Breaking Free from Shame: Mastering Sexual Energy for Deeper Intimacy & Confidence

Breaking Free from Shame: Mastering Sexual Energy & Deepening Intimacy with Graham Waterfield

In this powerful episode, we take a deep dive into sexual energy mastery, breaking free from shame, and how men can reclaim their confidence and intimacy. My guest, Graham Waterfield, has spent over 30 years exploring healing, Tantra, meditation, and men’s work. He shares his journey of overcoming depression, battling compulsive habits like porn use, and learning to channel sexual energy in a way that fosters deeper emotional connection and purpose.

Many men feel trapped in cycles of shame, guilt, and disconnection when it comes to their sexuality. Graham explains why this happens and how men can rewire their relationship with sexual energy to experience more vitality, confidence, and fulfilment. We discuss:

✅ Why men struggle with intimacy and emotional connection
✅ How shame and trauma get stored in the body—and how to release it
✅ The impact of porn on dopamine, attraction, and self-worth
✅ How to harness sexual energy for creativity, confidence, and deeper relationships
✅ Practical techniques for self-mastery, including Tantra, breath work, and mindful self-pleasure

This episode isn’t just about sex—it’s about self-discovery, emotional healing, and stepping into your full masculine power. Whether you're struggling with compulsive habits, seeking more meaningful connections, or just curious about how to integrate spirituality and sexuality, this conversation is filled with life-changing insights.

🎧 Listen now and start your journey toward freedom, confidence, and deeper intimacy.

🔗 Subscribe & Follow for More: 

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1T71nZ2AgkAvDotAkPxYDk?si=5465f3461924418e

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/man-quest-to-find-meaning/id1760746249

Graeme Waterfield is a men’s coach and embodiment guide with over 30 years of experience in Taoist and Yogic arts, tantra, and spiritual embodiment. He helps men cultivate self-awareness, empowerment, intimacy, and healing through somatic practices, breathwork, and psychological integration.

Creator of Sexual Energy Mastery for Men: The Way of Water and Tantric Alchemy, Graeme’s work empowers men to embrace their full selves with both strength and gentleness. He teaches that true transformation comes not from striving, but from surrender, self-acceptance, and alignment with one’s deepest nature.

👉 Connect with Graham Waterfield: 

https://www.facebook.com/graeme.waterfield/

www.graemewaterfield.com

Transcript

0:00

In this week's episode, we're diving deep into a topic that many men struggle with, but rarely talk about. Shame, sexual energy. An emotional connection. We'll explore how to break free from shame, why true intimacy starts in the body, not the mind, and how mastering your sexual energy can lead to deeper confidence, purpose, and relationships. Welcome to Man: A Quest to Find Meaning, where we help men navigate modern life, find their true purpose, and redefine manhood. I'm your host, James, and each week, inspiring guests share their journeys of overcoming fear Embracing vulnerability and finding success. From experts to everyday heroes. Get practical advice and powerful insights. Struggling with career, relationships or personal growth? We've got you covered. Join us on Man Quest to Find Meaning. Now, let's dive in.

James: 1:05

I have my special guest, Graham Waterfield. How are you, Graham?

Graeme: 1:09

I'm really well today. Thank you for asking.

James: 1:13

Let me just start off. Just tell me about yourself.

