Sex without love is as hollow and ridiculous as love without sex.

~ Hunter S. Thompson

The second installment in my Man trilogy, where I will take on the herculean task of explaining male sexuality – all of it – through the lens of the nervous system. My intention is to bring all my understanding around male sexuality together, in such a way that both the very inexperienced man, as well as the man who has seen some things in his life, would find some value in this post. And just as my previous post, even though I wrote it with the heterosexual man in mind, I cover many basic principles of human sexuality, so my hope is everyone who reads this, regardless of gender or sexual preference, will gain some insight into the often murky swamp that is male sexuality.

Credit where credit is due – much of what I write here is informed by the works of Sasha Cobra, Chris Bale and especially David Deida for their teachings on sexuality, as well as the works of Dr. Stephen Porges and Deb Dana for the polyvagal perspective.

A few warnings before we get started. I will assume a basic understanding of polyvagal theory throughout everything I wrote here. If this is new to you and want a quick introduction, check out the section on Safety in my previous post. I will use the term co-regulation from the start, a concept that will be defined in bite size pieces throughout the entire post, so bear with me. I will also use the words parasympathetic and vagal interchangeably, for variety’s sake. Some of the ideas I express might cause resistance in you, as I’m purposely challenging the traditional and popular narratives on sexuality. These might even threaten your sense of identity. I invite you to keep an open mind and read through the whole thing before dismissing my words.

This post is also a bit longer than the previous one, making it a two to three hour read. My reading suggestion is to breeze through the entire thing on first read, just to get the lay of the land, possibly even skipping the side note overload. Then, on your second read you can slowly digest each section, or even paragraph. Simplifying sexuality is a complex matter, and there’s a lot of ground to cover.

With all that out of the way, let’s begin with an obscure Eminem reference.

We Can Start At The Penis

Three things can come out of a man’s penis : urine, semen and intention. Since this post is about male sexuality, I won’t say too much about urine. Stay hydrated. Keep your kidneys healthy. There are plenty of resources on the interwebz that cover this subject well.

The entire first half of this post will concern itself with semen, or more specifically, the release of semen. The central idea that will serve as the foundation for everything that follows is that ejaculation deeply affects nervous system regulation.

The second half of this post will concern itself with the energetic aspect of male sexuality. There you will learn that the penis is indeed much more than a pleasure stick that can expel bodily fluids.

The first (and big – pun intended) side note of the day on the question whether size matters : Penis size only matters in the absence of three things : a deep awareness of the true nature of sexual polarity, conscious social attunement, and an understanding of the power of intention and masculine presence. Penis length can be an advantage, since it allows for physical stimulation of the cervix. However, this is a very sensitive area of the female anatomy, and unskillful rampaging there will only cause pain, and subsequent social disconnection.

Penis girth can also be an advantage, as it can cause pleasurable sexual overwhelm in a woman, which will bring her to a state of inevitable but accidental surrender. This is a crutch however, since this type of surrender is not brought about by deep awareness, attunement and co-regulation. Not to mention it can also be painful when a woman is not anatomically able to accommodate a penis of atypical size. And even though sexual skill is important, it pales in comparison to the impact that bringing self-awareness, nervous system regulation, conscious intention and presence can have on the sexual communion.

Ejaculation

Ejaculation serves three functions in social animals, humans included : regulating the nervous system, reproducing the species and relieving the biological system through release. Although in men ejaculation and orgasm are often lumped together, these are two separate mechanisms. And even though it is possible to achieve ejaculation without orgasm, or orgasm without ejaculation, for practicality and simplicity’s sake, I will use ejaculation as shorthand for the combined experience of ejaculating and experiencing ejaculatory orgasm.

A side note on orgasm without ejaculation : There are various so-called advanced sexual techniques to be learned that will bring about a non-ejaculatory orgasm, possibly even a full-body orgasm. As alluring as they may seem, these techniques are much less important than learning to consciously regulate your nervous system. Effort is the enemy of connection, and trying to engage in these practices from an unconscious chronic survival state will do more harm than good. Being too focused on self-serving techniques during sexual communion will get in the way of social attunement and co-regulation.

What’s more, these so-called advanced experiences will occur spontaneously once conscious self-regulation of your nervous system is possible, and you are capable of skillful co-regulation during sexual communion. And should you still want to actively explore these advanced techniques at that point, always go for teachings that are rooted in relaxation, never in constriction or effort.

The most important function of ejaculation, and the basic premise of this post on male sexuality, is to consciously, but more often than not unconsciously, regulate and modulate the autonomous nervous system. When looking at a map of the autonomous nervous system, we see that both the sympathetic – responsible for mobilization and fight/flight responses – and dorsal parasympathetic nervous system – responsible for immobilization and shutdown/disconnect responses – connect to the testicles and penis.

These are the last organs to be reached by both systems, beginning at the brain stem. Since procreation is such a powerful and important biological imperative for the mammalian body, it will prioritize its resource allocation to favor reproductive ability. It is easy to see then why the reproductive system has such a deep impact on the autonomous nervous system, and indeed the entire body.

The fibers of the autonomous nervous system are mostly afferent, which means that most of the information that travels through these nerves goes towards the brain. Practically speaking, this means that the reproductive organs strongly affect how the brain functions. To put it simply : unless ejaculation is consciously integrated and skillfully used for nervous system regulation – from the ventral parasympathetic state, which is responsible for social attunement and inner safety – it will rule your life, your mood and your habitual thought and behavioral patterns.

A side note on the cliché that men only think with their penis : The recurring refrain of countless disappointed women throughout all of human history is a cliché for a reason, but it is not entirely accurate. More correct is to say that a man’s mental narratives are strongly influenced by the relief provided by ejaculation to a dysregulated nervous system. Relief from the seemingly incessant inner turmoil produced by living in a constant state of survival, caused by the systemic and culturally sanctioned denial of experiencing their inner world of emotion and bodily sensation. The difference is subtle but important.

The most obvious function of ejaculation is of course reproduction. This is what male sexuality is reduced to by the educational system. Although not the focus of this post, an important aspect of human reproduction that is seldomly addressed, is the impact nervous system health has on fertility. Medical science focuses on pathology, and to a lesser degree life style, to explain fertility problems. Semen viability, sex drive and erection quality depend on lifestyle to some extent, and can be artificially corrected through diet or the use of pharmaceuticals. But the main determining factor for fertility is nervous system health, since it governs not only stress hormones and the immune system, but indirectly also shapes lifestyle habits.

A side note on the link between erectile dysfunction and diet : The penile arteries, responsible for engorging the erectile tissue in the penis during an erection, are very thin and are very prone to atherosclerosis. This is why Viagra and co are so effective, since these drugs were developed to treat hypertension and coronary heart disease through vasodilation. In many cases, erectile dysfunction is the result of a systemic proliferation of atherosclerosis, and as such, it is often the limp canary in the coal mine for the onset of heart disease.

Diets designed to reverse atherosclerosis have youthful erections as a side effect, even in men over 80. That being said, more and more younger men suffer from this form of erectile dysfunction, caused by the increasing over-availability and consumption of processed food.

The third function of ejaculation is release. This is release in the biological sense of the word, just like expelling urine, feces, or more relevant, menstruation. This release of semen is a natural process – the human body is not designed to be a sperm bank and keep semen stored for several days or even weeks. In menstruation, the oocyte that is released into the uterus is expelled if not fertilized, a process governed by hormonal cycles that are very difficult to ignore or thwart. Ejaculation is governed by similar hormonal cycles, but these are not only much shorter, they are also much easier to ignore and willfully distort.

Since male mammals are biologically designed to fertilize females of their species at short notice, there is a lot of wiggle room in the male hormonal reproductive cycle. This cycle can also change with age, as a human teenager will often be able to ejaculate much more frequently than a human in later stages of life.

A lot has been written about this topic since the beginning of human history. Unfortunately, much of the traditional medical systems are still being regarded as truth, even though much of what they profess is obsolete and not relevant to life in the modern world. There is a lot of magical thinking, borrowed from these ancient, traditional systems, that is currently surrounding the concept of ejaculation frequency. But looking at this idea through the lens of the nervous system draws a clearer picture. Which brings us to…

Semen Retention (And Squandering)

A very simple nervous system mechanism is at play in relation to ejaculation. When you don’t have conscious access to your ventral parasympathetic state of inner safety and social attunement, ejaculation promotes the dorsal parasympathetic state of shutdown, collapse and social disconnect. Similarly, from this place of dysregulation, abstaining from ejaculation promotes the sympathetic state of mobilization, which inevitably turns into chaotic fight/flight energy. Since dorsal parasympathetic and sympathetic system activation are so closely linked in an antagonistic bond, the strong influence ejaculation has on this interplay makes it a powerful tool for nervous system regulation, which unfortunately is mostly used and abused in a deeply unconscious way.

Semen retention, and all things nofap, are the currently in vogue disguises for this unconscious abuse of the influence ejaculation has over the nervous system. The highly lauded superpowers attributed to semen retention are in actuality nothing more than the symptoms of artificially promoting the sympathetic nervous system state, since it produces a mobilized involvement in one’s life, as opposed to the sense of defeat and disconnect that is experienced in the dorsal parasympathetic state. This shift in dominant nervous system state, brought on by abstaining from ejaculation, is then reflected back through others – it will always evoke a stark contrast in how and which people respond to you.

