Longing

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  As you ponder the distant beginnings of your sexual self—perhaps writing your thoughts in your journal—don’t be surprised if your memories are rather vague. Even fuzzy memory fragments can contain important clues about your erotic development. Notice especially if you can identify any of the four cornerstones in your oldest memories, where your erotic patterns began to form. CORNERSTONE 1: LONGING AND ANTICIPATIONPart of being human is the ability to picture in your mind something or someone you desire but don’t have, or isn’t there in the way you want or as often as you wish. This capacity develops shortly after birth and stays with you for the rest of your life. As a child you undoubtedly remember yearning for Mom when she went away or counting the moments until Dad came home. Or perhaps you created an imaginary playmate, someone you could always count on, who would never disappoint or hurt you. When you yearn for someone, the reality of his or her absence or unavailability is the obstacle you seek to overcome by remembering or fantasizing. According to psychoanalytic theory, the earliest instances of eroticized longing universally occur between the ages of three and five as a desire to possess the parent of the opposite sex. I remain skeptical that these Oedipal urges are anywhere near as universally significant as the Freudians believe, although my research neither supports nor refutes the theory. A great many of The Group’s earliest sexual memories do involve vivid experiences of longing, but only a few—all reported by men—are directed toward a parent. Hank writes: I know I was very young when I became obsessed with getting my mother to hold me. Now I recognize that thinking about this aroused me at times. The big problem for me was the fact that Mom was a doctor and rarely at home. I was cared for by a series of nannies. Sometimes I even fantasized that I would be taken to her office and be examined as if I were one of her patients. To this day I find myself wanting more attention from the women I date than they are willing or able to give. Hank’s recollection coincides with my observations as a therapist that sexualized longing for a parent is primarily a compensation for lack of availability. After all, longing always directs its attention toward what’s missing or in short supply. Keep in mind, however, that as adults we’re likely to transfer old feelings of longing toward either parent to whomever we desire now, regardless of their gender.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Repetitive, problematic attractions are not so easily modified, which is why some people have, in recent years, labeled them love addictions. Calling Maggie’s tragic search for love an addiction may provide an illusion of understanding. If, however, we genuinely wish to uncover the sources of difficult attractions we must reject easy labels and venture inward where the erotic mind has its own ways and reasons. Maggie first encountered longing in response to the pain of not feeling loved by her father.5 Unfulfilled cravings for affection defined the key problem her CET was trying to resolve. As her eroticism evolved she discovered—but only semiconsciously—that by continually placing herself in positions of longing she could convert her pain into passion. Logic suggests that someone in Maggie’s position might be drawn to men who, unlike her father, would be naturally warm and loving. And true enough, the men she found most irresistible were capable of great warmth and tenderness, but never consistently. To select a man who would love her wholeheartedly, Maggie would need to bypass the very dilemma her CET was designed to reverse: how to get someone who seems ambivalent to change his mind and love her without reservation. At her most passionate moments that’s exactly what happened—at least for a while. Unfortunately, her CET forced her to select men who were not readily available, otherwise she couldn’t anticipate the reversal that was the overriding goal of her eroticism. Her passion only sprang to life when fulfillment seemed possible but just beyond her grasp. In a moment of stunning clarity Maggie articulated the essence of her problem: “What really turns me on is almost being loved.” Maggie’s dilemma is far from unique. Millions of people gravitate toward partners who appear to possess characteristics similar to those of significant others—parents, siblings, special friends—who have let them down in the past. Their goal is not primarily to perpetuate the pain (although this tends to be the most frequent outcome) but rather to reenact hurtful situations in hopes they can be reversed—the pain transformed into passion. A complete understanding of Maggie’s determination to avoid fulfillment requires one more piece of the puzzle, one Maggie found very difficult to accept. It’s true that Maggie’s first object of longing was her father, but it was through her emotional alignment with her mother that she learned on a day-to-day basis the ways of longing and sadness. Remember how desperately Maggie struggled to make her mom feel better? While it doesn’t make sense logically, it is difficult for most of us to grow beyond our parents, particularly the one after whom we most model ourselves. For Maggie to receive the love she craved she had to follow a path radically different from her mother’s, which seemed to her a terrible act of disloyalty.

• From Sister Outsider (1984)

  Adrienne: Then you went back to the Lower East Side, right? Audre: Yes, I went back to living with my friend Ruth, and I began trying to get a job. I had had a year of college, but I could not function in those people’s world. So I thought I could be a nurse. And I was having such a hard time getting any kind of work. I felt, well, a Practical Nursing license, and then I’ll go back to Mexico ... Adrienne: With my trade. Audre: But that wasn’t possible either. I didn’t have any money, and Black women were not given Practical Nursing fellowships. I didn’t realize it at the time because what they said was that my eyes were too bad. But the first thing I did when I came back was to write a piece of prose about Mexico, called “La Llorona.” La Llorona is a legend in that part of Mexico, around Cuernavaca. You know Cuernavaca? You know the big barrancas? When the rains come to the mountains, the boulders rush through the big ravines. The sound, the first rush, would start one or two days before the rains came. All the rocks tumbling down from the mountains made a voice, and the echoes would resound and it would be a sound of weeping, with the waters behind it. Modesta, a woman who lived in the house, told me the legend of La Llorona. A woman had three sons and found her husband lying in another woman’s bed — it’s the Medea story — and drowned her sons in the barrancas, drowned her children. And every year around this time she comes back to mourn the deaths. I took this story and out of a combination of ways I was feeling I wrote a story called “La Llorona.” It’s a story essentially of my mother and me. It was as if I had picked my mother up and put her in that place: here is this woman who kills, who wants something, the woman who consumes her children, who wants too much, but wants not because she’s evil but because she wants her own life, but by now it is so distorted.... It was a very strange unfinished story, but the dynamic ... Adrienne: It sounds like you were trying to pull those two pieces of your life together, your mother and what you’d learned in Mexico. Audre: Yes. You see, I didn’t deal at all with how strong my mother was inside of me, but she was, nor with how involved I was. But this story is beautiful. Pieces of it are in my head where the poetry pool is, phrases and so on. I had never written prose before and I’ve never written any since until just now. I published it under the name Rey Domini in a magazine ... Adrienne: Why did you use a pseudonym?

