I have a friend that whenever I ask him about the new girl he is dating he responds, “She’s just how I like them. Super cute, with low self-esteem.” I usually laugh and then continue on with our conversation. That is, until I meet the girl…which by the way, all of his girl friends –past include—have always been attractive, but they always seem to be sizing me up as competition or questioning how they look. Now don’t get me wrong, it is always nice to have a second opinion on a new outfit, but to constantly berate or question yourself is another.

Over the years I have been aware of a distinction between having sex and making love. Recently I have come to see how far apart they are.

In his book ‘Indecent Practices and Erotic Trance: Making Sense of Tantra’, John Ryan Haule questions our use of the term ‘making love’ for anything sexual. I recently spoke about this during my workshops. As I did, I came to see how clear a concept ‘making love’ is.

We all know what sex is and maybe even have had some experience of making love. When I’ve spoken about the difference, everybody in the room has agreed. 

I’ve come to define sex as a goal-oriented genital activity. The goal is orgasm for at least one of the people involved, both if you’re lucky and/or know what you’re doing.

Making love is a different story. The words themselves tell us that we’re going to make something, we’re going to create it or build it, or mix the ingredients to get something more or different than when we began. And because it’s love that we’re making, our hearts are involved. Our mouths, our hands, our genitals, our bodies become a channel to express that love.

Aware and awake

This tells us that there’s an intention involved. We’re not unconscious of what we’re doing, it’s not out of habit, as is often the case with sex. We’re aware and awake. We’re creating something between us, or just with ourselves, that wasn’t there before.

This act of creation is really exciting because it’s done with pleasure, in the name of pleasure. It forces us to use aspects of our bodies and minds that we wouldn’t normally bring to a sexual encounter.

We have to take time to make love, get the mixture right, give it time to brew and bake, to heat and settle. So we slow down from the speed of the world, we can breathe. And we’re saying I’m important, you’re important, what we have is important. We have value. In valuing we are nourished.

And in making love we’re able to feel beautiful, whatever the body looks like. If you can give and receive pleasure at this level, you will feel beautiful. Think about the relief and peace you’ll feel accepting yourself because somebody, even yourself, loves you.

What about sex?

Now before you jump down my throat and say, ‘What about sex?’. Sex is wonderful, orgasms are great! I teach people how to have better sex, how to have awesome 20 minute orgasms.

But if sex is all there is, we have a problem. Because it’s not enough. If sex is all there is we will get bored, that is guaranteed.

Once we’ve done everything we possibly can, with every position, every orifice, once, twice, ten times, we will get bored and look for new levels of excitement elsewhere, or stop having sex.

What about those not in a relationship?

You’re not excluded from making love. This doesn’t mean orgasm-oriented masturbation. It means a sensual exploration of your body, your face, allowing your heart and your genitals to talk to each other, allowing your hands to express your heart’s love to your body, feeling and touching your own beauty.

Being open to your own self. For you are a sexual and sensual being in your own right, regardless of whether you’re in a relationship or not. You can make beautiful love to and with yourself. Wonderfully, gently, passionately.

Are sex and making love exclusive?

Of course not, you can make sexual love. Having become aware of this difference and talking about it in massage and touch workshops, it’s amazing to see how these experiences can become acts of love-making, where something real and tangible is made.

It’s also been incredible to watch people make love to themselves and not even touch their genitals.

In one of his songs, Nat King Cole sings about, ‘a strange, enchanted boy’, who teaches that:
the greatest gift you’ll ever learn,
is to love, and be loved in return.

Let’s Make Love! - (Jonti Searll, sensualist)

I had a boyfriend in college tell me that once you hit 25, you are past your prime and the next set of younger, cuter models begin to appear. Now that I am 25 (I am a woman — so you know my true age will never be revealed) I am starting to see the newer versions with the tighter bodies appear. I am no longer the center of attention when I walk in the room. Plus I am about $5,000 negative in the bank from all of the time and effort spent pleasing the ex. So what do I do? I just heard of a case in China where a man was ordered to pay his ex-girlfriend over $4,000 for emotional damages. Another case showed a couple setting up an IOU plan of over $14,000! What do you think? Weigh in.

