Male Bonding2
For those who like to explore the concept and dynamics of male bonding. Men are socialized in different ways in different societies, and so many men would like to have close male friendships, yet after spending time establishing a career, primary relationship and live in general, find themselves without close male friends. Many of us want male friends with whom we can share openly without...
Naked Hugs
Return to DiscussionsI have been thinking about some of the things that have been happening in the world and how people have become so disconnected from each other, which makes me go: people need to hug each other more. I love hugging, especially a naked hug because its an ultimate way of showing someone you care for them...and it's something anyone can do to anyone!
So I ask you: how do you feel about hugs, and naked hugs?
A gourmet hug is a long, full body hug where you really exchange energies. My favourite kind, especially when naked. :-))
Yes, I was a Body Electric coordinator for 5 years here, and we teach gourmet hugs! Love them! All of your skin front to front touches!
Hugs are the greatest...we're big huggers!! Like everything else if we can do it naked it's even better. We hug our platonic friends naked all the time, and it's never sexual...sensual perhaps because we all need to be touched. So many people need to relax and naked hugs are the best way to do it!!naked hugs everybody!!
I think of elderly European guys sitting shoulder to shoulder on a bench, watching bocce ball; young Russian soldiers falling asleep on the train, slumped together in a pile. Routine sharing of beds in hotels and among houseguests, which was still happening when I was young. The Anglo-American reticence to touch is really kind of peculiar. Hugs are a way to cut through that. In a way it's too bad we have to more or less consciously make the occasion. Like the difference beween the "go out and play" that I grew up with versus the modern play-dates-and-soccer-practice methods for cutting through isolation.
Naked hugs are a wonderful male bonding activity which disarm self-consciousness and inhibition without words. I love 'em! Naked hugs are the opposite of the "pyramid hug" I had to master growing up in an ethnic evangelical enclave. It's a hug where you lean forward and touch a shoulder to avoid the risk of coming into any contact whatsoever with a breast or genital, which would border on "indecent". A pyramid hug is false intimacy and is best accompanied by a singsongy voice as in "How are you-ew? Im fiii-ne? And you-ewew? A naked hug among men on the other hand is strong and silent and it's important to have no concerns about genitals, flaccid or aroused. The quiet understanding of being a man among men says more than anything.
Hugs are a wonderful way to connect with one another, naked hugs only more so. Nothing nicer, or more healing, than physical contact with another person and especially with other males. Our naked bodies touching-- hairy chest against hairy chest, penises touching-- are a way of letting one another know they're cherished, all is right with the world.