This is in effect the unconscious pursuit of activating one survival state in favor of the other. And the seemingly mysterious effects these so-called superpowers have on other people are merely a reflection of an unconscious shift in posturing – since the different posturings register differently to other people’s neuroception – as described in my previous post. But most of all, it is a clear sign of deep self-unawareness and social non-attunement.

Actively abstaining from ejaculation for long periods of time, based on the illusion of the increased masculine power this provides, is an unintentional, indirect, unconscious – and inevitably unsuccessful – way of achieving nervous system regulation. Taking things even further, the popular nofap challenges, where an arbitrary number of days without ejaculation is the goal, can be highly detrimental to nervous system health, since they force the nervous system to stay in sympathetic activation, effectively bringing even more imbalance to an already dysregulated system.

These kinds of self-absorbed challenges only reinforce the habitual survival states, both the fight/flight state which is deemed preferable because of its mobilized quality, as well as the artificially repressed state of dorsal collapse and disconnect, which is evident in the self-shaming narrative that comes with “breaking your streak.”

The opposite is of course also true. When your ejaculation frequency is higher than your hormonal cycle allows for, you will be actively promoting the dorsal vagal survival state, which will bring about the well-known and documented experience of feeling empty, drained, defeated and depressed post ejaculation. This can actually be the preferred state for some. When you are taught to feel unsafe in the mobilized energy of the sympathetic survival state, dorsal collapse will feel much more like home.

Either way, the hormonal cycle that governs semen production and natural ejaculation frequency doesn’t stop once it’s started in early puberty. It might slow down with age, but unless you gain access to the ventral state – unless you develop true inner safety – your ejaculation cycle will strongly determine which survival state you are in at any given moment in your day and in your life : collapsed and empty or hyper-aroused and over-energized. You might even believe this is a good thing.

Big sentence alert : when you nervous system is dysregulated and you live in a state of chronic survival, spending too much time in either the under- or over-energized state – because of an unnatural ejaculation frequency – will exacerbate the hormonal, emotional, mental and energetic imbalances caused by the underlying chronic dysregulation itself. To simplify : ejaculate too much – or too little – and your physical, emotional and mental health will suffer. But getting off this detrimental merry-go-round doesn’t require great effort and self-discipline. All that is needed is knowing how to access the ventral sympathetic state.

Through learning nervous system self-regulation and gaining access to the ventral sympathetic state of safe and social, two things will happen with regard to ejaculation. Firstly, the frequency with which you will want to ejaculate will slowly return to its natural state. You will lose interest in artificially feeling energized through abstaining, and in the artificial (and very draining) avoidance and relief from this hyper-arousal, which is attained through ejaculating too often. Ejaculation is not the enemy here – the real issue is one of not knowing how your bodily systems operate, and not being aware of its natural cycles and needs.

Secondly, because of the self-healing capabilities of the body come online in the ventral sympathetic state,the collapsing effect ejaculation has on your nervous system state will lessen over time. You will feel less empty, drained and worthless as a result of ejaculating, and so will be less inclined to avoid it – or seek it out. There are much more efficient and direct ways to consciously self-regulate your nervous system, and learning these will provide you with a very empowering freedom from the apparent tyranny of your own reproductive system.

An important side note on nutritional deficiencies : Nutritional deficiencies contribute greatly to nervous system dysregulation and weaken the immune system. Semen retention will mask these underlying nutritional deficiencies, just as ejaculating too often will exacerbate them. The best solution to address both the deficiencies and their effect on your nervous system and behavior is to eat better, nutrient dense foods, and supplement if needed. Taking care of this very practical aspect of your health will be a great help in tackling the more elusive and intangible facets of healing your nervous system, and indirectly help a great deal with freeing yourself from your struggle with ejaculation .

Ejaculating By Choice

We have to differentiate between the often very woowoo practice of semen retention, and learning to ejaculate by choice. Semen retention, even though it is sold as a conscious practice, is mostly used unconsciously for its so-called magical properties, and often ends up being a very self-absorbed endeavor. In contrast, learning to ejaculate by choice is learning to consciously use it as a tool for self-awareness, connection, as well as overall physical and physiological well-being.

There are two sides to learning to ejaculate by choice. The first is becoming aware of your individual natural rhythm of semen production and need for release. Finding this frequency is obviously not an unpleasant exploration, especially when you can do so with a loving and well-informed partner.

I found that a good place to start this exploration is taking the first number of your age, and aim for ejaculating once as many days as this number. Every time you ejaculate you reset the counter and increase the number of days by one. Eventually, as this period grows into weeks, you will start to experience the over-activation of fight/flight energy near the end of this artificial cycle. This often expresses itself in a narrowing of the visual field : your eyes become sex radars that start to scan for “things to fuck” and your mental narrative will follow suit.

When you have learned from a young age to distrust the over-activation of the sympathetic state, and it registers as unsafe to your own system, what can also happen after abstaining from ejaculation for longer than your natural cycle, is that you go into a sexual freeze state. You will experience the same symptoms I described in the previous paragraph, but instead of compulsively acting on them, they will produce an increasing constriction in your body, especially in the abdomen, anal sphincter, trapezius and jaw muscles. The function of this muscular constriction is to keep this sexual predator energy from expressing itself through your body.

Feel free to keep adding days once you have reached this point, just to become aware of how deeply the frequency of ejaculation affects your nervous system, and how this influences your mental and emotional narratives, your behavior and how people respond to you.

Eventually you will find that going too long without ejaculating has more drawbacks than advantages when it comes to nervous system regulation. Your body knows this and its favorite means to remedy this imbalance is by bypassing your conscious mind and producing nightly emissions – wet dreams are a sure sign your body was ready for semen release and you didn’t pick up on it, or repressed the sensations that signaled its readiness.

A side note on ejaculation quantity : Just as important as exploring your natural frequency of ejaculation is experimenting with the quantity of ejaculate. The belief that you need to “shoot a big load” every time you ejaculate has become part of the unnatural paradigm of masculinity, and has been mythologized in porn by – often fake – humongous cum shots. The frantic urge to fully unload in the moment of sexual frenzy is also driven by the desire for release from the stresses of living in chronic survival mode.

When you learn to not fully abandon yourself in the fleeting and short-lived pleasure of the ejaculatory orgasm, you will find you can consciously modulate the actual amount of semen you ejaculate, when you choose to do so. With sufficient bodily awareness you will find your body does not require a total evacuation of semen. And a logical consequence of lowering the quantity of your ejaculate is that ejaculation will have less impact on your nervous system balance.

After playing with this cycle, and exploring the impact of ejaculating too often and not enough, you will find your natural cycle will be somewhere around a number of weeks equal to the first number of your age. But it’s important to only use this number-of-days system as a temporary tool in your exploration, and not rigorously adhere to numbers or formulas. Even when you’ve found the ejaculation frequency that feels good, the number of days between each ejaculation will change, since there are many variables that will determine what your body actually needs. And this is of course the main goal : to become more aware and attuned to your body’s needs, and learning to honor them.

Honoring the natural rhythm of your ejaculatory cycle has a powerful soothing and stabilizing effect on your nervous system. Ejaculation registers as a powerful and acute shock to the chronically dysregulated nervous system. When you aren’t yet able to consciously self-regulate your nervous system, and don’t have free access to the ventral vagal state, through this exploration you will become aware of how every ejaculation acutely activates the dorsal vagal state.

The longer you postpone ejaculation and artificially extend your natural cycle, the deeper this drop into dorsal will be. Then, in the days following a single ejaculation, the nervous system slowly builds back up to sympathetic survival mobilization, and eventually goes into over-activation. Every ejaculation resets this cycle.

The best way to keep track of this is by being alert to the indirect feedback of how this saw-tooth wave shaped cycle operates in you. You will notice a shifting of your mental and emotional narratives, from stories and feelings of collapse, defeat and worthlessness in the period following ejaculation, to the chaotic frenzy and sexual tunnel vision that comes with sympathetic over-activation. See these as the expression of how your nervous system reacts to ejaculating and abstaining. Becoming aware of how this cycle operates in you will slowly strengthen your anchoring in the ventral vagal state.

Also know that the climbing part of the saw-tooth wave – from dorsal to sympathetic – is not a straight line. There can often be a short and intense burst of sympathetic over-activation, or a sudden drop into dorsal collapse, in the days following ejaculation. Ejaculation impairs nervous system resilience, especially when your nervous system is already habitually in survival mode. For a day or two after ejaculation, your nervous system will be more vulnerable to threat responses being triggered, which often presents itself as sudden and short-lived outbursts of depression or anger.

A quick side note on your nervous system’s natural base line : Nervous system regulation does not equal calming your system. You might have a natural penchant towards calmness and immobility, but your natural equilibrium might also lie on the side of activity and mobility. If your naturally preferred state is one of calm, you might find yourself ejaculating too often, since the depleted and immobilized state this produces lies closer to home. Conversely, if your naturally preferred state is one of activity, you might be tempted by the hyper-aroused states induced by ejaculating too little. Use this concept as one more tool in your self-exploration.

When your nervous system is still stuck in a chronic state of survival and threat responses, you will find that in between these under- and over-mobilized survival states there are two windows of temporary balance. A day or two after ejaculation, and until the inevitable onset of sympathetic over-activation, your nervous system will be in a state of suspension between under- and over-activation, and you will find a calmness that is unlike the depressed or restless energies of the survival states. It will be easier to breathe, literally and figuratively, and your senses will be less dulled-out or hyper-focused.

