June 5, 2025 • 33 mins
Healing from betrayal can be a daunting task, but is it possible to truly move on from the hurt and pain? In this video, we explore the concept of healing from betrayal and provide guidance on how to start the process of recovery. From understanding the emotions that come with being betrayed to learning how to forgive and trust again, we'll dive into the steps you can take to heal and move forward. Whether you're struggling with feelings of anger, sadness, or resentment, this video aims to provide you with the tools and insights you need to begin your journey towards healing and recovery. Can you truly heal from betrayal? Let's find out.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
It is a practice of faith where you recognizethere must be some meaning here.
There's something important about this.
When you can actually have that deep sensethat, god, this is painful, but you can learn
from it.
You can you can grow from it.
And it it takes time.
Like any sort of recovery from trauma,inevitably, we blame ourselves when something
(00:21):
bad happens, even if there's no moral sense weshould be blaming ourselves.
Forgiveness is a really important first step,and I lay out three steps to forgiveness.
The first step is The second step is And thethird step, I have a funny name for, and you
don't have to be religious to appreciate thisstep.
I call it Good sex.
(00:42):
I simply mean, simply, good sex is when it'snot just sex.
It's we have three levels.
I have plain old sex, good sex, and sacred sex.
Plain old sex simply requires couples needthose moments of intimacy as much as they need
stability.
Sacred sex, to get from good sex to sacred,it's really more about the vast majority of
couples I work with.
They're not having stability issues.
(01:04):
More often, they're having intimacy issues.
It's not something you can engineer.
It's something you can lay the groundwork for.
Hey, everybody.
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Now back to our show.
Hey, everybody.
This is doctor Diane, your host of the LibidoLounge.
I'm so excited about today's guest, doctorBruce Chalmer.
We are getting into so many important topicstoday.
(02:13):
One of the most important topics we're gonnatalk about is forgiveness.
And it's really cool to have doctor Bruce onthe show with me because I know this is
something that I have even spent a decentamount of time myself looking up on Wikipedia
and other types of platforms like that.
Like, is forgiveness and how do we define it?
(02:34):
And I think so many times, we get in our way offorgiveness, and we hold this energy, and we
hold this frequency, and the anger, and allthese things, simply because we don't
understand it.
And it not only damages ourselves, but itdamages the re- the relationship.
I know there's been things in my past thatforgiveness has been a real challenge and a lot
(02:54):
of personal energy working to, to actuallyforgive people in my life.
So and I'm really, really excited to go intothis conversation today.
So, Bruce, thank you so much for being herewith me.
Well, I'm delighted.
Thanks for having me on.
Yeah.
I'd I'd it's funny to say I love to talk aboutforgiveness because it's it's a topic that
involves all kinds of pain.
(03:16):
You only need to forgive when you're in a lotof pain, but I do find it's an important thing
to talk about.
And let's define it.
And I think, like, defining, like, what isforgiveness, like Gay said, like, like, it's a
challenging thing, and I think due to society,due to upbringing, due to religion, we have a
lot Like, one of the things when I'veresearched this is there's a lot of different
(03:37):
definitions out there of what people actuallythink forgiveness is.
Yeah.
So let's start with what is forgiveness?
How are you defining it?
So, you know, if you boil them all down, I'msure I'm oversimplifying, but if you boil them
all down, there's basically two ways to defineforgiveness, and there's the way I like and the
way I don't.
So I'll start with the way I don't.
I say I don't like it, but it's a very commonway of defining forgiveness.
(03:58):
A lot of times when people say they'll forgivesomeone who's hurt them badly, what they mean
is they'll restore the relationship.
If I forgive someone who's hurt me, okay, I canperhaps trust them again.
We'll go back to where we were.
You know, it's kind of like when people use theterm forgiving a financial debt.
To forgive the debt is saying, You know what?
You don't owe me the money anymore.
Let's just move on.
That's one way of defining forgiveness.
(04:21):
I don't like that way, And let me tell you theway I like.
The way I like is where forgivenessand I didnot coin this phrase, but I love itforgiveness
is an inside job, which is to say, I canforgive someone I don't trust at all.
I can forgive someone I have absolutely nointention of restoring a relationship with.
I can forgive somebody that I'm still going tosue or divorce or prosecute in court.
(04:45):
I can forgive all kinds of people that don't,in any sort of moral sense, deserve
forgiveness.
I can forgive people who have no remorse, whohave no understanding of what they did.
In that sense, forgiveness is all about thatinternal sense.
I can get past the essential trauma.
I cannot be obsessed with it.
I can think about it, have some perspective onit, recognize, yeah, well, that happened.
(05:07):
I wish it hadn't.
Maybe I understand why it did, and maybe Ididn't.
Maybe I had a part of it, and maybe I didn't.
But all of that I can have perspective on soI'm not freaking out.
And that's what I mean by forgiveness.
And the reason I like that better than theother one is it's empowering because you
recognize you're no longer at the mercy ofsomeone else's attitudes or, you know, someone
(05:28):
whether or not they apologize or whatever.
You're not carrying around the hurt.
And I would be remiss if I didn't quote AnneLamott that so many people quote around
forgiveness because it's a lovely quote.
I'm sure I won't put the words exactly right.
But she said essentially, to not forgive islike drinking rat poison and waiting for the
rat to die.
And as I like to point out, yeah, once you getthe poison out of you, then you can worry about
(05:51):
the rat.
You know, the rat might still be there or itmight still be a rat.
But if you got the poison out of you, you canthink more clearly.
You're not, you know, distracted by panic.
Yeah.
I like that definition a lot because I thinkwhere people get stuck, and I know when I've
looked this definition up where I was gettingstuck, was thinking that it almost like says,
(06:11):
okay, that behavior or that thing was okay.
Right?
And what you're saying is like, we're not,we're not saying that, Hey, whatever somebody
did was maybe okay.
Like, you could've been wrong, you could'vebeen hurt, you could've been all these things.
And it's not saying their behavior is okay,it's saying you're changing your nervous system
response to it so that you can live a healthierlife and still deal or still say say navigate
(06:36):
if you need to, if you need to keep arelationship with that person, still navigate
in a way that your nervous system can, say,handle better.
Correct?
Yes.
Yes, exactly.
Yeah.
That's the sense, you know, if you think of itin terms of, processing trauma, to use this
sort of trauma language, you know?
Yeah.
It's like when you process the trauma, you'reno longer freaking out whenever you think of
it.
Your brain has learned that the memory of theevents is safe.
(07:00):
The events weren't, but the memory is safe.
And so you're not distracted by it if you getreminded of it, which of course you get
reminded of things all the time, consciously ornot.
So in that sense, yes, that is exactly how Ilike to think about forgiveness.
And it gives you, as I mentioned earlier, itempowers you.
It gives you the sense that, Okay, I couldactually do something about this.
(07:20):
Then you can figure out if you can rebuildtrust with someone, if you want to maintain or
if you need to maintain a relationship withsomeone.
And that's a whole different set of issues.
That's not an inside job.
That involves both people.
The forgiveness is a really important firststep.
And I lay out in that book you mentioned, I layout three steps to forgiveness.
And of course, anytime anybody lays out threesteps, you know it's partly baloney because
(07:45):
that's not how life works.
But having said that, yes, I have my threesteps.
And I'll just briefly say what they are.
The first step is to forgive yourself becauseinevitably, we blame ourselves when something
bad happens, even if there's no moral sense weshould be blaming ourselves.
It's a that's part of the survival mechanism.
It's like, okay, gives me a sense I have somecontrol even if I don't.
