Spirituality Archives - Relationship & Sexuality Counselling Specialists

What Does Your Sexual Energy Mean to YOU?

September 8, 2022 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Our sexual energy lies at our core

Most people think of sex, as just something they do between the sheets at night with an intimate partner, but it’s so much more Tantric Sexual Energy than that. Treating the heat and tingling we feel in sexual pleasure as such will change your relationship with it and with each other.

Sexual energy is the primal and creative energy of the universe.

Everything that’s alive was created by it: animals, plants, humans, and even the universe itself by the first big bang. We ourselves were all created by an orgasm, even though most of us cringe at the idea of our parents having sex.

In fact, sex reminds us all of our humanity.

Almost everyone has succumbed to the urge to get vulnerable and naked (and let’s face, even slightly ridiculous, if you think about it!). We’re linked through the ages by those moments of total, sweaty abandon.

“Modern men and women are obsessed with the sexual; it is the only realm of primordial adventure still left to most of us. Human lives otherwise are pretty well caged in by the walls, bars, chains and locked gates of our industrial culture.”

Sex At Dawn, Edward Abbey

Yet sexual energy is so much more than just biology.

It’s your animating life force energy, the creative part of you that brings new life within yourself, as well as bringing your offspring.

Sexual energy is present in:

A relationship as attraction, arousal, passion and pleasure.

It’s equally present in your enthusiasm for interesting projects in work or hobbies.

You’ll find it in the energy you use to run around the back yard with your children and grandchildren. People with disabilities stepping out of shame

It lies in your inspiration for new ideas and creativity, and it’s the energy you feel when you’ve had a shift in your level of self-awareness.

You’ve probably noticed that after really satisfying sex, you find yourself with increased enthusiasm and vitality for living.

Sexual energy opens us and makes us available for life.

When sexual energy is transmuted up through the body to the heart (rather than drained away) it becomes love…

Equally, when sexual energy is transmuted up through the body to the higher chakra centres (rather than drained away) it becomes spirit…

At a physical level

Sex has multiple benefits from reducing high blood pressure and stress, producing dopamine to build confidence whilst inspiring action, oxytocins to enhance affection and bonding to opoids that produce feelings of happiness and wellbeing. Sex keeps us physically fit, and we keep fit to enjoy better sex (and we have to keep fit to have great sex!). Our pleasure may even boost our immunity and reduce chronic inflammation- the source of many disease processes through the production of Nitric Oxide.

Saying YES to your sexuality

Saying YES to your sexual self, connects you to a very deep part of yourself. Even deeper than the love and pleasure you share with your lover. That place within you has nothing to do with actually having sex, it’s your power centre.

Sex is power

This is why it’s used to sell everything in the world from cars to ice cream; and it’s also why the church, culture, society, parents and now pharmaceutical companies want to control it. Even science now tries to explain it- good luck with that! The explanation can never be the experience.

Being connected with sex in a healthy way makes you powerful within yourself

Healthy sex makes you available to deep vulnerability, compassion and healing. It’s worth cultivating your sexual energy for these reasons alone. And the more aware of, connected with, and authentic in your sexual self you are, the more your sexual pleasure flows. It’s a win-win situation!

It’s a natural human desire to want to feel good

Humans commonly seek experiences of altered or uplifted states of consciousness.

Feel good moments that can be as simple as having a glass of wine, watching a sunset, taking a moment in prayer – or as complex as taking mind-altering drugs, or doing a BDSM ritual.

This is part of our longing to break free from the burden of our ordinary minds, and to connect with something larger than ourselves to make sense of the world. Almost every community on earth has some kind of ritual or spiritual practice to access something they call God or Spirit. From shamanic plant use to whirling dervishes to seeking God through prayer.

Suppressing and corrupting this energy is life-taking and unhealthy

For it denies our true nature and makes us neurotic. Suppression of this energy comes from our fear of and conditioning around its power. Sexual problems generally relate to unconsciously acting out the repression, or the unhealthy expression of this energy, rather than by its healthy expression.

Sexual Energy is Natural, Powerful and Beautiful

Sexual energy is catalytic: you can’t see it or measure it, but you can notice its effects. This energy arises in you, changes your state and leaves you feeling different afterwards.

Sexual energy is not just physical

Sexual energy is emotional, psychic and subtle, and it impacts your soul-body. When you’re having sex you’re connecting a lot more than just your bodies. It fosters your capacity for wonder, your absolute confidence and your openness to the world and to your heart. If you can experience this simultaneously with another human being in a loving, sexual context, it’s absolutely magical.

With your sexuality...it is your vitality, your life force

Sadly, it’s the only way most people feel absolute freedom – in that moment of orgasm where they’re free of their everyday, ordinary, limited minds. This experience is known as the surrender or ‘little death’ of the ego.

Almost all of us have been there at some time in our lives, and we want to go back as often as possible

We promote our sexual energy by saying YES to it through how we live, as much as what we do in the bedroom.

You say YES to your sexual energy and potential for ecstasy by:

• Eating plenty of fresh foods

• Living in an aware and embodied way that minimises your negative stress

• Developing a ‘felt’ sense of your body so you know its real signals, including hunger, thirst, tiredness, sexual desire etc

• Minimising your addictions (as they take you away from your felt sense)

• Getting regular exercise, including some that challenges your body

• Getting adequate rest

• Taking a few minutes each day to stre-e-e-e-tch your body

Say YES also by:

• Taking regular breaks from your electronic devices

• Finding gratitude

• Appreciating beauty

• Doing something just for the joy of it

• Doing something purely for sensual pleasure daily

• Making life-affirming choices rather than life-defeating ones

• Being honest and in your integrity

• Doing something for others

• Doing something you love

• Keeping your mind active by learning new things

• Being willing to take healthy risks

• Finding a way to express your inner wild man or woman (the primal part of your nature) to balance the time you spend being civilised

• Developing some kind of spiritual practice, whatever this means for you

You can say YES in the act of sex by:

• Having life-affirming sex through tantric transmutation practices, rather than the energy-draining kind

• Keeping an open mind to the connection between sex and your spirituality

Reviewing your own relationship with this part of you

It’s important to explore the relationship you have with your own sexual energy so you can care for this awesome power in a healthy way. And so you can talk about it more clearly with your partner.

