211. Untangling the Scripts for Intimacy and Setting Them on Fire with Elise Braunschweiger

[00:00:00] Nicole: Welcome to Modern Anarchy, the podcast, exploring sex, relationships, and liberation. I'm your host, Nicole.

On today's episode, we have Elise join us for a conversation all about running wild in your erotic desires. Together we talk about embracing the fluidity of your sexuality, listening to the intuition of your pleasure. And reigniting our imagination. Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Modern Anarchy.

I am so delighted to have all of you pleasure activists from around the world tuning in for another episode each Wednesday. My name is Nicole. I am a sex and relationship psychotherapist with training in psychedelic integration therapy, and I am also the founder of the Pleasure Practice supporting individuals in crafting expansive sex lives and intimate relationships.

Dear listener, ah, I love getting to share these conversations with you at Dear Listener Liberation. Liberation. Liberation. Elise and I get into all of it, our personal journeys, the vulnerability of the lessons that we've learned along the way, and. Yeah. You know, as a researcher and a pleasure activist and a psychotherapist and a sex educator, I am passionate about all of our liberation, and especially as a woman myself, I am so curious about the future of women's sexuality.

Again, we get into some of the complexities of that today and some of the recent rules and expectations and all of that stuff that we are still all learning to deconstruct. Yes, let's set those expectations on fire and write a new narrative of what is. Possible, dear listener. And I'm so grateful that every single guest is vulnerable and shares their authenticity around these topics because that is how we grow.

That is how we heal. That is how we learn together. And so it's such a joy to be releasing these episodes for you each week and to be co-creating these educational resources. And I'm really, really excited, dear listener that you're here with me along for the ride.

Alright, if you are ready to liberate your pleasure, you can explore my offerings and resources at modernanarchypodcast.com, linked in the show notes below. And I wanna say the biggest thank you to all my Patreon supporters, you are supporting the long-term sustainability of the podcast, keeping this content free and accessible to all people.

So thank you. If you wanna join the Patreon community, get exclusive access into my research and personal exploration, then you can head on over to patreon.com/modern Anarchy podcast, also linked in the show notes below. And with that dear listener, please know that I am sending you all my love and let's tune in to today's episode.

So the first question that I ask each guest is how would you introduce yourself to the listeners?

[00:03:37] Elise: I would introduce myself as Elise. Hi. I go by she her. I am a cis white female. I am super gay. Um, hell yeah. Uh, super kink friendly and I'm a business owner and date coach slash matchmaker. So that was a lot of ands, but that felt like a holistic, of course, holistic definition.

[00:04:04] Nicole: Yeah. Well, I'm excited to have you here today and see what we're gonna end up talking about.

[00:04:09] Elise: Thank you. I love the topics that you cover on the podcast. Mm-hmm. So super pumped to be here.

[00:04:13] Nicole: Hell yeah. I feel like we're gonna end up talking about, uh, queer liberation and the freedom of relationships.

[00:04:22] Elise: There is so much I could say about that.

Yeah. There's so much I could say that's go, even just the interconnectedness, I think between queer relationships and like liberation. There's so much queerness and kink friendly poly relationships because I. There's this script given to traditional heteronormative couples and queer people, like by definition, sort of light that on fire and say, what do we want this to look like?

And sort of reconstruct that. And so I think even the straight people who are engaging in some sort of non-monogamous or kink friendly dynamic are, in some ways there's something kind of queer about that. 'cause they're dismantling that system and building a new.

[00:05:06] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I'm curious, in your own life, how has this sort of liberation come to be for you?

[00:05:14] Elise: Oh, it's been such a huge journey. Mm-hmm. I think to get to the place where I am, and I'm such a big believer in. Our previous experiences and sometimes even especially the bad ones, are so important and inform how we can do better. They are huge lessons into what our emotional needs are and how to advocate for them and how to get them, um, met by your partners or even by yourself, and yeah.

Like so many people. My experience coming into sexual liberation was honestly because I was in a relationship that was so without that really was very restrictive, very, very heteronormative. I was like a kid without a ton of family. Met a guy at 18. Okay. Lots of stability sort of promised there. Sure. And then I'm like 23 and have a mortgage in the suburbs and I'm like, this is not

[00:06:14] Nicole: wow,

[00:06:15] Elise: what I'm looking for. It's, it just was not resonant and I don't think that was something I could reconcile with that partner. It was very clear. He always knew when he met me, I was like literally in like in a field at a music festival at 3:00 AM and so he knew I had like this piece of me that was very sort of explorative and

[00:06:34] Nicole: mm-hmm.

[00:06:35] Elise: Just think like so many people, you kind of get into a dynamic. Matthew Hussey says this really cool thing, he's a date coach where he says relationship dynamics are like cement. Mm-hmm. Where they're really in the start, but then they're quick to harden. I think there's something so key there. And so, you know, I was like in my early twenties, feeling super, super stuck.

Definitely was not sexually satisfied, did not feel like I was in a dynamic that encouraged play and exploration, or even just being connected to myself and my own pleasure. And then kind of like had this. Renaissance, like a, a sort of lighting my life on fire. Oh. Like signed my quick deed, gave up my house and my mortgage, quit my job, moved out to New York City and I got a job as a matchmaker.

[00:07:24] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:07:24] Elise: And that of it was so interesting 'cause I was going through this like professional revolution where I was learning so much about dating and compatibility and then like alongside that, going through like a queer revolution for myself where I was really coming into my queerness, I found my current partner, it's always been so much easier for her to be more fluid and open and exploratory with me.

And it's key, I think, to have a partner who matches that energy. So a lot of it's been through relationships. I think I've gotten where I am through learning alongside other people, and then almost like pruning and weeding what doesn't work and building something better for myself. So

[00:08:02] Nicole: yeah,

[00:08:03] Elise: a little long-winded, but

[00:08:04] Nicole: yeah. Yeah. No, it was great. Thank you for being vulnerable and sharing your journey. I'm thinking about going back to the beginning when you had the mortgage and you were in the suburbs. I'm curious what you were feeling. You said it wasn't in alignment, but what were you feeling? What were you noticing? What What's coming to mind for me is often the people that have that low energy feeling that dull.

Just like, oh, something's off with my life. I don't know what, but it just doesn't match. So I'm curious, what were you feeling at that time?

[00:08:37] Elise: That's definitely spot on. I think something that was really interesting for me during that time was I was kind of growing into my womanhood too, where I was coming from, you know, a sort of stable, unstable childhood, and there was this conflict internally where the partnership created stability.

Right. You know, and it gave me something to sort of latch on to. I like worked 40 hours a week and put myself through college. Like I probably wouldn't have been able to do that if I didn't have some sort of support system and I wasn't gonna get it for my family. So I have so much empathy for Little Elise and why she stayed as long as she did, even though I was speaking very proactively internally, out loud with my partner about the fact that there was some sort of misalignment.

And I think it felt like, honestly, it's so funny. It feels like sort of in a very reductionist sense. Like I was staring at a path and it was like the traditional monogamous, heteronormative path and there was some safety there, some familiarity maybe there. And then there was this black hole of the unknown.

But it was so exciting to me, like it was just, and it got to a point when I left, I remember saying to him like, I will regret for the rest of my life if I don't. Yeah. Get out and go do my own thing and figure this out.

[00:09:59] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. I think we forget, I don't know how to describe this well, but the ways that the people we are in relationship with shape our sense of self and our reality and everything.

So, right. The compatibility piece, when you're with someone who doesn't have that same desire, that same vision for a lifestyle, you think, well, why don't I, something's wrong with me. I'm the strange one. Right? And then you meet someone who has that same vision, that same goal in life, and then you feel that resonance, you feel normal, and like, this is what people do.

Right. And I think we forget, it's, it's making me just think about, you know, the ways that when, when we study, like quantum mechanics, how the environment shifts, the experience, right? And who's watching, who's observing or not, it shifts the experience of the atom. And I think that we kind of feel like we are individuals.

Individuals, and it's true. Individual Adam exists, don't get me wrong, but we are shaped by our environment. Right. And how much of that is that interplay with us? And how much, and you know, just even like you said, being in the suburbs, that lifestyle brought you down. It didn't feel right. Right. It was not the environment for you.

There was not fertile soil for your flowers to grow and blossom. And we don't get mad at the plant. We get mad at the soil and we say, this is not the right space for me to plant. And when I even look back on my own life, it's so hard. 'cause at the time I don't think I had the language for it. It was, uh, you know, I try to pin back to that version of myself, who I grew up very Christian.

[00:11:31] Elise: Yeah.

[00:11:32] Nicole: At the purity ring. I thought I was gonna be married by 21.

[00:11:36] Elise: Yeah. So much undo there. Yeah. Just so much to untangle. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:11:41] Nicole: Absolutely. Absolutely. It's been a journey. Quite the journey. Um. And yeah, there was something about it that just didn't feel right. I didn't have the language, but when I looked out at my path before me, I, I couldn't see past like 25, 30.

'cause I hated it so much. I was like, there's no way I'm gonna thrive and this is not okay. Like, I do not see a future. Right? Yes. And I, I think now where I'm sitting at, it's like, yeah, 'cause that wasn't where you would thrive. That was not the soil for you. Right. And so, trying to get clear now, even where I'm at now, of what it means to continue to ask that question of like, where is my pleasure?

