis which is
the degeneration or deficient development of the articulating parts of the vertebra.
It can range from a serious condition to a mild one.

In CC’s case serious
as this happened
Spondylolysis may permit forward slippage
of a vertebra onto the next vertebra below it,
producing a spondylolisthesis.

(kinda like crimping the spinal cord)

he was a star high school football playe
and football was to be
his ticket to college
so even after practices when he could not
exert conscious control over his legs
he continued to play

eventually there was surgery
and scar on the spinla cord
and surrounds
and the development of stenosis
in the sacral/lumbar region
wherein plaque starts to be deposited
in the open spaces in the vertebrae
eventually closing up the opening through which
the spinal cord passes, severing it.
and causing complete paralysis
and lack of feeling
except for phantom limb feeling
in the legs


despite these developments
CC went to college
earned a Master’s in Occupational Therapy
married and worked

several workplace accidents/events
did more damage.

when I encountered him
itr had been determined
that a few years previous
that surgery to cut the cord
was not a promising solution
due to all the scar tissue and stenosis
i.e., they might end up having to cut higher
causing more paralysis
than would occur by waiting
for the plaque and shards to sever it;
a process they told him
would take 5-7 years on its own

so CC decided rather than riusk greater loss
to wait the process out.

I came into his life
around year five
he and his wife had recently relocated
back to the midwest where he was originally from
and in the process
lost health insurance
before the move
he had got to the point
that morphine was no longer touching his pain’and the pain meds that did
cost $2000 per month

so he was enduring without ANY pain medication.

he was in process of losing complete movement
in his legs
and in bowel and bladder control
and not knowing how much longer
he’d have erections

meanwhile his mate
was working long nights
at a job
and sleeping the days
and for reasons of her own
was no longer interested in sex.

terrible situation for both of them.


CC had a biofeedback machine and trainging in using it
and also was using relaxation techniques
and visualization and breathing
to help control his pain
but he told me
many days he spent screaming and crying
and he was not sleeping for more than two hours
at a time.

This got me thinking about something I had observed:
that even with headaches or backaches
or really any kind of pain
when I was having sex the pain
was not present.

So I suggested to him
he try sex as pain control

which was when he told me
that his situation was pretty much sexless

so I proposed that we have phone sex
and see what that did for his pain
using the endorphin rush and relaxation afterwards
to see if we couldn’t shore up
his ability to control his pain
plus having a sexual life
while he still could
(a thing of great concern to him)

so we did
and afterwards I talked him through
focusing on how his body felet
especially his unfeeling legs

the extreme contractions and extensions
of his legs and feet stopped
his back uncurled
he felt warmth in his legs
he was totally pain free for some rare precious minutes
and he was able to relax and fall asleep
and sleep
for eight hours!

so we continued with this practice
once or so times a week

he worked on deepening his visualizations
and reproduction of the warmth and relaxation
to use on his own

we continue though now
the degenerative process is really hitting him hard
and the pain disappears only for seconds
still it affords him some better quality sleep

the pain got so bad recedntly
that he has been back to the doctors
even though insurance is unavailable
in the hopes that something new
might have become available surgery wise
in the intervening years

we kid around about
giving pain management
workshops

there is no question that this
has afforded him some relief
and to me
that makes it
a best aspect of sexuality

I add
this man despite living in pain
for thirty years
that you and I cannot even imagine
has a wonderfully optimistic outlook
the majority of the time

and he continues to try to do work
(despite all this pain; and a recent mini-stroke
and other horrendous consequences of his condition)
which is why I have chosen to call him
Captain Courageous
and why I expend loving time and energy
with him

so there you have it:
sex as a healing meditation

suzanne

[Steven Barnes]

A beautiful, beautiful post. I would never say "stuck" at the second chakra: that would be both unfair and inaccurate. I'd say that you are gloriously alive at the second chakra. Human energy is human energy--it boils closest to the surface during emergency situations, and sexual expression. Learning to take the sexual energy and raise it to the level of physical power (third chakra) is learning to use it for healing. Thank you so much for sharing this!

Steve

[soussans]

"thingie" STEVE???!!!!!!

*cracked up*

IS there something verboten
about the anglo-saxon word
which is one of my favorite
words; stripped
of all the negativce crap and abuse
its taken over time?

[baubosboy]

Actually, soussans, it's nothing to joke about. I had a thingie on my back, and my doctor decided we should remove it. It turned out to be benign, but still--you should get it looked at. By a professional. Especially if it's anywhere near your girl thingy.

[marylahree]

What a loaded topic! I notice there weren't many takers on the invitation to respond. So I thought, why not?

I'm hardly the most knowledgeable when it comes to a variety of sexual experiences, having been with only one man, my husband of thirty years. But I do have set opinions about what is appropriate. Long ago my father suggested to me that, ones body is the highest complement they can give to another and that, the other ought to be worthy of that complement.