When you abstain for longer periods of time, and especially if this produces a sexual freeze state for you, a second and shorter window of temporary stabilization might occur. Right after ejaculation, the chaotic surplus of energy from sympathetic over-activation dissipates, and the muscular constriction required to keep this excess energy at bay can relax. This provides a well-needed break to your nervous system – and physical body – before it eventually drops back down in dorsal collapse.

Being in this temporary stabilized state is not the same as conscious self-regulation, but it can provide a nice preview of things to come when you persist your self-exploration. It is important to become aware of these islands of nervous system soothing throughout your days, because they will provide a necessary reference experience that contrasts with the seemingly endless turmoil of living with a chronically dysregulated nervous system. And as you become more skilled at conscious self-regulation, this saw-tooth wave shape will slowly flatten out over time : the valleys will be less deep, the peaks will be less high, and the rise and fall will be less violent.

A side note on post-ejaculatory shutdown : Most male land animals exhibit what is known as the post-ejaculatory refraction period, where the body goes into a shutdown state that inhibits further sexual engagement after ejaculation. Females of most animal species do not exhibit this shutdown state. This mechanism raises the chances of conception, since the male can no longer dislodge his own semen, and the female can be inseminated by other males without causing too much social friction. Very romantic, I know. This biological mechanism is operational in humans too, as you probably are well aware, which gives you one more reason to learn to ejaculate by choice.

The second side of learning to ejaculate by choice is learning to modulate arousal levels during actual sexual communion. In this context, ejaculation by choice has a very different function, but more on that later. Let’s keep things solo for now, which brings us to the question :

To Fap Or Not To Fap?

Bringing everything covered so far to the matter of masturbation clearly puts the act of self-pleasuring in a very different light. Since ejaculation is often the result of masturbation, the obvious implication is that masturbation is often used unconsciously for relief from nervous system dysregulation. Making masturbation a conscious practice then becomes a fairly straightforward affair : use masturbation in the framework of learning conscious nervous system regulation and the exploration of your natural frequency of ejaculation.

A quick side note on the place of masturbation in relationship : Conscious masturbation is a natural and necessary ingredient of a consciously co-created relationship. The requirements of your natural cycle don’t always align with the opportunities for sexual communion. This needs to be understood by both you and your partner. You might even engage in it together, since it takes much less time than is required for a fulfilling sexual coming together. Another bonus is that it will make it much easier to ejaculate by choice when there is time for a sexual coming together.

It’s crucial to take the focus away from masturbation (and ejaculation) as a separate problem to be solved, and place it inside the larger task of learning conscious nervous system self-regulation. Then it becomes a wonderful tool to add to your arsenal for growing towards conscious inner safety. And it keeps the pipes clean.

A gentle side note on meat beating : Since masturbation is so often used in the context of unconsciously seeking relief from the stresses of living in a chronic state of survival energy, the penis becomes demoted to a numbing stick. Masturbation then occurs with very little awareness of the actual sensations in the penis, which often leads to internal and external tissue damage. It also solidifies the physiological habit of bringing about ejaculation as quickly as possible when sexual arousal occurs, which is detrimental to the social co-regulation that is possible during actual sexual communion. But more on premature ejaculation later.

An important and powerful practice is to slow down masturbation, and focus on the actual sensations in the penis and the entire pelvic floor. Learning to feel how the buildup of energy occurs and dissipates in your body will help greatly in learning to modulate arousal during sexual communion. Also : use lube and love when spanking your monkey.

In these modern times of overabundance of sexual imagery, masturbation is often practiced while consuming pornography. I want to focus here on the physiological habit of using visual stimuli to activate sexual arousal, specifically when your nervous system is in a chronic state of survival. As mentioned in my previous post, the sympathetic survival state of fight and flight induces a narrowing and impairment of visual capabilities. This impairment, and the underlying habitual mobilized survival state, is reinforced through using visual sexual stimuli when masturbating.

This creates a vicious cycle of seeking relief from the chaotic over-energized state in the numbness and social disconnection of dorsal collapse, induced by visually driven ejaculation. This in turn reinforces the underlying habitual immobilized state, which leads to seeking out more extreme forms of sexual imagery to be able to activate arousal and get your ejaculatory fix. And even though this cycle is mostly created through masturbation, it is also the underlying mechanism that drives sex addiction.

The obvious side note on sex addiction : Addiction to masturbation, pornography and casual sex are all born from the powerful and often deleterious impact ejaculation has on the mental and emotional narratives produced by a nervous system that is in a chronic state of survival. Like all addictions, their function is to provide nervous system soothing through the use of external devices. The long term solution is to become aware of the function ejaculation plays in your personal nervous system imbalances. If you have a male body, this exploration is a necessary part of learning conscious nervous system self-regulation.

What I found to be a good way to break this cycle is to bring awareness to any feelings and sensations of comfort, social connectedness and inner safety induced by ejaculation by masturbation. This is the practice of conscious masturbation, using it in the larger context of learning to self-regulate your nervous system and acquiring the skill of inner safety. And this can be done with or without visual stimuli, whether imagined or not. Learning to discern, and then focusing on, these feelings of inner safety and desire for connectedness will change the way your sexual arousal is activated, which brings us to :

Fantasizing, Porn And Casual Sex

Our human imagination is a wondrous gift. However, when it is enslaved by unconscious nervous system dysregulation it serves the survival narratives of a nervous system that does not feel safe in true human intimacy. Visions and fantasies of sexual dominance, submission, revenge, unnatural sexual activities and even perversion of so-called true love are all ways in which your imagination tries to help unburden your system from being overloaded by chronic survival stress – collapsed or over-energized.

These visions and fantasies are only an expression of the underlying dysregulation, and when you grow your ability to find inner safety in the ventral parasympathetic state, you will find that the sexual content of your imagination will naturally and spontaneously evolve towards images, visions and scenarios which revolve around social connectedness and conscious co-regulation.

A quick side note on premature ejaculation, pun intended : Premature ejaculation is nothing but the symptom of a deeply dysregulated nervous system that has been trained to use even the smallest amount of sexual arousal as an impetus for ejaculation – and its instant relief from the sense of unsafety – with total disregard to and unawareness of social attunement. This physiological habit is reinforced by unconscious porn use, which focuses on visually stimulated sexual arousal.

The solution is to become aware of the actual bodily sensations of your sexual arousal – where these sensations originate, how they grow and expand, how their pressure builds up if they can’t expand, and what release feels like. Conscious masturbation and pornography use can actually help you in this exploration, as they can show you how you’ve unconsciously taught your body to over-react to sexual arousal and visual stimulation.

This is not a disease or a shameful character defect – there is nothing wrong with you. This is an unfortunate but normal consequence of learning to be a man without proper guidance, since masculinity is defined by the rejection of true bodily awareness. And it is learning to become lovingly aware of your body and how it operates that will solve this imbalance over time, and replace it with a deeply rooted self-trust and self-love.

In my previous post, I explained how online dating provides a false sense of safety, because it foregoes the need for actual social interaction, which might register as unsafe to the dysregulated nervous system. In the same way, pornography provides this false sense of safety when it comes to sexual experience. But just as the false safety provided by online dating reinforces the triggering of survival responses by social engagement, so does porn reinforce the sense of danger to the body that actual intimacy evokes.

A conscious way to use pornography in the larger context of nurturing inner safety is to become aware of our inner sense of unsafety that is in the background when using porn to masturbate, but more importantly, to seek out the often well-hidden desire for social engagement that arises in parallel. In practical terms, this means to use your imagination to bring the images on the screen (or if you’re really old skool, the magazine) to life, and see yourself in social engagement with the people (or animals, or objects) in the images you consume.

This will train your nervous system to bring its social engagement system back into the realm of your sexuality – the hybrid states of play and intimacy which I’ll discuss later on – as well as help you become aware of all the ways your own sexuality registers as unsafe to your nervous system.

A side note on porn actors : Most pornography is a very artificial and socially disconnected portrayal of natural human sexuality. Most female porn actresses portray a strong dorsal vagal expression of sexuality : they are often very uncomfortable in the role they are asked (or forced) to perform, feel deeply insecure about their self-worth, or are compensating for these underlying insecurities. Most male porn actors portray the sympathetic ideal of socially oblivious, self-serving and unconsciously self-regulating male sexuality. The people in the porn industry that actually enjoy their job while also being conscious of its artificial nature are very rare.

Conscious porn use will over time decrease its allure. As you bring your social engagement system into your pornography consumption, you will become increasingly aware of the deep dysregulation and even suffering that is so commonplace in the world of pornography.

Engaging in casual sex exhibits the same qualities of false safety, and because of that, on the surface it might seem like a good deal. There is sexual relief from the stresses of nervous system dysregulation, without the apparent hassle of true social connectedness and human intimacy. This sense of hassle is of course induced by the fact that true human connection often registers as unsafe to the nervous system that’s locked in survival mode.

In effect, this is nothing more than mutual masturbation, and as such, casual sexual encounters reinforce the survival responses induced by true social connectedness and intimacy. Just as the sexual content of your imagination will shift when you become more skilled at nervous system self-regulation, so will the desire for the false safety of casual sex subside, naturally and spontaneously.

