Feelings are actual sensations in the body such as a tightness in the belly, a dull ache in the heart, a heated rush of energy, or an overall lightness. Emotions are what we experience when our brain interprets the feeling and gives it a label, such as confusion, sadness, anger, or happiness.

I’ve learned that all that emotions want is to be seen, heard, acknowledged, and/or experienced. They want to be expressed. That’s it. And then they’re happy to go. Sometimes they might need some time and space to hang out but they will eventually pass.

I’ve learned that all emotions, no matter how silly or small or petty or embarrassing they may seem, are 100% valid and worthy. I really didn’t know that before! They may not be 100% logical or helpful, but they're valid and worthy. And it’s also 100% ok to change my mind about my emotions at any time.

I’ve learned that feelings are our internal guidance system for our entire life, not just within our relationships. They are our truth. I had to learn to trust them.

I’ve also learned that when I dismiss my feelings, I dismiss my needs. How can I get what I want and need out of my relationship or my life if my feelings can’t guide me?

90% of my pain in my marriage came from dismissing my feelings.

In the marriage (and long before), I was a master stuffer of feelings. This meant that every time I’d get that tightness in my belly or whatever it was, I’d do everything I could to disregard it, put it in a box, tie it tight, and shove the feelings somewhere far away in the deep recesses of my being.  

Why? Because it was too painful to bring them out. I didn’t have the tools to keep myself safe while being vulnerable, nor did my partner.

I had learned to stuff my feelings and needs as a kid growing up in a family with a special-needs brother (low functioning autistic) whose needs trumped everyone else’s needs at all times ­– not an unusual outcome for a situation like that.

The thing is, the feelings and emotions don’t go away. They build into explosions down the road. At some point, the mountain of resentment and fear and anger becomes non-navigable. At least that’s what happened with me in the marriage.

I credit Marshall Rosenberg’s book, “Non-Violent Communication”, with helping me finally wrap my head around feelings and emotions. Not only does he write about identifying them but also discerning them from non-feelings and then being able to express them neutrally. Game changer!

90% of the success in my current relationship comes from feeling my feelings and honoring my needs, as well as my partner doing the same for himself.

I’m no master at feeling my feelings but I’ve come a long way. I’m pretty good at feeling things in the moment, or worst case, within 24 hours. Much better than the 4-to-6 months it would take for big things while married, and that’s no joke! It is so much easier now to feel the feelings and emotions as they arrive. Oh, if only I had known! But that’s ok. I know now. 

Oo, this is a scary one! It’s still scary. It’s still hard. I stumble. But it always leads to more ease. 

Being in truth has nothing to do with expressing opinions about things. It has everything to do with honoring feelings and needs. That’s it. 

In order to express my truth, I had to learn assertiveness. Besides Marshal Rosenberg’s book, which helped me learn to express emotions neutrally, I credit David Richu’s book, “How to Be An Adult”, for helping me wrap my head around assertiveness. Being assertive does not mean being aggressive nor demanding. It means knowing my needs are worthy (that message again!), stating what I want or need, not worrying about the other’s person’s reaction, and also letting go if the answer is “No”. The power is in the asking. 

In my marriage, I was not in my truth. That does not mean I was in deception. It’s more that I was in avoidance and denial. I had been taught to “keep the peace”, “avoid conflict”, “put others first”, etc… which ended up being all at the expense of myself. I really “lost myself” along the way. I literally did not know that my feelings and thus my needs were worthy. 

I have since learned by experience that truth really does set you free! 

Being in truth means I’m doing much better at not doing things I don’t really want to do and thus preventing resentments from building up. Being in truth means keeping the air clear between my partner and me at all times. 

Truth encourages trust. Trust allows for feeling safe to be vulnerable with another and feeling safe to simply be myself. I can trust that if there’s something up with my partner, that he’ll say something, or I have the freedom to say something. There is no second guessing. There’s no information vacuum.

Not that it’s easy being in truth. It’s perhaps the most vulnerable place I can be. I’m exposed and that’s scary, putting my true self out there, when I ask for what I need. And sometimes I might not even know my truth because it’s buried! Being in truth is an ongoing practice involving mistakes and forgiveness. I’m no master but I’ve come a long way. 

My partner and I have agreements with each other. If either of us doesn’t want to bring something up, that’s a sign we need to bring it up. If we think something is small or petty and we would rather just ignore it, that too is a sign to bring it up. Even if we don’t entirely know what we need or want or how to say it or are afraid of hurting the other’s feelings (even though that’s not our responsibility), bring it up anyway. 

