The Orgasmic Edge: A Sex Tip of Exquisite Pleasure and Torment

I was introduced to what is known as "Edging", "Peaking, Surfing, or even "Orgasm Control" in my training as a sex educator.  And I have to admit that it is one of my favorite pleasures. I love to introduce sexual technique to women at Back to the Body: Sensuous Retreats for Women couples in private retreats, workshops and coaching sessions.  Frankly, I personally enjoy surfing it's pleasures and exquisite torment.  It is my favorite dish! Extended Orgasm is a sexual technique which may be practiced either alone or with a partner and involves the keeping the recipient of the pleasure in a high level of erotic arousal for an extended period of time while not letting them climax or orgasm. This can go on for a period of minutes or hours or even days!

When the choice is made to allow the recipient to climax or orgasm the physical sensations may be much more explosive, expanded and frankly more pleasurable than if the orgasm were experienced with it's usually build up and release. But there is much pleasure in the play!

Some people have described the experience of being kept in heightened states of arousal for long periods of time as producing euphoric states and altered streams of consciousness like "Erotic Trance".  Orgasm control prolongs our pleasure and heightens the experience of sexual sensations  that occur during the final build-up to orgasm. It's a powerful experience for both the giver and the receiver whether you are "in control" of your partners climax or if you are the one delaying your own release.

Orgasm Edging Tips:

1.  If you are going to share this with a partner, I would start with full body touch, almost like giving a massage. "The Giver"  gradually move towards the genitals and would stimulate "The Receiver" with hands, fingers, sex toys, gradually bringing them up to the point high in the plateau phase of sexual response where an orgasm is actually building. Then "The Giver" would gradually move away from the genitals and move the energy to other parts of the body or simply  reduce the level of stimulation to just below that needed to set off the climax or orgasm.

2. Another way of playing with this is to give control of the orgasm to "The Giver" and play with something called "Orgasm Denial". With this lovely game,  orgasm is not allowed for even longer periods of time in order to develop an increased level of sexual tension. Remember that "Orgasm Games" can take some practice. Both the giver and the receiver have to really get to know each others responses. But by carefully varying the intensity, depth, techniques and speed of stimulation and lots of practice a "receiver" can be held in the highly aroused state near orgasm for an extraordinarily long time.  When the orgasm or climax is "allowed" it can be described as "earth shaking" or even "overwhelming".

3. You can even bring in elements of "Fifty Shades of Grey" if you choose to experiment that way. Some people enjoy creating an additional layer of power elements into this game and the person who is receiving the extended pleasure, or denial is called the "Submissive" can be even be put into restraints and or blindfolds for an added rush of not being in control.  The technical term for this game is "Tie and Tease" or "Tie and Deny".

4. You can play alone! Orgasm control is a way to be more creative with solo touch practices and can also be a great training ground for our own personal orgasmic responses. Masturbation or "Self Pleasuring" allows each of us to learn our own orgasmic response and practice having control over timing, the kind of touch we enjoy, speed of stimulation and our feelings in getting close to orgasm and then backing off and starting again. The term "edging" has been more closely associated with the solo practice where we experiment with stimulation until we reach that place right before climax happens (the plateau phase) and then we just stop or back off the stimulation just before orgasm occurs.

Self Pleasuring is a great training ground for people who want to play this game with a partner because you are in control of  your own intensity and don't have to rely on a partner to "guess" where you are in the game.  Playing alone is also a wonderful way not only to vary self pleasuring but it's also an easy way to learn your own capacity and limits in edging.

Playing with Orgasm Control or Extended Orgasm or any of the variations of these games are all about making every stroke count. This is all about heightening pleasure. When we play with our arousal we are not just trying to "get off". We are turning orgasm into a feast instead of something to get done. Arousal can become an unexplored lands of moans, groans, giggles, laughter, power play, and ecstatic trance states. It's a beautiful way to build communication and a sense of playfulness between partners and interesting enough when "The Giver" learns to spread the arousal and sensation all over "The Receivers" body there is a learning that our erotic response is not just held in our genitals. It can be found in all the parts of our bodies like soles of feet, nipples. lips, and arm pits in equal parts! My invitation to you is to explore your orgasm! It can be more than something to get done. It can be a surf board to ride!

Becoming An Artist of The Erotic

This is True and Fucking Big: Nothing expands me, rips me open and leaves me more vulnerable than love, desire, and the erotic. I remain in awe of it's power to turn my life upside and make my heart beat funny. This triple treat of human emotion's relentless invitation to me to drop my shit, trust, expand, be willing, lean in and love can toss my heart and soul around like a tiny boat on a huge restless ocean.And I will be a hot mess, until I'm done. And a resting place of realization fills my body and soul. Just like this time. Love, Desire, and the Erotic ask us to constantly be willing to be seen naked and raw. It's relentless in it's challenges to us to see things through a different lens. Just try to understand the erotic. I double dare you.

