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You can’t judge a workshop by its title, especially if the wording includes orgasm, men, and fun in bed.
I got an email a few months back from a women’s group that was hosting a “Man Whispering” workshop here in town. The course promised to disclose the secrets of snagging, straddling, and subduing our very own Supermen.
Far from being excited about their event, I was annoyed at this latest attempt to tell women yet again that we needed special tactics just to get men to pay attention. Language like that does a huge disservice to men, too, by suggesting intimacy and commitment required little more than a brushed-up thrust of the hips and lip gloss. I wanted no parts of it.
Then, last week, the other email came.
I’m no sourpuss when it comes to sex, but I tire of seeing it referenced everywhere but bed. Orgasms! they said. [Yawn.] The best fun he’s never had in bed! My ass. Here’s my thing: when you’ve got items like shiso honi and Climax on your sushi roll menu, and Ménage à Trois crowding the wine store, and men’s shower gels that promise unlimited female attention (accompanied by suggestive groaning for no good reason), then you know it’s bad. Frankly, I’m just not that into all the advertising.
And is anyone other than me more thoroughly over the recent demonization of women’s bodies and derogatory talk of our lady parts in the media? Did you hear that one about the Michigan politician who was censured for saying vagina in the hallowed halls of government—as she discussed legislation concerning vaginas?
So, the workshop. Even with their pseudo titillating title, it was the group’s second time around with similar material, and that meant it must have been popular to somebody the first time out. I figured if I came away with useful information—strictly for my own research and development purposes, mind you—well, everybody won. Either way, I was determined to get some good material. My curiosity aroused, I headed down—tongue in cheek, eyes wide open—to hear all about orgasms.
Boulder never does things the way you’d expect. I showed up to about thirty seats forming a giant ring in the center of the room. In the middle of that circle lay a dozen more meditation cushions and pillows—all bright red, if that means anything to you. To me it meant a lot. It meant: there was probably going to be some simulated extra credit during class, or that I’d need to put on my Jackie Os in case they’d be taping, or that I should have shaved my legs and paid more attention to my feet before leaving the house. Like I say, I’ll try anything once—or I’ll at least show up to watch.
By the time the seats filled (twenty-five women and five men total), my fears had calmed; the cushions were optional for those who wished to sit on the floor during the orgasm business. Boulder, remember?
As it happened, there was a whole lot of conversation about very real relationship struggles and very little talk of orgasms. It was anticlimactic, and it rubbed me all over again. I know I’m one to talk about titles—Oh, man. Who knew?—but this was different. Finally, here was a mature group of men and women speaking candidly about our concerns without the pressure of pickup lines or anything less than noble motives. Why is this kind of communication so novel in this culture of information excess?
Those men weren’t representative of all men, but what they said pointed me back to my own relationships with more insight than I had going in. I scanned the room as they shared their collective fear of failing to connect to the women they loved; they shared how much they wrestled with their own perceptions of masculinity—on top of the impossible standards that women and culture already placed on them. Did you know the average man only has 1.2 real friends? one man asked, confirming the statistic. We want to connect with you.
They asked if we women had any idea how hard it was for men to relate to them emotionally when society had made it so difficult to do for themselves. To hear them tell it, it seems our culture had run a dangerous game on men, too. Society had fed us the lines we lived by, by rewarding men’s impassiveness at the expense of emotion, by commercializing the Bad Boy and Mystery Man mystique, by insisting men swallow the pain that ate them alive inside, by celebrating the cowardice of false bravado and disappearing acts. I had my own opinions around this, but when I added it up, I honestly didn’t have any idea what they were up against. Nobody trained us in feeling, another man said. We need your help with that.
The more we talked and listened, the more hopeful I became about the likelihood of fostering deeper relationships through an honest exchange and unguarded openness. I was also saddened at the reminder of how accustomed and encouraged we are to accept generalizations as gospel instead of being urged to take our time with each other, for better or worse.
You know that saying about life being a mirror that reflects what we think? Well, after the orgasm talk my mirror showed me some of the outdated frames through which I’d been viewing men. It showed me my blind spots and revealed how I’d been unwittingly casting myself in roles of old beliefs.
Within the span of an afternoon I saw myself donned in outmoded garb—as a matter of habit more than anything—where men were concerned. When’s the last time you responded to a man (or anybody, for that matter) as a child when you felt you felt powerless, as a victim when you felt wronged, as a smartass when you felt clueless, as a bitch when you felt abandoned, as a bully when you were weak? Get my point(s)?
It might not come as a surprise to you, but those men were unanimous in the belief that there was nothing sexier than a woman who let herself be herself. They expressed their gratitude in meeting like-minded men on a similar path of understanding. They said it made them feel good knowing the women they were with felt good, too—in and out of bed. They said there was nothing women needed to do, be, have, or become, that we didn’t already possess in order to experience the love we deserved.
According to those men, men take more pleasure in pleasuring women than we do for ourselves. They said more, like we’ve got to be responsible for our own happiness (and orgasms!), but I’ll leave you with this: as I live and breathe, I can confirm that real men live and breathe, too. And they can love, they do love. I hear lots of them even want to get better at it. Somewhere in me I was already aware of this. And so were you. But what a great reminder. Oh, man. Who knew?
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