EP125: The Ego-Obliterating Practice of Deep Intimacy: Choosing Connection Over Being Right

Are you truly devoted to intimacy, or are you just devoted to being right? In this fiery and deeply personal episode of Sex, Love and Everything In Between, Jacob and Meg get incredibly real about the uncomfortable, ego-obliterating reality of long-term partnership.

Spoiler alert: true intimacy isn't about finding a "perfect" partner who never triggers you. It is built in the micro-moments of tension—when every bone in your body wants to withhold love, keep score, and wait for them to apologize first. Meg shares a raw story about projecting her own lack of self-care onto Jacob, and the internal work it took to drop her defenses and walk back into the room with an open heart.

They also tackle the concept of "emotional foreplay" for men, explaining why forcing a partner with a shut-down nervous system to process emotions at your pace isn't connection. It's self-serving. If you are tired of playing the right/wrong game and want to step into a new paradigm of sacred reciprocity and true devotion, this episode will change the way you relate.

Episode Highlights

• The Illusion of the Perfect Partner: Why waiting for your partner to do everything right so you can finally relax is a recipe for deep control, not deep love.
• Devotion to Ego vs. Devotion to Intimacy: How to catch yourself in the micro-moments when you are withholding love, and the practice of opening your heart even when you want to be right.
• Meg’s Moment of Tension: Unpacking a recent argument over a camping trip to reveal the deeper truth of self-abandonment and unexpressed desires.
• The Power of Self-Inquiry: Why surrendering your "story" of the argument is required to drop into the deeper truth of your relationship.
• Emotional Foreplay for Men: Understanding how to attune to your partner’s nervous system. Why men often need non-verbal emotional foreplay (like physical touch) the same way women often need sexual foreplay.
• The Danger of Forced Vulnerability: Why demanding your partner to "just open up" when their nervous system is in shutdown mode is a violation of their safety.
• Unconditional Ownership: The absolute power of taking deep accountability for your projections without expecting a single thing in return.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_07 0:00

Devotion to intimacy is noticing the part of you that when your partner is speaking out something that has felt painful for them or something that is hurting the relationship and you can feel the part of you that wants to defend and feels a part of you that wants to protect and say, but I didn't mean it and you're taking it wrong and da da da you're just so sensitive, right? But there is a paradigm of relating where it's you are truly not in the game of right and wrong and and I'm winning, you're losing, and you you fucked up, and I'm the one that is the victim in there.

SPEAKER_00 0:32

I understand if you're frustrated, I understand if you're at wit, and I understand if you've tried a thousand times and it's fallen on deaf ears. This is why I believe having a space for men to come and unpack. Because what I've heard from so many men is that they're just so scared to bring it because there's so much there. Yo lovers, welcome to Sex, Love and Everything in Between with Jacob and Meg.

SPEAKER_07 0:55

This is the place we have real, raw, very deep, and sometimes incredibly spicy conversations about relationships and sex. Let's get into it. Enjoy the episode.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

Three, two, one.

SPEAKER_05 1:13

Oh.

SPEAKER_07 1:17

Hi, hi, lovers.

SPEAKER_00 1:19

Hey lovers.

SPEAKER_07 1:21

How are you, my lover?

SPEAKER_00 1:22

I'm good. I'm a little tired.

SPEAKER_07 1:24

Yeah, I'm a little tired too.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

I am I'm gonna show up and I'm gonna lean in.

SPEAKER_06 1:30

Good work. I'm glad I'm gonna do the same. Yeah, let's lean in.

SPEAKER_00 1:34

Yeah, let's see where let's lean in.

SPEAKER_07 1:39

Uh, we're talking about choosing intimacy over ego.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

We are. Which it's an easy statement to say I'm gonna choose intimacy over ego. Yeah. However, the ego can be a bit of a crafty nonsense. Crafty little fucker. I was I was going to say that, but I didn't want to swear. I thought we were gonna we're parents now, so we're trying to limit limit the are we limiting the swearing? Yeah, we haven't really done that.

SPEAKER_06 2:05

I need to do better of that about that.

SPEAKER_00 2:06

You're badass. You are really bad. And he's learning a lot of things.

SPEAKER_07 2:11

He pronounces coffee fucky.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 2:13

And also says fuck for truck.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 2:17

And he said fuck her for tractor for a while. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

And I think a lot of that is so cute though. It's very cute. It's very cute.

SPEAKER_06 2:23

We can interrepeat it a lot. I don't think that's the point.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

You guys want us to talk about him for the rest of the podcast in the weekend? We swore we'd never be like that, but we are.

SPEAKER_07 2:33

Something that I've been really uh just that's been really alive for me in this conversation is how much I feel, even the women that come into my work and just I I feel how deeply people say they want intimacy. They want to feel more connected to their partner, they want to feel a deeper sense of intimacy in their relationship, they want, you know, a deeper sense of richness, you know, in their marriage, in their relationship. And yet, in the actual fucking micro moments of life, they don't choose that. They're more devoted to their ego, being right, right? Withholding and withdrawing love, you know, before you know that their partner needs to do it. I'm gonna withhold my love, my intimacy, right? Until you do that thing. Like that's not a devotion to intimacy. You can't just say, I wish I had more deep intimacy, I wish we were more connected, and then not show up in those fucking moments. That is how you create deep intimacy. Experiencing deep intimacy is really uncomfortable sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

Like you go. It's exposing.

