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Folgen
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SUBSCRIBE to the new "POSITIVELY SEX! WITH LILA" podcast on APPLE PODCASTS
(or wherever you like to get your podcasts)
& never miss an episode!
Get ready for a 46 episode season of Sex Ed, with Pleasure!
Host Lila, Intimacy Specialist & founding member of the premier sex-positive intentional community in New York, explores intimacy of all kinds in this sex-positive talk show on timely, titillating, tender, & taboo topics.
Her guests are pro-Dommes, therapists, kink masters, sex coaches, non-monogamous people, & folx on the street with opinions.
Positively Sex! celebrates intimacy & our ability to design our own relationships.
PS! talks about all those sex things you want to know, but might be hesitant to ask.
PS! lays it all out for you.
PS! is sex ed, with pleasure.
Darling, that is Positively Sex!
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Hello horizontal lover.
This is horizontal with lila, the podcast about intimacy of all kinds, recorded while lying down. Usually, the first part of our conversation is available wherever you listen to podcasts, and the last part is available exclusively to my patrons on Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila.
Navigate yourself on over to Patreon for 50+ exclusive horizontal episodes!
Season 4, however, is my Season of Experiments. The experiment of this episode... introduces you to my brand-new live show, Positively Sex! Sex Ed, with Pleasure.
Clubhouse pioneered a new form of media: interactive social audio. It’s like a podcast you can participate in...
I joined the app in late February and promptly became deeply infatuated. Really. Full-on limerence. NRE: New Relationship Energy.
I hardly slept! I barely ate! I talked about it to anyone who would listen! I fell asleep at wee morning hours in Clubhouse rooms, the phone half under the pillow next to me. It was, if you will, horizontal with clubhouse.
It began by ‘raising my hand.’
Then Alec Murphy began making me a co-moderator, and passing me the mic to offer intimacy advice & sexual education.
I started saying, “Just a sex ed moment here!”
As I moved from infatuation to bonding, I met other beloved favourites, like De’Andre Sinette & Shane Cottle & my Clubhouse wife Annie Block & my Clubhouse mistress Dani & Brittany Michalchuk & Angus McColluch & & & & … I became a regular in Angus’s club MATE. I found communities of people who shouted my name with joy when I entered a virtual room.
These relationships feel tender and warm and deep, playful and tasty and delightful. And real. I haven’t met these people in person (yet). But I know their voices. And I can feel them. They are a real part of my real life.
Clubhouse is the app of the zeitgeist.
We are the most connected, and the loneliest we have ever been. Facebook Image Crafting & comparing and despairing on Instagram has most of us feeling so much less intimate. There is something unbelievably wholesome and grounding and genuine about dialing our digital connection to its very first form: a phone call — with the addition of a few bells & whistles.
It’s free. It’s global. It’s live. And it’s just, voice.
I think that’s marvelous.
I starting co-hosting rooms, like:
“Ask Men Anything” with Alec.
“The Sex-Positive Room” with De’Andre.
And then I opened rooms of my own:
Ladies of the Sex House (with my former housemates from the Villa)
I Just Found My Poetry Stash (which I actually did, from 10 years ago, when I was doing a page a day writing practice, and there is some glorious stuff in there!)
Then I formed my own club: The Sex-Positive Club, and began gathering about me wise, compassionate co-mod to carve out a space for sex-positivity.
My second week on the app, I happened upon the last few minutes of Abraxas Higgins’s “Apply to the Creator First Program” room. He was doing his very last reset — giving the information about the room for the last time before closing it. I snagged that link & stayed up 'til 4am working on the application, very horizontal, laptop resting on my thighs. At 4am, I fell asleep under my computer. At 7am, I woke and kept working. That was the due date. I submitted around 1pm.
I was chosen as a finalist.
There were 5,000 entries. 53 finalists each made a pilot episode (this episode), and 25 shows were chosen as the inaugural Creator First Class of 2021… and mine, mine was one of them.
YESSSSSSSSSSS.
This is basically the first time I’ve won something in 20 years.
Positively Sex! Sex Ed, with Pleasure airs a new live episode every Sunday night through September at 9pm EST / 6pm Pacific.
Catch it live, or become a patron of the horizontal arts on Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila (that’s P-a-t-r-E-o-n.com / horizontalwithlila) for exclusive patron access to the entire 12-episode season.
