[LISA] The Am I Ok? Podcast is part of the Practice of the Practice network, a network of podcasts seeking to help you market and grow your business and yourself. To hear other podcasts like Faith Fringes, the Holistic Counseling Podcast, and Beta Male Revolution, go to the website, www.practiceofthepractice.com/network. Welcome to the Am I Ok? Podcast, where you will discover that being highly sensitive is something to embrace and it’s actually a gift you bring to the world. We will learn together how to take ownership of your high sensitivity, so you can make positive changes in your life, in the lives of others, and it’s totally okay to feel this way. I’m your host, Lisa Lewis. I’m so glad you’re here for the journey. Welcome to today’s episode of the Am I Ok? Podcast. I’m Lisa Lewis, your host. Thank you so much for tuning in. I would like to remind my listeners that I offer a free eight-week email course titled Highly Sensitive People. My email course provides weekly tools that help you feel more whole in a world isn’t exactly made for us and I show you how your sensitivity can be seen as a unique gift and how many others are just like you. To find out more about my email course, please go to my website, amiokpodcast.com. So if you had been following along on my podcast for the last month, you would’ve heard the many self-care tools that I have guided my audience through with meditations and guided imagery to help highly sensitive people manage their emotional responses. As highly sensitive people, or what is also known as sensory processing sensitivity we can easily get overwhelmed and over stimulated and need to shut our minds and our bodies down to recharge. So with this heightened awareness and perceptions as HSPs, what happens to the mind and body around sexuality? Today’s guest is going to talk with us just about that thing and about the unique advantages and challenges around sexuality for empaths and HSPs. Today’s guest is Heather Shannon. Heather is a sex coach who helps sex and gender diverse clients transform their relationship with their sexuality and achieve deeper intimacy in their relationships through a holistic mind, body spirit approach. Heather is a licensed clinical professional counselor, certified sex therapist, internal family systems therapist, meditation guide, and health coach. Welcome to the show, Heather. [HEATHER SHANNON] Thank you, Lisa. I’m very happy to be here and thank you for the lovely introduction. [LISA] You’re welcome. Tell us a little bit about yourself. [HEATHER] That’s a broad question. [LISA] I’ll make it more specific. Do you consider yourself a highly sensitive person or empath and if you do or do not, would you mind sharing a story with us? [HEATHER] Yes, for sure. I definitely do. I don’t know if I would say most, but quite possibly more than half of the clients I’ve dealt with over my career have also been in path or highly sensitive people. I do think we’re a group that likes personal growth and development and therapy and coaching and all of those good things. I think for me, it’s been an interesting journey realizing that I’m not too much. I’m sure there’s some other empaths or HSPs out there that have that feeling at times. So I think that sort of realization or awakening that some people have the capacity for handling my sensitivity really well and some people don’t, and that’s not necessarily good or bad or reflection on me. So that’s really been helpful for me to get to a place of self-acceptance. I had a therapist tell me once, what if it’s just okay that you’re needy? I was like, what? This was like, back in my twenties. I was like, what? Now I’m like, yes, I’m just going to own it. So it feels good to just own it. [LISA] Oh, that’s wonderful that you accepted yourself as being needy, if I heard that. [HEATHER] It’s interesting because I would actually say I’m probably less needy now than I used to be, I think almost the process of accepting. I certainly can be needy still, but I think it’s more just the sensitivity, the emotionality at times that knowing how to, I think in an accepting myself, it’s helped me meet more of my own needs. So I actually feel less needy if anything. [LISA] Wow, I like that. That’s so powerful. So I’m just going to jump right in here and just with like, with HSPs and empaths having that heightened awareness, how does it play out in the bedroom? [HEATHER] I was so excited to talk about this because I had a few different thoughts. I think one of them is that as more sensitive people, we might be more sensitive to the subtle undertones of a sexual situation. We might be more sensitive to do I feel really safe with this person? Do I feel comfortable being my fully sensitive self or do I feel like I have to hold parts back? So I think even the discernment part before you even get to sex about, is this somebody I really feel safe and comfortable being myself with, is this somebody that my sensitivities are sort of safe with? So I think those are some interesting questions to ask. I’m sure there’s exceptions, but one of my general thoughts was that as empath and HSPs, we might have a little bit more struggle with casual sex because of our sensitivity. [LISA] Well, what would that look like, to be more sensitive to sex and can you give us some examples of that? [HEATHER] Yes, I guess, I mean in terms of emotional