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  A relatively rare form of longing operates according to a different set of rules. Some people yearn for love so profoundly and for so many years that they never forget that experience, even when they eventually do form a close, intimate bond. Repeated fulfillment doesn’t reduce their longing, but rather reminds them of how lucky they are to have beaten the odds and found a loving mate. They have developed a self-generating, longing-based erotic system that enables them to nourish a fascination with their partners for years and decades. They retain the aphrodisiac effects of longing by holding it in memory, where it sweetens their fulfillment. CORNERSTONE 2: VIOLATING PROHIBITIONSEvery society tries to limit sexual behavior. Not only do these cultural restrictions define and enforce the ideals and mores of the community, but they also have another function that is not consciously intended: they provide ready-made barriers that anyone can use to intensify his or her turn-ons. We’re all born with the capacity for arousal, and sooner or later (usually sooner) we’ll experience it. But what happens when we sense (or know) that adults don’t want us to feel this way? The erotic equation predicts that those who grow up in sexually restrictive environments are almost certain to discover the erotic potential of breaking the rules. If you can recall any titillating childhood adventures—such as playing “show me” or “doctor,” being fascinated by pictures of semiclothed people in catalogues or National Geographic, secretly looking up sexy words in the dictionary, or discovering the parts of your body that weren’t supposed to be so pleasurable—you probably had two contradictory reactions. At times feeling naughty, dirty, guilty, or afraid of punishment may have restrained you from further experimentation. On other occasions these feelings might just as well have added an extra charge to your activities and made you want to repeat them. A fusion of arousal and rule-breaking when you’re young dramatically increases the odds that you’ll retain in your adult eroticism a tendency to be excited by violational behaviors and fantasies. I call the aphrodisiac effects of violating prohibitions the naughtiness factor. Not surprisingly, it is especially pronounced in societies that seek to block most, if not all, expressions of childhood sexuality. And such societies dominate the modern world. On a more personal level, you’re certainly not alone if you remember adolescence as a period when the link between nervous excitation and breaking the rules loomed especially large. Tina still thinks of an encounter from her teen years as among her most exciting, even though she’s now almost thirty, married, and pregnant with her second child. Her story captures perfectly the aphrodisiac qualities of sexual rebellion:

• From Mud Vein (2014)