Prepare for SENSUAL CONTESTS…
Like "Best Sext”
DELECTABLE PRIZES…
Like a deck of “Let’s Talk About Sex” cards from Games for Humanity’s Erin Hickok aka The Connectress. (By the way, all of her fabulous question card games are 10% off with the discount code: HORIZONTALITY, in all caps.)
FUN & SPICY AUDIENCE POLLS…
Sexted lately? Got a Clubhouse crush?
TENDER, TABOO, & TIMELY TOPICS…
Such as the pilot theme, the theme of this episode: Sex @ a Distance, which included:
* noods
* sexting
* aural sex (phone sex, er0tic hypnosis, described video p0rn)
* video sex & sex on video
* virtual play parties
& BRILLIANT THOUGHT LEADERS.
This pilot episode features special guest Cindy Gallop, one of the most brilliant extemporaneous speakers I've ever heard. The Michael Bay of business (because she blows shit up!) creator and CEO of Make Love Not Porn introduced us to the concept of social sex.
We were joined by a few of my former housemates from Hacienda Villa, the sex-positive intentional community I used to live in, as a founding member:
Mirelle, polyamorous woman, purveyor of sensuality, & horizontal’s very first guest, of episode number 1. feed your delight, which is my most downloaded episode of all time, treated us to her unerring taste for pleasure & a voice that positively drips with sex.
Tiger, former Villan & former lady, him of many trades, Trans & gynecological educator and horizontal guest of episodes 16. kiss me I’m jew-witch, and 17. professional cuddling, gave us a taste of erotic hypnosis that left us with our mouths agape.
Theia made us all aware that described video porn is a thing, Shane brought his soulful sensuality, Fiona tallied our very important polls, & my Creative Producer & Social Media Maven Natalia Sketch helped me sjuzz the episode, then sat behind me in the tiniest focus room at the co-working space, calling the show & managing the backchannel.
The episode begins with my working definition of sex & concludes with showering at a virtual play party.
Join my club on Clubhouse so you don’t miss an episode.
I have always been a Creator First, and now, finally, again, I am being recognized as such.
And DAMN it feels good.
P.S. Which is, of course, a double entendre, meaning both Post Script and Positively Sex! … Welcome to social audio.
Come get positively sex with us, all across the globe, through the magic of the interwebz.
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Fehlende Folgen?
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Hello horizontal lover. Intimacy investigator. Horizontalist.
Typically, horizontal is the podcast about intimacy of all kinds, recorded while lying down. The first part of our conversation is available wherever you listen to podcasts, and the last part is available exclusively to my patrons on Patreon.
But this: is Season 4, my Season of Experiments.
And this experiment is an installment of Alexa Martinez’s that sex chick podcast, which was, full disclosure, recorded while in bed, but (gasp!) sitting upright. For that sex chick, it’s episode 34, and for horizontal, episode 128. I’m told it’s the longest Alexa has ever gone with a guest, so, here’s to horizontal stamina. *wink*
In this episode, sex parties done right, I share the orientation I lead at my last play party — which is a Facebook-safe euphemism for a sex party — in its entirety.
Alexa’s super-connected sex-positive crew of curious kittens, a collective on Facebook called That Sex Group, have been really curious about these parties. Both of us have found it’s what a lot of people want to know about when they find out it’s a) something we’ve got a fair amount of experience with, and b) something we’re willing to talk about publicly.
So here! We made you an episode.
This contains the lion’s share of wisdom I’ve gathered about play parties during my 7 years in the sex-positive community. What can happen at a play party, how you prepare for it, how to communicate with your partner or partners about it, some points of etiquette, and some of my personal tales of play parties past.
I first met Alexa at a Future of Sex panel, curated by the podcast host and sextech expert, Bryony Cole, who was my guest for episodes 28. future of sex, and 29. sexual attitude readjustment day. This was also the very same event at which I met Bryan Stacy (who was on said panel) & Dominick Q., champions of men’s work and co-hosts of The Great Man Within podcast, who were also my guests for a Season Threesome on episodes 76. the discerning dick, and 77. post-sex choice. (In Season Three, I got horizontal with two guests at a time, who were in some kind of relationship with one another. Hence: the season threesome!)
Recently, I guested on The Great Man Within, and we did a deepdive into The Stoplight Game. It’s episode #220, titled, “How To Ask For What You Want in the Bedroom.”
