Television watching may seem less significant than other factors we have mentioned. However, television promotes passivity; people wrapped up in watching T.V. have neither the motivation nor the energy to develop an intimate relationship. It can become so hypnotic that one does not realize how much time is being given to T.V. viewing.
It can turn into a source of real friction. One partner stays up to watch the late-night programs and then expects the other to still be alert and ready for lovemaking when he or she comes to bed. Sometimes television viewing is used deliberately as a means of avoiding sex.
So weigh your priorities and decide which you would rather have: a life spent passively staring into a television screen or an intimate relationship with your marriage partner. Read the rest of this entry »
Sensuousness is defined by therapists as the need to be held, fondled, caressed, and touched. It should not be confused with sensuality, which is a preoccupation with the physical, as opposed to the intellectual and spiritual. We are speaking simply of the importance of touch, as a means of meeting a human being’s deep needs, and as an essential way of developing intimacy in the marriage.
In Love Life we have given twenty-five suggestions for nonsexual touching, which any husband and wife would do well to put into practice. Some individuals are hungry for more touching and they will gladly have sex, just to be held and caressed. Others do not understand what their true need is and they may try to use sex as a substitute for sensitive, affectionate, physical fondling and closeness. Then there are those who believe they “are just not affectionate.” These must learn to enjoy sensuousness through the loving, patient persistence of the partner and the practice of nonsexual physical touching. Read the rest of this entry »
To enjoy intimacy with your mate is to “be in touch.” This means physical touch, as well as the ways you touch emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually.
I have observed that married people need physical touching of an affectionate nonsexual nature to retain the feeling of being in love. Emotional/sexual intimacy cannot grow unless you touch often, gently, sensitively, freely, without fear of rebuff or misunderstanding. Intimacy requires cuddling, snuggling, sitting close to each other, holding hands, and kissing as a part of your daily life.
Too often after marriage, couples use touch only as a sexual signal, but this should not be. Sex cannot be expected to meet all your needs for physical contact and affection. To build intimacy you must “keep in touch” every day.
Intimacy grows as we show our sensitivity to our partner’s needs. An insensitivity to needs and desires, particularly in the sexual relationship, can be quite detrimental to the development of intimacy. One traditional example often cited is the husband who demands sex right after an unresolved argument, with the children playing in the next room, and a neighbor at the front door! Or the wife who interrupts her husband’s impassioned lovemaking to go take meat out of the freezer or check on a sleeping child! Therapists call behavior that hinders a satisfying sexual experience “sexual sabotage.” If you want to develop intimacy, you will pour yourself into understanding your partner’s needs and meeting them in sensitive, loving ways.
Predictable, Mechanical Sex
An emotionally enriching intimacy is always a sign of life. Sex that is as routine as brushing one’s teeth and as mechanical as mailing a letter is a sign of a dying relationship. It may be revived by emotional preparation for physical sex, by varying times and places and approaches for sex, and by emphasizing tenderness and sensuousness rather than a technique that is goal-oriented to quick orgasm. A man can have a sexual experience that lasts a scant two minutes but this would be cheating both himself and his wife.
De-emphasizing the Value of Sex
The sexual relationship within marriage is one of the most profound, rewarding, and mysterious of all experiences. But, strangely, some people think of sex as an immaturity that should be outgrown. In some marriages one or both partners may consciously de-emphasize its value and turn their attention elsewhere. This is, of course, devastating to the rich, sexually dimensioned intimacy God planned for husband and wife.
“Spectatoring” is a therapist’s term for apprehensively observing one’s own behavior during lovemaking because one is so anxious about performing well sexually.
This can be remedied as an understanding partner helps the person turn his or her attention to sensual feelings and the pleasure of nondemand physical caressing.
Because intimacy is a mutual experience of sharing, it is difficult to enter into the enjoyment of it when you are self-preoccupied. Switching your attention to pleasuring your partner and enjoying the way your partner pleasures you will build intimacy and do away with anxious self-consciousness.
There is a direct correlation between a negative perception of one’s body and inhibited sexual intimacy. Free sexual interaction, or even the intimacy of sharing a bedroom, cannot be enjoyed when a person is embarrassed about his or her body and trying to keep it covered at all times. The natural sexual responses of the body are also inhibited when a person is concentrating on his or her physical imperfections, rather than erotic and pleasurable thoughts. It is amazing but true that many people feel quite unlovable, just because of some aspect of their body, and they are convinced their partner has the same negative feelings toward their appearance. The one thing the partner can do is communicate his or her appreciation verbally for every part of the mate’s body, always praising, never tearing down. Read the rest of this entry »
Mutual trust is one of the essentials of intimacy. It takes time and care to build this trust. But a different problem arises when an individual does not have a good feeling about himself. This can cause fear of intimacy, because intimacy is reciprocal. To be intimate is to exchange, which means that one must have something to give. A person with a low self-image may feel that he or she has nothing to give and may try to hide this “fact” by distancing himself or herself from family and friends. Sometimes people shrink from deep emotional involvement because they have been hurt by close relationships—often this happened when they were children and too young to understand and work out the problem. Read the rest of this entry »
There really cannot be intimacy without communication—a sharing on both verbal and nonverbal levels. One partner may actually attempt to keep the relationship superficial, because he or she is afraid of intimacy, afraid of closeness developing.
Most people, however, can learn to communicate with practice, if they really want to. Communication requires a listening love, as well as a willingness to be vulnerable—to try to put into words what one is feeling and trust those words to the partner’s understanding.
To Ed Wheat Sr. and Gladys Gibson Wheat, whose commitment, devotion, warmth, generosity, and integrity stood for fifty years as a beautiful picture of genuine agape love.