Libido, Virility And Testosterone

No conversation on human male sexuality can be complete without the mention of one of these three words. However, these three vaguely defined words actually point to the same unconscious mechanism : the mobilization of sympathetic activation and its apparent effects on physical well-being, sense of aliveness, sexual desire and the illusion of lust for life. Seeking out these qualities makes sense only when seen in contrast to the collapsed, defeated, disconnected and depressed states induced by dorsal parasympathetic activation. When only these two options are available – which are the only two options virtually every man alive has – the chaotic and socially un-attuned qualities of the sympathetic survival state will be the lesser of two evils. As such, this state is revered and mythologized into something it is definitely not : desirable.

A quick side note on horniness : Being horny is considered a normal, natural and even positive state. In reality is is only the unconscious desire for relief from the chaotic energy of the over-energized survival state. In other words, when you feel horny as it is traditionally defined, take it as a clear sign that your nervous system is chronically dysregulated. When conscious self-regulation becomes your reality, being horny will lose its function and appeal. It will occur less as well. Don’t be alarmed : this is a positive evolution – in its place you will find a growing desire for sex in the context of conscious co-regulation, and the deep nourishment and healing it provides.

The words libido, virility and testosterone are actually a misinterpretation of the external expressions of the play state, a hybrid nervous system state that is only accessible from a deep inner sense of safety and ventral vagal activation – but more on that later.

This provides us with the third option : living life anchored in this ventral vagal state of inner safety and social attunement. This is the practical outcome of learning to self-regulate your nervous system – to no longer be a slave to the over- or under-energized survival states of fight/flight or collapse and disconnect. But this third option has a hefty price, which few men are willing to pay : living from inner safety is boring.

Learning nervous system self-regulation requires consistent work, patience and humility. It’s a life-long endeavor which demands you give up the illusions of youthful masculinity – which is only the idealization of the mobilized survival state – in favor of a mature tranquility and true and solid self-trust. Inner safety may seem boring in comparison to the powerful oscillations in energy experienced when living from a chronic state of survival state, because the chaos, passion, drama and depression that are the hallmark of living from survival will be absent. I’ll take boring any day of the week.

Sexual Attraction, Neuroception And Reciprocity

Speaking of boring, time for some more nervous system theory. The three branches of the autonomous nervous system – dorsal, sympathetic and ventral – each have a distinct effect on your sexual desire and mental narrative. Since neuroception, our body’s danger radar, operates outside of conscious awareness, we can only perceive indirectly which nervous system state is activated at any given moment. Knowing the indirect effect your neuroception has on your sexual attraction and arousal will help you become more aware of how your nervous system is wired, and will become one more tool to help you become more skilled at conscious self-regulation. Here are the three distinct sexual narratives and attraction styles :

From the dorsal parasympathetic state, the object of your sexual desire and attraction will by default be unattainable, and you will often find yourself subconsciously seeking out unattainable partners to confirm these feelings and narratives. You will not feel sexually desired or desirable yourself, and the hopelessness and despair this produces is only deepened by ejaculating, which you actively seek to do because it also numbs you out – through the physiological habit of post-ejaculatory collapse and disconnect.

You often experience resentment towards women, as they seem to hold great sexual power over you. You will also resent men who are more free than you in expressing their sympathetic over-activation. As I mentioned earlier, this will also produce visions and fantasies of sexual domination, submission, revenge and unnatural sexual desires, which sometimes are even acted out. It also creates the desires for a perverted fantasy of true love – since this holds the promise to end all our suffering – which is often projected onto any unsuspecting woman that happens to walk into your field of view.

From the sympathetic state, sexuality is a jungle and there are only the hunters and the hunted – the killers and the prey. Women – or more accurately, their bodies – are the prize to be won, at all costs. There is a total lack of social attunement, and any social awareness is always weaponized in the name of conquest. Any women is reduced to the means to an unconscious end, which is of course the relief from survival stresses.

You are very visually driven : you see life through predatory eyes and suffer from sex tunnel vision. You have clear preferences about what a desirably woman should look like, and are very drawn to the women who happily and unconsciously play their part in this masquerade. Since the release any given woman can provide you from your survival stress is short-lived, you will always be looking for the next prey. Sexuality is ruled by the need for control, which leaves no space for love or connectedness – things which are seen mostly as problems and obstacles to attaining your goal.

From the ventral parasympathetic state, sexual attraction only arises when the other person registers as safe to your nervous system, and they are perceived to be a strong candidate for true co-regulation. From this place, sexual arousal will only arise inside the larger context of a safe and real connection to another human being, which will always be the result of a broad-spectrum compatibility and actively pursued co-regulation. This is a much more powerful and all-encompassing sense of attraction and arousal than in the other two states.

True and natural sexual desire is the desire for a deep co-regulation of both your nervous systems, the kind of co-regulation that can only be attained through sexual communion from a mutual place of ventral vagal safety and social atunement. Your body knows this, and you will recognize its qualities once you learn to become anchored in ventral vagal safety. From that place, sexual attraction and arousal will feel very calm, soothing, natural, connecting, nourishing and necessary in that specific living moment.

But to be clear : the goal is not to be in the ventral vagal state 100% of the time. That would be tantamount to pursuing the illusion of perfection, which the ever-moving flow of life does not allow. You will never be purely in one nervous system state for very long, even though you have a dominant state that your system will default to under stress. The real goal here is two-fold : to become aware of how the different states of the autonomous nervous system operate and present themselves in you, and to learn how to consciously modulate your nervous system so you slowly learn the way back home to the safety of ventral vagal – one small step at a time – when your threat responses throw your system into under- or over-activation.

A side note on sexual entitlement : Historically and culturally, men have considered themselves entitled to use women for sexual gratification and relief – with or without consent. This is part of your subconscious heritage, whether you like it or not. Best to make friends with these inherited beliefs as soon as possible, since they will be healed by your awareness, which will aid you in learning conscious self-regulation. This in turn will bring your natural social attunement online, which will outshine any vestiges of ancient entitlement you might still hold in your body.

As David Deida often says, you are always attracted to your reciprocal. In this context, that means that each of the three nervous system states will attract a different kind of match. From dorsal vagal, you will inadvertently find candidates who will unconsciously take on the role of your savior, martyr or mommy – and eventually come to resent you for it. Their nervous system dysregulation will match with yours, they will match your sense of being undeserving, take pity on you, or downright take advantage of your subservient stance. Sex will be a rare occurrence, and often used as a tool for power plays.

In the sympathetic state you will find a plethora of candidates who will very willingly be your prey and want to be hunted. Sex will be mostly abundant, but so will drama, chaos and a deep sense of loneliness and dissatisfaction, caused by living from a place of self-armoring. Both states obviously produce very fragile, volatile or explosive connections.

Anchored in a state of ventral inner safety, you will only match with people who consciously choose to inhabit this state as well. Don’t let the scarcity of portrayal or example of this type of attraction fool you into thinking it is uncharted territory. This is by now well-documented, but you’ll have to dig through the constant avalanche of survival-based portrayals to find the good stuff. The quantity of sex may vary, but it will have the potential to be other-worldly – but more on that later. This connection also has the potential to be extremely durable, resilient and lasting.

However, what often happens is that a person who desires to live from ventral inner safety settles for a partner that does not, out of sheer scarcity. This often happens when said person is not firmly anchored in their own inner safety yet. My advice in that situation is very simple : never settle, it’s a disservice to all parties involved. Persist in your inner exploration and focus on learning to consciously self-regulate your nervous system.

This neuroception induced interplay of attraction also opens the possibility for mismatches to occur. When you come from a place of dorsal collapse and want to sexually engage with a person in sympathetic armoring, you will face annihilating rejection and/or humiliation. When you come from a place of the sympathetic hunter-hunted mindset and want to sexually engage with a person in dorsal collapse, you will be bored very quickly by the lack of resistance.

A person that is solidly anchored in ventral will have zero interest in the unsafety, chaos and drama that people who are stuck in the the other two states express, but will still acknowledge them as fellow human beings, with compassion and understanding. The opposite is also true – as I described in my previous post, a truly safe person registers as naturally attractive, and will attract people independent of their dominant nervous system state or level of conscious self-regulation. Caveat emptor.

A side note on passion : Touted as a non-negotiable prerequisite for a healthy relationship, passion is nothing but the chaotic frenzy of attraction energy between two people with matching or complementary nervous system dysregulation patterns. Passion inevitably turns into a volatile shit show – or a draining morass of depression. The best way to inoculate yourself against passion is – you guessed it – learning to consciously self-regulate your nervous system. This will allow you to objectively assess potential partners, which makes for a much more mature (and boring) approach to courtship, relationship and sexual communion.

Clarifying Sexual Attraction

As a former mentor of mine liked to shout : “The penis never lies!” This is true because the body never lies. However, from a place of lack of self-awareness and survival-induced misunderstanding, the body’s communications can be easily misinterpreted or missed altogether. As I explained in my previous post, masculinity has been culturally and historically defined by a chronic state of survival, because men have always been taught to distrust and ignore the inner guidance of their emotional and somatic systems. One of the consequences of this culturally sanctioned and unquestioned paradigm is that most men take their limited awareness around their individual sexual attraction for granted.

“I am a guy, I like tits, ass and pussy” is the idealized way men are taught to approach their sexual desires, often through the use of alcohol-fueled high-fiving. This is of course a very limited, primitive and unexplored self-understanding of sexual attraction, and deeply lacks in social attunement and human compassion. Add to that the fact that openly questioning your sexual attraction, and bringing your personal exploration of your sexuality into conversation with other men, is often met with emotionally and sometimes physically violent resistance.

