Pleasure Uprising: Desire, Attachment, and the Sex You Actually Want

If you're searching for how to be a better lover, chances are you're encountering a lot of opinions that aren't rooted in fact. Most of us absorbed a version of what makes a great lover without ever being taught it — from movies, porn, romance novels, and a culture that never corrects those images with reality. The result is a subconscious checklist that includes perfect technique,...

You love your partner. You're pretty sure you're still attracted to them. So why does your body say no — and why does it feel so connected to the fact that you've reminded them three times this week to do one thing? It is connected. The slow creep of feeling like your partner's parent is one of the most consistent desire-killers I see in my practice. In this episode I'm br...

Most people who are experimenting with power play and BDSM aren't doing anything extreme. They're just two people who trust each other, trying to "spice it up." But skipping the negotiation conversation because it feels like it has to be a mood killer is a rookie move that can lead to real problems.  I'm not talking bruises here, I'm talking about emotional distance,...

Sexual self-abandonment is what happens when we stop having sex for ourselves. We may or may not actually stop having sex -- we might be doing it for someone else. For their desire, on their timeline, their idea of what sex should look like, while our own wants, our own pace, our own boundaries quietly went missing somewhere along the way. That's what this episode is about. How we get there —...

It's Pride Month, and I am celebrating with my dear friend and fellow feminist relationship coach Maggie Reyes by doing something I've been wanting to do anyway: sit down and talk about Heated Rivalry — the show, the books, why we love them, and what they actually teach us about real relationships. Beware: There be spoilers ahead, matey.  This is a fun one, and it goes deeper than fangir...

If you've been wondering whether your sex life can actually be different, this is the evidence. This episode is like the before and after photos you've been needing that real people get real change.  We're going into details about specific goals and what actually changes when people do real, structured work on desire, intimacy, and connection. Not inspiration. Not theory. Real peopl...

You've solved harder problems than this. So why is this one still stuck? This episode is for the high achievers who have done real work on themselves — the therapy, the books, the hard conversations — and still can't get traction when it comes to desire, intimacy, and their closest relationships. It's not because you haven't tried hard enough. It's because you've been...

Most people who feel disconnected from their desire, their body, or their partner aren't broken. They're just exiled — from themselves. And nobody ever taught them the way back. This episode is about what it actually feels like when you find it. The felt sense of coming home to your own body's sexuality — as a resource, a grounding force, and the place from which real confidence, re...

You don't have to join a compound to end up in a high-control group. Sometimes it starts with a neo-tantra festival. A weekend workshop. A community that feels like finally, finally, you found your people. Anke Richter is an international cult journalist, author of the bestseller Cult Trip (HarperCollins), and founder of Decult — the first cult awareness conference in Australasia. She spent s...

If you've ever left a sacred sexuality workshop feeling worse about yourself than when you walked in — or heard a friend blame herself for not being "receptive enough" — this episode is for you. Sexual polarity teachings are everywhere right now. They promise to unlock your feminine energy, reignite desire, and deepen connection. Sounds great. The reality is different. They're...

You've done the work. Real work. Therapy, couples counseling, the conversations, the books. You understand yourself better than you ever have — and you still feel the same way in your body. That's not a sign you're beyond help. It's a sign you've been using the wrong tools. This episode explains why the things most people reach for — talk therapy, mindset work, even good c...

If you've been trying to figure out how to want sex more and nothing is working — this episode is going to explain why. And it's probably not the answer you've heard before. A lot of people struggling with low desire or low libido have already done the reading. They understand the concepts. Their body still hasn't gotten the memo. That's not a character flaw. It's the...

Most people carry sexual shame so quietly and for so long that it starts to feel like a character trait rather than something that was handed to them. It isn't. Every flavor of shame — about wanting too much, too little, taking too long, not taking long enough, about your body, your history, your desires, your "low libido" — came from somewhere specific. And that somewhere is not yo...

Have you ever followed the "right" advice and ended up further from yourself? That's what this episode is about — and it's also why we're now Pleasure Uprising: Desire, Attachment, and the Sex You Actually Want . The evolution of this show mirrors what happens in my practice all the time: when you stop trying to fit yourself into the frame someone else handed you, somethin...

When a woman asks a male partner to "be more assertive in bed," those words are typically landing differently than she intends — and differently than he's hearing them. This is a gendered language problem, and it's causing real confusion, frustration, and disappointment in real relationships. There is a real vocabulary mismatch about "dominance" and "assertivenes...

You've heard it a thousand times: " keep the spark alive, get back to how it used to be, recreate that honeymoon phase magic." But what if that's the wrong goal entirely? Here's what nobody tells you: the honeymoon phase was a drug state — literally. A neurochemical cocktail of dopamine, norepinephrine, and nerve growth factor that made you want constantly, but didn't...

BONUS: Teaching embodied consent at home—for your kids AND your relationship. This special Podcasthon 2026 episode benefits Freedom Network USA, the largest coalition working on human trafficking in the United States. Prevention of sexual violence starts in families— and most of us were never taught how to practice true embodied consent ourselves. In this episode, you'll learn: Why teaching c...

Does your partner's touch make your skin crawl? You're not broken—and this is fixable. Touch aversion is when affectionate or sexual touch from your partner feels wrong in your body— irritating, threatening, or like you need to escape. This can happen even with light, loving touch.  This isn't about attraction. It's a nervous system response— and it's more common than you...

Treat others the way you want to be treated? Great rule. Terrible sex advice. In this episode I'm breaking down the principle that actually works — go at the pace of the slowest body in the room, with open curiosity — and why applying the wrong golden rule is one of the most common ways couples accidentally shut down desire without even realizing it. I talk about what going slow actually asks...

Ever notice how sometimes the answer isn't more information — it's actually doing something with what you already know? Like when your car is broken, you don't actually need more information from the mechanic after a certain point. You need someone to get under the hood and DO the work.  I recorded this episode because I kept seeing the same pattern: people who've been reading...

You've read the books. Maybe you've done therapy. You've tried scheduled sex, date nights, "just doing it." And you're still stuck. Here's why: you've been trying to fix a layout problem with decorative solutions. In this episode, I break down the kitchen remodel analogy— why desire gaps need something very different than what most people try. You need a com...

If you're ready to work on your desire gap but your partner won't go to therapy or coaching, this episode is for you. The answer to "can I actually fix this alone?" is yes — and today I break down exactly how individual work changes the entire relationship dynamic, even when only one person is ready to start. Drawing on systems theory and real client stories, we'll cover w...

Avoiding sex? Feeling the "ick" when your partner initiates? Going to bed at 8pm to dodge intimacy? You probably think you have low libido. But what if that's not what's actually happening? In this vulnerable episode, I share my own story of years spent in what I call "the messy middle"—that phase where you've stopped having sex you don't want, but you haven...

When you're running on empty, sex feels like just another demand on your already depleted system. But burnout isn't just affecting your work life—it's killing your desire and disconnecting you from your partner. Dr. Amy Grimm, veterinarian and certified burnout coach, joins me to explore how chronic stress impacts intimacy. We discuss what both high and low desire partners need to k...

Before you can solve your desire gap, you need to know what you actually want. This super simple, somatic practice helps you stop overthinking sex, connect to your body's truth, and find the safety you need to access authentic desire. Whether you want more or less sex than your partner, self-attunement is the foundation for everything. Learn the simple 1-minute body check-in that reveals your...