Where is the space that I thrive in relationally? And kind of still continue to flex that muscle of, of listening to that 'cause I, 'cause I feel it. I'm sure you do too. And even in different relationships. Platonic sexual or not spaces where we thrive, and then other spaces where maybe the, you know, frequency or the values are a little off and you're like, yes, this is, this is not it, you know?

[00:12:40] Elise: Yes, yes. I think something you mentioned earlier was just the idea of sort of the influence that other people have on us, and it's like such a cliche, but it's like, so it's just so crucially important to pay attention to the influence that people do have on you and if it's a positive or negative one.

And I think there's so many, um, more traditionally minded people who, like, I just have felt very boxed in by like, there's this feeling of limitation and I think we all want to feel like we can be expansive and playful and just not limited by. Where we currently are, like, so just having this exploratory mindset with our identities, I think that's only a good thing.

It's something that I actually talk a lot about in reference to the queer community too, because Sure, I think the queer community can be kind of funny sometimes about, um, people who are newly questioning their sexuality. Um, so there's sometimes this feeling of skepticism and I just try to remind everybody that it's only a good thing to be playful with your ident identity.

It's only a good thing to try on new labels and to see what works for you to update language as you're learning about yourself. And I think not just with sexuality, but across the board. I, I wish people were less rigid in terms of how they viewed themselves and what they allowed themselves to experience and who they could become.

[00:14:12] Nicole: Right. 'cause the, you know, the more rigid, the more repressed is where we see harm and violence when we really look at it, right? The more repression, the more rigidity it's actually causing harm towards other people. If we go that full route to look over at that space, right? Versus a little bit of flexibility of exploration not being so rigid with the boxes to the full expansiveness, which is things change.

You know what I mean? Like, you can think, this is where I'm at right now and then it evolves if, if I've learned anything in my own personal life, is that my eroticism continues to evolve outside of my control. Where I'm like, this thing no longer does it anymore. Alright, we are here now what do we do with this?

[00:14:55] Elise: You know? You know, I think there's this fear oftentimes in partnership of change where it's almost like there's a homeostasis and there is like an underlying paranoia that if that's disrupted then the whole thing sort of falls apart. But I, from experience my own relationship feel like the opposite is the best approach.

So my girlfriend, for instance, has from the very beginning we met, been really on board with every iteration of me that could come along and, and has always been really encouraging for me to explore those different parts of myself and is kind of excited by the idea of watching me grow and learn and change and is not threatened by that.

And that is, um, that's not the norm. Unfortunately. I talk to a lot of people about dating and I think someone said to me recently that they find a lot of relationships. There's one person who desperately wants the other person to change, and there's one person who desperately wants the their partner to stay the same.

She said she finds it's often like men will want their women to be the woman that they found the first night. So it's like, I just wish she was that fun girl who she used to be. And women are like, we have four kids. I need you to show up. And these are huge, again, generalizations. But it's an such an interesting concept to me.

'cause I think that quality of how willing someone is to give you that flexibility to adapt and change and explore yourself, there's something there that gives like a metric of health of the relationship. 'cause if someone expects you to stay the same, it's a conditional sort of love.

[00:16:32] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:16:32] Elise: It's conditional on you performing the same role you've been performing.

And so I want to help people undo that. I don't think it's the only way.

[00:16:41] Nicole: No. Yeah. 'cause immediately when you were talking about your girlfriend and the way that she gives you. The way that I don't wanna use that language gives the way that she supports you in all of your expansion and all of your exploration.

That is love. Yeah. That is, you know, the highest form of love. To be supportive of this other human before you and say, I want you to explore everything to your heart's content and hold your hand and root for you in that exploration until it no longer serves us right. Or we die, or wherever that is for you.

But that, that true love of support. Wow. And I think that it's hard because we're all locked up in our own heads. Right? And so we have concepts of people, right. This is who I started dating and for all the while, forgetting that every single day we are becoming. Someone new every day, which thank God, right?

Thank God. Like we are changing and growing and evolving. But if you don't continually check in with your concept of that other person, you can get locked in that old concept and dream and, and spend a whole lifetime, even longing for that past version of self forgetting what's right in front of you. And so what does it mean to be in that fluid state of acknowledging that change is inevitable?

Your partner, the person that you're dating right now is not gonna be the person that you're dating in 10 years if you're still together, right? It's gonna be a new human, which is exciting, should be exciting. And so what does it mean to be in that dynamic? That's what gets me like erotically excited is like, oh, like we're constantly changing.

There is no staticness in our actual dynamic here. And so I think that the more we can get flexible with the inevitability of change and the discomfort of that, the better we're gonna be off in our relationships.

[00:18:30] Elise: Yes. I think there was something you said in there about like essentially just like the, it being the highest form of love, and there have been times, you know, I don't think it's true that people who are open in their relationship style, it's, I don't think it's true that it's a binary, so I don't think it's that you're either monogamous or you're open.

Mm-hmm. I think there's so many different kinds of non-monogamy that exist, and to me, intuitively, me and my girlfriend in many ways live a monogamous lifestyle, but there's just this peace communication wise that gives us the permission to never, everything's a conversation. Everything that's good for you, that resonates with you is on the table for us to talk about and think about.

There was something even a long time ago, much earlier in my development as a person, um, that poly relationships, there was something about them that seemed altruistic and so loving.

[00:19:27] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:19:27] Elise: Because there's primacy given to your partner's needs outside of just what's good for you in the dynamic. Right.

It's not about a self-serving. Well, what's good for us, it's about, we are two individuals and I love you and I want you to be as happy and content and satisfied and whole as you can be, and I'm gonna support you in whatever that looks like. And there's something about that that is so loving to me, and I know it doesn't work for everybody, but for the people who are doing it, I think there's such a purity to the love that they must have for each other in order to.

Yeah, center the other person's needs and combat, you know, Polly being poly isn't easy. There are things that you have to confront. And so to sort of face that challenge so that you both get to be the best versions of yourself, I don't know, it's just, I think it's a wonderful thing to be able to do if it's the right lifestyle for you.

[00:20:20] Nicole: Yeah. Yeah. It's been the most wild, psychedelic drug I've ever taken, you know, full of highs and lows, uh, in the work with psychedelics. You know, we talk about it as a non-specific amplifier, right? So it really turns up all of those emotions, and I think about non-monogamy in the similar vein, right, where you can feel the heightens of jealousy or the heightens of attachment, or the heightens of multiple love and what that can feel like and new relationship energy and all of that.

And you really get the full spectrum of it when you turn up that dial. And yeah, it's, it's been really exciting though for me as someone who practices it too. When I get scared to ground, truly in what you just said of mm-hmm. Okay. I am rooting for this person before me for their joy and for their exploration and everything that they want to do in this lifetime.

And I am supportive. And that has been like a very loving spiritual practice for me. I would say to ground in those moments of fear from that space, not a, oh, I'm losing them or I'm getting less. It's like, no, I support them. I, I mean, it's hard though. Don't get me wrong. And I think at particularly, even in my own world, I've had various partners and things have shifted over the years of poly dynamics where maybe someone that I was orbiting at more frequently.

I have this other connection, and as I grow and change, I find myself resonating with this person more. And so to move and center my pleasure. Oh. My goodness. When you love both and you're finding yourself mo oh my God, it is so hard. And then for me, I'm thinking about one of my partners in particular who has been such an example of that Love for him to say, you know, like, are you happy?

Yeah. Yeah, I'm happy. Okay. I support you. Go, oh my God. Like, but it's so complicated. Whoa, whoa.

[00:22:18] Elise: I love, yes. I love the idea that people in monogamous relationships don't escape jealousy. They just sort of usually bury it. Usually they just suppress it. They don't really want to acknowledge it if they're acknowledging it.

It's, it's sort of in this really bizarre way where it's almost like, how dare you experience the full range of human emotion? And it's like the idea of being shamed and guilted for just these natural feelings coming up. It doesn't mean you have to go full blown. You can sleep with anyone. I think, like I said, it's a spectrum, but just like one thing that was so healing for me and my girlfriend is just being able to talk so openly about feelings that come up.

Or we used to live in Jersey City. We'd go out in Brooklyn, there's a very open group out there, and we'd go and we'd sort of just be out and flirting and um, or even like, we went to an a SIC event recently. Mm-hmm. And they have like wristbands for if you're friends or you're flirting. And we were like, we're flirting tonight.

And like, even though I'll make out with her probably the whole night, I think it's just so fun to have someone who doesn't. Like demonize the part of me that is called to that, that thinks that that would be fun and and exciting. And instead she's like, you go babe. You know, go have fun. I'll see you in a little bit.

And that's just so liberating 'cause it also puts the power back in my hands. So when I do decide to stay home, when I do decide to be with her, it's so genuine. I'm really actively choosing her and not because she's shamed me into, you know, essentially her being the only option left. And, and that's just so empowering to be able to choose that myself.

[00:24:06] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. And I think that conversation of the spectrum is so important, right? Because I think that. The default mode in our current time. Again, historically this was not always the default mode of monogamy, so we can first name that. And culturally, it's not always the default mode In our context of America, it is the default mode that you wake up into and you say, oh, this is what we do.

And so, so many people ride that relationship escalator, right? Of, okay, this is means we're serious now, the exclusivity. But so many people don't actually talk about what that means, right? Where do you actually draw that line for you? And I would love for more people to actually have those sorts of conversations, right?