It's mostly impossible to nail down. It can be beyond challenging to understand what turns me on in the way that it turns me on and what turns you on in the way that it turns you on. Sometimes, they fit together like the perfect puzzle pieces and sometimes, it's more challenging. Sometimes, what is hot for me, is less so for you. But we are dating, lovers, life partners? What then?

And there can be boundaries. And fuck can those sometimes feel "personal". Those places where you are invited and those places where you are asked not to tread. Where those welcome mats are placed and removed can shake us to the core. Boundaries can feel restrictive, but when you really look inside they can create enormous freedom. Draw a circle and then stand instead of it. Can you feel all the space to create and dance in? That's a part of the erotic. And It's the speaking and the listening that can also build the fire of intimacy and create the safety for more air to get in if we can handle the discomfort. Can you digest all of this?

Here's the lesson: Can you play in all of that and feel hot, turned on, and desired? Can you learn to expand your own erotic dance within all of that, in a way that is both a turn on to you and your partner within erotic boundaries, turn ons, and the great unknown? Can you hang in there for the erotic evolution that is all of our sexuality? It's big right? It's an edge. It might even be fucking awesome if you allow yourself to become an artist of the erotic.

Tips for Bringing "The Playful" Back Into "The Sexual"

Sometimes even sex educators can really caught up in our own brains.  We think, and we write, and we talk about sex a lot.  And frankly, sometimes we talk the sexy and the pleasure right out of sex!  And if you are like most people, you want to get out of your brains just for a little while, and you want to get into your bodies. You are yearning to laugh and to play. And you just can't remember the last time that you played with your sexuality.  When was the last time you did something different? Some people even put their noses up in the air and make groaning sounds at the very thought of being sexual with their partners or with even with their own bodies.

To truly experience what it is to have sexual freedom, we need to cultivate our erotic imagination.  For each of us, our sexual freedom and playfulness lies in our ability and willingness to create a sexuality of our very own. Forget normal.  In truth, what works for doctors and some psychotherapists putting the human experiences into boxes of normal and not normal does not always serve us when it comes to sexuality.

What if we were each invited to view our sexuality as a work of art, and I handed you a blank canvas that was the size of the biggest wall you had ever seen, and an endless supply of colorful paints, pencils and markers. What if I invited you to fill this tremendous blank canvas with your erotic desires? What if you felt truly free enough to create your very own sexuality without shame, judgement or inhibitions? What if I invited you to play in your sexuality?

The human erotic imagination may be one of the golden keys to having an extraordinary sex life.  So many of us are raised with a spoken and unspoken understanding of what is allowable when it comes to having sex.  We are raised with this idea of what is "normal' and "approved" and what is not.  Quite literally,  for many of us our erotic imagination get's shut down and we are left with a very short list of what is allowable for us in our expression of sexuality. Everything else is somehow made "taboo" or "dirty" or "not normal".

That leaves us with either filled with shame over desires that we may think are wrong, or we simply become numbed out to the possibilities.

For others, we may simply have not explored how to cultivate our erotic imagination.  So what makes up our erotic imagination? What are some tools to free up and explore our erotic imagination:

• Sexual fantasy is a great starting ground.  Allowing ourselves to travel freely in our own mind and explore without shame or putting any labels of judgement around our sexual fantasies.
• Reading erotica and romance novels can be a great place to put your erotic flint to stone.
• Wandering through a sex toy shop can also be a great place to cultivate your erotic imagination. Walk around and handle the toys. Often there are books and videos to explore as well.
• Explore the idea of sexuality being playful.  When we play we are free to get things wrong, experiment, try on different roles, laugh and even be foolish. What if we looked at sexuality as play?
• Put on costumes.  And this idea is not just limited to women.  Erotic lingerie can be a wonderful tool to assist our erotic imaginations. I know men who put on superman boxer shorts to get into the mood.  Are they exploring their erotic imagination? I think so.
• We can all cultivate our own erotic imagination and create a sexuality of our very own.  Let go of "normal" and invite in exploration and play.  The possibilities for sexual expression is as vast and limitless as the human mind. Come play.

Let's see if I can conjure up some a  few more ideas for bringing the playful back into your sexual.

Let's get started:

1. For couples for who bored, feel like there is nothing new to do with each other and are stuck in a rut. Here is my all time favorite game. I call it, "What's in Your Basket?"  This is a couple's game. Go into a sex toy store...or go on line and each person gets half an hour to put toys in their basket. Sometimes, "Showing" our desires and fantasies is SO much less scary than "Telling".

The couple meets up and they get to look into each others baskets. Oh la la!  I bet you will find things in each others basket that you had no idea they were interested in. Remember that when your beloved brings you their basket, they are bringing you an incredibly intimate and vulnerable part of themselves. Please receive the basket with as much love, and kindness as possible. You may be truly surprised and delighted by what is in the basket, and you might be blown away too! That's great!

