Intimacy is a very popular topic -- it tends to get a lot of people tuning in.

Intimacy itself is not an issue -- what we're talking about today are the issues that keep us out of being present, and prevent intimacy from happening. I think there's a lot of confusion about what intimacy really is. We imagine that intimacy is about two beings coming together. You see that person from across a crowded room, and there's an instant connection, and the two become one. But actually, real intimacy is far more profound than that. Ric Weinman, the founder of VortexHealingⓇ, has a really good definition. He talks about intimacy being divinity recognizing itself through form. Instead of two people coming together as one, the oneness recognizes itself through two forms.

In a way, the intimacy is already there. We don't have to connect, we just have to be present, but that's harder than it seems. There are so many issues that get in the way of our being present. I hate to say this, but for so many of us, our issues create a kind of agenda. When we meet each other, and see each other, it's very hard to be vulnerable enough to see and be seen.

Very often we come to the moment with an agenda, what we want out of that person, what we want out of that moment, what we want to convey, and what we're trying to connect to. All of this gets in the way, and we stop seeing each other. We're looking to connect on a certain level, but in other ways we're trying to protect ourselves on other levels. We can't really have it both ways. This also comes up when we think about shame. We tend to hide, even from ourselves, those places that feel unworthy of being loved. We overcompensate by trying to connect. Very often, I believe that we're craving intimacy from a place of feeling disconnected. It's not until we're willing to be vulnerable, in the best sense of the word, that we can allow ourselves to really be seen and see each other.

Very often we're worried about being seen. Do you know me? Do you see me? Are you connected with me? But are we really seeing the rest of the world? Are we really seeing each other?

Survival is a core issue. If any issue is deep enough, we feel it on a survival level. We need to connect to each other -- that is a survival thing. When we feel we don't get it, or we don't get it in the complete way that we imagine we need it, we really get scared. We overcompensate, and try to connect in all sorts of different ways. In the modern world, there's this false sense of connection through social media. I think social media can be used in a very positive way, and can bring people together in many positive ways. But very often, there's a false sense of connection. We feel the lack. And coming from a sense of lack, we reach out again.

We're trying to connect, we're trying to be seen from a place of feeling disconnected. We have our needs, which really override the moment, and our agenda gets put onto who we want to connect with. It takes a lot of courage. I think an ongoing practice of the willingness to put that agenda down, and just be who you're with. As soon as we start talking about intimacy, we imagine romantic relationships. But I'm talking about intimacy in a much broader sense. That casual conversation you have with someone you have at the grocery store can be very intimate, in the sense that you're very together in the moment, and connecting over whatever it is -- even if it's a squishy avocado. Everyone understands, and you can kind of share that moment with true joy and without agenda.

Then we go home to our partners, and we need what we need, and we get what we get.

So often we just fall into that from our sense of lack, and we just stop seeing each other. In VortexHealing we talk about something called the relationship field. That's VortexHealing language for something that happens between people. We have our relationships, and we have our issues. Then we have the astral buildup between two people, which is history. We tend to relate to people through the history that we've experienced with them. If you've been married to someone for twenty years, in some sense you still see them as they were. People change, and yet we're not really seeing that. We tend to work with a pattern that was established early on in the relationship, and at some point we just don't see each other.

You hear that story about someone waking up, turning to their spouse and saying, "I don't even know you!" And maybe you don't. Have we really been looking, or have you just decided that you already know what the other person wants, what they're going for, and how they're going to react. Without really stopping, listening, asking, and allowing space for the person that you're sharing time with. We do it all the time. I think it takes a special kind of commitment to not do that, and a special kind of commitment to others and ourselves to be willing to be vulnerable.

The word 'vulnerable' gets a bad rap because I think we imagine that vulnerability is a weakness.

Being over-sensitive is one of the worst insults you can hurl at someone these days. It implies that you're weak, and you're putting responsibility onto someone else to make you feel better. The genuine vulnerability is really an open heart and resilience. It's when you're no longer afraid to be hurt. "I'm just here with you, listening to you, not afraid to be hurt, and even if I am hurt, I'm still here." Which is different from wearing our heart on our sleeve, or holding someone else responsible for your feelings. It's truly just an open heart. And in that open heart, it's no longer about you. It's about whoever you're being present with, be it your partner, a friend, or your cat. Your relationship to life changes when it's not about you. There's freedom in that, and relaxation. When you feel that you can relax, then people can relax in your presence because they feel seen and held in a very tender way. Very quickly a whole dynamic can change. When you demonstrate to someone that you're willing to put your agenda down, and they feel seen and heard, it changes everything. You have to be willing to do that, and that's very hard to do when we've known pain and come from places of self protection and fear. It's just a natural part of being a karmic human being.

If we don't have compassion for ourselves, and we're not able to meet and be with our own issues and feelings, then we really can't be present with other people.

