Since our most recent holiday in the States I've been ruminating about intimacy and what a feeling of intimacy might really be like, and be about.
I have no idea how other people feel about intimacy but for me it isn't necessarily about being sexual. I have, in moments, experienced deep intimacy through sex. I remember them distinctly because they are not at all everyday experiences.
Don't get me wrong. Many sexual experiences are wonderful, and some are even liberating, but not necessarily intimate. That is to say, they don't raise me up to a dimension that is in the upper hemisphere of experiences.
If you were to ask me, well, which sexual experiences have raised you up to another dimension, my honest answer would be those where a deep, soulful need of mine was fulfilled, even if just for seconds. Those seconds stay in my mind, and can be recalled immediately at any time, on any day.
I could speak to you of the time I was bound and spanked well beyond my limits. That he did not stop as he saw me pulling and pushing at the ropes around my wrists and ankles made that for me, both in the moment and long after in my mind, one of the most intimate experiences of my life.
Such experiences fulfill needs for me over which I have no control. I could go without, of course. Doesn't someone imprisoned in a situation go without? They don't necessarily wither and die when their needs are not fulfilled. Then again, they don't flourish either. The need for human intimacy, for love and fellowship, remains. The need to be known and understood sits there under the surface.
It was on this past holiday (vacation) that I realized that I also have a need of intimacy in a non-sexual way. It happened one other time for me, that that need was fulfilled, and maybe that time sat in my deep memory banks willing me forward. I am not sure.
It was quite simple really. My husband suggested a hike to a waterfall that would be a challenge for me since I was suffering a bit of altitude sickness and my fitness isn't at his fitness level. I immediately agreed to the challenge and the next morning we set off.
It wasn't long into the hike that I realized this was a significant challenge. It was one of those hikes where you walk upwards, turn a corner and find you have to walk up an even steeper rocky path. Multiple this hundreds of times and you might see why at a particular moment, maybe half an hour from the waterfall, I found myself wording, 'I don't know what to say'.
My husband assured me we didn't need to keep going, that we could turn around and go back. But, once I had taken several breaths the thought of failing, of giving up, became a repugnant thought to me. I do wonder, if in that moment, I was chasing a feeling of intimacy that I hoped might ensue if I finished the hike. I had no way of knowing how I would feel at journey's end but I just knew I had to find out.
When I caught site of the waterfall, all I felt was relief. I just didn't know where to put myself. I suspect he had the same thought and he had me follow him closer to the waterfall. With a final burst of effort I climbed up a rock with him, very close now to the waterfall; so close that we had the spray of the waterfall on our faces.
Finally, I had arrived. I could sit and soak it in. I was very quiet. I watched the water thundering down the rocks, listened to it, and I felt cool, but warm inside. I felt so happy to be here and to be having this experience.
'Turn around,' my husband whispered. 'Look back at the town. You walked all this way.'
If you looked way back, as far as the eye could see, in the very far distance was a square of green , in the center of my vision. On either side were majestic, rugged rock and tall trees. And, then I turned around again, to see the cool water at the other end. I was sitting in what I think is referred to as a 'box canyon', but at that moment, and maybe any moment, the canyon could be quite simply referred to as 'Paradise'. It was so beautiful, so pristine; so wild.
That's when it happened. I reached for my husband, hugged him, climbed up behind him so that my legs were around, and I hugged him tight around the waist. My heart pulsated with eternal feelings of love for him, always there but not always available to me. He hugged me back. I could feel his sense of love for me coming back at me, into me. In these moments, we were 'one'.
There are simply no words to explain the welling of emotion in my being in those moments, perhaps like bubbles that rise up in a champagne bottle when uncorked. I overflowed with gratitude for the experience, for being alive on this day in a canyon in Colorado, far away from civilization.
What I loved about the whole experience was his tenderness towards me to make this possible. He knew, without me saying a word, that I wanted to make the distance. He knew it would be hard, but he facilitated this for me. When I needed to stop, he stopped. When I needed water, he got out the water bottle. When I needed to voice my doubts, just that once, he offered to go back, but more out of the fact that he knew that's all I needed, to say it, and then buckle down.
He praised me. He held my hand. And, sometimes, when I said that I felt more motivated when he walked ahead of me, he did that. He was patient. He was kind. He facilitated my success.
When I think about moments of intimacy in a power exchange, a BDSM situation, it's just the same. Well, not quite the same. If you suggested to me that the spanking or some other sensation could stop, I'd be too bamboozled by that. Maybe not. It might be the same, ensure I buckle down for the ride. I do so hate being giving options in such moments. But, you know what I mean; it's the same approach, facilitating success, by whatever means, tapping into my need to succeed, to stay the course. That's incredibly intimate to me.
