A MODEL FOR POLYS TO GO APE by Janet Kira Lessin and Sasha Lessin, Ph.D. Worldpolyamory@aol.com
In our polyamory and tantra seminars and private sessions, men outnumber women 3 to1. Women, we found, fear tantra and polyamory as emphasizing sexuality too much and so avoid both. What, we wondered, makes women cautious about situations they perceive as involving sex?
Nan Wise (The Attachment Flu: Lessons In Loving and Letting Go: Loving More #22) discusses a biological basis for this caution. She writes, following Ken Wilber ( A Brief History of Everything)
When a woman’s skin is stroked, she releases oxytocin, the hormone of relationship and attachment. It’s nature’s way of assuring that woman stay with our partners and nurture our young and feather our nests. It is present in men in smaller quantities.
Years ago Janet read a similar article noting that a woman’s oxytocin increased with the number of orgasms she has with a man. Orgasms and oxytocin keep her coming back to him, attaches her to him for more love and pleasure until she conceives. The man is rewarded by reproducing. His genes continue.
“Oxytocin,” in Nan’s words, “is part of my hard wiring. Once I attach it is very difficult to let go. It is why I pay attention to relationships. It is why I have held on tightly to my lover as I have, past the point that my reasoning mind thought was suitable. It is partly why I have tolerated unacceptable behaviors and suffered from the side effects associated with valuing relationship over self.”
Perhaps this is the major reason women are cautious about workshops and coaching involving sex. This varies, of course, with the woman. Some men, too, have higher levels of oxytocin and are consequently as sensitive, bond as much emotionally and can be as devastated as women. The amounts of oxytocin released varies with each individual.
Men and women both release testosterone, a hormone that increases interest in sexuality. Men tend to have more testosterone, and are more drawn to activities, such as poly and tantra workshops, that they think will involve sex. Amounts of testosterone also varies among individuals, and some women, with higher levels of testosterone relative to oxytocin, are sexually free and able to have many casual lovers, like men.
Women imagining polyamory and tantra workshops to be potentially sexual also fear competition with other women for men. Sad to say, but women have been trained to distrust each other. They’ve seen how sex led their mothers to have children. Then, in the ostensibly monogamous relations of most parents, woman may have seen their mothers either be abandoned or sexually ignored by their fathers.
It seems that a woman’s mothering can get in the way of her sexuality, especially if she makes her relationship to a child more important to her than her relation with her man. The man feels abandoned and seeks other primary relationships. This can kill the standard monogamous relationship. The man, the woman or both may think of cheating and eventually do so, or the sexual interaction between the couple may lessen or die.
Bonobo chimps solve problems of female fear of non-affiliation with sex partners that bedevil humans. Bonobos eliminate competition among females, resolve conflict, love intensely and intimately and maintain very active sexual connections their whole lives.
The bonobo are female-centered and sexually egalitarian. Their females ally to inhibit male aggression; sexual behavior (in every partner combination) replaces aggressive behavior. Unrelated bonobo tribes make love rather than fight.
When two tribes of bonobos meet the lead females of each group inspect, then engage in sex with each other. Then each of these females each takes the leading male from their respective groups by the hand and leads him to the female she just loved. She presents this male as a sexual gift to her female counterpart. Each lead male then has intercourse with the lead female of the new tribe. Then all the members of both tribes enjoy sex with one another. Bonobos use sex to avoid conflict.
Anything that arouses the interest of more than one bonobo tends to result in sexual contact. If two bonobos approach a cardboard box thrown into their enclosure, they will briefly mount each other before playing with the box. Such situations lead to squabbles in most other species. But bonobos are quite tolerant. , They use sex to divert attention and to diffuse tension.
A jealous male might chase another away from a female, after which the two males reunite and engage in scrotal rubbing. Or after a female hits a juvenile, the latter's mother may lunge at the aggressor, an action that is immediately followed by genital rubbing between the two adults. The species' most striking achievement sensitivity to others. (DeWaal, F: Bonobo Sex and Society)
We have much to learn from our bonobo cousins. The sensitivity they display is crucial in the human polyamorous dance. My husband, Sasha, and I use the bonobo model when we date couples; it seems to work well.