I still keep reminders in the form of notes around my house. One of them says, “You must step up and speak your truth and not worry about whether they’ll love you or not.”[1] I refer to that one often. Another says, “If you think you can’t possibly talk to your mate about something, realize that you won’t be in truth if you don’t.”[2] Amen. 

I am so beyond grateful to have a partner who has the same commitment to being in truth that I have. That is the source of true partnership, the likes of which I’ve never experienced before.

This one is tricky because it goes against almost everything we’ve been taught about relationships, which is to put the other first. 

I credit Neale Donald Walsch’s “Conversations with God” for introducing this concept to me. Putting myself first does not mean being selfish, narcissistic, nor putting myself at the expense of others. It means loving, accepting, and honoring myself before I can do the same for anyone else. The more I take care of myself, put myself first, fill myself up, have my needs met, the more I’ll be able to be available, generous, present, and loving with others without “losing myself” or “draining my energies”. Not putting myself first can lead to resentment, frustration, bitterness, and anger. 

Similar to the safety warning on an airplane, you need to put on your own oxygen mask before helping anyone else with theirs. 

Putting myself first is a practice that incorporates feeling my feelings and living my truth. 

Putting myself first means being “self-centered” instead of “self-ish”. The more centered on my Self I can be, the healthier I am and thus the healthier I can be in all my personal relationships. 

A big piece of this practice involves letting go of what others might think or how they might react. I’ve had to learn that the only reaction that matters is my own (still not easy but I’m getting better). How do I feel in this moment? Is this situation in alignment with my values? Is this situation working for me? Is it what I want to be doing? Is it something I need? Then I keep going only when the answer is “yes!”.

“My stuff” consists of my beliefs, assumptions, expectations, fears, vulnerabilities, woundings — mostly woundings — derived especially from childhood but also from adulthood. 

Common types of “woundings” might be rejection or abandonment; experiences of shame and embarrassment; not feeling good enough; feeling inadequate; being disregarded; being let down; feeling unimportant; feeling powerless; feeling the pain of not being accepted for who you are… 

“My stuff” can get triggered. I know I’ve been triggered when my reaction is out of proportion to whatever is actually happening with another. I know I’ve been triggered when I am affected by another instead of simply taking their actions as information.[4] 

Getting triggered is like having a button pressed right onto an aspect of myself that is almost too painful to bear, causing my body to panic, to do whatever it takes to not feel those feelings. Without understanding what is going on, common reactions to being triggered are not so different from being traumatized because the body thinks it’s being threatened, even if the actual situation is something totally minor. Simplistically speaking, one either goes on the attack (fight), runs away (flight), or shuts down/is flooded (freeze). Fight, flight, or freeze. I was a master freezer. 

Some of my common triggers are when someone doesn’t do something they said they would; when I feel judged or laughed at; when someone is raising their voice at me; when I feel undermined or controlled. Less obvious triggers are when someone does something completely innocuous but it brings back memories in my body of a similar past situation that was painful. 

“To own my stuff” means learning to recognize my triggers, not blame my partner for them, and take responsibility for my choices. It means understanding that nothing a person does “makes” me feel a certain way. My feelings and reactions are my responsibility. This understanding in turn frees me from taking responsibility for another’s behavior, reactions or feelings (which I used to do in spades). They have their stuff and they need to own it as well. 

“Owning my stuff” also means I need to stop blaming all others (society, family, whomever) for what I struggle with now, even if it’s the result of something I didn’t get as a child or other factors that warped me along the way. Instead, I need to practice forgiveness and figure out how to get what I need in order to be the person I want to be now. 

Navigating triggers is an art unto itself. Once triggers have been identified, the best course of action (at least for myself) has been to take a pause. Sometimes it’s enough to say, “Wow, I’ve been triggered”. That gives me a moment to do whatever I need to do for myself. I might need to offer myself some compassion; comfort an imaginary little version of me; or simply acknowledge whatever feeling has arisen and allow it to move thru me. Sometimes with my mate, actual time apart is needed, where we stop whatever is happening because things are getting too charged, usually when both of us have been activated at the same time. We pull apart (which often involves some journaling on my end to figure out what is happening), and then we come together again when we’ve calmed down and can claim a bit of clarity. 

