Conscious Sexuality

When I first began writing about polyamory, some people proclaimed that I was just in it for the sex.

I explained that my primary interest in polyamory has to do with sharing emotional intimacy, not physical intimacy. That’s the honest truth.

However, later I realized there was a hidden assumption behind the comments people were making. I really wish I’d caught this earlier, but I didn’t notice it until recently.

I suddenly realized, “Wait a minute here. What if sex really was my primary motivation for going poly? What if I was just in it for the sex? Would that have been a problem?”

The hidden assumption is that enjoying sex with multiple, consenting partners is somehow wrong.

Now that’s a belief I definitely don’t agree with.

Let’s explore this issue in more detail.

What’s Wrong With Sex?

Is there anything wrong with two people coming together and just having sex — for fun — without first having an emotionally intimate relationship (assuming safe sex is practiced of course)?

I was raised to believe the answer to this is yes, that there is something wrong with it.

As a sophomore in high school, I had to write a school paper on why premarital sex was wrong. I did the assignment and regurgitated what I needed to get an A.

Privately I had doubts about what I was taught. And of course I went ahead and had premarital sex anyway, which turned out to be a lot of fun with no guilt or regret.

Looking back, I think I would have preferred to get an F on that assignment and had more fun instead. 🙂

Today I see absolutely nothing wrong with having sex just for fun, as long as it’s done safely and consensually. I think those who feel that sex is wrong, dirty, or immoral are terribly repressed. I’ve never met a genuinely happy person that felt this way about sex. Perhaps if such people just got laid more often, they wouldn’t be so grumpy.

Prerequisites for Sex

What prerequisites do we actually need to engage in sex? A willing partner is really all that’s required. If you have a willing partner, you can have sex.

Serious rocket science here, eh?

Just to be clear, let’s assume your body and your partner’s body are physically capable of having sex as well.

All other rules, constraints, and requirements arise from social conditioning and are therefore unnecessary.

You don’t need to be married or in a committed relationship.

You don’t need to be dating.

You don’t need to be in love.

You don’t need an opposite-sex partner.

You don’t need to be exclusive with your partner.

Your partner doesn’t need to be exclusive with you.

You don’t need to be programmed in multiple techniques.

You don’t even need to have met the other person first.

All you need is consent.

Technically speaking, even your partner’s consent is a socially conditioned prerequisite, but I think it’s one we should maintain. The alternative is illegal, unethical, and hurtful. We can certainly enjoy sex without resorting to rape. Acting out your kinky fantasies, on the other hand, can still be completely consensual.

How many extra rules do you have in your head about what’s required for you to have sex above and beyond the most basic?

How are those rules working for you? Are you delighted with the results they’re producing?

Do your rules make it easy for you to enjoy the sexual experiences you desire? Or are they simply getting in the way and blocking you?

Do you realize that you have the freedom to choose the rules you want to keep as well as those you’d rather dump?

I’m not suggesting that you need to lower your standards to the absolute minimum. I’m simply suggesting that you take a good, conscious look at your current rules and requirements for having sex, and consider whether they’re helping you or hurting you.

Personally I have pretty high standards for when I will and won’t have sex. These standards, however, are ones I’ve chosen because I’m happy with them. I don’t maintain standards just because everyone else feels they’re proper and necessary.

Let go of unnecessary sex rules that don’t serve you. You decide what’s really important to you, and drop the rest.

Perhaps my #1 requirement for having sex with someone is the energetic connection I feel toward her. Does her energy feel open, loving, and positive? Do I want to share my energy with her? Would I find the experience draining or uplifting? Is she capable of both giving and receiving? In most cases this type of connection will arise from genuine friendship. But it’s possible to enjoy this kind of connection with someone I just met.

The more restrictive rules you pile on top of the simple act of having sex, the more fun you’ll deny yourself. The more flexible and consciously chosen your rules are, the more sexual abundance you’ll enjoy.

Sexual Awareness

Your personal experience of sexuality depends on the awareness you bring to it. If your thoughts are rooted in fear and scarcity, your sex life will reflect that. If your thoughts are centered in love and abundance, your sex life will reflect that as well.

I’ve spent a lot of time this month hanging out in Las Vegas with polyamorous people. These are people who enjoy having sex with multiple partners quite often.

I found it absolutely fascinating to learn from them. One conversation lasted nearly eight hours without a break, from 8:30pm until 4:15am. The time just flew by because I was so enthralled. I left their hotel feeling so energized that it was hard to fall asleep afterwards.

Here are some of the common patterns I noticed about them:

  1. They believe sex is a giving act; inviting someone to have sex is like giving someone a special gift.
  2. They take pleasure in giving pleasure to their partners.
  3. They enjoy having sex and see it as a fun thing to do; sex is play.
  4. They easily attract willing partners who feel the same as they do.
  5. They embrace their sexuality and aren’t embarrassed by it; this makes you feel the same about your own sexuality in their presence.
  6. They accept themselves as they are, warts and all; they feel good about their bodies, regardless of how well they live up to society’s standards of physical beauty.
  7. They see themselves as being worthy of sexual abundance; some can offer specific reasons for this, like knowing they can create massive pleasure for their partners.
  8. They enjoy the variety of having sex with multiple partners; their partners enjoy it too.
  9. Everything is 100% consensual; no one is pressured to do anything they aren’t comfortable with.
  10. They’re pretty darned happy about their lives; they laughed a lot!

Within the first few minutes of conversation with someone they just met, these people can express sexual intent, and a positive response is anticipated and received. They regard sex as a gift they can offer and share with others, and this causes others to respond in kind. They don’t broadcast creepy vibes because they aren’t trying to take anything from anyone.