SPEAKER_07 3:54

It's deeply exposing. And the amount of moments, and I still like I still am in the daily practice of this. Maybe not I I'm devoted to this practice every day. It maybe doesn't show up every day, but there's still moments in our relationship where, you know, I'm contracted, we're in a moment of tension, and I can feel a part of me that wants you to apologize first, or um wants to explain why I'm right, or you know, just just just ego-y stuff. Like that's stuff. And I can feel that, and I can also feel it not only just like the the internal dialogue, but like the embodied sensation of like, ah, like I want to be right. I'm closing, I'm withdrawing, I'm withholding, I'm, you know, you know, putting up my walls and I'm gonna throw the fucking grenades. Like I can, there's still moments where I feel that. And yet I am deeply devoted to practicing beyond that, choosing intimacy over that. And I feel what so many people don't realize is you don't just get to a stage where it's like, oh, we're deeply, madly in love in every single moment, and we always feel deep intimacy. Or what I think a lot of people are waiting for, my partner is perfect and always doing the right thing and never doing anything to piss me off. So it's always just feeling great. And that's why I feel deep intimacy. That's the result, that's why I experience deep intimacy. But true deep intimacy is a result of practicing in the actual tiny micro moments of life, choosing that, like choosing to expose your heart when the ego wants to stay in the other room until your partner comes in first and apologizes. Right? Like devotion to intimacy is noticing the part of you that when your partner is speaking out something that has felt painful for them or something that is hurting the relationship. And you can feel the part of you that wants to defend and feels a part of you that wants to protect and say, but I didn't mean it and you're taking it wrong, and you're just so sensitive, right? Choosing deep intimacy in that moment is to feel the part of you that wants to do that and yet instead choose, oh, I'm gonna open. I can feel the part of me that wants to protect, that wants to defend, that feels unsafe right now, and yet I'm going to choose to practice intimacy. I'm gonna choose to be in devotion to intimacy, which would be to open my heart, which would be to spend all of my life force energy receiving and listening to my partner instead of using all of my life force energy preparing for what I'm about to say once he gives me space to speak. And so that like that is the practice, like that is what creates deep intimacy, not the perfect partner, not him or her doing and being everything that you want them to be and do in every single moment. Uh yeah, it's it's actually the devotion to those moments, those deep moments where you have to choose to open beyond being right.

SPEAKER_00 7:06

A couple of questions about this. Sorry, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_07 7:10

I just think this is like the actual practice. Like it's like this, we can talk polarity, we can talk masculine, like nothing trumps this, like this, this, this, this, this.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

People will go looking for the framework that confirms their bias a lot of the time, too, and then they'll weaponize it, and then they'll say that they're I'm I'm actually trying to, I've done the work and I'm trying to.

SPEAKER_07 7:32

I'm being in the masculine right now, and you're just being trying to mean you're masculine, you're not being feminine right now. If you're just feminine, like we wouldn't be having this issue.

SPEAKER_06 7:38

No, it's because both of you are trying to be fucking right. It's got nothing to do with masculine and feminine, like like no.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

Yeah, totally. And why do you think people want to be right? Do you think that like like I for me like intimacy has been a huge edge for me? Like the the the the vulnerable exposing and like the say like I didn't know it was safe to be intimate. Like what I and also what I heard in you saying that too, my love, was almost like when women say, I want like a deeper, more delicious relationship, but sometimes I feel what they what they're saying is I want him to do the all the things that I want him to do so I don't have to feel any discomfort.

SPEAKER_07 8:19

That like genuinely a lot of and I think I was for a while, a lot of women are living in the illusion that, oh, I'm going to find the perfect man and he's gonna be perfectly masculine, or my partner needs to transform into the perfectly masculine man, and therefore he will do everything perfect in every single moment, never annoy me, never piss me off, never trigger me. And that's when I'll be able to feel ravished and open and claimed and surrendered as a woman. That's not reality. That's not reality at all. That is so deeply selfish, yeah. And that is only ever going to have you living in deep control, right? And deep uh you're only ever going to be able to be disrespectful to a man that is your partner because you're gonna be constantly trying to mold him into the perfect, you know, little puppet for you. Yeah, I just it's like true deep intimacy is ego obliterating. I I say this all of the of the time in my work. It is ego obliterating, meaning there's gonna be so many moments. And again, I I I remember so I I've got so many memories in our 12-year relationship. You know, maybe it's at where I've had to obliterate my ego. I've consciously chosen to obliterate the ego in those, in, in those moments. And what I mean by that is say that we've had a moment of tension in bed, and like I've rolled over and I'm like pissed or annoyed, and my internal dialogue is like, he better roll over. Or like maybe we've gone to bed and you haven't said goodnight.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

What do you normally do? What do you normally do when I haven't said goodnight?

SPEAKER_07 10:02

I would turn over and be like, You haven't said goodnight to me.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

No, you'll you'll roll out and be like, Goodnight.

SPEAKER_07 10:10

And then my practice would be to notice the part of me that's being closed or sassy or like withholding my love before I can, you know, before I'm able to open. And then notice the part of me that's doing that and go, okay, I'm gonna go, hey, I I really would love you to say goodnight to me before we go to bed and give you a kiss and a cuddle. Yeah, give me a kiss. But there's also been so many moments where we might be in a moment of tension and I'll like, yeah, roll over. And I'm waiting, and I I really remember this. I think I've I'm beyond this pattern now, but I remember this a lot in our Benogan house that we would have moments of tension and I would roll over and I would be like waiting. There I would have a requirement on my openness, a prerequisite.

SPEAKER_00 10:52

He needs to roll over.

SPEAKER_07 10:53

You need to roll, he needs to roll over first and apologize, and then I will open.

SPEAKER_00 10:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 10:58

Right? That's not a devotion to deep intimacy in that moment. I'm devoted to being right. I'm devoted to getting my way, which is you go first. You you uh you you fucked this up, or you're the one that should apologize, so you're gonna go first.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

For you to be right, the other person has to be wrong.

SPEAKER_07 11:17

And I no doubt there is someone, many multiple people listening to this now and being like, but what if he was wrong? What if he should apologize first? That is that that voice that's saying he should apologize first. That is what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_00 11:30

That exactly. Yeah, but what if he actually is wrong? That's the thing.

