by Susan Stark | Jan 13, 2025 | Uncategorized
Most recently I am noticing how difficult it can still be for me to say “no” to another person.
To turn down their offer, however wonderful it might all sound.
To say no thanks, to their desires and invitations, often knowing that my response will most likely land hard.
To be with another in their experience of disappointment, without rescuing or minimising what it evokes in each of us.
To meet their expectation with softness and care, while honouring the limits I feel within myself.
This is a practice I have explored for many years, and the deeper I go the more edges I find.
At times I feel skilled and embodied in my awareness.
I can stay in my lane and not fall on the trip wires hidden beneath the surface of my knowing.
I can say no, without needing to puff myself up in a masquerade of bigness.
I can decline without blowing my discomfort through another.
Other times, the “no” still sticks in my throat and feels almost impossible to say.
by Susan Stark | Oct 12, 2024 | Uncategorized
Our experiences of trauma shapes our nervous systems and impacts how we navigate sex and intimacy. Read how decades of working as a sexual trauma counsellor has left its mark on me.
by Susan Stark | Oct 12, 2024 | Uncategorized
Have you ever had the experience of being in the presence of another human being, who deeply knows and cherishes their sexual self and is able to ‘sit back’ with it in their own body.
A person who can slow down and bring themself to the present moment with nowhere else to be.
Someone with whom you feel so comfortably seen without a word being spoken.
Whose touch feels so electric as they attune to the unique felt sense of you.
Chances are, if you have had this experience, it still lives in your body and memory, and you are feeling it right now as you read.
This is the essence of good sex. It is our ability to slow down and have a bandwidth to pay attention, that allows us to step out of life’s fast performance and agenda lane, and into the depth and beauty of now.
by Susan Stark | Aug 5, 2024 | Uncategorized
Life is meant to be a date with the Erotic.
A flow of aliveness and connection to vitality.
An expression of creativity and beauty.
Being in this moment, now and embracing the pleasure before us.
This is our essence.
Lost in the mind-field of life.
Trapped in the constant grid to be more, do more, have more.
We have lost our way.
by Susan Stark | Feb 21, 2024 | Somatic Sex & Intimacy
Chris had been seeing a talk therapist for a few sessions. It was useful, but not much was changing in the bedroom. Chris has been married for 29 years and has two children. He and his partner got along ok, except when it came to sex. “My sex life is dying and I...