So ask yourself- How do you view your sexual energy? How do you manage it- both in sex, and in your everyday life?
Is it something you nurture, cultivate, savour, transmute, deny, avoid, shut down, drain yourself of or let it control you?

Your answers will give you insight into what is possible in this part of your life.

This post is an excerpt from our book, Coming together- Solving the Mystery of Intimate Sex and Relationship

The World No Longer Belongs to Men as it Once Did

June 29, 2022 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

And that’s a good thing…

A few words from Graeme about healthy masculinity

There has been a lot of water pass under the bridge over the last 2 – 3 years for me. The same as for most with covid and its associated challenges. Along with some locally produced drama’s for us like the NSW floods. Graeme Sudholz

It has been a particularly challenging time for me, in dealing with my own deeply embedded and subconscious demons. I have been to hell, and back.

As a result of this clearing out of my cupboard, I deeply feel and believe that being male has also come under subtle and increasing pressure in recent times. This is reflected regularly and unprompted, in the conversations with men.

It is a Confusing Time to be a Male

My firm belief is that what is missing, to counter the negative labels being thrown around, is a distinct lack of healthy masculinity.

As men, we have a desperate lack of healthy role models, unless we have been lucky enough to have grown up around them. In the form of strong and loving fathers, uncles or friends.

So many sporting heroes, leaders and other so-called examples of male ideals have fallen over, or collapsed under the weight of their own shadows. Or at the very least, are having their shadowy underbellies exposed.

It is a confusing time to be male, with all the negative rhetoric being thrown around, and is easy to feel shame in being male. The media is constantly bombarding us with open ended labels like patriarchy, toxic masculinity, domestic violence and other ugly human behaviours.

I know I certainly feel this negative subtleness, as some of it is deserved, some of it misses the mark and some of it is just male bashing. Change is being called for.

Doing My Own Work

During these external challenges, I deliberately chose to step back from our work in Oztantra. I took a lower profile to enable me to focus on my own demons.

Little did I know how deeply I had buried my past in order to survive it. Even though part of me had somehow suspected it. I had unconsciously buried my past with the belief that I could do that and get away with it. My wheels fell off, I was confronted with nowhere to go, but to meet, clear out and own my cupboard.

It was confronting to see that I had no idea where or how to do it. This after quarter of a century of doing, learning and practising life skills.

I had given up.

Annette was deeply into her cupboard as well, as she has mentioned. It was full on time for both of us. With therapists and everything we could lay our hands on to not only survive, but thrive.

Coming Through

It never ceases to amaze me what is underneath relationship.

Especially the relationship we have with ourselves, that drives all others.

Annette was fully rising into more of her own power, something I found both a relief, and a challenge. We have had no choice but to practise the relationship skills we preach. We did so in order to come out stronger, happier and sexually connected! What we have learnt and bring into our work through Oztantra is unique, effective and f…g real!!!

As an adult, there is no doubt in my mind that, as a child, I had to do what I did to survive the pure horror, terror and trauma of my child hood. My biggest mistake was in under estimating what was living underneath. Therefore I believed I could carry on and ignore it.

As a now survivor of complex PTSD with all the associated trimmings that inevitably go with it, (depression, anxiety; relationship, intimacy and sexual challenges etc) I have achieved total remission. I had to step a long way into, and outside normal therapy to achieve this.

As part of my own cleansing I have written some of this on our website. It is not easy reading, and so is hidden 2 clicks in, behind embedded links. You’ll find it on the “About Graeme” page. Many people have told me that reading my story has given them trust in both me and the process. Although of course it may not be relevant for you as everyone’s path is different.

Stepping Onto My Path Renewed

What all this means, is that I am back on deck. With a clarity and sense of purpose I haven’t felt before. Though my past has cost me dearly, in all aspects of life, it has got me to where I am.

I am grateful for this and I am definitely not going to waste what I have so painfully learnt.

I now have a renewed and robust, loving relationship with Annette. As well as 3 grandkids- a very pleasant distraction and reminder that life goes on. And a renewed passion for my work, coming from a lighter, yet even more grounded place in me.

This is what I see men need to do to thrive in the future.

To look within and live from their own truth. Rather than living unconsciously from the old confines of unhealthy patriarchy, toxic masculinity and sexual shame.
Most men’s inner journey will not be as deep as mine, but it’s the place where their answers to both present and future lie.

Counselling/Coaching For Men

Counselling/Coaching for men will be a big part of my focus. It will develop into more refined aspects moving forward, particularly for men in relationship.

My focus with men includes their:

relationships
identity
sexuality (erection challenges, porn addiction)
dealing with trauma
depression
parenting challenges
workplace and business related issues.

Do you as a man, want some support?
Support to come through these changing times strong, alive, clear and motivated?

We can’t do it alone.

Call me on 0457 966696 or

Contact me for a free 15min chat to explore what I can offer you.

Relationship Breakdown, our National Tragedy

February 28, 2020 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Not Dealing With Relationship Breakdown

is

Our Hidden National Tragedy

Written For

https://intimaterelationships.com.au

Australians are reeling from the recent horrible & tragic consequences of a relationship breakdown in Brisbane, where a husband and father brutally murdered his wife and three small children, before stabbing himself to death.

There can never be an excuse for this kind of act.

Police had been involved

Prior to this horrific incident, police had been involved in this couples’ relationship breakdown, and had advised both of them to seek support regarding domestic violence and an ongoing dispute over child access.

Soon after this violent incident in Brisbane, an obviously distraught police investigator, who was involved at the scene of the crime, stated in a media interview:

“Is this an issue of a woman suffering significant domestic violence and her and her children perishing at the hands of the husband, or is it an instance of a husband being driven too far by issues he’s suffered by certain circumstances into committing acts of this form?”

He has since been stood down for these remarks.

Listen to His Words..

What is happening to the system

What has happened to a system designed to support both the people (and children) involved in a relationship breakdown in a fair, humane and equitable manner, or has the system itself become part of the problem?

My own personal experience of this system

My own personal experience of dealing with this system as a man back in 2000 pushed me to the edge, where I was out in the paddock with a gun, ready to end it all.

