I have a client who recently took a ‘marriage sabbatical’. At least, that’s what she and her husband called it.

A work sabbatical is traditionally when you take a break from your job to study something else for a while. The idea is that regular work is too full to focus on the study, so you have some time away, and come back to the job both with new and useful knowledge and a fresh spirit.

That’s what this client is doing with her marriage: she’s taking a month off to be away from her husband and all the expectations and pressures she feels (rightly or wrongly) from being in the marriage, in order to have the space to learn more about herself and what she wants and needs in her life and in her marriage.

So, yes, it’s a marriage sabbatical.

I love this term. It’s so much better than ‘trial separation’ or other more onerous terms. It’s calling it for what it is: time out.

These clients, like so many others who seem to have reached a plateau, have been married for over twenty years and are now empty nesters. They’ve had some struggles in recent years, but otherwise life is good - they’re well off, healthy and their careers are thriving. But she’s lost the zing and feeling a bit lost.

I see it mostly in female clients. They can’t see the forest for the trees, meaning they can’t identify their needs from within the marriage. They need a break to see things more clearly.

Not surprisingly, their husbands can find this concept of needing a break as threatening. He’s worried that if she has this level of freedom, she won’t come back to him. This is of course one possible outcome. But as the saying goes: “Set the caged bird free, if she comes back, she’s yours, if she doesn’t, she’s not.” You have to set her free to find out.

Of course, the husbands will argue that she’s not caged. If she’s not, then there should be no problem in her expressing her freedom. Or he might argue that being in a marriage or committed relationship comes with certain obligations to be there for him. Undoubtedly that’s true, but if she’s feeling she’s so stifled, for whatever reason, why not give her space to discover herself anew? Then if she does come back to you, you know she’s with you out of true desire and not obligation.

And of course, this is equally true if it’s a man who wants the sabbatical.

Scary stuff - for both, however it plays out!

Negotiating the ‘rules’ of the sabbatical are important: how much if any contact to have with each other, and of course the biggie - can you see other people while apart? That discussion in itself is challenging yet empowering and personal-growth-inducing. It’s hard though, which is why I get called in to help out.

I do admire the couples who can allow this to happen. It does take a considerable amount of personal growth to be able to accept this choice. This level of awareness and consciousness does mean though, that if the one on leave decides that they don’t want to be in the relationship any longer, they are mature enough to separate with love and consideration, rather than the more typical bitterness and hostility.

So back to our couple who opened this article, when he said his wife was having a ‘marriage sabbatical’ I knew that he understood, and so did she. He gave her the space with love, got on with his own life in the meantime (so wasn’t just ‘waiting’ passively), she accepted that offer graciously - and they both gave their relationship the best chance for growth that they could.

The result? She chose to stay with him, and they’re continuing to grow and develop their relationship anew.


Note: I have to stress that a marriage sabbatical of this type is not for everyone, and is certainly not a guarantee of ‘falling back in love’. So, if you are thinking of taking one, it has to be carefully negotiated - I’d recommend some professional guidance if you are.

(This is copy of a blog I wrote five years ago, hencesome of the historical references.)

Here I am sitting in the depths of the jungle in northern Thailand, spending some time at a permaculture farm. Last weekend I was studying spiritual healing. Over Easter I attended the Xplore festival on alternate sexuality. Three quite different experiences, but all united: the sexuality, the spirituality, and the connection to the environment.

What unites them? You, one, the individual. The individual is the basic unit, and it is only through you that change happens, or doesn’t. It’s up to the individual to find their spiritual connection, their connection to the environment, and their connection to their sexuality.

The basic sexual unit is one.

You’d hardly think so, given our society’s obsession with couples. Not that I have anything against couples, pair-bonding is a normal human activity, and it is the social norm. The problem is two-fold:

The first is that people feel that they need to be in a couple to feel complete. This places enormous pressure on the other to live up to this expectation. Even the archbishop who married Will and Kate last week in his sermon said that one of the problems with modern couples is that they expect the other to be everything to them. This is simply not possible, totally unfair and one of the reasons why so many relationships are dysfunctional.

The expectation of your partner to complete you, also removes the responsibility of the individual to develop their own personal self-awareness and growth. It’s so much easier to expect the other person to fill your deficiencies rather than work on them yourself; and then you’ve got someone to blame for what you lack in yourself.