safety. So it might be this is someone we don’t know super well, there isn’t maybe like as much rapport or history or a foundation for emotional intimacy. So it might be an experience where it’s like, okay, that’s fun. Now let’s cuddle and now let’s connect and the other person’s like, cool, that was fun. That might be tough. That might be tough, especially, probably for anyone, honestly, but I think especially for anyone who’s more emotionally sensitive. I almost think of it like, and I’m curious how you think of it actually, but almost like our emotional pores are just like more open at times. So I think the need for boundary work is pretty much there with every empath I’ve ever met. [LISA] Yes. I can see an issue, this doesn’t even happen in the bedroom, but it can be, oh my gosh, even more heightened in the bedroom because you are just as like the most vulnerable thing you can do with another human being and just how impasse HSPs are so attuned and aware and have the tendency to read other people’s energy or think they know what the other person’s thinking and it’s not always right. [HEATHER] So true. [LISA] If you’re being so intimate with another person, and then you get this hit in your, you pick up something that doesn’t feel so good that can just completely shut us down. How do you work with someone that maybe is having, a couple is having those issues and then their partner is getting really mad or they’re not being able to really have a partner. [HEATHER] I think you just said it actually in your question. You hinted out like, oh, we just think we know, and we’re so intuitive and we sense these things, but to still communicate especially, but really regardless of whether the other person’s also a highly sensitive person. It’s important to be verbal. I think that our intuitions or our gut feelings can be coming from, this is part of the internal family systems, it can be coming from our self-energy, which is our higher consciousness. That tends to be very accurate, because it’s not fear based. But it could also be coming from an insecurity of our own that popped up and so then we’re almost looking for like, oh, they’re not really into it or they’re not really into me or they don’t seem very present and then we make all this meaning out of it. That’s maybe coming from more of a fear-based part. So to just say, hey, I’m noticing you’re not, you seem not as present. What’s up, what’s going on? Or hey, can we like slow down or pause or let’s check back in. So I think just being verbal, asking for what you need and letting the other person tell you what’s going on with them rather than assuming. [LISA] I love that. Those are great techniques and tips to use. As we’re talking about dis-communication and HSPs, empaths, if you are being intimate with another HSP or empath, you can have dialogues without even talking. You’re just, and I’m wondering what do you do with that? [HEATHER] I think that, because there’s a pro and a con here, the con is like we’re sensitive to everything and sometimes that’s challenging. Or we might assume something is accurate when it’s not, but I guess the benefit too, is that you can be in this magical dance of sex with somebody who’s also highly sensitive and there’s just, this, it’s just this organic, natural connectedness where you don’t have to talk. So I think there’s going to be a lot more of that for HSPs as well, which I think is the real gift in sort of the bonus of being so sensitive when it comes to sex. [LISA] Do you know, with your experience and your training, if HSPs or empaths tend to have less sex because they easily get over stimulated or is it — [HEATHER] I don’t think so, to be honest. I mean, I haven’t noticed any patterns or trends like that because, again, I think maybe because there’s that strength where it’s like, when you can feel so empathically and so sort of exquisitely and you’re picking up on things that maybe other people wouldn’t, that can make sex that much more appealing and enticing. I think that was why I had a little bit of the disclaimer that we have to be a little bit careful and make sure we still have our boundaries. If you’re someone like, hey, I know it’s casual. I know how to take care of myself. I’m secure within myself. I can validate myself. Then. Cool, you do you. But if you’re someone who’s like, I’m not super confident and validating myself or I might have some insecure attachment or anxious attachment or something, then just communicating, asking the other person, what is this for you? How do we feel about each other? What are we expecting afterwards? It’s okay to have those conversations. In fact, when I think about couples I work with who are struggling with intimacy, they’re avoiding a lot of those challenging conversations. So that can even enhance the sexual experience. [LISA] How do you work with couples that are having those challenges of let’s say, just being communicative about what they want to receive or the experience they like to have and during sex and taking that initial step to ask their partner? [HEATHER] I think even the way you’re framing that is so lovely. [LISA] Aw, thank you. [HEATHER] When you think about what you want to receive, I once had a partner ask me just about a specific sexual scenario. How do you want to feel, how do you want to feel during this? I was like, Ooh. So I think having