Integral Life
July 2nd, 2012
Sex
is arguably still in the closet.
Yes, it’s wearing a lot less and showing a lot more than was
the case forty or fifty years ago, but it’s still not truly out in
the open, except in mostly superficial ways. Its ubiquitous exposure,
highlighting, and pornification simply camouflage it. However
brazenly explicit sex now is, it nonetheless remains largely hidden,
its depths mostly untouched, its heartland still largely unknown,
obscured by the tasks to which we commonly assign it, especially that
of making us feel better.
Just as getting openly and passionately angry does not
necessarily bring us any closer to truly knowing our anger, being
frequently expressive of and/or pervaded by things sexual does not
necessarily bring us any closer to truly knowing—or being intimate
with—our sexuality.
How-to books and courses on sex abound, pointing out various ways
to get turned on or more turned on in a relationship, with little or
no attention given to actually exploring the very
turned-off-ness
that seemingly necessitates finding out how to get turned on. Judging
from the sheer volume of such books and courses, plus an immense
amount of personal testimony from all quarters (for example, the
great number of American women who admit that they don’t
enjoy sex with their husband), it appears that there’s an abundance
of sexual dysfunction and dissatisfaction within relationships.
There is plenty of focus on this, accompanied by all kinds of
remedies, but not nearly so much focus on how dysfunction and
dissatisfaction in the
nonsexual areas of relationship might
be affecting one’s sexuality.
We are usually quite reluctant to cast (or even to permit the
casting of) a clear light on what is
actually happening
during our sexual times with our partner—other than
biologically—but without this, we are simply left in the dark,
pinning too much on what we hope sex will do for us.
And there is
so much that we expect sex to do for us!
More often than we might like to admit, we assign it to stress
release, security enhancement, spousal pacification, egoic
gratification, pleasure production, and other such tasks. We may use
it as a super sleeping pill, a rapid-action pick-me-up, an agent of
consolation, a haven or hideout, a control tactic, a proof that we’re
not that old or cold. We may also employ it as a psychological
garbage disposal, a handy somatic terminal for discharging the
energies of various unwanted states, like loneliness or rage or
desperation. Mostly, though, we just tend to want sex to make us feel
better, and we use it accordingly, whether in mundane, dark, or
spiritual contexts.
Not only do we hear more and more about “sexual addiction,”
our culture itself is so ubiquitously sexualized that it could be
described as sex-addicted. But sexual addiction is not
primarily
about sex but about that for which sex is a “solution.” It is so
easy to think that our sexual charge with a particular person or
situation is no more than an expression of our natural sexuality,
when in fact it may actually be an
eroticizing of our
conditioning or of some need we have. (For example, arousal in a
certain pornographic fantasy may be
secondarily sexual, its
primary impetus being rooted in one’s longing to be unconditionally
seen, loved, and wanted.)
There won’t, however, be any real freedom here until we release
sex (and everything else!) from the obligation to make us feel
better. So long as we keep assigning sex to such labor—slave
labor—we will remain trapped in the very circumstances for which
sexual release is an apparent “solution.” Increased stress means
an increased desire to get rid of stress, and if we attempt to do so
through sexual means (which does not really get rid of stress, except
in the most superficial sense), we simply reinforce the roots of that
stress. In addicting or over-attaching ourselves to erotically
pleasing release, we also frequently addict ourselves to the very
tension that seemingly necessitates and sometimes even legitimizes
such release.
The abuse of sex, particularly through the expectations with which
we commonly burden it, is so culturally pervasive and deeply
ingrained as to go largely unnoticed, except in its more lurid,
obviously dysfunctional, or perverse extremes. Even more removed from
any telling awareness is our aversion to truly exploring and
illuminating the whole matter of human sexuality, not clinically nor
in any other kind of isolation, but rather in the context of our
entire being, our totality, our inherent wholeness.
That is, sex does not need to be—and in fact cannot
be—crystallized out and set apart from the rest of our experience
(as those overly focused on the mechanics of sexuality often try to
do). Rather, it needs to be seen, felt, known, and lived in open-eyed
resonance—and
relationship—with everything that we do
and are, so that it is, as much as possible, not just an act of
specialized function nor an act bound to the chore of making us feel
better or more secure, but rather an unfettered, full-blooded
expression of
already present,
already loving,
already unstressed wholeness.
To embody such wholeness requires a thorough
investigation of the labor to which we have assigned—or
sentenced—our sexuality.
That
labor and its underpinnings are eloquently revealed through the stark
slang of sex. Many of the words and phrases regarding our sexual
functioning bluntly illustrate the frequently confused,
disrespectful, and exploitive attitude commonly brought to one’s
own sexuality and sexuality in general. Consider, for example, the
notorious and enormously popular “f” word, for which there is an
incredible number of non-copulatory meanings, a fucking incredible
number, all pointedly and colorfully describing what we may
actually
be up to when we are busy being sexual or erotically engaged.