(08:06):
So I'm at to blame myself, so I need to forgivemyself.
The second step is forgive whoever hurts you.
And that I claim is a fairly short step fromforgiving myself, because if I've forgiven
myself genuinely, if I've really gotten to thepoint of saying, you know what, I didn't know
what I didn't know.
I knew what I knew.
I didn't know what I didn't know.
I guess I was doing the best I could.
(08:27):
I'm not evil or stupid or crazy.
I just kind of blew it, but that's what happenswhen you don't know enough, you know.
I could apply that to the person who hurt metoo.
Again, I'm not trying to say there's no moralculpability.
I'm just saying, well, I guess that's what theycame up with.
You know, bummer that they did, but that's whatthey came up with.
They were doing the best they could do.
I don't want be angry about it.
Now I can figure out what do I want to do.
(08:47):
And the third step I have a funny name for, andyou don't have to be religious to appreciate
this step.
I call it forgiving God.
And what I simply mean by that is how could welive in this world where we have this this
tantalizing sense that we're in control ofthings, which is largely an illusion?
You know, we think we're controlling somestuff.
We do have influence, but shit happens, and weget hurt by it, and we need to forgive the fact
(09:12):
that that's the case, sort of forgiving theuniverse for that.
And I think that's a really important step toobecause then it's it it leads to a mindset that
says, wow, this whole reality business isactually good to be what it is even if it's
painful sometimes.
And that's I call that mindset faith.
Again, not necessarily religious.
That's what heals.
(09:33):
That's what gets people to be able to deal withyou know, to see the meaning in it and not just
freak out and say, oh, we just wanna go back tohow it was because how it was won't work.
How it was is what got you into trouble.
Yeah.
It's really helpful.
And I think that I like the step threeoftentimes too because it's so easy from a
standpoint of losing, say, power within oneselfto start, say, projecting and say, well, this
(09:58):
is that fault of of God, the universe, thatenergy, whatever it is that that we that
anybody believes in.
And in doing that, we can lose some sense ofpower.
So even by saying, like, forgiving on thatlevel, like, energetically, the universe, God,
at large, we begin to, like, put that power, Ithink, back into ourselves.
So I think it's a really important step that alot of people haven't, talked about in this
(10:21):
realm.
So you bring up trust, and I think trust is areally important place to go next because,
especially since you a lot of your work is withcouples and relationships and that sort of
thing and that is what we talk about on thisshow.
But many times, if we're dealing withforgiveness and we're talking about
forgiveness, there is a fundamental trust thatprobably has been broken and
(10:44):
Oh, yeah.
Right?
And that leads to so much feeling for so manypeople of not feeling safe in their
relationships, maybe not feeling safe inthemselves.
And I don't think, like, it's news to anybodythat this can be a big pivotal The loss of
trust can be a big pivotal turning point thatif people do wanna reconcile their relationship
and this is not addressed, oftentimes it's aslippery slope downhill from here.
(11:08):
Oh, yeah.
So where do people go?
Right?
So it's like, okay, taking the time to forgiveoneself, forgive their partner, and it sounds
like this is done through a lot of like selftalk or like what is can actually before I go
to the trust thing, let's take a step back.
And like from the standpoint of forgiveness,how what is that process?
(11:31):
I understand the three steps, but, like, ifsomebody's trying to take that first step to
forgive themselves, what exactly are they doingthere?
Yeah.
You know?
So here is my gross oversimplification of that,I'm sure, you know?
Yeah.
How do you how do you lead someone there?
I don't have a simple formula that says, oh,you know, self talk.
You know?
Say these affirmations and everything will befine.
(11:52):
I I don't tend to think that's true.
You know?
I think the affirmation it's not thataffirmations are bad, but the affirmations
often follow from feeling better rather thanthe affirmations making you feel better.
You know, it's something of a bootstrapprocess, I suppose.
I boil it back down to that one word faith thatif you can actually practice, and it is a
practice.
It's not a knowledge you can learn.
(12:13):
It's not something that, you know, it's notsomething you can simply repeat to yourself.
It is a practice of faith where you recognizethere must be some meaning here.
There's something important about this.
That's how you can get to that place offorgiveness.
You know, Viktor Frankl, his book on Man'sSearch for Meaning, where he here is he
survived Auschwitz, One of very few people inthe group of people he went with who did, and
(12:38):
found meaning in that, in pure evil.
It's not that he's he doesn't deny it's pureevil, but he was able to find meaning in that
suffering.
That's the sense of faith I'm talking about,that when you can actually have that deep sense
that, god, this is painful, but you can learnfrom it, you can grow from it, That's how you
can get to that place of forgiveness.
(12:59):
And it it takes time, like any sort of recoveryfrom trauma.
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Now back to our show.
Takes time.
One of my I was trained.
I did a lot of work before I did before I gotsort of almost exclusively into couples many
years ago.
I did quite a bit of work working with traumasurvivors.
I'm trained in EMDR, and I'm trained inhypnosis.
(14:06):
And the work there, all the various therapiesthat work with trauma basically invites you to
go there in your mind without freaking out.
If you can actually go there without freakingthe fuck out, that's basically what'll work.
Yeah.
Then you have a shot at your brain learning,oh, these memories are safe and you can recover
(14:26):
from it.
So the forgiveness process is certainly, from atherapy standpoint, is a lot about going to
those places and what the therapist isproviding.
I think more than any of our fancy techniques,what we're providing is faith.
We're saying, wow, this whole thing is, it canbe meaningful.
You can learn from this.
Know, I've had many people go through that sortof process.
(14:48):
I've never had anybody say to their partner,hey, thanks for cheating.
Haven't heard that one yet.
I've heard lots of people say, in effect,thanks for precipitating that crisis, because
we're so much better off now.
Yeah.
And that's what I mean by that sense of faith.
If you go in with that sense that, boy, this ispainful, but I'll bet we can we can grow from
it, that's what lets you get to that place offorgiveness, I think.
(15:11):
Yeah.
Go ahead.
I was just gonna say it's so so well said.
I mean, I think in oversimplifying things, it'sreally finding the silver lining.
-ASHLEY (15:19):
-Right?
Which, like you said, through trauma, it's likefinding a silver lining is it's a daily
practice and a daily work when there's so muchpain and there's so much hurt.
So, I I like that a lot.
It's not as simple like, I love EMDR and someof those other therapy, know, types of
therapies you mentioned.
At the same time, like like you said, it's likeall they're doing is they're bringing that
(15:42):
processing to the prefrontal cortex where wehave reasoning we can actually think and
process these things without emotion.
So we're still in many ways doing the samething.
We're just it's just a different way of helpingour brain find that that silver lining so we
can begin to let go of the trauma.
Mhmm.
Yeah.
Right?
Absolutely.
And, you know, rebuilding trust then is, firstof all, it works a lot better if you can think
(16:06):
clearly to see if you even want to try thatwith a partner.
And if you do, if you have good reason to wantto do that, and of course, simply being a, say,
a married couple or people who've been togethera long time, especially if they have kids, they
have enormous reason to wanna do that.
Even if they decide to divorce, they haveenormous reason to wanna be able to work
together as parents.
(16:27):
So that building of trust is a lot I'll put itin the contrapositive terms.
Is that is that the nerdy word?
It can't happen if you haven't had some levelof forgiveness because you're too distracted by
panic.
Even if you've forgiven, rebuilding trust thenis about reaching a level of understanding
(16:49):
sufficient to be able to say, wow, I canimagine a person that I rebuild trust with
having done something that they did.
I understand it enough.