Is it. Flirting. Is it watching porn? 'cause there's some relationships where watching porn is considered cheating. Right. And I struggle with that one. That one's really hard for me. Yeah, right. And so I think Great. I love that. You know that. Right? And some people would I, yeah, that one I would,

[00:25:09] Elise: oh, I'm saying by the way I'm saying, but I'm saying porn is hard for me in the sense that it's difficult for me to understand people who are so monogamous that they're threatened by their partner accessing porn.

Where for me, that is almost like the entry level, I, how do I put this? It's almost like forbidding your partner to access porn is as restrictive as we could possibly get. Where even in their alone time, playing with themselves with really fundamentally, no one else actively involved. They're being shamed.

If you are so threatened by your partner accessing porn, to me that is insinuating that there are other insecurities in the relationship that need repairing. Because why do you lack so much trust? Unless it's genuinely a wellbeing thing. Like I'm concerned about your usage. If it's a, I feel so insecure that you wanna see other naked women.

Oh baby. I just feel like there's some work there to be done. You know? There's just maybe some work to be done.

[00:26:14] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Totally. I mean, it's complicated 'cause the culture. The cultural humility of it all too. Because if we go into certain religious practices, then yeah, masturbation is forbidden even without porn, right?

So it's like, where do we draw that line because, and then it gets complicated too. 'cause we end up being in different, you and I even end up being in different cultural spaces where sometimes that is how I feel about monogamy, if I'm being honest. That same sort of way where I'm like, why? What is going on here?

What do we need to explore so that youth could feel secure in this space? So I think it's interesting, depending on our cultural positioning, that's how we start to look at different practices. So I usually just start to say like, okay, like people flowing with what feels good to them. And if, if porn doesn't feel okay, then it's like that's their religious structure, right?

That's their cultural narrative. And I try to do my best, but I, I agree with you in a lot of different ways where I'm like, what is it? I think it's really problematic that if we can't look out at the world and say that this beautiful human is attractive to me. If there's something wrong with that,

[00:27:21] Elise: I think. But that's kind of what, it's like a baseline for me. 'cause porn culture, like I said, can be so problematic. I understand why people might have concerns about their partner using porn. It's more like the insecurity that's arising for the other partner. Yeah. Just at the mirror concept, like if you see a naked woman, our relationship will fall apart.

Yeah. It feels like there's an undertone there for them. And I have experienced being in such a trusting partnership,

[00:27:47] Nicole: right.

[00:27:48] Elise: That. There are certain boundaries that could be pushed. And I, I just view her with such positive intent. I want that for people. You know, I want them to just be in a dynamic that doesn't feel rigid, that feels very expansive, but it also needs to feel safe for them.

Yeah. And sometimes there are certain boundaries that allow that for them.

[00:28:05] Nicole: Totally. Yeah. It's a really complicated space. I think just the, the realities of, yeah. In my past dynamics, I, when my, you know, growing up Christian, it was all very much, so you can't be in a room with someone of the opposite sex, um, or of an opposite gender without it being dangerous.

So, which is wild, like just the wild, like the concepts of your inability to control yourself. Like you can't be in a room with someone. 'cause you would just, I don't even know, just immediately start fucking, it's, it's kind of wild when you think about it. But anyhow, my boyfriend at the time would talk about getting coffee with a female friend, and I would.

Lose my shit. Yeah. Lose my shit. You know? I'd be like, what? I'm so, you know, whoa. Compared to where I'm at now in security. And then, so I asked just such deep questions about free will and all of that. Yes, right. Of what were the cultural narratives that were taught to me. And I think it's really interesting given the context of where we're at, what feels normal and what doesn't feel normal, and what we can feel security and not security in is so culturally laden.

And so I just, I'll continue to explore that for a lifetime of what it means for us to feel safe as we unpack these narratives that are so deeply restricting. I think our access to love and intimacy really at the end of the day.

[00:29:25] Elise: What a, what a terribly disempowering narrative to sort of have woven into your very young brain.

Just the beginning. Oh my goodness. That is just so much fear too. And, and what really should be like, you know, meeting our partners and having sex and falling in love. These should be like the greatest things that life has to offer. And so many people talk about them in a context where it's like just terrifying.

Just so much fear, um, so much risk that is sort of injected into it. And yeah, I've just got so much love for little Nicole. And why that fee? Why that coffee date would just feel so big to you? You know, like you've been told your whole life that there's something inherently risky in that end. Just you, you were really, the context for you was so much different probably for him.

[00:30:21] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think of all the rom-coms too that say like, if we, you know, if you love two people, you should leave the first one because you never would've really fallen in love if you love the fir. And I'm just like, uh, you know, like that's what we're all sitting in in terms of, uh, our cultural narratives, again, within our current context and our framework, that is what we're sitting in.

So I talk about it often as the classical conditioning, right? Is, oh, they're gonna go get coffee or a dinner date with someone else. That means they don't love me. That means they're going to leave me, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That starts like the avalanche of this whole experience that is really unconscious in a lot of way because of classical conditioning that has said this is what happens.

And so unpacking that over years. It's, you know, like you mentioned, the security of your partnership, the way that you feel so secure to be able to flirt safely. That's what changed it for me was being in these secure partnerships for me where, you know, my partner would go to an orgy without me. I. My brain go, what the fuck?

But you know, what ends up happening is they come back and they stay with me, and then it actually, like the coffee date didn't end our relationship. And then I'm like, oh, whoa. What a rewiring of my brain. But at the end of the day, it is also complicated though, because time and energy is so limited. And so I think that, you know, whether you choose to have kids or not, that's a question about your time and energy.

And I think that that's my view of, like, when I think about non-monogamy or not, it's like these are questions about your time and energy and where do you wanna invest it? We can be secure as we want, fly the whole plane around the world and we feel safe. But at the end of the day, what kind of time and energy do you want from your partners?

And that maybe be in the space where it makes sense to want to have this sort of, uh, closed commitment because it is the time and energy commitment that you want. It's not about the insecurity, you know?

[00:32:22] Elise: Hmm. It's, look, I, there's this, I love adventure time. I don't know if you ever want Yeah, yeah.

Adventure time. Yeah. But there's this quote where Jake goes to is not efficient, yo. Yeah. And I think there's something to that, like sometimes I'll say that to my girlfriend because I understand why having a primary partner is a stable, effective, life building dynamic. I think it makes so much sense, and I think something that's interesting for me as someone who maybe leans a little bit more open mm-hmm.

Is how drawn I am to having a primary. Sure. Because it just allows for a very expansive connection when you're able to dedicate a lot of time to one person. I think something that's been interesting, and I know we've talked a lot about this on during this podcast, but just the idea that it doesn't have to be an either or, so it doesn't have to be either.

You get a. A stable life partner who's committed to you and you guys do life together, or you have to throw that out the window and essentially be at a giant poly Q. Like those are not the only two options. Totally. Yeah. There's so many different ways that we could build our relationships to serve us, and that could change so many different times as we continue to grow, like, like you were saying, sort of entering someone's orbit a little bit more and you know, maybe there's a coming back to maybe there's people who you return to.

Yeah. And so, um, just giving yourself the freedom to organically make those movements based on what's best for you is just so empowering compared to some of those more restrictive

[00:33:58] Nicole: right.

[00:33:58] Elise: Dynamics. Usually, most of the time I think some people are really empowered by monogamy too, and by having a strong firm understanding in certain boundaries.

But yeah, I think everyone wants to be allowed to explore themselves.

[00:34:12] Nicole: Right, exactly. And find out what works for them. Just 'cause I rock climb doesn't mean that everybody should be rock climbing. Right. Or just 'cause I love psychedelics and the power of where it goes doesn't mean that everyone should, or that I'm more enlightened because I love psychedelics.

Right. Like there's, I think the space for the diversity of all of it. And I, oh man, there's so much talk within the non-monogamy community of being anti primary. When I first started learning about it, I kind of stepped into the movement where that was part of already the conversation of no primaries. No primaries, no primaries.

And I, you know, in some of the conversations with other relationship anarchists, you know, this questioning of hierarchy makes sense. Mm-hmm. And I think the questioning of hierarchy of authority, power over dynamics, like veto powers and all of that makes sense. And then where I'm scratching for language is, okay, time and energy is limited.

I want a depth of connection that is so deep. I can only do that with so many people unless I'm living together with them. Or we're on a com, right? Like we're talking about different variables now. And then you're in a whole different group dynamic if you're living with three or four. I mean, yeah, so, so, okay, so I really want this deep partnership, at least with one, you know, 2, 3, 4.

But how do you. Share that energy out. I don't know if you do 20, 20 20, 20 20 across all your dynamics, there's a limited amount of depth that you can hit. Sure. My one partner who's more relationship anarchy and loves to spread out that way would say that we can meet that depth over years. And that is true.

And so I think for me it's been a very similar journey of wanting someone who I try, I try, I try to find other language than primary since it's so like complicated within the community where I'm like, okay, so I want someone who orbits me at a frequency of every day. Got it. That feels really good to me.

I want you to orbit. I wanna know what you had for lunch. How was your meeting? What happened? And that feels good to me. And then I have someone who orbits a little bit wider. And wider. And it doesn't have to be this power over model, but like of course I want depth in my relationships. And so I think that was something I struggled with a lot when I first came into the non-monogamy world was this like, no primaries.

No primaries. And I felt bad to have a deep partnership with one person versus Oh wow. Okay. It's more, I see it as a friendship model, right? You might have a best friend. Mm-hmm. Some people actually have two best friends and are in a throuple, you know? Right. Like, and some of us have one and that feels good.

And we don't say this best friend is more important than the other people, but it's the place that we end up prioritizing our time and energy and we don't have to, you know, really attack that.

