Category: Human Sexuality

Bisexuality – Sex not Gender

Published on by Bi-Ed: Bisexual Education3 Comments

SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)Bisexuals do not have a gender. In fact, we may be the only group on the planet without one. But even saying that is as much as claiming that we are, in fact, a gender of non-genders. Such is the Catch 22 that Rebecca Reilly-Cooper is referring to in her article Gender is Not a Spectrum.[1] Rebecca is a political philosopher at the University of Warwick in the UK. She is currently working on a book about sex, gender and identity. She refers to the concept of gender as:

“ It used to be a basic, fundamental feminist idea that while sex referred to what is biological, and so perhaps in some sense ‘natural’, gender referred to what is socially constructed….Gender refers to the externally imposed set of norms that prescribe and proscribe desirable behaviour to individuals in accordance with morally arbitrary characteristics…. From birth, most female people are raised to be passive, submissive, weak and nurturing, while most male people are raised to be active, dominant, strong and aggressive.… We are all educated and inculcated into one of two roles, long before we are able to express our beliefs about our innate gender identity.”

We political people in the LGBTQ movements have hijacked the concept of gender for political reasons. We claim there are more genders than just ‘woman’ or ‘man’ to choose from. We have invented a whole new range of gender identities from “genderqueer” or “non-binary” to “two spirited” and beyond. Rebecca goes on to say that there is no end of the possibility of variances in the concept of gender. She refers to this as a spectrum:

“If gender is a spectrum, that means it’s a continuum between two extremes, and everyone is located somewhere along that continuum.…. In reality, everybody is non-binary. We all actively participate in some gender norms, passively acquiesce with others, and positively rail against others …, enabling the non-binary person to claim to be both misunderstood and politically oppressed by the binary cisgender people…... ”

So why the gender? It has and still does serve an important role, both within the group and individually. As a community, gays and lesbians had to overcome the harsh societal and religious  judgement that led to abhorrent practices like imprisonment, frontal lobotomies and brutal forced conversions. We needed a political voice. As individuals we were oppressed and confused, often due to our upbringing and the pressures of our society to be “normal”. We needed an identity that we could hold onto as a crutch until we could sort everything out and feel that we belonged somewhere with someone on this god forsaken lonely planet. But perhaps it is now time to move on.

Within the bisexual community there are so many variances that we could not possibly provide a definition of bisexual gender that would include all of us. The characteristics are not about gender but merely about personality. This includes our sexual tastes and preferences, but it also includes our value systems and our nonsexual behaviors. All the so-called gender issues can be captured by the broad definition of personality. We are all different and that is exactly the way it should be.

As bisexuals I believe it is in our best interest to eliminate the concept of gender altogether. We are not political.  We do not need special considerations. We do not need a bisexual gender label.  We are biologically men or women and we have two sexual preferences. Personally I like to think of it as “making love” with a woman and “having sex” with a man. That makes us bisexuals and forget the gender stuff. What we do need is understanding of ourselves and some supports in overcoming the mental issues related to our sexual preferences. I believe that would be easier to do if we concentrate on our personal issues rather than the martyrdom of gender because of our sexuality. If we eliminate the concept of gender, there is no viable purpose for grouping ourselves together according to our personalities or our personal issues.

Some parting advice from Rebecca:

“One of the first steps to liberating people from the cage that is gender is to challenge established gender norms, and to play with and explore your gender expression and presentation….The solution is not to reify gender by insisting on ever more gender categories … The solution is to abolish gender altogether. We do not need gender. We would be better off without it….The solution to an oppressive system that puts people into pink and blue boxes is not to create more and more boxes that are any colour but blue or pink. The solution is to tear down the boxes altogether.”

As bisexuals we should only seek to model the fact that we are more than what our society currently views as men, or women, or queer (I hate that word). Personally, I just want to be viewed as a loving and caring human being with a meaningful and rich life. Rebecca is right.  It is time to forget all the social and political issues and just learn to play.  Let’s enjoy sex in whatever way turns us on, forget about gender, and just be happy human beings.

Please Note: I am referring strictly to bisexuality.  There is a much stronger case for gender for gays, lesbians and transsexuals, both personally and as a community.

[1] Reilly-Cooper, Rebecca. Gender is Not a Spectrum.  https://aeon.co/essays/the-idea-that-gender-is-a-spectrum-is-a-new-gender-prison?utm_source=Aeon+Newsletter&utm_campaign=3b10c4d7b4-Weekly_Newsletter_1_July_20167_1_2016&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_411a82e59d-3b10c4d7b4-68637497

 

Bisexuality and Pride

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SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)

Has pride become a meaningless side-show attracting political parties and marketing ploys? Is Pride now a family show for the amusement of the straights in the community? Are we ignoring the issues for which many have fought and died? In a recent article in the local newspaper, the writer stated just that, but I think he missed the main point. It has truly become a community celebration, and that is a good thing. Pride celebrates the uniqueness and freedoms of all of us.  We have fought and won the main event. For the most part, our right to exist has indeed been won; the community has recognized and accepted us into its heart, and our unique contribution to society is being recognized. It is indeed a time to celebrate and to welcome the political parties (I marched with the Greens) that want to be a part of our community, and the local and national companies that want to show their appreciation for our business. It is time to welcome families and children to our events to paint their faces and listen to the music.