This is because this very reduced and primitive way to approach sexuality is born from the deeply rooted avoidance of the intense bodily sensations and deep emotional activation produced by sexual arousal and attraction. A man who has been taught to disavow his inner world, and whose sense of masculinity is unconsciously defined by the unsafety of acknowledging the emotional and somatic aspects of his life experience, will find the heightened intensity sexual arousal creates in his inner world to be a real threat to his sense of identity.

A side note on sexual shame : Sexual shame is a misnomer, as it is nothing more than one of the many symptoms of the underlying habitual sense of unsafety surrounding physical self-expression. When you acquire a sense of freedom and safety in natural physical and verbal self-expression, through a personal embodiment practice and a conscious co-regulation practice with a trusted other, sexual desire will naturally be given the space to be expressed spontaneously, both physically and verbally. Since this expression will come from a place of ventral vagal safety, it will arise out of deep social attunement, and become a precious gift to the other.

The less-talked about opposite of so-called sexual shame is sexual advertising – the physical and verbal flaunting of your sexual attraction and arousal, devoid of any social attunement. This urge will also subside when nervous system self-regulation is acquired, since from the ventral vagal space of safety, social attunement is inevitable.

Inside this painfully real current state of affairs lies a beautiful invitation. Because sexual attraction has such a powerful activating effect on your inner world – your emotions and bodily sensations – it is also a powerful modality for deepening self-awareness and self-understanding, both mentally and somatically. Sexual attraction is one of the most potent forces to bring internal conflicts and ignorance to light, and to not use it as such will keep your sexuality ruled by survival patterns. Your unmet and repressed emotional and somatic needs pulling your strings – from deep inside the shadows they were exiled to – and guide you towards sexual experiences that will only mirror and support this inner conflict and darkness.

This is why it’s important to find ways to explore your true sexual desires, both in a contemplative and a social setting. While in general it is important to come into contact with your inner world, and explore the actual state and workings of your emotions, thoughts and sensations, sexuality is a deeply social aspect of human life, and understanding your individual sexual narratives can only happen through conversation and sexual communion – with another human being.

Because the penis never lies. When you live your life from an unconscious and chronic survival state, your erections will reflect your inner lack of clarity. You will find yourself sexually aroused by people, situations or images that have the potential to provide powerful but often detrimental relief from the stresses caused by living in a body that’s under constant apparent threat. In contrast, when you learn to live anchored in inner safety, your erection will be the natural result a deeply felt connection and a clear sign of the potential for strong co-regulation. And possibly of some wonderful times ahead.

The opposite is also true. From a chronic survival state, people who could actually bring healing and awareness to your unconscious patterns will register as sexually uninteresting. And from a state of inner safety, people who cannot fulfill your need for conscious sexual co-regulation will also result in your penis staying flaccid. But enough dick talk – at least for now.

Polarity 101

Time to change gears. So far we’ve been looking at the tangible effects your sexuality has on your physiology. Let’s now take a closer look at how it affects the less visible aspects of your life. I’ll start by sharing my personal definition of the word polarity in the context of human sexuality.

Polarity is the universal dance between the masculine and the feminine energetic principle, as well as the law that governs these two principles. These are the energetic principles that govern and underlie the workings of both your physical universe and your field of consciousness – your visible and invisible world. To keep it simple, the masculine principle comprises the aspects of existence that are empty, still and witnessing. The feminine principle comprises the aspects of existence that are full, moving and experiencing. The masculine is truth, the feminine is love.

These are the absolute extremes between which all of manifest and unmanifest existence is created, moves and dissipates again. As abstract as these ideas may seem, they are crucial for understanding everything that follows, and will become more clear and tangible as I describe how they present themselves in your daily life.

There are three ways in which the dance of polarity expresses itself in humans, in this moment in our history : severed polarity, denied polarity and integrated polarity. If you’re familiar with the work of David Deida, you will recognize these categories as his theory of the three stages.

When living in a state of severed polarity, a single person embodies only a single side, and is divorced from the other. A person is either strongly and unconsciously masculine or feminine. This has been the state most humans have lived in for most of human history. Since the severed masculine man is divorced from the richness of his inner feminine world, he both craves its healing properties and simultaneously resists its expression, both in men and women. Since the severed feminine woman is divorced from the active leadership of her inner masculine power, she both craves the safety men can provide and simultaneously resists her own masculine expression out of fear of physical retaliation.

Luckily, we live in a time when humanity is slowly healing the countless wounds this deep separation has caused on our planet. That being said, these wounds and fears are still part of your personal subconscious heritage, and it is your responsibility to heal this collective history of woundings as it lives on in your individual being.

When living in a state of denied polarity, a single person resists embodying the powerful extremes of the scale of sexual polarity. Many people are taught at a very young age that the expressions of their naturally dominant sexual pole are unwanted, and thus unsafe – increasingly so in the last 50 odd years. In practice, this often means that a person will come to unconsciously embody the opposite of their natural dominant pole : a naturally masculine man will learn how to live from a false place of femininity and a naturally feminine woman will learn to live from a false place of masculinity.

This second layer of imbalance is increasingly being portrayed and idealized in popular media as being a positive evolution. Everywhere in movies, television, printed or online press and social media, we see girl bosses and flow boys – seemingly hard, strong and focused women, and soft, weak and indecisive men.

A side note on the hybrid state of tend and befriend : In many mammals, the fight or flight response engendered by sympathetic mobilization is predominantly expressed by the male of the species. The female of the species, under similarly threatening circumstances, will use this mobilized energy to tend to their offspring and prioritize their safety over her own, or in the more social mammals, befriend her aggressor.

This threat response explains the Stockholm syndrome, but also why so many women stay in abusive and physically dangerous relationships. This mechanism is sometimes observed in rape victims as well. On the other side of the spectrum – in the last few decades an increasing number of men have learned to use this threat response for social survival during infancy. This is the underlying mechanism that is at the root of the so-called Nice Guy epidemic.

To be clear, I am not advocating all men should be masculine and all women feminine. Many humans have a body that is built for a dominant pole that is the opposite of their biological gender. Some men are naturally built to express the feminine principle, some women are naturally built to express the masculine principle. But in our modern world, the majority of human beings are deeply unaware of what their actual dominant pole is, and often harbor deep resentment towards their own polarity. This is a powerful reason why cancer and other chronic diseases affecting the sexual organs are so ubiquitous, both in men and women, and will continue to be increasingly so in the future.

When living in a state of integrated polarity, a single person can embody either side, consciously and by choice, modulating between expressing the masculine and feminine principle, in accordance to what is required by the present living moment, and in accordance with their natural dominant pole.

The key word here is of course consciously, since coming to a state of integrated polarity is the result of deep self-exploration, acquiring the skills needed for conscious nervous system regulation and modulation, and using the resulting social attunement to spontaneously guide the choice of which pole is wanting to be expressed in the here and now, and with whom. And it is only in this space that true devotion is possible in relationship, since devotion and conscious co-regulation go hand in hand.

A big side note on poles : The idea of masculine and feminine poles also expresses itself in how the human body integrates and interacts with the invisible energetic world. When sexual polarity has been integrated, a person with a dominantly masculine system will feel more at ease and nourished when absorbing and assimilating loving energy coming from the outside through the upper part of their body – the heart is their negative pole. They will also feel more at ease giving and transmitting loving energy into the world from the lower part of their body – the pelvis is their positive pole, the penis is their plug.

Conversely, a person with a dominantly feminine system will feel more at ease and nourished when absorbing and assimilating loving energy coming from the outside through the lower part of their body – the pelvis is their negative pole, the vagina is their socket. They will also feel more at ease giving and transmitting loving energy into the world from the upper part of their body – the heart is their positive pole.

This is not gender-specific, the opposite is possible, and some people actually have no natural preference either way. But as stated, this is only a description of what it looks like in a person who has consciously integrated their polarity. It is not a rule set in stone that needs to be adhered to, or an ideal that needs to be pursued through effort, but simply a good starting place for the inner exploration of your own energetic system and sexual polarity.

Both the state of severed and denied polarity are born from a body that is taught to be in a constant state of survival. For the longest time humans have taught their puppies to act in accordance to their biological gender and to dismiss any emotions, urges or thought that go against it, under the threat of social ostracization. Additionally, in recent years humans have been teaching their puppies to dismiss acting in accordance to their biological gender, as well as the underlying natural emotions, urges and thoughts that come with it.

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. This is why this blog is called Walking The Wrong Way, because at this point in history it is deemed an act of rebellion and revolution to find peace, strength and pride in your natural sexuality, however it may express itself for you as a human individual. The only exploration of true importance you need to concern yourself with here is : which polar principle is truly and naturally dominant in me, and how can I honor its expression, as well as its polar opposite, in and through myself, consciously and by socially attuned choice?

A side note on determining your dominant sexual pole : Here’s another little something I learned from David Deida. A quick and dirty way to figure out which sexual pole is dominant in you is to ask yourself the following question : if you had to commit to just one role in sexual communion for the rest of your life, which would you prefer to be : the fucker or the fucked? Which idea feels more nourishing and self-affirming to you : to skillfully lead your partner to places of deep sexual bliss they never experienced before, or to surrender completely to the wild ravishing of your partner, and to the self-effacing bliss this evokes in you? Or maybe you don’t care either way?