[00:36:56] Elise: Oh, there's so much there. I think the hierarchal part of polyamory, so many people find problematic. There's a lot that we could say there about why.

Right. I get it. I think it, I get it. I was gonna say, I think it makes a lot of sense and I also think it's. We're not going to minimize how difficult it is to manage more relationships. It is hard to manage more relationships. You have to, um, you know, if you have one partner versus four partners, you've gotta be attentive to all of those needs and they might have partners.

And so, like what you were saying, it's not just, do I enjoy my partner's time? If I want more time with them, maybe that means I need to be spending time with their partners. Or, there's so many different conversations that need to be had about what that time commitment will look like, and then that sort of informs those connections.

It's really interesting. I think one thing that the Poly Community Centers that is so important and so unique and across all relationships would, they would benefit from this is just the importance of really active communication. Yeah. Really active communication if I feel like I'm not getting my needs met.

Taking that ownership to go to you, be proactive and you know, to sort of foster an environment where you are receiving those needs, hearing me out, and we're working as a team to figure out next steps or whatever the case, so it's. Yeah, I think the poly community is so exemplary in that way most of the time.

I think, you know, there are plenty of unhealthy relationships, monogamous or not, but usually the poly community really, really tries to advocate for the importance of communication because there's a lot of feelings moving around, you know, there's a lot of people involved.

[00:38:42] Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I wish someone would've told me.

And maybe I did, maybe I read it in the ethical slut. Maybe I read it somewhere and it didn't even hit. But I just wish someone could have told me. When the world of, of four or five partners, how does that look? It looks the same way that you have four or five friends. Yes, my dear younger Nicole. And you can have that friend that you, that, you know, the words get complicated, friend, partner, lover, what, whatever word we want to use.

But I can have that person that we explore eroticism with once a month, once every three months, once a year around my birthday. You know, like it's the same mm-hmm. Way that you do the friendship thing. Just with the added joys of play that go a little bit further. Right. And so just holding that as how, 'cause I always was like, how do I, how could I do multiple, how could, oh wait, I already have multiple, I just don't have sex with all of them.

I can absolutely add sex into the equation and keep the same sort of spaciousness of this wide world. But yeah, the ability to communicate that, that's. It's been a learned lesson, particularly with sex because it's such a complicated thing for most of us. So to find my language in sexual connections that vary at various orbits and frequencies, that's been really tricky.

And I think that kind of like you were saying earlier, earlier, the love and the spaciousness that we can hold in these dynamics to support the spiritual development of our partners. That's one way I ground in those moments of jealousy, but it's also a really important moment to acknowledge what I want or need.

It is an indicator 'cause Yeah, I take the step one of like, okay, I support them. I support this liberation for myself and we're in this together. But also, what is that flaring up that I actually want and or need in this dynamic or with someone else? And I try to. Cue into that heart. So instead of it coming to my partners with like that rage or that crying or the tears, I'll come and say like this, I'm feeling a lot.

This is what I think I need. Can we have this met? How do you know? And that muscle, wow. I'm still learning to flex that.

[00:40:51] Elise: You know what an incredible thing though, to view it as opportunity and view it as, you know, there's a real lesson for me here, and this response is pointing to something for me to shine a flashlight on and examine a little bit.

And I also think it's so interesting when you were talking about how our model for friendship in many ways is transferrable to polyamory. And it's kind of silly the way that, you know, people will say things like, oh, I love all my kids the same, you know, or I've got all these friends. And then when it comes to our partners, it's like there could only be one, you know?

And it's really dramatic and we make it like. This totally separate thing. You know, love only exists in this way. You know, it's, it's just so interesting to me, the complete separation between romantic love and platonic love. And I think especially as a queer person, I was speaking with someone about this recently, we know intimately what it is to arrive that line.

To have someone who is a friend, but who is maybe like, we're sharing intimacy in a way that wouldn't be as, you know, ascribed to a friendship or, you know, because we're both clear. The queer, there's a sort of blurred lines. And so, yeah, it's just very interesting to me. I think queer people are very privy to the fact that friendship and romantic love are a spectrum.

They're not totally different camps that we exist in.

[00:42:24] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:42:25] Elise: Yeah.

[00:42:26] Nicole: 'cause yeah. Where do you draw the line, my friends? You know. When practicing relationship anarchy, I like to get clear on the labels that feel authentic to both of us. Right. And I might even use a different label than they use, right. And the complexities of all of that.

But my friends, people that I don't have sex with will bring me flowers, right? Will write love letters and sit and snuggle on the beach together. Right? And then I'll have people that I have sex with where we don't do any of that. It's like, where do we draw these lines of the boxes? And I think this is like you're saying, it's so clear how we can, it's facts.

We all have multiple relationships, just facts. Like, I don't know who you are. You were born into this world and as babies, we cannot thrive on our own. So you had some relationship at some point, and I would bet that you have friends and a community. Okay. So we all have relationships, but yeah. The second you throw pleasure, romance, sex, we lose our shit.

It's just like what? It gets so complicated.

[00:43:29] Elise: I think because we view it in almost this like very binary way. A lot of people who are, and this is just my opinion, but a lot of people who do lean more monogamous and may feel threatened by, I. Any form of intimacy so that I'm not saying their partner's sleeping with someone.

Sure. I'm saying, you know, they have one-on-one time with someone of the opposite sex or whatever that looks like for them. I think monogamous people sometimes miss out on what you've described with your friends, where there is nothing harmful, innately sexual, innately threatening about someone engaging with you in that way, where it's like bringing flowers is sort of maintaining this emotional connection.

Maybe even like affection, touching. Yeah. Me and Taran both have really touchy-feely lovey friends. Lovely. Yeah. And I remember one time we were introducing some new people and they were less touchy feely. Sure. They were a married straight couple. I think they had been together a long time. When me and my girlfriend Taryn, get to this event, there was a friend of ours there, mutual friend, we both love her and Taryn and her just went and laid on a couch together and like spooned and cuddled.

And the couple came up to me and they were like, are you okay? Are you okay? Is this, you know, I just, we see what's happening and we just wanted to check in with you. I was like, they love each other. It's adorable. I feel only good, happy things. And that was genuinely platonic, like genuinely very platonic and I.

I know for me in that restrictive relationship I was in, there were things I couldn't even do with my friends that were very just sweet and maybe a little intimate, but were not sort of a transgression on the relationship. And I think sometimes when we exist in more of that binary mindset, we might, might be missing out on some of those gooey, gooey feelings that we can also get from our friends, which are so special.

You know, it doesn't have to be innately sexual or romantic, like I said, but sometimes because we view it a certain way, it's like we set up these rules that really wouldn't make a difference in a monogamous dynamic, but still feel maybe threatening. Yeah.

[00:45:42] Nicole: Isn't that sad? Yeah. Bums me out.

[00:45:45] Elise: Yeah.

[00:45:46] Nicole: Like the capacity for love and pleasure and connection and intimacy and to put such harsh boxes on it.

And then particularly, I mean, it's just heartbreaking when I look at the research of long-term eroticism dying and. You know, then you're just like, okay, like we've put so many boxes to protect this thing that ends up like often crumbling in many long years. And particularly the research shows for women, it crumbles faster than men.

And so I'm like, damn, you've put so many boxes around it and, and are you thriving? Are you really, I mean, you're safe, but are you actually thriving? What would it mean to have more space to snuggle? What would it mean to have these other sorts of connections? But you're right, there's so much tied up in it.

I'm thinking about my first time having a threesome with my two partners. And man, it was so funny because. When I look back on it, the sex part was good. I loved that. That was gorgeous. It was so great. I think probably because of my positionality of like reading all that research, there's some level of maybe more spaciousness with the erotic sex part where I'm like, great, like I love that we can all play and have sex together that feels comfortable.

Like you, the snuggle for you. That feels comfortable for me. Where when I saw him hold her hand in the car and start to like just gently caress her hand, I lost my shit. I was like, what do you mean that you're caressing her hand? It's the romantic piece for me that hit way harder than the sex where I was like, whoa.

What does it mean that you're loving on her in that way? All the while like. That's something that my partner could have done with his mom to console her and the loss of like, let me hold your hand. You know, those small things and all of the meaning making behind it. Yeah. I find that real fascinating.

Like the things that yeah, feel different for each one of us and what hits us, how we interpret that, and the meaning making, the potential loss and fears that could come with that. 'cause my brain was like, oh, she's the pretty object. He's way more interested in her now I'm just dull and no longer important.

You know, like all the list of thoughts that were running through my head, like, oh,

[00:48:00] Elise: you know, the, the ability for our dumb human brains to internalize right away. No evidence that you need to internalize this, but we just go right there. We're like, actually I think it's me and my worth. You know? Like I know I love your separation of the romantic and the sexual because.

When you said that I like observed in myself like a sympathetic response. Like I was like, I could imagine that being more triggering than like straight up penetration. Right, right, right. Like I watched you penetrate her was cool. Yes. But your tiny little thumb rubbing her hand feels too intimate. Like it's very, and also I love that repositioning of, it's so funny too because I think different people, it's different too, where in the past I had some partners who were more selective.

[00:48:56] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:57] Elise: And that made me feel special. Oh yeah. I felt special. I felt like this person who didn't often open up was opening early and then that was threatening to me to watch them explore with other people. But I've also had partners where like. My heart explodes with joy, watching them interact together.

