Stage 5 of 7
Love/Sexuality
3 → 6 years
Where the child learns to love in a romantic way and learns to integrate heart and sexual feelings. In an adult, the disruptions from this stage can lead to a split between loving and sexual feelings, and a romantic or seductive way of being in relationship.
Developmental themes
- Becoming conscious/aware of one’s gender.
- Develops and integrate of love and sensuality/sexuality (between heart and gender).
- Expresses love feelings with awareness of energy in the pelvis that is together with sensual/sexual feeling and energy.
- Directs these towards the parent of the opposite sex then grown-ups, and children of the same age.
- Being in love with, 1) the parent of the opposite sex (homosexuals often in the same sex), 2) with other grown-ups, and 3) with peers/ children of the same age.
- Gaining ability to speak in long sentences and is able to reason and participate in talking (from concrete to abstract thinking).
- Gaining ability to change focus from the imagination/ fantasy world to concrete reality, from romantic fantasies to bed-rock reality.
- Develops friendship relationships with another child of same sex (best friend).
- Practicing the creation of constructive alliances.
- Becoming aware of muscular tension and relaxation.
- Becoming aware of gender roles and different aspects of the gender roles in the family, in groups and other families.
- Learning to balance one’s loving, intimate and sexual emotions and actions in the social context (these different relationships)
Early position
Romantic
General attributes
- Parent negates sexual component of love, and encourages child’s “sweetness”
- Child denies sensual/sexual feelings and identifies with romantic & heart feelings
- Repressed sexuality
- Wound is in the pelvis, results in poor pelvic energy
- Experiences their love as pure, untainted by sexual desire
- Coquettish – flirty however waits for other to initiate contact
- Waiting for their prince charming/princess, so they can “give” their heart away when they arrive
- Thoughts and feelings wrapped up in fantasy
- Wants reality to be different than it is
- Defense: Denial
- Paradoxically uses sex to get love/connection
- Female version: Charlotte from Sex and the City
- Male version – chivalry, white-knight
- Romeo & Juliet, Beauty & the Beast
Physical attributes
- Neck is held high
- Gaze is innocent/flirty in females, proud in males
- Sex organs are “hidden”/”drawn back”
Needs to learn
- Integrate fantasy and reality without giving up on either
- Feel sexual arousal/desire in the lower part of their body as opposed to exculsively in the heart
Late position
Seductive
General attributes
- Parent focuses on sexual component of love; focuses on reality at expense of fantasy
- Child identifies with sexuality and represses feelings of love
- Gaze is straight on; undresses you with their eyes
- Wound is in the heart
- Guards/protects heart from deeper intimacy
- Paradoxically shows love to get sex
- "What's Love Got To Do With It" - Song by Tina Turner
- Female version: Samantha from Sex and the City
- Male version – Don Juan, Womanizer, Player, Lothario
Physical attributes
- Neck is held straight
- Gaze is seductive
- Move like they are on the prowl/hunt
- Sex organs are forward, exhibited
Needs to learn
- To have friendships without sexualizing them
- Drop the guard around their heart and open to feelings of greater heart intimacy
Healthy resolution
Love/Sexuality
Balancing heart and sexuality: Enjoys both Loving and Sexual Intimacy - A person acting from the healthy or resourced Love/Sexuality position feels valued and respected for her loving and sensual/ sexual feelings and behavior. She senses both of these and decides how to act on them. Her muscular coordination is free and well-integrated. Her pelvis is centered, and not rotated forward or back. She can enjoy flirting or being seductive, and does so responsibly. She can be loving or sexual with another person, or both. She can accept refusal or rejection. She responds clearheadedly to the overtures of others. She avoids triangulation and does not unconsciously take sides in other people’s conflicts.