As I already mentioned, integrated polarity can only express itself in a person that has learned to consciously modulate and regulate their nervous system, including its sexual aspects. To turn that upside down, integrating and understanding your sexual polarity will become a natural extension of your nervous system exploration and quest for inner safety. A quest that will eventually make you reconsider everything you’ve been taught about…

Sex

Human sexual intercourse serves three functions : procreation, nervous system self-regulation and nervous system co-regulation. Most of what was said about the function of ejaculation in procreation obviously applies to sex as well. Which leaves us with self-regulation and co-regulation.

In this context, nervous system self-regulation through sex is the unconscious use of sexual communion to relieve oneself of the burden of the symptoms of nervous system dysregulation. Almost all of the sex that has been had on planet earth in human history falls under this category. Many false promises, unspoken agreements, monetary exchanges, violent acts of compulsion, cover-ups and weddings have been used to secure this kind of sex – or rather, its indirect function.

This is the mutual masturbation I mentioned before, where people will unconsciously seek out and use the healing properties of sexual communion for their personal benefit – sometimes at a high cost. This type of unconscious self-regulation depends on external devices, and in the context of sexuality this external device is often another human being.

An important side note on sexual abuse : More people, which includes men, have experienced sexual abuse, especially before puberty, than the world wants to hear about. The effect of sexual abuse at a young age is deeply detrimental to the developing nervous system. It makes sexual arousal and communion to register as unsafe, and robs sex from its power to bring social connectedness and co-created healing.

Since sexual arousal is inevitable, because it is a prime biological imperative of our mammalian body, sexual abuse has the power to create a deeply complex feedback loop that can keep a person stuck in chronic survival mode for a lifetime. The good news here is that learning to develop your inner sense of safety, through the deepening of self-awareness of your nervous system’s modus operandi, will prove to be one of the greatest tools for healing the wounds caused by sexual abuse. As a result of this exploration, sexual communion can eventually become the bonding and healing tool it is supposed to be.

The third function of sex in humans is nervous system co-regulation. To understand what those fancy words actually mean, we need to pay a visit to our closest primate cousins : the bonobos. In bonobo communities, sexual intercourse serves an important social role : it is used for bonding, conflict resolution and reconciliation. These behaviors are also seen in humans. Because the human physiology is closely related to that of the bonobos, it can also reap the benefits of sexual communion.

The underlying biological principle of the social benefits of sex is nervous system co-regulation, which is an important aspect of how our physiology is built and operates. As I explained in my previous post, it is only when our nervous system is in the ventral vagal state of safe and social that we have access to our higher brain functions, that our organ and hormonal systems function optimally and that our body’s self-healing systems are online.

Where conscious self-regulation is the skilled soothing of our nervous system when it is in an unnecessary state of survival – either dorsal collapse or sympathetic mobilization – nervous system co-regulation is the conscious use of the power that social engagement has to soothe another being’s nervous system. Which in turn brings soothing to our own nervous system. I use the word beings here because this co-regulation is also possible with companion animals, albeit to a lesser degree.

In the context of sex, nervous system co-regulation is the conscious coming together in sexual communion to create deep nervous system regulation in each other. It is the most powerful tool to create a deeply safe and secure bond between two people. This level of conscious engagement never comes about by accident, and it is a rare experience, since it requires two people to consciously step into the sexual communion with this agreed upon intention.

This is why sexual co-regulation is mostly known in its accidental form, where all the stars align and two people engage in sex from a place of relative (and unintended) safety. This is often referred to as the magical, mind-blowing, best-sex-of-my-life experience. Such an experience might also occur when one of the participants is skilled enough in nervous system self-regulation to entrain the other person’s nervous system into a state of safety. People who are skilled in conscious self-regulation and modulation are still a rare breed, which makes consciously chosen sexual co-regulation an experience on the cutting edge of conscious human evolution.

One thing to be aware of when you choose to become skilled in conscious nervous system self-regulation : your sexual desires will naturally start to evolve towards co-regulating experiences. You will find yourself attracted to a very different kind of person than before, but more importantly, you will find yourself attracted to much fewer people. This is nothing to worry about, since it is a sign of your increasing capability to soothe your own nervous system and provide your own inner sense of safety. It is also a sign that you have learned to allow yourself to desire good things for yourself, and no longer compromise your well-being in favor of false and temporary safety.

A side note on BDSM : There is a big emphasis in the BDSM community on safety. The artificially created safe container in BDSM practices mimics the true inner safety that comes from skillful nervous system self- and co-regulation. Even though this is a very conscious approach to sex, it is still an artificial construct and so will never have the same deep and lasting impact as when people who have gained true inner safety engage in co-regulating sexual communion. The taking on of the dominant and submissive roles in these practices are also artificial versions of true conscious leading and surrender. But more on that later.

Sexual Play, Intimacy And Safety

Understanding the hybrid nervous system states of play and intimacy is crucial in the context of conscious sexual communion. The play state arises when the mobilization produced by sympathetic activation is governed and regulated by a stable ventral vagal state. The intimacy state arises when the immobilization produced by dorsal vagal activation is governed and regulated by a stable ventral vagal state. That is the technical explanation, so let’s explore what that looks like in real life.

When a person is consciously anchored in a state of ventral vagal activation – when they have learned to find their inner safety and develop their natural social attunement – the other two branches of the autonomous nervous system don’t lose their job. Instead, they now perform their function inside this context of inner safety, social engagement and self-healing.

When the body’s mobilization of the sympathetic state occurs in the context of inner safety and social engagement, there is play. This is of course seen in young children that are provided some level of inner safety, and a safe environment, by their caregivers – their play is deeply motivated by social engagement. Most people lose their access to the state of play when they move into adulthood and its numerous threats and assaults on the nervous system. Many adults, especially since the advent of video games, engage in false play, in a desperate and unconscious attempt to regain access to the the soothing, healing and connecting that real social play provides.

Just as most video games only provide the illusion of social interaction, so does sexual communion that does not take place in mutual ventral vagal activation only provide the illusion of true social connectedness. It is just not possible for true social play to emerge without the prerequisite mutual safety that the ventral vage state provides. Conversely, when sexual communion is born from this place of mutual safety, sexual play becomes the natural expression of the coming together, and naturally results in a deep healing and bonding between two people.

A side note on performance anxiety : The pressure to perform well in sexual communion is caused by unrealistic expectations and beliefs around sexuality, often acquired through popular media and our equally clueless peers. When you are sexually inexperienced, these expectations and beliefs are likely the only thing that can seemingly guide you through your sexual encounters. If you feel you are sexually inexperienced, you must understand that social connectedness and creating a safe space for sexual exploration are much more important than pursuing an illusory ideal of being a skilled lover. Without social connectedness and safety, you have no access to spontaneous play, and play is exactly what gives true meaning and lasting value to any sexual encounter.

When the body’s immobilization of the dorsal vagal state occurs in the context of inner safety and social engagement, there is intimacy. This phenomenon can be observed in a baby sleeping in its primary caregiver’s arms. Here also the inner safety and safe space is provided to the infant by the caregiver, and this intimate moment is deeply motivated by social connection. And yes, most people lose their access to the state of intimacy when they move into adulthood, and its numerous threats and assaults on the nervous system.

There are many ways for a human being to engage in false intimacy – anything that will allow the dorsal vagal state to be experienced in a context of false inner safety will provide a false intimacy fix. Vegging out in front of the tv, alcohol and other depressants, companion animals, non-action video games, social media, many forms of physical self care and even meditation can be used to evoke the illusion of intimacy to the nervous system. Of course, none of these tactics provide the deep healing and connection that true social intimacy with another human being naturally provides.

It is just not possible for true intimacy to occur without the prerequisite mutual safety that the ventral vagal state provides. Conversely, when a calm and serene coming together is born from this place of mutual safety, the healing and bonding this can create between two people is even more powerful than what is possible during conscious sexual communion. And it is of course no surprise that this level of intimacy most often occurs in the aftermath of a truly conscious and co-regulatory sexual coming together. Which brings us to…

The Myth Of The Female Orgasm

The history of the female orgasm, like nearly all of recorded history, has mostly been written by men. Men who looked at female sexuality through the very limited lens of unconscious and survival-based male sexuality. Sure, anatomically speaking the glans penis and glans clitoris are very similar. And since the female body doesn’t need to concern itself with semen ejaculation, the glans orgasm is repeatable in women. Some might even say that this is a good survival and reproductive strategy – the female can have intercourse with many males, raise chances of conception, and create a strong social cohesion in the community since fatherhood is never a certainty in these circumstances. That’s what happens with the bonobos, and most likely with pre-historic humans as well.

But the reason I used the word myth is that most scientific understanding and popular representation of the female orgasm is still based around the physical stimulation of either clitoris, vagina or, if you dig deep enough, cervix – pun intended. These orgasms are often short lived, especially the clitoral orgasm, which, as David Deida like to call it, is very similar to the genital sneeze of the ejaculatory orgasm in males.

One important distinction that is unfortunately rarely made is between orgasm and orgasmicness. Where orgasm is the build-up and then release of pressurized sexual energy, orgasmicness is the slow, steady and long-lasting circulation of sexual energy throughout the entire body. The human body and nervous system have a great capacity for orgasmicness, especially a body that is dominantly feminine.

