The energetic traditions I draw from are both Tantric and Taoist, as well as my own experiences in the martial arts, particularly aikido (which translates as ‘the way of harmony’ and which is extraordinarily like sex, in the sense that is simultaneously still and moving, physical and spiritual, strong and soft, and constantly requiring connection and flow).

There are some very useful analogies about sexual energy and I love to share with modern people that they generally find quite illuminating. Here’s one:

‘Women are soft on the outside and strong on the inside, whereas men are strong on the outside and soft on the inside’.

Some people have an immediate negative reaction to this as there is a strong belief in our society, particularly among intelligent, well-educated people, that men and women are equal. Agreed, we are equal, but we are not the same. Vive la difference! Sure we should have social, political, economic, educational, etc, equality. But that does not mean that men and women are the same. In fact, it’s the dynamic tension between the male and female energies that keeps sex strong and powerful in a relationship (in same-sex relationships there needs to be a similar dynamic working, just not so overtly male-female).

So ideally in a sexual encounter the man opens up his strong exterior and invites the woman into his soft interior where she can completely let go safe inside the space he’s created and let her strength manifest, resulting in extraordinary sexual responses.

Interestingly, what is happening energetically is the opposite of what’s happening physically: physically the man enters the woman, energetically the woman enters the man (and how scary and vulnerable can that make the man!)

Note, I am in no way implying that this means the woman becomes pathetic, passive, weak or any thing like that. Nor that the man becomes aggressive, domineering, macho, etc. No, they both realise their possibilities and potentials. They can completely meet as equals, and through that express their real selves.

In this way both people can let themselves go and submit to the experience. Then, and only then, can the magic begin!

Similarly, in a relationship, the man holds the space in which the woman can blossom and reach her potential. He’s like the pot and she’s the plant, so  it’s essential that she has a pot big enough to hold her or she will be limited in life (a story all too familiar…).

If, as so many women in our society feel they’ve had to do, she tries to be like a man and be strong on the outside,, and thereby deny her softness and hide her inner strength, it will be hard for her to enter into him and feel his support. She’ll feel she’s doing it all on her own which is tiring and brittle, and ultimately she will feel the lack of connection with her man and they will bounce off each other (if he’s maintaining his strength on the outside) or she’ll feel nothing from him if he’s turned too feminine and gone soft on the outside (unless they’re in the minority of couples where the inverse energies are functioning).

It’s so important for modern people to come fully into the strength of their masculine and feminie energies. It’s a challenge because the feminine has been so devalued in our society that women often feel they’d become weak if they allowed their true feminine to manifest. Similarly many men are aware of the unequal powers in our patriarchal society, so try to tone down their masculinity.

So, as I ask so many of my clients and workshop participants, and here I’m asking you: how does feel if to be fully into your masculine energy or feminine energy? If you don’t know, how might it feel?

I can tell you, it feels powerful, it feels good, it feels whole.

What would it feel for you to feel whole?