I believe this recent incident has brought further to the surface, the ugly side of how the complex issues of relationship breakdown are poorly understood and handled.

Information available has limitations

In writing this article, I have spent many hours searching, reading and deciphering statistics, statistics and more statistics.

One thing from that search became very clear: relationship breakdown and domestic violence are not gender issues, but people issues.

Finding an accurate picture is still very difficult, when (according to the ABS2017, Australian Bureau of Statistics) 87% of women don’t report domestic violence to the police and neither do 97% of men.

The reliable statistics we do have come from hospitalisation, coroner and police reports. The ABS2017 itself comments that their available data is limited, and are broadening their survey questions in an attempt to capture more of this picture.

Male suicide is barely the tip of the iceberg

Beyondblue survey has found Ambulance data indicates 30,197 attendances for men who attempted or had suicidal thoughts between 2015 – 16, yet hospital figures identified only @10,000.

“This study tells us that what we know about male suicide is just the tip of the iceberg” Beyond Blue Chair, Julia Gillard.

According to ABS2017, relationship breakdown is the common denominator for both men and women in exposure to violence, with 39% of women and 35% of men experiencing partner violence after separation.

An unpalatable truth

Surely these statistics show a perhaps unpalatable truth in the current social and political climate: that BOTH gendered partners are equally capable of unspeakable acts of violence and cruelty, in the common and highly volatile fuelled up and emotionally charged state of relationship breakdown.

See this next Link about the 2017 tragedy in Cairns, were Raina Thaiday murdered eight children in her care, aged from 27 months to 14 years, 4 boys and 4 girls. Seven of these children were her own, and a niece.

Police are forced to act

In my work as a Relationship Counsellor, I have regularly spoken to members of the police force involved in the hands on aspect of relationship breakdown.

They say that often they’re taking the wrong person ie. the man, away in handcuffs, where it is obvious that both people have been involved in creating the situation.

Making domestic violence a purely gender issue, and heaping all the blame and responsibility onto men, is I believe, making a bad situation worse.

We have a people problem, rather than a gender problem.

With partner violence, a woman is murdered every 6 days and a male every 10 days, yet when all other family members are included, such as children and siblings, victim numbers become relatively even.

My own experience of relationship breakdown

As a partner and parent, I went through my own relationship breakdown in 2000.

I still struggle to put into words the lasting effects of the systematic cruelty I experienced simply because I was a male. I lost my kids, I went from being full time with them to being ‘granted’ 4 days a month.

I was devastated, I spoke up and was simply told “this is the best things for the kids.”

How could I argue with that?

I still have those lawyer letters…

Under this system, my feelings were used against me

My emotionality, the fact I had feelings was used against me, I was devastated, deeply hurting and just plain lost didn’t matter.

My wife and her lawyer deemed I was unfit to have any increase in custody and even threatened an intervention order if I breached any of the ‘list of rules’, such as driving onto the property to pick my kids up.

I was forced to park out on the road, hundreds of meters away.

My solicitor was blunt when she cautioned me my actions or reactions were teaching and influencing my kids in how man treats women.

I had nowhere to go

My hands were tied with nowhere to go, but to suck it up.
Something died in me during this time.

My sense of loss and helplessness was, and still is painful even 20 years later.

Prior to our separation, as our long-term marriage faltered, we sought help.

During our couples counselling, I had my first gob smacking exposure to this undercurrent of bigoted ignorance towards men.

Why wasn’t I asked the same question ?

Our young woman counsellor asked my wife if she had ever been hit, or had experienced any form physical abuse or violence from me, to which she said no.

The counsellor moved on and I interrupted her and asked why didn’t she ask me that same question?

She just looked at me, as if I had suddenly contracted a contagious disease, then continued to move on.

I interrupted her and said that I had been hit on several occasions by my wife and what did she have to say about that?

Without a pause, she continued on with her diatribe and I lost much interest in couples counselling, even though we did try several others with even less success.

Some therapists make better truck drivers

Looking back, I see it now as total incompetence in relationship counselling, and I believe some therapists would make better truck drivers.

I see too that poor therapy is very damaging and that having no therapy is safer than bad therapy.

This is an article from ABC on poor therapy

Decades later, this whole event still saddens me.

My 3 children were also hurting and confused at that time. They felt then, and still feel, that I had abandoned them.

I didn’t want to end up in police custody

At their age, I couldn’t tell them what was really happening.

I wouldn’t say that I couldn’t see them simply because I was told by their mother and her lawyer that this is the way it is done.

And I didn’t say that any attempt by me to see more of them would most likely land me in police custody.

The local school could see what was happening, and suggested I come and sit with my children at school, especially my youngest.

My emotion was intense, my youngest just sat on my knee, clung to me and we both cried and cried. I only did this a couple of times, as it was too disruptive for everyone, including her class and teacher.

For me, losing access to my children, created in me a sense of powerlessness, overwhelm and pain that was and still is indescribable.

I am still shocked, decades later how cruel the system still is

I still shocked today, decades later, how heartless and inadequate our system was, and still is for vulnerable men who are hurting.

At no point during the first 18 months of separation was I given any credit or acknowledgement that I loved my kids or that I had a right to see them.

I was the token male whose sole function was purely for financial support and how dare I have feelings for my kids…

My access was measured and limited by financial reasons.

If I was allowed more than a certain number of days per year, the amount I paid would be reduced, which was determined by their mother and her lawyer.

My experience with the Family Law system was beyond belief, every step in this process took months and cost 000’s, with a greedy, heartless and extremely predatory legal system supporting it.

Meeting the Child Support Agency

After separation my ex’s legal genius advised her to remove all joint money and freeze all our bank accounts, in spite that I had agreed and supported her managing business accounts and finances.

On top of lost access, my cash and business accounts had gone or were frozen, despite having a business to run, to live plus child support to pay.

Now I just had to do it with no funds, business or other financial means.

I contacted the Child Support Agency explaining my situation.

They were very clear and stated that my next payment was due next week and they expected it to be made, otherwise there would be penalties.

There was no offer of support or guidance, just a simple threat “pay up or else, and it’s not our problem…”

That really pissed me off.

During the first 3-4 months of hell and indescribable agony of separation, I was slowly and steadily sliding into a deep dark hole.

