Erotic Intelligence: Do you have it?
We’re talking ‘intelligence’ here, so right from the start you should understand that if you are addicted to pornography, whether it’s performance porn (as in porn videos), or exhibitionist porn (as in Twitter), or you need to look at images of men to arouse yourself, or need to pose for other men to have a sense of identity and worth, you do not have erotic intelligence.
As men, whether straight or gay, we are subjected to – and subject ourselves to – different standards in our day-to-day lives but even more so in our erotic lives. Men have to constantly be prepared for rejection, failure, defeat at some level – it’s just that way in western society; we call it competition -, men have to deal with anxiety associated with a priori inadequacy, until proved otherwise.
The message of toxic cultural conditioning is that men have to prove themselves. It’s simply not true. What is true is that you’re born a male but you have to attain masculinity. But to be honest; that is, to be honest with ourselves, we’ve set ourselves up, and we do it self-deflatingly and Oh! so very well.
Most of the men I have mentored or who with whom I have worked have no idea who they are. That becomes very difficult for me, because I have to know something about the man but if he can’t be honest or doesn’t know himself, good mentoring becomes impossible. Any man, pick one – maybe the one in the mirror – has one personality on the street, one on the job, one with their families, and yet another one for his partner. And you thought it was hard to juggle multiple men in your life? Most of you are juggling multiple men in your heads! Do you wonder that depression and self-destructive behavior is so common in men?
We men generally, but especially we gay men, have to adopt a different mindset, we have to have a change of heart not only regarding the outside world around us but also regarding the inside world within ourselves. We have to have one mindset: We are good enough! And we have to stop thinking that Mr. Perfect is going to be interested in us. Unless you are perfect, and no one – including myself, whom I know comes even close to perfect, you’re gonna lose. And who likes a loser?
Not very long ago, a man contacted me because he saw a “profile” picture on Facebook. Like so many others, he assumed that the picture might be me, although it was clearly not captioned as me nor was it “real.” If he had taken the time to read my timeline or profile before contacting me, and if he hadn’t become infatuated with a fiction of his own making, he would have done much better. But that’s the problem with many of the men both off- and online: they’re looking for a fiction, a fantasy; they’ve lost contact with reality, with their human need for flesh-and-blood relationship, and they are too ready for a quick fix with Mary and her four sisters.
Online social media has become pornographic and masturbation has become the new relationship. Guys have become so out-of-touch, literally, so desperate that they think that if they send a picture of their butts, cheeks spread wide, or their dickpics, or of a clip from some sordid porn flick, that someone is going to be interested in them as a person. It’s really pathetic. How can you respect someone or even be interested in him if that’s his identity or if he’s got such low self-esteem?
When someone sends me a shot of his butt or his junk, I ask him outright, “Is that all you are?” When they don’t respond, I have their answer. I can only hope that my question might make them take a step back and re-examine themselves. Maybe they’ll see how depraved and perverse they’ve become. Or maybe not?
Well, now that we all know what erotic stupid is, let’s get back to my topic: Erotic Intelligence. Erotic Intelligence is a personal development process, and very similar to general intelligence, emotional intelligence, and spiritual intelligence. Describing erotic intelligence (EI), Rafia Morgan writes:
Well, that’s all well and good for you if you’re alone and intend to stay that way – as many out there do – but what about when you’re with someone new or someone already special? Doesn’t EI come into play then, too? Of course it does!
Even a 5-minute quickie encounter is a sort of relationship, and there’s some sort of infantile EI involved. The same applies to a so-called one-night stand.
It’s there to some degree – maybe not a lot but it’s still involved. But what about those evolved men among us who really want relationship, even romance? What is erotic intelligence in relationship with another man?
In Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ we explore that question and many others. There are a number of steps that we have to take, it’s all work, and most men don’t want to work at a relationship, and are doomed to become cyber-pervs or chronic masturbators. Then there are the elite erotic Warriors among us, who find the sacred in everything they do, and they work at doing it right; for them it has to be right, real, and true. For them Truth is the only right answer, the only answer.
Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ is a system and an entire ongoing process. To reduce it to “a number of steps” would be to do the program and my followers a great injustice. So I have to make it clear that what I’m going to describe and discuss below, and the ”steps” is just the surface of a vast ocean. Let’s have a go at it anyway.
©2020/2021. Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠ and H.W. Vadney MDiv. (Daka Karuṇā (करुणा) T.).All rights Reserved. This document is considered proprietary and confidential. Permission to publish this article is granted provided attribution is recognized without prejudice to the author’s rights. Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠, Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Timacy℠, and Daka Karuna are alteregos of H.W. Vadney MDiv. Homoerotic Tantra℠, Mascul-IN-Touch℠, and Homoerotic Tantra:Mascul-IN-Touch℠, Hesion℠, and Mascul-IN-Timacy℠ are proprietary service marks claimed by H.W. Vadney MDiv.