Now, each person gets to pick three things from the other person's basket that they are willing to explore. This is where "Consent" and "Boundaries" come in. When you pick the items in your partner's basket you are only consenting to exploring the toy or fantasies that the toy represents. You are not consenting to do it. You are consenting to explore it. Talk about it and then decide how much you want to play. And you just might be a "Hell Yes"!  And you might be a "Maybe".  It's also really acceptable to be a "No".  The hope is that you can find three items in each others baskets that you can be either a "Hell Yes" or a "Maybe" too.

It's a great way to begin the conversation of "what turns my partner on" as well as opening new playful doors for the two of you to explore. And it's fun! Amazing openings and play has happened with this delicious heart opening game.  Enjoy the conversations and experiences. Go to dinner after and then go home to slowly explore and savor the play that will unfold.

2. For all of us: Do you have a secret sexual alter ego?  You now, the sexual person you might want to be if you didn't have any rules around who you had to be in your real life as a sexual being? Have you ever spent time with your sexual alter ego? Playing on line with your secret sexual alter ego can be a lot of fun. Some people write blogs, develop Facebook pages, join sexy on line communities such as "FetLife" in order to explore and play with their secret sexual altar ego.  It's called having a "Scene Name". Some people even going out and  buying clothing for this part of themselves, and will go out in cities or areas of their town where they are not known, and enjoy  being seen in this part of themselves that they normally wouldn't allow anyone to see them.  This can be a lot of fun and very playful.  This can also be a way of "Trying On" parts of yourself.

3. Do something really different. There are so many different kinds of retreats, trips, meet ups, and centers for sex positive explorations. Sex stores in your community may be running workshops. Go. Getting out and explore some of your edges.  They are waiting for you.

Yes is the only living thing....

I hear an enormous amount of noise and encouragement around the word "No". And "No" is a great word. No can protect us and free us, and allow us to rest. But what about the word "Yes"? I want to hear more about what saying "Yes" can do for our lives. e.e. cummings says "i imagine that yes is the only living thing". I imagine that too. When I want movement, it usually involves a yes. Or excitement. Or taking on something new. Or desiring change. When someone offers me an amazing opportunity and I'm not sure how I am going to do it; I say "Yes" and figure it out later.

I understand that you still might say "No, I will never do that."or "No, that's not who I am." or "No, that's just too scary."

And I will say "watch me say yes." It's okay to say Yes. It can be safe to say "Yes". It can feel couragous, freeing, affirming and extraordinarily loving to ask those around you to say "yes" to you and your dreams and your desires.

Yes can open doors and fill our world with a sense of aliveness and sparkle. Yes is so much sexier than, "I can't" or "I shouldn't" or "It's impossible". In the space between yes and no, there can be a lifetime, an adventure, a transformation. Yes can be the gateway to learning how to receive in your life.

Yes is the difference between the path you walk and one you leave behind; it’s the gap between who you thought you could be and who you really are; it’s the legroom for the lies you will tell yourself in the future.

Consider Yes.......

Reclaiming The Female Erotic Body

Imagine a society where a girl grows up being taught that her genitals are beautiful, sacred and belong to her.  In this culture, this girl might then grow up to become a woman who is able to live in her own bright light and not be frightened, constrained or shamed by her own femaleness.  I have never met an adult woman who was raised with her sexuality being celebrated and honored. I am hopeful, for the next generation. But that would mean we would need to stop regulating female sexuality and reproduction. We would have to come together as a global community, stand up and declare that a woman's body belongs to no one but herself.

I want to live in a world where women who are empowered in their bodies and their sexual expression are not thought of as dangerous or slut shamed. Where women are not taught to separate their erotic nature from the most vital parts of our lives other than sex.  Where women are taught that their erotic nature empowers their work, creativity, and their ability to serve their community.

As women, we need to forward the way in which our communities can truly be different.  What if the erotic nature of women truly is our life force energy? What if my belief that this erotic energy transforms and fuels us to a greater expression of creativity, learning, loving, working, painting, dancing, cooking, parenting, and enjoying our lives? How can we support girls and women to have this?

Every women needs to know she is welcomed, honored and worthy of having pleasure in her body. Every women needs to be taught from the earliest age that her vulva is beautiful, that her desires are important, and that she is worthy of attention.

Women who have not been raised within this loving environment need to have their wounds healed. Most women are raised with some level of shame around the appearance, smell, or discharges from their genitals. It is only in recent years that menstruation is being honored for young women, and only in segments of our communities. Because so many women have been raised with fear around their own sexuality, we have learned to numb out and disconnect from our bodies. Women need to be given the opportunity to reconnect to their bodies and their sexual feelings. This is a kind of re-parenting of the body: where each women is given opportunities to focus on simply feeling and focusing on sensation.  For a woman who is raised with shame, fear, or hurt in her own sexuality, it may take time for her to drop her full body armor and open.

Without real and relevant sex education, women are raised without knowledge of their own genital anatomy - let alone what could possibly give them pleasure. Most women do not have partners who also understand the female body. Our men, were not given an education either. So if women and men do not know what is possible erotically for a woman - the experience of sexuality can often be less than pleasurable or not as beautiful as it can be.