I was in a bad way

I was unaware of my decline, I was in a bad way.

I remember a conversation at this time with my parents, about what was happening

They refused to believe it and declined to help me, stating that my ex “would never do a thing like that”.

I felt betrayed, I walked out and never had a conversation about that or much else with them again.

A few days later, I was out in the paddock with a gun, ready to end it all.

I held my breath and was about to pull the trigger, when the family dog jumped into the front of my ute with me and broke that spell.

I ended up out on the ground, vomiting, and I think I must have blacked out, as when I came out of it the dog was lying beside me with its head resting on my chest.

I broke into tears at the sheer helplessness of my situation.

From that point, I started to climb out my black hole.

I rang Lifeline later that day and a friend was on duty and I spilled my story.

As a current and active Lifeline counsellor, I knew Lifeline was absolutely brilliant, it is free, confidential & 24/7 for any phone call.

Plus, they have one of the most comprehensive computerised data bases of all local services available for people in crisis, like me.

My friends at Lifeline knew something was happening in my life, and after that call, my support really kicked in.

From that moment in time, I threw myself into every kind of self-learning and personal development I could lay my hands on so I could do better than just survive.

Some of this learning happened on weekends.

My ex refused to swap these weekends with me so I missed out on several with my kids during this healing phase, her routine was more important than kids seeing their father.

This meant sometimes four, and at one point six weeks between visits, even though they lived locally.

I will never get that time back.

If I was successful in my ‘attempt’ to end it all, nobody would have known my agony or my reasons, and most likely my actions would have been put down to a ‘mental illness’.

Even today, only a handful of people know my story and how I felt during that time.

Man up

It’s as if “men don’t have feelings, so man up and get over it…”.

Even life long friends bailed out of my life during that time.

From my own personal experience with this systematic form of ignorance, cruelty and torture, I understand (but do not excuse) how men take their own lives or, God forbid, act out something much worse.

According to the Australia Brotherhood of Fathers , 21 men in Australia commit suicide each week as a result of relationship breakdown and our Family Law System.

Out of a total of @ 2,700 Australian (ABS2017) men who suicide each year, that’s over 1000 lives annually, lost to systematic ignorance and cruelty.

Continuing a one sided approach in managing our national tragedy of relationship breakdown and domestic violence is clearly not working.

We have a people problem, not a gender problem..

Entering The Void- why it’s good for your relationship

April 17, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Building relationship with the void is a necessary relationship skill

Contrary to our fears the void is a place of abundant healing.

In the feeling realm there is a vital piece of the puzzle which is a feeling state called The Void. The Void is the place inside us of nothingness, or no-thing-ness. It is a place inside us of high awareness with an absence of feeling, of emotion. The void, if we are willing to allow and experience it is a place of exquisite wonder, beyond calm, beyond peace, a different flavour of Big Love. For us in our world of things, of possession, of needs, this idea of nothing can seem at best pointless, at worst terrifying. We can even label it depression, yet it is not the bleak greyness or blankness of the depression family (some may say it is underneath depression), it is profound nothingness. This is what the eastern mystics do so well, and whilst we might not need to rid ourselves of our worldly possessions and live on the road without money like a sadhu, a life of nothingness it does have much to teach us. If we can be OK with our experiences of nothingness we can let go of the endless need to get, to have, to do, to accumulate, to be and to achieve. Not that these are bad things in themselves, our lives are richer for them. But if they control us we are out of control of ourselves. And the way to find this control within is to be willing to be OK in our nothingness, to welcome it in as a precious gift and experience for a time and receive its profound healing. Just like the night sky can be a relief after the intensity of a hot, sunny day. So if you come across nothingness in your ABC practice welcome it in!

Being comfortable will help you deal with any feelings of abandonment that might come up for you in relationship. After all our partners can’t always be there when we need them. Instead you can get in connection with yourself by actively going into your inner void rather than suffering in your external one…

Practice: The Void Meditation

Sit comfortably upright with your eyes closed.
Breathe deeply and slowly, scan your body and get present with what you’re feeling.
Concentrate your gaze into the back of third eye.
Imagine the crown of your head has opened and you can see through the roof of your building, up into the sky, through the clouds, way, way out into the blackness and stillness of space. At first you can see the stars above you then you see them all around you. You pause here feeling the beauty and the wonder of it.
Then you move further out and the stars are further apart and the blackness and stillness is all you’re aware. The blackness that seems like nothingness. Beyond feeling, beyond desire, beyond all. Experience whatever this is like for you.
Allow the nothingness to envelope you until all you are aware of is your breath in the nothingness. Stay here until you feel complete.
Then bring your awareness back in through space, clouds, sky, ceiling and crown back into your body grounded with the earth. Welcome back!

Nothingness is an important key in your sexual practice too. For if you cannot let go of doing, of striving in sex you will never experience its true gifts, you’ll never find the magic that can arise within it. This is the meaning behind the Indian Tantra Temple at Khajuraho which is covered with thousands of highly erotic sculptures, considered vulgar or pornographic in the west. A student of this temple must meditate on each erotic image until he has come to peace with the lustful desires it inspires before he is allowed to enter the vast space that lies within the temple itself. A lustful mind will imagine a real orgy going on inside these temples, even more sex than is depicted on the outside, when actually inside is the vastness of nothing, where true peace lives. This understanding allows us to no longer be controlled by sex, to no longer destroy love at the expense of lust.

Daily Devotion
The practice: To join in sexual union with no foreplay and no orgasm.
The Reason: Why would we suggest you give up foreplay & orgasms altogether? The practice of Daily devotion is to take you to the place that is beyond doing in sex, to the place of being, as in meditation.

It allows men to let go of performance anxiety, having to get it right, and for women to relax with no expectation of having to give anything. This practice will also take you beyond orgasm, and beyond orgasm focus is where you need to go if you want to take your sexuality to its highest level.

The How: Can be done at the beginning or end of the day x 10 mins. Or anytime for any length of time.Or for a total relationship renew optimally x 1 hour, each day for 14 days (a great to start on your holidays).

To commence the practice get into sexual union without foreplay, using lots of lubricant. You can use your hand to create an erection or you may like to experiment with “soft entry” where the soft, lubricated lingam is taken between the thumb and forefingers and “threaded” into the yoni.

