Chris Legg, LPC

In the recent Seminar for Men, I quickly referenced the different engagements with sexuality – erotic, illicit and intimate.

I have gotten questions about it, so, in preparation for the rest of the articles on “insights helpful to men into regards to communicating treasure-hood to their spouses through sexuality” (or some other equally subtle and well-thought out title).  The basics of what the treasure principle that I am talked about can be found at:  (http://chrismleggcounselor.wordpress.com/2010/08/15/a-new-treasure-principle/)

So, with no further ado:  Thoughts on the different facets of Experiencing Sexuality

There are at least two different ways to engage sexually… at least these two different ways of experiencing sex, and maybe three.

I have to start somewhere, so here is as good a place as any… First, a person can engage with sex in a way that is primarily erotic.

The Nature of the Erotic experience of Sexuality

I have already explained the Greek concept of eros, as I understand it, in the article about 5 different Greek words for love. (http://chrismlegg.com/2009/10/01/5-greek-words-for-love/).  In this usage, I am more closely aligning the word with our common modern English treatment, though the Greek certainly still applies.

In this expression or experience of sexuality, the sex is experienced for its own sake, and for the sake of the excitement, pleasure, and/or emotions of it.  One erotically engages with another person sexually in order to experience sex, and to receive (and give) the pleasure that can come with it.  There is nothing inherently wrong with this, so far as I can see, but it must be understood as limited…

…like icing… or candy… or dessert.   It can be a wonderful thing; but if someone tries to live on it, they will eat more and more and more and the more they eat, the more malnourished they become.  The erotic experience of sexuality is meant to be enjoyed, but it would be wise to remember that it doesn’t have the ability to nourish long term.  That is why if it is the only way that a person engages with sexuality, they always have to keep working at making it more, different, more extreme.   To reiterate yet again, there is nothing wrong with the erotic experience of sex any more than it is wrong to have dessert as a part of a meal.

There is, however,  a subheading under eros that is pretty much always based in sin…

… the illicit experience… the hidden, shameful, or guilty experience.  In fact, this can be one of the most powerful aspect of erotic sexual experiences.   Some people are addicted to it.  It is extremely powerful, but it is always short-lived.   This is the power of pornography, affairs, sometimes even just the pursuit stages of a relationship. 

It is toxic to a healthy sexual relationship.  In fact, this may explain why God’s Word calls for premarital abstinence… most early and virtually all pornographic expressions of sex are illicit in nature!  Hidden, shameful, abusive, selfish sexuality is common before marriage – especially in adolescence (or earlier), when most people experience “adult” sexuality for the first time.  If you suspect that you are somehow addicted to the illicit expression of sexuality, one great resource is http://www.pinegrovetreatment.com/.  Carnes is the expert on these issues.

Erotic sex is essentially what our culture understands, and virtually (and sometimes literally) worships.   Even though I believe that most of the erotic aspects of sex are a wonderful gift of God, like all things connected to the flesh, it has little power across time.  It must be re-fed in always newer and better ways… like food and drink.  When engaged with in wisdom, humility, and submission, they are sweet.  When made a part of the overall sense of nourishment, they are a wonderful pleasure… but when worshipped or idolized, they are eventually poison to the system.

I mentioned that this is the expression of sex that the World understands.  It prefers the illicit but understands the erotic.   One of the most clear evidences of this can be found in the world’s solutions to any sexual problems.

Grab any magazine from the checkout lines, or purchase a merely secular book on helping with sexual problems (don’t, by the way).  “Sixteen ways to spice up your sex life” on the cover of a women’s magazine will involve virtually nothing but new ways to bring more eros (like lingerie or something a little kinky) or even more often, illicit expressions of sexuality (pornography or other ways of involving other people).  The world’s assumption is:  if there is something wrong with your sex life, it must not be erotic or illicit enough.

That assumption, in my experience, is almost always inaccurate.

Generally, in my experience, when someone has a dissatisfactory experience of their sexual life, it is because they ONLY have illicit or even erotic expressions… so, to paraphrase the Apostle Paul, let me show you a more excellent way…  Next week about this time!

The other way that a person can experience sexuality is intimately.

If illicit sex is about experiencing the dark or shameful excitement of doing something “wrong” and erotic sexuality is about experiencing the joys of sex, then intimate sexuality is about experiencing  and knowing another person.