Graeme: 1:16

That's a great question. I guess for the purposes of what we're conversing here, I'll go into the kind of the healing part of myself, I've been on a 30 year journey so far. I started my healing journey when I was about 21 due to having everything I wanted to achieve in my life achieved, sales manager, nice company car, like the picturesque box house everything. And finding myself confused because I was depressed and I achieved my goals. And I was like, oh man what am I meant to do now? And so then I remember I got addicted to watching Billy Connolly. So I just thought I'll watch this and nurse my way through it. And watch him going all over the world and talking about his amazing life. Stop me thinking about mine, and I guess I would call myself someone on, it's a very loose word, but someone on a healing or spiritual journey because around about the age of 21, my father had just recently passed with lung cancer. And got me asking some big questions about life and my mom took me kicking and screaming to something called a Reiki attunement, which I didn't believe in. And so I spent a weekend at her house with some really lovely middle aged women having a nice, like bit of salad buffet with the sausage rolls and everything that everyone used to put out as a spread in those days. And just having some very powerful life changing. Experiences, in my experience of what I actually am, that there is this underlying force of energy, which they call Reiki in their tradition. And that started me off on a journey, which kind of, I remember sitting at the end of that Reiki achievement weekend in a state of shock. Because everything I believed about life, which was, this is the power of the mind duh. I'd just been flipped upside down and I felt tangible energy flowing through my body out my hands and into someone who at the time had depression unbeknown to me into their heart and I felt like I remember putting my hand over his heart what I now know is his heart chakra. Energy pours out my hand and then I move my hand away because I'm like, no, what's going on? Move my hand and it stops and then I move my hand back and it starts again. I was like, whoa And then I got my other hand and just thought oh, that's it You know, and then it started out my other hand took my other hand away. It stopped So that was my first I would say cracking open onto the beginning and wow What am I here for and that got me into yoga that got me into meditation? Got me into looking at where is my place in life? What am I here for? What is my purpose? I started to believe, that I'm here to, as an act of service, to help, to try and make the world a better place in some little or grand way. And that started my 30 year journey. And during that journey, I've picked up many qualifications, yoga teacher, tai chi teacher, fully trained qualified counselor. Past life regeneration therapist somewhere along the line as well. And I guess maybe about 20 years ago my very final 9 to 5 job was me trying to still be in service, through the existing structures of the world. So my final job I call it before starting out my own mission was as a community youth and drugs worker working with young people with addictions helping build, helping the running of community youth and community centers and working in a young people's drug and alcohol misuse project. And since then I really, I went to India halfway through that job, as my contract was coming to the end and I came back from India After about three months of me learning to teach yoga, realizing I couldn't do nine to five anymore. It just, for whatever reason, I'm gutted to say, because my life would have been so much easier if I could have got on with that, but I couldn't do that anymore. So I've spent the last 20 years as a Full time yoga, meditation, Tai Chi teacher. And again, this never ending journey of healing that we all find ourselves on, which is our life path and spending the last 20 years continuing my healing, going from through my 10 year dark night of the soul, battling depression, anxiety, panic attacks, and finally getting to a place in my life. probably in my mid 40s where everything suddenly started to make sense. It's like I'd come through the furnace and I got some answers about, yeah, this is what life is about. This is how to heal ourselves. And in the last two years, I would say two to three years, life has really pushed me into the direction of men's work, which I didn't set out to do at all. It's just that's what showed up. And then so I guess on a pre because we'll be talking about sexual energy mastery. And, maybe some of that work that I really focus on now I would say the backdrop to that also was trying to work out. How I could spiritualize every aspect of my life, the way I was in the world, the way I taught, the self love I had, the way I operate with people, all seemed in alignment. What didn't seem in alignment and I couldn't figure out was, I had this randy part of myself. Couldn't stop watching porn that like had what I felt to me personally were inappropriate sexual feelings to people I shouldn't be having like, someone I'm maybe I'm not in a relationship with or but not doing anything about that But just noticing I had these weird Stuff going on inside of me and I just didn't know what to do with it. And so As a, the other part of my life that kind of ran along with my healing modalities that I was learning was a slow study and integration of that part of my being, which I call my sexual self, or, my eros, my, my sexual vitality, and working out how do I make this a my spiritual path as opposed to in the early days trying to push it away, trying to subdue it, trying to suppress it, trying to deny it. And that just seemed to make it even more tense and problematic. How do I integrate this energy? And so I guess because I'd worked on that myself, life maybe two to three years ago started to just ring me men who were asking me questions about sexual energy and then I was helping them based on what I'd learned within my own nervous system. They were having breakthroughs and healings. I was like, man, I've got something here. So then I started doing online courses, which started to fill. And I guess that brings me, as a very surface level explanation, that brings me to a date where my main focus now is assisting men predominantly on healing trauma, because I started to realize that on these subtle levels of our being, where we not only have this flow of sexual energy through what's called the meridians chakra system We also have these lodged trappings in our body, areas of tension, areas of where we've rejected ourselves through life, areas where our consciousness hasn't been able to grow, usually from childhood trauma, childhood wounding, that's actually stopping our life or stopping us. Becoming all that we can be. So as well as that, I'm also helping men and some women as well, identify where they're holding trauma in their body and using massage, sorry, not massive meditation techniques that I've learned over the years to help them just release those traumas so that energy can start flowing in their relationships, maybe their finances, maybe their purpose, maybe their health, and just to help people open up in that way. So yeah, that's the. That's the introduction.

James: 9:15

That's quite an introduction and I must relate with regards to Reiki because before, so I went through a breakup in 2017 and before that I'd done a lot of personal growth. I've done loads of personal growth, but after the breakup I was so hurt and I was at my complete lowest, I was after some way to heal myself and I was looking, what was I looking for? Spiritual healing and I literally found Reiki, so I went in to get a Reiki session with a lady, came out and felt a whole lot better, And then decided to do Reiki level one and level two myself, and literally, as you said, breaks you, and you almost, just, you're like, almost being slapped around the face really, innit? And just, welcome to the world of spirituality.

Graeme: 10:06

Yeah man, I didn't know about that about you, that's so amazing, yeah, I totally relate, yeah, I mean that slap across the face, it's oh okay. There's a lot I didn't know that I thought I did know, and here we go, let's see where this goes.

James: 10:21

Unlike yourself though, I I did it a one on one session with a lady, rather than in a big group session. But you do find when you go to things like Reiki or a lot of spirituality they are, seem to be middle aged women.

Graeme: 10:37

Yeah, maybe that they're all showing us the way these these mothers of the energy or mothers of society, I, one of the gigs that I ended up, when I was living up north, one of the big gigs for me was teaching Tai Chi predominantly with AGK. Now I'd set my intention at the beginning of my Tai Chi journey. And I say this with a bit of. Shame, but forgiveness for myself. I just don't want to work with old people. I want to work with the young people that are strong and powerful and blast sheen and all life would give me was working with people like the Stroke Association to develop chair based yoga for people in wheelchairs or working with Age UK and I came to see oh my god, these people are like spiritual teachers like a lot of them are so peaceful in themselves, so wise and they're just Going about their life. And so I, yeah, I really hear you about that the middle class woman thing, but also seeing some surprise beauty in that and some surprise wisdom, as a young kind of go getter guy, is good for me to settle into those circles,

James: 11:39

The wisdom keepers as some would say.

Graeme: 11:42

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Yeah, that's what I saw.

