Intimacy & Relationships

And at some point Brittney said something that landed with a weight I wasn't fully prepared for. That she often felt alone even when I was right there. Not because I was absent in any conventional sense. Because the quality of my presence — the specific felt sense of being genuinely met by someone who is fully in the moment with you rather than partially somewhere else — wasn't consistently what she needed it to be.

Brittney is a Sensual Erotic Blueprint. I'm a Shapeshifter. If you know anything about those two types, you already know something about the specific challenge we navigate in our intimate life. What I've learned from years inside this dynamic — and from the research that illuminates why novelty matters — is that novelty in intimate life is not primarily about doing new things. It's about bringing genuine curiosity to the familiar. Here's what the research actually shows.

If David Deida's work is the map, John Wineland's work is something closer to the training ground. I came to Wineland's work after spending significant time with Deida's framework — after understanding intellectually what genuine masculine presence is supposed to look like. What I found in Wineland's approach was something that filled a gap Deida's writing leaves largely unaddressed: the specific, embodied, practical question of how.

When most people encounter David Deida's work, they encounter it as a framework for men. This framing misses something significant. Deida's work is equally a framework for understanding feminine essence — what it actually is, what it needs to thrive, what suppresses it, and what restoring it makes possible in intimate relationships. Here's what it actually says — and why most people miss it.

For years I tried to think my way into intimate presence. I understood what it was supposed to look like. I knew the frameworks. I just couldn't consistently do it. What I eventually learned is that presence in intimate connection is not primarily a cognitive achievement — it's a nervous system state. And that distinction changes everything about how you approach this work.

One of the things I appreciate most about David Deida's work is that it offers a map. Not a prescription — a map. A way of locating yourself in a developmental landscape and understanding not just where you are but where the growth opportunity actually lies. The three stages framework is probably the most practically useful piece of his work for the couples I work with — because it explains something most long-term partners feel but can't quite name.

I came to David Deida's work the way most people do — through someone who recommended The Way of the Superior Man with evangelical intensity that made me slightly skeptical before I'd read a single page. What I found was more nuanced, more useful, and more genuinely challenging than either the recommendation or my skepticism had prepared me for. Here's my honest assessment — and how I actually apply his framework in coaching.

There's a pattern I've been noticing more frequently in my coaching work — and in the broader cultural conversation about relationships in 2026. More couples are quietly redistributing their emotional lives outside the primary relationship. Not through infidelity. Not through crisis. Through the gradual process of finding it easier to seek genuine connection somewhere other than with their partner. Here's what the research says and what it's actually pointing toward.

There was a period in our marriage where Brittney and I had what I'd describe as a functional intimate life. We were close. We loved each other. We had sex. But something was missing that I couldn't quite name — the intimacy felt more like something we were maintaining than something we were inhabiting. Here's what that distinction means and why it matters.

Brittney is a Sensual Erotic Blueprint. What she needed from me — what she had always needed — was what is now being called soft life intimacy. Not performance. Not intensity. Presence. Safety. Slowness. The kind of intimate experience that feels like an exhale rather than an achievement. She didn't need me to try harder. She needed me to slow down. Here's what this trend is actually pointing toward — and what Nashville couples can do with it.

Nashville is one of the most exciting cities in America right now. But nobody mentions the intimacy cost of building a life here. If you and your partner have been running on fumes in your relationship while building everything else — this guide is for you.

If you've ever been in a long-term relationship, there's a good chance you've felt it — the quiet tension of wanting different things in the bedroom. Most advice treats this as a logistics problem. It isn't. Desire mismatch is almost always a signal pointing toward something deeper. Here's what it's really pointing at.