Offering simple mindfulness and reflective exercises, Robins helps readers learn to integrate ideas from both Eastern and Western approaches into everyday practice that is intended to both open and protect our mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health.

Building off the idea that when we are happier, we tend to be healthier, Robins explains the phenomenon of how our intuitive knowing fosters healthy relationships that contribute to our physical, mental, and emotional health. Readers learn to utilize a variety of pathways that will change their responses to others and will produce lasting, more rewarding, and closer relationships in all areas of their lives. This book is designed to aid readers in looking inward and experiencing how their intuitive sixth sense informs their ability to be intimate without the negative triggers of past experiences. Through a considered and thoughtful approach, Robins offers insight into cultivating a truly integrated self so that one may lead a more fulfilling and healthful life.

One of the world’s most respected voices on erotic intelligence, Esther Perel offers a bold, provocative new take on intimacy and sex. Mating in Captivity invites us to explore the paradoxical union of domesticity and sexual desire, and explains what it takes to bring lust home. Drawing on more than twenty years of experience as a couples therapist, Perel examines the complexities of sustaining desire. Through case studies and lively discussion, Perel demonstrates how more exciting, playful, and even poetic sex is possible in long-term relationships. Wise, witty, and as revelatory as it is straightforward, Mating in Captivity is a sensational book that will transform the way you live and love.

This integrative book is like having a wise supervisor in the room with you. Stop "fixing" your clients--engage them in their own healing through the Four-Dimensional Wheel of Sexual Experience. Gina Ogden guides you in helping your clients explore the full range of their sexual issues and challenges—including couple communication, erectile dysfunction, vaginismus, low desire, affairs, trauma, religious proscriptions, pornography use, and more. Part I offers strategies that correspond to the core knowledge areas required for certification as a sexuality professional, while Part II puts these innovative approaches into action through following five case examples from seasoned practitioners. The numerous user-friendly elements, such as quizzes, worksheets, and "hot tips," will help you see the larger picture of an issue, become fluent with a diversity of sexual identities and behaviors, and expand your ability to offer safe, ethical, evidence-based therapy.

Sex Work Matters brings together sex workers, scholars and activists to present pioneering essays on the economics and sociology of sex work. From insights by sex workers on how they handle money, intimate relationships and daily harassment by the police, to the experience of male and transgender sex work, this fascinating and original book offers new theoretical frameworks for understanding the sex industry. The result is a vital new contribution to sex-worker rights that explores the topic in new ways, especially its cultural, economic and political dimensions. Readers weary of the sensational and often salacious treatment of the sex industry in the media and literature will find Sex Work Matters refreshing.

Incorporating the most up-to-date literature in sociology, psychoanalysis, psychology, and communication, this book provides an exhaustive synthesis of theoretical, empirical, and clinical research on personal relationships. Prager explores the complex interconnections between intimacy and individual development, examining relationships from intimacy to old age in their social, cultural, and gender contexts, and constructing an innovative, multi-tiered model of intimate relating. The book also delves into the thoughts and emotions people experience when they behave intimately with each other, and asks how intimate relationships come to be satisfying, stable and harmonious for the people involved. This book will be of interest to researchers, educators, students and practitioners who study or treat close relationships. It will also serve as an invaluable text for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses on personal relationships, intimacy, and family relations.

The sexual revolution: an evocative term, but what meaning can be given to it today? How does 'sexuality' come into being and what connections does it have with the changes that have affected personal life on a more general plane? In answering these questions, Anthony Giddens disputes many of the dominant interpretations of the role of sexuality in modern culture. The emergence of what the author calls plastic sexuality - sexuality freed from its intrinsic relation to reproduction - is analysed in terms of the long-term development of the modern social order and social influences of the last few decades. Giddens argues that the transformation of intimacy, in which women have played the major part, holds out the possibility of a radical democratization of the personal sphere. This book will appeal to a large general audience as well as being essential reading for students and professionals.

Inscapes of Intimacy: Exploring the Dynamics of Relationships in the Select Plays of Tennessee Williams is an odyssey into the captivating world of Tennessee Williams' literary brilliance as this thought-provoking analysis unravels the intricacies of human connections within his acclaimed plays, The Glass Menagerie (1944), A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), The Rose Tattoo (1951) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955). The book skillfully dissects the complex web of relationships depicted in Williams' plays, through pressing issues like gender and sexuality that form and inform the conceptual matrix of this study. From the lens of feminism, the exploration of man-woman relationships unveils layers of societal dynamics, while a critical assessment of woman-woman relationships offers a fresh perspective on empowerment and camaraderie. Delving into man-man relationships, the book courageously examines the portrayal of the homosexual psyche, shedding light on Williams' bold and groundbreaking portrayals. As the exploration deepens, the spotlight shifts to the theme of women, sexuality, and strangers, illuminating the transformative journeys of female characters in their pursuit of self-discovery and autonomy. Each chapter offers a profound understanding of Williams' multidimensional characters, evoking empathy and recognition of the human spirit within his plays. The book is not just an academic investigation but a profound encounter with the timeless themes of love, desire, and vulnerability that find expression in Tennessee Williams' plays. Delving into the profound insights of the playwright's works, this book presents a compelling tapestry of emotions, drama, and human spirit, leaving readers with a richer understanding of both Williams' genius and the complexities of human relationships. For scholars, theater enthusiasts, and anyone captivated by the power of storytelling, this book offers a deeply rewarding expedition into the heart of Tennessee Williams' enduring artistic legacy.

A behavioral scientist explores love, belongingness, and fulfillment, focusing on how modern technology can both help and hinder our need to connect. A Next Big Idea Club nominee. Millions of people around the world are not getting the physical, emotional, and intellectual intimacy they crave. Through the wonders of modern technology, we are connecting with more people more often than ever before, but are these connections what we long for? Pandemic isolation has made us even more alone. In Out of Touch, Professor of Psychology Michelle Drouin investigates what she calls our intimacy famine, exploring love, belongingness, and fulfillment and considering why relationships carried out on technological platforms may leave us starving for physical connection. Drouin puts it this way: when most of our interactions are through social media, we are taking tiny hits of dopamine rather than the huge shots of oxytocin that an intimate in-person relationship would provide. Drouin explains that intimacy is not just sex—although of course sex is an important part of intimacy. But how important? Drouin reports on surveys that millennials (perhaps distracted by constant Tinder-swiping) have less sex than previous generations. She discusses pandemic puppies, professional cuddlers, the importance of touch, “desire discrepancy” in marriage, and the value of friendships. Online dating, she suggests, might give users too many options; and the internet facilitates “infidelity-related behaviors.” Some technological advances will help us develop and maintain intimate relationships—our phones, for example, can be bridges to emotional support. Some, on the other hand, might leave us out of touch. Drouin explores both of these possibilities.