that conversation of like, how do we want to feel, what dynamic do we want to explore, are there any sensitivities that we don’t want to touch on or any traumas or triggers or anything like that? So I think just setting a really safe space and even in having the conversation about sex, hey, how do you, are you open to feedback? Do you want me to deliver feedback in a certain way? Would you prefer I don’t? What are you excited to try? What are you excited to receive? So I think that type of conversation can be super helpful and just knowing how, it’s like a meta conversation like, how do we want to talk about sex? How much do we want to talk about sex? Sometimes people will talk about it in the moment and that makes it like extra sensitive and extra challenging. So sometimes deciding like, okay, let’s wait until we’re out of the bedroom, we’re out of that moment and then we’ll process anything that we liked or that we want to try differently in the future that didn’t really work for us. I do think this is where building your own sense of secure attachment. I don’t know how much your audience knows about attachment, so I’ll just explain a little bit. [LISA] Yes, please. Go ahead. [HEATHER] There’s basically three attachment styles. So the secure style is about half the population and that means we’re pretty comfortable being close with other people and we have a sense of completion or wholeness just within ourselves as an individual. The other half of the population is some type of insecure attachment. That can either look like an anxious attachment style, where you’re maybe a little bit preoccupied with dating or sex life or relationship and what’s working and what’s not. There’s a sense of, it might not consciously be outsourcing your sense of security, but that’s effectively what’s happening. So looking for that validation, looking for someone else to have the answers or to fix you even, that’s where that neediness can come in too. So I’ve had more of an anxious style historically. The good news is there’s something called earned secure style where maybe you weren’t starting out with a secure style, but you can get there. So this is definitely something that is changeable. Then there’s the avoidance style and that’s another form of insecure attachment. That one is like, you just feel like I just can’t count on other people. They pretty consistently are letting me down or not meeting my needs. I basically just need to meet my own needs. I want intimacy. I crave that connection, but it just seems like sometimes it starts getting too close. I feel a little suffocated. I need some space. I don’t really feel independent anymore. I don’t want to lose myself. So intimacy doesn’t always feel safe in that way. What happens is that fortunately, or unfortunately the anxious and the avoidant people tend to attract each other. So they tend to reinforce each other’s beliefs, so an anxious person’s going to be like, hey, let’s connect and let’s be so close and validate me and the avoidant person receiving that is going to be like, oh my God, this is like proving all my worst nightmares. You’re smothering me. I don’t have space. This is why relationships aren’t safe. Then the reverse is true as well where on the anxious side, they’re like seeing this person’s not available and they’re not meeting my needs and they’re letting me down and I feel needier than ever. So that’s often what happens, but when we can pull back and become more conscious of the patterns and learn how to meet more of our own needs and learn how to communicate directly and kindly, especially when it comes to sex then we’re able to move towards a secret place. [LISA] Oh, that was beautiful. Thank you, Heather. You just beautifully named my partnership with my husband, anxious and I’ve avoiding. Always a work in progress. [HEATHER] Yep, it is. But it helps to be aware of it and know how to move towards center. [LISA] Oh, it sure does. I think that’s probably the key right there, is just knowing what was going on that you can change and change is not always easy. It takes time. If you have outside support that change can happen. [HEATHER] A hundred percent. Thank you for sharing that. [LISA] Yay, welcome. What are some of the best holistic things an individual can do to become a better lover? [HEATHER] I think what we just said, become more secure. Probably very high up there on my list. At one point being a therapist and private practice for a while, I was like, I feel like attachment issues basically underlie every other issue that people come to talking about. So I see that with sex, too. The more you’re able to build that secure partnership, the easier it’s going to be to let go, to orgasm, to experience more pleasure, to enjoy each other as sort of like an added bonus, not because there’s an emptiness inside of you that you’re not meeting for yourself. So I think that really just frees people up. So that would be one of them. People can work on that by meditating, learning to be alone with your own thoughts, by communicating their needs for space in a relationship so they don’t feel too trapped, by finding other ways to meet needs that we can’t put, I mean, we can just doesn’t work very well, put all of our needs on one person. So starting to employ some of those strategies. Then some of the other things, I think also just basic stuff