And it's like only a good thing. And I'm like, I love these people. They love me. We all love each other really, almost like wholesome. And so it's really funny how it's not just a one size fits all. It's not that Nicole's always gonna get jealous every time she sees someone engaging in something that's more romantic or intimate.

It's that certain situations might just surprise us with like what comes up. And like you said, that's such a good stopping point to reflect and say, this is creating a reaction in me. Why is that? And just burying down and sort of exploring that. Yeah. I'm so proud of you for giving yourself the tools because honestly, Nicole, like the background you're describing is not one that sets you up to.

Go down this path of centering your own needs and exploring yourself and sort of putting shame and guilt that was placed on you, not inherent to you, placed on you to the side so that you could do that. That is a tremendously brave thing to do.

[00:50:19] Nicole: Mm, thank you.

[00:50:23] Elise: Yeah, no, I mean that, I really do. Do you mind me asking, how, how did this start for you?

Catalyzed, catalyzed this for you?

[00:50:34] Nicole: Yeah. Um, I remember being in a long-term relationship with one guy and, uh, I had yet to explore my full queerness with sobriety. That's the first step, right? I've explored it drunk, but never sobriety, and so then I was in this long-term heterosexual, monogamous relationship and feeling bored.

I loved him. Don't get me wrong. I love this man very much. But I was bored. And then I remember watching some HBO shows that had play parties and I was like, wow. Like this is so cool. I think I'd love to do that one day. How exciting. But had no idea how to do this. No idea. No idea at all. Okay. Um, and then so he breaks up with me.

I am devastated, excited to explore my queerness, but devastated The first person that I go on a date with, with on Hinge, we connect. It's great. The sex is lovely. And then he tells me indirectly, this is a part of whole story too. It's complicated indirectly that he's poly. And I look at him and I say, if you really loved me, you would only be with me and I wouldn't have to share you.

So, no. And I walked away and uh, you know, I walked away a little bit and then kept hanging out with him. 'cause the sex is really good.

[00:51:54] Elise: Was he trying to. Patiently explained to you? No. Like, was he doing that work with you or was he just kind of, I mean, the fact that he told you after you guys had sex might not be setting you guys up for the best communication.

[00:52:08] Nicole: No. Well, so now, so should we start talking about my dad and emotional availability and what, what I didn't realize, you know, until later, but no, Elise, he didn't even tell me he was poly. I was like trying to ask him about questions, about commitment and he was just like, well, you know, I just, I like lots of people and so I had to say.

Are you Polly? And he nodded in silence. Yeah, Elise, when I look at this now, I'm like, I would've ran away so hard. But of course, again, we can talk maybe about my dad, we can talk about the journey

[00:52:43] Elise: you're like, but he was very hot and you know, and I was on orgasms in those post breakup, like post breakup Nicole.

A part of me is like, get it girl. Like ruin it. Just burn it to the ground. Like just see the whole way through. 'cause sometimes you spent enough time being sexually repressed and it's worth the emotional turmoil.

[00:53:05] Nicole: It was. It got me here, man. You know, I'm not gonna give him the credit, but it did get me here.

But where the story gets interesting is I was running with him and then my ex of three and a half years comes back and says, I want to be with you. The guy you dumped. You. Yeah, the guy. You dumped me. Oh wow. And so then I say, well you broke my heart. I don't know about this. And again, thinking about, I was feeling more bored in our sexual dynamic and I'm having this great sex over here.

And now I'm like, I'm not gonna give up this pleasure. I couldn't even imagine. And so then he starts to try and like court me and date me again. And meanwhile, I'm still dating the other guy. And then I have this moment where I had told him I won't do poly, but then I'm like actively dating both and really enjoying it.

And I'm like, oh shit. I feel like you made a point. You may have a point too. Yeah, exactly. Maybe this is possible. And so then that kind of sparked the beginning of it and, and kind of going down this and reading more about relationship anarchy and feeling immediate connections, needing a dissertation topic for my doctorate in clinical psychology.

Finding no research on that, saying, well, here I go. And then that being my path. And then about two years ago I met, um, and then I met this guy who was also practicing relationship anarchy. And it was such a. Connection of our value system. And he had been doing non monogamy for 10 years. And so his freedom that he gave me and security at the same time radically changed my life because I said,

[00:54:33] Elise: I don't think there's anything hotter.

I don't think a person could give you something hotter than to be so grounded and confident in themselves that you have all the play ability, no reigns, like go off, have fun. But when you're together, it's, you feel so confident also in that dynamic that is like chef's kiss. It's the perfect mix.

[00:54:54] Nicole: Absolutely. And yet the eroticism still faded. And what, what do we make of that?

[00:54:58] Elise: You know? Oof. I, I am gonna open a whole can of worms here that specifically gets complicated when I've had conversations with sex therapists. But I am curious about your experience with this. In non-monogamy in coming into your queer identity.

Yeah. I've got some big feelings around the O gap.

[00:55:21] Nicole: Mm.

[00:55:21] Elise: I've got some feelings. As a woman who dated men for a huge portion of her life and had sex with a lot of them and had effectively none of them care about my pleasure in a way that was really. About my pleasure. Yeah. I had a lot of people who were performative about caring about my pleasure, but there was a disconnect between how they were treating my body and how and what they were saying.

You know, they were sort of observing my cues.

[00:55:47] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:55:48] Elise: It was, they enjoyed doing certain things to me that should have been pleasurable. Yeah. And I, I think it's given me a little bit of a bias where I now date coach a lot of straight women. I hear very often from them similar things. Countless people have come to me and said things like, I dated this really kind man for a long time, but no matter how many times I asked him to just care more and even if I showed him exactly what to do the next time we were in bed, he just didn't put in a single iota of effort. And I think that's not universal. I think there are tons of men who make excellent partners and are very caring, dotting partners.

[00:56:24] Nicole: Right,

[00:56:24] Elise: right. Coming into my queerness where Sure. I lesbian, kind of by nature, there's this. How do I put this? It's not mutual in, in that if we're having sex, one person is pleasing the other and it felt immediately like a leveling out.

Mm-hmm. Where it was like gonna be a little bit gross. But sometimes I felt with men that I was being like masturbated with Sure. Was when my partner initiate sex with me as a lesbian, I'm like, oh, she wants me to feel good. Yeah. It's such a huge shift for me where I think, if I'm honest, I look back on almost every sexual interaction I've had with men and, and almost like, how did that happen?

How did it happen? Not just once, twice, but many times. And it could be that I wasn't a good communicator. Yeah. It could be. I mean, you know, whatever the case. But I'm wondering like, has that been, has that come up for you at all in your exploration of your queerness and your exploration of your eroticism?

How do people show up for you as partners Sexually. Yeah. And is there a line for you or do you find No, actually. I mean, I think especially poly people or people who are more open might be better at sex and communication. Um, so I'm curious about your experience with that. 'cause as a date coach and matchmaker, I talk to a lot of women Yeah.

Who quite frankly have really struggled to have enjoyable, engaging sex with men, even if they're super affected to men. Yeah. Even if they're super affected to men. Yeah.

[00:57:54] Nicole: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. I think about my first time having sex with a strap on, and it was radical, um, to be receiving because there was, so I'm just immediately thinking of Betty Martin and the Will of Consent episode that I had with her too, of just all of the dynamics here that go through our brain.

But when I was having penetrative sex with someone who had a penis, I. There was this level of, it should feel good for me and them at the same time. That really muddied the water, I would say, of my pleasure to having sex with a strap on. Not to say that the person wielding the strap on isn't enjoying the pleasure, but there is obviously a different experience and that, you know, the dildo coming inside me, I was like, this is actually for me and I don't need to be thinking about, you know, whether they're enjoying the act of the penetration.

And so that really allowed me to center my pleasure in a really radical way that I had never done before in my hetero sexual experiences. And then, yeah, I've had, my God, the amount of. Lovely men that I have connected with that Yeah. Are just so if, if sex is, and eroticism is a language, they are still struggling to get the words.

I remember connecting with someone who knew like everything that I do with kink and went to gently choke me on the first experience and I had to pause him and say, Hey, this is not something we do without conversation. And he said, why I go on non-verbals? And I was just like, oh. And the relationship ended there.

Right. There's so many, you know, sometimes boxes that men exist in and so yeah, I find myself often teaching and trying to expand. And sometimes you find people who are open to that or, yeah. The other partner that I was referencing is someone who has always centered my pleasure and always been there and does so much of that.

And yet still the eroticism complexities are there. And that's where I think about what Jessica Fern had said with me in our conversation about the spaciousness of non-monogamy and how sometimes when you are so spacious, say you're only seeing your partner once a week for a year, do you know how much longer it's gonna take for you to really see parts of that person that you might see in a dynamic where you see them every single day.

And so as you continue to do that, you get more of that full picture, but it might take years for you to hit some of the things that maybe you would've noticed in a couple of months. And then the complexities of that. And I think that's where I'm at with her. It's like, oh, you can have these beautiful people.

But the reality is the more you learn about people, sometimes they grow with you. And sometimes you feel like you grow in different ways that separate. And so for me, I'm in this process of learning that I can still so deeply love this person. I care for him with all of my heart. And the eroticism isn't there.

And that doesn't mean I love him any less. And that doesn't mean that we can't snuggle every night that we see each other and nuzzle up next to each other and give each other kisses that feel really authentic. And maybe the eroticism will come back and maybe it won't. But for me, I'm in this process right now in the here and now truly like personally of trying to separate the idea that sex is the most meaningful thing I could give.