James: 11:47

You mentioned you had some weird randy thoughts with regards to sexuality. Can we go a little bit deeper into that?

Graeme: 11:54

Yeah, sure, man. I'm like, I'd like to be an open book on that because I think it really helps because I think So many men are in this predicament and so many men because we don't talk about this And I know we don't talk about it because when I run my groups all the men have the same story And it's like they all think they're the only one battling with this and it's this kind of epidemic of shame around We have this sexual energy. We don't know what to do with it. So we go to the default setting we've been taught from childhood, usually, in my generation, it was like VHS videotapes that were badly been recorded 10 times over and you squinting. It's there's my sex education. My sex education as a teenager is like listening to my mates who were totally unconscious watching like these VHS videotapes that would be sold from the school or given away sometimes. Or it was just the scientific model, penis, eggs, and, fertilization, that there was not really anything apart from that, that I was certainly told. And I find that with a lot of men. So we have this our programming is basically I call it like the fast food of sex. Like we've been literally grown up on the McDonald's of sex, in other words, watch something, get stimulated, release, relax. get on with our shameful day feeling exhausted sometimes, especially as we get older. And so I was certainly in that model. And I, there was so many times I'd be like, I'd have the greatest day ever. I'd do some yoga. I'd meditate. I felt alive. And I get home and suddenly there's this burning passion in me. Suddenly there's this like a tense energy in my groin that I just don't know what to do with. I can't suppress cause it's. meaningful to do that. So I have to release it and I have to indulge this energy in some way. And of course, now we're getting to know about dopamine and the dopamine receptors in relation to porn. And that actually may be a lot of men aren't addicted to porn or aren't having this compulsive relationship with porn. They're having a compulsive relationship. to the way that their receptors have learned to experience quick hits of pleasure and quick hits of relaxation to deal with an over hyper stimulated world, and I think that's a big part of it too. So I would have these great days sometimes teaching Tai Chi or yoga or whatever and get home, home alone, just tapping away, right? I'll just go and entertain myself and have that release. And so that was my, and then. Of course, the shame, the guilt that comes after that and for me anyway, and just not knowing what to do with that. And so I think the beginning of my journey of exploration with that was there was only really at the time Type a teacher called Mantak Chia that a lot of men who study this stuff, the Taoist Tantra guy, and he'd written a book called, I think it was called the multi orgasmic man. You can look that up by Mantak Chia. I've actually trained with him as well. And, in my earlier days of exploring this kind of stuff, and that was all about. Instead of just basically self pleasuring to porn or whatever. He was the first introduction to this can be used as a spiritual or energetic Taoist alchemy practice where you're actually specifically stimulating that chi so it's not about suppression and then you're learning to almost force it through energy channels in the body. And so that was my introduction to that. And And yeah, that's what I started to do, but I still noticed after a number of years, I still had a lot of sexual tension in my body, I had still had this need to release, so it wasn't, although it was teaching me how to work with energy, it wasn't giving me what I was after, which was to somehow Get rid of this inbuilt desire for constant release, constant excitement and all the, I guess the problems that was bringing to my life because it wasn't making me happy. It felt like an addiction or a compulsive behavior. And so then over time, my, my journey with that was getting to what I call the way of water, my man's training. Now, I just started to figure out ways of, being more mindful of that energy in my body, realizing I didn't necessarily have to even try and move it or do anything with it. I just had to learn how to use the skills I'd used in meditation and tai chi and yoga. to be present to it in a way that relieved that, that tension that I was holding in my body, that suppression of this energy, which was, if you imagine like a, like I call on my training when I speak to the men I call ejaculation like the release valve. So I say, imagine that you already have erotic energy, life force, chi flowing through your body right now, and that can become orgasmic. Some people My God, this food is orgasmic. That sunset is orgasmic. We sometimes have these rushes which are non sexually induced. A big part of the tantric practice is simply learning how to regulate that energy in our body without taking it to the point of no return, without needing to release it, and then ultimately how to if, do you want me to speak to this a bit more about stimulation and how that works? And

James: 17:21

If we were able to, so you think of the everyday man, sometimes when you jump into holding, stopping themselves, it's quite a big jump. So what is it that if the men, cause I know from myself that I can work through five days and not doing, not do masturbation and then I'll get caught out. Great. And. This is me being vulnerable here because I still, I struggle still with pornography. But I'm hoping our conversation on this podcast now will help maybe inspire others to accept that it's probably quite a normal thing for Most people I reckon probably 80 percent of people probably use porn or either keeping it to themselves or are quite open about it. And this is, it's only been the last probably six months where I've started to become a bit more open about it all because again, there's this shame, this ridicule about it. And, as, with friends, you can joke around, Oh he's, either way, he's doing something by himself, he's masturbating, and it all becomes a joke. And it almost feels like you said, and I said a minute ago, shame. And it's a shame can build up and we almost hide away, but really we need to be opening up to this and exploring why do we need to go and masturbate and myself of doing a bit of exploring around this, there's a sense of sometimes there's this sense of lack of connection or this thing of wanting to feel good, or is this, as you say, dopamine effects? So how can men and women are quite a similar situation, start to embrace this and start to explore it in a bit more of a deeper level.

