Desire (a working definition): The foundational current of energy in the body from which all acts of will and creation initiate.
Desire Creates Life
Why is it necessary to struggle to understand desire, to know its workings, to attempt to re-ignite it?
Let’s begin by taking a moment to imagine what life would be like without Desire. And I’m not talking only about sexual desire. The sexuo-creative-life-force-Chi-prana-hunger-yearning is what I’m naming. It’s the flow of energy that moves through the body, inspiring action and growth. Without the flow of desire moving through the body like a river current, the internal space stagnates, becomes rigid and cement-like, and movement and growth are both impaired.
Who do you know who has tried for years to stifle and repress their Desire? And how did that work out for them? Not so great, yah? Most likely, they are bitter or brittle, inflexible and stony. And as much as they try to control it, the hunger leaks around the edges. Repressed desire takes an enormous amount of energy to contain.
The essence of desire depends upon its movement and flow, and so we are a conduit, not a container. We can learn to hold desire as a river moving through its banks. Our bodies are the banks and edges. Desire is the flowing water that erodes and changes us. Indeed, when set free desire has its way with us. Daming the flow does no one any good. Let the waters run free again.
Relearning authentic desire is a process. My deep belief is that we do know what we really want and need, but must remember and relearn listening deeply for the truest voice of our Desire.
Cultivating an Intimate Relationship With Yourself
It is through our breath we come to know our Desire. We quiet inside, and start to notice the gentle tugs on our attention that come through our senses. Too often, our Desire is subjugated and we are force-fed the Desires which the capitalist world would choose for us. Learning to reconnect with our own authentic desire that is less flashy than superbowl ads is challenging.
Can you feel it? Can you feel the yearning you have inside towards healing, towards wholeness, towards union, towards cooperation? Towards the Divine as you know it? Sometimes the pull is so quiet, so subtle. So we practice. We practice paying attention to Desire. We practice noticing the places it is noticeable already in our lives. We deliberately cultivate our relationship with Desire. Most importantly, we give ourselves permission to feel Desire.
Challenges in Intimacy
This is where Desire is fraught with challenge. What happens if our Desire is not met, cannot be met? What happens if we must sit with this intolerable yearning forever? What happens if we desire something that the person whose job it is to meet our desire (a.k.a. our partner) can’t or won’t? And also, what happens if we actually get what we say is our desire, and the hunger doesn’t abate? What about that gap between my internal experience of desire, what I am able to communicate in words, and whatever shows up to meet that desire? How about the grief I feel when I get almost the right thing, but it’s never quite it? It doesn’t stop the recurrence of desire? Oh, complicated indeed.
Better, perhaps, to not give full permission to feel the desire, judging by all of the complexities that occur when I feel it. But then, we’re right back to that repression, and blocking the flow of my want, my craving, even though it’s still there.
Desire sources from our yearning to remember who we are and our purpose. The very moment we allow the flow of desire to move through us unhindered is when our lives become the appropriate size for us.
Questions to ask yourself:
- Just for a moment today, can you let yourself be pulled by the sweet tug of your Desire?
- Can you feed it one long, lovely breath?
- And what happens next?
- Stay with your desire, breathing, listening, and noticing, for as long as you are able.
I am an entrepreneur, somatic sex educator, and activist on a mission to help others get free in their bodies. I founded Wellcelium with the goal of bringing world-class teachers of sexuality, embodiment and intimacy together, to create a world that is relationally and erotically well. Read more.