SPEAKER_07 11:34

Like there is literally, yeah. Yes, and there's that and and I think even maybe 10 years ago, I wouldn't have been able to really understand this paradigm of relating. But there is a paradigm of relating where it's you are truly not in the game of right and wrong, and and I'm winning, you're losing, and you you fucked up, and I'm the one that is the victim in this. Yeah. There is, and yes, I want to bring nuance to this that yes, like obviously, I'm I'm I'm not saying you're in this paradigm, and then if you do make a mistake, you shouldn't, you don't need to apologize. No, like take accountability for your action. But what I'm saying here is when we're playing this game of like, well, he did the wrong thing, or he was the one that hurt my feelings, but he doesn't know it, so I'm withholding and he needs to apologize first before I'm open. That is not a devotion to love. That is not a devotion to intimacy. You are never going to get to the place that your heart deeply yearns for, the place where you can truly be available for deeper and deeper levels of love and deeper and deeper levels of being met when you're operating in in those ways. You feel that?

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Like the piece here that I'm like, it's like, oh once I'm aware of it, I then get to choose. And I think that's what I'm hearing in you. Like, you the moment you become aware of it is the moment you get to then choose whether you lean back in or whether you double down.

SPEAKER_06 13:13

That exactly.

SPEAKER_00 13:14

And that's where like, yeah, am I gonna choose intimacy or am I gonna choose my ego, my story that keeps me above or better than, or I don't have to I don't want to feel what I I I if this isn't my pro this is you, you're the problem. And you have to you're the problem, and you have to acknowledge that for me my openness is conditional on your ability to see that you're the problem. Now, sorry you go.

SPEAKER_07 13:42

I was just gonna say there was a moment recently, and I can't even remember what happened, but we had a bit of a moment of tension in the kitchen, and then you took Oshi for a bike ride, and I was feeling a lot, I can't even remember what it was about. I was feeling a lot, I went and lay in bed, and this does not happen often for us, but I went and lay in bed and I was just like, I think I was crying, and I was just like I just felt annoyed because I felt I felt annoyed at you, and I felt that you um yeah, there was just like some like I was I was annoyed, and I there was part of me that felt like you just you know why don't you just do what you should done?

SPEAKER_00 14:15

Why don't you just do the thing?

SPEAKER_07 14:16

Yes, I can't even remember what it was, and then I lay in bed and I was just angry, and I could feel the part of me also that was annoyed that you'd gone on the bike ride and like hadn't like you know, and then I went to my office and I sat down and I just like breathed and I was just like I could feel the anger, and then I could feel the part of me that was wanted to to wait until you came in and apologized. And I was like, as soon as you hear, oh, you were putting Oshi to sleep. Yeah, so then I could hear you that you'd gone into the bedroom, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna give it him a few minutes so that Oshi can go to sleep. But then I'm I'm gonna I don't give a fuck if I think that he needs to come in or what the fuck. I don't give a fuck what even just happened in the kitchen. My devotion is to our intimacy, but also my devotion is to practicing moving as love. And I do not, if I'm devoted to moving as love, I do not stay contorted and and contracted and withheld. I let love move me. You know, I'm available to love. And so my own personal practice outside of our relationship was you go into that motherfucking room and you share what's here. And I think it was something again, I don't even remember what the tension was around, but I remember what was underneath it, which was I I hadn't been really choosing to let my desires take up space in our relationship. And the things that I wanted to do. I was almost like always waiting for like, is there space for me? Is there space for me to go to Pilates? Is there space for this? And I had been taking that out on you or making you wrong for that when I'm like, oh, that's a me thing. I I haven't felt like my des I haven't been ruthlessly bringing my desires and saying this is important.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

You were also not being like acknowledged for the sacrifice that you had made. And then I was like, I want you, I was saying something, I want you to do things for yourself. And you're like, yeah, but I I have a response, like I just can't go away like you do. And it's like, I know that, and I that's why I want it, I want, and you're like, yeah, but I and I think there wasn't like you were like, I just need you to acknowledge me for what I've done.

SPEAKER_07 16:19

And I'm like, like No, do you know what it was? It was that the t the the tension started from the camping thing and you messaging the camping in the group, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:29

Which I thought, which I thought was like me.

SPEAKER_07 16:31

I know it was beautiful, but underneath all of it, yeah. So there was this, yeah. Oh, you won't even get into it, but yeah, um, underneath all of it. So when I real when I'd sat with myself enough to be like, I know what this is now. This isn't, I've tried to make it about you're not you're not seeing my needs as important, or you don't communicate because then I brought you don't communicate with you weren't communicating with me, and then when you did that work thing and you only told me the day before, and you just have to realize that that's annoying for me and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, right? Then I sat with it and I was like, oh, underneath this is like I desire to do more things for myself, and I haven't been bringing that to the relationship. So as soon as I felt that, I was like, even though I can feel the part of me that wants him to come and apologize and say all the things, I'm going in because this is my devotion. So I went, oh, she wasn't even asleep. I was like, fuck it, I'm going in there. And I said to you, I'm gonna, I'll put him to bed. And then we cuddled in bed with him. And I said, that wasn't, I said, can can you just forget everything I said because it wasn't true? All of those things I was like saying that that was the issue, that wasn't it. Like actually, underneath all of this, I'm yeah, my I I need to bring more of my desires and take up more space in in, you know, in our home. And that's the thing. And I said, I'm I'm really sorry. And I said, I'm really sorry for some of those things I'd said because I'd made it about something to do with your work or something. And I said, I don't mean any of those things, and I want I want you to know your work is really important to me and and us as a family. And I just rem I share that story because I just remember that moment where I deeply chose whilst I was sitting in my office. I'm like, you're going to go back in and you're going to open and you're going to reveal and yeah, and just share what's true for you here. You're going to choose intimacy and love instead of holding him to, you know, the thing that he's that you think he's just done. Do you feel that your ability to self-inquire unbelievably important?