Using just enough movement to gain an erection (if you’ve used soft entry) and to maintain the physical connection. Get into a position that is comfortable- scissors is good (see below).

Move just enough to sustain erection! Even if you lose your erection just having your genitals so close will have a similar energy boosting effect and if you do the practice last thing a night you can even fall asleep this way.

Just breathe and be present with each other, have eyes open occasionally.

Use this time of being in union as a lovemaking meditation, eventually you will discover there is no orgasm like no orgasm. You may also experience a range of other phenomena such as visions, moments of exquisite peace, bliss etc.

Regular practice even for a few minutes will increase your energetic connection and increase levels of desire for connection with each other.

The Position: Scissors position- man lies on his side, woman lies on her back with both legs over his hips then slides her uppermost leg between his so your legs are entwined. You can support yourself with pillows if desired. You may like to connect a hand to your lover’s heart to connect your upper bodies to complete the energy circuit.

Getting to know the stranger

January 25, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Listening with curiosity rather than judgement…

It’s human nature to get into habits…

And these habits are also a way of avoiding living constantly in the unfamiliar, which can be highly stressful for some…

In relationship, habits can work both for and against us.

Creating habits does work for us in the building of unique little rituals only we share, creating feelings of connection.

Some habits can also work against us, in creating and allowing unhealthy relationship patterns, such as taking our partners for granted.

Habits like taking our partners for granted can be a fast track to relationship boredom and dissatisfaction.

Here is how it can happen, and that it is also possible to learn embodied listening with curiosity as a way out of boredom and into fascination.

In new relationship there seems to be so much to talk about.

In the bubble of new love you’re completely fascinated by each other, literally hanging on each other’s words.

You’re fully engaged in the moment with them, hours seem to disappear, making time seem meaningless.

If you think back on it, you were probably not only hearing their words you also noticed their facial expressions, the nuances of their body language, subliminal messaging and even their tone of voice.

Your own body was involved in the conversation as well, feeling tinglings of excitement, an openness and an aliveness that felt totally engaging.

But after a while it begins to seem as if you’ve heard it all before.

You assume there’s nothing new coming and your interest level wanes.

It becomes easier to check out the TV, Facebook or your emails rather than give your partner your full disconnected couple attention.

You believe you know what this once fascinating person is going to say before they even open their mouths and quickly start to tune out and think of other things.

It’s the same thing with your own sharings, you think they’ve heard you all before, that they’ll be assuming they know it all and that you will have little new to say.

Sharing becomes a bore and you wonder where has the spark gone?

But the spark hasn’t really disappeared, it’s just that where you’re coming from in your listening isn’t creating or allowing the spark to ignite.

You’re listening to your significant other from your intellectual self, where your judgements and assumptions come easily.

Are you judging your partner based on the past rather than experiencing them fully in the now, as you used to do ?

Are you assuming you know what the other’s talking, rather than actually listening to what they are trying to communicate?

This becomes an assumption that you know everything about who the other person is, and listening to answer, rather than listening to actually hear and feel into what they trying to communicate.

You might actually know who they’ve been, but you don’t know who they’re being right now if you’re not truly listening, and miss out on seeing their growth and change.

And you’ll miss who they’re becoming as it hasn’t happened yet.

Don’t you want to be there to find out?

The information they’re sharing may be the same as they (or you) have shared before.

But this person has lived more of their life since the last time they shared and their life experience makes the different.

They may be in a different space emotionally or energetically.

Don’t just listen to the story and assume you know all about it, and therefore all about them (which is not only Creating Safety in Intimacy limiting it is also shaming).

Do yourself a favour and see your spouse in this moment as a whole new being you’ve never met before.

Do all those things you used to do without thinking, put all of your attention onto who they are being right now, observe rather than judge, listen with your body, listen with your heart rather than your head, feel into them as well as hear them.

Ask open questions, inviting more of them to emerge..

Ask opening questions that invite deeper sharing such as ‘how was that for you?’ or ‘can you tell me more about that?’

This spark of curiosity in you allows previously unforseen questions to arise in you so you can ask them.

All this extra information will be totally new and interesting as it has never happened before in exactly this way.

The same is true for you, you’re different from the person you were when you last heard this information. What is it that you are noticing in yourself?

Relationships are either growing or dying

One of the things that stops us from fully seeing or listening with our whole self is that we may feel uncomfortable or have fear over what we may find.

We may hear our partner’s pain, feel their walls or maybe their lack of presence with us.

We’re tempted to make this about us but the skill is in seeing that where they’re at is about them.

How we perceive them is about us.

If you can separate yourself from them and hear, see and feel them as a multi layered, unique being at this particular moment in their own world, having their own experience from a place of curiosity you will find a fascination that never leaves.

Offering our presence in this way can allow our significant other to share more openly as well.

There’s nothing like an engaged, available listener to inspire a person to new heights.

After all, isn’t that what used to happen?

Your partner will feel seen, heard and even loved, unconsciously inviting the same from them.

Yet this is about being curious for ourselves, to create our own satisfying relationship experiences rather than expecting anything in return, for expectations deny possibilities.

Practice: Experience your next conversation with your partner as above rather than just listening with your intellect and see what happens!

Tantric Sex for Men – Oztantra

February 9, 2015 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Tantric sex for men

In my journey of self exploration and discovery, I have had many realisations, and one of them is tantric sex for men is mostly unexplored and poorly understood.

Actually, the more I discover about Tantric sex, the more I realise I don’t know, as I also believe that learning Tantra is finding that place of limitless and connection that exists in all of us.

I have also reached an understanding that with heart and sexuality connection where there exists potential for significant increases in pleasure and heart felt satisfaction with your partner.

What this actually looks and feels like for a man, is in his ability to be able to fully tap into and connect with his own awesome power in all aspects of his life.

From the Boardroom to the Bedroom

This potential exists not only in the bedroom but from the boardroom to the clubroom and every aspect in between.

For a man connecting with his heart is also him connecting with his warrior self, as they reside in the same place in a man, in his heart.

Because, when a man confronts his fears and gives himself permission to fully connect his heart and sexuality also includes accessing and owning his warrior self. Warrior intensity comes from the power in a man’s heart, and the healthy masculine warrior is pure heart.

