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In my last blog, I talked about the predictable phases of almost any spiritual practice, and how the mature phase of  spiritual practice often is acquired only after traversing the mountain of fanaticism as well as the valley of profound disenchantment.  In response to that blog, a beloved brother and friend wrote with this comment:

“love it … hate it … meh.” LOL – been there,  felt that. Question, though: How would you consider your experience of Touch Practice in this regard?

Touch Practice has become a genuine spiritual practice for me, and so, yes, my experience of it as such has encompassed these three regions.

When I first discovered Touch Practice, I couldn’t get enough of it. You can read more about the very beginnings of my story here, but in summary, in the beginning, I was holding and being held by perhaps 3 or 4 or 5 people a week, every week, for the better part of a year. That’s 5 to 8 hours a week, maybe 25 hours a month, perhaps three or four hundred hours of being held in my first year. And the more I got, the more I wanted. At first, I worried that it was an addiction, that it would be a bottomless pit; the more I got, the more I wanted.

And at some point, without being able to say exactly when, exactly why, or exactly how, whatever endless need I had began to be satisfied. Not before I’d spent hundreds of hours satisfying it, but at some point, I started to feel “full,” like you do when you’ve eaten enough and you’re no longer hungry. Actually, I lied: I DO remember the exact moment I started to feel that way.

I had been invited to a retreat for professional body workers. There were more than a dozen people there, all of whom were licensed, professional people who worked as masseurs and physical therapists and so forth. I didn’t really belong at that retreat (I’m not a professional or trained in any way) but one of my friends who is a professional body worker said, “I know Touch Practice, and I know the impact your work has had on people. Trust me, you are a real body worker; you belong at this retreat, and you should come.” So I spoke with the organizer, and despite my lack of credentials, I was allowed to register and attend.

We spent the whole weekend touching and talking and touching and talking. We spent hours that weekend in various forms of physical exchange, demonstrating our various practices and exchanging freely with talented, experienced, touch professionals. From Friday 5PM until Sunday 3PM we virtually touched and talked about touch non-stop.

And right around Sunday morning, I had this very funny feeling: I was sitting in the room with folks, and all I could feel was, “I just want to be by myself. I just want to spend some time alone. I am so tired of getting touched.”

I nearly fell down laughing when I heard myself say that inside my head, because it was the first time in 40-something years that I could remember feeling that way! Somehow I had touched and touched to the point where, finally, I felt like I had had enough.

I always understood my practice to be largely about me: something that I needed to get, and something that I was prepared to provide for someone else in return. I’ve never been under the delusion that my practice is a “pure” service to someone else; I always get something out of Touch Practice. As I like to say, you can’t hold someone without getting held back. It happens automatically. There’s always something in it for me.

In the very beginning, there was a lot in it for me. But after that day of “I’ve had enough,” things shifted somewhat. I felt dedicated to Touch Practice, and I wanted to keep going and continue exploring the practice, but it wasn’t driven so much by my own need. I was able to be a little more neutral or even “disinterested” in the sense that I would sit with people without looking for something for me.

That was the period where I decided, “I will sit with whomever shows up. I don’t need a face pic.” It coincided with me needing less from the practice, and showing up because it was something I was devoted to, rather than being driven from such an extreme sense of need.

There was never really a “hate it” period of Touch Practice, but the very lowest point in the valley was when I was falsely accused by a third party of having propositioned a Touch Practice partner for sex, something I have honestly never done. From the time Touch Practice became a formalized practice, with a name and a structure, I have been very careful to establish and preserve Touch Practice as a non-sexual practice.

When I responded by inviting the third party, the accuser, and the accuser’s therapist to an open and honest dialogue to explore the allegation, there was suddenly no interest in talking further, and it became clear  the entire allegation had been fabricated in retaliation for an unrelated matter.

But it was unfortunate, because a practice that I have always approached with a level of idealism that in retrospect now seems naive and foolish was suddenly tainted with fear. Instead of feeling brave about putting it into the world, I suddenly became shy and  paranoid. It was the moment of falling out of the Garden of Eden for me, out of the bliss of ignorance and into the real world of good and evil. Instead of being comfortable being out there naked in the world, I started to cover myself.

But living in the real world is good! There are people who understand the intention behind Touch Practice and people who will attribute and project things onto it, and, after all, that’s just how life is.

This is perhaps my “meh” period of Touch Practice.  Some people will come to it and find healing and transformation the way I did, because it’s a practice that works for them. Some people will say “that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard of.” One of my friends said, “go through all that hooey, for 90 minutes, without sex? What’s the point?”

Meh. I carry my practice; it works for me; it’s not for everyone. For a few, it’s a life saver. I carry it for them, and for me.

The New England Retreat weekend is now about 50 percent sold out! Please contact me as soon as possible if you’d like to reserve a place, or arrange a phone call for more information.

Have thoughts you’d like to share?

Touch Practice is a sacred practice for me, and part of that is keeping confidences sacred. While a name and e-mail address are required to post a comment, feel free to use just your first name, or a pseudonym if you wish. Your e-mail address will never be seen by or shared with anyone. It is used to prevent spam and inappropriate comments from appearing in the blog. I’d really like to hear from you!