I see where it came from, and I also see fromthem, and so to say this involves both people,
I also see from them that they understand itenough that they have reason to be able to
(17:10):
reassure me they wouldn't do it again, notbecause it's just, oh, no.
We'll go back to how it was.
That's nonsense, but because they've learnedwhat they needed to learn.
And they also often the trusting works bothways.
It's really surprising.
You know, the the person who was cheated on,let's say, if it was kind of, you know,
infidelity sort of situation, the person who'scheated on is often feeling, how can I trust
(17:33):
this person not to cheat?
The person who did the cheating, if they havegotten to that place of forgiving themselves,
forgiving their partner, they need to trusttheir partner too.
Among other things, they need to trust thattheir partner won't keep hating them or won't
keep you know, they most folks don't wanna bein a permanent, you know, permanent villain
role or, you know, permanent probationer rolewhere their partner is then their probation
(17:57):
officer.
That's not usually how people wanna live, andso to get past that requires that both parties
have this real sense of of, you know, thatthey're they're made whole again, and they can
appreciate what they went through to get there.
Do you have in your process, like, anythingbecause I I'm thinking about a situation,
(18:17):
right, where somebody's cheated on, and I thinka common thing that goes through in infidelity
or in anything that's a major trauma is this aquestion of, well, do we actually want to
continue together?
Right?
Mhmm.
When because it's like there is a ton of workthat goes into everything we're talking about
here.
(18:37):
Like, where the the reparation on both sides,it can be pretty major and, you know, it can
take weeks, months, and years even to to fullyrepair from this some of this stuff sometimes.
So do you have a part of your process at allthat helps individuals within the context of a
couple actually go through and ask themselvesquestions or just do any sort of processing
(18:58):
around what is the right step after this?
Like, do I actually want to continue with thisor do I wanna do something else?
How do you how do you guide people that way?
Yeah.
You know, there there are, of course, zillionsof different approaches on this.
Yeah.
My favorite way, I don't tend to make that abinary question, certainly not early on.
It's an implicit question right from the getgo.
(19:19):
They're wondering, well, okay, how's this gonnaturn out?
You know, what are we gonna decide to do?
And I absolutely respect that from day one andalso recognize that that is not it's often not
a simple decision.
It's not a simple, well, obviously, we have tosplit up or, obviously, we, we're going to stay
together.
And so you have to one of my favorite littlephrases my wife and I, you mentioned we do a
(19:41):
podcast, and we've said, if people did adrinking game, every time I said the phrase
tolerate the anxiety, they would be drunk bythe end of the podcast.
I say that a lot.
It's about tolerating the anxiety.
Yeah.
That sense that if you can sit with not knowingfor a while and, you know, and I have such
sympathy for people who can't they can't standit, and I'm not I don't I'm not judgmental
(20:05):
about that.
I can well understand that.
You know, the the only certainty you haveavailable to you early on in in this or anytime
in the process, the only thing you can becertain about is you can file for divorce in in
all the states in in our country now.
I think it's true.
Either party can file for divorce, and theydon't have I I think they're pretty much all no
(20:25):
fault now as far as I know.
Maybe there is exceptions.
But which is to say you don't have to concoctsome sort of scheme proving a particular sort
of, you know, abuse or infidelity or somethinglike that.
You can simply say, I want out, and you get toget out.
And that at least gives you some sense ofpower.
Well, okay.
You can end it.
But if you don't wanna end it, you're gonna bestuck with some uncertainty for a as you go
(20:49):
through the healing process.
So I don't have a sort of black and whiteapproach.
Now, having said that, I want to mention withrespect, there are folks who do, and I'm
forgetting the particular buzzword that theyuse to describe this, But there are folks who
will say, we're gonna meet for six weeks orwhatever it is, and the focus will be solely on
do you wanna continue the work, or do you wannasplit up?
(21:11):
That will be the sole focus.
And I, you know, I respect that.
That doesn't I don't wanna work that waybecause it feels to me like it's making things
too black and white when they need to be fuzzyfor a while.
But I don't know.
That's not exactly a scientific argument, isit?
So I respect that approach because that's nothow I like to work.
Yeah.
(21:31):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's I mean, I think there's differentlots of different types and ways for different
couples, and that's what's amazing about thework of many in the world is that we get to
choose the right thing for us, and the rightapproach for us in any, you know, any situation
in life, or in relationship.
And, you know, this thing you're you're talkingabout around in talk, like, or tolerating the
anxiety, I think is so important because Ithink it's it's like a rare thing in life that
(21:57):
we're actually taught, like, especially like ata young age to tolerate discomfort.
Yeah.
And in a world where comfort is the thing thatdrives, is one of the key, I think,
motivational drivers for people.
This thing of like being uncomfortable andbeing pain and being anxious is just there's so
much of this tendency to just like, what do Ihave to do to get rid of it as fast as
(22:19):
possible?
Yeah.
And that's natural.
That's normal.
I mean, I feel that too.
But from a standpoint of fixing things and ofchoosing things and of having time to process
things and making up decisions and not makingdecisions in that intense nervous system state,
which is not always the best decision.
Yeah.
You know, tolerating that is is reallyimportant.
(22:40):
I wanna move us on since we, only have acertain amount of time today, although I feel
like we could talk forever, to talk about oneof the things you talk about also in your work
is the difference between good sex and sacredsex.
Yeah.
So I wanted to talk about a little bit aboutthat, especially since libido and sex is one of
the things that comes up, you know, most fromour listeners as well as far as what they wanna
(23:02):
hear.
So can you differentiate though between both?
Actually, I have three levels.
I have plain old sex, good sex, and sacred sex.
But what was the first one?
Plain old sex.
Oh, plain old.
I think the title of the chapter was in mybook, reigniting this far.
The title of the chapter was sex, good sex, andsacred sex.
But the sex, I mean plain old sex.
What do I mean by plain old sex?
Well, anything you think it is.
(23:22):
Yeah.
So if you think it's sex, it's sex.
Yeah.
I'm not being really fussy about how I definethat.
It's whatever you think sex is.
So obviously not just intercourse, not evenjust general stuff.
I mean, it's whatever you think of sex, broadlyor narrowly.
Plain old sex simply requires that you more orless not be freaking out at the very prospect.
(23:43):
Now, people who've gone through sexual trauma,which is, of course, unfortunately, very many
people, that's an issue.
They need to recover from that to even be ableto have plain old sex without it being
horrible.
So that's for plain old sex.
You just need basically to not be in a state ofpanic.
For that, it also helps to have some basicknowledge of anatomy and physiology, You know,
what's where and what does what.
(24:03):
That's basically anatomy and physiology.
And for many people, and I'm sure not tomansplain to the woman in the conversation, but
I guess for a lot of women, that's a particularissue.
It's like, what's down there, how's my bodywork?
You know, usually men aren't unsure aboutwhat's down there and more or less how it
works.
Though I have to say, I wanna put in a plug foryou.
I think as we're recording this at your mostrecent one that dropped, which was with Matt
(24:29):
Sturm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
About, yeah, non ejaculatory orgasm, which Ihave often talked about with folks as well, and
an incredibly important thing if men can manageto learn that.
Anyway, all about that's plain old sex.
Good sex, I simply mean simply, good sex iswhen it's not just sex, it's intimate.
(24:49):
And by intimate, I don't mean necessarily thatit's quiet and romantic.
It could be loud and, you know, very I'm shyingaway from the word violent, but, you know,
rough or whatever, whatever people want.
But it means you're present, when you'reactually present in your body.
I define intimacy pretty broadly as when youare present and honest with yourself and each
(25:10):
other.