Our couples Retreat is the perfect forum for any man to learn these skills with his partner.

Warrior Sex

In recent times, the term “warrior” has had a bad rap, as so much of man’s unhealthy shadow is seen as coming from this aspect and most men have fear about this and hold this part of themselves in denial. As men, denying our warrior makes our unhealthy shadow aspect even deeper and much harder to manage.

If your wondering what this unhealthy masculine looks like, then examples are all around us. Watch any news media and nearly all the story’s are about money, sex or power. These aspects are all part of the healthy masculine as well, but the healthy masculine is heart connected which totally changes any outcome. Money, sex and power without heart is behind majority of conflicts, economic difficulties and environmental challenges. It takes heart connected masculine energy to change these problems, and that is the healthy warrior.

A man in his heart connected with his warrior is a man that will stand up and protect his heart, himself, family, community and his place in this world.

It is a challenge for any man to connect with and honor this part of himself, as so much of our cultural political correctness supports the shaming of this essential aspect of healthy and sacred masculinity. It takes real courage for a man to stand up for what he believes is right, as quite often this requires him challenging societal norms. Healthy masculine will also challenge and call out wounded feminine behaviours but in a way that is healing for woman.

Connecting with his warrior self is a journey deeply into himself and must include experiencing himself with other men in healthy masculine space.

A man connecting with his warrior is accessing his depth of inner masculine strength that all men have, yet most carry shame or confusion about connecting with this essential part of masculinity. Warrior is the healthy part of masculinity that grounds and holds safety for himself and those around him, especially when a man decides to open his heart and connect with his sexuality and with his partner.

Men have been shamed out of this place and have confusion as to what healthy masculine sexuality looks and feels like.

It is this healthy connection with his inner strength or warrior that will hold him grounded and safe in opening his heart in intimate sexual connection in his relationships.

Relationship Sex is the Best Sex

I also believe that for most men, this intensely pleasurable sexual potential is best achieved and maintained in committed and long term relationships, where all these aspects can flourish and develop.

This special and healthy gift of sacred masculinity requires nurturing, expression and connection.

Man’s fuel of desire for sexual connection comes from his open loving heart, and this is best achieved for most men in healthy relationships.

Healthy sexual desire is heart connected and heart energized for any man, and if in doubt ask a woman what she most desires in her man and it is usually to feel his loving open heart, to feel his power in loving presence.

Yet, for a man to tap into this sexual potential is much more than simply being physically capable, for it requires emotional awareness, connection and courage to really be able to connect to his true sexual heart capability.

This connection is internal and doesn’t require any mystical or esoteric skills from outside.

For any man, simply being emotionally aware and understanding and fully grasping and accessing his own vulnerable heart sexual connection is where it all begins.

Sexual Power

Strength of connection to his sexual power will require a man to be fully connected and grounded in his body and heart. This is not about being overtly sexual but simply recognizing and owning his heart intensity and sexual power. In this place, it is important for any man to claim and own his masculinity in how it is for him, and most often this may look different to how a woman would desire it to be. If in doubt, simply consider the differences between the romance industry for women and the porn industry for men. Both have their appeal, but don’t really appeal to the other. This is where men quite often become derailed in their journey into their masculinity, as they believe they have to play “the game” to get what they want from the opposite sex. This is why it is important that any man’s journey into his masculinity requires plenty of healthy masculine connection.

When heart and sexuality are accessed and activated and connected, a man begins to feel his true power. It is in this place that man can truly connect with his inner warrior and feel his own strength and power surging through his body. Making love from this place is like nothing else, for a man can be fully in his power and feel it surging through his body, or simply be quiet and in stillness.

Mastering the skills of separating ejaculation and orgasm requires a man to feel his power, as men require access to their feeling of inner strength to manage and hold ejaculation energy successfully with out needing to shut it down. Ejaculation energy in a man is pure heart and is the energy force that creates life and requires clarity and focus to manage this energy into full bodied pleasure.

Ejaculation energy is pure heart energy with the power to create life.

Tantric lovemaking is about creating more of everything, including ramping up your ejaculation heart intensity and multi orgasmic energy and this also applies to women as well. In tantric lovemaking, this combined energy is truly breathtaking.

This masculine ejaculation heart energy creates heat for intense full body multiple orgasms, which further deepens open heart and inner connection and vulnerability with the power of sexual connection holding all this together.

It takes a man who is fully in his power to hold himself in this place and meet his partner in lovemaking.

The stronger heart connection that any man can create for himself in his relationship, the more loving pleasure he will experience during sex.

And, so will his partner, for a women desires to feel this part of her man, and if in doubt, ask her…..

In this place of accessing his masculine warrior strength during lovemaking will also impact on his partner in a deeply loving and subtle way. A woman will feel met, held and safe enabling her to open into her sacred surrender.

Gspot

A women’s Gspot is an energy point that is highly sensitive and receptive to this masculine energy and both can easily experience deeply loving, satisfying heart connected lovemaking with very little movement.

This is tantric lovemaking in its simplest form.

Are you a Spiritual Vigilante?

January 5, 2015 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

A Spiritual Vigilante is someone who creates unnecessary suffering…

by seeking to avoid healthy shame, seeing it all as toxic.

As you move into the New Year of 2015 you probably set intentions to be healthier and happier, eating and drinking more consciously, getting in some regular exercise and feeling good about yourself in the process. The same is true of our spiritual selves. We seek to become better at relating with others more consciously, doing our best to move beyond limiting thoughts and draining dramas whilst becoming a little more enlightened along the way.

Sometimes these good intentions can backfire into ‘spiritual vigilantism’ where, just like with food, drink and exercise we constantly stalk ourselves to the point of madness with every lack and imperfection becoming a cause for horror. With this singular type focus on our own behaviour we can end up making ourselves much more wrong than necessary. For unlike eating and exercise relating doesn’t happen in isolation from others and we can’t always see our behaviours clearly as they’re part of a multi levelled playing field.