Graeme: 19:18

Firstly, thank you for your honesty there, James. I really cherish your, your ability to share that and should to share that kind of vulnerability. That in itself helps. So many of the men who are in that situation and Oh, my God, I thought it was just me, and then you get the, yeah the five to six days. Sometimes it was three days for me, like the blue ball thing where it's just intolerable. You can't literally, it's, you can't sleep at night. Maybe the thoughts are in you, the tensions in your body. And it's more I used to try and describe it like, it's just like going to the toilet to release something so you can just have some peace again sometimes, or that's what it was like for me. And so there's two things happening there energetically. The first is realizing we have all these different senses. We have. The sense of sight, we have the sense of smell and we have a taste and we have touch. Now, as men, we've only ever been taught how to be stimulated through the optic nerve. So imagine, so we see an erotic image, or we can use the inner, what I call the inner senses. So we imagine erotic image, and then there's a charge in the body. Then we start to get turned on. Then with our jing, our energy starts to become more intense. Now, We know bizarre things happen with that because most men remember, or still have wet dreams where there is no friction, but there's just the intensity of a fantasy and in the dream time can bring about that release. And so we, so most men have never been taught any other way than using the optic nerve. And so we're reliant. On an image or something or a person outside of our experience to be able to stimulate that and that can show up in, as a sideline we'll maybe talk about later, but that can show up in relationships that can show up as resentment in a relationship because now my partner has. the ability to help me release this pain I feel in this buildup of pressure. She's not interested. So what am I meant to do with that? And so that can be another thing that we might talk about later. But I say that I teach men to be sexually. self sufficient. And so what that means is I'm training men how to, instead of the using the optic nerve or the root of fantasy, I'm teaching men how to use touch the sense of touch to have the same stimulation. So maybe a massage technique combined with a breathing technique, a way of them. And this sounds so alien to many men when they first hear it. But in the end, this becomes even better than optical nerve stimulation. It's oh my God, why like in my training time and time again, I just men that sometimes cry on the first night. It's like after they've done their practice for the first time, it's like, why isn't everyone, no one ever taught me this, so what I'm teaching men is. specific massage techniques to begin with, where they're training themselves to experience arousal through self massage, which is the sensation of touch, as opposed to having to rely on imagery, even in the mind or in the eye. And so it's just reprogramming the mind to do that. And then once you start to to feel how that Works and we start to resensitize the energy that takes us towards the ultimate. One of the ultimate goals of Tantra. So one of the ultimate goals of Tantra is instead of leaking our sexual energy outwards, which we could say through the eyes, we could say through the penis, we're actually learning to, and often this can be done through touch. So we're learning how to internalize it. So as a very basic. starting technique. I would say, just give yourself a penis massage. Just give yourself a penis massage. Get some oil, give yourself a penis massage. Notice when you're heating up too much and stop and breathe. And relax and wait for that energy to calm down again, then come back to that. And that's usually where I start with the men on my training. Of course there might be visualizations that might be self love that might be ways of bringing awareness to the body that help with that energy flow, but in essence, that's all it is. It's training. The male body, that it can become aroused through touch, self touch, instead of aroused through the optic nerve. That, that's it. That's the life changer. That's what changes everything. And also that, that sexual energy is a whole spectrum. You don't need to go to the 1 to 10 scale. 8, 9, 10 being the point of no return and ejaculation, that there's this whole zone from 1 to 6 that you can play with. One of my Taoist teachers once joked and said don't be in a rush to get rid of your erection. I was like, oh man, yeah, that's what we do. That's what we do as men. I have an erection. Let's race to the climax, have the explosion, have the relaxation, and then go about our day. He was like saying, an erection feels great. Just stick with it. Enjoy having it for a while. Don't get rid of it. So yeah, I guess that is the advice I would give to men. The second advice is again, we do exercises around this. A lot of men have this. inbuilt shame of their penis. Not just that, this is generational, this isn't just what we've learned now and when we go really into the cellular level of it, we carry shame about, how we use it, we get, we, we get shame about, its place in society and so all of that builds up as like this it can turn into touching it with it or touching him with aggression. It can like, like beating the meat, choking the chicken. It's you don't hear, loving your penis. So also look at the stories you give to your penis, are they positive? Do you have, can you just lay down and just hold him and breathe to him and just be at peace with him that in itself, instead of having this aggressive. attacking strategy for the penis. That can be a beautiful cellular reprogramming as well.

James: 26:02

You ever heard of Mindvalley?

Graeme: 26:04

Yeah I have, yeah.

James: 26:06

So I did a course on Mindvalley, and I think it was called Neo Tantra. And she was teaching the art of self masturbation. But she was focusing, as you said, on touch. Almost giving yourself a good amount of time to slot it in your day to go and self pleasure. And what I realised was that When you are, when you're doing yourself pleasuring, you could almost move that energy up your body. So rather than it being down in your penis is a sense of it coming up your body. And it felt almost amazing. It felt that buzzing feeling and I felt energized. Whereas if you continue and carry on to the ejaculation, suddenly I have to have half an hour sleep. Because I'm suddenly knackered. And it's almost a waste of that that, literally, that sexual energy that we have, to just get rid of it.

Graeme: 27:04

Absolutely, man. That's such a beautiful description. It just has this nature. If you imagine ejaculation is almost a down energy, down and out. Whereas the tantric energy of conscious self pleasure is up and in, so as you're beautifully describing it, it brings it up into the body, and then we can add circulating in certain ways, and then ultimately, it's good to bring it down again, because if it the up, The upways pathway can be fire. And so that can still leave an erotic charge in the body that tends to be, need to be released for a lot of men. But yeah, if we can also learn to bring it into the cells and to relax it into the lower chakras, what they call the Dan Tien in Taoism or the Hara in Japan, or the second chakra in yoga. If we can learn to just rest it into that space in the body and relax that space, that's when we feel really grounded as well with that. Yeah.

