Heather Shannon (00:01.089)
Hello, my loves. We are back with part two of the Pathway to Passion. And for those of you who may be missing guest episodes, don’t worry, they are coming back. We just had our 100th episode celebration, so that was a bit of an exception. And we also had some rescheduling due to health issues and hurricanes and all of that. But we do have some exciting guest episodes coming up soon.

And a couple announcements, we do want an intern again. So we had a lovely intern for quarter four of this year, helping us with the podcast. And there were some family matters that needed to be addressed and so she’s not able to complete the internship. And we are looking for a new podcast intern. So if you are curious to learn about podcasting, about sex education, about sex therapy,

video editing, social media, could be a really good fit for you. And reach out to us at askasextherapistpodcast at gmail.com. All right, and then we also still have, so the day this comes out, if you’re listening on Monday the 21st, you have until the end of the day today, so 11.59 p.m. Eastern to join our 100th episode scavenger hunt.

So basically if you find the little moving Giphy in the video episodes on YouTube, it’s for episodes 98, 99, and 100. So you’re gonna find one Giphy in each episode. If you find all three of those and submit the correct answers, we have a link to submit the answers in the show notes of all three of those episodes, you will be entered to win one of three prizes. So there was a mini coaching package with me. There is a $100 Amazon gift card.

And there is a opportunity to win one of my digital courses of your choosing. So it could be a podcasting course, it could be a libido course, or it could be an emotional mastery course. So I hope that some of you guys will submit your scavenger hunt findings. I feel like it’s kind of fun to be a detective. And those little giffies, they’ll just appear on the screen randomly at some point in the episode for five seconds, and then they’ll disappear and you just got to keep track of them.

Heather Shannon (02:24.291)
Alright, so without further ado, let’s get into the pathway to passion. So if you didn’t catch part one, I would recommend going back and listening to part one. was a few episodes ago. And that part one, just as a short little recap, was about the emotional mastery, right? And that’s also why I have that course on emotional mastery.

because it is so foundational. And what I find so often with my clients, especially couples that I’m working with, is that they get stuck because they’re having a hard time regulating their own emotions in order to hold space for their partner, right? We all know that listening is a huge part of communication, but you can’t really listen and be present when you’re feeling emotionally dysregulated. So if you’re feeling rejected, abandoned, frustrated,

guilty, whatever it is, you’re often kind of triggered not able to listen. So we need to be able to do that. And the other piece of it is that you’re also not able to communicate, right? I certainly know for myself, and there’s research on this from the Gottman Relationship Institute that studies relationships that once our heart rate gets over about 95 beats per minute, nothing good is going to come out of that conversation.

Right? We escalate, we get defensive, we’re attacking each other. It’s just not helpful. So that’s emotional mastery is, you know, learning to regulate emotions, learning to communicate in a healthy way, and also getting really clear on your intentions, your priorities, and the trade-offs you’re willing to make, because we can’t have it all at the same time. That’s kind of my philosophy. We can have it all. We just can’t like do it all at once. It’s just ineffective.

We kind of got to get one plate spinning and automated and get our habits down. Then we can move on to the next thing. So check out that episode if you’re having it. And if you’re interested in the emotional mastery course, you can also access my courses through my website, heathershannon.co. There’s a courses tab. There’s also a freebies tab. So go check out the website if you’re having it.

Heather Shannon (04:32.003)
Okay, so for part two, we’re gonna focus on sexual foundations. So that’s kind of what I call this level and there’s three steps in this level. So we’ve got consent, we’ve got how desire works, and we’ve got body confidence. And so the reason I designed it this way is because once we kind of have just general good emotional connection, then we wanna focus on like, what are the sexual foundations? What are sort of the…

things that help us create a good container for great sex. And what I mean by container is sort of emotional safety, physical safety, keeping in mind nothing is going to be 100 % safe. Like being alive is not safe. So, especially in today’s day and age. But we want to be mindful and intentional and create a safer experience with sex. And so often when I’m working with couples where they’re trying to get the passion back,

you know, there’s something in this stuff that’s missing where someone’s like, well, I don’t actually feel like my partner like gets me or sees me or understands me or, you know, I feel like my partner is constantly like nagging me about sex. And then it just feels like it’s this kind of performance or obligation or duty. And that’s that is not the foundation for great sex, right? But keep in mind, we’re also not taught

how any of this works, generally speaking. And so then that brings me to the next step of this second phase on how desire works. So we need to have some knowledge. There’s like a knowledge base that’s required here about how desire works. So do you know how your own desire works? Do you know what hits the brakes on your desire? Do you know what hits the brakes on your partner’s desire? Right?