If we're busy judging ourselves and our own feelings, and beating ourselves up for being oversensitive, and deciding that we should be a different way from how we are, we're not listening to the person talking to us. That's part of our own agenda. So often we bring to the table not what the other person needs, an anticipation of what we want to be in relation to that other person. Even if it's well-meaning. We want to say the right thing, do the right thing, and that's all in relation to us. Instead of putting that down and just being there for them, and then responding in the moment spontaneously to whatever arises, is a completely different thing. If we can't do that with ourselves, and we're too busy judging ourselves, there's no way we can do it for someone else.

It all comes down to presence. What does it mean to be present? It's when you can put all of that agenda down. It's not that everything disappears, but the mind, body, and emotional sense of self come into alignment with the moment. So you can be with whatever those feelings are, and whatever those thoughts. But that's not what it's about. That stuff can be there, but you can still be there in the moment. There's freedom from that agenda, from those issues.

The Presence class, which is offered in VortexHealingⓇ, has three aspects to it. It has a freedom aspect, where we're free from our own agenda and our own issues, our own stories. We're also free to be a new way, free to move forward. And when we're free, we're free here, not outside somewhere, we're free here, with you. In this space, in this heart. The key ingredient to presence is the nowness of it. We're free here in this moment. When you can bring that to the table, even though we always have issues, and we always have stuff going on, that's enough for someone to feel held, seen and touched. As we talked about, presence responds well to presence. If someone feels seen, that's an intimate moment. The presence that's already there comes to the surface, and everyone can relax. The next moment arises and plays spontaneously without tension. Those are our most joyous moments, even if the context surrounding them is difficult. Even if something bad is happening, there's a recognition of grace there, because it just flows. And then we just let go into that. That's the person we want to be, and that's the person we want to be with. And that's the kind of relationship we really want from life. We're so busy trying to connect from the place we feel we need to, we've lost contact with the natural connection that's already there. We don't need to connect, we just need to recognize the connection that's there. That's hard to do.

In essence, it's simple. We complicate it.

We're afraid of the simplicity of the moment. We just can't imagine that it can be that simple, we have to bring an agenda to it. We have to make the other person feel a certain way, so that we can feel a certain way. We are afraid of that simplicity. But it means a lot to people when we're willing to put our stuff down. 

I have two stepsons, and when they graduated college, I wrote each of them a letter. They're very different from each other -- both wonderful people. I basically said to each of them, "I recognize that you're different now from how you were growing up. You're not the little boy that I knew when you were growing up, and I want to know that I'm looking forward to getting to know you as the young man that you are. " I think it meant a lot to each of them in different ways, because they felt seen. The fact of the matter is, they weren't the children I watched grow up. They're completely different people, with their own ideas, experiencing the world from a different point of view. What I was doing was promising to make the effort to recognize their ongoing growth, and give them credit for changing and growing. Looking forward to seeing where that process takes them, instead of just imposing my old ideas of what they should be like. We do that to our partners and children all the time, and they hate it. Understandably. Because they're not being seen.

This pandemic has certainly been very challenging, and feeling disconnected has been a very hard thing. I think people have been feeling very isolated during the pandemic, but I also think that people have had to look hard at this stuff. Understanding where they're feeling disconnected, and how they can really come together. I think it's forced us to really take a look at what we've been missing.

It's easy, when there's so much noise around, to be distracted.

Not realizing that we're not being seen and met. But when things get still and quiet, then we really feel it. We long to work with that. I think a lot of the issues we've always had presented themselves, everything sort of came up in our faces, because everything became more obvious. The isolation that we were already experiencing became more obvious, so we've been forced to deal with that. It's uncomfortable, but can also be very healthy. People have found new ways of coming together by creating groups, and forming friendships. I had the pleasure of meeting someone in person, someone who works for me, who I had never met in person. I know them well, we've been working together, and then recently I taught an in-person class for the first time since Covid, and they came. And I was delighted to meet them in person and give them a hug. I realized that intimacy was there, it just was forged from a different place and a different way. It can be done, but we have to pay attention to it, and make a commitment to it.

We crave intimacy from the place where we believe that we're disconnected.

We charge force with that agenda, but we have this preconceived idea of what connection means, and what intimacy looks like. I'm a very mental person myself, so I'm looking to connect on a very mental level. Other people are more emotionally based, and relate more that way, and there's nothing wrong with any of that. But when we create a focus in that, and only connect mentally or emotionally, we lose that deeper presence of it. There is no connection because there was never a disconnection. Real intimacy is just relaxing into the presence of the moment. When we come from a place of lack, we can't see that because all we can see is meeting that need. Fulfilling that lack. That intimacy becomes impossible. So we're always chasing that.

Transformation is possible.