The other problem is that people think being in a couple is somehow normal and natural and therefore doesn’t need discussing. It absolutely needs discussing. Everyone’s idea of what constitutes being in a couple is different. We all have different boundaries and expectations, some culturally defined, others personal. And these change over time.

You need to come back to yourself first. What do you want, what do you need, what are your expectations/hopes/fears regarding your partner? Once you’re clear about this, you then need to be able to share those openly and honestly, without fear of rejection, without judgement of their input. Only then can the two of you create your own individual relationship, one that is unique to you. And one that continually changes and evolves over time.

Think of yourself as a circle, and your partner as a circle – how big is the over-lap and what does it cover? What only happens within the overlap, and what is yours alone?

There will be many other overlapping circles too – work, children, friends, activities – some of which overlap with just your circle and some which overlap both of your circles.

Try drawing this for yourself, then compare with your partner. Use this as an exercise to understand yourselves and each other more.

If you’re single, do it anyway to get clearer about what you want and need in a relationship. In doing this you’ll understand yourself more and you’ll attract someone appropriate, with whom you can share openly.

Two whole people who come together in realness and with individuality - it’s a beautiful thing.

Happy loving parents make for happy loving children, so it’s vital that as parents you make the time and space to be loving with each other.  A lot of people seem to feel it’s all too hard when you have children, so they have infrequent sex, if any at all.

It doesn't have to be that way though, not if you train your children to know that Mummy and Daddy need “Cuddle Time”.  

Read more about how to keep your sex life strong after kids in my book: Great Sex After Kids.

I was honoured once to give the reading at a friends’ wedding. They’d chosen a reading they liked, but wanted it ‘sexed up a bit’ - and who better to ask? Like most wedding readings it was beautiful and poetic and spoke all about love and commitment and sharing and respecting - all good and important aspects of marriage - but nothing about sex and intimacy. As my friends rightly said: “It’s our sexual connection that brought us together and it’s what makes our relationship unique - so we want that celebrated in our wedding ceremony too!”

So, in the reading, I pointed out that a marriage (or any long-term relationship) is like a tripod. It has three legs: friends, partners, and lovers. When all three are strong, you have a strong relationship, when they’re wobbly or missing, so is your relationship.

Being friendsmeans just that: enjoying each other’s company, sharing conversation and activities, and generally being good companions.

Being partners means being teammates in the game of life: being able to successfully run your household and family, managing the logistical parts of life.

Being lovers means maintaining the ‘mmm’ factor, that special energy that connects you in a way unlike any other. It’s a light, joyful, delicious, connection that pervades your life, so that you continuously cultivate desire for each other, and can co-create a quality, life-enhancing sex life, throughout your years together.

When you’ve got all three, you’ve got a great relationship.

Many relationships fall down in one or more areas:

• Sometimes a couple can be good in the partnership and lovers area, but not good enough friends for it to last;
• There are plenty of cases of couples with friendship and passion, but can’t manage the logistics (especially when drugs, alcohol and gambling is involved);
• And certainly, what I see most commonly in my practice, is couples where despite getting on well and having a good life together, the lovers’ side of things is wavering or has disappeared.

Enjoy the companionship as friends, manage the logistics of life as partners and feel the pleasure as lovers!

I’m back from running another gorgeous Couples Retreat in the Blue Mountains last weekend. I’m feeling all loved up myself from being surrounded by couples celebrating their love and honouring their sexuality as an expression of that love. It really is such a wonderful experience that I want to tell you all the good reasons to attend.

I was going to write this myself, and then I received this feedback from one couple who attended - and so I figured that rather than me waxing lyrical about it, it’d be much better for you to hear from the participants themselves!

Hi Jacqueline,

We want to give you some formal feedback on what was an amazing weekend.

We both feel it was THE BEST investment we have ever made as a couple.

We had so much fun on the weekend but that is just a fraction of the value as we learned tools that will serve us for the rest of our lives.

(1) We were hoping it would allow us to derivemore enjoyment out of our sex lives. These expectations have already been exceeded, and with so much more enjoyment and fun yet to explore we know it will only get better.

(2) We were also hoping this wouldbring us closer together as a couple,and again these expectations were exceeded.

(3) We didn’t expect to be given useful tools that wouldbring us closer together as a couple inallaspects of our lives. That was a truly incredible surprise!

(4) We also didn’t expect to be able toderive more pleasure out ofallaspects of life -from savouring the taste of food, to appreciating the beauty in the natural world, and everything in-between.