 

Are there still issues that we need to address? Sure, but they are not on the same scale as imprisonment and forced lobotomies, or being targets for abuse by the thugs on the street or even the justice system itself. I sit on the Saanich LGBTQ subcommittee for the Health and Wellness Committee and we are addressing issues still faced by the Transsexual Community. All our concerns are listened to and approached in a rational and compassionate manner. We have workers on the police force and the parks and rec department that have taken on the role of addressing our needs. It is no longer a fight to exist; it is just a matter of crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s. It is indeed a time to celebrate.

 

In our bisexual community there are many horrific needs to be met, but they are not political in nature. Bisexuality in not just about sex and it is not really about gender. We are not like the rest of the LGBTQ community seeking our place in the sun.  We do not protest or organize for common goals, and we seldom join organizations for a sense of community. We have the freedom to float in and out of the homosexual and heterosexual communities without notice.  But we are complex human beings with an unquenchable thirst for intimacy with both men and women. That places us on the front lines of the sexual revolution that is still being fought. We have sexual needs that go beyond the rest of the community and we are fighting to have complete sexual freedom so that we can explore our sexuality and conquer our demons.

Like many in the community we have a huge hole in our soul that cannot be filled, but our hole seems to be centered on our sexuality. Perhaps it is related to unfulfilled needs for love during childhood; perhaps it is some genetic drive that leaves us with a huge hole that needs to be filled; perhaps it is some psychological/biological intense drive that urges us on to taking risks to fill our hunger for connection. Perhaps it is all of these or none of these. But when this hole is not filled, it results in an epidemic of depression and suicide attempts that I have documented in previous blogs. These are our issues; they are personal issues not political, but we still do not have the support we need in our community, and we are still afraid to ask for it.

Our challenge is to make the community aware of our plight and to make sure the community mental health services are open to us. We need to have our identities protected if we wish to remain anonymous, but we must be open to counselling that will bring the major players to the table in an open and honest way. This includes, spouses, parents, and brothers and sisters. It is our responsibility to make sure these services are available and then to take the initiative to use them. This requires a support network to assist bisexual men and women to come out and accept their position in the sun.  Bisexuals need to feel proud of their orientation and be willing to take their place and dance in the Pride Parade.

Bisexuality – Seeking Greater Passion

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cropped-2016-03-26_0931.pngWhat we all desire, in spite of our orientation, is not just sex, but passion. Sex is fine as long as we are enjoying it at the conscious level, and as long as the goal is not just orgasm for the sake of orgasm. If that is all we want, why not masturbate; it’s a lot less complicated. So what is passion? Sexual passion involves an exchange of sexual energy between two consenting adults for the purpose of mutual pleasure.

 

I think we can look at passionate sex at various levels. The first level is mutual orgasm. There is nothing wrong with orgasm; in fact, it is one of the greatest pleasures that human beings can experience. There is nothing wrong with wanting lots of it, every day or more than once a day, for that matter. There is nothing wrong with wanting it from the same sex and/or the heterosexual experience. All of these experiences can be a form of profound passion. Unfortunately, as stated in the previous blog, this pursuit of mutual orgasm for the sake of orgasm can become addictive for both partners. . Addictive sex involves a dopamine rush followed by dopamine withdrawal and negative feelings associated with that withdrawal that can lead to a strain on the relationship.

 

In order to understand the difference between addiction to orgasm and passion, we need to look at one more neuromodulator, and that is cortisone. When there is a perception that there is something wrong or a possible threat with a sexual experience, the brain gives out a stress signal. The body reacts by emitting the hormone cortisone which influences the workings of dopamine and serotonin, putting them on hold until the crisis has passed. But in the case of a mental crisis, the crisis never comes to a conclusion, so the perceived threat just goes on and on. Too much cortisone for too long a period of time is a bad thing. It can lead to generalized anxiety and depression on the mental side, and increased blood pressure and diabetes and all that bad stuff on the physical side.

 

So how do you control cortisone?  Simply by taking the stress out of sex and altering the perception from threat, shame, and guilt brought on by focus on orgasm, to the mindful pursuit of pleasure through our senses. This includes the natural body aromas that involve the increasing levels of pheromones, the taste of our lover’s body, the sounds of our lover’s passion, and the sight of our lover’s beautiful body. Above all we explore the wonderful sensations of touch, which brings us to tantric sex. Tantric sex is an ancient Hindu practice that has been going for over 5,000 years, and means the weaving and expansion of energy. It’s a slow form of sex that’s said to increase intimacy and create a mind-body connection that can lead to powerful orgasms. To enjoy the full range of pleasures of tantric sex, we need to slow things down and enjoy the subtle pleasures of touch both receiving and giving. We do not focus on orgasm but on delaying orgasm for as long as possible as we enjoy the feedback from all our senses.