Once you see an issue for what it is, then we have the opportunity to work with it. Just meeting and being willing to put it down is huge. Before I started doing VortexHealingⓇ, I had an experience that I call The Day I Realized I Was Full of Shit. I was in the process of getting my yoga training certification, and doing a practice practical. I was leading my fellow classmates through an asana practice, and being evaluated by the teachers. I felt good about myself, I knew my stuff. But the feedback I got back was that it seemed that I was more invested in showing off what I knew than actually helping the people I was working with. And it hurt, because I realized it was true. It was coming from a very deep place of insecurity, and so demonstrating my knowledge and performing well was more important to me that listening to the people I was teaching.

That deep insecurity was with me all the time, and I was bringing it to every part of my life. It created what felt like an armor of self protection. I wasn't seeing others, or allowing myself to be seen, and I wasn't really intimate with the world in that way. I didn't have any tools. All I could do in the moment was know that it wasn't how I wanted to be. That's not the person I am. So I just made a decision when I went to work the next day, that I was going to put my agenda down and just listen to my client, and bring whatever I could to the table to help them. And then do the same with the next. And then the same with the next. It just became a practice. My tools came into play, but they came into play from a spirit of service and supporting, which is a very different place. I made a commitment to take on the deeper issue of insecurity and self worth that created that wall.

Recognizing that you're coming from a place of lack can be life-changing.

Then you have the opportunity to meet it in compassion, and not judge it. To just keep going, and recognizing that it's more important than anything else. We just do the best we can. No matter what tools we're working with, it's the same process of meeting each moment as it comes, catching yourself when you have an agenda, and maintaining the willingness to put it down and really be vulnerable. You can't really be vulnerable unless you have the resilience to know that you can be hurt and be okay. When you feel like it won't be okay if you're hurt, then you can't allow yourself to be vulnerable. But being hurt, and being hurt again... I'm willing to do this because I care. That's the best we can do.

Vulnerability is scary -- where do boundaries come into play?

I think that in the presence of the moment, when you have no agenda, how to act is clear. If you're really showing up for someone, it becomes very clear very quickly if that other person has an agenda. How to navigate that becomes very clear. We don't have to come in ready to go, because when we're present in the moment, we see exactly what's going on. That's just coming from a place of recognition as opposed to fear. There's nothing you need to protect yourself from. If you do get hurt, then there's resilience in that. But you don't check your mind or reasoning at the door, that's part of the moment. If someone oversteps their bounds, you'll have the presence of mind to recognize that maybe they're coming from a place of pain or reaction, in which case you'll be able to handle that better if you see it for what it is. I've found my best moments, when I've been able to navigate something tricky, are when I've been softer. When I've been able to put my agenda down. Then it's very clear what to do. When I come in with my boundaries set, then it becomes kind of a push/pull thing.

We have this idea that vulnerability is over-sensitivity. I think that comes from a habit we all have sometimes, that when we feel badly we hold the other person responsible for making us feel bad or making us feel better. That's what over-sensitivity means, and that's why we resent it when someone is being over-sensitive. When we can just say, "Hey, I'm hurt. That's making me feel uncomfortable in this moment," without necessarily making it someone else's fault, that's a different dynamic. That's actually the greatest strength. How do you call someone on their stuff without judging them for it? It's very tricky to do, and it may require telling someone you’re hurt and explaining how you're receiving what they're doing. "This is how that's landing -- what did you mean?" When you come from that place, rather than, "You're wrong," it changes the whole dynamic. It requires vulnerability, and it's hard to do.

It's hard to argue with an open heart.

Maybe innocence is a better word than vulnerability. I like the word vulnerability because it says I'm here, and I have a willingness to get hurt if that's what it takes, I'm still here. That comes from a deep place of love. But real intimacy, and the divine recognizing itself through form -- when you first catch eyes with someone, even someone you don't know, there's something greater than the two individuals. There's an underlying recognition that there is something there, that's bigger than your past history or backstory. You can have this intimacy with someone you don't know. It's an incredibly intimate realization, and it's so much bigger than you are. It's so much about heart-opening and presence, and it just happens when we're not looking for it. It just happens when we put our guard down, or we get caught with our guard down. It's just there. Those intimate experiences are happening all the time, if we can just see it and enjoy it. If there's only one divine, if that's true, then everything that we are, and everything else, is an expression of that one. That one meets itself and plays through form. It recognizes itself in those beautiful, joyful moments. For us to appreciate that, we have to be willing to put our own agendas and stories down. We do our best to come back to finding that presence. Even if the moment is painful. Even if you see someone on the subway, and they're in pain, it can still be a beautiful moment if you can recognize that through form. If it's safe enough to be seen, then there's always room for transformation.

We can't talk about intimacy without talking about love. And love is the open heart.

It's that divinity that's there. Unconditional love is intimacy and presence. It's all the same thing at the end of the day. So when we make space for that, and allow ourselves to have the opportunity to recognize that, we're held in love. And we hold others in love. It's a whole different way of navigating the world.

If you want to read more about the issue of intimacy, you can see Lorraine’s interview on the subject on the cable access show Oneness and Wellness here.