And that love has to be connected with that.

[01:01:14] Elise: Oh, there's, I mean, I think, I think women in particular, there's this piece with us and our sexuality where. We're sort of trained to want to feel wanted. And I think a lot of women, something that I struggle with with some of my clients is they will be very queer and having a really bad time dating men, but just feel so confident and comfortable in their dynamics with men because it's so familiar to them.

Sure. Going back to it, and it's like dating women is like dating an alien. They just have no idea what they're doing there. They feel really insecure about showing up in that space. And I think men, a lot of women feel like they can maybe take a little bit more of a passive role, um, where whether that's sexually or romantically, it's almost like they're being acted upon so the man is maybe pursuing them.

It's just sort of this, this quiet social code.

[01:02:09] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:02:10] Elise: And I also think when you were talking about sort of the waxing and waning of eroticism, I was thinking a bunch about Asir. Perel. Yeah. And how. She's amazing. And she talks a lot about the complicated interplay between intimacy and mystery and desire and how our relationships naturally move towards intimacy and closeness.

But desire is sort of contingent upon a certain amount of mystery right there. There's this sort of wanting with desire, once you have desire isn't really at play right? 'cause you've kind of, you've kind of captured it. And so she talks about couples who spend too much time together, right? Who are too entangled right there eroticism dying in part because they've, they, the mystery is completely gone.

Mm-hmm. And so I think one thing Polly might give you is that space away from a partner. Totally. And then when you do come back, it's like, I've been thinking about you. Oh yeah. Versus you're always accessible to me. Right. And I think there's something really hot about that, about. Just a little bit of mystery with the person.

This feeling of like, there's more to uncover here.

[01:03:21] Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:03:21] Elise: And I think there's also maybe a connection there between how, you know what I was describing with my girlfriend. Mm-hmm.

And sort of her ability to let me figure myself out and be very expansive. There's like a mysterious part to that where we're excited to learn more about each other.

Not scared of that change. Yeah. And that's hot. Like it's hot to. What we might look like in five years, 10 years and how different that might be. And Sure. I, yeah, I think there's something there. But for, for that, the interplay of intimacy and mystery and Yeah. How we feel about our partners. Absolutely.

[01:04:00] Nicole: Yeah. And the partners that orbit much closer. I usually try to remember existential galaxies and that. Even if we do share and see each other, often, often, often we are two separate people having completely separate experiences of life. And so what does it mean in those moments of, wow, we've spent so much time together and I feel the normalcy of all of this to kind of actually ground in that of like, oh, this is a completely separate human who could freely leave me at any time and is having their own experience, then that usually helps to charge the erotic.

And then yeah, the more partners that I have at varying distances, of course it's more erotic. 'cause I only see them so often. I think about that in the same way of a painting, right? You know that that partner that's really up close with me can see all the fine paints and the strokes and the beauty of the painting.

And so they have a very unique experience of the painting. They're very, very, very, very, very, very close. But these other people who are much standing much further see the whole canvas and they don't get lost in little details that maybe sometimes make us lose the whole painting, you know? And equally by association too, I've found that when someone's so distant.

Eroticism isn't there for me. I want that emotional connection. So if we haven't had enough touching points, I don't feel centered enough. You know, where I, I don't feel important and there's not enough of that too. So like finding out each one of them and where I kind of land. And then also, I mean, just.

Adding onto this. This is where I'm like, Esther, let's get more. Come on. It is about the failure of imagination. I just released this episode with a dominatrix. We're talking about what it means to be a femdom and to control them in that way. And so this male partner that I'm struggling with, the eroticism with, I'm like.

Oh shit. We've been doing this DS dynamic where I'm the sub, you're the dumb. I actually want you to sit down and let me get the flogger and you're gonna sit here and take this order. And until I have been in this level of consciousness communicating with other powerful women, I had never even thought about that.

And so I think that like part of the conversation that is missing is also the failure of imagination because of our societal context that has taught us this is the way you interact, this is the way you have sex. And particularly disempowered women in so many different ways that we don't even realize.

And so for me, I'm also sitting here of like, okay. What does it mean to get more creative and like really find into the type of eroticism that does excite me. So I don't know. He is coming over later tonight. Maybe I'll throw it down and say, let's get the rope. We've done it once and it was great, so maybe I'll get it back out.

[01:06:32] Elise: I love also your like what some of what you're referencing too, and this is a function of not necessarily you having multiple partners, but I think also just being someone who's open-minded and yeah, community oriented and, but it's so cool to hear that your openness to other ideas and other people has also allowed you to open entire new parts of yourself where Yes, you know, those conversations wouldn't be taking place if you didn't have a certain mindset.

And then for you to be able to bring that in and say, Hey, what we're doing is not working and I thought of something new that is so expansive. Isn't that just what we all want, like to be able to explore and play and. Yeah, I, I love, I love the idea that your access to multiple partners only allows you more inquiry into yourself.

Sure. And more. You know, exploring of the different facets of who you are.

[01:07:26] Nicole: Oh yeah. It's been the most enlightening thing I've ever done because again, I felt like, oh, I'm jealous. And then I realized, oh wow, there, there's so much more because I'm not as jealous depending on how further out someone orbits me have multiple, I don't care.

Oh. So jealousy is about my fear of losing these resources, not about the actual act. Like there's been so much I've learned through having multiple that I didn't know until I did, and now I'm realizing I'm able to kind of like look at these different pieces, compare, contrast, and find so much. And I'm, I'm thinking too about what we had said earlier in the conversation of what it means to support your partner in all of their development and how we get locked into certain concepts of self.

Right. So, you know, I know my partner, you know, this person I'm thinking about was supportive of me topping them and having that experience. But I could easily say another cis male who says, no way. I am not about to let you tie me. I am not a submissive, actually. I only Dom. And so this is what I do. And so I cannot grow with you to see you evolve into this powerful version of yourself because you're actually my sub.

You know? And so then that's a whole thing, and we can get into the politics of that, of what it means for someone who is a cis man to embrace their surrender. Oof, that's, those are deep unconscious politics right there.

[01:08:51] Elise: And it's hot. I think there's something, I know nothing about these two men, but the one who's open to exploring comes across as much more self-assured, grounded, confident.

Yep. Just all of the things that turn us on with a partner and sort of, you know, that doesn't mean everyone has to be open to getting flogged or to be submissive, but I think it's also how you respond to those inquiries. And again, I'm thinking about if you had. Entered a more traditional monogamous dynamic, realized that maybe there were these other parts of yourself and speaking, I mean, from firsthand experience, what it's like to have a partner who just cannot give you those things and then it's a dead end.

You know, it's sort of, yeah. I guess I don't get to explore that part of myself and so many people go through that. I've had like close family members even say stuff to me about, you know, they've been with this partner more than half their life, and they're like, yeah, I'm gonna be honest. Our sexist, vanilla, like, I remember they literally said something like, sometimes I just wish they would choke me.

And I'm like, that a bum for 16 years. You know? And to, that's pretty bare minimum to say, can we at least have some kinky sex together in a monogamous dynamic? And right. There's just so many people who don't get that. Who, who you know, and maybe they're getting other things from it. I think that's usually why we stay, but it's just so exciting to hear about your.

Access to those parts of yourself.

[01:10:21] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it is really exciting and I have a lot of privilege getting a doctorate to say, you know what? I actually don't need this man to pay for my house. Okay. So that changes a lot of the game because I've been reading Untrue by Wednesday, Martin, and just the research on women's, um, infidelity and cheating and the ways that that took off the second that we had access to credit cards and financial stability.

I mean, again, that has only been 50 years. So I'm real curious about women and all of this because part of it is a bigger political conversation about resources and when you need this, and obviously the limited failure of imagination of what is possible, right? I mean, there's so much here and I, I, you know, I started all of my work with, uh, sexual assault survivors and rape culture, and that's what eventually propelled me into wanting to focus on pleasure and what it means to have the whole healing continuum.

And I do think that there is a deeper conversation to have about rape culture in the ways that. Sure that person in their dynamic might say, okay, I will compromise and not access this part of myself, which is heartbreaking to me. I feel like you should have access to getting that in a different relationship because it's a part of your identity that you want to explore.

However, some people then go to the opposite and also say, I'm gonna force my partner to eventually want this because I get nowhere else. I can explore this. So my partner, my husband, needs to want to be pecked. And I'm like a, that's not okay either. That's rape culture. Your partner doesn't want this. And so when you get locked into one person and you're trying to find all of that in one person, you have to compromise.

Do not force your partner to do things because you want them. Get another partner. Talk about non monogamy. Get it met elsewhere.

[01:12:11] Elise: Oh yes. Because if you have to find compromise, and the partner who's less willing is the one who compromises. We're setting ourselves up for something really truly problematic.

And not to overshare, but that was a huge piece of sort of the downfall of that major first relationship I had with a man. Sure. Where I was really interested in BDSM and never in a million years would've trusted him to enter that space with me because his lack of respect for my sexual boundaries was palpable.

And I think it is so interesting to look back on that and how casual I was about having sex. I really genuine, genuinely did not want to have, and that both me and my partner knew I didn't wanna be having. Mm. What a remarkable thing to look back on and think. Both me and him knew I did not wanna be having sex so much of the time we were having sex.

And often, and this is maybe in some ways not fair to him. If anything, I was like, this isn't a huge inconvenience to me, just get it over with. And I'm just like, geez, little Elly. Like, I think that that partner had some of his own problems, but I also think some of it is like, we're just socialized and these really problematic ways and then we autopilot and all of a sudden we find ourselves in a dynamic where we're like, how the heck did I get here?