Yes, I agree that sex is communication, entertainment, stress relief - all of what you mentioned Steve. But only if I value the person I intend to engage in sex with. I believe that 'love' is most easily defined as the highest degree of value we place on another; with 'like' being a lesser degree of value. I believe I would feel less than honest if I slept with someone I didn't really value deeply. Mary

[Steven Barnes]

Mary--
Having had sex with people I did NOT have love for, I can promise that, while the physiological response may be powerful, the emotional power is diminished considerably when emotions are not engaged.

[marylahree]

I believe I can well imagine. Aside from my father, brothers, very close friends, I have felt my skin crawl whenever casual friend has tried to put an arm around my shoulder, ect., male or female. I guess I don't care to have my personal space invaded.

[delilah]

Sex is hard for me to talk about publicly. I'm odd. Regular sex bores me to tears. What stimulates me are elements of control, given or taken. Some people think this is bad and wrong. I've come to accept it as just different. We can all like different colors and that doesn't make anyone wrong.

I worry about it sometimes, because my husband isn't like me, and I worry it could become a big problem if I wanted more of what I like. As it is I feel almost celibate, but he gets what he needs. I get the rest of us and we work well together, so well I wouldn't want to end it to find someone with less who can be what I enjoy sexually.

This is d**n embarrassing to talk about!

Sexuality to me is a feeling. It should always be consensual. There was an encounter (before they stopped because it's too much effort for him, and he generally isn't very good which often left me frustrated) where I found BLISS. Yes, bliss, that place of complete peace and contentment where the voices in my head were utterly silent. It was awesome.

[Steven Barnes]

May I ask the circumstances under which this blissful state was reached?

[delilah]

Perhaps it is similar to meditation in that, through activities involving pleasure and pain (where pain can actually be pleasure, it's a fine line between the two when you can wrap your mind around it), I focus on pleasing. At first I thought of it as being comfortablly submerged in a pool, because everything had that liquidy movement and feel to it. And getting there is like walking into the pool; there are different levels of depth. When I found bliss, I was deep, very deep into it. It's too bad my husband doesn't get the same feeling. It'd be so cool to share bliss together.

I had another thought about sex. I never thought I connected it to love, and that's true on the surface, but underneath, over time, it is a very bonding experience. Feelings of love come from the act, and the natural reaction is to attribute that to who you're with.

[Steven Barnes]

Sex is a type of physical merging. Love is a spiritual/emotional merging. They overlap, but aren't the exact same thing.

[marylahree]

Well stated, Steven. But I suppose you already know that. <grin> Delilah, out of curiosity, what leads you to believe that your husband does not find bliss? I mean, as much as foreplay and intercourse are mutual exchanges, there is still a self-serving aspect to the act on the part of each partner. Otherwise, why would one engage in it? Could it be that he just doesn't express the bliss he might feel in a way that leaves you aware it? Also, please take no offense, but I have to wonder if what you believe results in feelings of "love" towards a casual partner might only be profound gratitude and a sense of comfort - knowing that the person is available to you sexually, and that they are in tune with what physically pleasures you.

[aprilg]

Sex for me has always been basic to my sense of well being. It's a way of relating to the world and my deepest self. My writing tends to be intensely sexual, and I like to read work by Charlaine Harris, Laurell K. Hamilton, and Charles DeLint, where there is this deep connection between sex and the world. What DeLint sexual? Perhaps sensual would be a better way to describe him.

I'm just coming out of a six month dry spell in writing. At 51 I've entered menopause and I'm trying to adjust to the changes that my body is creating in me. I just finished one of the short stories that I started last Feb. and am about to re-start and finish another one.

I think what has forced me back into a creative mode is losing the use of my right arm through tendonitis and bursitis for the past two months. I'm working with a chiro to get back the use of my arm and he's given the green light for me to take up karate again, so yeah, a lot of healing has gone on.

Though married, my dh and I have lost a lot of our sexual mojo. He had a quadruple by-pass three years ago, and for a long time we were afraid to touch each other. As a middle aged couple we get most of our excitement from attending Saturday matinees at the opera . We hug and cuddle a lot and verbally show affection, but not too much more. Sorry if that’s TMI.

I'm trying to chart this course through middle age gracefully, but it all feels very awkward right now.

Thanks for the great topic,

April

[marylahree]

For me, I don't know that sex has ever been basic to a sense of well being, but only to a sense of fullfillment in that aspect of my life, or the lack of. Somewhat early into our marriage my husband decided to become a truck driver, which back then, kept us apart for weeks at a time. I adjusted much earlier in life, to what most don't begin to experience until later years, as their sex drive diminishes, but not necessarily in unity with one another. My urges were no less normal than any other woman's, so it took a lot of soul searching on my part. Did love and sex equate to the same? Because I did not prefer a life without my husband in it regardless that frequency of sex had changed. Ultimately I discovered much more to love and life.