Sensation
Page 9
‘… And I’m beginning to think that perhaps I have the smallest clitoris in the Western world,’ I confide. ‘Even when looking closely, T sometimes can’t find it and I have no idea how to direct him. The most sensitive upper left quadrant of the clitoris that you speak of seems to move?’
‘Don’t you mean upper right?’ says T.
‘I guess it’s upper right for you but it’s upper left for me when I’m lying down so I think of it as the upper left position – 1pm on the clock face.’
I talk, eager to avoid the more practical part of the lesson. This is like going to a music lesson and wasting time telling the teacher about your instrument.
‘If you’d like to lie down, Isabel? I’ll just check the position you are both in.’
She’s so matter of fact. Just relax, Isabel. Have to ignore the ‘WTF are you doing?’ questions racing around my mind. Just stop thinking. Breathe. I can’t believe I’m doing this.
‘You need to make sure that there is no strain on your back,’ she says to T.
‘Isabel, would you like another cushion?’
‘Yes, please.’
‘It’s important that the woman has enough support. You need to be 100% comfortable.’
‘OK.’ I try to keep breathing. I try to relax. Contradiction. Yes, I know.
They look at the matter in hand. ‘And there is Isabel’s perfectly normal-sized clitoris.’ Justine says.
I laugh. What a relief. Bless Justine for that observation.
I wonder if I’m really going to write about this later.
‘If you take the lube?’ She and T discuss finger positions and the angle of the arm – just as if he were playing a cello.
‘Be sure to give at least one instruction. OK, Isabel?’
‘OK.’ She’s so practical about it all. Amazing.
T says, ‘I’m going to touch you now,’ as the practice requires. This is so that the strokee can relax fully and nothing surprising happens, which would startle you and raise the vigilance centre in the brain and so prevent relaxation.
They discuss more or less lube and then he begins to stroke.
‘A little bit further up and to the right – just a tiny fraction,’ Justine says.
I feel more in tune.
‘And if you just adjust the angle of your finger so you are slightly more on the tip.’
I feel more sensation.
‘And if you could give an instruction, Isabel?’
‘Er – that feels like a good position. If you could just stay there.’ I manage to enunciate.
I have no idea where the 15 minutes goes. I lie there feeling very light and happy while they discuss technique in a goalless practice. This was certainly the weirdest experience of my life. So far. But it was wonderful. When the time was up we thanked Justine as if we had just been for any other kind of consultation. And walked out into the street as if it was all a dream. I was in a kind of exhilarated shock.
‘Good grief. I need a coffee. What did we just do?’
‘That was amazing, weird and, in a bizarre way, really wonderful,’ said T.
The following morning our usual practice was noticeably improved. Not that we have a goal of course. It just felt more, well – in tune.
• • •
We had just got used to the idea of being coached when Justine phones and asked if we’d like to join the London ‘OM Circle’. If you are in a relationship there is nothing to stop you using this practice exclusively with your partner. But they had yet more on offer. An entire community, previously unknown to me, has grown up around Nicole and the book. People who wanted to learn the OM practice found each other. People who had been practising a long time started to teach people who were new. Those who wanted to practise every day even moved in together and created OM community houses. And then some of this came to London. So in Central London (and by the time you read this they may be in a town near you) there is something called an ‘OM Circle’. No, really, I am not making this up. Groups of people who would like either to learn to be very good at stroking a clitoris or very good at knowing how to relax so that they can enjoy having their clitoris stroked – meet. You just have to go for a training session or attend a training day and then you can go to a group OM practice. The links are at the end of the book so you can consider whether you’d like to try any of this.
It sounds bizarre doesn’t it? But what it offers, for men, is the opportunity to learn how another clitoris responds to the stroke and for the strokee – well, me, the chance to be stroked by a different stroker with a different energy, and hopefully to learn something from that experience about receiving. Each evening has two 15-minute practices. If you go to the practice with a regular partner you have the option of either staying together for both sessions or having one session with your partner and one session with someone else.
‘But can’t you learn with just your partner?’
‘Yes, you can. But if you have a similar experience at each OM session, how do you know whether it’s you who is stuck or your partner?’
I toyed with the idea of holding interviews and auditions. ‘To apply, please send details of how many years’ practice you have. And please send a photograph along with a short essay, in less than 1,000 words, on why the OM practice is of interest to you and what you feel you could bring to this opportunity.’ But it doesn’t work like that. Sadly.
Is this all beginning to sound a little dodgy to you? Well, it’s certainly outside the box, isn’t it? And I can hear questions in the ether – let me answer just one of them. ‘What about hygiene?’ And the answer is that they have super-thin gloves that they use, once only of course, and everyone uses them unless they are touching their regular partner.
