Healthy Happy Intimate Adult Relationship, Uncategorized

Healthy Happy Intimate HHIA Relationships 52

Intimate Space

On the Tip of my Tongue

Photo by Tajana Dedić Starović on Scopio

I love things that are indescribable, like the taste of an avocado or the smell of a gardenia.

Barbra Streisand

Sean here again! And, we are exploring our senses in our HHIA relationships. Our senses include touch, sight, sound, taste and smell! We have been looking at touch, sight & sound, and smell, including several exercises. These exercises encourage and support our intimacy and pleasure.

All exercises can be experienced with a partner and/or solo.

Sense (and sensibility)

Our last sense (and sensibility) is taste. Our sense of taste is closely related to our sense of smell but is differentiated a bit differently. We have essentially five distinct tastes which most of us can distinguish and enjoy to a variety of degrees:

  • Sweet: sugar, honey, syrup, candy, cakes and confections,
  • Sour: lemons, citrus, vinegar, dill pickles,
  • Salty: sodium, sea salt, cured meats, brine,   
  • Bitter: cocoa, mate, tea, dandelion greens, hops, gentian, quinine,  
  • Umami: Champagne, truffles, miso, caviar, cheese.

In addition to our five primary tastes, we mix and meld them like our primary colors to create flavors and delight for our tongues. A good example of this is our use of cocoa which is bitter to begin with. We can mix it with sugar, milk and even salt to create all kind of flavors and tastes to please almost everyone. And those who have no interest in cocoa can go straight to “white chocolate” which has no cocoa at all. 

Photo by Claudia Cotici on Scopio

Texture and Temperature

Secondary factors in our savory experiences include texture and temperature. In other words, how foods (and perhaps friends, lovers, partners or spouses) feel in our mouths and to our tongues affects how they taste. In other words , flavor is one thing and the overall physical, tactile, chewing , swallowing and aftertaste are another.

Like “Goldie Locks” we are always trying and tasting things to find which one is “just right”; not too hard or too soft, not too hot or too cold, not too salty or too sweet.

„When birds burp, it must taste like bugs.“

Bill Watterson

Tastings and Things

Tastings can be a great way to get to know ourselves and our partners better. With just a little dialogue and a bit of creativity we can create a burst of flavor and experience. We can have this be as sensual, sexy or serious as we choose as an individuals, pairs or groups.   

Tastings can include:

Photo by Javier Sanchez Mingorance on Scopio
  • Food:
    • Chips
    • Olives
    • Cheese
    • Pickles
    • Fruit
    • Toast & Jam
    • Ham
    • Honey
    • Mustard
    • Yoghurt
    • Pizza
    • Pasta
    • Cakes
    • Cookies
    • Chocolate
  • Anything you would like to share with yourself or your partner.
Photo by Pablo Nidam on Scopio

Consent and Communication

Some ways to enhance the sensual nature of these tastings could be

  • sharing drinks mouth-to-mouth
  • dipping our fingers in sauces, syrups & honey
  • feeding one another
  • blindfolds
  • dimming the lights
  • candles
  • music.
Person holding clear glass cup

It is important to remember that taste include touch and therefore verbal consent and clear understanding and communication are essential for us to come together. On the one hand, to share a bit of food and fun. And on the other hand, to share intimacy, trust, and ourselves.  

Good Taste

“My tastes are simple: I am easily satisfied with the best.”

Winston S. Churchill

Taste is so much more than experiencing flavors. In English Taste is also an individual preference, a sensibility and an appreciation of the word around us. It includes making choices and choosing to be our authentic selves and accepting the authentic selves of those around us.

When we do this, we are able to express and experience the great variety of our experience, society & cultures, and potential relationships, in a wholistic and sensible fashion. And at the same time we can explore all of the things which turn us on and excite us about ourselves and others.

Photo by Lucrezia Cantelmo on Scopio

This is Sean. Try savoring something special with yourself (and with those who are important to you) this week and see what happens.

(You can always contact me for more concrete suggestions.)

Our earlier Blog-Lessons:

123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748495051