And to be that way and nobody's that way 20fourseven.
I am not always present with myself all thetime.
I'm distracted a lot.
Damn, smartphones.
You know?
Whatever.
There's all kinds of way life.
Exactly.
Yes.
But those moments and one of the things I claimis that couples need those moments of intimacy
as much as they need stability.
(25:30):
That's another issue.
But what were you so for good sex, you need tobe actually present.
And that's remember, we were talking abouttolerating the anxiety.
That's a lot about that.
That's a lot about being willing to say thingsto your partner that you're worried your
partner is going to think weird, or fantasies,or to be able to talk about stuff, whether it's
(25:50):
politically correct or not, and say, oh, thisis a fantasy even if we don't actually enact
it, that this turns me on, that kind of stuffconversation.
So that's intimate sex, or good sex.
I call that good sex.
Sacred sex, to get from good sex to sacred,it's really more about the sacred than it is
about the sex.
Now I I think you you had mentioned in that inthat podcast that you heard about tantra.
(26:13):
You know, you've you have probably morefamiliarity than I do.
I mean, I've read what I've read.
We've interviewed quite several people on ourpodcast who are really tantra folks.
I love it.
And it's all about that sense that the whateverthe sex is, it isn't just about the couple
anymore.
It's joining forces that are much bigger.
And so that is something, as I say, much moreabout the sacred per se than it is about sex.
(26:37):
Sex is just a good example.
I think I mentioned in the book, you know, whysacred sex as opposed to, you know, sacred dish
doing?
And of course, some people would say, well,there is such a thing as sacred dish doing if
you are present in that sense of sacred.
It can be, but the forces of sex are soamenable.
They're so awesome, literally.
(26:59):
They're awe inspiring.
The first time anybody's had an orgasm,perhaps, if wasn't unpleasant, and I know there
are trauma situations where that happens.
But often, the first time someone has anorgasm, it's awe inspiring.
It's like, oh my god.
Where did this force come from?
And that is very amenable to that sense ofbeing joined with the universe in some much
(27:22):
larger ways than just the two people involvedor however many people involved.
Yeah.
I love it.
Thank you for explaining that.
I I love how we can take concepts.
Like, of my favorite things is like, whathappens in the bedroom or wherever we're
intimate is actually a reflection in many waysof what happens outside of the bedroom.
And, you know, it's like we can take basicthings that there's a lot of research on, like
(27:43):
meditation and mindfulness and these sorts ofthings that also in some sense, and in many
sense when people get deeper and deeper withpractices like that, are ways of connecting to
the divine, ways of connecting to the feelingof awe and all that.
And I say this because I've done like, I'vedone thirty six day meditation retreats.
I've like gone very, very deep into themeditation world.
(28:04):
And one of my favorite things to say is like, Ithink sex is better than meditation.
Right?
When we're really in that sacred sex like typeof thing you're talking about and we're
connected to that all as something greater, andsomething cosmic, and beautiful, and we're a %
present.
Mhmm.
You know, we're a % present in our body, andit's a it's a real big practice there.
(28:24):
So, do you, in your work, do you help?
And is this in your, your book on this?
Do you help couples or individuals, like, learnhow to tap into these, you know, different
types of sex and how to actually startexploring them?
Yeah.
You know, I suppose if I were gonna talk aboutwhat have I written about and what do I talk
with folks about, I talk about the distinction.
(28:46):
I don't, you know, I don't lead, like,workshops on how to how to get to that level of
sacred sex.
I mostly talk about more about the intimatepart.
Yeah.
So a lot of the work I do with couples yeah,the considerable majority, I was gonna say
vast, I think that's true.
The vast majority of couples I work with,they're not having stability issues.
(29:07):
More often, they're having intimacy issues, Andintimacy is all about that.
So good sex is all about that.
And we're often talking about both sex andintimacy more generally.
And so I do talk a lot about ways to get there.
Again, all about tolerating the anxiety.
I don't talk a lot about, okay, here are somepractices that can invite you into that sacred
(29:29):
mode other than the fact of saying, hey, readup on that stuff, or, you know but the more you
get into I I do have a a sense, and I thinkthis is true of peak experience in general,
it's not something you can engineer.
It's something you can lay the groundwork forso that you engage in practices.
This is no different from daily prayerpractices people have or daily meditation
(29:52):
practices.
You might have the occasional experience ofthis astonishing unity with the divine or
whatever you wanna say, but you can't make thathappen in any given circumstance.
You can simply get good at it, and then it canhappen.
And I think that's true of sacred sex as well.
So it's know, I don't I don't, have I don'thave workshops on tantra and stuff like that,
but I I mention it to people.
(30:13):
Beautiful.
I love it.
Well, I know we're about out of time today.
I wanna make sure we know that people know howto get ahold of you.
I wanna make sure people know how to get yourbook and any other offerings, and your books, I
should say.
I just know there's, you know, your betrayaland forgiveness is the new one.
And then, of course, I want everybody to knowthat we are also offering part two of this
(30:34):
interview with doctor Bruce here.
And so part two, we're talking about stabilityand intimacy.
These two forces that are almost almost seemkinda like, contradictory to people where it's
like, okay, how can I feel safe?
How can I feel stable in a partnership?
And still how can I do all these things thatcultivate that intimacy?
And sometimes they almost feel like they'reopposite things that are needed.
(30:56):
Sometimes they're the same.
At least that's my experience.
So I'm gonna talk to doctor Bruce about thatmore here in part two, so make sure you look in
the show notes and then, so you can understandhow to access that, coming out here soon.
Okay.
So let's, now tell us, doctor Bruce, tell usplease how do people get ahold of you, do
people get your book, All of those good.
Yeah.
Well, best bet is if you just go toBruceChalmer.com, b r u c e c h a l m e r,
(31:22):
Bruce Chalmer Com, that has sort of links towhatever you might need.
That links to my practice if people areinterested in actually working with me.
I do all telehealth, so that's doable.
I have also links there to my books.
My books are widely available pretty muchanywhere you can get I, you know, almost hate
to do it, but I'll put in a plug for Amazonbecause that's the more people get on Amazon,
(31:44):
the more people find out about it, and that'sjust kind of how it works these days.
So if you go to Amazon.com, if you search forDoctor.
Bruce Chalmer, your Doctor.
Bruce Chalmer, you will find all of my booksthere, including the book I wrote in 1986 on
statistics, which is still available, which iskind of hilarious.
That's another story.
(32:05):
So you'll find links to that.
And then, the podcast that my wife and I do,Couples Therapy in Seven Words, available on
all the podcast platforms.
You can search for that, or you can go to ourpodcast website, which is CTinseven.
That's the numeral seven.
CT in 7 Com.
So how to find it.
And we'll have all of those links, everybody.
We'll have all of that in the show notes fromtoday's episode.
(32:26):
So thank you everybody so much for tuning intothis episode.
Please, please, please do me a favor.
Share this with your friends and family.
This topic on forgiveness, like, it's just sucha big, big conversation that honestly, I think
we've been figuring and trying to figure out ashumans for centuries, for eons, how to do this,
what it means, and I just think we can't getthis information in enough people.
(32:50):
So if you would please do me a favor and sharethis with friends and family and anybody you
think that could could benefit from thisinformation.
And thank you so much, Bruce, for being herewith me today.
Well, thanks for having me on.
Everybody, we'll see you real soon for anotherepisode on The Lounge.
Take care.
(33:11):
Thank you for listening to the Libido Lounge.
Please don't keep me a secret.
Please share this with your friends.