  I carried it inside, flipping it over in my hand. There was a slot on one side of the cardboard. I stuck my finger inside and pulled out a CD. It was black. A generic disk, something he’d burned himself. Curious, I put the disk into my stereo and hit play with my big toe as I stretched out on the floor. Music. I closed my eyes. Heavy drum beat, a woman’s words … her voice bothered me. It was emotive, going from warm cooing to hard with each word. I didn’t like it. It was too unstable, unpredictable. It was bipolar. I stood up to turn it off. If this was Isaac’s attempt at facilitating me into his music, he was going to have to try for something less… The words—they suddenly picked me up and held me, dangling in the air; I could kick and writhe and I wouldn’t have been able to come down from them. I listened, staring at the fire, and then I listened with my eyes closed. When it was over, I played it again and listened for what he was trying to convey. When I ripped the CD from the player and stuffed it back in its envelope my hands were shaking. I marched it to the kitchen and shoved it in the back of my junk drawer, underneath the Neiman Marcus catalog and pile of bills bound by a rubber band. I was agitated. My hands couldn’t stop moving— through my skunk streak, into my pockets, pulling on my bottom lip. I needed a detox so I retreated to my office to soak up the colorless solitude. I lay on the floor and stared up at the ceiling. Normally the white cleansed me, calmed me, but today the words to the song found me. I’ll write! I thought. I stood up and moved to my desk. But even when the blank Word document was pulled up in front of me—clean and white—I couldn’t splash any thoughts onto it. I sat at my desk and stared at the cursor. It seemed impatient as it blinked at me, waiting for me to find the words. The only words I could hear were the words of the song that Isaac Asterholder left on my windshield. They invaded my white thinking space until I slammed shut my computer and marched back downstairs to the drawer. I dug out the cardboard sleeve from where I’d shoved it underneath the catalogs and bills, and dropped it into the trash.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  You can also use your imagination to visualize what might happen if you were to let your eroticism venture off in a new direction. Don’t worry if your images are fuzzy or keep changing. By its very nature the imagination plays with possibilities. If at first you draw a blank when it comes to your erotic future, don’t be concerned. In time your imagination will conjure up pleasurable fragments. Be aware, however, that the moment you try to freeze one image to the exclusion of others, you halt the imaginative process. Long before Maggie adopted her policy of turning away from the sorts of men she once pursued, she visualized the implications of such a decision in her mind. Her initial images were of being stuck with one of the “normal” men who had always bored her. But as she recognized how frustrating it was to be perpetually in a state of longing she grew increasingly fascinated by the image of being loved without reservation, not by a boring man but by an available one. She couldn’t help noticing that whenever she had grasped for love that dangled just beyond her reach she had become highly excited but also frantic. But when she pictured herself withdrawing from the chase and letting someone approach her, she felt calm and self-assured. Whether you stumble unexpectedly into the gray zone or place yourself there by deliberately stepping away from well-worn but unsatisfying behaviors, your journey is destined to be unsettling. Expect to feel lost and alone for a time. Chances are you’ll also be frustrated as you grope for answers that rarely come easily. Why put yourself through something so uncomfortable? Besides the fact that you may not have a choice, the gray zone is a powerful impetus for change. It is an opportunity to confront yourself as you never have done before—and to emerge stronger, with a piercing new clarity about what you must do for yourself and how it can be done. STEP 4:ACKNOWLEDGE AND MOURN YOUR LOSSESAll growth, no matter how desirable or eagerly sought, involves loss. As outgrown habits fall away, you naturally miss their comfort and familiarity. Every troublesome turn-on has fulfilled crucial functions along the way—or it never would have developed in the first place. Even when it hurts you, it cannot easily be tossed aside. As the changes you imagine find a place in your life, don’t be surprised if emotions associated with grief and loss—sadness, loneliness, emptiness, anger, or guilt—are a part of the experience. Try not to resist, downplay, or deny these feelings; they are essential for healing. Grieving is the way through the pain of loss.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  At home, Paul made himself the center of attention—“the apple of his mother’s eye,” his father recalled—but he was mischievous and full of pranks. “He got the strap when he was five years old,” Ted said. When Paul was about thirteen, he was taken to say farewell to his grandfather on his deathbed. The old man had been a janitor in a bowling alley, having fled England because of some mysterious scandal. He seemed to recognize a similar dangerous quality in Paul. His parting words to him were, “I’ve wasted my life. Don’t waste yours.” In high school, Paul began steering toward trouble. His worried parents sent him to Ridley College, a boarding school in St. Catharines, Ontario, near Niagara Falls, where he was required to be a part of the cadet corps of the Royal Canadian Army. He despised marching or any regulated behavior, and soon began skipping the compulsory drills. He would sit in his room reading Ramparts, the radical magazine that chronicled the social revolutions then unfolding in America, where he longed to be. He was constantly getting punished for his infractions, until he taught himself to pick locks; then he could sneak into the prefect’s office and mark off his demerits. The experience sharpened an incipient talent for subversion. After a year of this, his parents transferred him to a progressive boys’ school, called Muskoka Lakes College, in northern Ontario, where there was very little system to subvert. Although it was called a college, it was basically a preparatory school. Students were encouraged to study whatever they wanted. Paul discovered a mentor in his art teacher, Max Allen, who was gay and politically radical. Allen produced a show for the Canadian Broadcasting Company called As It Happens. In 1973, while the Watergate hearings were going on in Washington, DC, Allen let Paul sit beside him in his cubicle at CBC while he edited John Dean’s testimony for broadcast. Later, Allen opened a small theater in Toronto to show movies that had been banned under Ontario’s draconian censorship laws, and Paul volunteered at the box office. They showed Ken Russell’s The Devils and Bernardo Bertolucci’s Last Tango in Paris. In Ted’s mind, his son was working in a porno theater. “I just shut my eyes,” Ted said. Paul left school after he was caught forging a check. He attended art school briefly, and took some film classes at a community college, but he dropped out of that as well. He grew his curly blond hair to his shoulders. He began working in construction full-time for Ted, but he was drifting toward a precipice. In the 1970s, London acquired the nickname Speed City, because of the methamphetamine labs that sprang up to serve its blossoming underworld. Hard drugs were easy to obtain.

• From Mud Vein (2014)