So maybe just ponder that for a moment. Sometimes we know a few things, sometimes always really there’s more to find out. So I think it’s also a process. And then lastly, I put body confidence as part of this because if you’re self-conscious about your body, it can prevent you from being present with your partner and that takes away from your own pleasure.

Heather Shannon (06:47.275)
of be able to enjoy your partner and to enjoy the sensations you’re experiencing and to kind of communicate what you want and need. And it also takes away from your partner’s enjoyment. Because if you’re kind of like, don’t look at my stomach rolls, like, don’t look at, you know, it’s like, okay, you’re kind of taking both of you out of the moment then, right? And it’s not, this is not an attack at all. I think everyone has body insecurities, but we are going to talk a little bit about each one of these steps in phase two.

and how to kind of optimize them a little bit more than they are now, right? I’m a big believer in baby steps and it’s like if we can get one or 2 % better at something each time, I think that’s all we really need to like feel fulfilled is just like, hey, I’m on the path, I’m moving in the right direction. It’s a good feeling. Okay, so I’ve had entire episodes on consent, so I’m not gonna get into like super duper into detail on this, but if you do want to educate yourself more about this and how to become

really an expert at this and not just like, it goes beyond, hey, do you want to have sex? Yes. There’s more to it than that. So check out episodes 12 and 80 if you would like to go more in depth on consent. Episode 80 is really great with Dr. Betty Martin. She is like a legend in my field and wrote an awesome book on the art of receiving and giving and you know,

really helps bring some nuance and a new lens to what consent is and how to get better at it. And then episode 12 is a solo episode where I go over some of, again, some of the more subtle things about like pestering and pressuring and nagging that really are not very consensual, you know? Like we want clear consent. Realistically, might not always be wildly enthusiastic, but it should be like,

yes, I will do this. Yes, let’s go for it. Not like, okay, you know, big difference there. So a couple of things I do want to cover though about consent is that generally speaking, you want to opt in to the activities you’re interested in when it comes to sex. So if you want to say, for example, you would not want to say, everything’s fine, but I don’t like giving oral sex. That leaves whole

Heather Shannon (09:11.543)
whole lot of things. If you’ve listened to any of the other episodes, that leaves a whole lot of things on the table, right? And in your mind, you might be assuming, well, I just mean the quote unquote regular things, but there is no quote unquote regular things because everyone’s brain works differently. So you just got to be careful what you say. And that’s why we want to opt into things. So instead of that example where you’re saying, I just don’t want to give oral sex, you might say something like,

I’m interested in kissing, fondling, fingering, hand jobs, receiving oral sex, and that’s it. You could say something like that. Or you could say penetration is fine. But the idea here is that you don’t assume what’s going on in someone else’s mind. I mean, that’s the other thing I’ve learned from doing the work that I do is we get ourselves into a whole lot of trouble when we make assumptions, right?

okay. And then another way to discuss consent is by asking your partner, how do you want to feel? Right. And so someone might say, I want to feel really taken care of. You know, I want to feel like I can relax and you’re making the decisions. And that’s kind of the important thing for me in this experience, or I want to feel really sensual and just like slow. we’re really savoring like every central experience of lovemaking. Right. And.

someone else might say, you know, wanna be in charge or I wanna feel like really edgy and naughty. And so there’s so many different ways that we can wanna feel during sex. And I think when we establish that, that can really inform what activities we do and how we set it up, maybe how we initiate even. So I think that can be a really rich conversation. If you’re just trying to get to know your partner and yourself better when it comes to sex.

And then as I mentioned before, as I cover in episode 12, just removing the pressuring, pestering and obligatory or like duty sex. Because I see this a lot in couples where they haven’t had sex in a while or one person has lost desire. And I think a lot of what’s happening is if you’re feeling like, well, I just kind of have to do this to keep my partner happy, then you’re not enjoying it. And then you start to develop negative associations with sex.