Here’s a partial list, the majority of which overlap in meaning:
ignorance (“Fucked if I know”); indifference (“I don’t give a
fuck”); degradation (“You stupid fuck”); aggression (“Don’t
fuck with me!”); disappointment (“This is really fucked”);
rejection (“Get the fuck out of here!” or “Fuck off!”);
manipulation (“You’re fucking with my head”); disgust (“Go
fuck yourself”); vexation (“What the fuck are you doing?”);
exaggeration (“It was so fucking good!”); rage (“Fuck you!”);
and, perhaps most pithily revealing of all, exploitation (“I got
fucked”).
Throw together the various meanings of “fuck,” plus the
“higher” or more socially acceptable terms for sexual
intercourse—including the vague “having a relationship” and the
unwittingly precise “sleeping together”—and mix in some
insight, and what emerges is a collage composed of (1) the
dysfunctional labor to which we have sentenced our sexual capacity;
and (2) the expectations (like “Make me feel wanted” or “Make
me feel better”) with which we have saddled and burdened it.
When we primarily assign our sexuality to stress release, security
reinforcement, egoic reassurance, the fueling of romantic delusion,
and other such chores—thereby burdening it with the obligation to
make us feel better—we are doing little more than screwing
ourselves, dissipating much of the very energy that we need for
facing and healing our woundedness, the woundedness that, ironically,
we seek escape or relief from through the pleasuring and various
sedating options provided by our sexuality.
This is not to say that we should never use our sexuality for
purposes such as stress release, for there are times when doing so
may be entirely appropriate, but such usage needs to be more the
exception than the rule.
We are living in a pervasively sexualized culture—“sexy” as
an adjective has infiltrated just about every dimension of life.
There’s much more openness regarding sex than there was fifty or
sixty years ago, but much of that openness has more to do with
breadth than depth. We have more permission to experiment
with sex and to talk graphically about it, but we nevertheless don’t
talk about it in real depth very often—exploring, for example, the
nonsexual or presexual dynamics that may be in play during sex—for
to do so would put us in a position of real vulnerability and
transparency, not so able to hang on to a semblance of “having it
together.” Seeing what we are actually doing in nonsexual contexts
while we’re busy being sexual may not be very high on our list of
priorities!
And this is the era of informed consent, centered by the myth—yes,
myth—of consenting adults. In sexual circumstances, many
of us may not be clearly considering what is really going on and what
is at stake, instead making choices from a desire (largely rooted in
childhood) to get approval, affection, connection, love, or security,
or to be distracted from our suffering. At such times, we are
operating not so much as consenting adults as
adult-erated
children (and/or adolescents) whose “consent”—however
“informed”—is largely an eroticized expression of unresolved
woundedness or unmet nonsexual needs.
The deepest sex, sex requiring no fantasies (inner or outer) or
turn-on strategies or rituals of arousal, but rather only the love,
openness, and safety of awakened intimacy, cannot be significantly
accessed without a corresponding depth in the
rest of our
relationship with our partner. Without such mutual maturity, it
doesn’t matter how hot or juicy or innovative our sexual life may
be, even if we have many orgasms, big orgasms, together.
In fact, when we make coming together a goal, we simply come
apart, separating and losing ourselves in our quest for maximally
pleasurable sensations. “Sensational” sex is precisely that: sex
that is centered and defined by an abundance of erotically engorged
sensations. The romanticized presence of these sensations is
often misrepresented as actual intimacy, at least until the rude
pricks of reality do their vastly underappreciated job.
Most couples we see are not really all that happy with their sex
life. Some of them have gone flat sexually, having had little or no
sex for a long time. (Not surprisingly, the rest of their
relationship is also usually flat, emotionally depressed, low in
passion, unnaturally peaceful.) Other couples are more openly
frustrated, wanting more than they are getting (such a quantitative
focus being mostly a male complaint), or wanting more connection
before sex (such a qualitative focus being mostly a female
complaint). And others initially act as if they are doing fine
sexually, being reluctant to reveal their discomfort with the
direction that their sex life may be taking (like tolerating a
partner who prefers porn to them). And so on.
The good news is that such dissatisfaction,
if allowed to
surface in its fullness, will often goad a couple into doing work
that they would otherwise avoid or postpone.
As a couple explores their sexuality, and explores it deeply, they
will discover that what’s not working in their relationship usually
shows up in their sexuality, often in exaggerated form. And
conversely, as they ripen into more mature ways of relating, they
will find that this revitalizes and deepens their sexuality. No sex
manuals or tantric rituals are needed, nor any fantasies or other
turn-on tactics—their increased intimacy and trust in each other
are more than sufficient, creating an atmosphere within which
love-centered, awareness-infused sexual desire can naturally arise
and flow, carrying the lovers along into the sweet dynamite and
ever-fresh wonder and ecstasy of what sex can be when it has deep
intimacy’s green light.
Anna