James: 27:58

I obviously know men as a whole, I feel, and I've heard it from quite a lot of people, is that men are very logical generally as a whole. And so when it comes to the emotional side. It's a different ball game. It's hard for us, and I can account for that probably about 15 years ago, where it's hard to understand your emotions, what's an emotion? Where's it in the body? And it's only been the last 10 years, so we'll start to explore this. And it's this idea that when it comes to masturbation, we have, as men, we have one goal to ejaculate. And that's it. And so there's this emotional numbness that we have. So how can men break free from this emotional numbness?

Graeme: 28:47

Yeah, it's resensitizing. I think there's a reason for that. I often point to that two generations ago, when I hear stories about my, maybe my great grandma or great grandfather, they'd have ten children and five of them would die. And that was normal, that that's what happened. And I, and there was huge wars, like brutal wars, World War I was brutal trench warfare, working down the coal mines as men, you don't really have the luxury of emotions. You just stip off stip up a lip it, up a lip it, so we, I don't think as a, as we developed as a society in those times, we had the luxury as men of being able to feel. And I think hopefully why witness now is we have a society where survival, we're broken hearted for a family that loses one child. It's almost unspeakable. And so we can see as a society, our hearts are opening. We're able to become more empathic, because we're not. Stuck in our reptilian brain or fight or flight, and now we were able to have a nervous system that isn't constantly in survival and can work into the parasympathetic response, the downregulation, which of course is how we connect with the more evolved areas of the brain, the frontal neocortex, which processes empathy and emotion and, is it works with through the reptilian brain and the emotional brain to help us work with emotions. So as men, feeling is in the body. And so most men are in the, as you beautiful said, I think it was young that said that intellectualism is a form of disembodiment that he often saw that men who are very intellectual carried a lot of pain in themselves. So they were escaping. into the mind, into philosophy, because it stopped them feeling. Or, we see this in the spiritual communities. It's about ascension. It's about getting into heaven. It's all about the higher chakras. It's all about just the light. And that's fine. It's what, why not? It's certainly a beautiful experience, but at some point we have to bring heaven to earth. We have to come back into the body and process. All the trauma that's in there to bringing that light of consciousness down. So so that the first step of men getting into their bodies and there's a There's chemical involvement in this in the eastern philosophy. This is why they have so many physical practices so in the Eastern tradition or the, what we could call Indian tradition, they have yoga, which is embodiment. It's like bringing, it's only a small part of the spiritual journey or healing journey, but it's a way that they were, they will get their bodies healthy enough and vital enough so that they could explore consciousness. And so they could sit in stillness for a while and not feel aches and pains and be distracted so that they'd have more energy to explore themselves. It wasn't necessarily about having a six pack or a type. Bon bombs or anything like that, it's about coming down and in again. And of course the other tradition I teach is the Tai Chi tradition, which we know is literally, I can't remember the name of the chemical, but they say if someone's had some big up and out experience, say if they've been on a plant medicine journey or say if they've had some condolini awakening, it's good to go into nature. It's good to, they're actually one of the best. And I'm sorry, I'm not. Great with chemicals and biology and all this kind of stuff, but and chemistry But there is this very specific chemical that is released when you do Tai Chi or when you do mindful walking Which was one of the Buddha's biggest teachings around meditation was just mindful walking When you do those kind of exercises in nature consciously and feel your feet in the earth You start to get back into your body, you start to feel again, you start to release that trauma and I'm speaking with, for someone, as someone with ADHD who feels very happy outside the body with anxiety and with being up there and with hyper dopamine stimulation and with all that stuff. So my journey has been into feeling. Empathy. feeling. It comes from the more of what I call the more evolved areas of the brain, the more evolved areas of the brains, like neocortex, frontal neocortex, that's hardwired into your parasympathetic nervous system, which is a relaxation response. And that ties into sexual energy because literally the penis is at the root. Of the body it is an extension of the base chakra in a way you don't get more into the body than the penis So even just doing conscious and mindful self massage of the penis That will start to awaken our empathy that will start to awaken the parasympathetic nervous system and what is a very common experience with the men I work with is You know, I just hear it time and time again this beautiful story of Wow, I was self pleasuring or I was making love to my partner and I started crying, but not tears of sadness, tears of just relief and joy, and I felt like my heart literally opened for the first time, especially around the sexual energy experience. Now there's a if we go into the esoterics, there's a reason for that, because they're, your low base chakras are like fire, they're often called the fire element in Taoism, it's our vitality, life force, and so when we start to be more embodied in that, when we start leaking it outwards and bring it into the body, as you're, you described it, the the beginning of this conversation, James, then the the heart center is seen as a water element. So as this water gets warmer, it stops the bubble, produces steam and expansion. And very naturally to the simple way of feeling is, if I just invited you now, just take a moment Have you noticed the chair that you're sat on, or for you, I mean notice the ground you're standing on And that's it come back to your body, you know that it's not and when you're in your body When you're relaxed, you'll start to feel more. And then when you start to feel more, you'll start to also notice those places in your body you're holding tension, which is trauma, and you'll start to meet those with a softness and an awareness. And just that softness and awareness will allow you to start to process that trauma in a very gentle way, just releasing it from the body. So yeah, it's just about embodiment. To feel into your body. Be still, relax, everything starts to come back to you very naturally.