Heather Shannon (11:38.651)
And the partner who is maybe doing the pressuring or pestering might feel like, well, I’m being neglected over here. And if I don’t speak up assertively, then I’m going to continue being ignored and neglected. And that’s super hurtful to me. But there is another way. I think that’s what I really want to say is there is another way. And I talk a lot about internal family systems. And one of the phrases I love about IFS is,

quickly or slowly, slowly we get there fast. And it sounds so counterintuitive, but I think a lot of wisdom is sort of paradoxical. And the idea is that like by really allowing space, by really getting curious, by letting go of our agenda, then people feel safe and our protective parts and defense mechanisms feel safe to kind of open up and like put the guard down. And then we can have a really good conversation.

When it’s sort of like this pressure thing where you feel like you’re gonna explode, then you just wanna avoid and it can kind of perpetuate the problem. So these are some of the reasons why consent is so important. Okay, so now let’s move on to how desire works. So there’s a lot here. There’s three main levels of desire. So there’s the biological factors, there’s the environmental factors, and there’s the relational factors.

So biological factors might be things like what medications you’re on, if you or your partner just gave birth or is breastfeeding, if, let’s see, if you’re depressed, right? That’s a factor. If your hormones are balanced and optimized. So there’s so many things that can be going on biologically.

that maybe are not necessarily emotional or that maybe are having emotional side effects. We are one kind of integrated complex system, so of course it’s all connected, but I do find that a lot of people tend to just look at one of these levels or layers and not at all of them. And they all intersect, so I think we have to look at all of them. And then on the environmental level, I think this one is kind of interesting. To me, this is sort of the

Heather Shannon (14:00.193)
the quick wins, and I cover this in my libido course. The quick wins are like, how can I incorporate more sexual stimuli into my life? So if your life is, okay, like I wake up, I brush my teeth, I get dressed, maybe you have breakfast, you feed the kids, get them off to school or something, start working or commute, get home, maybe you have to do more kid stuff or volunteer stuff or maybe you’re working long hours.

So if this is kind of your lifestyle, there’s nothing sexual in there for a lot of people. And some of it is that I think we need more space. We tend to be very hectic and I know it’s, I think it’s also a baby step process of how do I subscribe less to hustle culture and how do I just feel more present in my own life? But I think we can start small. So it could be, okay, I’m gonna get a romance novel.

It could be, let’s watch a TV show that has sort of a steamy romance in it. Or it could be, let’s take a dance lesson once a week, and that’s gonna kind of be like our weekly date and quality time. And that might just kind of get us in a romantic mood. And it could be also how you take care of yourself. It could be, you know, I’m gonna just be like really well-groomed, I’m gonna take great care of my skin, I’m gonna start exercising a little bit.

I would say don’t try to do all of this at once. Right, I’m throwing lots of ideas out there. Pick one or two, do not pick more than two. Unless you have nothing else going on. If you’re just like, Heather, I am bored out of my mind. This is my top priority, great, go to town. But for the rest of us who have pretty full lives, I would say pick one, really? I think if you pick one, it’s like there’s a clear single focus. Otherwise, it’s so easy to get distracted and then we wind up only doing one or doing nothing.

is what happens. So picking more goals winds up backfiring often. So yeah, so environmental factors and then the relational factors. So these are deeper and this is a lot of the work that I do is how do we create that emotional safety or, hey, I have this resentment built up towards my partner. So like, I don’t really want to be sexual with them. Like I have a sex drive. I would otherwise be interested in sex, just not with them right now, right? And so…

Heather Shannon (16:22.241)
That can also be an important way to create the condition. So again, this part two of the pathway to passion is really still about creating the conditions for great sex to happen, right? Part three is where we get into like the nitty gritty and the sexual fantasies and the details and the turn-ons and the turn-offs. Here we’re just kind of like, let’s sort of clear the obstacles as much as possible. Okay, so then the…

The last part of phase two here is body confidence. And I included this one because 90 plus percent of my clients have some issue going on here when it comes to body image or body confidence. It’s not surprising. We are sort of presented with images of very fit, attractive people that are famous or influencers or actors.

