Finding the Sweet Spot
Originally posted August 20, 2013
View original article on elephantjournal.com
We hear a lot of conflicting perspectives on desire.
Oftentimes we are warned to detach from it, lest we spend our lives running towards pleasure and avoiding pain. This attitude comes across as a bit fundamentalist to me and works to deactivate and deny our fundamental creative impulses.
Or we are told it’s the fuel of life and that we should heed its every call; otherwise, we are living dry and colorless lives and stifling our creative potential. While this is more in alignment with my beliefs, taken to the extreme, it can breed attitudes of narcissism and entitlement and make us feel like victims of circumstance when we perceive that we aren’t getting what we are wanting.
I believe the sweet spot lies somewhere in between.
Of course, let us not confuse desire with craving, that passing habit of addiction which we use to desensitize ourselves.
No, desire is very much a feeling animal—alive and rife with orgasm.
The sweet spot brings us to the edge of our pleasure and holds us there so as to savor the experience and gently land before becoming bloated and numb to sensation.
It loves to rest right in the center of wanting and having.
It satiates while keeping the appetite sharp.
The Japanese have a saying for this regarding food: Hara hachi bu. Which means “Eat until 80% full.”
And of course we’ve all heard the saying “Leave them wanting more.”
So when you feel your desire call, slow down. Listen. Really tune in to what she is saying. It may be a little confronting, especially since desire often goes against the cultural grain.
It’s less about totally expressing your desire and more about simply acknowledging and approving of what you hear. From the center of the sweet spot, desire becomes a conscious choice. And you get to decide how much fun you are going to have on the ride, regardless of whether or not the desire is fulfilled.
Oftentimes, it’s just as delicious to sit with desire—to hang out in the wanting. How hot and sweet is it to be sitting so close to your lover, swelling with desire, and only feeling the heat from his skin shimmer across your body?
So, neither squelch desire nor rush towards it. Slow down. Get present. Find the sweet spot.
And keep yourself always ready for just little bit more.
The following poem is featured in her upcoming book, “From 6 to 9 and Beyond,” which uses stories, poetry and visionary photography by Sequoia Emmanuelle to capture the erotic awakening of six feminine archetypes. She plans on donating 10% of the book profits to All We Want Is Love, an organization that ends sex trafficking. Learn more about the project here.
Unexpressed Desire
By Candice Holdorf
Cool raindrops on my window.
A liquid warmth insulates
The soft Sunday morning
(The grey skies
A cozy backdrop
For our scene)
My bare right thigh
Rests on your pajama-ed leg.
My right hand slipped
Under your left
As my palm inhales
The heat from your ribs.
You hover on the edge
Of a waking snooze.
A soft snore rises
From your throat.
A moment frozen
With desire.
This could go in any direction.
On the one hand,
I hate to disturb your sweet surrender,
Like a nostalgic portrait
Studied by professors
And glanced over by disinterested tourists
As they rush through the gallery.
On the other hand,
I want nothing more than to feel
Your lips brushing the side of my neck.
Your entire fist slowly twisting inside me.
Your coarse fingers mashing my left breast,
Squeezing out my nipple and tugging with your teeth.
Another soft snore.
A resigned sigh.
I pull my hand out from your shirt
In one, cottony stroke.
Unraveling from you,
I tiptoe to the door
Turning in time
To see your lazy smile
And half-opened eyes.
“I’ll let you get some rest,”
I whisper, as the door firmly latches
Behind my back.
To Love a Woman (Part Deux)
Photo: _mubblegum_
Originally posted December 27, 2012
View this article on elephantjournal.com
Inspired by EJ’s recent articles on femme/femme eroticism (most notably by Lori Ann Lothian and Lyla Cicero), I decided to do my own inquiry into my attractions, both emotionally and carnally, to the female form.
I will not deny that when I see a woman’s shape molded by an elegantly tailored cocktail dress (complete with stilettos), I feel my skin prickle and my mouth water.
