Nicole has thought of everything. His ideal hand position is described. The man (or woman in a same-sex relationship) gently opens the labial lips to reveal the clitoris fully. Then he uses the thumb and second finger of his left hand to hold the lips open (and the hood back.) Then, with the first finger of the left hand the stroker simply learns to stroke the clitoris. He places the thumb of his right hand at the base of her introitus (entrance to her vaginal canal) and rests it there lightly but assuredly. It’s a very subtle process and it seems that Nicole has considered and found a solution for every possible difficulty that could come up. For example, for women who have trouble giving direction and who would experience difficulty saying, ‘I think you need to move a fraction to the right,’ she has the man ask questions to which the woman simply replies ‘yes’ or ‘no’. So a stroker might ask, ‘Would you like me to move a little to the right?’ Or, ‘Would you like a firmer stroke?’ Or even simply, ‘A different stroke?’
For the stroker who may be doing their best, and a braver strokee, she has a way for the person being stroked to give feedback that is not discouraging. So first you find something that is good, and then add a request to it. So it may sound like this: ‘Pressure feels good – a little faster please.’ Or, ‘Position feels good – a little lighter please.’ So Nicole has worked out a simple set of guidelines to make the communication between the partners as easy as possible.
It’s like learning to play a musical instrument. The stroker learns slowly but surely by feeling empathetically the result of the strokes on the woman. The truly liberating aspect of this practice is that it is not goal-oriented. In other words, the stroker is not trying to produce an orgasm in the woman. The only instructions to the person being stroked are ‘relax and open’. That’s it.
This idea fascinates me for several reasons: Firstly, it’s an easy, incredibly easy, way to focus on learning how to give pleasure to the woman. As we all know it is usually far easier for a man to receive pleasure from a woman than the other way around, so this seems like a practice that is well overdue. Secondly, it’s so simple; it doesn’t begin by asking me whether my earliest experiences were traumatic or assume that I am repressed or dysfunctional in some way. It’s simply lie down, open your legs, relax and enjoy. Thirdly, it’s about concentrating on sensation; whatever the sensation is, without judging it or pushing for more.
I’m almost perspiring with a mixture of terror and anticipation – just reading it. What the book describes is a long journey that both the stroker and the strokee go through. The stroker learns how to tune into the body of the woman. A man isn’t necessarily intuitive to the high levels of sensitivity that the clitoris seems to demand and a woman isn’t necessarily able to receive the pleasure that her clitoris can give her. So you learn together. And there are all kinds of promises, of a feeling of ‘electricity’ that the man can have travelling through his finger and through his body that comes from the woman. A woman being able to experience sensations more extraordinary and powerful than any ordinary orgasm can give. The book also speaks of this practice as being a source of energy for the woman and a powerfully empowering experience for the man. And some couples spend their evenings watching television?
I want to pluck up the courage to ask T to read the book and consider becoming my ‘stroker’. I order a second copy and sit down to write a letter. Later he suggests I copy the letter to you in full.
Dearest T
I can honestly say that out of all the scary things I’ve done in my life, giving you this book is the scariest. It feels like entrusting you with my whole life. That is not overstating it – you’ll see why as you read.
I place myself in your hands, grateful that your hands are capable, your spirit is willing and your heart is pure. Please know that it is not the strong confident woman who knows how to take care of you when you’re having a bad day, but a far younger and more vulnerable part of me speaking. But don’t worry, she comes to you willingly and all she wants is fifteen minutes of your time. Often.
Please be sensitive around this book and don’t crack jokes about it. ‘Normal’ sex is easier to combine with humour and maybe we will laugh if you are willing to travel this journey with me – but at first, just as the book says, it’s about safety and this requires more vulnerability than I’m accustomed to.
For my part, if you are willing to read and to do this with me – I promise to take the best care of your heart and your body that I am able.
So please read and let me know. Are you willing to learn all this with me and to be with me through the ‘ups’ and the ‘downs’?
I am breathing and waiting for your answer.
With fear and joy, xx Isabel
T said,
‘That was a really beautiful letter. I’ve read it about 25 times ... So it’s a sort of mixture of sex and meditation? Single point of focus, but instead of focusing on the breath I’m asked to focus on your clitoris?’
‘Yes, you could say that. Or on the sensation on the tip of your finger when it’s touching my clitoris.’
‘And I have to keep my clothes on?’
‘Yes.’
‘And look between your legs and not become aroused?’
‘As I understand it there is nothing wrong with you being aroused but the point is to channel the arousal correctly. Before you start the practice you are asked to describe what you see but using descriptive, not evaluative, language.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Because if you say to many women, “You’re beautiful,” they may not believe you. Many women have ambivalent feelings about their yoni, er – pussy. But if you say, “You have a darker shade of flesh on the inner lips than on the outer lips and your inner lips fan out slightly more to the left than to the right and make a petal shape,” or something like that, then no woman can argue with you because you are just describing what you are seeing and not putting a value on it. I can see that this would work to help women accept what the man is describing.’