James: 35:43

I can, yeah going back to a few things, I've had to, so I've hurt my back recently and I went to see the massage therapist and my feet are pointing out. So she said that's probably the reason why I'm getting back issues. So I've got to re I've got to retrain myself to walk. So bringing my feet in, I've also got to bend my knees and I've got to focus on having heel, foot heel, midfoot, toe, rather than leaning forward and having toe, midfoot, heel. Now, that what that does is it makes me more conscious in how I'm walking. So as you say, mindful walking and his idea there that You're, I'm in the body, so I'm having to focus on the body to reprogram how I'm walking. And actually, a lot of men, and I've noticed in our conversation with quite a few people, are walking like that. So that could be an opportunity to change the way you're walking, because you're slightly out of alignment, but it's also about getting into the body so that you can start to sensitize yourself to how the body works. And where areas might be slightly tight.

Graeme: 37:00

Yeah that's so true, man. It's it's funny, one of my, I was smiling to myself because one of my Tantra teachers, incredible woman who's written some great books, and I'd highly recommend these books for men. And my favorite book is called Tantric Sex for Men by Diana and Michael Richardson. That's the Bible as far as I'm concerned of this, everything we're talking about. And I remember her saying, she goes, some. Quite a lot of men, they're all cock. And they walk like this with their cock on display. And I was it made me laugh. And she said and it's it's even just bringing the feet in slightly grounding instead of the sexual energy, literally coming out like this way. And I relate. I used to say, I wore like Charlie Chaplin all the time feet out to the side. So a hundred percent relate with you. And yeah, I noticed as I do these practices, my, I, I notice when I'm walking, the more I've guided the sexual energy up through my body, I notice instead of walking like Charlie Chaplin, I actually look down and my feet are walking like this now, and it's almost come about naturally as well. So I think that's really a beautiful point that you can actually. Bring the feet in willfully, which will retrain the whole structure of your bones, in tai chi. That's called the horse stance or in qigong. That's called the horse stance and it's the foundation of the martial arts and tai chi. Just learning to stand like that and breathing into the belly. Another beautiful technique you can try is in Chan Buddhism that I think it was Thich Nhat Hanh, I first heard described this actually in Zen, and he said he said all mindful walking is Notice that you're walking and slow down a little. And then when we slow down a little, suddenly, a lot of us might feel we're walking in our head. We're up and out walking. And then when we slow down, we just, oh, wow. Now this isn't just airy fairy stuff. I, there's a program i used to watch all the time i think it was sas who dares wins or something on channel four and one of the ex sas guys and their guy called neil fox i was reading his biography and he had complex ptsd i think for it was taking himself into very dark places in his life and he talks about candidly in his biography and one of his favorite famous sayings is I realize it was only when I allowed myself to be vulnerable that I became strong. And so that then in his book, he gets taught by his therapist. There was, there's at least two things I remember he was taught. The first is mindful walking. So she encouraged him to walk in nature, but without a phone, without anything, and just look at nature. Just, that's it. Nothing more than that. And then she also encouraged him to have goals. To have what, where can you take your warrior spirit and focus? I think he ended up rowing across the ocean or something like this, that's or across the Atlantic. And so he found a way of channeling his dharma, his warrior spirit into something new. But yeah, so just slowing down the walk, walking in nature and paying attention. These are very powerful practices, thinking about the walkabouts that the aboriginals do as their spiritual practice by themselves. Yeah, I really resonate with that.

James: 40:22

With regards to men as a whole, what are some of the biggest fears men face when it comes to intimacy? And how can they overcome it?

Graeme: 40:34

Wow, such a great question, man. See, intimacy exists in the body. So again, we can't, we struggle to be intimate through the mind. But bodies know how to be intimate. When we have a coddle with our lover, or when we even just lie down and hold ourselves, in that moment of intimacy, it's like We experience something where everything just feels connected, like just feel great. And so what's, let's start with the obstacle to intimacy. So the obstacle to in this intimacy is we're trying to connect through our mind. And Now I don't want to be one of those people that slags off social media, but, because I use it, and I hopefully I use it to the, I'm always mindful of using it and it not using me, and I fail at that sometimes, but it's an ongoing thing. Don't

James: 41:29

we all.