It is possible for women to self connect to their own erotic bodies; even women who have been traumatized and not just neglected or shamed on subtle levels. Women can be shown how to reclaim what was always there and find all the joy that their are capable of feeling in their bodies.

Once women are able to deeply feel all the aspects of their sexuality and bring it fully into their lives - they will begin to demand from themselves and from those around them a level of integrity that is full of radiance. No one some want to keep it all under wraps. A fully erotically empowered woman will evaluate all of her life: her partnerships, her work, and even where she lives. She may make changes. She may no longer settle for what is convenient or conventional.

A fully embodied self loving woman will finally let go of the fear of her own deepest cravings. She will no longer be frightened of the loud, wild "YES" within herself.  Imagine all of us being able to claim our pleasure - and where no one has to retreat into fear and numbing. It's possible.  I have bore witness.

Falling Into The Gap: An Exploration of Mindful Touch and The Pleasure of Surrendered Receiving

Join Internationally known Sex Educators Pamela Madsen and Ron Stewart for an extraordinary workshop on the tools of touch and embodiment. The key to a delicious sex life with your partner or with yourself is understanding how to give and receive touch. Our fingers, our eyes, and our breath are all tools for connection. This seems basic and yet most of us have never been taught these skills. It’s all suppose to come “naturally”. Falling Into The Gap: An Exploration of Mindful Touch and The Pleasure of Surrendered Receiving

This clothes on workshop invites intrepid explorers (singles and couples) of all ages, genders and sexual orientations to learn with us in a playful and non-threatening environment.

Participants will discover that both the giving and receiving of touch is not only fun and delicious, it’s also transformational and healing. Through a series of mini-lectures, demonstrations, movement, breath and touch exercises, we will open our hearts to what is possible through the power of touch.

What you will explore:

* Communication and Boundaries -. Overcome the fear of setting limits and be comfortable with your own boundaries. Explore your own “pleasure ceiling”, and challenge yourself to raise it.

* Mindful Practices - Movement, breath and meditations will be offered to help participants become present to the subtleties of giving and receiving touch.

* Touch Explorations - Through guided exercises, improve your touch skills and deepen your capacity to connect with self or partner(s).

* Receiving Pleasure - Utilizing conscious relaxation,verbal/non-verbal communication and active receiving, we will heighten our ability to become more present to pleasure.

Date: April 27th, 2014 Time: 6:30pm to 9:30pm Location: 115 Wooster Street in SoHo NYC Buzzer Apt 2F Cost: $35.00 Reservations are required: To reserve your spot and to ask any questions please contact Pamela Madsen at 917 703 3785 or email at Pamela@backtothebody.org  AND you can register on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/events/1383597568549034/

Please wear comfortable clothing. We will be doing gentle, easy movements that most people will be able to participate in. This workshop involves no nudity.

Kintsukuroi and The Heart/Vagina Connection

My day is often filled with speaking with women who are trying to connect to their vaginas. Some of the women that I speak with find it hard to get through the conversation without feeling physically ill. They may get a headache or an upset stomach. Some speak of an inability to feel their own vagina or any sense of aliveness in their genitals. Some are willing to make peace with this feeling, others sense that there is so much more life in their bodies and that somehow it is related to this somewhat unknown place between their legs. The feel a sense of  disconnection or brokenness.

And I keep coming back this week to this art form called Kintsukuroi.  This idea that an object can be made more beautiful after it's broken. It's value is not diminished, in fact the filling in of gold, silver or lacquer is used not only to repair, but makes the object more beautiful. What a metaphor for so much in our lives.

This is what I have learned. Our hearts can stretch to hold love, grief, devotion, and dreams. Our hearts can sacrifice, forgive and remember. And I believe that in female bodied persons, so can our vaginas.

We just have to be able to listen. And we have not been taught to listen to our own vaginas. So somehow we are getting static on this incredible line from our vaginas to our hearts and then back again to our vaginas. You see, they are wired together.

If we are feeling physical illness, numbness, and fear when we think about connecting to our own vaginas it's time to stop and listen deeply. Trust your vagina the way you trust your heart. Sometimes, we will need to practice Kintsukuroi and support the places that have worn thin with gold or silver. It just makes what we have more beautiful and more valuable.

And if your vagina is screaming at your heart to go away - listen to that too with a different ear. Why is she so scared and shut down? Perhaps it is time, to hear her pain and softly begin to coax her out of hiding. Speak to her about the practice of Kintsukuroi and tell her that you will go and get some gold, or silver.

After all, your vagina will ache for you, bleed for you, open for you and shut down to protect you. Pay attention to her. She has stories to tell you. Truths to share. She is valuable.

And sometimes, her silence is a cry for help.

