Sex and HeartHow I transformed devastation into love and loving lust

I received this request from a reader.

“I would really like to you to give some advice on addressing “wandering eyes” in men. Last night while walking in the park with my husband we came upon a ball field. There was a very petite well-enhanced blonde mother who was grabbing all the coachs’ attention (including her teenage son’s friends). My husband actually slowed down almost to a stop and peered around me to look at her while doing the 10 second up/down look. I stopped walking, glanced at her and looked at him–I was speechless. He was picturing her naked right there in front of me with this lustful look on his face and even looked around me to do it. I was shocked that he didn’t hide it. I know that this is a problem for a lot of women and would really appreciate some advice.”

First of all it’s normal and natural for men to check out women. It’s almost as if it’s built into their DNA. Can you in all honesty say to me that YOU NEVER notice a well-built man or one that has a certain look that makes your heart beat a little bit faster? Or maybe a man smiles at you as he passes by, and this makes you feel good, and maybe even a little spark of something sexual glimmers inside you.

Doe this mean anything to you? Do you imagine this man in your bed having sex with you? Of course not, unless you’re totally single, ready, and available, or you are just not that into your man. Unless you are trolling for a new guy, it would be a passing thought, and it’s just as quickly gone.

And so it is with your man.

Now when out with their woman, men “should” have learned along to the way to be discrete about their natural instinct to simply look, and this is all it is. For the most part, they are not even aware they have done it, given a woman a quick once over. It’s SO quick that if you had blinked when he did this, you would have missed it.

In this case and in any other similar ones, and this is VERY important, it may NOT be as you have imagined. I can almost guarantee you that if you are with a good man, it’s rarely if ever what you think.

You really DON’T know he was undressing her with his eyes. Really you don’t. You are majorly making assumptions here. Yes he was checking her out. It was likely as a reflex, as I just explained, BUT he was also looking to see what the obvious to do was about which you described. You were looking to see what was going on too, weren’t you? Commotion creates curiosity.

AND for all you know, and this is likely a more accurate depiction of this scenario, he was looking not in awe at her enhancements but in shock and horror, in astonishment. As in WOW!!! Why would she do that to herself? How silly she looks. How plastic. And the hair! Can we say so uninviting, so unappealing. How pathetic. How sad. Yuck. Of course I’m translating HIS words into girl speak.

That said, let’s say your man actually did obviously and blatantly stare at another woman, tongue hanging, eyes bugged out. It’s clear he desires her. My first question to you would be, “why are you with a man who has seemingly no regard for your feelings, who would be this disrespectful to you? He doesn’t seem at all committed.” Think about this first.

Okay so let’s say this is a first time occurrence. If his look lasts for more than an instinctive split second, and if it bothers you for more than a split second, then you need to let him know that what he did feels bad. It made you feel uncomfortable, insecure, angry, whatever it was you felt. And you must speak up in the moment.

If you initially let it go though and this incident continues to eat at you, then you still need to say something. You don’t want it to fester and then have it come out at another time in a totally inappropriate, out of proportion way. You could say something like this:

“The other night when we were out walking, it seemed as though you were ogling that blonde woman, and that felt so bad. I felt so not enough in that moment.”

A good guy would apologize and make it right is some way, in his way.

My reader’s response:

“Wow I never thought I could say anything like that if a man does that. I always felt it’s ok to look at the menu just don’t order.”

There is a distinct difference between a brief glance over that even you as a woman would engage in in this kind of situation, and flat out eyes wide staring for fifteen seconds.

BUT we don’t really know if he was staring at the woman, or if he was simply wondering what was happening or if he was staring at the “spectacle” that is she, a caricature of a real woman.

We women have a tendency to project our insecurities on to our men. And it’s okay to be mistaken.

If after voicing your feelings over what you think was going on, he still gets defensive, then you will know that maybe you were correct in your assessment, and there are maybe things you need to talk about. Maybe you need to rethink this man. But do talk first.

“Tinque…you are awesome!! I know they will look (I walked through the red light district in Amsterdam with him once)  It’s the 15 second look and re-look that made me feel icky and so undesirable…so not enough…maybe it was the fact that she had that “porn star look” (sorry but that’s what she looked like…unnatural body…fake tan…bleach blonde)…maybe scared the porn use will skyrocket again…then the sexual rejection will come back again. Maybe I feel my man doesn’t look at me that way. I wish men (more importantly…my man) would look at me with “lust in their eyes”. I felt totally turned off from him in that moment. I felt like giving up trying to deal with the lingering feelings of rejection and turning around and walking away.”

