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A new friend and brother asked me a question this week which serves as the fuel for today’s blog. He asked, in essence, “what first motivated you to meet and hug total strangers; what drove that, what were you seeking? And, as your “fetish” turned into a conscious practice–a ritual–over many years, how has your motivation changed over time?” It’s really a great question that points at a fascinating personal journey.

When I began to seek out and hug total strangers–which I did primarily through Craigslist ads many years ago–I have to say I was fairly unaware of my motivations and not particularly conscious. I went about it a bit like we go about any compulsion, like a moth to the flame.  I would resist the urge, initially, but my sense of “need” would slowly increase until the feeling of need was completely overwhelming. At that point–feeling absolutely driven–I would seek out a partner, get it over with quickly, feel ashamed afterwards and vow never to do it again.

And then I’d do the whole thing over again two weeks later.

It was a cycle that did not have any qualities of mindfulness about it, and it contributed to shame and self-hatred. Not exactly a satisfying pattern, but it was, in retrospect, learning that I needed to engage, and I did learn from those experiences. That process was ultimately productive, although in the beginning it had very self-destructive qualities attached to it.

Through sheer repetition, I think what happened is that I accidentally discovered grounding. I discovered certain patterns, different techniques for breathing, standing, or for holding my own space, that allowed me to stay very conscious during the experience. Instead of compulsively drinking from the touch fountain and then feeling badly about it afterwards, I began to be able to take a sip of something that actually quenched my thirst, at least a little. I slowly became more conscious of what I was looking for, and very slow became more and more able to identify and get the thing that I wanted.

Over time, instead of resisting what I was drawn to, I made a conscious effort to go find it; instead of bracing against the experience and feeling shame afterwards, I made a conscious effort to lean into the experience, perhaps even fall into the experience. It was as though a part of me said, “look, let’s investigate this. Let’s really go into this experience, eyes open, and see what’s here. Why do I keep coming back to this? What am I seeking here? Maybe I can find it.”

While it didn’t happen suddenly, there was a profound shift in orientation at some point, and that is this: I went from feeling, “the thing I need to be well is inside the other person” to feeling “this thing I need to be well is inside of me.”

The desperation, the need, that first motivated my “hugging fetish” came from some sense of not being whole, and needing that wholeness, wanting that comfort, from someone else. After being held several hundred times, that sense shifted. In psychological terms, I stopped projecting that piece of myself onto someone else, looking for it in them, and I realized it was actually within me.

In practical terms, I began to get what I need, because I allowed myself to be held as many times as it took for me to feel, “ok, I’ve had enough.” There were weeks, early on, where I’d meet four or five or six people in a single week, six hours of being held in one week. I allowed myself to have as much of it as I wanted in order to feel satisfied. That, in retrospect, was a good move.

But when that happened, my sense of where the “comfort” was coming from shifted. It was a subtle shift but it was also undeniable. While I used to go looking for someone else who would comfort me and make me feel whole for a moment, at some point I realized that I had become “the teacher;” that this other guy was looking for me to make him comforted as much as I was. The source of the comfort shifted from “something I need to get from someone else” to “something I carry within me and can access at any time.” I now understand that source, whatever it is, to be something that each person has, each person can find, and something we can offer to one another.

That has had a strange, even bizarre, impact on my sense of motivation. I’ll blurt it out, and then I’ll explain it: The more I do Touch Practice, the less motivated I am to do Touch Practice, but the more seriously devoted to it I have become.

By “less motivated” I mean my sense of desperation, of personal need, of thirst, has nearly vanished. I’ve held so many total strangers at this point that there’s very little fascination with holding total strangers left. I’ve done it, and that urge is satisfied. I’m not going after something from a grasping, clinging, “I’m desperate to have this” place. That place is satisfied; it’s full. I feel comforted. I got what I went looking for.

However, on another level, I feel utterly devoted to Touch Practice, from some sense that it helped me become whole (or, more accurately, helped me to recognize that I was already whole.) Words are awkward to describe this, so if I’m losing you I don’t blame you, but perhaps this can make sense to you on some level. I needed to pursue “getting” this thing from other men only to realize, ultimately, that the thing I was looking for was already inside me. Not only am I no longer looking for it from them, I have become the teacher who helps them find it in themselves, too.

So, purely from the point of view of “what’s in it for me,” Touch Practice has become less interesting, because my sense of personal need is so much less than it was. There’s less driving me.  However, from the point of view of “how can we all use this to help one another, and to support each other,” Touch Practice is endlessly fascinating to me, and that makes me feel devoted to it.

I believe from the impact I have witnessed that if even a small number of men were able to incorporate non-sexual, non-competitive, non-combative touch into our habitual interactions with each other, there would be far less violence in the world. I believe that men who were about to engage difficult things in their lives would feel supported, empowered, and allied in ways they currently do not.

The electrified fence between “gay men” and “straight men” would begin to come down, and all those men who don’t fit easily into either camp would have a place too, so that men can just be men, and brotherhood is just brotherhood.  My vision statement talks about what this world might look like; perhaps it’s just a fantasy. But this vision, more and more, is what continues to drive Touch Practice for me as a practice of devotion, a place I keep showing up, coming back to.

This process strikes me as something very similar to what happens in love relationships. At the beginning of the relationship there’s a hot, lustful, attraction, a really passionate love that I would describe as “I have to have you” love. A lot of that is wrapped up in my own needs and wants; “I love you because…” love. As relationships mature, that love often changes over time, and it shifts from “I love you because of how you make me feel” or “I love you because you do something for me that I need” to, simply, “I love you. Unconditionally. Not because; not if, not “as long as.” I love you. Period.”

So it has become, in a way, with me and Touch Practice. I used to love Touch Practice because of how it made me feel; I used to crave it. Now I just love it, more or less unconditionally. I no longer feel driven, fanatical, or, at times, even passionate about it. But I do feel utterly devoted to it. And devotion is my very favorite spiritual practice.

Have thoughts you’d like to share?

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