To clarify with an analogy, the difference between orgasm and orgasmicness is similar to the difference between lighting a match and boiling water. With a little friction the match will spark, burst into flames and burn a short while. Water requires heat to be applied consistently for a certain period of time before it reaches its boiling temperature, and will retain this heat for a longer period, even if the heat source is removed. If you’re familiar with the traditional Chinese system of energy medicine, you will recognize fire and water as being the masculine and feminine expressions of life force energy – yang and yin.

Following this analogy, what is required for the waters of orgasmicness to come to a boil, is the skillful application of fire. Not the short but intense burst produced by the match, through friction, but the smoldering heat of steady masculine presence. To make this practical, let’s shift the analogy to the kitchen : feminine water needs about 45 minutes of constant heat to come to a boil. But once this water is boiling, the resulting state of orgasmicness can last hours or even days, which brings us to the difference between…

Friction vs Intention

Practically all portrayals of human sexuality focus on friction based engagement. This behavior is seen in most of the land animals – reproduction occurs through penetration and friction induced release of semen. This is also the case with our closest primate cousin, the bonobo. But as I mentioned earlier, bonobos also use sexual intercourse for social cohesion. This is the expression of the natural desire and biological imperative for nervous system co-regulation that is built into the physiology of the socially most evolved mammals – including humans.

In humans the often subconsciously driven expression of this biological imperative to use sex as a social cohesive can be seen in sex parties, swinger clubs or the currently popular polyamory and sex-positive communities. And even though in these cases sex serves the purpose of unconscious self-regulation and the occasional accidental co-regulation – and not just reproduction – the physical sexual engagement is still mostly born from the paradigm of friction.

Here’s a simple but rarely encountered truth : orgasmicness activation does not require physical contact. (It doesn’t even require close proximity, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms…) Prolonged friction-based stimulation is often counter-productive to activating a state of orgasmicness. This is especially true if the actual pre-requisites for orgasmicness aren’t available : intention, presence and mutually created safety – and surrender.

Orgasmicness is a sustained state of full-body orgasm, which is the somatic expression of the pure feminine principle – to lose oneself in the experience of all-encompassing blissful pleasure – activated by the pure masculine principle – laser-like focus, clear and strong intention, and unwavering presence. Practically speaking, this means that for orgasmicness to be activated in one partner, the other partner needs to withdraw from experiencing sexual pleasure directly.

Yes, you read that right. This needs to be the clear and strong intention which is required to consciously modulate your own sexual arousal and postpone ejaculatory orgasm, all in the name of activating the state of orgasmicness in your partner. To achieve and co-create this state, you must consciously and skillfully step into a state of unwavering presence. And here is where the third inherent function of the penis finally comes into play : in this form of sexual engagement, the penis is used as a powerful energetic conduit for your strong intention and presence.

A long and seemingly woowoo side note on energy exchange during sex : When ejaculating while your penis is inside your partner’s body, you not only expel semen, but also energy. The quality of this energy is determined by the level of consciousness and clarity you have around your intention and masculine presence. When your nervous system is in a chronic and unconscious state of survival, the energy release will be your body’s way of expelling excessive survival energy. This energy will get imprinted in the energetic system of your partner. If your partner is a feminine woman, know that her vagina functions as an energetic vortex that will absorb your energy indiscriminately, especially if she surrenders to the moment.

Since this place of chronic survival implies social disconnectedness, there is no real two-way energy exchange possible – you might feel relieved that the tension is gone from your system, while in fact you just dumped that stagnant and murky energy inside your partner. You will have used another person as an energetic trash can, and your ejaculation will still have a negative impact on your nervous system.

When ejaculation while inside your partner occurs from a place of ventral vagal anchoring, the energy released will bring love, nourishment and healing to your partner’s energetic system. And since in ventral vagal your social engagement system is online, there will be a two-way energy exchange, where both your positive poles nourish each other through your negative poles – if your partner is a feminine woman, you will be nourished by the love radiating from her heart. This is the energetic meaning of sexual co-regulating and healing. From this state, ejaculation can have a positive impact on both your nervous systems.

Give Or Take – Presence Or Pleasure

Most portrayals of sexual communion in popular media idealize the simultaneous orgasm. This is a romanticized notion that is born from a deep misunderstanding of how sexual polarity operates in humans. It is also very much built around the idealization of the male ejaculatory orgasm. When two people engaged in sexual communion both use sex for self-regulation, they will both strive for the relief of the glans orgasm. As we’ve seen, the biological imperative is for the male to reach this orgasm first, through ejaculation, and this often means the official end of the sexual engagement, for him at least – also for biologically imprinted reasons.

In this scenario both participants are engrossed in their own experience – the direct, internal experience of their own pleasure, which is a substitute for true play, and their own orgasm, which is often just a friction-induced state of relief. The direct experience of pleasure and the state of unwavering presence cannot co-exist in the same body, since they are expressions of respectively the feminine and masculine polar opposites.

An important side note (for women) on pleasing your man : Many women hold the belief that it is important to please their man. Acting on this belief, they actually – and unwittingly – rob themselves of experiencing orgasmicness. Allowing yourself to completely lose yourself in the experience of sexual bliss can be difficult for women whose social survival strategies are based around self-effacement – the tend and befriend state – where they prioritize others’ well-being over their own.

A practical solution naturally arises from learning to consciously regulate your own nervous system – in general, as well as in the container of sexual communion – and in becoming aware of the healing properties of fully experiencing your own sexual pleasure. In the context of sexual communion, this of course requires open conversation and a partner who is sensitive and conscious enough to support you in this healing process.

Also consider that if you have determined you have a dominantly feminine pole, you should know that your sexual bliss is not your responsibility during sexual communion : it is your partner’s. This is where surrender comes into play as one of the required ingredients for orgasmicness to occur. In this context, your surrender requires you to be able to feel safe in relinquishing all personal control and responsibility to another human being. To feel safe in letting go and letting life happen to you. Again, this requires a partner who can consciously access his inner safety. It takes two to tango.

To best describe the state of unwavering presence I like to compare it to the state of consciousness required by a F1 race car driver or fighter jet pilot. These people need to be in a state of hyper-focus and consistent state of detached witnessing to keep control over a machine that constantly operates at the edge of human capability. They have zero error margin, and their life depends on their capacity for unwavering presence. Bringing this level of conscious focus and detached awareness – true presence – to the sexual communion is what provides the pure form of the masculine energetic principle. This is what will evoke the expression of the pure form of the feminine energetic principle – orgasmicness – in your partner, if they allow themselves to surrender to the experience. No physical touch required.

But a word of warning is necessary here : witnessing the unbridled physical expression of orgasmicness can prove to be very terrifying for the uninitiated. This is the opposite of the portrayal of feminine sexual rapture popularized in pornography, especially in hentai : a demure and subservient posture, careful and restrained movement and high pitched shrieks. True orgasmicness will evoke a wild, untamed animal – the cock-worshipping whore – and often lower a woman’s sexual vocalizations by an octave or two. It can (and should) get loud and violent. Experiencing this seemingly extreme behavior in your sexual partner for the first time can catch you off guard, and even trigger a survival response. Consider yourself warned.

A side note on post-coital conversation : A popular trope in cinema is the post-coital conversation, in the past often portrayed with both participants smoking in bed. Even though this scene may be relatable to most people, since it is a part of the well-known but unconscious game of self-regulatory sex, it is a representation of the prevalent and very poor understanding of human sexuality and sexual polarity. Simply put : if your woman can form a coherent sentence in the hour following sex, you have not guided her into a state of orgasmicness. If this is the case, it is a clear sign of your need for deeper self-awareness.

To be clear, the goal of orgasmicness activation is not to bring out the animal in your partner, but to invite a deep surrender to the sexual experience, whatever shape this may take. This is the most precious gift you can give to a feminine woman. It is easily the most healing experience possible for a woman’s soul, but since it is so rare and seldomly talked about, it is easy to dismiss the entire idea as woowoo nonsense.

Another reason to dismiss the idea is that it goes against the cultural idealization of the so-called male sexual performance, which is actually nothing more than an expression and unconscious denial of the dorsal collapse state. A man’s self-worth is dependent only on his sexual prowess if deep down he unconsciously believes he is not worthy of love.

A necessary side note on technique : Very absent from the conversation so far has been the topic of sexual technique and skill. It is of course good to know what goes where, to have an understanding of human anatomy, communicate with your partner about what is pleasurable and what is not, and to have a few neat tricks up your sleeve. But none of that matters nearly as much as acquiring the skill of consciously being able to regulate your own nervous system, to gain deep inner clarity and develop a solid state of presence. However, should you want to expand your sexual vocabulary, sites like PornHub have many excellent tutorial videos available for free. It never hurts to learn.

Instead of performing physically, which serves only to refute an underlying survival state, the focus needs to be on leading the experience, for her and for yourself. For orgasmicness to be activated, its opposite – presence – is needed, which means her surrender to experiencing orgasmic bliss requires your leadership. Leadership in the context of nervous system co-regulation takes a lot of time to master, and starts with learning to lead your own system first.

Leadership in the context of co-regulating sexual communion is also something you cannot learn alone, not even from casual sexual encounters – unless you have a vast amount of them and have the required sensitivity. The best place to learn this is in repeated conscious sexual communion, with the same trusted person, in a loving and safe space, surrounded by open and loving conversation.

Relinquishing the personal and short-lived pleasure and self-serving instant gratification of the ejaculatory orgasm – the genital sneeze – in favor of taking her to places she can’t go on her own may sound like a lousy deal at first glance. “What’s in it for me?” is a valid concern with what I have shared so far. The answer to that question is easy : in the long run, this kind of sexual communion can deepen the bond between you and your partner like nothing else, and it creates the space for true mutual devotion to flourish.