I have no idea how other people feel about intimacy but for me it isn't necessarily about being sexual. I have, in moments, experienced deep intimacy through sex. I remember them distinctly because they are not at all everyday experiences.
Don't get me wrong. Many sexual experiences are wonderful, and some are even liberating, but not necessarily intimate. That is to say, they don't raise me up to a dimension that is in the upper hemisphere of experiences.
If you were to ask me, well, which sexual experiences have raised you up to another dimension, my honest answer would be those where a deep, soulful need of mine was fulfilled, even if just for seconds. Those seconds stay in my mind, and can be recalled immediately at any time, on any day.
I could speak to you of the time I was bound and spanked well beyond my limits. That he did not stop as he saw me pulling and pushing at the ropes around my wrists and ankles made that for me, both in the moment and long after in my mind, one of the most intimate experiences of my life.
Such experiences fulfill needs for me over which I have no control. I could go without, of course. Doesn't someone imprisoned in a situation go without? They don't necessarily wither and die when their needs are not fulfilled. Then again, they don't flourish either. The need for human intimacy, for love and fellowship, remains. The need to be known and understood sits there under the surface.
It was on this past holiday (vacation) that I realized that I also have a need of intimacy in a non-sexual way. It happened one other time for me, that that need was fulfilled, and maybe that time sat in my deep memory banks willing me forward. I am not sure.
It was quite simple really. My husband suggested a hike to a waterfall that would be a challenge for me since I was suffering a bit of altitude sickness and my fitness isn't at his fitness level. I immediately agreed to the challenge and the next morning we set off.
It wasn't long into the hike that I realized this was a significant challenge. It was one of those hikes where you walk upwards, turn a corner and find you have to walk up an even steeper rocky path. Multiple this hundreds of times and you might see why at a particular moment, maybe half an hour from the waterfall, I found myself wording, 'I don't know what to say'.
My husband assured me we didn't need to keep going, that we could turn around and go back. But, once I had taken several breaths the thought of failing, of giving up, became a repugnant thought to me. I do wonder, if in that moment, I was chasing a feeling of intimacy that I hoped might ensue if I finished the hike. I had no way of knowing how I would feel at journey's end but I just knew I had to find out.
When I caught site of the waterfall, all I felt was relief. I just didn't know where to put myself. I suspect he had the same thought and he had me follow him closer to the waterfall. With a final burst of effort I climbed up a rock with him, very close now to the waterfall; so close that we had the spray of the waterfall on our faces.
Finally, I had arrived. I could sit and soak it in. I was very quiet. I watched the water thundering down the rocks, listened to it, and I felt cool, but warm inside. I felt so happy to be here and to be having this experience.
'Turn around,' my husband whispered. 'Look back at the town. You walked all this way.'
If you looked way back, as far as the eye could see, in the very far distance was a square of green , in the center of my vision. On either side were majestic, rugged rock and tall trees. And, then I turned around again, to see the cool water at the other end. I was sitting in what I think is referred to as a 'box canyon', but at that moment, and maybe any moment, the canyon could be quite simply referred to as 'Paradise'. It was so beautiful, so pristine; so wild.
That's when it happened. I reached for my husband, hugged him, climbed up behind him so that my legs were around, and I hugged him tight around the waist. My heart pulsated with eternal feelings of love for him, always there but not always available to me. He hugged me back. I could feel his sense of love for me coming back at me, into me. In these moments, we were 'one'.
There are simply no words to explain the welling of emotion in my being in those moments, perhaps like bubbles that rise up in a champagne bottle when uncorked. I overflowed with gratitude for the experience, for being alive on this day in a canyon in Colorado, far away from civilization.
What I loved about the whole experience was his tenderness towards me to make this possible. He knew, without me saying a word, that I wanted to make the distance. He knew it would be hard, but he facilitated this for me. When I needed to stop, he stopped. When I needed water, he got out the water bottle. When I needed to voice my doubts, just that once, he offered to go back, but more out of the fact that he knew that's all I needed, to say it, and then buckle down.
He praised me. He held my hand. And, sometimes, when I said that I felt more motivated when he walked ahead of me, he did that. He was patient. He was kind. He facilitated my success.
When I think about moments of intimacy in a power exchange, a BDSM situation, it's just the same. Well, not quite the same. If you suggested to me that the spanking or some other sensation could stop, I'd be too bamboozled by that. Maybe not. It might be the same, ensure I buckle down for the ride. I do so hate being giving options in such moments. But, you know what I mean; it's the same approach, facilitating success, by whatever means, tapping into my need to succeed, to stay the course. That's incredibly intimate to me.
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