Most the time, getting triggered can be navigated within the hour. Sometimes triggers can be navigated within minutes! Other times, triggers might not be cleared for days. When we can’t find clarity right away, we “table it” until we’re ready or finally have insight. The longest tabled trigger I can remember in these past three years was about 4-5 days. Most of the time, it’s within the hour. Huge pats on the back for me and my partner for how far we’ve come navigating triggers! 

When either of us gets triggered, we try to remember to immediately reassure the other person that they’ve done nothing wrong. That helps the non-triggered person know what’s going on so they’re not in an information vacuum, allowing them to take care of themselves so they can give the triggered person some space to be with their stuff. 

When either party doesn’t own their stuff, or even recognize that they have stuff, the hurt can grow between two people over time, becoming too much to bear. Looking back at my marriage, we triggered each other often without a clue about this dynamic, without any understanding about “stuff”. My inherent reaction to getting triggered was to shut down. His reaction was to get defensive and then storm off. We were both hurting and not understanding at all what was going on. And then we’d never talk about it and somehow just move on with life. No wonder so much pain built up between us!

I’ve also learned that triggers appear almost immediately in a new relationship, even as quickly as 2-3 weeks in. Keeping triggers cleared keeps everything running smoothly because you don’t have the quiet build-up of resentments and frustrations. Trigger clearing utilizes the above tools: feeling one’s feelings, being in truth, and staying centered on one’s Self. 

I am so grateful to be with a partner who understands “stuff” and strives to “own his own”. We are both still learning and stumble and hurt at times but we keep going until we repair whatever has come between us. That is our commitment to each other. [5]

Listed three times because this is a big one and needs to happen often, with all things, big and small. 

Debriefing is almost not its own thing — as I’ve already sort of talked about it in the above previous four points — but it’s so important, that I’m treating it separately. 

Anytime there’s a painful moment (also known as “getting triggered”), the only way to navigate it is to debrief it. 

In my marriage, we debriefed about virtually nothing. We’d have an incident between us — maybe I’d say something, he’d snap back, I’d shut down, he’d storm off — and then we’d never talk about it. Debriefing would’ve gone a long way to heal all the little pains that accumulated over time. 

My current beau and I hit triggers not so dissimilar to ones that appeared in my marriage but since we know what’s going on, we take a pause, return to each other, and debrief. It’s the most powerful tool there is. 

Debriefing doesn’t only have to be about painful things. Debriefing can be about fun things, too! We’ve debriefed about trips we’ve taken and adventures we’ve had, looking at dynamics that didn’t go as planned or sharing the awe at things that worked out way more magically than either of us could’ve imagined. We’ve even debriefed about debriefs where we congratulate each other on how well we navigated a particularly difficult situation. 

We even regularly debrief after sex! Sounds like too much of a good thing, perhaps, but actually it is the very tool that has allowed our sex life to grow and flourish. We regularly share what we liked, what we loved, what was surprising, what if anything didn’t work as well as desired, or if any needs weren’t met. [6] 

Debriefing is so powerful on so many levels. It uses all the other tools. It’s how we keep the air clear between us. It’s how we maintain ease between us. It’s how we each get our own needs met. And when we regularly get our needs met, the sense of feeling safe in this relationship builds as does trust – in the other person, in yourself, and in the actual process of debriefing. 

Debriefing is the glue of relationships and the path to the continual opening of the heart. Debriefing also only works effectively when done in person, not by text nor by email. The chance of misunderstanding is too high with electronic communications, especially when you take different male/female communication styles into account.

That’s a pretty funny conclusion for someone who essentially has a degree in gender studies, who at one point was convinced that all our differences simply had to do with socialization. Ha, ha, silly me! 

This topic is SO huge that I waffled about putting it first above all the others because it underlies and supports everything. Without it, the other things I’ve learned would still work (certainly better than had I not learned them) but there would continue to be obstructions and frustrations that wouldn’t make any sense, despite our best efforts, without the understanding of basic male/female differences.

 This knowledge has done more to single-handedly change my life. EVERYTHING runs better with this knowledge. And not only with romantic partners but with EVERYBODY! Men and women. It has been the ultimate game changer. 

But this topic is also SO huge that I’m not even going to try to encapsulate the actual content into a sweet little summary. But I can give a little insight into my trajectory. 

There have been two main sources of this beautiful information: John Gray and Alison Armstrong. John Gray wrote the dated but still powerful “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus”. Alison Armstrong gives workshops on men and women.[7] 

John Gray’s book came out in 1992, the year my son was born, not long after I graduated from college with my very useful (snort) degree in gender studies. I dismissed the book out of hand because I thought, “how could a male possibly know or understand a woman’s experience, let alone speak for me??” 