I love to bite the soft, peachy flesh of her neck. I love my fingers wrapped up in strawberry-scented hair.
And yes, I love the wet, velvet tang of a woman’s pussy.
No doubt this is no shocker. I think it would be a rare human indeed who was not physically attracted, in some way, to the feminine form.
And yet, there is more to my story than pure lust.
Yes. I had had sexual experiences growing up: playing ‘Romeo + Juliet’ as a pre-pubescent girl; cuddling topless as a teenager; and the usual ‘makeout-with-your-female-classmates-so-the-boys-think-you-are-cool’ in college.
But when I chose, at the ripening age of 28, to give my presence to a woman and ride the undulating fire of her orgasm, I discovered that being with a woman was no experiment or titillating dare: it was one of the most miraculous experiences I’d ever known. It was like God raining on my fingertips.
And it was fucking hot.
It confirmed something I’d always suspected but was too ashamed to admit: a woman, surrendered to her orgasm, is undeniably, divinely irresistible.
Was I ‘in love’? Well, yes—in that moment, when the old hetero-normative patterns faded and I simply said ‘yes’ to what felt right, I can honestly say there was nothing in my world but love—within and without.
That first real experience with a woman opened a door for me. A door of abandonment. A door of disarmament. A door of possibility.
A door of love. Love: that burning teacher who whispers chilling truths.
And love: that gentle wind, which molded and shaped my heart so I became capable of receiving both woman and men into ecstatic embrace.
And love: the magnetizing force between my life partner and me.
A few weeks after my feminine epiphany, I wrote the following poem to capture the holy magic of that night—for to love a woman is to love all that is strange and exquisite about humanity:
To Love a Woman
Her liquescent cries
Inundate the hollow night
And it is here
In the palm if my hand
That the earth’s story
Is born.
The lotus
The lily
The magnolia
Unfolding flowers
Whose nectars
Form the seas
My fingers
Tickle Her petals
My thumb
Discovers Her pearl
My mouth
Alights on Hers
And as the sloop slips under,
Descending the
Ocean of our Love,
Sweet, salty waves
Rock us
To death
Who knew that
Unexplored reefs
(With the potent power
Of floral coral)
Could produce
Such radiant life?
To Love a Woman (written 9/2009)
Venice Beach, CA
Originally posted November 15, 2012
To Love a Woman
Her liquescent cries
Inundate the hollow night
And it is here
In the palm if my hand
That the earth’s story
Is born.
The lotus
The lily
The magnolia
Unfolding flowers
Whose nectars
Form the seas
My fingers
Tickle Her petals
My thumb
Discovers Her pearl
My mouth
Alights on Hers
And as the sloop slips under,
Descending the
Ocean of our Love,
Sweet, salty waves
Rock us
To death
Who knew that
Unexplored reefs
(With the potent power
Of floral coral)
Could produce
Such radiant life?
Carburetor Man (written March 2009)
Photo from the music video 'Born to Die,' by Lana Del Rey
Originally posted October 24, 2012
arburetor Man
Mixed tape blastin’ over busted speakers
Me and my carburetor man rumble down the road
He thrusts the pedal hard to the floor
A one-two-three-four pump
Gets my engine revved up
(Fuel injection is for lazy pussies
Addicted to cruise control and automatics)
Take a firm grip
On a sleek stick
And let’s shift gears
Rolling over lush peaks
Or just idling at a drive-in
Squeezed in the backseat
Black vinyl sticking to my thighs
Hershey lips caressing my face
Make me feel like I’m sixteen again
And in the stroke of a finger
We’re back on I-95
Soaring over that sweet ravine
Together
Sex: Not for the Faint of Heart {Adult}
Photo: Bryan Brenneman
Originally posted May 4, 2012
Read this article on elephantjournal.com
I got fucked open by the Universe recently. And not in a hippy-dippy, namaste, all-you-need-is-love sorta way. I mean in a total possession, out-of-control, freak-out sorta way. And since filling you in on the details would probably involve a good five hours of chain smoking and tequila shots, let’s just cut to the chase and say, it wasn’t very pretty—or rather, it wasn’t very ladylike.