Can you see how she’s boarding that run away train in her brain? A few seconds long look at something totally freakish (and I am sure that’s exactly what he was thinking) and she has gone from, “I know men look to, I WILL be rejected. My man never looks at ME that way, with lust.”

Her fears are understandable, and maybe they are well founded since he has had a problem with porn before, but since she has chosen to be with this man, she cannot live her life thinking, “what if”.

If his porn habit escalates, if he starts neglecting her, then and only then is there something to deal with. In the meantime, she must work under the assumption he looks a little at porn or not at all. And when he notices women out in the street, it’s nothing more than a passing glance. Maybe he will think briefly that she’s attractive, but that’s it, nothing more to be thought about or done about it. If he is turned on at all, then this is only fuel for his fire for HER.

Now in this case in Amsterdam, very much like the case in the park, he may very well have been looking at her in astonishment and couldn’t stop looking because she looked liked such a cartoon. You know how people can’t get enough of looking at car wrecks even though they’re hard to look at?

And lastly I would have her ask herself this, and this is crucial:

“How do you know he doesn’t look at YOU with lust in his eyes? Have you looked? REALLY looked? Have you checked his eyes right before you make love?

Have you ever looked at HIM with lust in your eyes, soft, open, come take me eyes?”

Please think about this. Think about this long and hard, and then go give him THOSE eyes, and see what he does.

xxoo

I often suggest sinking into feeling before falling asleep, deeply into whatever feeling it is, for this is the time when you are at your most vulnerable, when you are most open and thus available to suggestion and change. It’s a fabulous way to rewire your neural connections.

If you fall asleep immersed in good feeling feelings, you are training your body and mind to accustom to these feelings again and thus feel them more frequently and with increasing levels of comfort.

I was asked a wonderful question this morning though. If you fall asleep while feeling bad, while your mind is looping negative thoughts, when your gremlins are yapping away at you, won’t you reinforce feeling bad, or maybe you will reprogram yourself back to the old ways?

It would seem contradictory to say NO to this question, yet it’s not at all.

When you are asleep your body goes into a very deep state, deeply relaxed, deeply receptive too. If you check in with your body the second you wake up, EVERYTHING is completely and utterly at ease. Nothing hurts anywhere, not physically or emotionally.

You may only be able to feel this for a split second, for you could start to tighten up right away. This is simply habit, your protective mechanisms kicking back in, unwarranted maybe but there nonetheless. But the whole time you were asleep, you were in total relaxation.

Your body WANTS this, craves it even. It wants to feel good, at peace, calm, but we immediately start to THINK upon awakening, and the tensions set in, the negative, gremlin voices may start talking to you too. Your fears take over, and you close down a little here, a little there, maybe a lot, and maybe you are even unaware of any of it.

When you are on the brink of sleep, when you can really sink into whatever feeling you are having at this time, you WILL have even more of an opportunity to transform when you fall more deeply still, deep into a state of sleep. The bad feeling stuff will be more able to move through you and more quickly. The good feeling stuff will be more able to settle into you on a cellular level.

So you might ask, why would the good feeling stuff stay with you somewhere in your body if only as a trace memory and the bad feeling stuff move on out?

You were born in a pure state. Somewhere inside, your body, mind, heart, and soul remember this; they know this peaceful state, and desperately wish to feel this and be this, as in coming home. They will soak good feeling stuff up like a dessicated sponge.

The other stuff is at core foreign. Remember we are all born as love.  So you will in a sense reject it. Reject is not the best choice of word, for that seems like passing judgment, so maybe it’s more of the body wanting to let this stuff go because it’s not what it knows nor needs to thrive on at core. It’s not what you really desire despite the constant barrage in your waking state.

In the sleep state, your body can operate from its wisdom which we aren’t always so much while awake. Your smart being releases what doesn’t feel good, and it incorporates what does feel good.

And so when you know this on a conscious level, you can keep at it so that more and more your sleeping wise being more closely aligns with your awake being though I would say that our sleeping body’s eyes are far more open and awake, and our awake body far more asleep with eyes wide closed.

The body and mind really DO want peace and love. ALWAYS and ALL THE TIME.
xxoo

When you find yourself wondering where you are going in your relationship, maybe wanting to lay out an agenda such as where to take it, how to take it there, how about thinking in terms of day by day, moment by moment even.

If you feel sure you are both exclusive with each other, yet you haven’t been together very long, not long enough to really know each other, then there is really nothing to do right now but continue to get to know each other through ever deepening levels.