Fast forward almost 20 years. My marriage has already dissolved and I’m in the beginning stages of a new relationship, one that was lovely but already very frustrating for both of us. On a visit to Kepler’s Books down in California while visiting my Mom, I was randomly looking at the self-help section hoping to find anything that might be of assistance with my situation. The Mars/Venus book practically jumped out at me, its green spine glowing from the shelf. I cynically pulled it out, not expecting anything, and opened to a random page. What I read floored me: 

“The most frequently expressed complaint women have about men is that men don’t listen. The most frequently expressed complaint men have about women is that women are always trying to change them.” 

Ouch. There was my then-current relationship and my marriage in a nutshell. It was clear upon further glancing at the book that I needed this information.

Those first few chapters were the most powerful, especially the one called “Mr. Fix-It and the Home-Improvement Committee”. While light bulbs were going off all over the place in the “Oh, that’s what’s been happening” department, I got bogged down with the book after a while. Even though super helpful – especially in seeing many of my ex-husband's reactions in a new light: he wasn’t being an asshole; he was just being a Martian! — the book brought up a lot of pain and grief over my role in inadvertently causing pain in the marriage. So I didn’t pursue John Gray much beyond those first few chapters, at least right away. 

A year or so later I would be introduced to Alison Armstrong. My neighbor Doug had received a set of CDs from one of her workshops. (Thank you, Mari, for caring enough about Doug when he was hurting to send him those CDs!!) Doug was so blown away that he shared the material with me and out other neighbor, Steve, so we could form a study group. Oh, my God! Here was the John Gray stuff but more fleshed out and presented in a way that I could really wrap my head around while at the same time giving me tools for being more forgiving of myself. 

Doing this as a male/female study group, we were able to bounce things off each other that made no sense whatsoever: 

Doug & Steve (incredulously): “When a woman is hurting, what she often really wants is for us to just listen while she gets it all out? REALLY?? That’s the most insane thing I’ve ever heard.”

Me (dead serious): “Yes, really.” 

Me (incredulously): “When a man is driving a woman to a restaurant, it would be really nice for him if she didn’t talk much while he focuses on getting her there. REALLY?? That’s the most insane thing I’ve ever heard.”

Doug & Steve (dead serious): “Yes, really.” 

And on it went. I was convinced and converted. Mind blown! I have since listened to another of her workshops, read two of her books, and re-listened to everything with my new mate. It’s BIG information.

What I love about Alison is her focus and emphasis on being partners instead of adversaries. She challenges women and men to stop their negative thinking towards each other, learning instead how to work with and celebrate our differences. 

An unexpected but delightful outcome of practicing their work has been, for the first time in my life, I truly feel like a woman as I slowly step into my full power of the feminine. I now understand and embrace all the parts of me that I had unconsciously judged negatively before I found this work. And I can say the same with some confidence that my current partner for the first time in his life truly feels like a man, accepted as he is, as he slowly steps into his full power of the healthy masculine. He is different than me and I from him and that’s beautiful and worth celebrating! 

I’m glad to have been exposed to both sources (John and Alison). Some things she shares that he doesn’t talk about at all, and vice versa. Other things he says make more sense because she goes into more details about whatever it is, and vice versa. I cannot thank them enough for sharing their work with the world. 

There’s still so much that I continue to learn about men. Maybe one of these days I’ll take one of her workshops. If only she’d come to Portland! 

Men are amazing! And I love them. And my life is completely changed because of this new understanding and attitude about them.

Maybe these two should’ve been the first tool in the list because none of the other pieces will work without them, at least not very effectively nor over the long term. 

Self-compassion and forgiveness have not really been taught anywhere in our culture! Unless you happened to be raised Buddhist. Instead, we’ve got guilt and shame and “who do you think you are?” I used to be too angry at myself to offer either compassion or forgiveness, angry that I “got myself into this mess” or whatever. I developed masterful negative voices who could beat me to a bloody pulp before anyone else could with criticism, cruelty and contempt. 

Self-compassion and forgiveness were really hard for me to do at first. I just didn’t get it for the longest time. It’s as if I couldn’t see them. I understood them somewhat intellectually but in reality, I couldn’t wrap my mind around what that actually looked like. All my therapists spoke of them. Countless classes, workshops and readings that I attended spoke of them. But the concepts just weren’t integrating. 