You can find me on YouTube, on Instagram, aswell as how to work with me at MyLibidoDoc.com
It is a practice of faith where you recognizethere must be some meaning here.
There's something important about this.
When you can actually have that deep sensethat, god, this is painful, but you can learn
from it.
You can you can grow from it.
And it it takes time.
Like any sort of recovery from trauma,inevitably, we blame ourselves when something
(00:21):
bad happens, even if there's no moral sense weshould be blaming ourselves.
Forgiveness is a really important first step,and I lay out three steps to forgiveness.
The first step is The second step is And thethird step, I have a funny name for, and you
don't have to be religious to appreciate thisstep.
I call it Good sex.
(00:42):
I simply mean, simply, good sex is when it'snot just sex.
It's we have three levels.
I have plain old sex, good sex, and sacred sex.
Plain old sex simply requires couples needthose moments of intimacy as much as they need
stability.
Sacred sex, to get from good sex to sacred,it's really more about the vast majority of
couples I work with.
They're not having stability issues.
(01:04):
More often, they're having intimacy issues.
It's not something you can engineer.
It's something you can lay the groundwork for.
Hey, everybody.
Quick break in our episode to talk to you aboutour sponsor, My Libido Doc.
One of the things that we truly believe is thatgreat sex is available to everyone, but we just
(01:29):
have to learn how.
So head over to our site to get your free copyof our ebook, Five Steps to Mind Blowing
Orgasms and Romance.
Get the quick and easy tips to turn your sexlife around, rev up your engines, and fall in
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(01:52):
So if you just go to mysexdoc.com, you willfind that ebook there for download.
Now back to our show.
Hey, everybody.
This is doctor Diane, your host of the LibidoLounge.
I'm so excited about today's guest, doctorBruce Chalmer.
We are getting into so many important topicstoday.
(02:13):
One of the most important topics we're gonnatalk about is forgiveness.
And it's really cool to have doctor Bruce onthe show with me because I know this is
something that I have even spent a decentamount of time myself looking up on Wikipedia
and other types of platforms like that.
Like, is forgiveness and how do we define it?
(02:34):
And I think so many times, we get in our way offorgiveness, and we hold this energy, and we
hold this frequency, and the anger, and allthese things, simply because we don't
understand it.
And it not only damages ourselves, but itdamages the re- the relationship.
I know there's been things in my past thatforgiveness has been a real challenge and a lot
(02:54):
of personal energy working to, to actuallyforgive people in my life.
So and I'm really, really excited to go intothis conversation today.
So, Bruce, thank you so much for being herewith me.
Well, I'm delighted.
Thanks for having me on.
Yeah.
I'd I'd it's funny to say I love to talk aboutforgiveness because it's it's a topic that
involves all kinds of pain.
(03:16):
You only need to forgive when you're in a lotof pain, but I do find it's an important thing
to talk about.
And let's define it.
And I think, like, defining, like, what isforgiveness, like Gay said, like, like, it's a
challenging thing, and I think due to society,due to upbringing, due to religion, we have a
lot Like, one of the things when I'veresearched this is there's a lot of different
(03:37):
definitions out there of what people actuallythink forgiveness is.
Yeah.
So let's start with what is forgiveness?
How are you defining it?
So, you know, if you boil them all down, I'msure I'm oversimplifying, but if you boil them
all down, there's basically two ways to defineforgiveness, and there's the way I like and the
way I don't.
So I'll start with the way I don't.
I say I don't like it, but it's a very commonway of defining forgiveness.
(03:58):
A lot of times when people say they'll forgivesomeone who's hurt them badly, what they mean
is they'll restore the relationship.
If I forgive someone who's hurt me, okay, I canperhaps trust them again.
We'll go back to where we were.
You know, it's kind of like when people use theterm forgiving a financial debt.
To forgive the debt is saying, You know what?
You don't owe me the money anymore.
Let's just move on.
That's one way of defining forgiveness.
(04:21):
I don't like that way, And let me tell you theway I like.
The way I like is where forgivenessand I didnot coin this phrase, but I love itforgiveness
is an inside job, which is to say, I canforgive someone I don't trust at all.
I can forgive someone I have absolutely nointention of restoring a relationship with.
I can forgive somebody that I'm still going tosue or divorce or prosecute in court.
(04:45):
I can forgive all kinds of people that don't,in any sort of moral sense, deserve
forgiveness.
I can forgive people who have no remorse, whohave no understanding of what they did.
In that sense, forgiveness is all about thatinternal sense.
I can get past the essential trauma.
I cannot be obsessed with it.
I can think about it, have some perspective onit, recognize, yeah, well, that happened.
(05:07):
I wish it hadn't.
Maybe I understand why it did, and maybe Ididn't.
Maybe I had a part of it, and maybe I didn't.
But all of that I can have perspective on soI'm not freaking out.
And that's what I mean by forgiveness.
And the reason I like that better than theother one is it's empowering because you
recognize you're no longer at the mercy ofsomeone else's attitudes or, you know, someone
(05:28):
whether or not they apologize or whatever.
You're not carrying around the hurt.
And I would be remiss if I didn't quote AnneLamott that so many people quote around
forgiveness because it's a lovely quote.
I'm sure I won't put the words exactly right.
But she said essentially, to not forgive islike drinking rat poison and waiting for the
rat to die.
And as I like to point out, yeah, once you getthe poison out of you, then you can worry about
(05:51):
the rat.
You know, the rat might still be there or itmight still be a rat.
But if you got the poison out of you, you canthink more clearly.
You're not, you know, distracted by panic.
Yeah.
I like that definition a lot because I thinkwhere people get stuck, and I know when I've
looked this definition up where I was gettingstuck, was thinking that it almost like says,
(06:11):
okay, that behavior or that thing was okay.
Right?
And what you're saying is like, we're not,we're not saying that, Hey, whatever somebody
did was maybe okay.
Like, you could've been wrong, you could'vebeen hurt, you could've been all these things.
And it's not saying their behavior is okay,it's saying you're changing your nervous system
response to it so that you can live a healthierlife and still deal or still say say navigate
(06:36):
if you need to, if you need to keep arelationship with that person, still navigate
in a way that your nervous system can, say,handle better.
Correct?
Yes.
Yes, exactly.
Yeah.
That's the sense, you know, if you think of itin terms of, processing trauma, to use this
sort of trauma language, you know?
Yeah.
It's like when you process the trauma, you'reno longer freaking out whenever you think of
it.
Your brain has learned that the memory of theevents is safe.
(07:00):
The events weren't, but the memory is safe.
And so you're not distracted by it if you getreminded of it, which of course you get
reminded of things all the time, consciously ornot.
So in that sense, yes, that is exactly how Ilike to think about forgiveness.
And it gives you, as I mentioned earlier, itempowers you.
It gives you the sense that, Okay, I couldactually do something about this.
(07:20):
Then you can figure out if you can rebuildtrust with someone, if you want to maintain or
if you need to maintain a relationship withsomeone.
And that's a whole different set of issues.
That's not an inside job.
That involves both people.
The forgiveness is a really important firststep.
And I lay out in that book you mentioned, I layout three steps to forgiveness.
And of course, anytime anybody lays out threesteps, you know it's partly baloney because
(07:45):
that's not how life works.
But having said that, yes, I have my threesteps.
And I'll just briefly say what they are.
The first step is to forgive yourself becauseinevitably, we blame ourselves when something
bad happens, even if there's no moral sense weshould be blaming ourselves.
It's a that's part of the survival mechanism.
It's like, okay, gives me a sense I have somecontrol even if I don't.
(08:06):
So I'm at to blame myself, so I need to forgivemyself.