At the start of our date with another couple, Sasha makes love with me and the other couple also makes love. Then we women connect before we exchange men.
If the other woman and I do not bond and connect, if we don’t feel flowing and natural, we keep our relation social and do not become sexual. We don’t manipulate, convince or pressure her to more intimacy than she chooses.
If click energetically, I watch the woman of the other couple love Sasha. Then Sasha and she watch me make love with her man.
We commit to open, honest expression and treat emotional upset and jealousy, should they arise, as blessings–paths to deeper awareness and spiritual growth. We encourage an upset person to identify his feelings.
Sometimes, in a foursome situation, you may not know why you feel scared or jealous.
We women distanced ourselves from each other as we developed sexually and vied for men, we abandoned each other for them. Or we imprinted the woman-vs-woman competition habit. My girl gang in Avalon, PA, agreed without words to break dates with each other to go out with men. We acted like it was okay. In reality, it hurt.
This uncertain past with one each other disempowers us as individuals. It blocks the synergistic potential of our sisterhood. We need to become pals, to enjoy, encourage and help each other. Like the bonobos.
Bonobos are bisexual. Bisexuality gives females an additional level of intimacy that goes beyond just friendship.
I only discovered my bisexuality well into adulthood and I am delighted that I now have this added dimension for relating. Connecting with my female lovers enhances polyamorous interludes and reconnect me with the feminine in ways I haven’t known since pre-adolescence. Before adolescence, I was in love with my girlfriends. We adored one another. We gave each other “friendship” rings, like we were going steady. Now that I’m again lovers with women, I return to childhood innocence, to early days before adults shamed us for feeling what we felt--true affection and love for our dear, sweet girlfriends.
Bisexual or not, when two women in a two-couple date connect energetically, if not sexually, we bond to help and encourage each other. It’s so much easier to feel safe and really trust a woman that you know, feel and love.
We share more with bonobos. We and they enjoy recreational. We and these chimps use sex to nourish love feelings, bonding, intimacy. Bonobos, like us, make love face to face, eye to eye.
Both humans and bonobos, at the level of actual, genetically proven studies, show most humans have many sexual partners. In one study, one third of recorded fathers were not the genetic fathers. Humans are, in actual sexual behavior, one group of lovers. Our children are the children of us all, of the tribe.
In other ways, bonobos differ from us. Bonobo females run things and bonobo males are peaceful, nonviolent, opposite humans, with male control and violence. The peaceable bonobo has retained traits of common ancestry that we patriarchally-socialized people find hard to recognize in ourselves. It’s time for us to emulate our ape allies and live from bonobo consciousness.
Janet Kira Lessin, Chief Focalizer for the World Polyamory
Association and Dr. Sasha Lessin are featured speakers at the Annual Harbin Hot Springs
Polyamory Conference, "Celebrate Relationship Choice, May 2-14,
Harbin Hot Springs, CA. See www.worldpolyamoryassociation.com
In our polyamory and tantra seminars and private sessions, men outnumber women 3 to1. Women, we found, fear tantra and polyamory as emphasizing sexuality too much and so avoid both. What, we wondered, makes women cautious about situations they perceive as involving sex?
Nan Wise (The Attachment Flu: Lessons In Loving and Letting Go: Loving More #22) discusses a biological basis for this caution. She writes, following Ken Wilber ( A Brief History of Everything)
When a woman’s skin is stroked, she releases oxytocin, the hormone of relationship and attachment. It’s nature’s way of assuring that woman stay with our partners and nurture our young and feather our nests. It is present in men in smaller quantities.
Years ago Janet read a similar article noting that a woman’s oxytocin increased with the number of orgasms she has with a man. Orgasms and oxytocin keep her coming back to him, attaches her to him for more love and pleasure until she conceives. The man is rewarded by reproducing. His genes continue.
“Oxytocin,” in Nan’s words, “is part of my hard wiring. Once I attach it is very difficult to let go. It is why I pay attention to relationships. It is why I have held on tightly to my lover as I have, past the point that my reasoning mind thought was suitable. It is partly why I have tolerated unacceptable behaviors and suffered from the side effects associated with valuing relationship over self.”