 

So what does this have to do with bisexuality? Everything. As bisexuals, we tend to engage in same sex relationships for pure pleasure (dopamine rush and opiates) and we engage with our heterosexual partner for intimacy and heart-based bonding (may be reversed but is rarer). We have an opportunity to explore our sexuality on various levels, but first we have to take control of our impulses and our frantic drives towards orgasm.

 

For us men this can be a problem as we are physically driven by the old brain to penetrate and ejaculate. Women are ahead of us in this. In order to reach orgasm they need to focus on the sensations of their bodies, especially touch. So bisexual men tend to seek other men for the powerful feelings associated with orgasm, while women seek women because of the focus on touch that can lead to a richer and prolonged orgasm, or even a better opportunity for multiple orgasms.

 

Women are already geared for tantric sex whereas men have to cultivate this skill, especially with other men, to avoid the sex and withdrawal and guilt cycle. Bisexual women, on the other hand, often find the same sex orgasmic experience so satisfying that this may lead to breakup of their heterosexual partnership. Again when the pleasure of sex with orgasm wears off, they often find themselves separated from the one they loved, and in the dopamine rush/withdrawal cycle that results in an unsatisfying relationship with their same sex partner.

 

So how do we escape these dilemmas? Simply put, rather than just focus on the pleasures of sex, we can use sex as a pathway to intimacy. The difficulty is in weaving intimacy into our relationships with both men and/or women, and thereby maintaining our bisexual nature. More of that in the next blog where we will explore the relationship between passion and play.

 

FEEL FREE TO ASK QUESTIONS THAT COME UP FOR YOU. I’M HAPPY TO ANSWER.

Bisexuality, the Heart, and Transgression

Published on by Bi-Ed: Bisexual Education2 Comments

2016-03-26_0931There is a dilemma, in fact, almost a paradigm shift, in sexuality that needs to be addressed, especially in how it affects bisexual men and women. In years gone by relationship would lead to sex; in today’s generation, sex seems to lead to relationship.  In days gone by, we seem to have been guided by thoughts of transgression which prevented us from engaging in sex in a care-free manner in spite of the powerful desires of our bodies. Today, many of us engage in sexual acts without any feelings of transgression. Is this healthy?   This is a question that no one wants to ask today in fear of somehow offending the rights and freedoms of the modern generation.  Perhaps it is, but it does need to be viewed on a conscious level.  We must not throw out the baby (used to be literally) with the bath water.

Today’s women particularly seem to be exploring bisexuality as a natural flow of their sexuality.  As we have seen in a previous blog, close to 50% have experienced some form or bisexual desire and behavior.    According to the same set of studies, 95% of men tend to believe and act upon the belief that one should be either gay or heterosexual and most of them choose to be heterosexual. There is little room for accepting bisexuality. This brings us into the field of transgression.  Fifty percent of women and over ninety percent of men choose not to be involved in bisexual exploration, many of whom believe bisexuality to be a transgression which is a polite word for perversion. For us bisexuals, what others believe should not be important unless, of course, we are living a secretive life and have to deal with these people on a daily basis. The real question is what do “we” believe, and if this belief system needs to change in order for us to thrive mentally and spiritually.

Let’s look at transgression from a body, mind and soul perspective.  The body hormone system, once turned on by the brain,seeks sexual gratification and pleasure according to its sexual orientation, which for most of us bisexual men and women is same sex copulation or other sexual gratifications. There is no judgment here, therefore, no transgression. However, the mind or ego operates according to rules and regulations, and therefore is influenced by its environment and sets of moral and physical experiences. It produces thoughts which can be the source of  transgression. On the other hand the heart or soul seeks love in all its forms.  It is the heart that must choose between the desires of the body and pleasure seeking center of the brain, and the moral concerns of the ego. This is where the concept of transgression becomes just a feeling, and needs to be clarified before we can thrive as bisexual men and women.

Bisexual women tend to look for connection with other women and seek skin on skin with some degree of emotional involvement.  As long as they can detach from or train their egos to accept this behavior as  normal and satisfying, they can enjoy the eroticism on this level.  There is a danger here in that the act can become satisfying for its own sake and does not lead to the deeper emotional connection of love and compassion for their sexual partner.  They may shut down their feelings of transgression from the heart.  Over time, these feelings can become magnified and lead to disillusionment and possible dissatisfaction with life. This may be the cause of an extremely high number of suicides and suicide attempts among bisexual women.