The second step is forgive whoever hurts you.
And that I claim is a fairly short step fromforgiving myself, because if I've forgiven
myself genuinely, if I've really gotten to thepoint of saying, you know what, I didn't know
what I didn't know.
I knew what I knew.
I didn't know what I didn't know.
I guess I was doing the best I could.
(08:27):
I'm not evil or stupid or crazy.
I just kind of blew it, but that's what happenswhen you don't know enough, you know.
I could apply that to the person who hurt metoo.
Again, I'm not trying to say there's no moralculpability.
I'm just saying, well, I guess that's what theycame up with.
You know, bummer that they did, but that's whatthey came up with.
They were doing the best they could do.
I don't want be angry about it.
Now I can figure out what do I want to do.
(08:47):
And the third step I have a funny name for, andyou don't have to be religious to appreciate
this step.
I call it forgiving God.
And what I simply mean by that is how could welive in this world where we have this this
tantalizing sense that we're in control ofthings, which is largely an illusion?
You know, we think we're controlling somestuff.
We do have influence, but shit happens, and weget hurt by it, and we need to forgive the fact
(09:12):
that that's the case, sort of forgiving theuniverse for that.
And I think that's a really important step toobecause then it's it it leads to a mindset that
says, wow, this whole reality business isactually good to be what it is even if it's
painful sometimes.
And that's I call that mindset faith.
Again, not necessarily religious.
That's what heals.
(09:33):
That's what gets people to be able to deal withyou know, to see the meaning in it and not just
freak out and say, oh, we just wanna go back tohow it was because how it was won't work.
How it was is what got you into trouble.
Yeah.
It's really helpful.
And I think that I like the step threeoftentimes too because it's so easy from a
standpoint of losing, say, power within oneselfto start, say, projecting and say, well, this
(09:58):
is that fault of of God, the universe, thatenergy, whatever it is that that we that
anybody believes in.
And in doing that, we can lose some sense ofpower.
So even by saying, like, forgiving on thatlevel, like, energetically, the universe, God,
at large, we begin to, like, put that power, Ithink, back into ourselves.
So I think it's a really important step that alot of people haven't, talked about in this
(10:21):
realm.
So you bring up trust, and I think trust is areally important place to go next because,
especially since you a lot of your work is withcouples and relationships and that sort of
thing and that is what we talk about on thisshow.
But many times, if we're dealing withforgiveness and we're talking about
forgiveness, there is a fundamental trust thatprobably has been broken and
(10:44):
Oh, yeah.
Right?
And that leads to so much feeling for so manypeople of not feeling safe in their
relationships, maybe not feeling safe inthemselves.
And I don't think, like, it's news to anybodythat this can be a big pivotal The loss of
trust can be a big pivotal turning point thatif people do wanna reconcile their relationship
and this is not addressed, oftentimes it's aslippery slope downhill from here.
(11:08):
Oh, yeah.
So where do people go?
Right?
So it's like, okay, taking the time to forgiveoneself, forgive their partner, and it sounds
like this is done through a lot of like selftalk or like what is can actually before I go
to the trust thing, let's take a step back.
And like from the standpoint of forgiveness,how what is that process?
(11:31):
I understand the three steps, but, like, ifsomebody's trying to take that first step to
forgive themselves, what exactly are they doingthere?
Yeah.
You know?
So here is my gross oversimplification of that,I'm sure, you know?
Yeah.
How do you how do you lead someone there?
I don't have a simple formula that says, oh,you know, self talk.
You know?
Say these affirmations and everything will befine.
(11:52):
I I don't tend to think that's true.
You know?
I think the affirmation it's not thataffirmations are bad, but the affirmations
often follow from feeling better rather thanthe affirmations making you feel better.
You know, it's something of a bootstrapprocess, I suppose.
I boil it back down to that one word faith thatif you can actually practice, and it is a
practice.
It's not a knowledge you can learn.
(12:13):
It's not something that, you know, it's notsomething you can simply repeat to yourself.
It is a practice of faith where you recognizethere must be some meaning here.
There's something important about this.
That's how you can get to that place offorgiveness.
You know, Viktor Frankl, his book on Man'sSearch for Meaning, where he here is he
survived Auschwitz, One of very few people inthe group of people he went with who did, and
(12:38):
found meaning in that, in pure evil.
It's not that he's he doesn't deny it's pureevil, but he was able to find meaning in that
suffering.
That's the sense of faith I'm talking about,that when you can actually have that deep sense
that, god, this is painful, but you can learnfrom it, you can grow from it, That's how you
can get to that place of forgiveness.
(12:59):
And it it takes time, like any sort of recoveryfrom trauma.
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Now back to our show.
Takes time.
One of my I was trained.
I did a lot of work before I did before I gotsort of almost exclusively into couples many
years ago.
I did quite a bit of work working with traumasurvivors.
I'm trained in EMDR, and I'm trained inhypnosis.
(14:06):
And the work there, all the various therapiesthat work with trauma basically invites you to
go there in your mind without freaking out.
If you can actually go there without freakingthe fuck out, that's basically what'll work.
Yeah.
Then you have a shot at your brain learning,oh, these memories are safe and you can recover
(14:26):
from it.
So the forgiveness process is certainly, from atherapy standpoint, is a lot about going to
those places and what the therapist isproviding.
I think more than any of our fancy techniques,what we're providing is faith.
We're saying, wow, this whole thing is, it canbe meaningful.
You can learn from this.
Know, I've had many people go through that sortof process.
(14:48):
I've never had anybody say to their partner,hey, thanks for cheating.
Haven't heard that one yet.
I've heard lots of people say, in effect,thanks for precipitating that crisis, because
we're so much better off now.
Yeah.
And that's what I mean by that sense of faith.
If you go in with that sense that, boy, this ispainful, but I'll bet we can we can grow from
it, that's what lets you get to that place offorgiveness, I think.
(15:11):
Yeah.
Go ahead.
I was just gonna say it's so so well said.
I mean, I think in oversimplifying things, it'sreally finding the silver lining.
-ASHLEY (15:19):
-Right?
Which, like you said, through trauma, it's likefinding a silver lining is it's a daily
practice and a daily work when there's so muchpain and there's so much hurt.
So, I I like that a lot.
It's not as simple like, I love EMDR and someof those other therapy, know, types of
therapies you mentioned.
At the same time, like like you said, it's likeall they're doing is they're bringing that
(15:42):
processing to the prefrontal cortex where wehave reasoning we can actually think and
process these things without emotion.
So we're still in many ways doing the samething.
We're just it's just a different way of helpingour brain find that that silver lining so we
can begin to let go of the trauma.
Mhmm.
Yeah.
Right?
Absolutely.
And, you know, rebuilding trust then is, firstof all, it works a lot better if you can think
(16:06):
clearly to see if you even want to try thatwith a partner.
And if you do, if you have good reason to wantto do that, and of course, simply being a, say,
a married couple or people who've been togethera long time, especially if they have kids, they
have enormous reason to wanna do that.
Even if they decide to divorce, they haveenormous reason to wanna be able to work
together as parents.
(16:27):
So that building of trust is a lot I'll put itin the contrapositive terms.
Is that is that the nerdy word?
It can't happen if you haven't had some levelof forgiveness because you're too distracted by
panic.
Even if you've forgiven, rebuilding trust thenis about reaching a level of understanding
(16:49):
sufficient to be able to say, wow, I canimagine a person that I rebuild trust with
having done something that they did.
I understand it enough.
