Great post, Dinah. It got me to thinking about intimacy and how it can be physical, emotional, spiritual, and/or any combination. Emotional intimacy can have a similar build-up and sort of climax to it, too, as can spiritual intimacy. I think it can be easy to get them all tangled up or confused as the feelings can feel so similar and can occur in the mind and the body (and soul, I guess) for any and all three "types".

Expressions of emotion from a therapist can contribute towards a move towards feelings of intimacy of any kind, I think. Warmer or more tender feelings, erotic feelings, a sense of shared "moment" or "gift", something transcendent...all of these have an effect on us. Personally, I tend to retreat after times of increased or growing intimacy of any kind. I guess I kind of need to go back and re-group and try to deal with all the stuff it stirs up in me, most of which has to do with an intense fear of rejection. I guess that the more intimate I am with someone, in any form, the more rejection will hurt, or maybe the more I think it's likely. I don't know. I've seen this in my therapy. I've seen it in personal relationships. I've seen it in my marriage. Probably at online forums, too.

Therapy is definitely a place where one can explore these dynamics. Safety is so important for it, though, to feel okay with intimacy and identifying our own boundaries, how to express and enforce them, when to modify them, etc. But boy, oh boy, what a load of trust has to be in place, because we are making ourselves more and more vulnerable to the one we are becoming more intimate with, regardless of the type of intimacy.

Okay, done rambling now, I think.

gg