Bisexual men on the other hand can detach the sexual act from any sense of connection, to the self or to others.  We can seek glory holes in Adult Stores (common in the USA), or bath houses, or paths in the dark in wooded parks, where we are not even aware of the person’s face.  In my opinion, this is very destructive and can lead to deep feelings of transgression even to the body and brain that seeks deeper sensations of skin on skin.  We can also seek dating services where we can find skin on skin with no strings attached.  This allows for deeper physical connection but totally shuts down the heart.  Again, as with women, we can enjoy the pleasure of these experiences if we can convince  the mind that wants some system of understanding, and, of course, the heart that seeks deeper emotional connection.  Over time, we may experience deep feelings of discontentment and emptiness which may lead to depression, drug and alcohol abuse, and possible suicide.

The question on transgression then becomes whether or not we are being true, not to the voices of others, not to the voice of our mind or ego, but to our own inner voice.  If we feel that our behavior is somehow a transgression of our inner values, then we must not silence that voice, because that voice is trying to lead us on to deeper truths and feelings.  These feelings can only come through deeper connections within the self and with others, and, of course, we call this feeling “love”. Love is the root of genuine positive feelings for the Self, our self-concept, and our self-esteem. It leads to a higher state of being where we thrive instead of just survive. In my opinion, the shutting down of this voice leads to meaningless sexual acts that numbs the mind and soul to sexual experiences that are meant to be full body-mind-soul experiences, and therefore, much deeper and healthier. Can we still be bisexual and experience these sensations with both men and women? Of course, but  we have to be selective in the kinds of acts in which we engage, and we have to let our heart lead us to the kind of people where we can share on a body, mind and soul level.

The key to thriving in all aspects of life is to learn to listen to the heart, to trust our inner feelings, while silencing the corrupted thoughts from our wounded egos. This includes our sexuality. This is different from the “if it feels good, do it” from the body and the pleasure center of the brain.  A better statement from the heart would be. “If it feel right, do it.”

Bisexuality –Gender or Sexuality?

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I am a bisexual – I did not choose it, I was born with it. I do not even really have a choice on whether I will be attracted to a male or a female. It comes and goes almost like a bipolar experience, but I hate to use that comparison because there is an unspoken feeling out there that bisexuals are actually mentally unstable (my apologies to the wonderful and stable bipolar friends out there). We are not. We are just delightfully unpredictable, even to ourselves. So what does bisexuality mean? Is it strictly sexuality or is it more?

My daughter was having an evening out with female friends and discussing sexual behavior among young women when the host’s fourteen year old daughter chimed in. She stated that most of the girls in her school feel comfortable having sex with either guys or gals. My daughter and her age 35 + friends were shocked. This new sexual freedom among young women seems to be confirmed by a study by researchers at Boise State University that found that in a group of college heterosexual women, 60 percent were physically interested in other women, 45 percent made out with a woman in the past, and 50 percent had fantasies about the same sex.1

Is this bisexuality? Depends on your definition of bisexuality. If you mean sexual attraction and sexual experiences with both men and women, then it is bisexuality. But that reduces bisexuality merely to sexual behavior. I choose to believe it is much more than that, at least it certainly has been in my own bisexual life.

I could not find a similar study that identified the percentage of heterosexual males that experienced same sex attraction. Even if there was one, it would probably not be reliable because of male confusion and lack of disclosure. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Boise State researchers also found that men were more likely than women to report being “100 percent heterosexual” or “100 percent homosexual” continually throughout their lives. Most of the time we are lumped into the gay population. Most of the combined gay and bisexual statistics range from 2 to 5 percent. My guess is that gay would be 2% and bisexual males an additional 3 to 5%, but certainly not in the 40 to 50% territory. On the surface, this suggests a definite difference among bisexual men and women; however, my guess is that most of these young women eventually will gravitate to one or the other leaving a similar smaller population that continues to experience swings (pardon the pun) from one gender preference to the other on an ongoing basis for the rest of their lives.

I think we can safely conclude from these studies that there are a large number of people (mostly women) who experience a same sex attraction. We can call them bicurious and perhaps even bisexual, but not bioriented and certainly not bigender.

A true bisexual man is at least bioriented. At times we experience strong biological impulses to meet and mate with someone from our own sex. As a man, it gives me a sense of leaving behind my ego-mind and slipping into my biological, hormone based body to respond to the smells, feelings, strength, and pheromones of another man. At other times, I feel attracted to a well-shaped woman walking in front of me. Certainly when I am with my wife and we begin to cuddle and kiss, the lamp lights and my hormones are pushing me towards copulation. I need to feel the pull of my masculine sexuality, the need to dominate her body sexually as our sexual passions blend together. In other words I have a biological biattraction and biorientation towards both men and women.

