Interested in better understanding sexual polarity? My story below is a true example of polarity at work…
I met Eric on my three month trip to Central America at a random couch surfing party. He was just my type: adventurous, mysterious and evil. It was “love at first 6 hours of talking”.
He had already been in Panama for five months, studying Spanish, learning how to salsa dance, and considering whether he should pursue a law degree. He lived to question himself. Whether it was martial arts, learning languages, unusual career choices, or adapting to foreign cultures, life as a warrior, on the edge, was in his blood. And it was so attractive to me!
A few months later, we moved together to San Diego, where Eric was starting law school. Like any other couple, we had our ups and downs, learning and growing how not to step on each other’s “bubbles” or what to do when we did.
Over the summer, we went to Beijing, where Eric interned at a law firm. Despite high hopes and dreams of working with international law, the experience was so disappointing for him that he decided not to return to school the following year. Instead, we moved back to my home base: San Francisco.
At the time, I was doing web design which allowed me to support both. Eric wasn’t sure what his next step would be. You see, most of his life, he was a definition of masculine: driven, goal-oriented, advanced. Reflecting on his time in law school made him realize that he was chasing his family’s idea of success, not his own. We knew it would be good for him to slow down and figure out what success meant to him before rushing to the next try.
Our relationship was everything I wanted, except for sexual attraction and my completely diminished sex drive. I would be lying in bed with this most beautiful man I knew, whom I loved dearly, and I felt no desire to have sex, which was both heartbreaking and confusing. We tried our best to make it up but in the end we had to switch to friendship.
I spent the next three years grieving our relationship and trying to figure out what happened and what we could have done. One of the best insights I got came from a spiritual teacher David Deida and his work on sexual polarity.
Sexual polarity refers to the chemistry, tension, or charge between people with opposite energies: feminine and masculine, yin and yang. This idea is based on the premise that everyone has feminine and masculine energy within them. (You can think of it as having a right and a left brain and needing both parts to thrive.)
Most of the time, people prefer one of these actions sexually. There is more polarity between you and your partner, meaning one is more masculine and the other more feminine – more chemistry will be experienced. Feminine people prefer to be charmed, grabbed (sexually), while those with masculinity feel at home taking charge and being “the amateurs”.
You can think of the Feminine as the ocean while the Masculine is the ship. The ocean can be calm and pleasant one moment only to become rough and stormy the next. But if it’s a good ship, it goes steadily to its destination regardless. He knows that the ocean is inherently chaotic and it’s pointless to hold him against it.
Feminine energy is the energy of change, receptivity, chaos, creativity, flow, vibration. The feminine comes alive by feeling the fullness of life and love.
Masculine energy is goal oriented, driven. it is the energy identified with emptiness, death, consciousness. The male loves challenges.
When we first met, there was a lot of polarity between us. It was easy for me to stay connected to my feminine while traveling, having spontaneous adventures, spending a lot of time in nature. Eric, on the other hand, was in his masculine: from spearfishing to disciplined martial artist to studying law.
When we got to San Francisco, things changed. I had to spend a lot of time in front of the computer, solving problems, which engaged my masculine side. There wasn’t much time for activities that would previously help me connect with my feminine: dance, yoga, nature. Meanwhile, Eric had no schedule. He took up many hobbies and, for the first time in his life, was learning what it was like to do things just for fun (ie, hooking up with his female).
It turns out that this scenario was a perfect example of sexual polarity at work. Or rather, what happens when partners depolarize. If I had known, I would have been much more careful about finding ways to prioritize my feminine and be more conscious of “taking off” my masculine before entering the bedroom.
The truth is that living in a modern western world makes it very difficult to prioritize and nurture our feminine. We are stressed, we are constantly bombarded with things demanding our attention, we spend most of our days sedentary and indoors… No wonder so many women have no idea where to start when it comes to developing a stronger connection with their feminine!
In the same vein, men rarely grow up with inspiring examples of conscious masculinity.
At the end of the day, if you want to step into your feminine or masculine fully, you have to do your work.
It may look like:
- to become more aware of all the points in your life where you are contracted, reactive, weakened.
- to learn how to become more embodied and in touch with your emotions.
- how to stop being a “good boy” or “good girl”
- you connect and own your truth without seeking external validation.
If you are interested in learning more about how sexual polarity works or are looking for a polarity coach on a journey to reclaim your most powerful, authentic and sexually expressive self, sign up for a free consultation.