Perhaps this is the major reason women are cautious about workshops and coaching involving sex. This varies, of course, with the woman. Some men, too, have higher levels of oxytocin and are consequently as sensitive, bond as much emotionally and can be as devastated as women. The amounts of oxytocin released varies with each individual.
Men and women both release testosterone, a hormone that increases interest in sexuality. Men tend to have more testosterone, and are more drawn to activities, such as poly and tantra workshops, that they think will involve sex. Amounts of testosterone also varies among individuals, and some women, with higher levels of testosterone relative to oxytocin, are sexually free and able to have many casual lovers, like men.
Women imagining polyamory and tantra workshops to be potentially sexual also fear competition with other women for men. Sad to say, but women have been trained to distrust each other. They’ve seen how sex led their mothers to have children. Then, in the ostensibly monogamous relations of most parents, woman may have seen their mothers either be abandoned or sexually ignored by their fathers.
It seems that a woman’s mothering can get in the way of her sexuality, especially if she makes her relationship to a child more important to her than her relation with her man. The man feels abandoned and seeks other primary relationships. This can kill the standard monogamous relationship. The man, the woman or both may think of cheating and eventually do so, or the sexual interaction between the couple may lessen or die.
Bonobo chimps solve problems of female fear of non-affiliation with sex partners that bedevil humans. Bonobos eliminate competition among females, resolve conflict, love intensely and intimately and maintain very active sexual connections their whole lives.
The bonobo are female-centered and sexually egalitarian. Their females ally to inhibit male aggression; sexual behavior (in every partner combination) replaces aggressive behavior. Unrelated bonobo tribes make love rather than fight.
When two tribes of bonobos meet the lead females of each group inspect, then engage in sex with each other. Then each of these females each takes the leading male from their respective groups by the hand and leads him to the female she just loved. She presents this male as a sexual gift to her female counterpart. Each lead male then has intercourse with the lead female of the new tribe. Then all the members of both tribes enjoy sex with one another. Bonobos use sex to avoid conflict.
Anything that arouses the interest of more than one bonobo tends to result in sexual contact. If two bonobos approach a cardboard box thrown into their enclosure, they will briefly mount each other before playing with the box. Such situations lead to squabbles in most other species. But bonobos are quite tolerant. , They use sex to divert attention and to diffuse tension.
A jealous male might chase another away from a female, after which the two males reunite and engage in scrotal rubbing. Or after a female hits a juvenile, the latter's mother may lunge at the aggressor, an action that is immediately followed by genital rubbing between the two adults. The species' most striking achievement sensitivity to others. (DeWaal, F: Bonobo Sex and Society)
We have much to learn from our bonobo cousins. The sensitivity they display is crucial in the human polyamorous dance. My husband, Sasha, and I use the bonobo model when we date couples; it seems to work well.
At the start of our date with another couple, Sasha makes love with me and the other couple also makes love. Then we women connect before we exchange men.
If the other woman and I do not bond and connect, if we don’t feel flowing and natural, we keep our relation social and do not become sexual. We don’t manipulate, convince or pressure her to more intimacy than she chooses.
If click energetically, I watch the woman of the other couple love Sasha. Then Sasha and she watch me make love with her man.
We commit to open, honest expression and treat emotional upset and jealousy, should they arise, as blessings–paths to deeper awareness and spiritual growth. We encourage an upset person to identify his feelings.
Sometimes, in a foursome situation, you may not know why you feel scared or jealous.
We women distanced ourselves from each other as we developed sexually and vied for men, we abandoned each other for them. Or we imprinted the woman-vs-woman competition habit. My girl gang in Avalon, PA, agreed without words to break dates with each other to go out with men. We acted like it was okay. In reality, it hurt.
This uncertain past with one each other disempowers us as individuals. It blocks the synergistic potential of our sisterhood. We need to become pals, to enjoy, encourage and help each other. Like the bonobos.
Bonobos are bisexual. Bisexuality gives females an additional level of intimacy that goes beyond just friendship.