Graeme: 41:30

Totally like that. And again, dopamine receptors, et cetera. But what I noticed on social media is there's not much intimacy in conversation. It seems to be quite led by adrenaline cortisol stress, anxiety. And that. Sometimes I struggle to see people really connecting in a loving and beautiful way on social media, even though we have this web of interconnected people. And so how can that be? Because, true intimacy is, as the Buddha said, becoming one with everything. And, Arjun in the Bhagavad Gita says that this is the divine's universal form. So he gets. And his thing he gets shown the universal form of the divine and realizes he is and that is and everything is And has the ultimate intimacy one intimacy oneness with everything So how come we and again, hopefully this will point in a way to your So to the answer, how come we have a device in our hand all the time on our phone, using social media that in theory is the ultimate device of intimacy because we're all interconnected yet. Everyone's falling out. Everyone's not everyone. But, I'm sure you understand what I'm saying. And as a listener as well, yet the Buddha said the part of his enlightenment was realizing the intimacy had with everything and that because of the experience of being intimate with everything, all he felt was compassion and love for everything in the universe and within that experience of compassion, love for himself and everything in the universe was this call to service, if you like, so I would say compassion. Here's two types of intimacy. One is artificial intimacy. AI. I just thought. Artificial intimacy, which is through the head. Through opinion, through thought, through constructed ideas about each other. But there's another type of intimacy. And I would say this is the intimacy of the heart, instead of the head. The awakening of some kind of nature that they call the Buddha nature, or the soul nature. So intimacy is and why men struggle with it, is because we're so conditioned to be in our mind, to be in our head. So conditioned, school, facts and figures, come home, play a video game, turn on the porn, intimacy through the optic nerve and through the brain, which we've already spoke about. Everything is about opinion. Everything is about mind. Very little is about connecting through the heart and ultimately through the body, which is where we find intimacy. So intimacy is almost like. a byproduct of us being relaxed and the person that we're with being relaxed and meeting each other through that space of relaxation, compassion and a connection that isn't really the mind or the thinking connection. Now what stops us? Experiencing that firstly is a hyper stimulated society. I was reading the other day on AI, which I just love asking it questions time and because it just gives you so much data so quickly. So hopefully using it and it's not using me at the moment. And. I said, how long did it take to do a social media? What is a social media detox and what is the chemical constituency of that? I said, okay, for the first three days, if you just stop using social media, the first three days you'll experience depression. You'll experience withdrawal symptoms you'll dopamine imbalances in the brain, and it's thank god, this is rattling. This is literally coming off a drug after three weeks It said you'll start to gain more emotional regulation. You'll start to Feel less combative to those people around you And so what's this that will be it's the journey of detoxing these You know these chemicals in the brain and coming back into the body So what stops us coming to the body as men is a few things the inability Sometimes for us to sit with ourselves, the first job of intimacy, I say on my training and in other places, first job in intimacy is not to figure out how to be intimate with another, it's to how can I be intimate with myself? And now it doesn't get much more intimate than what we call self pleasure. That's true. Deep intimacy. So this is a relearning of intimacy. And as we start to feel more intimate with ourselves, that means we can be with ourselves instead. stillness without needing hyperfixation or, increase dopamine or whether we can be in intimate with nature. That means just sit for a while. Listen to the breeze through the trees, maybe feel the earth beneath the feet as we start to become still and start to regulate our nervous system. What happens? is intimacy. It's like we can't do intimacy. We can create a space within ourselves. And then we will start to find, generally, that the more we can be in stillness with ourselves, whether through nature and some of the things we've spoken about already, intimacy has its own wisdom. It's if I can be present to my You know, as you beautifully shared before, James, when I can be intimate with my own sexual nature without blaming condemnation and just noticing, Oh, this is what I have or my fear or my judgment or my criticism or my. egocentric, when egocentricity or my jealousy or my insecurity, when I can be intimate with all of myself, with love, compassion, these shadows, they start to dissolve. But then on sexual intimacy, when I learn how to be sexually intimate with my own body, when I lay down with another, I'm able to drop into a space of intimacy where it's almost like sometimes we may have experienced this. Maybe we experienced it on drugs, like in the rainy days on MDMA or something for some people, but maybe we experience it and suddenly it's like it's not me and another person having sex with each other. It's like life is just Dancing as energy, like a flame. It's we're just, and we call that making love, which is really deep intimacy. There's like almost a loss of self into the, the, I guess the flow state of making love athletes. We'll call it flow state in that perspective, specific game. But we just drop into. Intimacy. And it's almost like a loss of self. There's only a state we could call it non duality. We could call it oneness. Of life as being intimate with itself. And I'm just the experience of that. So that's the deep intimacy. Yeah, that's the deep intimacy.

James: 48:46

I haven't quite got that far, but I, when I was doing a Ecstatic dance not long ago, I set the intention to dance as my divine masculine to dance with my divine feminine and almost have a sense of interconnectedness. And it sent me to this place of wholeness. The sense of, just dancing, enjoying yourself, not even caring what anybody else is doing. You just dare flowing. And as you said, there's this profound sense of as they call it a Ecstatic dance, it's ecstasy. And just making, I was making some notes mentioned about intimacy and how It's not a goal to aim for, as you said, it's to like some people, you said, Oh, I'm going to go and try and be one with myself. And it almost, it's like making it a goal. But as you said, it's creating that space inside yourself to witness intimacy, which I can't quite found quite profound because We have this idea in today's society where we are on the go go, we want to accomplish this, and we make everything goals and logical and try to plan the whole process. But if you give it, create space, whatever you are. wanting to create, you will, I tend to find something more beautiful, more better than you would have had if you just aimed for, I'll have this.