But my bisexuality is so much more than biological attraction and sexual orientation. At times I feel an overwhelming drive to experience the feminine side of my being physically, emotionally, and sexually; in other words, I flow into my feminine gender is a full body and soul experience. This is when I feel a need to flirt and express my deeper emotions with my male friends. This is when I sometimes need to reach out and hold and hug a man from the heart in the hopes of feeling a magical moment filled with a sense of wonder and completion. This is when I feel the need to feel intimacy with a man and tell him “I love you”. But “I love you” means something different when I am with my wife. I also seem to have a need for a masculine biological/psychological base. I need to feel the power flow through my body as I reach out and hold my woman and feel her face against my chest and my arms wrapped around her body. I need to feel that I am the protecting husband and father.

I cannot truthfully even attempt to know how bisexual women experience their bigender but from studies I have read I believe they are more likely to seek a sexual/psychological base in either a same-sex or heterosexual relationship. They also appear to be more likely to seek deeper relationship in their “other” gender experience, rather than engage in casual sex like their male counterparts. In both cases bisexual men and women seem to need an intimate gender base that meets their needs for relationship, love, and family while maintaining a parallel drive for sensuous and even erotic pleasure in their other side. We do not seem to operate well on our own without a base. The world becomes too chaotic with constant confusion and pulling from the two sides of our nature. The hard part is to find a mate that understands our other side and is willing to give us the freedom to experience our bisexuality as a basic need of our bisexual gender. So there is a tendency to be dishonest and hide our bisexuality from our partners, and of course that leads to suffering and pain. On the other hand, as bisexuals, we are faced with the constant struggle to be true to ourselves, or should that read – to be true to “both selves”?

1 <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2011/10/20/study-more-than-half-of-women-attracted-to-other-women_n_1021730.html&quot;

Hyper-Bisexuality

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According to Simon LeVay, a neuroscientist and writer based in West Hollywood, California, “Bisexual men might have their ‘hyper-heterosexual’ female relatives to thank for their orientation.”[1] He attributes this to an X-linked gene that increases attraction to male sexuality. He claims that even though this genetic link may not be the determining factor in gay and bisexual sexual orientation, it’s certainly seems to influence it.

LeVay refers to a study by Andrea Camperio Ciani and colleagues at the University of Padua, Italy. [2] They asked 239 men to fill out questionnaires about their families and their past sexual experiences. On the basis of their answers, the men were classified as heterosexual, bisexual or homosexual. The results showed that the maternal aunts, grandmothers and mothers of both bisexual men and homosexuals had more children than those of heterosexual men. They suggest that the genes on the X chromosome may be responsible for influencing a woman’s attitude to men rather than actually increasing her fertility, making her likely to have more children. According to Camperio Ciani and colleagues, the same genetic factor appears to be passed down to both bisexual and homosexual men. .

These findings support some of the studies that we have looked at in previous blogs. A study by Blanchard and associates found that gay men tend to have more older brothers; the likelihood of being gay increased by a third to one half with each male fetus[3]. They suggest that these outcomes may be linked to pheromones[4]. The theory is that mothers develop a higher level of female pheromones to counteract the male pheromones of the fetus with each successive male pregnancy. This may reduce the male pheromones and create a higher percentage of female pheromones thus resulting in female psychological and perhaps even internal physiological characteristics. One last study before the conclusions, a study by Derr way back in 1976 indicated that homosexual men have significantly higher levels of testosterone.[5]

Granted these studies seem to have a whole lot of theory based on a small amount of science; however, the conclusions and possible implications are interesting to say the least. These studies suggest several things.  First, the genetic X component may be connected to a heightened awareness and attraction in both men and women to testosterone based pheromones from men. Secondly, males from larger families may be influenced by powerful female pheromones interacting with the male pheromones of the male fetus during pregnancy.  Either way, the evidence is mounting for a biological based attraction toward males in gay and bisexual men.

Here are some additional thoughts. Perhaps (just guessing, for after all that is the prerogative of a blogger) the degree of the power of the maternal X may  also determine whether we are completely gay or sort of half gay/half heterosexual as in bisexual.  A second possibility may be the strength of the forgotten Y component from sexually aggressive fathers.  Could it be that the degree of male sexual aggression and increased testosterone in bisexual men simply leads to a powerful drive that neutralizes the aversion aspects of the oxytocin bond?  As bisexuals we have a powerful testosterone based drive;  we  are definitely attracted to men and definitely attracted to women. Furthermore, could it be that we may have a hyper heterosexual/homosexual combined genetic XY factor that increases our drives directing them to male and/or female pheromones?

Perhaps the title should be “hyper-sensitivity”, or “hyper-sexuality”? Perhaps the title should be “hyper-bisexuality”?  Could this explain why we are so driven for gay sex even though we have healthy sexual relations with our female partners?

 

[1] Bisexuality passed on by ‘hyper-heterosexuals. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn14543-bisexuality-passed-on-by-hyper-heterosexuals/

[2] Journal reference: The Journal of Sexual Medicine (DOI:10.1111/j.1743-6109.2008.00944.x)

3. Blanchard, R.  2001. “Fraternal birth order and the maternal immune hypothesis of male homosexuality.” Hormones and Behaviour, 40(2), 105-14.