like body image is a big concern that I see with a lot of people. The answer is not necessarily oh, go get real thin and lean. It’s just, take care of yourself whatever that looks like. I’m a big health and every size believer. So it’s like, how do you show up for yourself? How do you show up for your body? What priority is that in your life? I find that when people start exercising or eating well and just caring for themselves on that level, not coming from a punitive place, but just actually caring for themselves their body image tends to improve. The other one, I would say for body image is just being ruthless with social media. That makes a big difference. I think we underestimate how impactful that is. So I’ve been very ruthless with my Instagram. It’s like any account that makes me compare or question myself or anything like that, unfollow. Immediately unfollow. So I think being mindful of that. There was a research study, I think, in Fiji many years ago. It was before, like US or British media had come to their island and there was really no eating disorders. Then when that media did start coming, I think it was in the ’90s, all of a sudden it was like 20 some percent of the women developed some version of disordered eating. So it’s powerful. I think being mindful of what we consume and I think just making effort with sex. I think that there’s this unspoken or sometimes spoken social script of how we move through relationships and how we move through a sexual partnership and to start deprogramming ourselves and really tuning into what actually feels good. What actually turns me on? What do I actually like? It’s interesting working with clients because it’s hard for most people to name what their turn ons are. And there’s, I think there’s sort of this sense of well, you either have chemistry with someone or you don’t or you either get turned on or you don’t, but one of the things I’ve learned really since becoming a sex therapist that I probably didn’t know before is just how much intentionality and control we do have over that it’s not just hey, it’s either there, it’s not. It’s like, oh, I really like things that are a little taboo or oh, I really, I have sort of an oral fixation or, oh, I really like clothing, or I really like setting the atmosphere or I really like learning with this person for the whole day leading up to sex or whatever it is. So I think just people starting to even just think back on what were some positive sexual experiences that you’ve had, what were the dynamics involved, was there a power exchange? Was it romantic? Was it sensual? Is there something about the person that just turned you on? Were you feeling yourself and you just were feeling your own sexual energy and what was going on with that? So I think just getting to know yourself as a sexual being, because I think it’s so interesting still. It’s like, if I were to ask someone about their emotional state or how they relate to their emotions, I think a lot of people could answer that or how they relate with their career, what their strengths are in that area, what works well for them, but when it comes to sex, I think it’s a new frontier of personal development. So I feel like we’re just starting to figure some of that out. [LISA] It seems like we’re just given what we learn in school. Some of us learn from what we’re told bio parents, just what we see in media, movies we watch, articles we read, people that we talk to and their experiences. Maybe that’s the base foundation and then we just try it and it’s maybe a good experience, a not so good or in between there. [HEATHER] Yes, that’s right. You mentioned what we learned in school. It’s really not very good or helpful. And I think with the Supreme court stuff around abortion coming out, a lot of people have been saying, okay, great, so we’re not going to educate people. Then we’re going to like penalize them or whatever. I was like, that is an interesting point. When I was growing up, I don’t think I had the worst sex ed, but there certainly was not a focus on pleasure or connection or communicating around sex. It was really just all fear based and don’t have sex and it’s terrible and you’re going to get a disease or you’re going to get pregnant. A lot of people carry that with them into adulthood even after they’re married and their church allows it or they’ve changed their whole belief system. It’s like sometimes some of that stuff still lingers. [LISA] I just want to go back a little bit to what you were saying about deprogramming yourself and really getting to know yourself. What is like the average of that, in time, I’m thinking like in time? Is it months? Is it weeks? Is it years? [HEATHER] Like, what does that process look like? How long does it last? [LISA] Yes. Uh-huh. [HEATHER] I mean your whole life. [LISA] Oh, okay. So it just keeps evolving and changing? [HEATHER] I mean, that’s my perspective on spiritual growth or emotional wellness too. I’m just sort of a believer and like, it’s just a lifelong journey. I think if we can embrace the process more and let go of the outcome. But I mean, that said, if you want to get to like, hey, I mostly know myself or I can at least partially answer that question, I would say months. I don’t think it needs to be years or anything. Depending how much effort you put in, it could be weeks but I mean, I think