At first, I had no interest in going. The invitation horrified me. Neither Justine, nor another leading London teacher called Rachel who organizes these events, called more than once. The OM Circles are free so no one is making money from these nights. The option is just there to teach, learn and enrich your practice. But as the weeks went by – inevitably I suppose, I began to be curious. I teach the value of going outside the comfort zone. It’s a way of life that I believe in – continually challenging ourselves. I love what T and I are doing. I love the way that he strokes. But I’m still having difficulty knowing how to give him instructions. My perception of where he strokes me and where I’d like him to stroke more, or less – is vague. And I’m keen to learn. Maybe – if I become, briefly, the instrument of a man who is a more experienced stroker then I, as the instrument, may learn something valuable that I could then feedback to T?
I tell him about the circle and T goes white – I see this clearly even though he’s at the other end of the phone. But, as always on this journey, nervous but excited, he agrees. And he’s fine, until we arrive. Outside in the car, he goes into high anxiety.
‘I am experiencing more anticipation, excitement and utter dread before our chosen activity tonight than anything I’ve done in recent memory,’ T communicates with clarity. ‘I mean – I’ve thought about this and it’s another man touching my girlfriend. It’s taken us a long time to get here. You’ve allowed me, with a lot of initial trepidation, to go to a tender and gentle divinity in you. What’s happened to the sacredness of tantra?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t see this as less sacred. Perhaps I’ve done too much spiritual work. I see everything as sacred.’ But T wasn’t listening … he was talking.
‘On the other hand I ask myself, “I’m a bloke and I get to stroke another woman. So what’s my problem?”’
I breathe in but before I can answer he goes on.
‘I’ll tell you what my problem is. These are men and men want sex. You are beautiful and I’m sure you could go home with any of the men who are there.’
‘I don’t think so, T. The majority will be there with their partners and I think it’s reasonable to assume that they like their own women better than a stranger. I’m going home with you. And why do you assu
me that the second OM stroker will necessarily be better than you?’
My answers weren’t relevant. His objections went on.
‘But this is your most tender essence.’
‘Darling boyfriend – we don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.’
‘No, we’re here now so we may as well go in. Just remind me, why are we doing this?’
‘To learn. To learn about ourselves, each other and sexual energy.’
‘I have another fear,’ he said without pausing for breath.
‘I’m afraid that maybe it will be good for you. Or for me even. Why would we rock the boat? Why would we want to know what’s out there? My sexual relations with you are the best that I’ve ever had. Why would I want to endanger that?’
‘You can walk away if you want to. We can walk away if you’d like us to. I’m not attached to this. I’m just intrigued.’
‘Yes, but I’m also intrigued. I booked the session after all. I’ve driven us here. I’ve even found a parking place, dammit. We’re here. Why do we need other people to help us become better lovers? Can’t we do this on our own?’
‘Maybe we can. Maybe we can’t. Maybe it’s just faster like this.’
‘I’m afraid that some other man will stroke you better or that you’ll want to come back and I won’t. After all, there is more in this for you. You are getting stroked. I love your clitoris. I’ve looked at it a lot in the last couple of months. And when we go home I will not be the last guy to have touched you. And he doesn’t belong there. Unless you want him there. I mean, it’s your body.’
Do I want him there? I don’t even know who ‘he’ is. There is clarity in that he’s just an anonymous male. ‘Do you want to do this or not?’
‘No. Yes. No. Yes. Oh, come on. I’ve paid for the parking.’ So in we went.
• • •
In a rather beautiful studio, which is perhaps more traditionally used for ballet classes, was a room covered with yoga mats, cushions and a large number of very attractive people.
‘Goodness, T. Everyone here is beautiful.’ I guess to be here you have, at the least, the courage to go after what you want and either a relationship or the determination to find one. To be a man here you have to have a genuine desire to want to learn to please women. And to be a woman alone here – well, that’s courage. They all seem to have an almost vibrant positive energy. I don’t know why. It’s not as if I had consciously expected this gathering to be filled with the kind of low-energy people that I more often meet at spiritual gatherings (very loving but maybe slightly depressed) but this is quite different. For one thing there is an equal number of men and women. The organizers make sure of that. I have no idea how. I suppose no single man wants to cross London and then find that all the women are taken and no single woman wants to cross London in anticipation of a new experience and not have one.
A woman says, ‘Raise your hand if you need a number two for tonight.’ T and I both raise our hands and look around nervously. I see a harmless-looking man in a check shirt and move over to him. ‘Would you like to OM?’ he says, using the required words. ‘Yes, I would. I have a number one but if you’d like to be my two that would be perfect.’
T finds a number two woman. She smiles at me. I smile back. T comes over to check out the man who has found me. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll take care of your woman,’ he says graciously. Hearing me referred to as his woman, T looks comforted.
‘You will be my first ever OM Circle partner other than my regular partner,’ I say to him. ‘It’s an honour,’ he replies. T is happier.
‘So if you could move to your places for the first OM now?’ says the woman leading. Everyone else is settled.
‘There’s a spare place over there.’ T and I crossed the room nervously. No one is paying the least attention to the two newbies. Each couple is focusing on themselves.
I lie down on a mat with T. We’re both too hyped up to relax.
‘Damn, too much lube,’ T says. ‘Sorry.’