I see where it came from, and I also see fromthem, and so to say this involves both people,
I also see from them that they understand itenough that they have reason to be able to
(17:10):
reassure me they wouldn't do it again, notbecause it's just, oh, no.
We'll go back to how it was.
That's nonsense, but because they've learnedwhat they needed to learn.
And they also often the trusting works bothways.
It's really surprising.
You know, the the person who was cheated on,let's say, if it was kind of, you know,
infidelity sort of situation, the person who'scheated on is often feeling, how can I trust
(17:33):
this person not to cheat?
The person who did the cheating, if they havegotten to that place of forgiving themselves,
forgiving their partner, they need to trusttheir partner too.
Among other things, they need to trust thattheir partner won't keep hating them or won't
keep you know, they most folks don't wanna bein a permanent, you know, permanent villain
role or, you know, permanent probationer rolewhere their partner is then their probation
(17:57):
officer.
That's not usually how people wanna live, andso to get past that requires that both parties
have this real sense of of, you know, thatthey're they're made whole again, and they can
appreciate what they went through to get there.
Do you have in your process, like, anythingbecause I I'm thinking about a situation,
(18:17):
right, where somebody's cheated on, and I thinka common thing that goes through in infidelity
or in anything that's a major trauma is this aquestion of, well, do we actually want to
continue together?
Right?
Mhmm.
When because it's like there is a ton of workthat goes into everything we're talking about
here.
(18:37):
Like, where the the reparation on both sides,it can be pretty major and, you know, it can
take weeks, months, and years even to to fullyrepair from this some of this stuff sometimes.
So do you have a part of your process at allthat helps individuals within the context of a
couple actually go through and ask themselvesquestions or just do any sort of processing
(18:58):
around what is the right step after this?
Like, do I actually want to continue with thisor do I wanna do something else?
How do you how do you guide people that way?
Yeah.
You know, there there are, of course, zillionsof different approaches on this.
Yeah.
My favorite way, I don't tend to make that abinary question, certainly not early on.
It's an implicit question right from the getgo.
(19:19):
They're wondering, well, okay, how's this gonnaturn out?
You know, what are we gonna decide to do?
And I absolutely respect that from day one andalso recognize that that is not it's often not
a simple decision.
It's not a simple, well, obviously, we have tosplit up or, obviously, we, we're going to stay
together.
And so you have to one of my favorite littlephrases my wife and I, you mentioned we do a
(19:41):
podcast, and we've said, if people did adrinking game, every time I said the phrase
tolerate the anxiety, they would be drunk bythe end of the podcast.
I say that a lot.
It's about tolerating the anxiety.
Yeah.
That sense that if you can sit with not knowingfor a while and, you know, and I have such
sympathy for people who can't they can't standit, and I'm not I don't I'm not judgmental
(20:05):
about that.
I can well understand that.
You know, the the only certainty you haveavailable to you early on in in this or anytime
in the process, the only thing you can becertain about is you can file for divorce in in
all the states in in our country now.
I think it's true.
Either party can file for divorce, and theydon't have I I think they're pretty much all no
(20:25):
fault now as far as I know.
Maybe there is exceptions.
But which is to say you don't have to concoctsome sort of scheme proving a particular sort
of, you know, abuse or infidelity or somethinglike that.
You can simply say, I want out, and you get toget out.
And that at least gives you some sense ofpower.
Well, okay.
You can end it.
But if you don't wanna end it, you're gonna bestuck with some uncertainty for a as you go
(20:49):
through the healing process.
So I don't have a sort of black and whiteapproach.
Now, having said that, I want to mention withrespect, there are folks who do, and I'm
forgetting the particular buzzword that theyuse to describe this, But there are folks who
will say, we're gonna meet for six weeks orwhatever it is, and the focus will be solely on
do you wanna continue the work, or do you wannasplit up?
(21:11):
That will be the sole focus.
And I, you know, I respect that.
That doesn't I don't wanna work that waybecause it feels to me like it's making things
too black and white when they need to be fuzzyfor a while.
But I don't know.
That's not exactly a scientific argument, isit?
So I respect that approach because that's nothow I like to work.
Yeah.
(21:31):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's I mean, I think there's differentlots of different types and ways for different
couples, and that's what's amazing about thework of many in the world is that we get to
choose the right thing for us, and the rightapproach for us in any, you know, any situation
in life, or in relationship.
And, you know, this thing you're you're talkingabout around in talk, like, or tolerating the
anxiety, I think is so important because Ithink it's it's like a rare thing in life that
(21:57):
we're actually taught, like, especially like ata young age to tolerate discomfort.
Yeah.
And in a world where comfort is the thing thatdrives, is one of the key, I think,
motivational drivers for people.
This thing of like being uncomfortable andbeing pain and being anxious is just there's so
much of this tendency to just like, what do Ihave to do to get rid of it as fast as
(22:19):
possible?
Yeah.
And that's natural.
That's normal.
I mean, I feel that too.
But from a standpoint of fixing things and ofchoosing things and of having time to process
things and making up decisions and not makingdecisions in that intense nervous system state,
which is not always the best decision.
Yeah.
You know, tolerating that is is reallyimportant.
(22:40):
I wanna move us on since we, only have acertain amount of time today, although I feel
like we could talk forever, to talk about oneof the things you talk about also in your work
is the difference between good sex and sacredsex.
Yeah.
So I wanted to talk about a little bit aboutthat, especially since libido and sex is one of
the things that comes up, you know, most fromour listeners as well as far as what they wanna
(23:02):
hear.
So can you differentiate though between both?
Actually, I have three levels.
I have plain old sex, good sex, and sacred sex.
But what was the first one?
Plain old sex.
Oh, plain old.
I think the title of the chapter was in mybook, reigniting this far.
The title of the chapter was sex, good sex, andsacred sex.
But the sex, I mean plain old sex.
What do I mean by plain old sex?
Well, anything you think it is.
(23:22):
Yeah.
So if you think it's sex, it's sex.
Yeah.
I'm not being really fussy about how I definethat.
It's whatever you think sex is.
So obviously not just intercourse, not evenjust general stuff.
I mean, it's whatever you think of sex, broadlyor narrowly.
Plain old sex simply requires that you more orless not be freaking out at the very prospect.
(23:43):
Now, people who've gone through sexual trauma,which is, of course, unfortunately, very many
people, that's an issue.
They need to recover from that to even be ableto have plain old sex without it being
horrible.
So that's for plain old sex.
You just need basically to not be in a state ofpanic.
For that, it also helps to have some basicknowledge of anatomy and physiology, You know,
what's where and what does what.
(24:03):
That's basically anatomy and physiology.
And for many people, and I'm sure not tomansplain to the woman in the conversation, but
I guess for a lot of women, that's a particularissue.
It's like, what's down there, how's my bodywork?
You know, usually men aren't unsure aboutwhat's down there and more or less how it
works.
Though I have to say, I wanna put in a plug foryou.
I think as we're recording this at your mostrecent one that dropped, which was with Matt
(24:29):
Sturm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
About, yeah, non ejaculatory orgasm, which Ihave often talked about with folks as well, and
an incredibly important thing if men can manageto learn that.
Anyway, all about that's plain old sex.
Good sex, I simply mean simply, good sex iswhen it's not just sex, it's intimate.
(24:49):
And by intimate, I don't mean necessarily thatit's quiet and romantic.
It could be loud and, you know, very I'm shyingaway from the word violent, but, you know,
rough or whatever, whatever people want.
But it means you're present, when you'reactually present in your body.
I define intimacy pretty broadly as when youare present and honest with yourself and each
(25:10):
other.
And to be that way and nobody's that way 20fourseven.