SPEAKER_00 18:29

It's easy to say like what we were saying at the start, choose intimacy. Oh, yeah, it's easier to say that. You have the ability to self-inquire so you can get to what's really going on. You were you became aware this isn't okay, cool. Yeah, I'm angry at him, but that's just the experience, not the direct uh, I guess the core of what's going on here. What's really going on? Oh, I don't feel like I prioritise myself. Oh, and I haven't brought my desires to my relationship. Oh, I'm not taking up space as Meg. I've only been in mother, and then he's only been in working as a and so I'm gonna attack the thing, and then I'm because I don't feel appreciated, and then he doesn't feel appreciated, then we're all no one feels appreciated, then we've got to try and fight to prove that we're that I'm doing more enough and you're doing enough, and then we've got to, it's like, oh, actually, here's what I've realized. Hey, let me share with let me let let when we open too, like I want to like when you say I'm gonna come in, what you're doing is you're letting me in.

SPEAKER_07 19:28

That, yes. And I'm also not holding you. And I want to be kind of nuanced with this because it's not like letting you like, how do I want to say this? I'm also not like punishing you for just what went down. I think a lot of when whenever there's tension, you know, and I I feel like I used to do this in previous relationships, and I've seen my parents do this, I've seen, you know, majority of relationships do this. It's like there was a moment of tension, maybe there's been a rupture, and people walk away, and when they come back, there's still a holding to what went down. Like, but you need to know that what you said was really bad, or you need to that thing you just said to me really hurt, and you need to know how much it hurt. And yes, like allowing ourselves to be seen, but I think again, where are we holding on to things that just aren't it? Like, where are we holding things that are actually, if we let them go, would be available for what we really want, which is for our hearts to arrive together, for us to feel each other.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

And when you tether yourself to that what what what I would call the truth or the the the deeper truth, then anything above that kind of just sort of dissipates. Like we can't, we couldn't even remember what we're like we're trying to remember what the actual material was, but it doesn't really matter. That yeah, yes, like the words like once again, if we can come back and touch that place of openness where hey, let I'm gonna let you in. Not because you said sorry, but because I've realized that there's a part of me that I haven't been bringing that I want to share with you. So you have the right, so you have like the the real information, the appropriate data. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 21:10

Yeah, and this is where our like our responsibility, if we desire deep intimacy with another, is to be um in deep relationship with our own body and deep relationship with the parts that are arising. And when we do feel hurt and triggered, the the uh you know, our first response as humans, if we're not really deeply in the practice of self-inquiry and ownership, is to make it about someone else. Uh you did this to me, right? So that experience, you you know, agreed to a camping trip without checking in on me. And it was like that made me feel like, oh, I I didn't matter. And so it's you brought that feeling up in me. You did that, you shouldn't have done that, right? Where it was actually like, oh, why does that feel like such a big deal for me?

SPEAKER_00 21:56

I was in my masculine.

SPEAKER_07 21:57

I know, like, but honestly, that was such a beautiful thing. Because you were taking ownership. So for me to be able to go, oh, why does that matter? Why did that feel hurtful? Because that's not an intentionally hurtful act. Why did that feel why did that feel hurtful or triggering for me in that moment? Oh, there's part of me that feels like my needs and what I want aren't as as important as yours in our relationship right now since I've become a mother. Oh, like, why is that? Because I know you're very fucking available for me having my needs met. Oh, there's part of me that's just like waiting to make sure you have your needs met and your work, and like and then like, is there any space for me? Like, that's why that's you know, that's the piece here.

SPEAKER_00 22:39

Would you also say there's like, what are my needs in this moment? Yeah, exactly. Because my life like with a child and business, like there's there's this evolving nature to our life right now. Things are moving and growing and changing. So it's like, what are my needs?

SPEAKER_07 22:52

And that conversation was then so important for me to be like, oh, okay, that is important. It's actually the inquiry of like, what do I want to do? And now I've got to go, hey, I want to do this. Where can I find two hours? Can you support me to find two hours to do this? Um, yeah. So I think that responsibility of our own, like, what's what's underneath this? What's underneath this? Why am I, you know, why am I triggered here? Why do I have this sensation in my body? Why do I think that what you did is wrong there? What what's what's what's here? And bringing that anytime, anytime we go on the attack in partnership of like, you did this, why did you speak to me that way? You, you, you, naturally, as humans, if someone feels attacked, they are going to defend. So if your partner is defending, they most likely feel attacked. Even if that isn't your intention to attack them, right? And this is where also like choosing intimacy over ego in a moment if your partner is getting defensive, right? Instead of being like, why do you get so defensive? I'm not even saying anything bad. You're you know, it's actually getting curious. Like intimacy is really this devotion to like being in how do I want to say this? It's like being with what's in the field together. You feel that?

SPEAKER_00 24:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 24:24

It's like like not just a devotion to how am I feeling and why I'm I being seen and why, like, why doesn't he get this and why did he do this to me or she do this to me? It's like, yeah, what's here together?

SPEAKER_00 24:37

Yeah, that that to me is attunement.