Marriage does not a committed relationship make. You can be married to a person you are not committed to. You can also be committed to a person you are not married to.

Less emphasis should be placed on marriage and more emphasis on developing a genuine, sincere, devoted friendship. People will always quit on a lover faster than they would on a friend. People would also always betray a lover sooner than they would betray a friend.

If becoming true and genuine friends takes you 3 months or 13 years, that is what you should aim for. What does being a true friend mean, that is for you to decide, for me, being a true friend is having someone that I know has my back unconditionally and vice-versa.

How does one get to this level of becoming true friends? By sharing, start slowly at first and then integrate that person into your story, your life, your goals and dreams and what not. If the person can’t handle some of it prior to having a committed relationship to your satisfaction, there is no way they would be able to once you are in a committed relationship.

Once you start the process of integration, keep on doing this, till your life is an empty canvas before this other person, if you can accept the way they paint on it, then you are good to go, if you can’t you know that there is no reason to take things to the next level.

Of course by doing this, you shall potentially expose yourself to getting your feelings hurt, but that is fine, it comes with the territory, nothing wrong with it, take it in stride and move on. Better to do your sincere best and get hurt up front, and not do your sincere best and hurt for the rest of your life, by involving yourself with the wrong person under false pretenses.

However, once a friendship is firm and a decision has been made to be in a committed relationship, ALL other options cease to exist, this is plain and simple.

What this means is if you are a guy, and you have 2000 phone numbers in your celly of potential, past and present babes, delete all of them. If you have all sorts of babes sending you mail via fb or email, politely tell them that at this point it is inappropriate to continue communicating, and delete their email addresses, of course also give your partner full and unfettered access to all your communication accounts (voice mail, email, etc).

If you are into “Boys Night Out” (specifically clubbing or partying) or whatever, except if your babe is coming along, don’t do it, you don’t need it. If your boys can’t hang in the company of your babe to do social interaction of whatever nature, it is not meant to be.

If you are a babe and all sorts of admirers are popping up with propositions, politely tell them thanks but no thanks, if you are into doing girls night out (clubbing and partying), cease and desist, except if your guy gets to come too.

Once a commitment has been made, two have become one, and just like my head and my neck always have to be in tune with one another 100% for my body to function properly, so do the people in a committed relationship.

Once you’ve been in a committed relationship and are happy to be in a committed relationship, whether you get married or not makes no difference, as marriage merely becomes a legalization before the laws of the land what you already have internally.

Have you met that girl? You know the one. Her life’s dream is to get married. She talks about everyone around her behind their backs when they are engaged. She laughs and smiles in their presence.

This is a description of a young lady that I work with. For anonymity’s sake, her name will be Stacy.

Stacy was with her ex-boy friend Josh for together for many years. She learned after they bought a house together that he did not want to get married and did not want to have kids. These both being very important things to her.

She since has tried playing the field to make him jealous. She even says how much she wants him back but he has to change. Stacy now admits that she broke up with him as a “threat”.

What’s even worse is that she is dying to settle down and it looks as though this is a race to the alter.

My question is why? Stacy is only 26. But this seems to be the thought process of a lot of women. We seem to have this timeline in our heads that must be met. Ok, I admit that I ‘had’ one too…but that was back in high school! Why now? Why as adults are we willing to just settle for the next man that comes along? Or, in Stacy’s case, settle for the man that we don’t necessarily want but, he’s ‘convenient’…

Let me know what you think.

The students in committed relationships who viewed the pictures were interested in attractive members of the same sex. These students were marked as those who were jealous of and worried about guarding their mates

The study also showed the pitfalls of visual fixation, including negative effects on self-esteem when looking at an attractive person of the same sex. The negativity could be linked to illnesses such as bulimia. Another pitfall is that people may become less satisfied in their current relationships.

If phones — or long-distance minutes are not readily available – try a virtual date. Play a game … or a few … over the internet.

If you have a lot of phone minutes (or just start after 7 p.m. when minutes are free), rent a movie “together” and watch it at the same time and share your comments over the phone.

Make gifts for each other. Nothing extravagant…but something that will tell him/her that it is from the heart. One idea is little notes or sayings of “I Love You” in different languages.