Loving you from here,

Pamela

Mothers and Daughters: Sexuality and 'The Mother Wound'

Daughters complain a lot about their mothers. And mothers can talk endlessly about their difficulties with their daughters.  Much has been written about "The Mother Wound" which is this idea that collective generational pain is passed down from mother's to daughters. For daughters it can feel like we will never be quite right for our mothers. This feeling that we will never totally win our mother's complete approval. We are too fat or thin. Not feminine enough or showing too much skin. This feeling that our mother is always comparing us to someone elses daughter or even our sister, who has a better job or does more for their mother. It can be about our parenting, our dress code and most of all—this unspoken shame around our sexuality.

Many daughters feel that they have to remain sexually small because how dare they want to have more sexual freedom and pleasure than their mothers had.  Or maybe their mother's were sexually or emotionally abused—and there is this fear that if the daughter is sexually alive the same fate will befall her. The daughter may not even know this on a conscious level, but somewhere deep inside, she knows that she cannot explore who she is on a sexual level because it will trigger her mother's fear and disapproval.

In my sexuality and intimacy coaching practice and at my retreats, "The Mother Wound" has been one of the prevalent issues that lay right under the surface for so many women.

They keep themselves sexually small because they don't want to threaten other women or call too much attention to themselves. There is this fear that "something bad will happen to them" that they will not be able to control. Or worse - that they will be blamed. They compete endlessly with other women and have this feeling that they cannot trust other women.

After all, some feel that they couldn't they trust their mother to protect them or see them as they truly were/are.

They have this secret fear that they are broken in some way and not worthy of creating what they really want in their lives. There is this fear around shaking things up too much. Women talk to me about attracting men into their lives that step all over their boundaries or are "safe and uninteresting". When asked about their desires, there is only this vague sense of unrest.

Many who struggle with their 'mother wound' take incredible leaps forward in exploring their sexuality and then self-sabotage by dropping out with excuses that range from money and time to feeling that they have gotten all that they need. Mostly they are frightened "of going too far and falling off a rail". The fear of anyone finding out that they are exploring their sexuality is extraordinary. No one wants to be a "bad girl" for real. So instead, many women develop anxiety, eating disorders, depression, addictions and complain of a general feeling of numbness in their genitals that we call "Low sexual desire" or "Low Libido".

So many of our mothers were raised in service to others rather than ever thinking about their own needs. They have their own mother wounds. It's important to remember that our mothers are someone else's daughter. She may have all of the same feelings that I just described above.

How is she suppose to teach and support her daughter to be anything other than filled with these same feelings of shame and comparison? This is a legacy that is carefully protected, shrouded in fear, shame and conflict. As daughters so many of us want our mother's approval; and if that means remaining small so that we do not challenge our mother's belief's about being a woman we will do that.

For many daughters that means shutting down their sexuality instead of taking on her own sexual power and potential. The risk of rejection and shaming is far too big a fear. I wonder if that is why so many women wait until mid life to sexually awaken. By then we are far enough out of the house, have accumulated  enough life experiences of our own, and we may have lost our mother through death or conflict.

Many of us develop a late life compassion for our mothers and a deeper understanding of our mother as daughter. That she is/was a product of the same legacy. We begin to  know at a deeper level in mid life that we will not lose our mother's approval or love—or if we do we are strong enough to walk away from the legacy.

While it may still feel risky for a woman to step forward and decide to connect to her body, her sexuality and a practice of self loving and pleasure out of a fear of risking angering and rejection from her mother—somehow in mid life we seem to be gathering the fortitude. As daughter's age, many of us come to this awareness that while our mother's may have given up parts of herself to her own mother—we no longer have to. We can break the cycle. This does not mean that we deny the legacy—it actually means that we take it on and look at it. Often there is grieving to be done.

In order to fully get into our bodies and let go of the fear of our own sexuality—it is vital to look at our own mother wounds as they are the foundation on which our relationship to our sexuality and our bodies are built.

As daughters we cannot repair or save our mothers lives. But we can choose to offer ourselves and our mothers compassion. We can offer our mother's and ourselves understanding and forgiveness. And we can step away and fulfill our own potential as women without this underlying fear that our relationship with our own pleasure and sexual expression is something dangerous and an act of defiance against our mother. We can step into our discomfort of "leaving our mother's behind" or even perhaps feeling their envy as we live lives that they were unable to have. In mid life many of us feel the disappointment that our mother's have in their own self sacrifice and the hunger for what they didn't have. Perhaps it is this maturity and ability to see what our mother's have held in their own lives that creates this burning mid life desire not to forever limit our own true potential. In mid life - it can feel like now or never. It is finally time to become all of those things that we repressed in fear of hurting, angering or betraying the sacrifices that our mother's made for us.

It becomes time to love our bodies as they are. It becomes time to be as big, creative, successful and  smart as we can. This can be a remarkable time of rebirth and recreation in a woman's life. We want our own experience of being a woman, and this reaching for our full potential is not about abandoning our mothers. It is about finally realizing that we will never be able to fully pay our mother's back for what they gave us—or letting go of the deeply held desire to win this approval and love. It is the final falling out of the nest.

