What receives our emotional intensity manifests into form. We develop an identity that becomes an attachment to that form by relationship. The greater the emotional intensity created by the raw material (our time, resources, energy, money, awareness, presence), the more disconnected we become from our true nature. The nature of a thing is more important than the form of a thing, per my man Brok from God of War Ragnarok. Our role in this is to attach, do nothing, release, and in that rhythm, hold true to our core idenitty. Hopefully this makes more sense as I talk through it.

In this episode of Selfed, I set out to talk about sex and ended up reflecting on reciprocity. Through the lens of the 69 position, I explore how life is a dance of giving and getting, of learning to balance energies that often feel off, especially after grief, loss, and transition.

I share the aftermath of a breakup that shook the ground beneath me literally and figuratively. From moving across the country three times, losing my home in a tornado, to letting go of a community I once gave to and received from, I’m coming to terms with the cost of identity in spaces that were never truly mine. I draw parallels between corporate spaces and sex education circles where shared language isn’t enough when shared identity takes priority.

This is a vulnerable reflection on longing, misrecognition, and the truth that not everyone reciprocates. I name the discomfort of realizing some people I thought were friends weren’t, and the truth that if folks wanted to hear my side, they would have asked by now.

So here I am, 69-ing with life. Givin’. Gettin’. Learning. Trusting myself to do my own thing. Choosing spaces where reciprocity and accountability are the baseline, not the exception.

This journal entry is about recapping my experience at Zoukfest NYC. Brazilian Zouk is a form of dance that’s around 30 years old and is born from Lombada. It’s sensual and . . . that’s all I can remember from my lessons. But I started learning this in August and got an immersive experience this past weekend in workshops and there were big emotions that came up for me as someone learning not only to dance Zouk, but to learn to dance PERIOD.

Today I talk about how learning to dance has brought light to other areas of my life reflective of my resistances to expressing my rhythm. I recognize podcasting, sex, working out, and Yoga are spaces where I let my rhythm express through those vehicles, and Football, relationships, and work have all been mechanical spaces where the mechanics have come easily but expressing rhythm wasn’t safe. Check out this episode of Selfed and see what works for you.

Oh as it relates to the title, I speak about the law of compensation from the “Fullmetal Alchemist” anime perspective on equivalent exchange. I spoke about how the weight of what I put into my identity from my last relationship and environment had to be let go of, freeing seemingly infinite charge for potential and possibility. Where I’ve given my presence, that freed up energy has allowed what aligns to materialize in my orbit. I speak to consciously making that shift into other areas of life.

I make some connections between the mechanics of doing versus the authentic expression of being. I’m taking Brazilian Zouk class and I recognize how I do one thing is how I do everything. In football, I was mechanical and it was “enough” to get by and to my goal. In relationships, work, it was all the same, but where I broke through this was in Yoga, running my nonprofit, podcasting. I find the most success when the mechanics become tools to use and this video here really put rhythm into a visual for me: https://youtu.be/2UphAzryVpY?feature=shared

That video showed me what looks like atomic motion in action as I try to stop conceptualizing dance and just, express my own rhythm. It’s the same as finding my voice, being myself, living authentically, it’s just within the game of something where it can be shared and experienced elsewhere.

The things I’ve done, I can do mechanically, but I recognize there’s so much more that translates from rhythm into dance to rhythm in any identity expression. When I bring MY rhythm to that which has a template or flow, I’m free to play within the “rules” of it without making the rules the game. In doing so, I’m free to play! I’ve been seeing that everywhere lately and the resistance I have to release is of my own limitations to locking in to the mechanics.

I’m in a place of feeling fulfilled and recognize this state as damn near opposite what I was just 2 months ago. My therapist helped me process some things and I share about that session and how hard it was to say out loud, AND how much growth I’ve had since starting therapy in 2020. Regardless how I can’t stand my therapist, he’s good at his job and helps me show up without using ya’ll to process TOO much rawness.

This episode I make a confession public about how I’ve been using AI to learn about the cosmos from the level of quantum physics. I’ve been teaching myself the language of spirituality in a way that makes sense to me. I reflect on how I’ve been using the nervous system in place of the solar system and I relate this to having had some of the best sex I’ve ever had most recently sharing intimacy in mutually present interactions. The pressure of performance has faded to the side and it’s now about the quality of the connection moreso than just for me to be out here catching bodies. A healthy and regulated nervous system in connection with another healthy and regulated nervous system has so much potential to become something more magnetic. I like my analogies because I envision 2 star systems syncing up and intensifying their gravity and impact. Relationships I enter feel more like that and the feeling of that presence is to me, what makes the sex great!

I liked the wordplay on this one as I speak to exercising the remembrance of the joy of curiosity and exploration! The Sex Down South Conference in 2023 was an incredible experience for me, 2024 was quite different and I wasn’t myself, and this year (2025) it was like I picked up from where I left off. I’ve been reminded by the Universe to just play, and I gave myself permission to do just that, and while it shouldn’t be a surprise, I was very surprised at how supported I was in my play.

Healing happened for me this weekend and I appreciate the space, and all the energy involved supporting that. I was reminded I can ask for what I want and that there are people enthusiastically willing to give me that, but I gotta get past the challenge of how uncomfortable it has been for me in the past. This was a healthy practice!

Sometimes as men, we mature emotionally at the expense of women’s emotional labor. Fortunately soon after a first date I caught that for myself. While she presented herself as a safe container for me to express these raw thoughts, it still felt like progressing forward would just be more of that.

2025 has been a long year and the first half I dealt with lots of compounding events that despite 7 months passing since my breakup, there’s still healing necessary n out just from my relationship ending and what came with that but the time I didn’t make for grief has come around and MADE me make time for it now.

I talk here about processing the avoidance while also looking to lean on to the safe spaces for me to practice existing in this identity that feels most aligned for me, but still I face internal resistance not to moving on but leaning in to this identity with people who can help me, and want to be there for me rather than trying to fill a blank space necessary for that self I thought I was to exist.

So what do you do with this into? Find out in this episode.