Despite spiritual claims that everything in life is our mirror is this simplification 100% true or are we still influenced to a greater or lesser degree by our interaction with others? No matter which it takes much practice to bring clarity and ease to our relating. The messiness of sorting out whose stuff is whose (even if it’s all ours) is both the challenge and the joy of relationship. And the healthy shame that goes with recognizing where we stuff up is an important part of the process. Just like the shame that serves as a motivation after eating cheesecake or lazing in bed to get us back on the health wagon so the shame of saying or doing something that hurts another (or ourselves) inspires us to make a wiser choice next time.

Healthy shame plays an important role in our spiritual wellbeing. However being a spiritual vigilante and taking on too much unnecessary blame onto ourselves creates a toxic shame instead, a deep cesspool of heaviness that stops us from being all we can be. This kind of shame can become deeply addictive.

Paradoxically the opposite is also true. By seeing ourselves as always working hard to ‘get it right’, by over spiritualizing ourselves we play out a covert, but equally addictive cycle of appearing blameless- to ourselves and those around us. This is really an elaborate way of avoiding feeling the associated shame of being wrong. Of being human occasionally.

It is important to observe and reflect on our behaviour but too much of this can be like a reverse form of self punishment where in trying to be spiritual we forget that we are human. And we forget that being human is also divine. It is healthier to give up our attachment to our enlightened spiritual persona and accept that we are not perfect, feeling our healthy shame and practicing the Art of Grace. Grace is the practice of loving ourselves when we feel most unworthy and trusting in its awesome power to shift us back into awareness of our Higher Self where choices come with ease and openness.

The same technique works well for eating cheesecake and sleeping in!

Sex For Men Over 40

December 9, 2014 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Better Sex for Men (and Women)

Awareness of our capacity for sexual pleasure for both men and women in this age of information, technology and numerous other gadgets and toys, is declining.

Our capacity for pleasure hasn’t changed, yet our awareness of our unique ability to achieve pleasure has significantly declined. I believe this is because of our increasing use and thirst for knowledge has taken us away from our feeling body into our intellectual mind.

Sexual pleasure for men (and women) over 40 can be a totally different experience when both consciously choose to own their real sexual pleasure, especially from an intimate and emotionally heart connected place. There are a lot of different factors in conditioning men (and women) away from real full bodied pleasure .

It doesn’t matter how many sexual partners a person has had, or how much sex is experienced as this unfortunately is how we experience or measure pleasure from our own external experience. The pornography industry has created farcical illusions of what sex looks like, and part of the reason porn has such impact is because real, meaningful heart connected sexuality is diminishing.

From my own personal experience, and in working with couples and particularly men, I am also aware that very few men realise what their sexual capability really is, or in extreme cases, if their capacity for pleasure even exists. Through my work, I firmly believe that most men achieve less than 10% of their capacity to experience their own pleasure during sex.

Understanding is key

Something as simple as separating ejaculation from orgasm for men is real, yet most men don’t realize this is possible for them. Just because both usually happen at the same time (ejaculation being the release and orgasm the pleasurable peak ) men just aren’t aware that they’re separate functions. Most men believe that their pleasure experience of ejaculation is their actual orgasmic pleasure, yet there remains so much more pleasure to be experienced.

Surfing the edge

If a man’s focus on ejaculation is his goal then most likely he experiences only a small percentage of his orgasmic potential. Ejaculation pleasure still does feel pretty damn good but it is a separate experience from orgasm and when a man stops when he “cums” then that is his finish. The actual reality at that point of finishing is also the beginning of his awesome potential in feeling his separate orgasmic pleasure, which he mostly misses out on. Delaying ejaculation, or simply “surfing the edge” is a simple yet powerful beginning of achieving so much more pleasure.

Surfing the edge is a practise of playing near the edge with out ejaculation. In this place, orgasmic energy begins to emerge, and with practise will dramatically increase not only the length of love making but also the pleasure experienced.

This is an attention grabbing concept even for those who are aware of this potential experience of separation. And even for those who are aware, it can often be a struggle to achieve pleasure from separation as it may feel like giving up something familiar. Yet the potential beyond this point is limitless pleasure and a life changing experience that is well worth the effort of exploration.

Multi orgasmic Man

As a man, take a moment and imagine your point of no return, your point of ejaculation as a 10 on your scale of orgasmic pleasure. Then, with 1 being the start and 10 being the finish, imagine how it would be if you could keep going after 10 (without cuming) and feeling your orgasmic self for as long as you chose. Maybe even hundreds of times, without needing to actually ejaculate or desiring to finish? Are you, as a man even aware that this is what you are capable of, of being truly multi orgasmic ? This is what is available for a man when he can choose to not ejaculate and cultivate his orgasmic energy beyond his “10”.

As a man, your real sexual orgasmic pleasure begins at your current “10”.

Converting your ejaculation intensity into orgasmic energy will keep your real orgasmic pleasure happening. This will create for you, a whole new world of pleasure each time you achieve your “10” and each time in this place it deepens, past 10 to 11, 12 or more. Your experience of pleasure increases, becomes easier to achieve and stays with you longer. Each time you go into sexual space, your “10” has moved, your pleasure is deeper yet closer to the surface and becomes more accessible as your normal feeling experience. This experience gets better with age and this pleasure is already happening within you. Simply by allowing yourself to experience your sexual potential with out limiting your pleasure sounds easy, BUT there is a condition attached. And it is not negotiable and we’ll get to that, but before we do, a bit more about men’s conditioning away from pleasure.

Male conditioning

Men are conditioned away from experiencing deeper pleasure right from the beginning of their sexual journey. From when they first become sexually active, boys are conditioned into ejaculation. In the early days of self pleasuring (masturbation) the pressure is on to get it up and over and done with before they get found out- stage (1). The next stage (2) is to get it up and over and done with before their girlfriend changes her mind, then (3) before the kids wake up and finally, (4) before they lose their erection.

Sadly, at no stage, or very rarely, are boys exposed to the real meaning of the sacredness of their sexuality and heart connection and what this means to be a healthy sexual male.

Generally, as a result of this conditioning and lack of awareness of what is possible, men struggle in accepting that there is so much more to their sexual experience.

Men become “addicted” to ejaculation as their pinnacle experience.

Some men only experience ejaculation and very limited orgasmic pleasure, even though there is so much more pleasure to experience and it is already available inside them.

