{"id":45382,"date":"2011-09-11T16:00:28","date_gmt":"2011-09-11T20:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=45382"},"modified":"2011-09-11T13:22:23","modified_gmt":"2011-09-11T17:22:23","slug":"surf-sink-or-swim-navigating-new-relationship-energy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/psychology\/surf-sink-or-swim-navigating-new-relationship-energy\/","title":{"rendered":"Surf, sink or swim: navigating New Relationship Energy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editor’s note<\/strong>:If you have a question you would like answered and explored in this forum, please email Jan at Drjanseward [at] gmail.com<\/strong>. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Don’t be shy — we’re enjoying what our readers come up with! — amanda <\/em><\/p>\n

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Hello Jan,<\/p>\n

My question is about the intense energy experienced at the start of a potential sexual relationship. It is potent, of that there is little doubt. It can feel powerfully creative. It is also a playground for projection and fantasy. Where is the middle ground? Can something so powerful also be healthy and productive? Can you surrender to it without losing the plot?<\/p>\n

Thank you!
\nAnonymous<\/p>\n

Dear Anonymous,<\/p>\n

Well, you said it. The \u2018urge to merge\u2019 is never so great as when we\u2019re in the throes of a new sexual relationship. Your question speaks to the difficulty we can have of maintaining a separate sense of self while giving ourselves over to intimacy with another, in a space where boundaries can dissolve. Whether or not we can enter that space depends on who we are coming in, how permeable our boundaries are to begin with, and how comfortable we are with opening the gates.<\/p>\n

That this place of melding boundaries is a playground for projection and fantasy is also certainly true, and it can become a battleground or a prison as well. Who sets the rules, who initiates, what responses are acceptable — all become part of the dance and each partner has to figure out the steps. What we bring to the encounter from our history will say everything about the fantasies we project onto our new partner and their ability or willingness to fulfill our fantasy or even play along. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

As the posts on last week\u2019s column attest, so many of us are searching, longing for the \u2018other\u2019, the \u2018one\u2019 that will complete us. The strongest moment of this longing is in that moment of limitless potential before encounter, where everything is possible in the unknowingess of who the other really is. What happens in reality after this moment can rarely match our fantasy of the possible, so we look for this moment again and again, often in serial new encounters. If we stay in the same relationship, we often end up asking the question of \u2018how do we make love stay?\u2019<\/p>\n

In my practice, when my clients and I engage in discussions of how to make the passion stay, or how to stay engaged in life in the midst of new sexual intensity, we always travel to explorations about self and other, and self with other. We explore how the projections and disappointments, or idealizations, of the other will always point back to original fantasies and disappointments in the family, particularly about how power was handled, and what the client has had to surrender in order to maintain their sense of identity. They are always able to make the connections between these early negotiations and the negotiations they continue to make in their new or ongoing sexual partnerings.<\/p>\n

Anonymous, how you surrender to the power of sexual connection while still maintaining your \u2018self\u2019 will have everything to do with how you have evolved in your relationship to yourself so far — are you comfortable with yourself and your body, with your relationship to your sexual self, and with your ability and desire to give yourself over to the contact and connection with yourself as well as an other? Are you able to truly let another \u2018in\u2019, with everything that intimacy and penetration implies? Can you surrender to the union without surrendering your power? Have you been able to integrate, acknowledge or overcome all that your religion, or your family of origin, or the media, has tried to push into you about what sex is supposed to — and not supposed to — be? And, after the merging, can you emerge again, as a complete self, or as complete as your are at this moment, and whole? <\/p>\n

Thinking about your question makes me think about the ocean — the impact of the current depends on the strength and experience of the swimmer. In potent new encounters, whether we ride with the tide or get pulled under, whether we remain healthy and productive while we go with the flow will depend on our maturity and integration. Losing ourselves versus staying present yet connected is a decision that we ultimately face in each moment, not just in sexual encounters, and as best we can, we should try to stay at the depth where we can swim.<\/p>\n

Thanks for you question!<\/p>\n

Blessings,
\nJan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editor’s note:If you have a question you would like answered and explored in this forum, please email Jan at Drjanseward [at] gmail.com. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Don’t be shy — we’re enjoying what our readers come up with! — amanda Hello Jan, My question is about the intense energy experienced at … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":191,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1738],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45382"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/191"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45382\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}