It takes a long while to REALLY get to know someone, especially the older you are, more time for more experiences and thus more secrets to be hidden away.You may think within a few months or a year possibly, but I guarantee you, ghosts from before can and will show themselves, and they are more likely to do so the more comfortable you become with each other which takes time.

If you live together, all or most all cards are revealed within two to three years. Longer if you don’t. I’m not advocating dating for this long before you make a commitment to each other, but what I am saying is don’t rush the ring and the proposal. Don’t even rush the words, the I love yous. Take your time to KNOW this other being, feel him, his heart, his essence. Give him the time to do the same.

What’s the hurry? Really and truly what is the hurry?

The wedding or the marriage is for some unnecessary. If you are both committed, and no one is planning on going anywhere, the rest is simply legalities which do make things easier in some respects, yet it can also feel like an imposition. Still the trappings of all of this can seem very attractive, alluring.

For others it makes them feel that little bit more secure, like it’s all that little bit more real, and this is quite valid.

But I say again. What’s the hurry? Don’t you want to be sure this is really and truly your “the one”?

Wouldn’t it feel good to explore each other, swim the uncharted waters together, dive ever deeper, to the deepest of depths with each other? I mean REALLY, REALLY develop intimacy and authenticity?

In reality there is no “future”. There is only right now. Yes you can plan for things, hope for things, yet this moment is all there is.

I’m not suggesting to take this piece I’m giving you and go forth to live recklessly with no thought of consequences, nor am I saying you should live your life just as you wish, selfishly, with no thought for those you care about or even those you don’t or don’t know at all. You still have responsibility. You still have feelings about how others might feel or be affected by your actions.

But if you are not hurting anyone, and it feels good to you, then go and do. And enjoy. Relish every second. Be curious. Be in awe. And BE this way with your man. BE with him.

Discard the rose colored glasses, and keep your eyes wide open. Please try to take the stars out of your eyes, and please put down your romance novel notions. Think about this. You are a real live human being, beautiful yes, yet you are full of foibles, wonderful ones no doubt, but you are not perfect. You are a perpetual work in progress.

So is he. There will be times for sure when you do see moonbeams and rainbows, and fairy dust falls everywhere around you and on you, evoking all the most lovely things imaginable, and he will sweep you off your feet in perfect white knightly fashion. But he too has bumps and bruises and warts and probably some other very gross things. You need time to discover them all or most of them and decide for you if these things are okay, if any of them are deal breakers.

THIS TAKES TIME. This takes living for right now.

Once you fully and honestly know him, then and only then can you have your own version of happily ever after.

xxoo

Does it seem as though you’re just not that much in the mood much of the time? From everything you read and hear about, does it feel like you’re all alone in this? And that something must be missing in you, or maybe something is amiss with you?

Or maybe it’s the opposite, and there are many women you know or have read about who lament over the same thing, low libido, little or no desire.

Maybe you’ve always felt this way. Or maybe you used to want it all the time in the early stages of your relationships only to have this peter out. Maybe life has just taken over, and making love is the last thing on your mind. Or maybe your hormones have changed, and you just don’t want to anymore.

And your man complains. Or he doesn’t say anything, but you can feel his longing. Maybe you caught him taking care of himself in the shower or elsewhere, and this made you feel badly or sad.

Or maybe you feel like you’re missing out. Or you are just missing it. You miss the closeness and connection it brings, the passion, feeling good in that way. Your heart beating fast in anticipation. Or your heart purring contentedly after a mind blowing orgasm or even a soft, gentle one.

Is there something wrong with you? Can this even be “fixed”? Maybe you’ve resigned yourself.

If there have been sudden changes or even gradual ones, I would first suggest ruling out anything medical. Then I would recommend having blood work done or a saliva test to see if your hormones are out of balance, a common thing. Your hormones can be re-adjusted with a choice of one of the varied alternative treatments available, such as bio-identical hormones made up just for you at a compounding pharmacy.

Or you can experiment on your own with the many wonderful herbs and/or supplements available, such as black cohosh, red clover, wild yam, chasteberry/vitex, false unicorn, ginseng, evening primrose oil. I would suggest trying one at a time, and see how you feel.

DHEA, a precursor to hormone production, has been documented as being effective for treating low libido in peri and post menopausal women. DO NOT take it for more than three months at a time though. And allow a good break in between.

Regardless I find herbal supplementation useful no matter your age or sexual status. Our hormones are always fluctuating, and the balance is delicate. Finding an herb or two which works well with your body to keep you feeling more aligned and feeling good is a good thing. There are few if any people who lead completely peaceful, idyllic lives, so in my view, nourishing this vital part of you is important.