And as a mother who is a daughter we have work to do too.  Being a mother is one of the hardest roles we will ever occupy. Occupying motherhood in our world is a job that no one can prepare you for. And it sets you up for all the old feelings of being a daughter like being competitive with other women—only this time it's about your kids plus all the other stuff that you were carrying before. It's hard to confront all of the "Mother" feelings when we think we are enlightened. This is not "old world" feelings. This is a legacy. In our own role of mother/daughter, we may be trying to take back our own sexual power while we are seeing our children out pace us. It can be terrifying to feel fear for our daughters while we envy them.

"The Mother Wound" is one of the most complex obstacles women face, and it's the leading cause of women staying small. As women we may have a tremendous amount of anger for the boxes that we are put into and the sacrifices that we make as mothers. Where can we talk about feeling left out in our daughters lives? Hating being the one that has to be the constant giver and nurturer? Who can we speak to without shame that we are tired of being in service to our daughter's whims, desires, anger and resentments?

There are few safe places to bring this rage and confusion. While there are a few advocates working hard to provide those safe places like Nekole Shapiro and her Holistic Peer Counseling Program for Birth and Parenting—these programs are rare and new.

It's time for all of us to take a look at the mother wound. How it has affected us as mothers,  daughters and ultimately as women. It's time for us to peek at how the mother wound has affected our relationship with our bodies and our sexuality. It would be wonderful if young women could do this—and it's not too late ever for any woman of any age to do this work and have this transformation.

I have seen women in their fifties, sixties and seventies heal their wounds and take back their bodies with extraordinary pleasure. I have watched them experience their sexuality in ways that they felt were completely out of the range of possibility for them. I have been inspired by women who have left the regret and the legacy behind them. It is a stepping out and letting go of the internal monologue of 'mother wound' self criticism, guilt, shame,  fear, and obligation that robs us from our full potential.

This wound can be healed and women can have lives that are full of love, self acceptance and sexual expression. I see it happening everyday.

What to do after reading this article?

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Finding Your Organic Orgasm: Exploring Erotic Trance States

We've all experienced various types of trance - perhaps a meditative trance or an exercise trance. Erotic trance is no different. Erotic trance is the state where you are so aware of your erotic energy that everything else fades away. The noisy mind is quiet and your only focus is on what you're feeling. There's no magic to accessing erotic trance, but it does take some practice.

I invite you to participate with me during this tutorial. We learn things by doing - not by reading about it or watching someone else do it. While I'll be offering examples and demonstrations, the best way for you to learn is to experience it for yourself.

Please set aside some time for the exercises I'll be showing you. Make a date with yourself. Put it on your calendar. Ensure that you won't be disturbed. There's just no substitute for experiencing this for yourself. Imagine reading a text that describes what an orgasm feels like. This isn't the same as experiencing one This is best if it's a hands on experience.

Breathe

The key to erotic trance is a conscious focus on the breath. Most people when experiencing increased erotic energy, tend to hold the breath and tense the muscles. These actions keep the erotic energy from circulating throughout the body. This first exercise is intended to help you focus on your breath and also to slow down. This is a self pleasure or masturbation homework assignment.

Assignment

Plan on a time when you can be alone and undisturbed. You may want to turn your telephone off. Find a comfortable place where you can relax. Throughout these exercises I strongly recommend that you have a mirror close by where you can observe your body.

Position the mirror where you can see your face and most of your body. Create an atmosphere that is comforting for you. This may include candles, music, items of personal significance, or erotic toys. Use whatever works for you.

Begin the exercise by closing your eyes and checking in with your body. Note any areas that are tight or relaxed. Try not to judge your feelings - just note them. Scan your body from the top of your head to the tips of your toes.

As you're doing this check-in open your mouth and take nice deep slow breaths. Make some noise with your breath. Keep the effort only on the inhale. Let the exhale fall; there's no need to push the exhale out.

As you're breathing be aware of your genitals. There's no need to touch them yet - just be aware that they exist. Be aware of the muscles in your pelvis. See if you can relax these muscles on the inhale. This is easier if you breathe into your belly rather than your chest.

Movement

Movement helps to not only wake up the body but it also helps us move erotic energy throughout the body. There are many ways to move the body. Some of us like to run. Others like to stretch. Some may prefer yoga. I encourage you to develop a movement routine that works for you and your body.

Assignment

This exercise is focused on movement around erotic energy. Begin by planning on a time when you can be alone and undisturbed. You may want to turn your telephone off. Find a comfortable place where you can relax.

Create an atmosphere that is comforting for you. Find a place where you can freely move around. Lay down and extend your arms and legs to make sure you have enough room. Begin the exercise by closing your eyes and checking in with your body. Note any areas that are tight or that are relaxed. Try not to judge you feelings – just note them. Scan your body from the top of your head to the tips of your toes.