  But I didn’t blink, and neither did he. We locked into a three second staring contest. We couldn’t have said any more in those three seconds. When you spend extraordinary amounts of time pushing someone away, their reaction to your apology tends to be slow. I imagined so, anyway. That’s how I wrote it in my stories. He came a week later. Since then I’d put away the red vase, gone back to craving white. I was at the mailbox when his car pulled into my driveway. I felt. You feel. When had that started happening again? I waited with the stack of junk mail clutched in my hands. He stepped out of his car and walked to me. “Hey,” he said. “Hi.” “I’m headed to the hospital, but I wanted to see you first.” I took it. I missed him. You miss Nick , You know Nick. You don’t know this man. I pushed that away. We walked up to my house together. When I closed the door behind us, he took my mail from my hands. I watched as he set it on the table next to the door. A single, white envelope slipped off the edge and slid to the floor. It skidded to a stop behind Isaac’s right heel. He turned to me and took my face in his hands. I wanted to keep looking at the safe white of that envelope, but he was right there, making me look at him. His gaze was slicing. Sluicing. There was too much emotion. He kissed me with color, with drumbeat, and a surgeon’s precision. He kissed me with who he was, the sum of his life—and it was all encompassing. I wondered what I kissed him with since I was only broken parts. When he stopped kissing me I felt the loss. His lips, for a brief moment, touched my darkness, and there was a glimpse of light. His hands were still in my hair, touching my scalp, and we were only a nose apart as we looked at each other. “I’m not ready for this,” I said softly. “I know.” He shifted positions until he had me wrapped up in his arms. A hug. This was far more intimate than anything I’d done with a man in years. My face was underneath his chin, pressed to his collarbone. “Goodnight, Senna.” “Goodnight, Isaac.” He let me go, took a step back, and left. His impressions were so short and so acute. I listened to the hum of his car as it left my driveway. There was a small kick of gravel as he pulled onto the street. When he was gone everything was still and quiet as it always was.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Lust connects us with our animal passions and brings us closer to primitive energies and motivations, which is precisely why it is so often feared. So it’s crucial to realize that lusty urges are most affirming when they are woven into the fabric of everyday life. Conversely, lust is most likely to turn destructive when it is split off from the rest of life, banished to a dark corner where it festers and grows hostile. Lust, by its very nature, objectifies, at least to a degree, but if you experience lust as an integral part of your total self, lusty objectification is balanced by your capacities to empathize with and respect others. And so, for example, while you may fantasize about taking someone sexually against his or her will (or about being taken), you will be able to draw a clear line between fantasy and behavior. Built into many a lusty fantasy or encounter is a hidden hope for more. In someone who experiences the full range of human needs, fears, and dreams, lust is sometimes the most tangible expression of a desire to reach out, to overcome physical separation and loneliness. How often has a momentary, casual turn-on ignited a desire for another moment with that particular person? More often than you might think. ROMANTIC ATTRACTIONSRomantic attractions share with lusty ones a compelling response to a fascinating other. But whereas lust’s primary objectives are arousal and orgasm, romantic attractions always include a craving for a mutual passionate bond with the other person. The romantic urge usually aspires to an even deeper goal—no less than personal transformation through the temporary joining of two separate beings. Whereas lusty energy flows from the groin, romantic attractions are experienced as emanating from the heart, although it is usually a meeting of eyes that first alerts you to the possibility of romance. Historically, psychologists have been reluctant to study romantic love, preferring to leave the subject to poets, philosophers, and artists, who presumably are more at home with the fundamental irrationality of love. In Freudian psychology the search for lost wholeness is associated with an impossible attempt to regain the symbiotic relationship we enjoyed as infants at the breast or even in the womb. To this day many psychoanalysts view romantic desires as regressive, neurotic, and immature. But because the chief concerns of psychoanalysis are the unconscious and the erotic impulses, insightful practitioners have returned repeatedly to the mysteries of love.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Think back to a time when you remember longing for someone who wasn’t easily available. When you finally did get together, I would guess that you felt joyful, not to mention aroused, and probably not at all angry—at least not consciously. If, however, your separations were extended and frequent, perhaps you resented the same unavailability that excited you. I’ve often wondered how much of the white-hot excitement of reuniting lovers is fueled by subtle resentment, especially when one partner feels more emotionally involved in the relationship and therefore longs more intensely. Tom, age twenty-two, describes such a situation. But unlike most longers, Tom is aware of his resentment: A couple years ago I dated an incredible fox who was fifteen years older than me. Not only was she beautiful, she also owned her own business and knew all the right moves in the sack. But it really bothered me that she was either traveling or in meetings just about every time I wanted to see her. I felt she was blowing me off even though she said she thought about me all the time. One night, as usual, I got her fucking answering machine and became totally pissed off. I drove over to her house and waited in her driveway until she finally pulled in about two hours later. She was glad to see me and we headed straight for the bedroom where I fucked her without mercy until she begged me to stop. She called me more often after that. It’s easy to see the dual meaning of “fuck” in Tom’s story. His tolerance for longing, probably pretty low to begin with, is reduced even further by his insecurity about the relationship. Thus, in a style not at all uncommon for men, Tom converts his vulnerability into angry determination, which seems to have an aphrodisiac effect on both of them. One of the most important erotic uses of anger, especially for males, is the neutralization of anxiety. It’s also easy to see the footprints of jealousy all over this story, another unpleasant but potent sexual intensifier in which anger is combined with insecurity. You’ve seen how one of the cornerstones, searching for power, can intersect with arousal whenever you take control directly through sexual dominance or follow an indirect route to empowerment by submitting to an aggressive other. Although anger and aggression are often confused, aggression need not be related to anger, just as anger does not necessarily lead to aggression. Sometimes, however, the two do coincide so that the excitement of a top-bottom scenario is tinged with hostility. We’ll take a closer look at hostility as an aphrodisiac when we explore the dark side of eros in the next chapter.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  I have not at any time believed otherwise than that L. Ron Hubbard was a fine and brilliant man. She went on to say, “In the future I wish to lead a quiet and orderly existence with my little girl far away from the enturbulating influences which have ruined my marriage.” (Sara did live a quiet and orderly existence until her death, of breast cancer, in 1997. She explained why she made the tapes, in her last months of life. “I’m not interested in revenge,” she said. “I’m interested in the truth.”) The meeting with the Scientology delegation lasted all day. Sandwiches were brought in. Davis and I discussed an assertion that Marty Rathbun had made to me about the OT III creation story. While Hubbard was in exile, Rathbun said, he wrote a memo suggesting an experiment in which ascending Scientologists might skip the OT III level —a memo Rathbun says that Miscavige had ordered destroyed. “Of every allegation that’s in here,” Davis said, waving the binder containing fact-checking queries, “this one would perhaps be, hands down, the absolutely, without question, most libelous.” He explained that the cornerstone of the faith was the writings of the founder. “Mr. Hubbard’s material must be and is applied precisely as written,” Davis said. “It’s never altered. It’s never changed. And there probably is no more heretical or more horrific transgression that you could have in the Scientology religion than to alter the technology.” But hadn’t certain derogatory references to homosexuality found in some editions of Hubbard’s books been changed after his death? Davis agreed that was so, but he maintained that “the current editions are one-hundred-percent, absolutely fully verified as being according to what Mr. Hubbard wrote.” Davis said they were checked against Hubbard’s original dictation. “The extent to which the references to homosexuality have changed are because of mistaken dictation?” I asked. “No, because of the insertion, I guess, of somebody who was a bigot,” Davis replied. “The point is, it wasn’t Mr. Hubbard.” “Somebody put the material in those—” “I can only imagine,” Davis said, cutting me off. “Who would have done it?” “I have no idea.” “Hmm.” “I don’t think it really matters,” Davis said. “The point is that neither Mr. Hubbard nor the church has any opinion on the subject of anyone’s sexual orientation....” “Someone inserted words that were not his into literature that was propagated under his name, and that’s been corrected now?” I asked, trying to be clear. “Yeah, I can only assume that’s what happened,” Davis said. “And by the way,” he added, referring to Quentin Hubbard, “his son’s not gay.”