There’s a reason why American conservative and religious leaders are doing their very best to crack down on sexuality. It threatens a system built on predictability, logic and the survival of a moral code based on patriarchal rule. We are seeing more and more the push for abstinence-only education, new bills are being passed limiting talk of ‘gateway sex’ in the classroom and abortion rights and easy access to contraception are under fire.
Then you have social conditioning parading around as ‘normal behavior’ adding another layer of obscurity to our already warped sense of sexuality (much of it tied up in the arenas of romance, commitment and relationships). This can be seen in books such as The Rules (a woman’s guide to capturing the heart of Mr. Right), classes taught by professional ‘Pick-Up Artists’ and Hollywood films hammering home the message that once you find ‘The One’ then all your fairy tale wishes will come true.
Finally, if you get through the labyrinth of political and social nonsense sitting on top your sex, you have to then contend with your own booby traps and deadbolts:
I’m too tired for sex
I don’t deserve sex
My vibrator/pornography gets the job done without the hassle
I’m straight/gay/married, etc, so I could never have sex with that person.
I’m too fat/ugly/old for sex
If I have sex now, I’ll be giving away the milk before he/she buys the cow
I’ve been hurt by sex in the past
So yeah, it’s pretty obvious why opening one’s sex is one of the most stigmatized and misunderstood of human journeys.
Sex.
Is.
Fuckin’.
Scary.
Period.
OK, a little more context. I went to a meditation retreat a few weeks ago and one of the things that came up for me was a huge amount of sexual trauma in my body. I had some floating memories of where this came from, but the history mattered less than the knots of terror that had embedded themselves in my genitals and were now passing through my system. The result looked a lot like a scene from The Exorcist. Screaming, shaking and crying rushed out of me as my pride (which had calcified on top of my trauma) began to burn away. Through the rusty faucet of my now flowing sex, a rotting cesspool of unexpressed anger took me over so powerfully, I thought I was going to die.
Obviously, I did not die (literally), but afterwards I felt as if I had been flayed alive. Every sound and touch was like pots banging in my ear or mites biting my skin. I had no more filter for how I was experiencing life. With no filter, my self-expression was direct, concentrated and immediate. This expression didn’t have time to collect a residue that would eventually fester and stink of shame (which would, of course, later end up in the basement of my soul with the other unsavory bits).
And then…something miraculous happened.
In the midst of my rawness, my lover came to me…and I could feel my pussy for the first time. I mean, on a profoundly deep level. All these years of thinking I knew what good sex was (I mean, I’ve been climaxing with a stash of porn since I was eleven, thank you very much), I had never dreamed of feeling something like this. It’s a little hard to put into words, but just set aside your woo-woo prejudice for one moment and stay with me.
Whereas before I was simply feeling my own body, I was now feeling my own body through the tip of his cock, which he was feeling (obviously). And I could feel him feeling his cock and feeling me with his cock. So it’s as if there was a circuit of connection—from me, to his cock, to his mind, back to his cock, and to me again—that added a whole new dimension of sensation to the experience. I wasn’t only in my orgasm, I was also in his orgasm, which then melded and becomes the shared orgasm. It’s as if one plus one did not equal two, but infinity.
Now I’m not saying every moment was bliss and rainbows and magical Candyland. For me, sex encompasses a lot more than the linear trajectory we typically ascribe to it (a kiss leads to above the waist action which leads to oral which finally leads to the grand slam intercourse and ejaculation). I mean, is it sex if, as he’s entering me, my body contracts into an accordion of fear, with the infantile mewing of “No, no, no” escaping my lips? Or is it sex when a man is reduced to tears of repentance the moment my velvet pussy lips slip around his cock? Or is it sex if I spend the whole night floating my hand over the warm fur of his chest in a state of wonder? For me: yes.
