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This weekend’s blog is dedicated with affection to the beautiful, full-hearted men of the Tampa workshop.

I’ve written much here about what I’ve learned from physically holding hundreds of men in 60-90 minute individual sessions. Much of that information I have gleaned from the “approach phase” of the encounter, and from exploring the various positions and techniques we apply in Touch Practice.

Today I want to write about what happens when I let go of someone, what takes place inside as we finish, and the last hug ends. That journey–the practice of letting go of someone–is for me every bit as epic as the journey of taking someone into my arms. In fact, it’s a parallel, balancing practice, like breathing in and breathing out. You can’t really do one well if you can’t do the other. If you can’t let someone go, you won’t be able to hold them well.

There are certain aspects of letting the other person go which I have begun to practice even before I meet someone. For example, I no longer encourage the exchange of face pictures or statistics on body measurements, age, background or the like. My agreement with Spirit is, “I will hold whomever shows up.”

I take reasonable precautions whenever I meet someone via the Internet, and I practice (and encourage others to practice) caution and safety whenever meeting a total stranger for the first time. But the person’s physical appearance–size, age, background, political or religious beliefs, orientation, etc.–has become irrelevant for me in the work. There is always plenty of time to find something attractive about the person during the hour I sit with them. There’s no need to establish that beforehand.

I also try to let go of preconditions about what the experience will be like. The person may be very nervous and awkward and so it might feel like holding a walrus at first. On the other hand, I might find myself with the living embodiment of a teddy bear, a person who is so intrinsically cuddly that we can barely hold ourselves back from jumping into each others’ arms.

My touch partner’s stance towards me might be trusting or fearful; he might treat me like a teacher, with great respect, or a combatant, with a suspicious, wary posture. A man might project onto me qualities that are admirable, or he may have negative judgments about me. Letting them go means that all of that is “just fine.” I hold the person who came, just as he is. Some people have come to use the term “unconditional love” in describing this aspect of Touch Practice, but that feels a bit fancy to me. It’s simpler than that, I think: just hold the person you have in front of you. Hold him, just the way he is.

I also try hard to come “clean” and neutral to the experience. I have a pre-game ritual (I wash my hands, I light a special candle that only burns when I am holding someone in Touch Practice, and I take a moment to go inside and set an intention: “this man is coming to be held by me. What is my intention towards him?”)

One of the things I set during the intention phase is the vow not to take anything from the other person which is not freely given. In Touch Practice, I accept what my partner offers; as he returns touch, or offers emotions, or describes thoughts, if he expresses gratitude or appreciation or affection or attraction, I receive those things as they are offered. But I try to be careful not to have expectations, or to set up any condition in which I am encouraging or manipulating him to do or to be anything other than who he is.

To do that, I have to be sure that I, myself, am only giving what can be freely given. I never do Touch Practice out of obligation; I don’t do it when I’m not feeling well, or feeling tired, or feeling unable to give. I don’t accept money or “barter” for Touch Practice; it only works for me if it is a gift freely given, because that’s somehow part of insuring that I don’t subconsciously expect or require anything from the other person. By creating an environment where I have no obligation to the other person outside of the hour we spend together, I can defend the same environment for them.

All that sounds lovely, and then there is the ego.

From the minute I disconnect from someone, I can watch my ego running around the house like a mischievous child. As I’m trying to practice neutral, observant presence with the person I’ve just released, the ego will start with the questions: “Did he like it? How did it go? Did you bring him to the depths of profound encounter; did he get in touch with his inner seven-year-old? Was it the biggest emotional release of his life? How did I do? Was I wonderful? Did I miss something?”

*sigh…..

In many, many ways it is much harder to let go in Touch Practice than it is to connect. Getting your arms around each other in a hug seems relatively minor in comparison to the practice of “take your hands off this person. Keep your mitts off. No strings please.”

All these little energetic “strings attached” of how-did-it-go, what-does-he-feel-towards-me, etc., are interesting to watch, and it’s essential to see those, to really notice them and keep an eye on them like we might keep an eye on an evil child who is intent on setting fires in his bedroom.

Interestingly, all that is necessary is to see it. I will never be egoless; I’m human. All that is necessary to avoid acting from the place of “I want something from you” or “I want you to be something” is to simply notice, to pay attention. That’s it; that takes care of it. The practice of noticing, actively, keenly, is enough. As long as I have my eye on that kid, he doesn’t try to set fires. He knows I see him.

The practice of letting someone go will often span hours, days, or weeks, if I pay close attention. For example, sometimes when I feel like I had a particularly wonderful or powerful Touch Practice with someone, and we exchange gratitude and express appreciation and say good-bye, I’ll keep my eye out for an e-mail for the next few days, wondering if he’ll write me about the experience. (Sometimes people do; sometimes they don’t.)

Sometimes people will return two or three times to repeat and deepen an exploration, and sometimes I never hear from someone again. Some Touch Practice partners have become close friends and are integrated into my life, and some are people from other countries far away who I will likely never see again, ever.

But it has become clearer and clearer to me, through the hundreds of practices, that unless I can completely let go of someone before he walks into the room, and completely let go of him after he leaves, I won’t be able to hold him as powerfully as I might like in the hour we have together. The act of sitting with someone just as he is requires a kind of “clean space” that has to be cultivated outside of that hour.

As is so often the case, these things are paradoxical and come in sets of opposites, like inhaling and exhaling, abductors and adductors, tension and flexion. Our ability to move closer and our ability to move away are codependent. Boundaries keep us safe; the first thing you have to do to be close to someone is learn how to put up walls (and learn how to take them down.) An essential part of taking great care of someone else is  “selfish” (“put your own oxygen mask on first before attempting to assist the other passengers.”) And we can’t really hold each other completely without the parallel muscle, the ability to let go completely.

Touch Practice frames two powerful states, for me: communion or a sense of “merging” with other, and agency, the awareness of being unique and separate from others. Touch Practice often touches on an emotion I describe as “grief.” I use the word grief, which I realize may be charged for some, but it’s a light, mild, sweet-sad feeling for me, not a major event but noticeable nonetheless as grief, the act of being separated from another with an acknowledgement of loss.

Every time you breath out, each exhalation is, technically, a gentle experience of grief. The definition of grief I see online is “deep mental anguish,” but I think that definition is flawed and perhaps exaggerated, and that’s part of our problem. If we’re not willing to notice, and acknowledge, that separation and loss happen practically every minute of every day, in minor, mild ways, we can’t properly practice the alternating pattern of attaching and detaching, connecting and disconnecting, which is so essential and so continuously occurring in our experience.

It is the condition of our life–as soon as we take a breath in, it has a expiration date (notice that word? expire means “breathe out/spirit out” in the way that inspire means “breathe in/spirit in.”) “Respiration” is just the act of letting Spirit come and go freely, in and out, repeatedly. We connect and we disconnect. We are born and we die. We experience love and we experience loss.

We hold each other, and we let go. If this idea interests you, be sure to exercise both muscles. Like a balanced workout, practice developing symmetry between these two opposing forces.

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!