Begin by breathing just as in the prior exercise. Each exercise build on the previous ones, so don’t forget to breathe Begin by making yourself comfortable on the floor. Then stretch your arms and then your legs. Be sure to also include your hands and fingers. Start with slow deliberate movement. The intention is to wake up the body.

The particular stretching technique you use isn’t that important for this. The important thing here is to move the body, so do whatever is comfortable for you. As you feel your body warm up you may also want to include some aerobic activity. Jump. Run in place. Kick your legs. Sweat is good Just remember that this is a prelude to self pleasure, so there’s no need to exhaust yourself.

Include your genitals and breasts in the movement. Wake up your genitals. Rotate your hips. and allow them to rock. Feel free to include some touch. Don’t focus on generating lots of erotic energy, but begin with some light touch and movement. Wake up your body and prepare for new levels of pleasure.

Reverse Genital Hole

Infants are naturally curious about their bodies. Babies touch themselves everywhere they can. As infants we learn that touch to our genitals is pleasurable. However, this natural exploration is usually discouraged. We quickly learn that genital touch is something to be ashamed of. As we grow older most of us are torn between the pleasurable feelings of self touch and the guilt imposed by our culture.

This causes us to develop guilt and shame around self touch. We enjoy touching ourselves because it feels good. However, others clearly disapprove of such touch. This causes continual mental conflict over self touch. As a result many men and women develop what has been called the ‘genital hole.’ We become conditioned to ignore the feelings and sensations in our genitals. Some of us become numb.

For many of us when we begin self touch our attention focuses entirely on our genitals. We ignore the rest of our body. It’s as if we live in two worlds: no genitals and only genitals. I believe that it’s important to engage the entire body when masturbating.

Assignment

For this exercise find a comfortable spot and plan on a time when you can be alone and undisturbed. You may want to turn your telephone off. Position your mirror where you can see your face and most of your body. Create an atmosphere that is comforting for you. This may include candles, music, items of personal significance, or erotic toys. Use whatever works for you.

Begin the exercise by closing your eyes and checking in with your body. Note any areas that are tight or relaxed. Try not to judge your feelings – just note them. Scan your body from the top of your head to the tips of your toes.

Create an intention to erotically touch all of your body. Begin with the top of your head.

Include your face and ears. Slowly caress your arms. Feel the sensation of your touch on the hairs of your skin. Caress your hands. Move to your chest. Play with your nipples! Spend time loving your breasts. Include your belly with your touch. Most of us ignore our bellies – some of us are ashamed of this part of our body. Make love to your belly.

Include erotic touch of your genitals. Use slow deliberate touch. Explore your inner and outer labia. Allow yourself to gently play with all kinds of touch around your clitoris and then move deep back around your vagina and your perineum. Caress the tender places on the inside of your legs. Include your feet and toes.

Erotically wake up your entire body. Yes, your genitals can create lots of erotic energy. But so can the rest of your body.

 Working with our Male Partners on Expanding Pleasure and Experiencing Erotic Trance

Most of us learned to masturbate when we were much younger. At this time in our lives we learned that we needed to hide our pleasure from others – like parents or siblings. This required us to be very efficient about masturbation. We learned to be quick and quiet. For some of us this habit carried into adulthood. We needed to be quick and quiet to hide our masturbation from roommates, partners or spouses. This results in a lifetime of quick hidden masturbation.

For men, this habit conditioned our bodies to ejaculate quickly.

Assignment

The focus of this exercise is to recondition our bodies with our partners. This is about learning to build pleasure. It’s not about ‘controlling ’male ejaculation. You may find that you and your partner need a lot of practice with this exercise. That’s okay, reconditioning takes time. And it's fun!

This exercise is about learning how to build excitement and enjoyment of pleasure without climax. This is a one way touch exercise - where you will be trading with your partner on giving and receiving touch. I recommend doing this on different nights. Ladies - start by giving your man a full body massage and then moving to the genitals. When touching your man's genitals - the key to building pleasure is to vary the pace and the strokes. Most of us are used to doing the ‘piston’ stroke – the usual up down stroke with a fist. I recommend that you vary the pace. Try using a ‘backhand’ stroke – reversing your hand as you stroke you man. You may want to switch hands. Include some light pulling and tugging of his balls. Include touching his perineum.

This exercise is focused on the distinction between excitement and enjoyment. All pleasure involves two polar opposites: “interest-excitement” and “enjoyment-joy.” Interest - Excitement is felt in the body as an increase in neurological firings. Excitement is that phase

where our erotic energy is increasing, progressing upwards on a curve leading towards orgasm and ejaculation. Our energies are focused on increasing the level of sexual energy.

Enjoyment-Joy is felt in the body as a decrease in neurological firings. Enjoyment is focused on simply experiencing the pleasurable feelings. The focus here isn’t on increasing the erotic energy as much as it is focused on experiencing that energy.

