 Hello. First things first; many apologies for the big lump of time between blog posts, I disappeared for awhile to jump on a vertical yoga teacher learning curve. Back now :) Now then, what do I mean by intimacy? I once heard Dossie Easton, matriarch of the modern conscious kink community, describe intimacy as ‘shared vulnerability’. This feels true for me, that the more vulnerable I make myself to another, the more deeply I risk and open up to another person (or myself - more on this later), then the greater the possibility of being accepted by that person and the more intimately connected we can be. Therefore intimacy for me has a quality of ‘closing the space’ between two people, if scape is defined as things that create emotional distance such as secrets, falsehoods, rigid boundaries, lack of emotional sharing etc. We close the space by being real, authentic with our feelings and emotions, real with our boundaries, honest about who we are, not willing to compromise or hide ourselves or falsely advertise ourselves in order to win approval from another person.  This experience of intimacy is somewhat opposite to a more sexualised, passionate expression of intimate connection which is better described as sexual polarity, which relies on space between two people so that energy can jump between the poles; you know, that feeling of electrical passion or desire between yourself and another. This can equally (or sometimes even more easily) be created between two total strangers than it can between lovers who have known each other for years, as there can be often more willingness to look beyond ‘stuff’, and more willingness to find connection and of course less patterns to break out of. These are some of the main reasons that sexual desire can wane in long term relationships. For sure, the Art & Practice of sexual intimacy is reconciling this paradox and learning to hold both deep connection and wide space in the same moment. This will be spoken to in another blog.  For me, intimacy refers to at least two different relationships. The first is the depth of connection I have with myself. The second is the depth of connection that I have with another or others. It feels to me that I can only meet another at the same depth that I am able to meet myself. This meeting with self is very well summed up for me in a poem called ‘The Invitation’ by the poet Oriah Mountain Dreamer. Here, Oriah asks us if we are able to sit with ourselves despite our pain, suffering, contraction. If we can sit with our Joy and can remain undistracted, if we truly like ourselves in the quiet moments. Her words are deeply touching for me, and do not always make comfortable reading, because for sure there are those times when I do not like the agitation or anxiety in my body, and I reach for whatever substance or avoidant behaviour will anaesthetise the feelings (Work, chocolate, a movie, a book, alcohol, sex or masturbation, social media, yoga, dinner with friends etc). Certainly some avoidant behaviours are better than others. I’m much happier these days that I will probably choose a walk on the beach over a crate of beer to escape the internal discomfort, and there can be a fine line between avoidant behaviours and resources. When is taking a walk a distraction from the discomfort, and when is it needed to move the energy, process the feelings and serve to integrate? However, ultimately it seems to me that cultivating the capacity to sit in still witness with our internal environment and allow whatever is activated in our body-mind to flow unheeded and without self-judgement or criticism is a key indicator of our depth of intimacy with ourselves. It is also a journey from our mind into our body, the very practice of deepening intimacy with self taking us further into our soma, into our guts and organs and muscles and nervous system, into sensations and feelings and associated emotions, and out of thought and detachment and mind. From a nervous system perspective, we are moving from a sympathetic activation (fight or flight) to a parasympathetic response (rest and relax). As we move between these two nervous system states our body down regulates, softens, slows and relaxes. Heart rate comes down, muscles de-activate, blood flow to the organs increases and blood pressure drops. We are in a more receptive state and, in my experience at least, better prepared to meet another being at depth  Let us say we have cultivated this capacity. That we can sit and witness our internal environment and for the most part conduct whatever arises, be those sensations ‘pleasant’ or ‘unpleasant’. Let us say therefore that we have cultivated what we may call a deep intimacy with ourselves. From this place are we able to meet and connect with another being, and what happens when we do? Often, one of the first things that happens is that we start making up stories about the other. Our mind tends to start judging, tagging and compartmentalising the other in an attempt to understand, analyse and essentially work out if this person is a friend, foe, potential lover, possible business ally, threat, and so on. This mental activity seems to move the body back from parasympathetic response into sympathetic response, while we assess the potential danger. Our breathing shortens, our body tightens, adrenaline and cortisol levels increase, and in order to present the ‘correct’ version of ourselves to the other to complement how we have assessed them (our most threatening aspects is we perceive a threat, our most charming aspect if we have found a potential mate etc). This false or incomplete presentation of self immediately moves us away from vulnerability and therefore intimacy. We move out of depth of connection with ourselves and away from the hope of connection with another. We start getting into assessment loops for the threat or seduction levels in the interaction, second guessing the other, remembering scenarios in the past we can reference, and imagining possible outcomes in the future we wish to move towards. We lose presence, we lose relaxation and we lose mindful witnessing of our bodily experience.  And so, from this place, the practice of deepening intimacy is to become aware of these movements, these separations, these neurological triggers and switches, and to consciously practice relaxing, softening, breathing, re-presencing, opening ourselves to the other, becoming more vulnerable both in our physicality (showing the soft frontal line of our body and especially belly to the other) and emotionally (expressing our authentic self rather than what we think the other should see, sharing of our shadow as well as out light, allowing emotions to flow and be present and being real. Risking abandonment, rejection, humiliation. Feeling our vulnerability and sharing anyway). And the Art of intimacy? I’m reminded of a story I first read in one of Bruce Lee’s books about Martial Arts and his fighting method. It’s the old 4 stages of mastery metaphor. At first we don’t know that we don’t know something (unconscious incompetence), then we realise that we don’t know something (conscious incompetence), then we practice that thing we want to learn, getting better and better at it, but still having to mentally move through the steps to perform it (conscious competence) until finally, after the mythical 10,000 hours of practice, we forget the rules and laws of the practice and become artists, moving from our muscles, from our unconscious, from a place beyond thought (unconscious competence). We become ‘naturals’.
The practice of intimacy is continually returning to the place where we feel vulnerable, where our body starts to shut down, to shake, to fill with fear, where we get triggered and terrified and want to run away or get drunk or tell lies to make ourselves appear bigger, better, tougher, more capable more attractive, less needs, to continue returning to this place over and over and breathing, softening, opening, and risking time after time after time. With compassion to ourselves and vulnerability to the other. The art of intimacy is knowing almost unconsciously how to open ourselves in vulnerability in every moment, and how much it is appropriate to open, and in what subtle flavours and combinations, so that we may meet ourselves or the other in every moment, just open enough to serve and support the other, how to dance the tango of intimacy with grace where grace is needed, force when force serves, pressing here, surrendering there, deeply in our bodies and breathing, always breathing. With love, in service, Drew.
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