And in the moment of sexual communion itself, eventually the power of the orgasmic state in her body will be so great that your body will start to resonate with it. Her pleasure will become yours, which will prove to be much more satisfying and healing than an ejaculatory orgasm could ever produce. And lastly, the sight of a deeply satisfied woman (fucked to smithereens, to quote David Deida once more) and knowing you’re responsible for bringer her there is a powerfully transformative and humbling experience.

A side note on listening to the body : How deeply you have learned to listen to your body – in general and in the context of sexuality – will determine how well attuned you are to your partner’s – in every day life and during sexual communion. Becoming more aware of your inner bodily sensations and emotions will eventually allow you to make contact with hers – including her orgasmicness.

That being said – from a place of strong attunement and connection, sexual communion becomes a spontaneous dance, which might take you to unfamiliar and frightening expressions of unbridled sexual play, in yourself and your partner. This can often take the shape of highly attuned and loving sexual aggression. This might sound like a contradiction, but in the context of a consciously created space of safety and love, this animalistic behavior is actually the free and natural expression of your bodies’ innate intelligence and biological hunger for sexual co-regulation. And true sexual play.

The obvious word of warning : when sexually aggressive behavior occurs outside a socially attuned and loving context, it is sexual abuse, and you need to leave the situation and relationship immediately. Never tolerate unconscious abuse.

With great power comes great responsibility : intellectually and somatically understanding and feeling the deep impact sexual communion can have will inevitably change the function and importance sex has in your life. Over time, the ideas of casual sexual encounters and sexual variety will lose their appeal, because they seldomly provide the circumstances required for reaching this depth in sexual communion. Which brings us to…

The Unimportance Of Sex

Another very simple truth : self-regulating sex is important in a man’s life only because of the unconscious impact of ejaculation on the nervous system, and the modulation of the emotional and mental narratives it indirectly affects. When nervous system regulation is addressed directly and consciously, self-regulating sex slowly loses its function, and consequently its importance.

When sex is used as an indirect and unconscious tool for nervous system self-regulation, the quantity of a man’s sexual encounters is important. Because of the pressures of the chronic background states of survival and the never-ending need for ejaculation, the desire for relief from these pressures will persist in the life of a man who hasn’t consciously scrutinized the mechanics of his own sexuality. A new fix will be needed time and time again.

The dorsal vagal narrative surrounding this desire for relief creates a link between sexuality and the lack of self-worth and lovability, which must continuously be disproved. This in turn expresses itself in the sympathetic narrative of always being on the lookout for the next prey. In both states, sex is reduced to being transactional. Most men spend their entire life on this merry-go-round of blind effort, confusion, frustration, inner turmoil and socially unattuned behavior – from the moment they become sexually active until the day they die.

Conversely, when the skill of conscious nervous system self-regulation is acquired, the desire for sexual relief will slowly dissolve. The fix won’t be desired anymore, since there won’t be anything that needs fixing. And when sex is used as one of the many tools available for conscious nervous system regulation, especially in the context of conscious co-regulation, the quality of any given sexual encounter becomes of primary importance, while quantity and frequency will lose its importance entirely. In other words, when it comes to sex, a shift will occur from self-serving and unconscious self-regulation towards the co-creation of safety and mutual nervous system regulation.

A side note on sexual variety : When a man is under the spell of girl glamour, as explained in my previous post, he will desire sexual encounters with a variety of people. More accurately, he will desire the visual illusion of variety, which is the result of the mental sexual narratives, beliefs and fantasies induced by both the state of disconnect and fight/flight.

This is a superficial, self-absorbed and dehumanizing desire, where the other human being is reduced to the means to an unconscious end. In contrast, one of the more important natural expressions of learning to consciously self-regulate your nervous system, is a growing desire for a secure primary attachment to a single person, who can meet all of our actual and natural needs – the most significant being a mutual desire for conscious co-regulation.

Effort is the enemy of connection, and this is also true in the context of sexual communion. This provides us with a powerful benchmark for the quality of any sexual encounter : good sex doesn’t get in the way of connection – it makes the connection stronger and more secure. When skillful and conscious nervous system self-regulation becomes your home, the healing and bonding potential of co-regulatory sex becomes glaringly obvious, which will then become your highest priority, naturally and spontaneously. Which brings us to…

No Sex Before Marriage

First, let’s get some crap out of the way. The historic ideal of abstaining from premarital sex has often been rooted in sexual shaming and the repression of women, femininity and feminine sexuality, often in a religious context. This is of course not what I want to talk about. But looking at this core idea through the lens of nervous system health paints a very different picture.

Let us first the consider proverbial marriage, and separate it from the traditional legal or religious constructs. What we’re left with is the conscious and mutual commitment between two people to a relationship they both deem important enough to nourish and protect – which is exactly what the symbolism of the marriage ritual is trying to forcibly emulate and portray. When we then look at the powerful impact a deeply co-regulating sexual communion can have, and see it as the precious gift it is, it starts to make sense to abstain from premature sexual communion.

I use the word premature in the context of consciously co-creating a safe and thriving pair bond between two people who have explored their broad-spectrum compatibility. Sex is not the best starting point for this compatibility exploration, since it immediately creates a very strong connection, which can thoroughly stain the objectivity required for this exploration. Too many people stay together and even get married because of the unconscious and distorted connection they created between them, because of having sex too soon in the initial stages of pair bonding.

Being sexually attracted to another person is very easy and a very common experience, especially from a place of chronic nervous system dysregulation. Finding a person with whom you share broad-spectrum compatibility is much rarer, even when it comes to friendship relationships. Finding a person with whom you share broad-spectrum compatibility and who also makes you feel all funny down there is downright exceptional. But that should not be a reason for concern – when you truly prioritize cultivating your own inner safety in your life, eventually the right kind of person will be attracted and attractive to you. You’ll know and feel it when you meet them.

A big side note on cheating : Let me start with a gross generalization : People cheat because of gradual depolarization, which occurs when they no longer consciously co-create a safe space for sexual play and intimacy in their relationship. This is usually because that space was created unwittingly and unconsciously in the initial phases of the relationship, and because the relationship was built on compatible nervous system dysregulation. Human beings have an innate (but often unconscious) desire for sexual co-regulation, and when a relationship does not provide the necessary safety to allow for this desire to be expressed and fulfilled, human beings will inevitably look for it outside of their relationship.

To generalize some more : women cheat because they have relinquished their femininity, and its healing power, in favor of micro-managing the external safety they want their relationship – and the family they created – to provide. Men cheat because they take the safety of their relationship for granted, and have relinquished or are unaware of their responsibility for co-creating safety inside the relationship – and the family they created. This is, in both cases, caused by a lack of self-awareness and consciously generated inner safety. And in both cases this causes resentment and distrust towards the significant other, which destroys the safe space for sexual play, intimacy and co-regulation.

But the reason why people cheat is less relevant than the concept of cheating itself. Cheating only exists in the context of unspoken and unconscious agreements between people. The implicit and unexpressed nature of these agreements is often socially and culturally approved, because they are born from the deep-rooted prevalence and normalcy of chronic survival states in human beings. When consciously co-creating a secure and committed attachment with another human being, these agreements will, and have to be, consciously expressed and discussed. This effectively invalidates the whole cheating paradigm.

The idea of not having sex too soon can be seen as old-fashioned, especially when you can use the obsolescence of the traditional definitions I mentioned earlier as an excuse for your survival-fueled ideas of sexual freedom. Which is of course the point of what I’m writing here : abstaining from premature sexual communion goes against the ideals of the current hookup culture, where sex has been reduced to a casual social pastime, relegated to the same category as video games and weekend team sports.

Even though the true motivations behind the sexual revolution were a very necessary growth point in human evolution, as in most revolutions the pendulum swung too far the other way, and its ideals were hi-jacked by the older and more primitive narratives born from humanity’s chronic survival state.

In my writing I always aim for the overarching context to be one of conscious evolution. So when we look at sexual freedom from a place of conscious nervous system self- and co-regulation, it includes the freedom to refrain and abstain from sex, and wait for a larger context of mutual safety to develop in which sexual communion can then become the precious gift it is supposed to be. To me, this seems to be a much better approach to your sexuality than all the previous paradigms provided, and I am definitely not the first or the only one to express these ideas.

In more practical terms, when you become able to consciously regulate and soothe your own nervous system, you will naturally desire and require a partner who desires and requires conscious nervous system co-regulation. And it is better to consciously and objectively co-create a connection that can then be deepened and strengthened through sexual co-regulation, than it is to follow a passing urge based on seeking relief from survival-induced stress, create a connection through a messy sexual encounter, and only then have to figure out if there is compatibility.

To Finish…

Despite millennia of time and countless generations of men preceding ours, masculinity is still enveloped by darkness, ignorance, confusion and pain. This is even more the case when it comes to male sexuality. It should be clear to you by now that the old paradigms are no longer viable options in our modern world, and that most of the new solutions are just repackaged versions of the same old crap. Despite humanity’s best efforts these last few decades, when it comes to masculinity and male sexuality, there is just more confusion than ever.

My desire is to share a very clear vision of what masculinity can be, so it can become a force for good, and reclaim its place on this planet in the 21^st century and beyond. And even though it might look very boring, it is very necessary.

But more on that in the final installment.