Aside from this there could be any number of other things going on here; stress is a big mood killer, tension within yourself or your relationship, things on your mind interfering, or a combination of things.

Any one of these factors will affect how you feel about having sex. Maybe you don’t even think about it at all or if you do, you feel too tired or anxious to do anything about it. Or you dismiss the notion because you’re just not in the mood for whatever reason. Or you just can’t figure out why you feel lackluster, but you just don’t feel like it.

This may or may not bother you, yet I would venture to say that it does whether you are aware of this or not and whether you have been wildly sexual at one time or have never been.

One thing to consider is that a woman’s conscious arousal is often NOT instinctual/biological, a have to have it now kind of thing, and it’s certainly not as obvious as male libido/arousal usually is. And very often even if we are physically in the mood, we may NOT be aware of it.

Studies have been done on male and female arousal, and the findings were surprising even to me. With the men it all played out as would be expected. When straight men see images of naked women alone, having sex with themselves, with other women, or with men, arousal is obvious. Brain scans corroborate the evidence. And the men were all well aware of their arousal.

Most women though were not only aroused by ALL of the above images, they were also aroused by seeing men with men as well as with animals getting it on, as evidenced by brain wave scans and vaginal lubrication monitors. BUT in a great many cases, the women were completely unaware of their arousal and in fact denied being aroused at all.

So a woman’s libido is far more complicated than a man’s. AND a woman’s sexual response is far more affected by what’s going on in her brain than anything else. This is one of if not THE most important point to keep in mind. SEX FOR A WOMAN IS LARGELY WITHIN HER BRAIN.

But the good news is a woman can teach herself to not only become more aware of her far more frequent than she might think arousals, her libido CAN be trained to run higher. This CAN be something you can reprogram. And it’s mostly by simply paying attention.

When K and I first got together, I was not per se sexually repressed, BUT I was somewhat shy, felt a little insecure about my abilities and capabilities, and I was just not all that free, liberated; I was not all that open, not as much as I knew I could be and wanted to be.

I liked sex though and wanted it because it made me feel wanted and desired and desirable as well as connected to my man.

I’ve never had nor do I now have any sort of strong sex drive really. I did engage in sex purposefully though. Now I make sex a priority.

But as good as my sex life was, increasingly I felt that there must be more. More of what I wasn’t sure. I just felt there was more to be experienced and felt and on different levels, maybe depths and certainly more to release and let go of.

From somewhere and somehow, I got the idea to explore my body and come to know it more intimately, see what I might be able to feel beyond what I had felt already, see if I could become even more comfortable within myself and just see what my body could do.

I read anything and everything I could get my hands on, tantra being the biggest draw. This was a big piece in raising not only my awareness about sex and about my own sexual responses, it also got me to thinking about and wanting sex far more. Instant libido lift.

So maybe you are not feeling sexual. Try having it anyway. You may very well be surprised how you can become aroused and get into it very quickly just by doing, by allowing, by keeping your mind, body, and heart as open as possible in that given moment

Read about sex, Watch sexy movies together. Talk about sex, with your partner and/or with your friends.

When you try out new to you things, yes you may feel weird or shy or insecure at first, guilty even but the more you gain confidence as your experiences expand to places you may not have even dreamed about AND you receive a positive response from your partner, the more everything will expand and in all ways, in your body, your heart, and your essence, AND your ability to feel more, bigger and more nuanced sensations, different feeling orgasms, bigger and more intense ones, and just more.

It has been great fun uncovering what my body is able to do, and the exploration continue. How about you?

xxoo

Woman goddess, born as beauty, birthed as love,

Divinely exquisite, soft, peaceful as a dove,

All that is sensuous. She is YOU and ME.

Velvety, redolent roses, blossoming myriadly,

Brushing the senses gently, sprinkling passion as dew,

As ladybugs, butterflies, ever aloft and new,

Touching, caressing, filling life so lushly,

Dancing sinuously, her being all aflushly,

As  dulcet music lilting, gently soothing the way.

Sunrise, sunset, rich rainbows, bright beams array,

Woman goddess, sweet, delicate, in love by design,

Freely vibrant, ardent threads deeply entwine.

Blissfully rejoicing, fragrant as the morning dew,

Reveling in ecstasy, as I die a bit with you,

Blending our luminously beating hearts as one,

Blissful smiles emerging, together and in fun.

I have a little secret, I keep ever close to me,

As I openly surrender, oh so completely,

To life to love, to my beloved man,

As my being fills with passion, glowing, as full as it can.

Yes I am love, alone unto me, singularly.

Yet with you I feel more, so profoundly, infinitely.

xxoo