It’s been a minute since I’ve posted something. Because, well, I’ve been living. And by that I mean really feeling and experiencing all the highs and all the lows of my existence. I’ve finally officially started reading Pleasure Activism by Adrienne Maree Brown (after many years of following her content but never having the attention span for books…thanks ADHD!) and she begins early on with this:
“I have seen, over and over, the connection between tuning in to what brings aliveness into our systems and bring able to access personal, relational and communal power. Conversely, I have seen how denying our full, complex selves—denying our aliveness and our needs as living, sensual beings—increases the chance that we will be at odds with ourselves, our loved ones, our coworkers, and our neighbors on this planet.”
While her book is about all forms of pleasure, for me sex continues to be a core aspect of my life that guides me through everything. So I wanted to share some of the many things sex brings to my life beyond basic pleasure and intimacy.
Presence
As someone with a racing ADHD mind it is only within the last couple of years that I’ve started to learn how to experience complete clarity and bliss. And my capacity to access that state didn’t come from mindfulness or meditation, it came from sex. There are times during sex when a movement feels like it could go on forever and I get completely lost in the smallest of sensations. I’ve since been able to hone my presence in other spaces within my life but sex is by far the fastest way for me to be present in the here and now.
A deeper understanding of my identity
I’ve written previously about gender fluid play. But the sex I’ve had over the last few years has completely transformed my understanding of myself in a multitude of ways. It is a space where all the different energies and spirits within me can be seen and explored. At times my partner feels like he is having sex with multiple people. It is the way that different sides of my learn to exist harmoniously together. Where nothing needs to be hidden and repressed.
Non-verbal communication
As an autistic person I find that my words often don’t match my thoughts, and that I’m constantly anxious about being misunderstood. The physicality I have with my partner was a form of processing and that goes beyond sex too. We’ve found ourselves using forms of kink or playfighting to grapple with complex differences and I can’t wait to deepen this practice at the Conscious Playfighting session with Open Relating.
Multi-dimensional orgasms
Sometimes when I orgasm I come around after and say to my partner “woah that took me to a crazy place” because sex can completely transform my experience of the universe. I’ve had times where I feel like I’ve experienced all of my past and future orgasms at once. Where it has very literally blown my mind and the only way to describe the sensation is like I’m travelling through space and time.
Other people’s orgasms
As a polyamorous person I’m very lucky that I get to witness and experience lots of people’s orgasms in a very real way. But sometimes I can experience them even when it’s just me and my partner present physically. Quite often when my partner is forming a new connection with another person they will pop up during sex and I’ll imagine what they might experience when my partner pleasures them and it is honestly like my being completely shifts in response to the energy.
Symbiosis
When I get completely lost in sex I experience me and my partner merging in ways where it feels like we two parts of a larger body. Or where I become an extension of their limbs, or they becomes an extension of mine. There have been times when I’ve been orally pleasuring someone and it’s felt like I’m doing that to myself, or vice versa. To feel the flow between organisms in this way is magical and helps me to understand the way the natural world is connected.
Stress relief
I’ve written before about how my relationship with orgasms used to solely centre around stress relief. I used to feel ashamed about the fact I’d often masterbate 5 or 6 times a day to regulate myself due to such high levels of anxiety. And sex with other people would often result in anxiety which I’d go to the toilet to relieve after having pretended to come. Thankfully sex completely shifted for me over the last few years and this is no longer the case. But I continue to use it at times as a form of regulation and if you ask me a wank is much healthier than a pack of cigarettes.
Endless possibilities
Sex has taught me how expansive our lives can be. It is beautiful to finally be in a place where I know there is a never-ending space to explore. As I grew up and through my 20s my understanding of sex was so limited and narrow, and that reflected itself in my life and generated feelings of stagnancy, claustrophobia and apathy. Now that I can see how endless and infinite the possibilities of sex are, I can see how endless the possibilities for how we choose to live are. There are so many ways of shaping our lives, our work, our relationships and there is pleasure and exhilaration that comes from experiencing the expansive beautiful complexity of our existence.