(5) The mix of spiritual and science suited us perfectly with our science background. The comparison of chakras to neural plexus was an inspired interpretation that put things in ways that allow people from any kind of background tounderstand the concepts.

(6) The couples retreat was a perfect way tolearn about the Tantric approach to sex.The interaction from other couples shows just how many similar issues other couples face and everyone is so encouraging and supporting, there is no judgement and the safe environment allows us to make some very brave steps both personally and as a couple.

(7) Thanks again. This really is your calling and you have an amazing gift to put people at ease and explain things so easily and provide a safe environment to allow us to share. It's very inspiring. Of course please thank your partner as well as his input really was amazing andhelped me personally more than I can say.

Till next time, we wish you the best professionally and personally. J&L

If you’d like to share that feeling with your beloved, please join me at one of my upcoming Couples Retreats:

• For the ultimate experience, join me in LoveLife Couples Bali Retreat for five days of deepening connection and heightening pleasure.
• And if you can’t get away for that long, come to a weekend Couples Retreat in the Blue Mountains.

A key to intimacy is expressing your feelings. Not your thoughts, your feelings: being able to share with your partner how you are feeling and being able to hear what he or she is sharing with you.

It's not an easy thing to do. More commonly people hold back out of fear of a negative reaction from their partner. So they end up playing this weird dance of trying to mind-read what the other wants and feels, and generally getting it wrong.

An exercise I give couples to improve this skill is every evening to have a chat over a cup of tea or coffee and take it in turns to share how you’re feeling.

Some people are fine with that level of guidance; others struggle and need more direction. If you’re in the latter category, here’s an activity for you.

Set aside some time for a chat, maybe after dinner, or if you’ve got young children, once they’ve gone to bed. Do not do this in front of the TV. Sit somewhere comfortable, and if it feels right, have a cup of tea together. Humans have been sharing over cups of tea for centuries. It’s comforting and bonding.

Now take it in turns to share five things from your day, in this order:

1) A good thing that happened today and how it made you feel.
2) A bad thing that happened today and how it made you feel.
3) A good thing that your partner did today and how it made you feel.
4) A not-so-good thing, a neglect, that your partner did today and how it made you feel (preferably small, until you get better at this).
5) Something you love about your partner in general and/or how you’re feeling at the end of this exercise.

So, each of you share how you’re feeling, then each of you share point two, then point three, until you’ve done all five. When you’ve finished, thank your partner for sharing, and tell them how that made you feel.

The important part is that you say how it made you feel. Not just ‘good’ or ‘bad’ or ‘pissed off’, be more specific, expand your vocabulary, such as: “I felt appreciated, as though you really cared” or “I felt really isolated and unsure of what to do”, i.e., be more expressive about what you felt or are feeling.

When you’re in the listening role, it’s important that you tune in to your own reactions. Be the watcher watching yourself. Note what your own emotional reaction is to what your partner is saying. Notice if you feel defensive, if you feel you want to justify yourself, if you feel you need to make them out to be wrong. It’s this response that causes people to hold their feelings in and not share. So, make sure that your focus is what your partner is saying, not your reaction to it. This also applies if you tend to go straight to fix it mode, or even if you go straight to soothing mode, as both these well-intentioned responses don’t let your partner feel heard.

So, listen, and repeat back what you’ve heard. That’s all.

The hardest one will of course be the something you did that made your partner feel bad. The important thing is simply that you acknowledge how they are feeling. You don’t have to fix it or justify it or anything for this exercise, just acknowledge their feeling.

Once you get in the habit of listening actively like this, your partner will become more comfortable with sharing their feelings honestly, because they know you can listen without judgment.

Similarly, your own level of comfort in sharing will increase because you’ll learn to trust your partner’s ability to listen without reacting badly.

This is mature relating. It’s not always easy, which is why you need to practice until it becomes second nature.

Then your relationship will evolve, in all areas, particularly sexually.

I'm always amazed at what happens when a couple is radically honesty with each other.

Let me share a couple of recent examples:

In one case, a young man told his wife that he didn’t find her sexually attractive and never really had. He had naturally felt he couldn’t tell her that for fear of insulting and upsetting her, but he was really finding it hard to have sex with her because of this feeling.

With my encouragement, he told her how he truly felt, which was, as expected, insulting and upsetting for her. However, because they were able to have this conversation from a gentle, open, sharing place, he could give her the space to sit with the information. There was no intensity of emotion on his part, no aggression, no judgment or condescension or fear, and this enabled her to sit with the news, process it calmly and accept it.