most people with the other priorities of their life and other demands on their time I would think a few months, at least [LISA] If someone were to do this working on themselves individually with themselves, not seeking outside support, what are some resources that you can recommend? [HEATHER] There’s some fun sheets. I know the Pleasure Chess, it’s a sex toy store in a few different major cities. They have like a yes, no, maybe list and they have sort of more vanilla sex activities. They have some more sex activities and you can go through them alone or with a partner and just see like, okay, what stuff sounds appealing? What stuff is a hard no? What stuff is somewhere in the gray area and I’d consider it in terms of sexual activities? Then I really like Emily Niki’s book, Come As You Are. She also has a workbook. That one is great because it gets you to reflect on those past experiences, even like saying sexual words, which sounds so basic. I saw her in person at a presentation for therapists and she was like, let’s say the words together like elbow, eyelash, whatever. Then I was like vagina, penis, clitoris and just to notice, how do you feel when you say those words and what are the associations? So, I mean, there’s so much you can do on your own to build your comfort level, to notice where you’re uncomfortable, to explore some of the beliefs around sex. I also really like the Life Coach School. They have a self-coaching model and they have a PDF on their website. I can provide a link to that if you want to put it in your show notes. That’s one where you look at, what’s the factual circumstance? Then like, what perspective, what thought am I applying to that circumstance? What’s my feeling about that thought? Then what do I do or not do once I’m in that feeling state? Then what result comes from those actions or inactions that I’m doing? That can be applied to any area of life, so starting to apply that to our sex life and just see like, okay, like maybe I’ve been unconscious about some of these beliefs, but how can I become more conscious and more intentional about what thoughts do I want to be thinking, what thoughts really work for me? What results am I wanting that maybe I’m not getting now? [LISA] Oh, wow. All those will be, all those resources will be in the show notes. Those are so helpful. As you’re just explaining this, I’m thinking, so what happens to a person, like if we’re a whole person and let’s say one part of us have many different pieces of the pie, our sexuality part is shut down and we start to work on that part of ourselves and it just opens up? How does that affect the rest of our whole? [HEATHER] Oh, that’s a good question. I think of sexual energy as being like life force energy. When you think about sex, that’s also literally how all life is created. So I think that makes a lot of sense. I think people probably have more energy. They probably feel a little bit more confident when they’re connected to their sexual energy. There’s also, I think background energy that’s being expended, like suppressing sexuality or resisting it in some way. So I think we’re also like freed up. There’s a sense of being a little more free to just be who you are, express yourself authentically when it comes to sex. Yes, I think I’ve actually even heard people like business coach, people be like using your sexual energy to grow your business. I think it’s just, people are more motivated, maybe feel more alive. So that definitely benefits all areas of your life. [LISA] I can just see like a big explosion happening yes, in all areas of your life. And what if the sexual energy is not like a positive energy? It maybe goes out, we say like sideways or backwards, or? [HEATHER] That is an interesting one because I do work with people quite a bit with like compulsive sexual behavior. Usually, I mean, not always, it could be around sex with other people, but it’s often around masturbation and porn as well. Yes, so I’m going to break down internal family systems a little bit, because I think that’s going to help explain this one. So with internal family systems, we have our self-energy, that’s that higher consciousness that I mentioned before, and it tends to be calm and confident and creative and compassionate and curious. They have like eight C words actually that describe it. Then we also have three different types of parts. We have manager parts that proactively run our lives, make plans, keep our schedule, get things done. Then we have firefighter parts. I think that’s the category where these less positive feeling sexual parts would be. So the firefighters it’s are more reactive. So it’s almost like, okay, something starts feeling icky. It’s like, there’s a little fire in the house. The firefighters come with their fire hoses and they put out the fire and no one dies in the house and a building doesn’t burn down, but everything’s wet, needs to be replaced. The gist with these parts is that they have a really positive intention and they’re serving an important function, but there is some collateral damage. So the way myself or another IFS therapist or coach would work with people is to help them sense this part in or around their body to notice how they’re relating to this part because oftentimes what happens is we do label the part is bad. Ooh, bad part go away. So it could be like, oh, I’m feeling