Sex is the most volatile arena for exploring who you are in the world and what you are running away from will typically arise in sex—quickly and in obvious contrast to everything you think you are. Facing this kind of ego death is a viable reason to keep sex tucked away in the back drawer of our psyches. But the reward for allowing all of myself to arise and to be witnessed and loved by someone else in that vulnerable state was nothing short of total liberation.
And I realized: to the extent that I could set aside my ‘script for good sex’ and allow myself to be penetrated with no judgment on what arose, I could actually experience God in connection with another human being. Which is what I think we are most hungry for on this planet (case in point: I had a recent OM, a.k.a. Orgasmic Meditation, with a friend of mine, who was grateful to stroke a woman who has spent time cultivating her orgasm because for him it was like ‘physical nourishment’).
Society teaches us that power lies in being the unrelenting penetrator. Go in hard, no holds barred and don’t come back until you’ve got the prize. It’s goal-oriented, it’s hard and fast and relies on brute force. We feel like we are in control of it all and get an ego boost when we shoot a giant wad after just one good thrust from our monstrous cocks, be that in boardroom or in the bedroom. It’s a brand of pseudo-masculinity that’s sort of like bad Chinese food—it fills you up in the moment, but leaves you hungry and undernourished over time.
Yet to admit that underneath all the bravado, we are dying to be penetrated is to come face to face with every taboo we have around sex and relating, especially for men. Look at the snarky remarks made whenever anyone mentions anal sex. Or the brutal jokes told in reference to gay men. In fact, the phrase ‘To be fucked over’ implies that you were a dumbass who put out and got nothing in return (which also ties into the often transactional nature of sex—make sure you get yours before they get theirs, lest you be ‘fucked over’). And who in society gets ‘fucked over’ all the time? Why pussies, of course.
Unfortunately, this negative view of being fucked (and the notion that the one being penetrated is somehow ‘weak’) is keeping us from the intimacy and connection we so desperately crave. Let me tell you from experience: it takes a lot of courage to be fully fucked open, to surrender to the Spirit within and to let all of her out in the presence of another. It is not weakness to be fucked open, but a place of power. And within that power, you will find innocence.
As for penetrating: this is actually the most surrendered position of all, for the penetrator must be willing to hold total presence and ride the waves of whatever arises. And it’s not physical strength that matters most, but the strength of commitment to stay 100% connected that creates the space for the penetrated to open and release.
In time (and to make things really interesting), there comes a point when the roles of penetrator and penetrated switch between partners from moment to moment—regardless of who has what member in what orifice. Many a skilled courtesan has deeply penetrated a man while his cock was inside of her.
And in the final stage of pure grace, the roles fall away completely and the Universe takes over. You become the penetrated and the penetrator. The fucker and the fucked. Kali and Shiva. Adam and Eve (and Lilith and the Apple and the Snake).
Get it? Of course you don’t. I don’t even get it. It’s a felt experience, not a rational one. In fact, I feel like I have had only a taste of the sheer potential available in the realm of my sex. Will I ever have this kind of experience again? Who knows. The path now is to simply keep feeling my way rather than trying to chase an ideal. But my intuition says if I continue to play like this, there are many doors that will open into ballrooms and caverns I never thought possible. I started my OM practice over two years ago and what was once an opening the size of a pinhole is now a quarter-sized aperture of orgasmic expression. It feels like the journey (with its feathers, stingers and silky, warm wetness) is just beginning.
Courageous Ones
By Candice Holdorf (written May 2009)
It’s the Courageous Ones
Who dare to tread My salty shores
Who spread their fingers
In My deceptive seas
(with hidden octopus
and pink jellyfish)
But when My tempests rage
And oceans wage war
Against their virgin skin
(Which rebels in welted bliss)
They think of it as a baptism
And bow their heads in honor
For who but a holy fool
Would offer sacraments
To My shrine…
And spend his whole life
Suffering for the religion
Of My Love?