On his part, releasing this huge burden, this terrible secret he’d been keeping, freed him up enormously.

The outcome: he actually opened up to the possibility, and then the reality, that he did find his wife sexually attractive.

She found freedom in understanding what was behind their sexual problem, realized that now that she had the knowledge, she could make a choice of her own volition.

Now their hearts are open to each other, he’s not shutting himself off from her due to his secret, and she’s not resentful and confused because of his withdrawal. And guess what? Their sex life is improving.

In another case, a man in his mid-40s came to me after his wife told him she had never found him sexually attractive and had only married him because he was what she considered “good husband material” (which apparently didn’t include sexuality). Of course, it was hard for him to hear this, but because it was presented with gentleness and love, he was able to take this news and decide what to do with it. In this case he realized that he had been living quite unconsciously and has set out on a remarkable journey of self-discovery and growth.

What was required in both cases of sharing the information, was a level of unattachment to the outcome. Such honesty always brings with it the possibility of a strong negative reaction from the partner. But if it is done with an open heart, with space for the other to take the news and work it, then a positive outcome is inevitable. The outcome might not be quite what you had hoped or expected, but there is inevitably growth.

I’ve had the same experience in my own relationship, where my partner and I both realized we had been ‘putting up with’ several issues and holding back from speaking for fear of upsetting the other. Yes, we ‘experts’ have the same struggles as everyone, with the result that our relationship was becoming increasingly strained. Over a few radically honest conversations, we were able to craft a new type of relationship. How radical honesty pans out in the long run, who knows? But it will be better than before and after our sharing my heart was more open to him than ever.

Whether it’s an issue as big as not finding your partner sexually attractive, or something smaller, such as finding your partner too noisy or too quiet in bed (other recent examples from my practice), if you hold back the truth, you’re holding back energy from your partner, which leads to resentment and confusion and misunderstandings on both parts.

Honesty, radical honesty, is the best policy.

Honesty shared with love, with calm and with no judgment or expectation, magic happens.

What is Tantra?
 
 Essentially, it’s mindful sex. Or to be a little broader: mindful loving. Loving with presence and focus, fully engaged physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
 
 Mindful sex means that:

• your monkey chatter mind is stilled, so your brain can focus creatively and connectedly;
• your body has heightened awareness, fully using each of its five senses, so there is great feeling throughout the whole body;
• you’re focused on the whole body, and even beyond the body, not just the genitals;
• there is a palpable energetic flow within you and between you, you feel connected;
• your sexual play flows in peaks and valleys, from intensity to subtlety and everywhere in between;
• you communicate verbally and physically with ease and understanding;
• you feel both deep and light: deep in feeling and light in freedom;
• orgasms may or may not happen, it’s the pleasure of the process not specific outcomes that matter;
• the encounter leaves you feeling recharged and reinvigorated;
• you find that the whole of life improves, you are healthier, more vital and feel a positive joyful outlook on life.

With mindfulness a quick snuggle under the covers can be as profound as hours of play on a weekend away. It’s about what’s happening in the moment. A mindful moment can be an eternity.
 
 Mindfulness is a challenge to modern urban types whose lives rush by at a million miles an hour. So, if you can learn to incorporate it into your loving and love-making, not only will the experience of sex be so much better, you’ll become more mindful in the rest of life.

This might sound obvious, of course you should love your partner. But do you really? And if you so, how do you express that love? Are you treating your partner like your lover? Or are you treating them as your spouse/co-parent/boss/subordinate/flat-mate/carer/dependant/provider/nurturer…?

There are only two true feelings in life: love and fear. All the negative emotions are essentially some expression of fear. Anger comes from fear: so if you are narky or nagging or irritated or down right furious with your partner, you are expressing fear. Oppression comes from fear; so if you are controlling your partner, or allowing yourself to be controlled by them, you are expressing fear. And boredom comes from fear; so if you are allowing yourself to become stuck in a rut and not seek enjoyment in life, then you are expressing fear.

That fear comes from within. You are projecting your fear onto your partner in the form of anger, oppression/being oppressed and/or boredom. It comes from you.

To turn that around and allow yourself to truly love your partner, requires you to transform your fear into love. You have to own your fear and your expression of that fear, and then let it go. Allow the love in to yourself and allow it to flow out of yourself.

True love, not love based on fear, which many people mistake for love, is both strong and gentle. It’s forgiving and accepting and all-encompassing. As the fear goes the love fills up the space and the world becomes a different place.