anxious. Let’s just make that go away. Oh, I’m feeling sad. Make that go away. That’s how a lot of us relate to our emotions and so we’re really flipping the script on that so instead of relating in that way, we’re actually befriending these parts. These might seem like parts of ourselves that it’s like, I don’t like this part. Why do I want to be friends with it? I think that’s how people generally think. But then when we start getting into that self-energy and relating to the part from a place of self-energy, then we’re able to be compassionate with the part. We’re able to let go of our agenda of how we think the part should be and just be gently curious about it and just start to get to know it and to understand it. What we inevitably find is that there are no bad parts, and actually Dick Schwartz, who’s the creator of IFS just wrote a book called No Bad Parts, which I think is fascinating. I think it really helps us to befriend ourself. So when we start befriending those parts, we start learning, oh, why is this part doing this? Oh, here’s why. It thinks intimacy with another person is unsafe or is worried I’m going to be depressed. It thinks that if I’m compulsive about sex and have an orgasm, then I’ll feel okay. Sometimes there’s those reasons there that we just don’t know yet, but they’re there and they’re important reasons. Then gradually we can work with the part to shift its role or to update the part about how capable we are now or for the part to be able to ask our self-energy, which is more infinite for help. Or eventually the firefighter parts are often protecting exiled parts, which those are parts that we’ve been told from society are not acceptable, not okay. So we shove them in the dark basement corner of our psyche and then we layer on the managers and the firefighters to keep them at bay. So eventually the firefighter part might let us just access that exiled part directly and unburden, whatever traumas those exile parts are holding. Then the whole system can shift around that. It’s pretty cool actually. [LISA] That is cool. Oh, I love your description. I hear so much healing in that and like having a domino effect with the individual person and then everybody else in their life. [HEATHER] That’s actually a really good point. I think it definitely can have a big impact on relationships and I’ve started incorporating more of the IFS work into my couples counseling as well. [LISA] Wow. What is the most important thing you want listeners to take away today, Heather? [HEATHER] I mean, the thing that pops to my mind is just to love your sexuality, love the sexual parts of yourself and know that that’s part of your wholeness as a person. I think a lot of us carry some shame and some stigma around sexuality that’s really not ours. I think it’s just been handed to all of us and so we can just hand it back to the universe or wherever it came from and just that it’s okay and it can be safe to befriend and love all the parts of yourself, including your sexuality. [LISA] Do you have a take-away for listeners? [HEATHER] I do, I’m going to have an empath resource guide for all the empaths and HSPs listening that will mention some of the tools I mentioned today. I’m going to have a recording of how to work with some of your parts when it comes to the internal family systems and just how to lean into your sensitivity as a gift rather than a burden. [LISA] Oh, wow, that sounds wonderful. I want to check that out myself. Thank you so much for those free gifts. Where can listeners get in touch with you? [HEATHER] My website is just my name, heathershannon.co, and my Instagram is @Heather A Shannon. Then my TikTok is at Heather Shannon LCPC. [LISA] Wonderful. All those will be on the show notes too. [HEATHER] Cool. Thanks. [LISA] Thank you so much, Heather, for coming on the show today. [HEATHER] Thank you for having me, Lisa. This is really lovely. [LISA] It’s been a delight to have you here. [HEATHER SHANNON] Thanks. [LISA] Thank you, my listeners, for tuning in today. Remember to subscribe, rate and review wherever you get your podcast. To find out more about highly sensitive persons, please visit my website at amiokpodcast.com and subscribe to my free eight-week email course to help you navigate your own sensitivities and to show you that it’s okay not to take on everyone else’s problems. This is Lisa Lewis reminding each and every one of you that you are okay. Until next time, be well. Thank you for listening today at Am I Ok? Podcast. If you are loving the show, please rate, review and subscribe to it on your favorite podcast platform. Also, if you’d like to learn how to manage situations as a highly sensitive person, discover your unique gift as a highly sensitive person, and learn how to be comfortable in your own skin, I offer a free eight-week email course called Highly Sensitive People. Just go to amiokpodcast.com to sign up. In addition, I love hearing from my listeners, drop me an email to let me know what is on your mind. You can reach me at lisa@amiokpodcast.com. This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regards to the subject matter covered. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the publisher, or the guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical, or any other professional information. If you want to professional, you should find one.