I am not always present with myself all thetime.
I'm distracted a lot.
Damn, smartphones.
You know?
Whatever.
There's all kinds of way life.
Exactly.
Yes.
But those moments and one of the things I claimis that couples need those moments of intimacy
as much as they need stability.
(25:30):
That's another issue.
But what were you so for good sex, you need tobe actually present.
And that's remember, we were talking abouttolerating the anxiety.
That's a lot about that.
That's a lot about being willing to say thingsto your partner that you're worried your
partner is going to think weird, or fantasies,or to be able to talk about stuff, whether it's
(25:50):
politically correct or not, and say, oh, thisis a fantasy even if we don't actually enact
it, that this turns me on, that kind of stuffconversation.
So that's intimate sex, or good sex.
I call that good sex.
Sacred sex, to get from good sex to sacred,it's really more about the sacred than it is
about the sex.
Now I I think you you had mentioned in that inthat podcast that you heard about tantra.
(26:13):
You know, you've you have probably morefamiliarity than I do.
I mean, I've read what I've read.
We've interviewed quite several people on ourpodcast who are really tantra folks.
I love it.
And it's all about that sense that the whateverthe sex is, it isn't just about the couple
anymore.
It's joining forces that are much bigger.
And so that is something, as I say, much moreabout the sacred per se than it is about sex.
(26:37):
Sex is just a good example.
I think I mentioned in the book, you know, whysacred sex as opposed to, you know, sacred dish
doing?
And of course, some people would say, well,there is such a thing as sacred dish doing if
you are present in that sense of sacred.
It can be, but the forces of sex are soamenable.
They're so awesome, literally.
(26:59):
They're awe inspiring.
The first time anybody's had an orgasm,perhaps, if wasn't unpleasant, and I know there
are trauma situations where that happens.
But often, the first time someone has anorgasm, it's awe inspiring.
It's like, oh my god.
Where did this force come from?
And that is very amenable to that sense ofbeing joined with the universe in some much
(27:22):
larger ways than just the two people involvedor however many people involved.
Yeah.
I love it.
Thank you for explaining that.
I I love how we can take concepts.
Like, of my favorite things is like, whathappens in the bedroom or wherever we're
intimate is actually a reflection in many waysof what happens outside of the bedroom.
And, you know, it's like we can take basicthings that there's a lot of research on, like
(27:43):
meditation and mindfulness and these sorts ofthings that also in some sense, and in many
sense when people get deeper and deeper withpractices like that, are ways of connecting to
the divine, ways of connecting to the feelingof awe and all that.
And I say this because I've done like, I'vedone thirty six day meditation retreats.
I've like gone very, very deep into themeditation world.
(28:04):
And one of my favorite things to say is like, Ithink sex is better than meditation.
Right?
When we're really in that sacred sex like typeof thing you're talking about and we're
connected to that all as something greater, andsomething cosmic, and beautiful, and we're a %
present.
Mhmm.
You know, we're a % present in our body, andit's a it's a real big practice there.
(28:24):
So, do you, in your work, do you help?
And is this in your, your book on this?
Do you help couples or individuals, like, learnhow to tap into these, you know, different
types of sex and how to actually startexploring them?
Yeah.
You know, I suppose if I were gonna talk aboutwhat have I written about and what do I talk
with folks about, I talk about the distinction.
(28:46):
I don't, you know, I don't lead, like,workshops on how to how to get to that level of
sacred sex.
I mostly talk about more about the intimatepart.
Yeah.
So a lot of the work I do with couples yeah,the considerable majority, I was gonna say
vast, I think that's true.
The vast majority of couples I work with,they're not having stability issues.
(29:07):
More often, they're having intimacy issues, Andintimacy is all about that.
So good sex is all about that.
And we're often talking about both sex andintimacy more generally.
And so I do talk a lot about ways to get there.
Again, all about tolerating the anxiety.
I don't talk a lot about, okay, here are somepractices that can invite you into that sacred
(29:29):
mode other than the fact of saying, hey, readup on that stuff, or, you know but the more you
get into I I do have a a sense, and I thinkthis is true of peak experience in general,
it's not something you can engineer.
It's something you can lay the groundwork forso that you engage in practices.
This is no different from daily prayerpractices people have or daily meditation
(29:52):
practices.
You might have the occasional experience ofthis astonishing unity with the divine or
whatever you wanna say, but you can't make thathappen in any given circumstance.
You can simply get good at it, and then it canhappen.
And I think that's true of sacred sex as well.
So it's know, I don't I don't, have I don'thave workshops on tantra and stuff like that,
but I I mention it to people.
(30:13):
Beautiful.
I love it.
Well, I know we're about out of time today.
I wanna make sure we know that people know howto get ahold of you.
I wanna make sure people know how to get yourbook and any other offerings, and your books, I
should say.
I just know there's, you know, your betrayaland forgiveness is the new one.
And then, of course, I want everybody to knowthat we are also offering part two of this
(30:34):
interview with doctor Bruce here.
And so part two, we're talking about stabilityand intimacy.
These two forces that are almost almost seemkinda like, contradictory to people where it's
like, okay, how can I feel safe?
How can I feel stable in a partnership?
And still how can I do all these things thatcultivate that intimacy?
And sometimes they almost feel like they'reopposite things that are needed.
(30:56):
Sometimes they're the same.
At least that's my experience.
So I'm gonna talk to doctor Bruce about thatmore here in part two, so make sure you look in
the show notes and then, so you can understandhow to access that, coming out here soon.
Okay.
So let's, now tell us, doctor Bruce, tell usplease how do people get ahold of you, do
people get your book, All of those good.
Yeah.
Well, best bet is if you just go toBruceChalmer.com, b r u c e c h a l m e r,
(31:22):
Bruce Chalmer Com, that has sort of links towhatever you might need.
That links to my practice if people areinterested in actually working with me.
I do all telehealth, so that's doable.
I have also links there to my books.
My books are widely available pretty muchanywhere you can get I, you know, almost hate
to do it, but I'll put in a plug for Amazonbecause that's the more people get on Amazon,
(31:44):
the more people find out about it, and that'sjust kind of how it works these days.
So if you go to Amazon.com, if you search forDoctor.
Bruce Chalmer, your Doctor.
Bruce Chalmer, you will find all of my booksthere, including the book I wrote in 1986 on
statistics, which is still available, which iskind of hilarious.
That's another story.
(32:05):
So you'll find links to that.
And then, the podcast that my wife and I do,Couples Therapy in Seven Words, available on
all the podcast platforms.
You can search for that, or you can go to ourpodcast website, which is CTinseven.
That's the numeral seven.
CT in 7 Com.
So how to find it.
And we'll have all of those links, everybody.
We'll have all of that in the show notes fromtoday's episode.
(32:26):
So thank you everybody so much for tuning intothis episode.
Please, please, please do me a favor.
Share this with your friends and family.
This topic on forgiveness, like, it's just sucha big, big conversation that honestly, I think
we've been figuring and trying to figure out ashumans for centuries, for eons, how to do this,
what it means, and I just think we can't getthis information in enough people.
(32:50):
So if you would please do me a favor and sharethis with friends and family and anybody you
think that could could benefit from thisinformation.
And thank you so much, Bruce, for being herewith me today.
Well, thanks for having me on.
Everybody, we'll see you real soon for anotherepisode on The Lounge.
Take care.
(33:11):
Thank you for listening to the Libido Lounge.
Please don't keep me a secret.
Please share this with your friends.
You can find me on YouTube, on Instagram, aswell as how to work with me at MyLibidoDoc.com
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