It was only about four years ago that self-compassion and forgiveness finally began to sink into my being. It took reading the book, “Self-Compassion” by Kristin Neff that ultimately did the trick. This was followed by “Embracing Your Inner Critic” by Drs. Sidra; Brene Brown’s Ted talks; and again “How to Be an Adult” by David Richu. Bless you, people, for the work you do! 

I’ve learned a lot about all those negative voices in my head. They developed very early in life. I’ve learned that they’re actually parts of myself that are trying to keep me safe, even though they’re going about it in a very convoluted manner — but it’s all they knew how to do. I’ve had to learn to work with these voices, acknowledge them, let them know that I hear them, thank them for their concern, but tell them I’ll take it from here. Not easy at first (those voices can be resistant to change and put up a fight!) but getting much easier the more I practice. 

Feeling my feelings, being in truth, putting myself first, owning my stuff, debriefing, understanding men — all of these things require large amounts of self-compassion and forgiveness! 

I am a gloriously flawed human being. Without self-compassion and forgiveness, I wouldn’t get far with any of the other tools.

What are healthy boundaries?This is a huge topic that I think I can distill down to two main pieces. 

1) Healthy boundaries occur naturally when you honor yourself. 

When you feel your feelings and honor your truth, a large part of healthy boundaries naturally follows. For example: maybe you’ve been asked to volunteer for something but you don’t really have the time nor energy. Instead of ignoring your stomach tightening into knots, you tell them “No”, even though they really need you and they’re struggling finding someone and the event is extremely important to the broader community. By saying, “No”, you’ve just set a healthy boundary that honors your needs and your truth. And when you say “Yes” to something, you’re doing so because you want to, resulting in a potentially more energized, focused, effective, kinder, better version of you that you can bring into the world. 

2) Healthy boundaries require the understanding that you are only responsible for your own emotions, reactions, and actions. 

Growing up in a family with a special-needs brother whose needs trumped everyone else’s needs at all times, where I learned to stuff my feelings and my needs, also resulted in the not uncommon consequence of my having learned to define myself through others’ behaviors. (Why this happens, I don’t quite understand but the literature and research supports the trend.) A solid sense of my own self was not developed. The boundary between myself and others was flimsy.

In the marriage, this took the form of blaming myself whenever my then-husband got hurt or mad, not having A CLUE that I wasn’t responsible for his reactions. I would go out of my way to do whatever it took to avoid him getting hurt or mad – which is just about the most unhealthy thing one can do in a relationship! But I didn’t know that. It was another way I gradually lost my sense of self in the marriage: bending over backwards to keep the peace while not paying attention to my needs or feelings. To be fair to my ex, I was this way long before meeting him and it showed up in all my relationships, even at work, especially with one particular boss who treated me badly but I just didn’t see it until a co-worker pointed it out one day. I had been assuming that I had made my boss mad instead of having any understanding that she was simply a bully. (I learned later from a colleague that my very existence was triggering her right and left).

I’ve acquired two really great tools that continue to help me establish my own personal boundary.

The first tool is to be able to ask this question whenever someone appears angry or hurt: “Did I actually do something wrong?” 

9 times out of 10, the answer is no. When the answer is yes, I apologize and we can move on. When the answer is no, that allows me to see that their stuff has been activated and has nothing to do with me. Seriously, you don’t know how powerful this one simple question has been!!! 

The second tool is a series of three questions to be asked in applicable situations: 

3) Am I denying them a learning opportunity that they may need? 

In the marriage, I was jumping in all the time offering my advice or telling my ex what I thought he should do. I thought I was being helpful! I grew up with that, watching my Mom do the same with my dad, actually watching every woman I’ve ever witnessed doing the same to their men. It’s how we were trained! You see it on tv. You see it around the neighborhood. Let it be said that this didn’t go over well with my ex and I never understood why! Throw in some basic male/female stuff around Venusians being inclined to help as a loving gesture, not realizing that they may be totally emasculating their mate in the process, and you have a world of hurt going on in both directions. If I could’ve asked myself those three simple questions, I could’ve avoided a lot of that hurt. 

Developing healthy boundaries is a cornerstone to being healthy in relationship.

There continues to come a time (though less frequently now) when I’m doing the best I can with the tools I have but something comes up that I don’t know how to resolve or a discomfort lingers that I can’t clear. That’s when I know it’s time to reach out for help.