The world really does need love, yet the media and the politicians and even the most well-meaning of people project fear out into the world, which only increases the negative. So it’s up to us to do the work on ourselves and in our closest relationships. That includes family and friends and colleagues, but most importantly it means that most primary of connections, your partner in life. This is the person with whom you have the extraordinary gift of being able to be completely open with, to the extent of sharing sexual intimacy. Nothing is as raw and vulnerable and truly open as real sexual intimacy (which is why so few people can experience it without a lot of application). Nothing else requires such a removal of fear and replacement with love. Your bedroom is the practice ground for love. Allow it there and transform the world. 

Love thy neighbour – start with thy partner.

It’s so hard when your partner has been unfaithful.

“How could this person I love, and who I thought loved me, do this to me? How can I possibly get over it? Should I even try…?”

These are the thoughts that plague you.

The first thing in moving forward is to realise they probably haven’t done it to you. Affairs are rarely initiated with malicious intent to deliberately hurt the partner, although hurt is inevitably the result. (If it was done purely with intent to hurt you, then you really do have a problem and shouldn’t be with that person.) It’s important that you accept that as hurtful as it is, the affair was not about you and not done with the intention to hurt you.

So, can you get over it? Possibly.

Should you try? Most definitely.

To deal with the affair and at least try to move forward is far braver and harder than just giving up and leaving.

There is always a reason why someone has an affair, and it’s generally because they are not happy, and the affair makes them feel better. So, to be able to move forward you have to understand what led your partner to have the affair in the first place. Once you’ve done that, you need to fix what caused it so there is no need for an affair, or any other ‘solution’ such as excessive drinking, drugs, overwork, or other unhealthy distractions from the misery of life.

I’ve spoken with countless people who have had affairs, as many women as men, and some of the reasons include:

• Feeling disconnected from their partner, not valued
• Too much pressure from their partner, feeling overwhelmed or criticized
• Living parallel lives and no longer feeling like partners, so feeling lonely
• Not being able to tell their partner how they are feeling, yet feeling they can share with their lover who understands them
• Bored with life and their relationship
• Not feeling desired sexually by their partner.

Affairs are intoxicating, as is any new relationship, so people tend to get drawn into them and find it hard to leave, even when the buzz wears off and the affair is no longer satisfying them. It is a kind of addiction as the chemicals in the brain function as with addiction: the ‘reward’ circuitry goes into overdrive with a dopamine high associated with the excitement and clandestine nature of the affair; but over time that is no longer satisfying, what gave you the high no longer works, yet you are still drawn to it craving the same reward.

If you understand the physiology and the psychology of affairs in general, and can establish what led to the affair, then it is easier to accept it and easier to move on.

It will still hurt though, and an important thing to understand is that your partner can’t actually heal the hurt, that’s something you need to do for yourself. That takes time.

There are different requirements for all three of the entities involved, that is: your partner, you and you as a couple:

- Your partner needs to be truly remorseful;
- You need to forgive your partner;
- You as a couple need to work on your relationship to ensure the conditions that led to the affair are fixed.

This is not easy, and parts of the process can be quite lonely. You have seen a side of your partner that you didn’t know about, a darker side, the scales have fallen off your eyes. You have to ask yourself the challenging question of: Can you still accept him or her even with these imperfections? And the even more challenging one, given the hurt and shame you’re feeling: What might have been your role in contributing to the affair?

These are hard questions. They are also questions that can lead to personal and relationship growth. If you and your partner can dig deep into yourselves and open yourselves up to each other with such honesty and realness that you can share and heal, then you will move forward together.

It’s also possible that the process means you decide that you can’t move forward together, but the process will enable you to move forward separately without bitterness and resentment, even with love.

One thing to be cautious about is that you don’t ‘resolve’ the issue by turning it into a power play where you as the betrayed partner take a holier-than-thou attitude, lording it over your partner who is constantly reminded of what a terrible person they are and therefore how inferior they are. This is not addressing the underlying causes and will not lead to an improved relationship.

It is essential that the underlying causes be addressed. Otherwise, your partner will have another affair, or reach for some other solution such as becoming an alcoholic. Or they will simply leave you.

Sometimes relationships do need to end, and an affair is a valid reason to end one. But it’s not inevitable.

Do the work and you may be pleasantly surprised at the outcome: a relationship with greater understanding, more depth and closeness, and more resilience.