SPEAKER_07 24:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:39

Like you can be like, I know what I'm feeling, and this is my stuff, and that's your stuff. I think there's still a separateness in when we like unpack, like that's your projection, that's my projection. It's like, hang on, there's always gonna be projections. And like the the there's gonna be the external world and the inner world. Can I actually relate with both? Can I be in relationship with what's going on in here? And I can I be in relationship with what's going on in here. A lot of people like that's your projection. Oh, though, that's my projection. It's like that's all it's it all feels a little like stale. Hang on, like, what's going on? Oh, cool. Like, yeah, I don't feel chosen. I don't feel being, I don't feel like my needs are valued, but also I haven't been speaking up about my desires. Oh, I oh, I've I don't oh I do want to go to Pilates, I do want to get to the gym, and I we haven't we haven't planned, we haven't been planning our weeks, we have been a little bit all over the place. Like, oh I actually, oh, I I I need space for my desires to to to be satisfied in this relationship, but also I need some I need some structure as well. So can we create some structure together and I want to share my desires with you? And like, oh, okay, cool. Now that we're actually sharing real data, or sorry, true data, not just the story, we can actually start to build a foundation that has both of us feeling deeply met and deeply seen and deeply loved. And then it's the unsexy thing of let's sit down and look at the calendar, let's create destruction. And then, like, and then it's not just putting in the calendar, it's like, hey my love, I know you had a ocean's up a few bit, like, hey, get to the gym. Hey, go to Pilates, you're gonna be glad that you did. No, go, get out of here. And then we get to support each other in in choosing ourselves. Because when you choose yourself, there's so much more of you available to me. And when I choose myself, there's so much more of me available to you.

SPEAKER_05 26:27

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

Which is really the the gift that we give each other.

SPEAKER_07 26:36

I think there's a piece here also in like and how do I want to bring words to this? It's yeah, that that when you were saying before, it's like being in relationship with what's arising for you, but also being attuned to the space. I think for probably up until maybe four years ago, I was always really good, or I've gotten better and better at being attuned to myself. I was always very good at bringing that what was alive for me, what was underneath it. I don't know if I was always good at the attunement to your nervous system and and what was alive for you. I think I've really been in the practice of attuning to you more and more, probably the last three years, four years.

SPEAKER_00 27:20

Which is almost correlated with me being more willing to share what I need. I think it's a bit of there, yeah.

SPEAKER_07 27:29

And I see this a lot with women that come into my world that have partners that they want to feel more of or have a pattern of shutdown, which of course, for a lot of men, when they were taught growing up, you know, boys don't cry, like it's not safe to feel. You know, obviously a lot of men have patterns of shutdown and and aren't emotionally available because that is, you know, was their reality. That is safety for them. It's unsafe to connect with their emotions really deeply.

SPEAKER_00 28:02

And so I think part of choosing intimacy, right, is also really choosing to be aware of the nervous system that you want to be intimate with, and not expecting it to move in the way that your nervous system likes to move. That massively. Yeah. Because if you have a man in your life and love wasn't safe or emotions weren't safe for him to feel, and if he did feel them, he was uh wrong or there was shame projected onto him, then even though you say it's okay for you to bring your feelings, I want your feelings, bring them, his nervous system is saying, Yeah, but the last time I did that, it was so painful. Even though you're saying what you're saying, I don't believe you because I my body remembers. Yeah, but just share your feelings with me. I need to know, I want, I want, like I want the Yes, and it's not safe. Like, hey my love, how how are you? Hey my love, how and like actually like taking a moment to breathe and check in, like and just pausing just to get a read. Even like last night when I was like, hey, do you want to go and take our laptops out to a for dinner? And like I know that you've got I know you didn't need as much of a chance to work yesterday. I was like, I'd love for you to feel really complete so we can show up tomorrow and do the buttons and like you're like like that was me reading what does your nervous system need? I could have easily just gone out to dinner and not done that, but I was also like, what's in service to us? That and I think circling back to like that's also not self-abandonment on my behalf.

SPEAKER_07 29:48

No, and and I think this is where it becomes nuanced. There's like a like circling back to women who are in relationship with men they want more from, more emotions from that might have patterns of shutdown. If we're looking at it from like intimacy, like choosing intimacy over ego, there is a selfishness, and I am guilty of this. I have been guilty of this in the past, where I would, I want to feel you. So instead of going, what is what is actually best for your nervous system? What feels, you know, like the the pace in which your nervous system wants to move, if I wanted a conversation, if I was really available for an emotional conversation, or I wanted like, ah, like tell me how you're feeling. I need to feel like that was quite selfish. It was self-serving. I'm asking you, how are you feeling? Because I need to know, so I feel that this is okay, or I just need that from you. And this has been such a deep practice for me in really realizing, okay, I I want more from you, I want to feel more from you. But also within that is I want you to feel safe to bring yourself to our relationship. Yeah, if you have a pattern of shutdown, I want to be part of the environment that supports your nervous system to feel safe to open, to you know, express, to feel here. Okay, so I'm probably a nervous system that's shut down, you can't force that to fucking open.

SPEAKER_01 31:21

Right?

SPEAKER_07 31:22

A man that feels unsafe expressing, you can't force him to express. In fact, that's probably gonna create more shutdown in a man. And he's going to feel very disrespected in that process, right? And so, yeah, learning, like I know for you, in those moments where I wanted to hear you express emotionally. First, a huge part for me was Alison Armstrong always says, Your man is not a hairy woman. And I love that look so much because I know for me, you know, I talk a lot. And like when you'll often say, I love narrating my entire life. So if I'm whatever's going on for me, you know, internally or whatever's in my world, I will express it. You know, if I'm really alive and really joyful and really ecstatic, you will fucking hear me. I will tell you a million times that day, life is so fucking good. I'm just so happy. Oh God, I feel alive. I'm so happy. Or if I'm challenged, I'll be sharing that, I'll be expressing that. And a lot of women, it's not all women, but a lot of women are more emotionally expressive than their male partners. And so a huge line that I would remember, you know, your man, your man is not a hairy woman. So stop, I stopped trying to treat you like if you were quiet and not expressing you were doing something wrong, or that you should express in the way I expressed. And if you weren't expressing like I expressed, you would be doing you're doing something wrong. And so that was just such a huge, um, beautiful like North Star for me in those moments. And then being like, oh, okay, how can I support him to just feel safe in these moments, instead of forcing him to be like, tell me what you're feeling, knowing that your pathway to expressing was actually being in your body. And you would share that with me, like, oh, just maybe just come and in those moments put your hands on my shoulders or touch me. And so instead of even though deep down I was like, I want to know what you're feeling right now, I would just go behind you and start massaging your shoulders, or just lay my hands somewhere in your body and just breathe. And again, be with the part of me that was like, but I I want to be in conversation right now, right? But actually, can I love this man's nervous system and know that that's not the pace he wants to move at?