This disconnection conditioning also encourages a man to focus on pleasing his partner in order to be a “good lover”. This is another potential that may take him further away from this place inside of himself and into a place of “performance”. The pornography industry is more manipulation that specifically targets these areas of masculine desire of performing and visually “coming” which even further separates a man from his heart. When watching porn the screen is where a man’s awareness is focused. When watching porn, the focus is on the screen and in this place pleasure is significantly limited . As a man grows older and his habits become deeper and more entrenched as testosterone fades, his normal type of sex has less feeling and becomes more difficult. This is also a part of male menopause, which is another issue for men (and women).

BUT, for a man to experience what is beyond his so called “normal” is simply realizing there is so much more, and that he can choose to experience and discover this for himself. If you’re a guy, ask yourself what it would be like if you could have your orgasm but not the “down” of ejaculation? Ask yourself what it would be like to get to your point of “no return” and instead of ejaculating choose to have your deeply pleasurable orgasm as many times as you desired?

Man’s ultimate challenge

For a man to move away from performance and go into his deeper full bodied pleasure within himself, is about him opening to and connecting with his own loving heart.

For a man to achieve these wonderful things in himself, requires his sexual energy and intensity be totally heart connected and driven. This place of heart connected sexuality in a man creates life force sexual energy that is pure heart, and is an unlimited source.

A man feeling and connecting with his deeply penetrating loving heart is also creating his fuel for sexual intensity and pleasure in lovemaking with his partner. And, if you’re a woman reading this, how does that sound and feel for you? (pretty f…g amazing would be my guess…)

For you as a man in achieving your sexual heart connection, a deeply loving and connected relationship container is ideal. This will enable you to create your fuel for your open heart, which creates more feeling of depth of pleasure. Masculine ejaculation energy is pure heart energy and this is what a woman desires most of all from her man, and this is what men are capable of bringing into relationship. Surfing the edge for longer will keep your ejaculation energy and dramatically increase your heart energy that you bring into your sexual connection. This is about a man being able to experience his heart opening in a way that will enable him in experiencing more loving sexual power centred within himself .

Sexual shame

Most men carry a deep pool of sexual shame, from male conditioning around their identity and their sexuality that interferes with their capability in connecting with and experiencing more pleasure. This shame is also a large part of the reason why most men find it challenging to accept unlimited pleasure can exist beyond separation of ejaculation and orgasm.

Men are conditioned from the beginning of their sexuality, to get it over and done with by ejaculating, resulting in conditioning men into being trigger sensitive, numb or lose interest in sex. This shame will also significantly impact on a man’s emotional availability, as most men will withdraw from relationship as a result of feeling this shame . Ejaculation mostly prevents a man from achieving the best bits in his pleasure, and will also enable him to retreat into his shame pool. There is also some primal conditioning in this as well, about survival and getting your seed planted before something eats you. The point being, men have a lot of conditioning to undo, and it is why most men are addicted to ejaculation and at the same time, unknowingly diminishing their capacity for pleasure. Men have a choice and can choose pleasure, but most simply lack awareness about their true capabilities and sadly remain disconnected from their own pleasure selves. It is a matter of choice, but most importantly, simply being aware that they do have a choice, and that there is more, much more.

As a man, you have a choice and how would it be for you in choosing to finish, because you felt totally complete without ejaculation? Imagine what it would be like for you, if each time you went into this place, that your orgasmic energy became deeper and more full bodied, and that it remained with you for days afterwards, and you remained in that place of heart connection with your partner ?

Imagine if this was your natural orgasmic state of aliveness, presence and potently heart connected? How would you feel? How would your partner feel as you shared this deep heart connection with them? How would this impact on those around you, if this place in you became your normal? This is the state that all men are born with, yet are conditioned out of for a variety of reasons, but mainly through cultural shaming of their sexuality and deep wounds carried from growing up as a boy.

Learning to separate and become full bodied multi orgasmic is not easy, but it is real and does involve having a good time that is all about more pleasure and true sexual fulfillment. And if you’re learning this with your partner, then it is a relationship game changer.

Numbness and Prostrate

Men who experience numbness or have issues achieving or maintaining an erection will also benefit from these techniques, but just require different practises. Men who have had prostate surgery will especially benefit from these tantric techniques. In those cases, it is important to realise that a man can still feel orgasmic with out an erection.

How to get started

A simple process to try during lovemaking, or self pleasuring, is when you start to get close to your point of no return, is to simply stop and take 3 – 4 deep breaths. As you’re breathing deeply, focus on what you’re feeling inside of you, in your genitals. You will notice that your intensity of pleasure has relaxed and moved away from your genitals. This will spread pleasure through your body. Then simply start again and keep repeating, the more you surf the edge, the more full bodied your pleasure. The first step is being aware of what you’re feeling inside of you. This will make a difference simply because you’re feeling in yourself and you’re choosing to feel more pleasure. As you increase your awareness of how your sexual energy moves so will your awareness in the difference between ejaculation and orgasm. Focusing on the difference and choosing to bring the ejaculation intensity forward then stopping and breathing will expand that intensity further into orgasmic pleasure. And, practice practice practice… This is the main difference between the expansion techniques of Tantra and the control techniques of Taoist .

A holistic journey

Also, a preparedness for emotional work, to really connect with and release shame, heal deep seated wounds, be intensely vulnerable and really opening your heart are beginning places. Connecting heart and sexuality is a beginning step, and this one particularly challenges most men to their core, yet is what a woman desires most to feel from her man. From this beginning place, becoming multi orgasmic is a complimentary and continuing journey. Let her know what you are doing and invite her to breathe too!

From my personal experience, (and yes, this place exists) and in my opinion, once a man starts down this pathway not only is there no turning back, but it becomes a limitless, timeless and never ending journey. This place in man, when actively introduced into himself and his relationship will create a depth of heart opening sexual loving that will keep growing and deepening. And it definitely gets better with age as it is an internal journey rather than purely physical technical journey.

A man can journey as far and as deep as he has the courage to go into himself connecting his heart and sexuality, his power and this grows stronger and deeper with age………This is the place in a man that woman craves for, to feel safe, protected, nurtured and met.
Better Sex for Men, definitely, a game changer

Both will never be the same again.