• From Mud Vein (2014)

  We walked up to my house together. When I closed the door behind us, he took my mail from my hands. I watched as he set it on the table next to the door. A single, white envelope slipped off the edge and slid to the floor. It skidded to a stop behind Isaac’s right heel. He turned to me and took my face in his hands. I wanted to keep looking at the safe white of that envelope, but he was right there, making me look at him. His gaze was slicing. Sluicing. There was too much emotion. He kissed me with color, with drumbeat, and a surgeon’s precision. He kissed me with who he was, the sum of his life—and it was all encompassing. I wondered what I kissed him with since I was only broken parts. When he stopped kissing me I felt the loss. His lips, for a brief moment, touched my darkness, and there was a glimpse of light. His hands were still in my hair, touching my scalp, and we were only a nose apart as we looked at each other. “I’m not ready for this,” I said softly. “I know.” He shifted positions until he had me wrapped up in his arms. A hug. This was far more intimate than anything I’d done with a man in years. My face was underneath his chin, pressed to his collarbone. “Goodnight, Senna.” “Goodnight, Isaac.” He let me go, took a step back, and left. His impressions were so short and so acute. I listened to the hum of his car as it left my driveway. There was a small kick of gravel as he pulled onto the street. When he was gone everything was still and quiet as it always was. Everything but me. Part Three Anger and Bargaining [image file=image26.jpg] Out of the walls, music begins to play. We stand frozen, looking at each other, the whites of our eyes expanding with each beat. There is an invisible chord between us; there has been since Isaac saw my pain and accepted it as his own. I can feel it tugging as the music accelerates and Isaac and I stand immobilized by shock. I want to step into the circle of his arms and hide my face in his neck. I am frightened. I can feel the fear in the hollows of my mind. It’s pounding like a doomsday drum. Dum Da-Dum Dum Da-Dum Florence Welch is singing Landscape through our prison walls. “Get warm clothes,” he says, without taking his eyes from mine. “Layer everything you have. We are getting out of here.” I run.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Some people, however, seem unable to achieve such a balance. For them the experience of longing, whether or not they fully realize it, is the centerpiece of their eroticism. No longing, no turn-on—end of story. Relying on subtle signs and well-honed intuition, they are invariably attracted to those who are unavailable, confused, ambivalent, of the “wrong” sexual orientation, or who live far away. They can sniff out long shots and lost causes with amazing precision. Yearning enthusiasts become adept at zeroing in on partners who are somewhat available, or very available part of the time, or who hint that they might become more available in the unspecified future. Longing-based involvements are passionate, stormy, and—at key moments—profoundly moving. Unfortunately, those who genuinely seek long-term relationships often discover that their commitment to longing as the source of excitement turns out to be incompatible with their ultimate goals. The thorniest challenge of longing-based eroticism is neither desire nor arousal—these are easy. The hard part is fulfillment. Maggie: Master of the chase With the wisdom that comes from tough experience, Maggie spoke a fundamental truth: “The most painful relationships to give up are the ones that never were.” She was referring to a year of wrenching grief that had followed the inevitable end of a four-year affair with a married man. But on a deeper level she was summarizing a realization that, with few exceptions, her strongest attractions had always been for men whom, in one way or another, she couldn’t have. Yet she dreamed of an enduring bond with someone who would desire her without reservation and enthusiastically choose to be hers exclusively. She thought she wanted a man she wouldn’t have to pursue. There was no logical explanation for her inability to find such a man. A bright, witty elementary school teacher in her mid-thirties, with a pleasing face, a shapely body, and a smile that exuded kindness, she obviously had much to offer. Over the years several men had pursued her. Yet she voiced a complaint I have heard often: “The ‘normal’ guys—the stable, dependable ones who would make great husbands—bore me. The exciting ones are all spoken for or on the run.” Although her latest affair had been the only one with a married man, four others had many similarities, beginning with an energetic youthfulness she found irresistible. Each also had a flair for adventure, both in and out of bed, and a knack for playful spontaneity. All her lovers had also been unreliable at times and could not be counted on to follow through with plans, return phone calls, or remember special dates—important symbols of love for Maggie.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Longing also has a natural affiliation with romantic love. It’s difficult to imagine the experience of limerence without the preoccupation that fills the hours while the lovers are apart. What is this preoccupation if not fantasy? Romance novels, enormously popular among women, typically use delayed or interrupted fulfillment to heighten the titillation. Lusty sex acts occur against the backdrop of uncertainty, endless trials and tribulations—all of which make it exceedingly difficult for the lovers ever to get together. When the lovers finally embrace, share a passionate kiss, or make love, their joy is usually short-lived. Soon new obstacles intervene so that yearning can continue. The most extreme type of longing—falling head over heels in love with a person who seems to feel little or nothing in return—has been called “unilateral limerence” by sexologist John Money. As a rule such one-sided longing doesn’t endure, because the lover who receives no response eventually gives up and lets go, though usually not without considerable pain. Some folks, however, keep hoping for a very long time. Many people deliberately populate their favorite fantasies with characters they can never have. The imagery is of fulfillment, but the arousal springs from longing, as in Rachel’s simple fantasy: I have a thing for a guy who plays for the San Francisco Giants. I go to a lot of the games because just seeing him on the field or even hearing the announcer say his name makes me wet. When masturbating I pretend he’s my boyfriend and completely adores me. It’s so simple, really. We just make love and I feel very close to him. Whereas Rachel’s fantasy is the product of pure imagination, other experiences of longing are inspired by actual events that are unlikely to happen again. Many of The Group’s most compelling fantasies relive, typically with embellishments, wonderful past encounters with former lovers or steamy, once-only trysts with strangers. Some longing fantasies acquire their power from missed opportunities or might-have-been or almost-were experiences. Sammy, a gay man now approaching forty, continues to relish an encounter that never quite happened when he was just fifteen: I invited two buddies to stay overnight. I was extremely attracted to one of them who sat next to me in class, where for months we had touched knees. First we took a swim in our pool. When we changed clothes, I saw him nude. He was dark, physically mature, with a beautiful dick. Finally he was in my bed but, unfortunately, we weren’t alone. When he got up to turn off the light he had a big hard-on. I wanted it so much I was going out of my mind. We started touching a little, but I was worried about the other guy so I held back. Fuck! After he fell asleep I leaned over and kissed him on the lips. I was awake all night horny as hell. I still want him!