[4] Money, 1987. Meyer-Bahlburg, 1995. Blanchard, 2001.

[5] Peter Doerr, MD; Karl M. Pirke, MD; Gotz Kockott, MD; Franz Dittmar. Further Studies on Sex Hormones in Male Homosexuals. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1976;33(5):611-614. doi:10.1001/archpsyc.1976.01770050063010.

 

Married to a Bisexual Man

Published on by Bi-Ed: Bisexual Education1 Comment

2013-08-30 14.26.43

(The following  blog on why a woman can enjoy bring married to or partnered with a bisexual man is based directly on the thoughts and words of my beloved mate and the love of my life.)

The other day my wife stated that she would not get involved with another heterosexual man if I passed on before her. I asked for explanations.

She said that in the 17 years that she had been divorced she had kissed a lot of frogs to find her prince (me, lol), she had noticed that many of them spent a lot of time interacting from their brains and dicks but not from their hearts. Apparently I was the first man who connected with her almost immediately from the heart.

She also told me that when she was a student at university she met a lot of really sweet (and stinkingly handsome) fellows who made easy heart contact and delightful conversationalists.  However, they could not perform in bed* and the poor girl was left with the impression that there was something wrong with her that turned those young men off. Only much later did she find out they were gay.

After her divorce she was frequently attracted to openly gay men and felt sad when they told her that they were not ‘available’. She intuitively knew that a marriage partner would have to possess some of those wonderful qualities that she had observed in her gay male friends: a spiritual approach to life, a way with words, appreciation for art, high energy, a love of life expressed in music and dance,  a high sex drive (preferably with knowledge about the workings of female sex preferences), compassion for sentient beings, enjoyment of nature, etc.

While heterosexual men have many of the above characteristics, she now can see that bisexual men (me) have a heightened sensitivity to them. They are easily moved to tears of sadness or joy and display intuitive understanding in many situations without requiring intellectual explanations or interpretations. Of course their hyper-sensitive natures can create ‘princesses’ that require an especially thoughtful approach with communication (me again, sad but true). Many bi men have anxiety and low self-esteem issues, so when a situation wakes up their pain body,  the Ego is immediately in charge and sparks can fly.

While my wife sometimes feels frustrated  by my over-reactions, she takes them with a grain of salt. She sees the many benefits of our union and is willing to pay the price for a deeply heart-centered relationship.

 

  • Most gay men either cannot or for some reason or other have no desire to have sex with women.  On the other hand, bisexual men have no difficulty engaging in and enjoying sex with either a man or a woman.

 

Power of a Kiss

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logo_2My search for material for these blogs is taking me farther away from bisexuality and into the common experiences of human sexuality experienced by all men and women.  In a recent read of James Thumber, I found the following:

 

“Many a man who loves spiritually is a weakling — a professor. Many a one who loves physically is a brute. But when the two are mixed, he loves with all the fire and passion of a poet and a cave-man… If I ever kiss you you’ll know that — and you’ll know what a wonderful thing my love is. Kissing seems not a great matter, in a way. And yet in one way it speaks the million things which words can’t… A real girl doesn’t care to be kissed, much, unless real love goes with it”[1].
As a spiritual bisexual, I am not looking just for sex, I am looking for intimacy. When you scroll the meat market, there are two types of bisexuals (and no, I do not mean “top” and “bottom”),  those who want to “get on and get off” and those want to “cuddle and kiss”. Getting on and off is okay just because everything is okay; there is no judgement. However, I find it disturbing when the bisexual man states he does not want to share a hug or a kiss.  There is oh so much more in cuddling and kissing – there is intimacy.

So what is in a kiss? Looking at it from the heterosexual viewpoint, the “caveman” searches for the kiss. Why? Because for him it means the woman is opening herself up to him for sexual exploration. And why is she willing to do that? Simply because she feels something, some connection, some excitement in her body, some stirring in her soul.

And then the kiss.  During the kiss she can sense just what the man’s purpose is.  If it is rough and urgent she may back away unless she already feels urgency and desire in herself for her own sexual needs. The kiss then quickly leads to a ‘quicky’ and both get off and, passion wains, and they usually are left feeling empty. So then, there has to be more in the kiss.  The kiss has to be exploring all right, but not just for sex.  It has to be for wanting to embrace the whole person, body, soul and spirit.

A close friend of mine confided that he has a wife who complains about his love making.  She says he does not make love like a man.  In other words, when it comes to sex, she wants to be made love to by a “brute”; she wants “a cave man”.  My friend is an English Lit “professor” a “poet” and I think, based on my conversations with other bisexual men, most of them are also professors and poets. Oh indeed there are many bisexual men (usually tops) who can be cave men, who can have a brute sexual presence, and as bottoms men we love it when we find one.  But for the majority of us (the three quarters of us who are bottoms), when it comes to making love to a woman, it does not come that easily.  We have more of a female brain.  When we kiss we want to express our inner being and we want to get in contact with our lover’s inner soul.  We want the kiss to be gentle and sensitive.  We want it to start slow and easy and build until it touches the latent caveman inside of us so that we can bring the combined “fire and passion of a poet and a caveman” to our partners. We want what everyone else really wants.  We want body, heart and soul connection.  We want intimacy.  We want to make love, be in love, and love unconditionally.   “If I ever kiss you, you will know that, and you will know what a wonderful thing my love is”.

