The V-Word

There is no time like long summer nights to cultivate our uniquely, profoundly human capacity for pleasure, especially sexual pleasure. Our pleasure response transforms our relationship to each other and even to life itself. Focusing on pleasure not only changes how we see our opportunities for intimate connection, but also invites us into a deeper relationship with our erotic soul.

It becomes hard to trust your own thinking when nothing seems to be working. The space between how I thought it would go and how it is going seems to widen in front of my eyes. Maybe most difficult of all is how often the undesirable outcomes around us spill over into our relationships, both at home and at work. An errant comment too easily turns into an argument. I become blind to my impact on people around me, caught up in the unresolved problems surrounding me. During times like these, we often underestimate the power of the choices we make and how it can create a path back towards what’s working or down the slippery slope of self-destruction, which my husband affectionately calls “flirting with the gutter.”

Mother’s Day is a celebration honoring the mother of the family, as well as motherhood, maternal bonds, and the influence of mothers in society.

In the first few weeks of May, the grocery stores are filling up with “I Love My Mom” balloons and flowers that are bundled together with “Happy Mother’s Day” ribbons. It’s that time of year again— when every son and daughter is on the hunt for that perfect gift to give their moms.

We interviewed Wendy Strgar, founder, and CEO of Good Clean Love as well as a mother of four, about motherhood from her point of view—a mother’s point of view.

May is “International Masturbation Month,” and here at Good Clean Love, we don’t shy away from talking about masturbation and self-pleasure. We agree with physicians and sex therapists the world over that it is a natural part of a sexually healthy life. 

To celebrate, we’re sharing four things you might not know about masturbation and the practice of self-pleasure.

Most of us don’t realize how frequently we are checked out of our life. We struggle to stay present in the day-to-day with the never-ending onslaught of digital feeds and new devices that offer superficial connectivity at best, but we lose out on the true contact that feeds our soul and makes us human. More and more scientific research is showing how much we give up when we trade the voyeurism of social media for the real-time relating that makes us feel seen and heard. Even more disturbing is how we are losing the muscle memory to do the messy and gratifying work of truly showing up, risking our heart, and communicating. It is in the trenches of our life, in the mess of people’s feelings spilling over onto us that we are really connected and that we can offer our best self. Start today with one of these tips and see how different life can feel when you fully show up!