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  She liked men with a rebellious streak, so, not surprisingly, all her boyfriends vigorously refused to be tied down. Yet in each she perceived a vulnerability that intrigued her. “In spite of their precious independence,” she once said, “they all looked to me for stability and understanding.” Maggie had always been an ultra-responsible “good girl” who always could be counted on to be cooperative, helpful, sensitive, and obedient. Consequently, although she felt miserable whenever lovers let her down, she admired their freedom to slough off so easily the obligations that dominated her. When it came to intimacy—what Maggie said she longed for most—all her lovers vacillated between openness and avoidance. The emotional expressiveness that excited her was always counterbalanced by a fear of being possessed. “It’s almost as if they see me as their mother,” she mused. During her first few months of therapy Maggie eagerly theorized about the psychology of each former lover, yet it was exceedingly difficult to get her to focus on herself. As is so often the case for those in the throes of longing, the other person held the key to everything. The goal was always the same: to identify and overcome their hangups. In a rare moment of self-reflection she acknowledged her motivations: “If I could just win them over I would feel loved.” “And what if a man didn’t need to be won?” I asked. “What if he wanted to love you?” After a long silence she answered, “I’m not sure I could handle it.” That’s when I knew Maggie was ready to direct the spotlight inward, a process that brought her face to face with her commitment to longing as her chief erotic stimulus as well as her reluctance to accept gratification. At first, Maggie described an almost idyllic childhood. But as she relaxed her automatic tendency to make things look good, a more realistic picture emerged. She never doubted her mother’s love, yet Mom usually seemed overwhelmed by responsibilities and duties. “I always had a sinking feeling that Mom was close to tears,” Maggie recalled. “I knew she was terribly unhappy and it was my job to make it all better,” a task at which she usually failed miserably despite her best efforts. Even as a small girl Maggie knew that a major reason for Mom’s unhappiness was that Dad worked long hours and was often on the road. When he was home be would be absorbed in the newspaper or TV. He generally rebuffed requests for companionship or conversation, whether from Maggie or her mom. Maggie later learned that her mom often suspected he was having an affair, although she never confronted him. Maggie too was unsure of her father’s love, since she rarely received more than perfunctory attention from him, and hardly any of the heartfelt affection she craved.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  As you ponder the distant beginnings of your sexual self—perhaps writing your thoughts in your journal—don’t be surprised if your memories are rather vague. Even fuzzy memory fragments can contain important clues about your erotic development. Notice especially if you can identify any of the four cornerstones in your oldest memories, where your erotic patterns began to form. CORNERSTONE 1: LONGING AND ANTICIPATIONPart of being human is the ability to picture in your mind something or someone you desire but don’t have, or isn’t there in the way you want or as often as you wish. This capacity develops shortly after birth and stays with you for the rest of your life. As a child you undoubtedly remember yearning for Mom when she went away or counting the moments until Dad came home. Or perhaps you created an imaginary playmate, someone you could always count on, who would never disappoint or hurt you. When you yearn for someone, the reality of his or her absence or unavailability is the obstacle you seek to overcome by remembering or fantasizing. According to psychoanalytic theory, the earliest instances of eroticized longing universally occur between the ages of three and five as a desire to possess the parent of the opposite sex. I remain skeptical that these Oedipal urges are anywhere near as universally significant as the Freudians believe, although my research neither supports nor refutes the theory. A great many of The Group’s earliest sexual memories do involve vivid experiences of longing, but only a few—all reported by men—are directed toward a parent. Hank writes: I know I was very young when I became obsessed with getting my mother to hold me. Now I recognize that thinking about this aroused me at times. The big problem for me was the fact that Mom was a doctor and rarely at home. I was cared for by a series of nannies. Sometimes I even fantasized that I would be taken to her office and be examined as if I were one of her patients. To this day I find myself wanting more attention from the women I date than they are willing or able to give. Hank’s recollection coincides with my observations as a therapist that sexualized longing for a parent is primarily a compensation for lack of availability. After all, longing always directs its attention toward what’s missing or in short supply. Keep in mind, however, that as adults we’re likely to transfer old feelings of longing toward either parent to whomever we desire now, regardless of their gender.