Now I have to encourage  my friend’s wife to read this, and if I convince her that it is better that a poet makes love to her than a brute, I may convince my skeptic friend to believe in the power of my words.

 

[1] Thumber, James; White, E.B. Is sex Necessary. Amazon, 2004

 

Bisexuality – A Shamanic Dance

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cropped-logo_2.pngI keep talking about consciousness and trying to create or perhaps fabricate a connection of consciousness to sex and bisexuality.  Does this connection really exist?  I am not sure, but I have a “feeling” that it does, and “feelings” truly are the door to consciousness.

Consciousness is not going blank and staring at a flower, it is experiencing the essence of the flower through the miracle of our spirit.  It is not about mind, or thinking, or imagining, or even sensing; it is about sharing “being”, sharing the essence of life with another living thing. How much more powerful then must it be to share connection, not with a flower, but with a man or a woman.  I believe that sex is one of those portals where we have an opportunity to ride the sensations of the body into a state of conscious bliss where we experience each other’s essence in a truly sensuous, mindless way.  And moreover, I believe that bisexuality gives us an opportunity to experience this bliss from two different sides, each of which has the potential to create and to enter into a state of conscious ecstasy.  Bisexuality is not a curse, it is a double portal into the spiritual.

The key then is to understand sexuality as a part of our divine nature. I have recently run across a website by Terence McKenna that contains some remarkable snapshots into consciousness and (which I apply to) sexuality:

“Nature loves courage. You make the commitment and nature will respond to that commitment by removing impossible obstacles. Dream the impossible dream and the world will not grind you under, it will lift you up. This is the trick. This is what all these teachers and philosophers who really counted, who really touched the alchemical gold, this is what they understood. This is the shamanic dance in the waterfall. This is how magic is done. By hurling yourself into the abyss and discovering its a feather bed.”[1]

You see, good sex is that shamanic dance in the waterfall.  It is that powerful surge of emotion, feeling, and all the physical and spiritual energy that goes with it. It is the magic that gives us an opportunity to escape the world of patterns and enter into the chaotic abyss for a few precious moments. And then the magic happens. As we leave the world of our mind, the restrictions or our culture, and our desire to seek the comfort of patterns, we land on the feather bed with another human being.

And this one:

“I think of going to the grave without having a psychedelic experience  (is) like going to the grave without ever having sex. It means that you never figured out what it is all about. The mystery is in the body and the way the body works itself into nature.”

You see, the mystery of the body is that we do not enter into nature through our mind or even mindless consciousness but through the sensations of the body.  And the sensations involved with sex are 1000 times more powerful than any other sensation we are likely to experience.  In addition, the beauty of sex is that we enter into nature in the embrace of another through whom we experience the combined rhythm that produces a harmony and  a resonance that slips into the timeless rhythm of nature, reproduction and life.

And this one:

“You are a divine being. You matter, you count. You come from realms of unimaginable power and light, and you will return to those realms.”

You see, once we arrive in this altered state, we can begin to share not only on the body level, but in the glow, the harmony, the sharing of soul, and even perhaps the sharing of spirit.  When we do this, we experience a powerful healing flow mentally and physically as well as spiritually.  This is the source of passion that gives us the male power to conquer the world and the female sensitivity to enjoy it.

So what does this have to do with bisexuality?  Everything.  Three of four bisexual men (previous blog) have their primary sexual orientation towards other men.  This is the primary power source.  This is where the feelings and sensations are at their height.  It becomes a power surge that can carry us into ecstasy.  On the other hand, when we are connected to women, we enter into a different kind of rhythm, a slower quieter beat where there is no urgency, where we can linger and glow, prune and build neural pathways, and form a different kind of harmony that is longer lasting and more centered on relationship building.  This allows us to carry the experience of the bedroom into the world around us, providing us with peace and contentment and harmony.

Bisexuality then is a gift, a portal into two sides of consciousness, the world of passion and the world of harmony. Let go. Leave all your care and even your thoughts behind and join in the shamanic dance beneath the waterfall.

 

[1] http://in5d.com/73-terence-mckenna-quotes/

Carol – A Study in Female Bisexuality

Published on by Bi-Ed: Bisexual Education1 Comment

Carol is a movie based on a novel, The price of Salt, by Patricia Highsmith. Carol and Therese are lesbian lovers. The movie (unlike the book) is played from Carol’s point of view with the assumption that she is the more vulnerable character (certainly a point to be argued). Even though the movie is widely acclaimed for its content and quality, I had difficulty defining my feelings and understanding of female bisexualism during the movie. However, I was challenged to try to see and understand female bisexuality, and discover the similarities between male and female bisexuals.