SPEAKER_00 33:44

Can I be in conversation with his nervous system? With like, can I actually be in conversation in a way that doesn't need me to use words? Can I actually like use the language of the body? That's like that's and ironically, when you do touch me that way, I normally like take a breath. I'm like, oh man, I'm feeling stressed. Or I'll I will just naturally share because there's no expectation, or I'm not backed into a corner. Yes. Almost forced to be something that I'm not. And if you can respect someone's nervous system and move in a way that doesn't rush them past their ability to feel what they're feeling, you will receive a much deeper present, authentic version of the person that you're relating with.

SPEAKER_07 34:36

Yes. We always use this example, but I know it just lands a lot for women that women often need a lot more sexual foreplay than men. But men often need a lot more emotional foreplay than women. And so, a beautiful for the women listening, imagine if your man just wanted to penetrate you like immediately, like no foreplay, or he gives you a few kisses and then he just wants to be inside of you. Like a lot of the time, and I've asked hundreds and hundreds of women this, I've stood on a stage and asked a hundred women in the audience this and asked them, how would that feel? Majority of women say disrespectful, disgusting, um, repulsive, you know, I'd want to close up, I'd want to shut, I'd shut down, you I'd I'd go numb, all of these things. And so that's what happens when a woman isn't offered the sexual foreplay she needs, her body needs, her body requires to be able to open. And it's the same if we do this. It's like us trying to like fuck our men, you know, emotionally fuck our men without any foreplay, right? And so even though we're ready, just like our man, if he's got a hard cock and he he's ready to go inside of us, but our pussy, our body might not be ready, we have to show him that same respect of we might be ready to have a conversation. We might in that situation be able to um connect with and really um have a relationship with what's alive in us or what we're feeling, but he might not be able to in that moment. And again, showing him respect, showing his nervous system respect by offering him emotional foreplay. So that could be, you know, just lying there. It could be not for not like energetically. And I know in the past I would have like energetically just like you would have felt my and you've shared this, you've you've and you've felt my like need to know something, or or my like, ah, can you just tell me how you're feeling? Can you just like express? It was like me not being able to um almost like a man not being able to contain his his desire, and you can feel that he just wants to fuck you, but you can feel it in a way of like, uh, can you just like calm down?

SPEAKER_02 36:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 36:58

And so I just think that when we when we bring it to that, I think a lot of women just there's like a oh fuck, is that what I've been doing to my man?

SPEAKER_00 37:07

Like, oh and if you take it slow with a woman in sex sexual foreplay, sexual foreplay. Jesus. If you actually slow down with a woman in that process, you will be able to read her body and communicate with her body with respect and depth. Yes, and this is what we're looking at with women wanting to connect with men and get their need for need for connection, emotional connection met. It's like, can I actually slow down and read his body and through the attunement process actually touch him in ways that is regenerative. Yes. Not I need something out of you.

SPEAKER_05 37:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 37:52

Because then it feels violating, it feels like we're not necessarily being respected for where we're at. And I also want to really honor that for a lot of women, you're probably starving for this connection in your relationship. You're probably like aching for some level of life aliveness from your man. I get it. So, like, I understand if you're frustrated, I understand if you're at wit's end, I understand if you've tried a thousand times and it's fallen on deaf ears. This is why I believe having a space for men to come and unpack because what I've heard from so many men is that there's just so scared to bring it because there's so much there. Yeah. For a lot of men, there's so much under the surface that their relationship isn't an appropriate place to bring it. Because I don't know what's going to come out. There's quite often there's a lot of rage, there's a lot of angst, there's a lot of guilt, there's a lot of sorrow, there's a lot of grief. So I just want to like respect and honour the women that really are aching for it, and for the men that feels terrified of what's inside of them. And that that is a pretty common dynamic that breaks down relationships because a man's terrified of his own emotions, his woman's exhausted from asking and desiring and trying every which way. It all comes down to coming back and doing the work for ourselves first.

SPEAKER_05 39:16

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 39:16

And this is why, like, if you're a man, the greatest gift you'll give your woman is actually going and sitting with a group of men or sitting with a coach or a mentor or coming and hanging out with me for a day and like just actually plugging in to a space where you can um unravel so you can then develop the structural integrity in your nervous system to communicate and emotively relate with your woman, like actually be in relationship with her, with your full body, not just with what you think she wants to hear or what you go and provide for her. And this is like intimacy, is it's it is, it's it's a closeness, it's a sameness. It's uh hey, I'm gonna let you in. So we have the responsibility to ourselves and to our partners' nervous systems to really not necessarily avoid it by taking it slow, but just like actually slow it down and move in the direction that we're wanting to go at a pace that is respectful for both parties.

SPEAKER_07 40:14

Yes. I think another uh piece here around like choosing intimacy over ego or like an ego-obliterating moment that is also so uh intimacy inducing, or yeah, it's like it is such a portal to depth, is moments of just like deep ownership in relationship. Um, so like leading on from that conversation we just had, if you're lit if you're a woman listening and you're like, oh God, I think I do that. Like I try and force my man to share things or force him to bring his emotions, and ah, I'm just realizing that would just feel so intense and and disrespectful to him. Something that would feel really respectful for him and really nourishing and maybe really relieving for him is if you just went and shared that without needing anything from him. You just said, oh, I realized I do this thing. And you probably already realize I do this thing because it's probably really annoying and challenging for you. But I realize like I love emo I love speaking emotion, I love feeling them, I love expressing them, and I know that's challenging for you. And I think sometimes I really try and force you into that, and I've realized that that would feel just hard and uh and I'm sorry I do that. Full fucking stop. Give him space to, even if he has nothing to say, then you don't go, well, you should be thankful that I said that like Well, what do you want to say now? Is it what do you want to own? What do you want to do?