• From Going Clear (2013)

  Thompson had just returned from Vienna, where he had been sent by the Navy to study under Freud. “I was just a kid and Commander Thompson didn’t have any boy of his own and he and I just got along fine,” Hubbard recalls in one of his lectures. “Why he took it into his head to start beating Freud into my head, I don’t know, but he did. And I wanted very much to follow out this work—wanted very much to. I didn’t get a chance. My father ... said, ‘Son, you’re going to be an engineer.’ ” THOMPSON WAS ABOUT to publish a review of psychoanalytic literature in the United States Naval Medical Bulletin; indeed, he may have been working on it as he traveled to Washington, and no doubt he drew upon the thinking reflected in his article when he tutored Hubbard in the basics of Freudian theory. “Man has two fundamental instincts—one for self-preservation and the other for race propagation,” Thompson writes in his review. “The most important emotion of the self-preservation urge is hunger. The sole emotion of the race-propagation urge is libido.” Psychoanalysis, Thompson explains, is the “technic” of discovering unconscious motivations that harm the health or happiness of the individual. Once the patient understands the motives behind his neurotic behavior, his symptoms automatically disappear. “This uncovering of the hidden motive does not consist in the mere explaining to the patient the mechanism of his plight. The understanding alone comes from the analytic technic of free association and subsequent rational synthesis.” Many of these thoughts are deeply embedded in the principles of Dianetics, the foundation of Hubbard’s philosophy of human nature, which predated the establishment of Scientology. In 1927, Hubbard’s father was posted to Guam, and Ledora went along, abandoning Ron to the care of her parents. For a man as garrulous as L. Ron Hubbard turned out to be, reflections on his parents are rare, almost to the point of writing them out of his biography. His story of himself reads like that of an orphan who has invented his own way in the world. One of his lovers later said that he told her that his mother was a whore and a lesbian, and that he had found her in bed with another woman. His mistress also admitted, “I never knew what to believe.” Hubbard made two voyages to visit his parents in Guam. One trip included a detour to China, where he supposedly began his study of Eastern religions after encountering magicians and holy men. According to the church’s narrative, “He braved typhoons aboard a working schooner to finally land on the China coast.... He then made his way inland to finally venture deep into forbidden Buddhist lamaseries.” He watched monks meditating “for weeks on end.”

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  erotic skills, 25, 38, 276 erotic stories, 363–364n9 exercise, benefits of, 250 exhibitionism, 214 expectations: of commitment. 272; and erotic experiences, 11; unrealistic, 48 experience, internal, 313 experimentation, sexual. See sexual experimentation exporting, in attraction, 145, 146 exposure, 156–157 exuberance. 111, 112 families: extended, 318; influence of, 189; interpersonal dynamics in, 3, 140; and love/lust conflict, 192 fantasy: -and access to CET, 148, 164, 292 -defined and characterized: defined, 25–26, development of, 189, differentiated from action, 305, 313; durability of, 148; gender differences in (case report), 34–35; repetitiveness of, 148 -and emotions: and alter–ego (case report), 151–152; ambivalence, 105; longing 77; as release from constraint (case report), 90, 91; in unresolved emotional conflict, 313 -and erotic health: how to use for, 148–151, 314; as pure imagination, 182; and self–discovery, 171, 313 -as private sex; with masturbation, 246, 252; orgasm and, 246; solo sex, 292–297 -and relationships: dominance/submission, 95–96, 223; multiple partners in, 43–44; romance and fantasy partners, 44; sharing erotic, 296, (case report) 297–298 -and shadow material, 90, 105–106, 154 father, role of, 198, 199,223 fear. See anxiety feedback, positive, 280 feminism, 179, 314 fetishism, 55, 295–296 fidelity, sexual, 290. See also monogamy flashers, 214 flirtation, 68, 81, 277, 288 Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, 372 For Each Other, 367n4 foreplay, 82, 244 For Yourself: The Fulfillment of Female Sexuality, 367n4 Freudian psychology, 58, 75. See also psychoanalytic theory Freud, Sigmund, 3, 4, 51, 148, 369n1 freedom, imaginative, 313 freedom, responsibilities of, 305, 308, 310–311 free will and consciousness, 164, 165 Friday, Nancy, 136, 363n9 friendship, 270 fulfillment, 12, 82–83, 183, 322, 341 Gagnon, John. See Simon. William, and John Gagnon gay men: couples, 277, 283, 291–292; and homophobia, 93; and recreational sex, 292; self–perceptions of, 93; and sex clubs, 252 gender differences: affairs, frequency of, 289; ambivalence (case report), 104–105; arousal, 156, 324, 361n3; childhood acculturation and development, 30, 62–63, 220; control issues, 64; fantasy partners. 43–44; giving and receiving validation, 331; idyllic contexts, importance of, 33; limerence, 62; longing, 79; mutuality and resonance, 334; naughtiness factor, 93; partners, importance of, 39, 40–41; pleasure phobia, 213; power, 195; risking discovery, 86–87; sexual surprise, reaction to, 32 genital stimulation: emphasis on, 244; and love/lust split, 194; in massage, 247; in masturbation, 245; in warm sex, 283 gentleness, 12 goal setting: affirmative, 229–230; clarification of, 228–234; how to set, 229–231, 232–234; and individuality, 230; and partners, 230–231 grand scheme of existence, 336 gray zone, the, 228, 237–242 Greek mythology, 2 Group, The. See SES group sex. in pornography, 153 growth: and change, 255; deterrence of, 226; integration of, 369n6; opportunities for, 218, 225, 259, 303 guilt: ambivalence and, 125; as aphrodisiac, 111, 112, 124–125, (case report) 126–127; and erotic development, 6, 174; as impediment, 2,48; neurotic; 124, 362n12; as social emotion, 124, 125, 127 harassment. See sexual harassment Hartmann, Nicolai, 111 hashish, 328 hatred, 129. See also self–hatred healing, sexual, 259 health. See erotic health helplessness, 156 heterosexist model, 298 Hillman, James, 111 Hinduism, 337 HIV, 9