You know? And it's, it's, it's just so interesting. I do think there's something with consent and monogamy where if you wanna be explorative with one person, you might have different boundaries. And how do you reconcile that? Truly? Because either you are cutting off parts of yourself or you're pressuring to do something that doesn't resonate with them.

And that's, that's a tough spot to be. Mm-hmm. And I think if you're in a long-term relationship, it's usually unlikely that you'll never find yourselves there. Right. Eventually, usually with a partner, we will get to a point where. I wanna try something and maybe you don't or vice versa.

[01:14:11] Nicole: Yeah, absolutely.

Yes. Underline, underline, underline. Yeah. And I think what's sad is that experience that you've had is also the experience that I've had and we know hundreds of thousands of people and particularly women are having right now. Yeah. Because they love that person. Mm-hmm. And I have loved that person. I have absolutely loved that person.

And so I thought, this is what I do. Yes. I particularly growing up in Christianity, I was taught you're gonna give your body to your husband. Mm-hmm. So yeah, that sex, I actually don't wanna have, well this is how I love him. Stop. Stop having sex. You don't want to have, that has been a big thing for me too, is in this world of multiplicity, I get to have sex that I want.

It makes me excited. There is no, oh, well, they want it. So I guess I will. No, go get it with somebody else. That's why we do this. Go get it with somebody else. I only have sex and I'm like, fuck yeah, let's go. Where are we going? What are we doing tonight? Like, I am ready. You know, like enthusiastic, kind. Yes, yes, yes.

And sometimes building it too, where I'm like, I want this. Let's build this together. So it's not always like the hot, I'm dripping constantly. Sometimes we throw the lube on there and we build it from there, you know? But it's always an abundant. Yes. Yeah. And never something that is out of the obligation.

And so, man, when I hear that in my clients and around the world, I am like, stop having sex with that person. But again. That is then say you have three kids, that's the person that pays the bills, and if you don't do this, what? Oh. And then now we're back into the politics of women's liberation and having enough money and caretaking can be anywhere just back in the same spiral.

[01:16:03] Elise: So, oh, and it's, it's something that, you know, really is resonant with me too. I think most of my motivation for having that sex that I did not wanna have was because, and I think a lot of women relate to this. It was the one tool I had to kind of pull him in emotionally.

[01:16:23] Nicole: Yep. Oh yeah.

[01:16:24] Elise: It was really emotionally disengaged.

Mm-hmm. But after we had sex, he was a little bit better. And I think there was an element of. You know, I'm a kid who grew up on food stamps. Mm-hmm. And I'm in college working my ass off. What am I gonna do if not this? And then you just sort of gaslight the shit out of yourself. Because once you start to accept what the situation really looks like, it's destabilizing, right?

You've created this sort of system in your life and it's going to fall apart once you sort of acknowledge it. And yeah, it was just remarkable to watch myself like wake up and be like, what the fuck am I doing? Why am I here? And just very interesting to look back on. And I think circling back on something I said earlier on, I would absolutely, without a doubt, not have the kind of relationship that I do now without the lessons that I learned right from those past dynamics.

I don't think he was a bad person. I think we were really incompatible and I. I think that we sort of fell into these really problematic dynamics that quite frankly we're not serving either of us. It's not fun as much as I wish he was more respectful of my boundaries and there's some issues that I take with him there, there's also something to be said about the fact that he deserves to have sex with someone who enjoys having sex with him.

Like that's a given. And so it's, it's a tough place. I think there is something with women and sort of, you know, we're kind of coming out of this dependence on men and we are seeing already just a huge change. I mean the conversations taking place over these past few years around weaponized incompetence or, or you know, financial abuse or the importance of Yeah, I think also coming from a generation maybe where we saw a lot of divorce, I know for me I was like, I know what it's like to have a mom who really struggles after divorce 'cause she was stay at home.

And so it's informing so much of how our generation and the next generation we're, we're making different choices. Yeah. Than our parents did. It's, I'm very interested to see where it goes. 'cause I think there's in many ways a crisis of culture in the US right now. I think men are experiencing a little bit of a displacement in terms of what their role is and not really knowing how to adapt with that.

And I think it's gonna be a remarkably interesting next decade or so.

[01:18:45] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I appreciate that you understand why I see this as such a large feminist issue. Our pleasure and our sexuality for our psychology. Right. As a psychotherapist, I see this so deeply linked. Okay. Like, where's your pleasure?

'cause at the end of the day, sexuality is intimacy. Sexuality is a meditation, sexuality is play. And there are so many political pieces that are tied into our access to that, like your naming, the way that. Because of the patriarchy, the majority of men don't have the emotional skills to be able to name their feelings.

Yeah. And so, yeah, sex is the one way that they feel connected, and so they can take that, they can only communicate through that. And so, so many people are in that, let alone, yeah. The financial pieces of this all, I mean, women couldn't have credit cards until 1970. It's been 50 years. Folks, let alone the, the one statistic I always drop that just hits me like a brick every time, is that marital rape was not illegal in all 50 states until 1993.

So until 1993, you could rape your wife because she was your property. We have to talk about that. If we don't think that that is still in our culture, you need to wake up.

[01:20:06] Elise: Oh, it's so deep. It runs so deep. I mean, it's crazy. Even, I don't know, you know, not to like out my mom and my grandma here, but I think also observing them and just how wildly void their sexual, entire sexual experience from conception to now they're, you know, seniors, they don't have really any good example of centering their own pleasure.

I think that they were taught that women sacrifice and do what's right with for the family, and oftentimes that looks like satisfying her husband. And it's remarkable how recent and yet people put this huge distance between us and this very recent history that informs so much of our political systems, our social environment.

And I think that we're not very good at acknowledging those undercurrents that are sort of feeding this bigger machine. Yep. Yeah know.

[01:21:08] Nicole: I know. It hits, it hits hard. It hits real hard, and it hits in my own life, right? When I look back and I would've told you, I'm straight and I'm monogamous. How dare you say that I'm queer.

Right? Like all of that. Yeah. Yeah. The free will questions about these desires that we have. The ways that in the past, I've been unattracted to men who cry. We can't just be like, oh, that's just who I am, and this is just where I sit. No. Our societal context shapes what we are attracted to, what we deem as normal, what we consider to be loving, and until we get that larger bug or concept of the ways that that is impacting us, we are asleep at the wheel.

So I'm here to talk about it. You know what I mean? That is where I see my path, is just continuing to talk about it and for myself, you know? I live in community. That's a really big part of my relationship. Anarchy is what does it mean to be interdependent? What does it mean to be in community with other people?

And there is also a really deep feminist part of myself that continues to say, be more selfish. I. Because for years we have been socially conditioned to be people pleasers. Let me care, take, let me do that. And so I, I don't want to be selfish, but I also feel this need to tell myself, no, center your pleasure.

Even harder if you don't wanna do that thing, don't you are not compelled to meet people in these spaces, erotically. Right. And so I just continue to try and run that too as well. And I, if I could give anything to women, it would be, that is get more clear on what you want and run for it. Run, run. Because like we're talking about, women have not had access to this.

And so you are a part of a new generation that is gonna make a different world for the generations coming up. And you have so much more privilege in America to run with it now than years past. And so let's write a new history. Let's write a new narrative.

[01:23:03] Elise: Yeah. No, I, I love also. Like I talk sometimes with my clients about this idea of like a love map.

Mm-hmm. And love maps. I think were introduced by a psychologist in like the seventies or something. I've gotta, I've gotta take a look. But love maps are essentially the concept that all of our experiences inform what we, how we define romantic love and how we define a good partner. Yeah. And so that's everything from how mom and dad interact with each other, the way that Disney princesses are treated, the media that we're consuming Yeah.

Is sort of, there's so much that we pick up, you know, under the age of 10, right. That informs how we're thinking about partners and romanticism. And one thing that I think people underestimate is the ability for that love map to change. And so, as a matchmaker, I'll have people come to me and have.

Incredibly restrictive rules and often ones that are not really, they're, they're kind of off base. Like I'll have, I remember I had one client say to me, I really earnestly believe that my husband could only be from one of three schools, London Business, Harvard, or Stanford. And that was really deep for her, really deep for her.

And when I asked her and just tried to learn more about what in her love map took place, that this was sort of the archetype of a good partner. Her response to me, very heartbreakingly and very, I mean it was very clarifying, was, do you not think I'm good enough to get men like that? And so it was almost like she was using this caliber of success, this sort of metric of success to measure her self-worth.

And so if, if men like that could really love me, you know, and, and that's also so complicated and. I think all it can take sometimes is to meet one person who like completely creates this new branch. Right? Like that guy who you met who was like, actually I'm kind of poly. And it like planted a seed and then Yes.

This whole vision you had for what a good partnership would look like for you changed. And you know, I joke with my girlfriend. I dated, I was, I've been queer since I was in my teens, but I dated like all straight women, mostly like I was the queer one. If anything, I used to say to Terran like I was the papa, you know?

Mm-hmm. Like I was the one who was in charge. Yeah. And it was like straight women would find me and be like, I think I'm gay. Do you wanna make out? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very different to date, a woman who's mask and dominant a completely different role. Sure. And I think especially for someone who could fall somewhere between Pan bi lesbian, that was really cool for me.