I’ll return to my therapist for 1 to 3 visits, figure out the issue, figure out tools for the issue, then go back out into the world practicing my new tools. 

While I believe the ultimate goal (both emotionally and spiritually) is to be able to source from our own inner knowing, instead of looking externally to “experts”, until we have the tools to do so, I think it’s asking too much of ourselves to figure everything out on our own. Besides, how can know what to do when we may not even understand what’s going on? Until we learn the tools, “experts” are there for a reason, thank goodness for them!

This one is a big one, if not the biggest one, that probably should have been first above all the other ones that should’ve been first! Instead, I place it last, supporting all the others from the ground up. 

Being present is the biggest gift you can give to yourself and others. 

Staying in the moment is how you stay present. 

This practice is really challenging for those of us who spent most of our lives worrying about the future or dwelling on the would’ve could’ve should’ve of the past. 

Now is all we have. Literally. There is nothing more. Stop and think about it: is the future happening now? No. Is the past happening now? No. Only the now is happening now. 

Being in the now is how one can truly feel one’s feelings. How can you be in your truth if you can’t feel your feelings because you’re not present to yourself? 

To get there, I had to learn to quiet my internal chatter (meditation helped). I had to work with therapists to learn about my woundings and my triggers, the latter of which throws you right out of the present moment. I had to learn to confront my fears. I had to learn to manage stress better. I had to learn that it’s ok to feel my feelings as they come up. I had to learn to trust and have faith that everything will be ok.

And it will, even if it’s not right now. 

These tools have made all the difference in the world to my life. I’m finally in an intimate relationship with an amazing man for the first time in my life that is a healthy and true partnership, yay! It’s not that there’s no more pain and confusion and frustration – there’s still plenty of that! – it’s more that the tools help me navigate the ups and downs with so much more ease.

–  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –  –

[2] From "The Magdalen Manuscript" by Tom Kenyon and Judi Sion

[3] Admittedly, I’m not sure how the concept of being “self-centered” applies to child rearing or caring for someone ill. There were SO many things I didn’t particularly want to do as a parent but had to because it’s what parenting requires. Perhaps it simply means “taking care of yourself” is a priority so you can be the best version of yourself while fulfilling your responsibilities. 

[4] The concept of "taking actions as information" comes from the book, “The Dark Side of the Light Chasers” by Debbie Ford. 

[5] Here’s a wee bit more about triggers, for those interested. These are from notes I took during the very first session I had with my current therapist. She said: Looking at your central nervous system, looking at the pain from your past relationships, you look really traumatized. You look like somebody who shuts down because you’ve had trauma. It’s a very natural post-traumatic response. Sensitive beings such as yourself can be easily traumatized, and it doesn’t even have to be big physically threatening events. It can be as simple as when someone is harsh, mean, and hurtful. When you get triggered, you’re no longer in the present moment. It’s like you’ve gone back to the place where the old pain resides. It’s a stress response. Your body is flooded with stress hormones. Your default stress response has been to “shut down”. The trauma response is related to a lack of “boundary” between observing a past painful event versus in a way feeling like you’re still in it, that it’s actually happening. It’s like the difference of watching a scary movie but knowing you’re not in it and you’re ok, vs. you’re in the movie and it’s actually happening! The goal is to be able to say “Wow, I’m triggered”, period. Not attach meaning or significance or “I ruined this” or “I’ve ruined that” or “I’m doing this to you” but to just be in that place of “Wow, I’m really triggered. There’s a gift in this for me. There’s a gift in it for him even though it’s not my business to figure that out.” The more you can hold that more neutral space for you, the more you’re not going to go to shame, the more you’re going to go to “This glorious mess is a gift!”

[6]  I’ve learned something else about myself and sex that might apply to other women. As stated, debriefing clears the air, whether it’s about dishes, accidental hurts, sex, or whatever. When the air is clear, I’ve learned that I feel like having sex! When it’s not clear, when there are things left unsaid or need to be addressed, I almost can’t have sex. That’s either a universal female thing or only a me thing or maybe a both sexes thing. Either way, I’m having a lot of sex these days! Gentlemen, my mate can tell you, if you want to have more sex, debrief debrief debrief!! 

[7] Even though the dynamics as taught by John and Alison are aimed at heterosexual couples, I like to think that this information is not limited to straight folk. It should also apply to anyone in the LGBTQ community because it’s less about men and women and more about masculine and feminine wiring, dispositions, and inclinations. Everyone, male or female, has a little or a lot of both and could benefit from their teachings.