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Those who, like Grace, must overcome obstacles on the way to an encounter usually engage in tender yet passionate lovemaking once they finally do get together. On the other hand, those like Will, who savor the energy of high-tension relationships, usually engage in rougher, more boisterous sex. KEEPING A DISTANCEBecause the erotic impulse seeks to bridge the space that separates self from other, among the most effective of all enhancing obstacles is distance—physical, emotional, or geographic. When you’re erotically drawn to someone new, the mystery of the unknown creates a realization of distance. This is one reason that visual stimulation is often so crucial to the initiation of sexual interest. Your eyes allow you to reach across the chasm of psychic and physical space, to catch a glimpse of someone who activates your fascination. During flirtation one or both participants play with distance by meeting the other’s gaze and then turning away. Perhaps, like me, you’ve noticed that flirting takes on a special intensity when circumstances make fulfillment impossible, as when the flirters are about to board different planes at an airport, are rushing off to business meetings, or are with other people and not in a position to respond. Over the years I’ve heard many married people say, often with consternation, that they were never so attractive to so many people when single. Partly, of course, their lack of neediness places them in a strong, relaxed position, especially compared to those who are desperately searching for someone. However, there’s no denying that the unavailability of those who are spoken for boosts their erotic appeal enormously. The role of distance in keeping erotic interest high is especially obvious when lovers must overcome the obstacle of geography. Those who are forced to endure an ongoing separation wait eagerly for the next chance to see each other. During periods of reunification, erotic sparks are likely to fly. When such relationships survive—obviously the strains are enormous—they typically retain a high erotic intensity long after their living-together counterparts have settled into more comfortable but sexually cooler routines. In both love and lust, the challenge is to find an optimal distance—neither too close nor too far. If you think of sexual arousal as being like an electric spark, you can easily visualize how the size of the gap separating the two poles is crucial. If the gap grows too large, even the high voltage of strong attraction will be unable to jump it. But if the gap becomes too narrow, especially if the poles continually touch, the circuit is completed, making sparks impossible. No wonder successful long-term lovers must find creative ways to balance their closeness with the separateness necessary for erotic enthusiasm.

• From Sister Outsider (1984)

  Audre: That’s right. He knocks at the door and nobody answers. “ ‘Is there anybody there?’ he said.” That poem imprinted itself on me. And finally, he’s beating down the door and nobody answers, and he has a feeling that there really is somebody in there. Then he turns his horse and says, “ ‘Tell them I came, and nobody answered. That I kept my word.’ ” I used to recite that poem to myself all the time. It was one of my favorites. And if you’d asked me, “What is it about?” I don’t think I could have told you. But this was the first reason for my own writing, my need to say things I couldn’t say otherwise when I couldn’t find other poems to serve. Adrienne: You had to make your own. Audre: There were so many complex emotions for which poems did not exist. I had to find a secret way to express my feelings. I used to memorize my poems. I would say them out; I didn’t use to write them down. I had this long fund of poetry in my head. And I remember trying when I was in high school not to think in poems. I saw the way other people thought, and it was an amazement to me — step by step, not in bubbles up from chaos that you had to anchor with words ... I really do believe I learned this from my mother. Adrienne: Learned what from your mother? Andre: The important value of nonverbal communication, beneath language. My life depended on it. At the same time, living in the world, I didn’t want to have anything to do with the way she was using language. My mother had a strange way with words: if one didn’t serve her or wasn’t strong enough, she’d just make up another word, and then that would enter our family language forever, and woe betide any of us who forgot it. But I think I got another message from her ... that there was a whole powerful world of nonverbal communication and contact between people that was absolutely essential and that was what you had to learn to decipher and use. One of the reasons I had so much trouble growing up was that my parents, my mother in particular, always expected me to know what she was feeling and what she expected me to do without telling me. And I thought this was natural. My mother would expect me to know things, whether or not she spoke them ... Adrienne: Ignorance of the law was no excuse. Audre: That’s right. It’s very confusing. But eventually I learned how to acquire vital and protective information without words.