‘So I’m not allowed to tell you that, as a man, I find what I see beautiful?’
‘Nope.’
‘And that makes sense to you?’
‘Absolutely. T, would you read the book?’
‘My other reading has been put aside. It’s been thrown out of the window.’
So T reads and agrees, enthusiastically, to become a student of the Orgasmic Meditation practice.
‘I’ve read the first four chapters. Can we start now?’
‘No. Please read the rest of the book.’
He was keen.
He created an evening when we had 15 minutes. The time demand being so small is really helpful. As the woman you don’t feel that you’re being overly demanding. The practice encourages the couple to have the ‘nest’ away from the bedroom and to keep this practice entirely free from the rest of your sex life. Nervously we set up cushions on the floor, some rugs covered with a towel to lie on. We had acquired some basic lube as we decided that the £15 official lube that came with the programme online was overpriced and probably just coconut oil anyway. Then we attempted to find the correct position, both feeling rather clumsy and awkward.
‘Does my leg go here?’
‘Ow! No, that can’t be right.’
We fumbled around.
‘It says that we need a light so that I can see clearly.’
‘OK, so put the extra light on.’
‘And if I put my iPhone on 15 minutes that should work.’
‘OK.’
‘What sound do you want at the end? A car horn? Space travel?’
‘I don’t think so. The harp please.’
‘Hold on.’ He got up again.
‘OK. Well, I’ll lie down then.’
‘Is it too cold in here?’
‘Yes. Can we put the heater on?’
‘Are you OK with that cushion?’
‘No. I don’t want one with a donkey looking at me on it.
It seems weird somehow. Pleas
e give me a cushion without a face.’
‘OK. Can I lean my back against the sofa do you think?’
‘Yes, it’s important that you are comfortable all the time.’
‘Is this cushion the right height for me to sit on?’
‘No, pass the Zafu.’
And so … eventually … we started our first Orgasmic Meditation.
Afterwards we took out pen and paper. I wrote,
Session One
God, I was scared. Why would it be so scary to open my legs and have a man stroke my clitoris? But he was so gentle that he stopped it being scary. T admits that he really doesn’t know where anything is – which is understandable because, based on precision of feeling alone, neither do I. At first when he started – beautifully softly – it felt as though he was stroking the outside of the hood rather than the most sensitive area. It felt good though and I wasn’t sure whether to re-direct him or not. He was tender with his touch and it felt warm. I did feel gentle warmth through my body. I wondered if he needed to hold the hood back further or whether my clit wasn’t erect. (Honestly, I really feel as if I ought to have more understanding of my own body.) And it felt as if we needed a little more lube … Fantastically moved that he is willing to do this with me. Position felt comfortable. Clit still feels slightly warm. Appreciative of the attention.
T wrote,
Easy. Comfortable. I’m a bit clueless about the clit. How to find it precisely and how to stroke in the manner that we are supposed to. Isabel was great – not nervous the way she thought she would be. Or at least, didn’t let on. She was willing to try. To be. To allow.
I didn’t feel clumsy – rather just clueless. Hard to open her with just thumb and second finger and stroke with the index finger. The index finger needs to be soft and mobile and the other fingers firm.
This was definitely one of the most extraordinary things I’ve done in my life so far. But a practice that requires only 15 minutes isn’t hard to find time for. After Session Two I wrote,
T was concentrating on the outer lips and I really wanted him to pull back the hood and say ‘Oh, that’s where it is and what it looks like’ – so that he could enlighten me too. I mean, I’ve seen it but it’s not as if I look in a mirror regularly to examine the details. T experimented with stroking on slightly different positions today. It’s hard to guide him because when he first touched the tip of the clit I said, ‘Please don’t touch there, it’s too sensitive.’ And then later I wanted him to. There were times when he was stroking when there was a wonderful heat in me that made my hands and nipples tingle and at other times I felt absolutely numb. It’s very hard for me not to enter into self-judgement at these times and feel that I ‘should’ be responding differently. I even found myself worrying about T’s finger. As if he can’t look after himself. But then there are moments when I do remember to breathe and just go back to focusing on the sensation. It’s wonderful when a beautifully subtle sensation fills my body that comes directly from the stroking and it sometimes takes a couple of hours to subside.
It’s scary but I wish I knew whether T is stroking the hood or the clit itself. Look forward to being able to be sure of the difference.
And he didn’t write anything ... the children returned from school. Sometimes real life takes over. Fifteen minutes is really 30 minutes by the time you’ve laid out the ‘nest’, calmed down, had an optional hug, done the practice and tidied away. But it’s still easy to fit into the day.
We made time daily; neither of us in much of a hurry but just happy to have found this practice – a different way of enjoying time. A bit like sex, yet not like sex. A bit like meditation, yet not much like meditation.