Legend of the South Seas (written 5/3/2009)
Venice Beach, CA
Originally posted May 1, 2012
Legend of the South Seas
(written 5/3/2009)
My heart hums in a secret volcano
Hidden patiently dormant
Midway between Helena and Espiritu Santo
Teetering on the tip of tectonic bliss
A loner by nature
(She never fit in with Pangea)
She calls the ring of fire
Home
Enigmatic magma rumbles
Beneath her crest
Luring worthy sailors
To slip onto her shores
Map-less, they must brave her currents
(No easy sextant for celestial navigation)
Caressing her whispering zephyrs
Riding her blistering squalls
‘Til they wash up famished
On her full, wet sands
Igniting her belly ablaze
Swollen earth morphs to enveloping lava
And in unrivaled eruptions
(Pele is so jealous!)
Impassioned ashes descend
Searing skin-to-skin, soul-to-soul
Immortalizing their bodies
In cinder-splendor
A pacific monument
To her tempestuous love
One of Those Girls (Written 8/1/2009)
Photo credit Michal Marcol, Freedigitalphotos.net
Originally posted January 27, 2012
One of Those Girls
(written 8/1/2009)
I am afraid
Afraid of losing you
To the Pretty Young Things
With straight blond hair
Slender white thighs
Girls eating ice cream
And playing volleyball
Paragons of petite perfection
In their pink sunglasses
Fierce acrylics
And cherry red lipstick
(Canine teeth flashing)
I am not One of Those Girls
No, I have loved too much
My heart, a menagerie
Of shattered glass
My unicorn horn
Super-glued back on
One too many times
And yet…somehow…
Your perfect hands
Continue to collect
My 1001 colors
Like shells in the sand
That doesn’t mean
I am not afraid
Afraid of losing you
To the Pretty Young Things
With straight blonde hair
And slender white thighs
Teasing lollipops
With their tongues
Playing volleyball
In the sun
Blissfully ignorant
To their ephemeral beauty
Unexpressed Desire
Originally posted January 21, 2012
Unexpressed Desire (aka The Morning After)
Cool raindrops on my window.
A liquid warmth insulates
The soft Sunday morning
(The grey skies
A cozy backdrop
For our scene)
My bare right thigh
Rests on your pajama-ed leg.
My right hand slipped
Under your left
As my palm inhales
The heat from your ribs.
You hover on the edge
Of a waking snooze.
A soft snore rises
From your throat.
A moment frozen
With desire.
This could go in any direction.
On the one hand,
I hate to disturb your sweet surrender,
Like a nostalgic portrait
Studied by professors
And glanced over by disinterested tourists
As they rush through the gallery.
On the other hand,
I want nothing more than to feel
Your lips brush the side of my neck.
Your entire fist slowly twisting inside me.
Your coarse fingers mash my left breast,
Squeeze out my nipple and tug with your teeth.
Another soft snore.
A resigned sigh.
I pull my hand out from your shirt
In one, cottony stroke.
Unraveling from you,
I tiptoe to the door
Turning in time
To see your lazy smile
And half-opened eyes.
“I’ll let you get some rest,”
I whisper, as the door firmly latches
Behind my back.
Freedom (Written June 1, 2009)
Tree after the rain, Clermont, FL
Originally posted May 14, 2011
Freedom
I was thinking about you
And her
Your new life
And I smiled
Invited the jealousy in
I sat with her
We became friends
I made love to her
Shared a cup of hot chocolate
Until I discovered
She was not here
To knock me down
But to teach me
To abide
In my own gifts
And in an act of great love
I released her
And she...me
And here I live
Hovered on the edge
Of freedom
To the point where I have forgotten
What brought me here
In the first place
(Written June 1, 2009)