The first question then arises – are these women lesbian or bisexual? Carol is in the process of a divorce, and has a child, and is therefore by definition a bisexual woman.  Therese has a boyfriend, and according to her own admission has a hard time saying no, which I presume means she is also a bisexual.  Which of course, for women or for men, begs the question – according to label and definition, who is gay, who is lesbian and who is bisexual? According to my simple definition, if you are attracted to and can have sex with either men or women (and I assume enjoy it) then you are bisexual.  Beyond that point, your preferences may change and you make different choices, not to be bisexual because that is what we are, but we have the ability to enjoy relationships with either men or women.   At first Carol choses to be married to a man and chooses to have a child whom she loves dearly, but she  is willing to give up parental custody for the sake of the child, and in order to peruse her love for Therese. Therese has a boyfriend, makes plans to get married and live a straight life.  She is then overcome by her attraction for Carol and enters into a lesbian life, I assume because of her need for genuine connection and the opportunity to share deep feelings and desires.

As a man, I find it totally incomprehensible why two women would want to live together with such potential for emotional turmoil and chaos. So much easier being a man and being with a man.  Interestingly enough, Carol and Therese felt the same way; that is, they found living with a man so difficult and preferred the predictability of living with a woman – emotion, chaos and all. In my search of the internet I found this quote from a woman claiming to be straight but with bisexual tendencies, “I am attracted to the beauty of other women — and they’re so much easier to understand psychologically than men. We girls form deep relationships through friendships, which some say are the basis of love. And personally I believe that emotional connection and physical attraction are linked”[1]. Well, maybe for women, but not necessarily for men. I can be very attracted to a man on a casual basis without ever wanting intimate relationship.

However, I think it is important, as a male bisexual, to try to understand female bisexuality and why most bisexual women eventually give up on the heterosexual relationship and choose to become lesbians. First of all let’s look at the differences. Women are much more likely to be bisexual then men. I found a study conducted by researchers at Boise State University that found that in a group of heterosexual women, 60 percent were physically interested in other women, 45 percent made out with a woman in the past, and 50 percent had fantasies about the same sex[2]. The researchers also found that men were more likely than women to report being “100 percent heterosexual” or “100 percent homosexual” continually throughout their lives. This explains a lot about Carol and Therese and their natural attraction for one another. Women are allowed socially to hold hands, hug,  and even kiss in girl to girl relationships.  For boys this is a taboo.  A man is supposed to be a man.  Begs the question – are we all really bisexual in nature but straight or lesbian or gay only due to social factors? Perhaps for women, but I think there is more to it for men.  For men there is an animal competition to spread our genes around so the dominant genes will be passed on.  This means ‘women only’ as men cannot reproduce with another man.  Whereas women seem to be straight only about 40 to 50% of the time, it appears that men are definitely straight about 95% of the time, definitely gay 4% of the time and about 1% of the time they seem to be either-or.

Research suggests that gay men tend to engage in promiscuous sex and lesbian women tend to seek long term relationship[3].  According to my research (I know four lesbian couples), of the eight individuals, five started out in a marriage or heterosexual relationship and then settled into a long term lesbian relationship, two were dominant (butch) lesbians from adolescence on,  and only one started out in a lesbian relationship and then later got married to a man and had children.  From the research, and from my observations, some have definite lesbian desires starting at a young age but most come by it later in life, almost as if they choose to leave the straight and sometimes chaotic life behind and seek out genuine intimate relationship. On the other hand, most of the bisexual men I know have known from an early age that they had gay tendencies but also felt a strong attraction for women and a strong desire to marry and be fathers.  They live for years going from one to the other, usually intimately with their wives and casually with their gay lovers. When they divorce, they usually go gay and then many of them again seek out another heterosexual relationship.  It seems they cannot make up their minds. They seem driven to be both.  Men are true bisexuals.  Most women seem to feel the need to be one or the other.
Even though this movie indicates major differences between bisexual men and women, I do believe we have a lot in common.  Like Carol, we have a very strong urge to explore our gay or lesbian sexuality.  Like Carol and Therese, we find same-sex experiences sensuous and erotic. Like Carol, we come to a time in our life where sexual freedom of expression becomes a deep expression of our inner self, and we choose to leave the security of a marriage and strike off into the unknown in spite of the turmoil and pain it will cause.  Like Carol, we are caring people who do not want to hurt anyone, especially our children, but being true to ourselves becomes more important that being true to everyone else.

[1] http://www.yourtango.com/2011104439/study-average-woman-bisexual

[2] http://www.advocate.com/bisexuality/2015/08/26/study-women-are-more-likely-be-bisexual-men

[3] 2 Sanford et al, 2001; Kulkin et al, 2000