We bought the official ‘OneTaste’ lube and found, after all, that it was worth the money. Coconut Oil is very good for massage and, er, other practices, and many of the commercial lubes are horrible. For this practice you need something with the right viscosity. They hand-make theirs out of olive oil, beeswax, shea butter and grapeseed oil and use only organic ingredients. As they use it every day they obviously care a lot about the feel of it. So, if you want to have a go at all this I recommend getting their lube.11
After session 12 I wrote,
Today there was a moment when T and I really felt for the first time the tip of his finger on my clitoris. I’m seriously beginning to worry that I may have an exceptionally small clitoris as T seems to be having such trouble finding precisely the right point but Nicole’s book says that it’s common for the man to have trouble. We women have so many folds of flesh and the clitoris can be elusive – it appears and then disappears again. And, like a subtle creature that retreats into itself, it seems, it/she needs to be lured out and can retreat and vanish again with surprising speed if the pressure is wrong.
It has been very hard for me to give direction and to communicate. Even when it’s going well it’s hard for me to guide him. Today T broke with the guidelines in the book and gave a direct instruction. ‘Just breathe and relax,’ he said. So I did. A bit. I know my job is to ‘open to sensation’ as Nicole calls it. ‘Just focus on sensation.’ But even that feels hard.
There was a moment today when it did feel like very delicate waves of light going through me. A very gentle sensation and a beautiful one.
What is so delicious about the feeling of T’s finger in contact is how subtle it is. And he felt it too today … just a little. I am so grateful to him for being prepared to go on this journey with me.
Meanwhile T was writing too. He wrote after that session,
Feeling more confident. Perhaps. Able to find my way around the many layers of skin. I need to breathe. I need to get more feedback. Seeing how this could be important for us. For her – sure. But maybe for us too. Maybe this practice addresses some of my issues of connection and vulnerability. Need to lean forward and really see. Need to go in deeper but equally be soft.
And my notes after our 14th practice read,
One of the things that these sessions are bringing up for me is how scared I am. Despite the fact that it’s always pleasurable – there is a part of me that dreads them as if I were anticipating a dental appointment. Once they start they are always lovely so I have to wonder why I almost do my best to avoid them. I realize that I’m unaccustomed to feeling that what is between my legs is a source of pleasure – it has been more a source of grief. My primary associations with the word ‘vagina’ would be ‘blood’, ‘pain’, ‘cystitis’, ‘birth’ and these words would all come before ‘pleasure’. And I suppose a source of pleasure for men, less for me. So this, which is for the woman’s pleasure is an alien experience. How absurd that this should be so.
I believe that I offered a line of feedback in the correct format. ‘That pressure feels about right. Could you try a little further to the right?’ It’s SO subtle though. I’m encouraged by Nicole’s instruction in her book: ‘see if you can feel just one stroke’. Because I focus on that and I can feel always feel one.
Just as with a musical instrument, you may not be able to play skilfully but from the very first lesson, if you are well taught and you concentrate, you can make a beautiful sound from the first note; so it is with this practice.
• • •
T and I are not living together, so we can’t practise every day as they recommend, but we are managing two or three orgasmic meditation sessions a week. We kept referring to the book and I kept doing my research and then I found out that the author, Nicole, was coming to London to give a talk. I already loved her from her writing. I found her loving, brave, tender and empowering.
I wrote to her and asked for an interview. I offered to change all my plans in order to see her and, much to my delight, she agreed. I played with the ‘record’ button on my iPhone and set off, joyfully, to meet the woman who had written this amazing book and brought this whole new experience into my life. On my own and on behalf of all of us, I had a few questions for her.
An Interview with the Clit Whisperer – Nicole Da
edone
I arrive in a smart, white, flat that some clever person had rented for Nicole on her visit to London. Nicole is the founder of ‘OneTaste’ – which teaches OMing internationally – and her staff know how to take care of her.
Nicole doesn’t walk. She moves with a mixture of a glide and a bound. She is an astoundingly beautiful, healthy and sexy woman, and she celebrates and enjoys that. But it’s not about her having a big ego. I didn’t feel from her any of the ‘I’m impressive, aren’t I?’ feeling that you get with people who look great but underneath are insecure and so are trying to impress you. Nicole felt free from needing to think about herself. She’s done her work on herself and today was meeting me so she put all her concentration on my needs in the interview. It’s easy to tell that she has done her spiritual work as well as her sexual work. She had nothing to prove; she isn’t concerned about how my impressions may reflect on her, she’s just having fun. She’s like an Afghan Hound – friendly, but not attached; enjoying you but not collecting you; interested but not judgemental; informative but not preachy. I’d enjoyed her book so much I was afraid that she might not live up to my expectations but instead she exceeded them. It is rare to meet someone so free. I didn’t have to explain anything. I could just get on with the interview. So I did. I sat on her white sofa and ate too many of her raspberries.
Sensation Page 7