I only discovered my bisexuality well into adulthood and I am delighted that I now have this added dimension for relating. Connecting with my female lovers enhances polyamorous interludes and reconnect me with the feminine in ways I haven’t known since pre-adolescence. Before adolescence, I was in love with my girlfriends. We adored one another. We gave each other “friendship” rings, like we were going steady. Now that I’m again lovers with women, I return to childhood innocence, to early days before adults shamed us for feeling what we felt--true affection and love for our dear, sweet girlfriends.
Bisexual or not, when two women in a two-couple date connect energetically, if not sexually, we bond to help and encourage each other. It’s so much easier to feel safe and really trust a woman that you know, feel and love.
We share more with bonobos. We and they enjoy recreational. We and these chimps use sex to nourish love feelings, bonding, intimacy. Bonobos, like us, make love face to face, eye to eye.
Both humans and bonobos, at the level of actual, genetically proven studies, show most humans have many sexual partners. In one study, one third of recorded fathers were not the genetic fathers. Humans are, in actual sexual behavior, one group of lovers. Our children are the children of us all, of the tribe.
In other ways, bonobos differ from us. Bonobo females run things and bonobo males are peaceful, nonviolent, opposite humans, with male control and violence. The peaceable bonobo has retained traits of common ancestry that we patriarchally-socialized people find hard to recognize in ourselves. It’s time for us to emulate our ape allies and live from bonobo consciousness.
Janet Kira Lessin, Chief Focalizer for the World Polyamory
Association and Dr. Sasha Lessin are featured speakers at the Annual Harbin Hot Springs
Polyamory Conference, "Celebrate Relationship Choice, May 2-14,
Harbin Hot Springs, CA. See www.worldpolyamoryassociation.com
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Honolulu
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Re: A MODEL FOR POLYS TO GO APE by Janet Kira Lessin and Sasha Lessin, Ph.D. Worldpolyamory@aol.com
Sat, January 28, 2006 - 12:43 PMAre you not tired of spamming everyone with your stupid stories to get money from other people.
Ho can you think that you are better than anyone else? how can you think that you know how to help people get better relationships?
you assume that everyone out there is unhappy and has to make your stupid so called tantra seminars to be happy.
Your stories about you and your husband are boring. Do you really think you and your sex life is so special?
Than you should probably be aware more of other people. Cos they also have good sex and probably understand more of polyamory than you do.
You only have sex with other people but on the outside you are only present as a couple. why not as a triad?
where are the children?
in europe in the Tantra seminars the women outnumber the men. how do you explain that. Maybe its because men also release oxytocin when they get touched ?? How about that. and
maybe because those people know that Tantra is not about sex . Have you ever been to India. Your stupid western interpretations fo Tantra are an insult for everyone who takes such things seriously. You just want to swing and have sex with others. Thats not Tantra.
Go back in school and learn a little more!
and not i dont believe in that oxytocin related psychological explanation of a division between men and woman.
you are doing politics and belief systems here. Everybody who has studied knows or should know that all interpretations of "biological" facts are highly attached to social role models and belief systems. What was the interpretations years ago is it not necessarily now.
You are way back in the 60ies or probably 80ies. We have 2006 now. Before you spray around your archived stories (do you know that capitals in the internet are regarded as shouting? why are you shouting all the times?
To create a distinction between mens and womens psyche is highly patriarchal.
And if you quote scientists than do so correctly and name them and their studies, so everybody can have an own opinion.
You cant just take names and numbers without quoting where you have them from.
The study below about the one third of children (cuckoos children) is simply WRONG.
it has never been one third, it was approximately 12 %.
And your citation of Ken Wilber is wrong also. I love Ken Wilber and his work and he would NEVER EVER write such bullshit, that women are socially different than men. have you ever heard that there is more out there than women and men? have you ever heard about queer theories? not even biologically it is proven that there are only two genders.
Read Simone de Beauvoir before you help the patriarchs devide between men and women with your stupid western influenced 60ies bullshit.
And your connection with Bonobos. i dont believe it. apes are not monogamous at all. read Sperm wars before you say that Bonobos are "female centered" . Those poor animals have to suffer from you ideological interpretations.
you have to be a little bit more critical especially towards yourself.
Not everything that sounds good is good.
Sina