SPEAKER_00 41:45

Is there anything that you'd like to take ownership of? Any projection? Nothing.

SPEAKER_07 41:50

If you can just share that, own it so deeply, need nothing from him, even his reaction, like if he just goes, Oh, okay, and then walks away, like let that be enough, but give him the gift of like owning that. That is just like such, this is such a beautiful gift you can offer into your relationship. And again, not from this place of I'm gonna do that, and then I'm gonna watch him and for the next week, he better fucking do that to me and own something. And like, what do you want to own now? Like, no, this is just your practice, your own practice in the relationship. Um, yeah, and and that is ego obliterating to go in and own something so deeply and own something without then needing it to be a 50-50 exchange or there to be instant reciprocity. Again, these are the kind of moments that shift the absolute fabric of partnership. These catapult you into a whole new paradigm of relating, the place you actually want to go where like richness and depth is just available to you in every fucking moment. Like that's how you get there, that practice.

SPEAKER_00 42:56

If it comes with a condition, it's not devotion. If it comes with expectation or something that you sort of add on to a share, like uh even if it's just a lingering anything, anything that you then you haven't come from a place of devotion, you've come from a place of transaction.

SPEAKER_07 43:18

And the generosity like generosity, right?

SPEAKER_00 43:21

Yeah, it's you you're reinstating the truth. You're not there to reinstate the fairness of the relationship. A relationship isn't designed to be fair, it's designed to like feed both of you not just the things that are nourishing, but the things that are here to be actually brought up and let go of. So, like, if it comes with a condition, it's not devotion. So you're when you are in these moments of like what what I would call devotion, where you're coming back and owning something, or you're actually like choosing to open deeper than the story, like this is a devotional, you're in devotion. To love. You're not in devotion to your partner or you, you're in devotion to love.

unknown 44:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 44:04

Because if you're in devo if you if you're doing it for your partner, then you're going to expect your partner to do something for you.

SPEAKER_06 44:10

That.

SPEAKER_00 44:10

And that's I've been having like literally conversations with guys around this that are that are very heavily influenced by a lot of the online nonsense. And I said, you're calling it devotion, but what I'm hearing is self-abandonment. You're doing it so they'll do something for you. That's conditional. That's not that's not love. That's an agreement. It's a one-sided agreement. You're doing that and expecting them to do something else.

SPEAKER_07 44:38

And the self-abandonment piece is you're abandoning yourself to do the thing.

SPEAKER_00 44:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 44:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:43

You're like, I'm gonna do this, and I'm gonna and then I'm gonna oh I'm gonna take ownership of this just so they'll take ownership of that.

SPEAKER_07 44:49

Yeah, and there's like a self-serving nature in it.

SPEAKER_00 44:52

Yeah. Yes. Which is which which which is not devotion. Like that's the thing. And devotion is devotion doesn't fit in the spreadsheet. And it's it's fucking uncomfortable.

SPEAKER_07 45:04

It's like I and this is why I wanted to do this podcast. It is ego obliterating. And I just don't think it's confronting to realize when you're not available for that. Again, all the ways you're choosing. Oh, I could choose love here, but he I apologize first the last four times. So actually I'm gonna withhold and I can't.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

It's his turn now.

SPEAKER_07 45:30

It's his turn now. I could not, I know, I can't even, I don't know. Neither of us keep track of that. For me, you're like, I do. But for for me, and even when I feel the sense of like I want him to first, again, like you said, it's my own personal practice. It's not even, yes, it's about intimacy, but it's also about who do you want to be? The woman or the man that withholds love, or the woman or the man that is the embodiment of love. The woman or the man that lives as generosity, or the woman or the man that, you know, keeps a fucking scoreboard for everything.

SPEAKER_00 46:08

Yeah, you're robbing yourself. You're robbing yourself of the beauty of the moment by holding on to things from the past. And that's not to say that there isn't things that you can process and and and declutter and clear and have clear and like and repair, of course. But if you continually dictate your current decisions on things that are from the past, then you're you're you're playing, you're keeping score. You're playing scorekeeper, and it just doesn't work when it comes to the like the the the yeah, devotion and the the the practice of love because it doesn't have a rule book. The bookum love is that's what I think of them like it's like yeah, you like love is it reminds you of uh on a retreat? No.

SPEAKER_07 46:53

That that song always reminds me of the retreat we did.

SPEAKER_00 46:57

I just think this is like ah, like when when I'm generous, like if I if I bring something to you from a place of generosity, it it it feeds me. It feeds me. So this is like which I feel like is a nice way to circle back to like the guiding principle that really started us on our journey together, which is irony, which is sacred reciprocity. Yes, which is why whenever I see people struggling, I'm like, why don't you just go and do five years of plant medicine? Like, I I just do five years. Why don't you just go and do it? Yeah, and then I'm like, I can feel my project, but I'm like, I'm so grateful that we chose to walk that path. And we sacrificed so many things to continually show up at the altar of life and and pray and give everything that we had, all of the story, all of the pain, all of the burdens that we were that that were holding our ego in place. Every every time we showed up and and and and invested in ourselves in that way and stepped into ritual, we were learning how to be in reciprocity. That when you're giving, you're receiving, and when you're receiving, you're giving, that nothing goes one way. So like your like like my generosity toward you is also if it's coming from that place of devotion, it's for me as well. It can it can't not be.

SPEAKER_05 48:11

Yeah, it is it is a beautiful thing to serve your partner.