Graeme: 50:31

I really love your reflection on the ecstatic dance as well. I remember being at, it was called the rave in the nave. Here in Glastonbury and so like last year, and it was one of those discos where you wear the earphones and it was so amazing. And I remember a friend asking me and I'd never been asked the question. And I guess it points to what you just shared that James it's like what is your dance style? How do w what do you think, when you're dancing? And I said, if I think when I'm dancing, I can't dance anymore. There's just the dance. I have to remove myself. From the idea that I'm dancing and then there's just the music and how my body is responding and moving to the vibration and flow of the music and that is my freedom of dance. And I guess that's the oneness or the wholeness that you're describing there. So yeah, we can find it in ecstatic dance beautifully. I love, I also, I really love your reflection there about the we have this part of us. That wants to achieve, whether that's enlightenment, wants to achieve wholeness. And that's the problem. We're already in wholeness. In every moment we're in wholeness. But what's disguising it is that part of us which is trying to get somewhere else. Into whatever that is. Even a spiritual activation or a spiritual experience. Again, nothing wrong with that. Life is a game. Play it. There's also something deeper that actually It's generally when that part of us, which is searching for the wholeness, the oneness, the intimacy, when that part becomes quiet, what we're left with is wholeness and intimacy. And then my, again, my beautiful tantra teacher, Diana Richardson, she says bodies already know how to make love. Your job is just bring your bodies together. Be still for as long as you need to be, if you're making love, bring your bellies together, just feel the breathing for as long as it takes, and you'll notice at some point, that intimate, that Eros, that expression of love through sexual energy is, what Eros means, that will start to arise, and then, just like the dance. You'll find the rhythm of it. And then that will leave that in your individual practice or with practice with another, that will just start to lead the dance and just learn to listen and to flow with that, create the space. Yeah, man. Yeah.

James: 52:58

Just to, just before we finish it's gotten so fast, actually, it's this session. It's good. The men out there who are very logical and have the idea that they need to do this, how can. They make space. How can we make space to witness intimacy, to witness oneness, if we would, if that's our intention, to be able to witness massive changes in ourselves?

Graeme: 53:27

The first step is always nervous system shift. Just figure out what would it take you as a listener to feel maybe more peaceful, maybe more happy. My counseling tutor used to call fishing, he used to call it maggot drowning. So going and drown a maggot for a while. So he said some people might have gone fishing, some people might like body work, gets us a deep tissue massage. Some people go off and take ayahuasca or reset the default mode, net mode networks in network. Me personally, I'm a meditator, so I go and. do some very gentle, very slow, very mindful yoga. Some people go on retreat. Some people go on holiday and they may, then they may make the mistake of go on holiday and fill it with loads of stuff, go on holiday, holy day, means retreat, go on retreat for a while by the ocean or if you can, or in nature or at the very least, some people might get that from. I don't know going for a drive going through a drive through the countryside some people sit on the top of a mountain top So just try and figure out, One of the beautiful questions I learned to ask myself regularly until this became so ingrained. It became part of me is Wake up in the morning. And if you have the capacity to do so ask yourself One or two questions. Maybe ask yourself as you wake up, what can I do in this moment? Maybe place your hand on your body or just take some conscious breath. What can I do in this moment to be happy or to be peaceful or to feel centered? And then That day, that might look, I'll stay in bed for another 10 minutes. The next day I'll go for a run. The next day I'll just go and sit, drink tea in the garden stillness while the summer comes up before work or before I have to make the kids sandwiches or whatever, the day ahead is. And I've been in all of those places. Second question, wake up in the morning and maybe think. What's one thing I could do in my routine today to feel good, to feel peaceful, to be happy? That might mean on the way home from work, I'm going to stop at a park. It might be on the way home, I'm going to stop at a coffee shop and just have a cookie and some coffee or a green tea or something. But what can I do to create a space as you Beautifully described to create that little space where I can just for a moment breathe out. Ah Just you know, whatever that is for you That's the start and then just start to expand those moments in your work in your day the guy used to know you've traveled all over the country. He just used to listen to relaxing music when he was in a traffic jam. That was, that worked for him. So all of these ways, but, use the mindfulness approach. If you're in a shower in the morning, feel the water of your body and just enjoy being in the shower or enjoy drinking your morning tea. Just doing that. The word Zen, big teaching of Zen is Zen only means do whatever you're doing. Don't do something else, just do that. And so all those ways can help. I hope there's a wide kaleidoscope there of opportunities.

James: 56:44

Thank you very much, Graeme. Just to finish off, can you tell people what is that, what is it that you do and how can they get in contact?

Graeme: 56:52

Thank you. Yeah, so I guess the major two ways people get in touch with me is either through my Facebook page Graham Waterfield, G R A E M E Waterfield, or I also have my website Graham Waterfield dot com. There you'll find my work. My, the main focus of my work really at the moment is helping men with their sexual energy mastery. I work, some people work with me one to one over this eight module program I've put together to take them on that All journey and give them all the tools they need. Some I run like groups men's groups that run over that eight week period. And I do a few of those a year. I've got another one coming up in a few weeks time. I also do one to one healing. I can do that over zoom where I take men on a meditative journey to help them becoming more embodied and to release the blockages in themselves in a very gentle way that stop that intimacy and that embodiment, but in a non sexual way. And I work with women in that way as well. Yeah, those are the two best ways of getting in touch. If you're in a couple and you want to work with me, my partner, we also run a yearly making love retreat, which is specifically designed for couples heterosexual couples, because it, it deals with the very specific way of what we could call penis and vagina sex. So we run a a week long program, which is a couple's retreat where there's no nudity, no swapping with partners. It's just you and your partner. We do some yoga, qigong, meditation, and then you have space and you have the privacy of your own room to do some of the intimacy practices. So if you're in a couple and want to explore that, you'll find that on the website too.

James: 58:26

Thank you very much.

Graeme: 58:29

You're welcome. Thanks for having me along.