I laugh. There is a woman next to me moaning gently with pleasure. Oh, heavens, isn’t this the experience that I’m supposed to be having? She’s obviously more open than I am. ‘Comparison is the thief of joy, Isabel,’ I tell myself. Then I wonder who said that, was it Theodore Roosevelt or Franklin Roosevelt? Do I have my Roosevelts muddled up? Or was it Franklin’s wife, Eleanor Roosevelt? Wouldn’t it be more likely to have been her? She’s the amazing woman who said, ‘No one can patronize you without your consent.’ Learnt that one years ago. It’s rumoured he had a lover. It’s also rumoured that she did too and that they both knew and were happy with this arrangement. How interesting that they are known for those quotes. Maybe he used to patronise her and she compared herself to him and knew that this made her unhappy. Maybe she’d have been the better politician. Then I realize that five minutes has gone by and I’m completely in my head.
I become aware of more gently quiet moaning from another corner of the room. But mostly the room is quiet. Thank God for that. No demonstrations of ability to climax here. No one seems to be noticing anyone else’s process anyway. What is T doing? Come on Isabel, take some responsibility here, give an instruction.
‘That feels like good pressure, could you try a slightly different position?’ It always takes all my courage giving these gentle instructions.
‘Yes. Totally distracted. Sorry,’ says T.
‘Me too.’ I didn’t admit that I’d been thinking about possible dynamics in the Roosevelts’ marriage.
We have both lost anything that we learnt from our private lesson. It’s a disaster. The first OM ends. T and I are both too overwhelmed to be able to focus.
We are supposed to describe a sensation we each experienced during the OM but we just hug.
‘If the men could now move into place for the second OM,’ says a voice.
My rather charming man arrives. ‘I’m a bit nervous,’ I admit.
‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘So am I. I’ve only just done the training.’ Oh heck, I have a beginner. I lie there and actually the humour of the situation overtakes me. Normally I am nervous about giving instructions because somehow it’s about me. I allow my inhibitions and my co-dependent desire to look after someone else’s feelings to get in the way of my ability to give clear instructions. But now my fears desert me because this man needs help. I have to give instructions. He’s clueless.
‘That feels good and could you move a little and see if you can see the clitoris at all?’
‘Ah,’ he says.
‘Yes, that’s closer.’ (Say something positive first.) ‘Now, if you move a little closer to the centre?’
‘OK.’
‘That’s a better position. Now, in terms of pressure, if you could try using the tip of your finger rather than the pad? I think you are using the pad?’
‘Yes.’
‘Could you try a light, short stroke using the tip?’
Suddenly all my inhibitions have gone. I’m a feedback machine.
‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘These instructions are very helpful.’
He keeps going but he hasn’t established contact or isn’t yet aware that it’s possible to. He has my full attention but for the wrong reason. I’m thinking, ‘How do I direct him now? He’s way off. He doesn’t seem to know what he’s aiming for.’ I wonder who he is, whether he has a partner, what’s brought him here. Then I try to focus on the sensation but end up focusing on the lack of sensation instead. Then I try not to judge him or myself and just accept what is. It’s not as though anything he’s doing feels bad. It feels good. I just feel a bit like a cello where someone’s only playing one string rather tentatively. It was very endearing though. Very gentle. Perhaps it was perfect.
The 15 minutes ends. We thank each other rather bashfully and he disappears into the night. T appears. ‘How was it?’ I ask.
‘It was very different from you. She was a very different shape; I found it hard to find her clit. How was it for you?’
‘Oh.’
‘But T. He doesn’t stroke as well as you do.’
Some part of T needs to hear this I think.
I take him by the arm. ‘Can we go and eat now?’ I ask.
‘Yes, and can we go home and have sex after that?’
This is called ‘asking for what you want’. We’re learning.
• • •
It’s amazing how one adjusts. If someone had told me a year ago that I would be doing this on a Wednesday evening I wouldn’t have believed them. Last night T and I went to the OM Circle in East London. About 25 people gathering in the upstairs of a church building. I wonder if the clergy have any idea what we are doing in their sacred space? Of course I would argue that what we are doing is completely honouring to God – if there is a God. A part of a woman’s body exists which has no other purpose than to give the woman pleasure. Yet there are women everywhere that never have this part of their body touched and there are unhappy and frustrated men that would love to touch this part of a woman’s body and learn how to give pleasure – but never have the opportunity. Then there are the men that are married and whose wives go cold on them because they never experience pleasure, not because the man wants to withhold anything but because he simply has no idea how to create it. He’s probably worrying that his penis isn’t hard enough. So which world is crazy? This one, where men are learning and women are teaching them and receiving pleasure at the same time – or the more ‘normal’ bedrooms which may, or may not, be filled with pleasure?
We walk in for the weekly practice. Men are laying out mats. ‘Hello – my name’s Mary – what’s yours?’ A friendly smiling face greets me. ‘Isabel …’ I say. She looks so sane. ‘Have you been doing this long? I mean, coming here on a Wednesday night?’
‘I’ve been practising for about three months.’ She smiles. ‘Yes, it’s weird isn’t it? It’s amazing how quickly it becomes normal.’