SPEAKER_00 48:16

What happened after you came in and like opened and after that time when I was with Osha? What happened?

SPEAKER_07 48:21

I can't remember.

SPEAKER_00 48:22

We felt really connected and we had a really great afternoon.

SPEAKER_07 48:24

Oh, I thought you were gonna say, like, I gave you a blowjo or something.

SPEAKER_00 48:27

We flipped. That's normally what happens, but like what happened?

SPEAKER_07 48:30

We I know, I remember lying there, and we were like, oh, this like this is it, yeah, like every time. Yeah, and that's the thing about this. But you didn't do that for yourself, no, but it it it fed you as well, yes, yeah, yes, that's what devotion does, and also I do do that for myself in a way, like the coming in first, because I I'm a woman that is devoted to my own liberation, and I think this is the piece too. It's a choice when something happens in your relationship that annoys you, that triggers you, your partner says something that, you know, brings something up for you. I know a lot, and you know, I did this, you know, probably earlier in our relationship and previous relationships. It's a choice to hold that. It's a choice to continue punishing your partner for that. It's a choice to put that in your backpack, in your artillery for next time and pull it out for the next time that that happens and you want some ammunition. Yeah, like that's a fucking choice.

SPEAKER_01 49:32

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 49:33

And that's a confronting thing to realize. That's a choice. The other choice is he can do the thing, we can be in conversation about it, right? This isn't never letting people be accountable or never bringing your hurt. But you can also let it the fuck go. Like you can truly let it the fuck go. And that is devotion. That is devotion to intimacy. Being, we we often talk about like the channel between the hearts, having the channel between the hearts being clear, like not clogging it with all of these things that like, oh, well, you did this last week and last Thursday and you didn't apologize properly, or I said, yeah, that's okay, but it I didn't really fucking mean it, and I'm gonna bring it up next week. Like, you can actually just like let it go. And that also, you can actually do that, and that takes deep work, that takes deep nervous system work to be able to do that. That takes deep healing work to be able to be a man or woman that can go, oh, okay, that hurt, and we've had a conversation, or oh, I can feel the part of me that wants him to apologize first, or I'm I'm not walking back into the room. I'm just gonna not say anything to him until he has to speak to me first, right? It takes deep work to be able to be the one. It like your body has to feel like a safe enough space.

SPEAKER_05 50:55

Yes.

SPEAKER_07 50:55

You have to have a deep enough relationship with your own body to be the one that goes, I'm walking back into that room. I'm speaking, even though the part of me doesn't want to, like that.

SPEAKER_00 51:07

Yeah, there's like and what it what I'm hearing is like you're surrendering to a deeper place within yourself. So you've got to you've got to give up the story and trust that you're gonna land in a deeper place within yourself. Like if you surrender the story, you're surrendering the ego, you're surrendering who you think you are. So there's a little bit of like faith here that you're being asked to have. And this is where the work comes into play. This is where the rites of passage and the ritual work and the ceremony work and the the deep embodiment work comes online because it's like, cool, there's something deeper than the story, and I'm gonna rest into that.

SPEAKER_05 51:40

Yes, and I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 51:42

You're not surrendering to him, you're not surrendering to him, and he you're not saying, Oh, I'm wrong, he's right, you know. Oh, this is a story that I'm surrendering in. I'm gonna relax into the deeper place within myself. And when I arrive there, then I'm gonna bring that through in devotion to love, which is a generous act for him, for me, and for us.

SPEAKER_07 52:00

Yes, and then you go and have an awesome night, go and have a great next two days, whatever it is, and that devotion, just like rounding this all up, this devotion to intimacy, but also intimacy with ourselves, also just like as a woman, I truly believe like the depth of feminine practice is living as love, like being a vessel for love. And so these kind of moments for me, when I notice I'm in the story, when I notice I want something, when I notice there's a requirement or a condition on when I can open and soften and relax again, I know I'm not deeply living my truth as a feminine being or like a deep practitioner of the feminine, right? So I go, oh, okay, I know I'm devoted to something else other than love here. I'm devoted to the story, I'm devoted to being right. Okay. Can I give that up? No, but he needs to know that he was wrong. What if I just gave that the what if? What if I just tried that? What if I just experimented with being like, that doesn't actually matter? I'm just gonna walk back into the room and open my heart and like oh what if I didn't make it mean something?

SPEAKER_00 53:14

Yeah, what if I didn't give everything some meaning that holds me in my righteousness? Can I let it go? Can I be here now? Spirituality.

SPEAKER_02 53:28

Okay, I love you. I love you.

SPEAKER_00 53:30

You're really passionate, and I'm like, I'm feeling like I just want to acknowledge your work and like how important it is. And like just yeah, jumped on and did a podcast with one of your previous clients, and now someone that you know comes in and you know is is just an incredible woman, Jackie. And I just like got to see, I got to really see just how far she's come, and she just really honored you in the amount of work, the amount of ways in which you have impacted her, and it was just so beautiful to see her aliveness, and um, yeah, like the world that I want to live in a world where there are like an abundance of fully alive women that that men get to meet and and receive that love from. So, yeah, thank you for the work that you do, my love. You rock.

SPEAKER_07 54:12

Thank you, my love. Big love, everyone. We'll see you next week. Peace. Thank you for joining us for this episode, my loves. And if you would love to support this podcast, and we would love it if you did, the best way to do that is to subscribe wherever you are listening to this episode right now. And also share, share this episode, share this episode with your lover, your husband, your wife. Anyone you feel would be into listening to very deep, real, spicy episodes on relationships and sex. And then if you have any questions, come over and join us on Instagram. I'm at the dot meg.o on Instagram, and my husband is at the Jacob O'Neal. Over on Instagram as well. Come and ask us any questions, share this episode, tag us, and we will see you very soon right here.