And it’s changing. We’re starting to see more variety in terms of age and race and body type. And I love that. And I hope we keep moving in that direction because it does help to see ourselves represented in the media. But in meantime, I think it’s really important that we are super selective and mindful about the media we’re consuming. So when I was Buddhist, which

I’ve kind of left organized religion, but I still love Buddhism. Great tenet. So one of the precepts, sort of a guideline for living was consume mindfully. And we hear that a lot in the context of food. And of course, food can also be related to body image. But what I mean here is more like consuming media. And so when I studied this precept, it really kind of brought that more into the forefront for me.

how much we’re impacted by the media that we consume. And I see this with clients and there’s also a great book called Burnout by Amelia and Emily Nagoski that has a section in it called the Vickini Industrial Complex, which I love the name of that. And I would highly recommend checking that out. So if this is an area that you are working on, regardless of your gender, this chapter is so impactful because I think it talks about Fiji, it talks about

Heather Shannon (18:43.715)
how there really was not disordered eating there until American and British media were brought in, which is kind of wild, right? And it was like within a couple years of that media coming in, all of a sudden it was like 20 some percent of people had disordered eating. So it has a bigger impact, I think, than we realize. We just get so used to, well, this is just how it is now. we’re just on Instagram and we’re like looking at all these people in spandex and we’re…

You’re looking at those people with like, you know, washboard abs and, you know, where we’re seeing models or we’re seeing, you know, actors and actresses and typically this triggers not the best thoughts, right? Or we’re seeing ads for Botox. We’re seeing ads for skims and, you know, waste trimmers and like just all the things, right? Cleanses, lose 10 pounds fast. Like we’re bombarded with this information.

And I mean, I’m pretty mindful about the media I’m consuming and I’m still seeing some of this, right? We can’t control 100 % of it, but we can control a lot, right? So notice, like the tip here is when you’re on Instagram, how do you feel when you’re looking at each reel or each post? Is it bringing a smile to your face? Are you feeling good in your body? Is it triggering thoughts of,

my God, I have to lose 40 pounds. Or is it triggering thoughts of, my God, I’m never gonna look like that. Right? And sometimes even if we’re following body positive influencers, we might still have negative thoughts. And so it’s not about what should or should not trigger certain thoughts for you. It’s just about what is triggering certain thoughts for you. And yes, I would also suggest working on the thoughts. I just think that it’s faster and easier.

to curate who you’re following and how much time you’re spending, right? So I’ve deleted Instagram from my phone. It felt like it was just triggering comparisons to other people in my field and triggering kind of annoyance, honestly. I’m like, there’s so much sort of like preachy stuff on Instagram. I’m like, I don’t want anyone telling me what I should be doing just in any area.

Heather Shannon (21:06.989)
I just want to be present with myself and see how I feel. So that’s one step that I’ve taken that’s really been helpful. And it helps me feel a little bit more present in my life. So I would encourage you to do the same across the board. Maybe pick one social media thing or one TV show to kind of change up. And there are a lot of great media sources out there. You might have to look for them a little bit more. If you’re not sure, send me a message and I’ll help you out.

Once we have this phase two kind of dialed in, is now creating, first we created in part one, the emotional mastery. So let’s just imagine you can regulate your own emotions pretty well. You can communicate well with your partner. And to be honest, it’s the same communication skills in all areas of life. So then you’re communicating better with your boss, you’re communicating better with your friends, with your family. And then you get to this level and you’re like, I feel more accepting of my body.

Sometimes we reach for body positivity where we’re like, I’m amazing, regardless of how I look, you know, there’s this confidence there. And sometimes body neutrality is enough. So even just like, you know what, this is just gonna be kind of a non-factor. I’m not gonna hate on my body. I also don’t need to love it, but I can appreciate some of the things that it does for me and the sensations and the pleasure it allows me to feel. So imagine that, things are getting pretty good here, right?

Maybe you don’t have like every tip and tricks actually, but you can communicate about it. You know how desire works. You can state your preferences. And if you’ve got two people that can do that, things are gonna start going pretty well, right? So if you’re not already follow the show on whatever platform, subscribe or follow and stay tuned for part three. So that’ll probably be coming up in a week or two.

and we’ll get into some of the more juicy, exciting bits in part three, and I’ll share some more fun resources with you. So thank you all for listening, and we will catch you next week.