A complete pleasure cycle usually involves the build up of excitement followed by a period of enjoyment. Most of us are better are experiencing excitement than experiencing enjoyment. One of the ways of getting into an erotic trance state is to alternate consciously between excitement and enjoyment.

Talk to your partner. Ask him to tell you when he is getting close to the place where he feesl somewhat close to orgasm, when he shares that - then back off on your strokes. Stop building excitement. Instead, spend some time focusing on the pleasurable sensations in his body. Encourage him to enjoy the feelings. Move to rubbing his breasts and nipples...kiss his belly and allow him to float in the session.

You may want to help him to scan body similar to what we did during the breathing exercise earlier. Ask him to scan his body from head to toe and become aware of what he notices. Encourage him to enjoy the waves of pleasure that he may be experiencing. When you feel ready to increase the erotic excitement, feel free to resume generating erotic energy. Freely switch back and forth between the two modes.

Spend time enjoying and savoring Don't get hung up on erections. Erections come and go - it's a natural cycle. Don't focus on making sure that your man is maintaining his erection; rather, focus on the pleasure and note the distinction in feelings between touching him with an erection and without.

This exercise can simply be reverse for you as the woman receiving touch Do him first so he gets the idea You can also use this exercise as a self pleasuring exercise - you do not need a partner to experience all of the things that I have talked about in the exercise.

Enjoy and savor Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

Pamela

Fair Energy Exchange in Sex and Relationship

It's time to talk fair trade when it come to sexuality and intimate relationships! Are you giving as good as you are getting and are you getting as good as you are giving? The concept of fairness and balance in energy exchange is not a new one, in fact I found a few articles and blogs about this idea on the internet. But I first heard about it in conversation with a friend over lunch. It seems reasonable, but somehow until I heard the term "Fair Energy Exchange", it didn't put my own feelings about giving and taking into perspective.

Most of us understand trading money for physical things, or even trading physical things for physical things. Ever go to a card swap? While we trade physical things, we are all also involved in trading energy on some level. We may on a very subtle level be also trading our emotions or thoughts. Have you ever bartered? Struck a deal? What did that feel like to you?

So, in the world of physical trading, it's all about everyone getting what is fair in value. In a fair energy exchange it's all about each person getting a fair and agreeable or balanced share of the effort and energy being put out and received in relationship.

People don't just steal or take advantage in business. People also steal, take advantage, or make bad trades when it comes to another person's energy.

Beware the energy suckers! These are the folks that are really good at getting, but rarely put out. They can literally steal your life force energy in order to feel better themselves. Energy suckers can keep you waiting, those folks that are consistently late for everything. Energy suckers are often insensitive to the emotional or physical state of another person and continue on with their own agenda. They may also demand unreasonable things and cause stress in the lives of their friends and family. Energy suckers can also steal ideas and pass them off as their own, such as writing about "Fair Energy Exchange" and saying that it is an original concept! It's important in energy exchange to give credit.

Fair Energy Exchange in sex and intimate relationship is crucial even in "Power Relationships" when one person is dominant and one is submissive. When a submissive gives to a dominant, the dominant also has responsibilities in supporting the submissive's needs at the back end. In every kind of sexual relationship, no matter how kinky or traditional - there is an energy exchange and fairness counts.

If you believe in what you give comes back to you, the universal law of Karma, we need to be aware of the balance of what we are taking and giving in a relationship. How we give back may be very varied. It may not be an orgasm trade!

So pay attention to your energy exchanges. It's important not to get stuck in a pattern of over receiving and over giving. Spending too long in each pattern will eventually cause a relationship collapse. We need to think about how to give back the energy in healthy amounts to the person that is giving to us, and this is not always as straight forward as it seems. Some ways of giving back can include touch. Giving a massage without receiving one back. Reaching for a hand, or putting an arm around your intimate partner while you are walking. using your "love language" with each other. Is it important to your intimate partner to be called by a nick name? Do you have a special way of signing off emails? Taking the time to listen without inserting your own story. Texting, or phoning just to send love. Planning an evening out, or even the traditional bringing of the flowers are all examples of ways to give energy. Taking your partner on a trip, making sure that their is wine in their glass, the possibilities are endless for way that we can give and take energy in intimate relationships. It is all about balance and being aware of the other person. So much of energy exchange is subtle. It can take the form of kind words, sharing our creative thinking, cooking meals, and even how we react verbally or physically to each other. How can we offer sexy fun, healing, compassion and support to each other?

We live in a world that is full of transition and erratic energy. Everyone it seems is going through something in our every day lives. The world is calling for our attention, and demanding our time. It's hard to create the time and attention that is often required for a fair energy exchange. It takes effort to give and receive pleasure, love, caring, and intimacy in our everyday lives.

It's important to remember that whatever we receive, is taken from somewhere.

We can also take a more proactive perspective to energy exchange. We can help build kindness reserves by giving more than we take. This is service. It's always our choice of what we need, want or expect in an energy exchange. It's just a good idea to be aware that fairness counts. Play fair everybody!