'cause I think there was something missing with fem women sometimes. Like a certain energy there. Sure. And I had these rules in my head about what that could look like. So there's only certain people I could be attracted to. And yeah, sometimes it just takes one person to like blow that up in your face and create these whole new set of possibilities for you.

[01:25:57] Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. And I, this is why the podcast is free and available for all people. I hope I do that for someone that they say she does what? How, you know, I think there's a lot of politics in that. And the reality is that. Previous me would've way, previous me would've first prayed for me and said, oh girl, that that, that girl needs so much prayer.

She is so off the rocker. And then other parts of me would've been so jealous of, who the hell does she think she is? Rah. Like, and I think coming back to jealousy, right? Those are really important moments. When you, we get jealous of other women, what is it that you see in them? That you want, that you think you can't have.

And that's been an enlightening process for me. Right. And so I think that sitting here, people get mad, people throw, you know, the fire at the woman who's the witch, right? And so I really appreciate getting to have conversations like this though, with someone who can be vulnerable like you about your work and your own lived experience and mine, and can be really raw and authentic about the personal 'cause.

The personal is the political, right? You and I have lived these experiences. We see it in our clients. And then when you look at the larger societal implications, we have to be talking about this. So I hope if anything, that this podcast can be one of those things where people get jealous and rage at and are confused and asked deeper questions and maybe go down the rabbit hole with me, you know?

[01:27:27] Elise: Yes. Yes. And I, you know, me and you talked briefly before the podcast about. How open and vulnerable and personal I was willing to get. And I think something that's been so palpable for me is if I'm going to ask other people to be vulnerable, I need to give a little bit of that to them. Mm-hmm. Because it's scary to be questioning yourself and exploring these sort of hidden parts of yourself.

And if I can just speak to the light at the end of the tunnel and like I've walked those that same path, I think there's value there. But it is scary to talk about your own personal experiences. And I think it's only because I've been so impacted by other people's stories that it's felt like the right choice to be, to be open and, and to share a little bit more about me as a person, not me, as like what my professional experience has sort of taught me.

Right. Yeah.

[01:28:25] Nicole: Yeah. Well, I really, really appreciate you taking that step today and, and trusting me and being so open. Yeah. This was so fun. I'm so glad that I came on. Mm-hmm. Well, as we come towards the end of our time, I'll take a deep breath with you.

Okay. So I have one last closing question for you, but I always like to check in with each guest and just see if there's anything else you wanna share with the listeners.

[01:28:54] Elise: I am just sending you all the biggest, most loving hug. I know that dating and love is really scary. It's very scary. It is also genuinely the best part about being alive.

And so I just hope you're all brave and good to yourselves and listen to that internal guiding voice 'cause that'll get you where you need to go. Yeah.

[01:29:21] Nicole: So powerful. So, so true. And to remember that wherever you're at, it's where you're meant to be right now. Take that deep breath. You've got this right?

[01:29:32] Elise: Yes.

Yeah. Future you will be, will look back on you today and be glad that you walked these in those shoes.

[01:29:39] Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, if it feels good to you, I'll ask that closing question now. I'm ready. Okay. So the one question that I ask everybody on the podcast is, what is one thing that you wish other people knew was more normal?

[01:29:56] Elise: Such a good one.

I wish people knew it was normal to not fully know where you stand in terms of your sexuality, and I wish people had more of a comfortable sort of a comfortability and acceptance with that. I think it's okay. To not know for sure if you're queer. I think it's okay to not know for sure if you're straight.

I don't think that you need to panic and redefine who you are as a person. I, I think it's just so normal to question your sexuality and explore that. And I want people to do that knowing that it's normal and do it with like a sense of wonder and fun. 'cause it's a, it's a genuinely fantastic, amazing thing to explore in yourself.

Even if the answer is actually I am straight, I am gonna go back to what I knew, that's okay too. But I think exploring that within yourself is incredibly normal. Almost. I would bet you pretty much every person on the planet has done it at some point. And be gentle with yourself if things come up that are unexpected.

[01:31:03] Nicole: Right? Yeah. Change is the only constant, my friend. Yeah. Muscle up mate. Luck. Right. You know, it's just like, if you could get comfortable with that idea in multiple areas of your life, one, I think life will be a little bit more enjoyable, and particularly in our sexuality. But, ugh, what you're saying rings so true to my journey of, oh, I'm so straight.

I'm, I'm queer. Oh, okay. I'm, I'm queer. Well, wait, what if I've been socially conditioned to like men and I actually don't like any of them and I'm actually a lesbian. The amount of years I spent in that space going, oh no. Oh no, where's the box? Where's the box? Where's the box? And one day being in therapy, I don't think I need a box.

I think I'm just gonna see what excites me. You know? And then living in that freedom, like that was radical. So if I could go back to younger Nicole and be like, stop trying to figure it out. It's expansive play, follow your heart, it's gonna change. Get comfortable with that. I think I would've been a little bit easier on myself back then, you know?

[01:32:07] Elise: Yes. Yes. I, something that cracks my friends up and probably would get me like an eye roller or two from some lesbians is I am not strict about my, I. Labels. So like I will often call myself lesbian and then sometimes I'll call myself by, and sometimes I'll call myself Pan. And if someone were to question me, Hey, you said you were a lesbian last week and you just called yourself by, I would just be like, yep.

Like that's how I felt then. This is how I'm feeling now. And it's so interesting, I think observing like the people closest to me and even their confusion with that. And to me it's so. Of course I would change my labels depending on how I'm failing that day, or especially 'cause sex and romantic, uh, romanticism is so complicated.

It's not the case that, you know, I think having sex with men can be fun, but I find them often really emotionally unengaging. Is that because I'm gay or is that because I haven't met the right man? I don't know the answer to that, and I think there's a big part of me that's just leaving it open. Yeah. And it's just acknowledging that truth for myself, but not necessarily boxing myself in anywhere.

Yeah. Are you laughing because that's like exactly where you've,

[01:33:20] Nicole: it's just like the more you get emotional insight and communication skills, yeah. The more that gap between like maybe your traditional patriarchy hurt cis man, that gap becomes more and more apparent. Yes, and I'm only here right now. I can't even imagine, you know, like it does like narrow the pool down really hard because they just can't talk about their emotions and that that breaks my heart for them.

But like my attraction is not there.

[01:33:48] Elise: Yes. If you are a bi woman, bless your heart. If you've dated women and now you're trying to date men again because they're totally awful women, you know, I know that to be the right, of course. But most women who start to date women report like. This woman is bringing me flowers and calls me every night and is the kindest, most attentive partner I've ever had.

And it's like absolutely mind boggling for them. And then maybe they break up and they go, oh, maybe I'll date men again. And I think it's just harder because I. I love that it's a different role and it's a different space, and I think it, it's almost like you've seen too much, you know? It's like,

[01:34:27] Nicole: oh, hell yeah.

Oh hell yeah. And I love that for them. Like, I love that you're raising your bar even higher.

[01:34:34] Elise: They're like, I know what it is to be eaten out attentively now, and I'm not going back, you know? Right. Right.

[01:34:41] Nicole: I recorded with someone once who was talking about how they were like giving their husband a blowjob because he helped out at Thanksgiving and I was like, dude, I don't mean to break it to you, but I've got two cis men cooking me dinner during the week.

Like, and I don't give them blowjobs for like you, we gotta race this bar. Like anytime we're raising the bar on our treatment, I'm like, fuck yeah, let's

[01:35:04] Elise: good. Good. You're like, if anything, they make me dinner and then I come. Yeah. The possibilities, they're endless for you here, you know? It's like, geez. Yeah.

[01:35:14] Nicole: Failure of imagination, right? Failure of imagination.

[01:35:18] Elise: Totally. Yes. Girl. Dream bigger. Totally. It's so hard though, like we don't know what we don't know. And I think. Sometimes we just think it's normal. We just think that's what you do. You blow your husband for some help with a holiday dinner. It's like big hugs to all of those women there.

Yeah, totally.

[01:35:39] Nicole: Well, it's been such a joy to have you on the podcast.

[01:35:41] Elise: Thank you. It's been so, so fun. Yeah. Well, I'm definitely gonna stay in touch with you. Yeah. And would love to just maintain this connection and be a part of this community. I love the conversations that you're having and the way that your brain works.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. I'm just really glad that you're creating this space for everybody.

[01:36:02] Nicole: Thank you. Thank you so much. I'm, I'm getting better at taking compliments and not immediately giving it back to you, so I'm gonna say thank you. Yeah. Takes practice. It is. It is. And for all the listeners who want to stay connected with you and your work, where can they find you and your business?

[01:36:21] Elise: Yes. So I have a website, conscious connections date coaching.com. And then I also have an Instagram that's su a super easy place to find me. And that's your dating copilot, um, as my Instagram handle. So feel free to check me out. I have a newsletter, I try to jam pack with all sorts of resources. And as a matchmaker, I have a lot of single people who are looking for dates.

So you can all email me, message me, whatever, and we'll see if I can get you like a free date. 'cause hell yeah. I've got clients looking for them.

[01:36:53] Nicole: Hell yeah. Great. Well thank you for joining me today. It's been such a blast.

[01:36:58] Elise: Yeah, you're the best, Nicole. Thank you so much for having me. And yeah, hope to see you soon.

[01:37:04] Nicole: If you enjoy today's episode, then leave us a five star review wherever you listen to your podcast and head on over to modern anarchy podcast.com to get resources and learn more about all the things we talked about on today's episode. I wanna thank you for tuning in, and I will see you all next week.