In the intimate expression of sex, the purpose of the sex is the most-complete possible engagement with your lover.  Your desire is for them… not primarily for sex.

Think of it this way:  I ask a bud to go throw the football.  He says “nah, I’m not really interested in throwing the football.”  Then I have two choices… I can say “ok, then I will find someone else who might be interested in tossing the football”… this choice would indicate that football was the interest – what was irreplaceable to me was football.  Obviously, with something like football, even if someone was as insecure about not being chosen as I am, they would probably be fine with it….

… or, I could say “well, then, bro, what would you like to do?”  In this, I would be making it clear that the intent of the request was getting time with the person.  The person is a priority over the activity, get it?

Intimacy is about knowing another person.  The more intimately I know them, the more I know what is going on inside of them – their thinking, ideas, beliefs, etc.  I think it is a mistake when speakers, pastors, etc. use “intimacy” as a euphemism for “sex.”  I think it is confusing.  Certainly two people  can have intimacy without it having anything at all to do with sexuality.  This confusion is another reason I wanted to write this article.

It is easy to see why or at least how the two got confused.  As its creator intended, sex is meant to be experienced intimately, and it also encourages intimacy.  It is meant to be intertwined with sex, like baptism and salvation for the Christian… however, they are not interchangeable and you certainly can have one without the other.  This unavoidable intertwining, I assume, is why “intimacy” has become a nice way of saying “sex”, but it leads to confusion… and God knows we don’t need any MORE confusion in this area.

There are some very significant consequences of the expression of intimate sexuality.  First, unlike erotic or illicit sex, it is an investment that grows.

One of the lies of modern psychology about marriage is that being good at sex (as a skill set, like skiing, or swimming) is important in marriage.  This MIGHT be true if every man or woman appreciated and enjoyed the same things sexually and in the same way.  However, they don’t.

I had some clients in the past who were both sex professionals… and they were married.  Why were they in counseling?  Because they were unable to enjoy the sex life that they wanted in their marriage.  Believe me, they had all the skills and experience they needed… and they looked like Greek gods.  Their eros meters must have been off of the chart.  However, as I said before, “generally, when someone has a dissatisfactory experience of their sexual life, it seems most often because they ONLY have illicit or even erotic expressions.”  Maybe this is part of why sexual experiences between future spouses before marriages often have to be healed as part of marriage counseling… maybe, but I don’t know.

The truth is that in marriage, the fulfillment is about intimacy, not sex… including in regards to sex. 

Make sense?

Again, maybe… maybe this is why people who have something of an expertise in sex aren’t more (in the anecdotal experience of this therapist) likely to have a great or satisfactory sexual aspect to their marriage; but, people with a “PhD” in their spouse do!

Hope for us:

All around us are examples of broken, shallow, empty, hopeless examples.  We have taken God’s great precious and valuable gift of sex, taken it out of its protective glass case of marriage and begun to treat it as common and cheap… a thrill of empty calories rather than a satiating meal of intimacy…

but all we need is the hope of it having been done well… a different kind of example…  A path worn well enough to follow.

I have one:  my grandparents were married 62 years before my grandfather died.  Few of us will ever know that kind of intimacy.  I don’t mean to be odd about this, but I assume that my 84 year old grandmother did not compete well in the erotic arena… but can you imagine how there would be no one on Earth capable of competing with her in the intimate arena?  And they didn’t have just time, but devotion, love, knowledge and passion.  My wife and I model our marriage after theirs.

As time passes and the “ravages” of age set in, our erotic power may fade… but our intimate investments can compound.  I am certain my grandfather would not have traded for any woman anywhere.

I have an example.

I intend to be another.

You?

Keep looking for more articles describing the rest of the teaching about sexuality that I went over at the Seminar.  My goal is that all of us be able to communicate to our wives (and families) that they are treasure.  I don’t want to leave sexuality out of that discussion.  If this is your first article to read, let me encourage you to go back to the Phalanx page and start the materials to men to start getting the complete picture.

For the ladies reading this as well, let me strongly recommend Shannon Ethridge’s book The Sexually Confident Wife  - it deals with many of the issues that keep women from enjoying a powerfully sexually intimate relationship with their husband!

Brother to Brother

Chris