I noticed that such people also resist putting labels on their experiences. They didn’t quite resonate with polyamory or any other specific labels. Some of them invented their own labels; others preferred none at all. They allow their sex lives to flow dynamically instead of trying to force their experiences into a particular mold. This was especially eye-opening for me because I have a hard time coming up with good labels for what I’m doing. Now I can see that it’s folly to even try.

What is your attitude toward sex? Do you see it as a fun gift to share with someone? Or do you secretly believe you’re doing something wrong, asking for something you don’t deserve?

Hanging out with these people for the past couple weeks was incredibly eye-opening. Just by being themselves and inviting me into their world, they helped me release years of accumulated mental baggage.

Most of what I observed, I’d already figured out mentally, at least in bits and pieces. But being around people who truly lived it helped me to “get it” on a much deeper level.

It’s easy to say that sex is an act of giving. It’s another thing entirely to internalize that belief so well that you can meet someone new and began discussing your desire to have sex within the first five minutes of conversation — and consistently get a positive response of delightful anticipation from the other person.

Why Sex?

“Why sex? Why not love without sex? Simply stated, were we not to manifest for the lessons of physicality we would have remained in the form of spirit.” – Mystic Life, Spiritual Polyamory

Do you think it’s a cosmic mistake that you have a body capable of — and desiring of — sex with another person?

Your sex drive makes you want to share pleasure with other human beings. You can deny yourself this pleasure, or you can enjoy it. Which path will make you happier?

Let’s be honest. If you were whisked away to a fantasy land where you could do absolutely anything you wanted, and no one else would ever know about it, what would you do? What sexual fantasies might you act out?

You slut!

Now which of those desires could you experience in real life if you simply had willing partners?

What if you could enjoy an absolute abundance of judgment-free, guilt-free sex with all the willing partners you desire? And what if your partners enjoyed it and were much happier for the experience as well?

Is this such a bad thing to invite into your reality?

Now do you realize that this is actually possible? We’re certainly capable of sharing this type of connection with each other. We just have to dump all the mental blocks we’ve used to convince ourselves it can never happen for us.

And the more brutal truth is that lots of people have already released these blocks, and they’re just waiting on you to do the same. People are willing to have amazing sex with you, but your limiting beliefs cause you to broadcast vibes that would send them running the opposite direction. Such vibes include unworthiness, scarcity thinking, and negative judgments toward people who enjoy sexual abundance. If you’re really blocked, you may never even see such people appear in your reality except as fictional characters. But I assure you — they’re real… and they’re spectacular. 😉

For too long we’ve demonized and repressed our sexual desires. But those sexual desires are there for a reason. If we pursue them consciously, they bring us together, they make us happy, and they even perpetuate our species.

What would happen if we stopped fighting and resisting our sexual desires and consciously embraced them instead? What would happen if we fully accepted ourselves as sexual beings?

Sex and the Law of Attraction

Do you realize that willing partners are everywhere? But they can’t come into your reality very easily if you harbor limiting beliefs that block them.

If you were a vibrational match for sexual abundance, you could go out tonight, meet someone compatible, and have great sex together. People do this all the time.

You can try to make progress by studying the behavior patterns of people who are able to do this, but what you’re really after is a vibrational shift in your being. You simply need to dump the limiting beliefs that tell you sex is something dirty, selfish, or unworthy. If you can do this, the discordant behaviors will fade on their own.

I’ve been amazed by the massive shifts that have been occurring in my reality over the past several weeks as a result of internal shifts in my thoughts and beliefs.

Initially there was some craziness as people reacted to my decision to explore polyamory. But regardless of how people reacted, I was already congruent with the change, and I knew with certainty that I wouldn’t turn back. I had burned the ships behind me before I posted the Dec 31st announcement.

Within days a whirlwind of external change began to occur. Sometimes it felt like Erin and I were in the midst of an energetic tornado. During the first week of January, several light bulbs burned out in our house (including some with a 7-year warranty that were only a few month’s old). We also popped a circuit breaker, and our car blew a tire that week as well. We’ve had previous experiences like this where significant vibrational shifts in our lives manifest as physical disturbances in our home.

A flood of helpful advice and resources came to us. New friends appeared. Polyamorous people came to Las Vegas to visit us and befriend us. New relationship possibilities began to simmer and gradually coalesce.

I’ve gone through some pretty big shifts in my life before, but none have been as rapid and explosive as this one. I’d look back on each week, barely able to fathom how much had changed. I can’t even remember when I last saw my comfort zone. I think he got left behind somewhere around Christmas.

Today I feel very differently about relationships, sex, and life in general than I did just 30 days ago. And consequently, the social landscape I’m experiencing is utterly and completely different as well.

I love the changes that have occurred, and I’m ridiculously happy with this new direction. It does take some getting used to though. I feel like someone power-leveled my character when I wasn’t looking. When I look around my universe, I hardly recognize it, and yet it still feels exactly as it should be.

One thing is clear. I can never go back to my previous level of thinking.

Conscious Sex

Perhaps the most conscious way to explore our sexuality is to stop corrupting sex by trying to turn it into something else. It’s time for us to release the emotional and social baggage we’ve linked to it.

Sex isn’t a relationship. It isn’t a sin. It isn’t a performance. It isn’t a curse.

Sex is simply an experience.

Take a moment to decide whether or not sex is an experience you wish to have and in what manner you’d like to experience it. Tune in to what you truly desire. Then work on shedding everything that keeps you out of vibrational harmony with your desires.

“Surrender into your own wholeness. Feel its warmth and genuine comfort. Question everything you’ve been taught directly or indirectly about love.” – Mystic Life, Spiritual Polyamory