This to say that… in the not-so-distant future, when I have Alexa on my podcast AT LAST, we will all have been guests on each other’s shows, and isn’t that a particularly pretty podcaster-polycule?
Yes. Yes I think it is.
Alexa is my kindred. She approaches sex, love, & relationships with the same kind of voracious curiosity I do, tickled through with playfulness. She was one of the first to encourage me to set up shop as an Intimacy Coach, and now, three years later, I finally have. She sometimes has purple hair and is always up for a frolic and a photo opportunity and a deep conversation. You can hear her smiling when she talks, and the way she shares her vulnerable relationship realizations with the world are both an affirmation and an inspiration to me. I love her. I hope you will too.
Come get figuratively horizontal with us, in Canggu, Bali, Indonesia, and Austin, Texas.
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Hello my horizontal lovers, my intimacy investigators, my horizontalists!
horizontal is the podcast about intimacy of all kinds, recorded while lying down (and usually, while wearing robes).
With few exceptions, our conversations are languorous, meandering, and long-form, as though post-coital, or stargazing, or staring out onto the open road in the wee hours of a very long road trip. It’s a private conversation made public. It’s consensual eavesdropping.
Typically on horizontal, each conversation is between 3 and 5 hours long, and divided into two to four parts. The former half is available to all horizontalists, and the latter, is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
This is Season 4, my Season of Experiments. During this season, I’m investigating form and format, length and structure, context and content. Playing aurally. Trying things I haven’t tried yet. Thus far, Season 4 has seen a mash-up with Devin Person’s “this podcast is a ritual” show, episodes with more-or-less intrusive narration (you decide), and a session with a matchmaker in which I get interviewed, as the client.
you spilled your hot come on my hot girlfriend, this episode, is from my very first recording spotlighting a single sexy topic!
In episodes 126 & 127, I lie down with Dallas King, L.A. native, global hedonist, director, filmmaker, hot professor, model, and profoundly experienced bull. He is writing the book on cuckolding. Literally. That’s what he’s in Bali to do.
It’s called GASM.
For images featuring such highlights as Dallas’s rippling abs, brooding fashion sense, and graphic tattoos, witness his Instagram @dallasking1
In this first half of our recording, we talk about:
craigslist personals what cuckolding means “the lifestyle” versus sex-positive culture working as a massage therapist in L.A. & becoming a bull his first time pleasing another man’s wife & being watched while doing it grappling with professional, mental, and religious inhibitions homophobia & sexual performance how being a bull can affect your romantic relationships humiliation & emasculation agreeing on where to come navigating couple dynamics dealing with your own expectations cuckqueens, and … my desire to be a female bull.For access to the spicy second half of this conversation, as well as 50 other exclusive episodes, navigate yourself directly to Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila. Make sure you click the link or type that in exactly, because, as a creator who is considered “adult,” my profile isn’t searchable on Patreon. (!)
Other than that, Patreon is great. It’s like the love child of crowdfunding and a subscription service. You can become a patron for $7/month on up, and the rewards get more and more sumptuous. For instance, at the $100 level, you get a 30-minute one-on-one Intimacy Guidance session with me every month...
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury of IGrecording.com. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, from 99designs. This intro music is a remix by acapella beatbox musician kidmental, whose motto is “theme songs for everyone.” Support a Black creator, and get a catchy jingle of your very own by hiring him on Fiverr or becoming his patron on Patreon.
Upcoming in Season 4, I have a recording from my guest spot on Dominick Q & Bryan Stacey’s “The Great Man Within” podcast, a couple of episodes with the journalist Sue Jaye Johnson, in which she interviewed me for her project “The Pleasure Report,” a 5-part mini-series with Jet-Setting Jasmine, who you must know — a badass Black therapist & porn star, and her incredible Dom husband, and a daughter that gives me hope for the future of humanity, as well as shows with segments, a la NPR, among other explorations.
Until next time: May you have someone to love, something to do, and something to look forward to.
I’m looking forward to scripting and rehearsing my first TED-style talk, and the event I curated around it to celebrate the 4-year podcast-aversary on May 21st, 2021! It’s gonna be called “Hot Love Talks.”
Thank you for listening. Thank you for getting horizontal.
Now, come lie down with us, in Seminyak, Bali, Indonesia.
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Hello my horizontal lovers, my intimacy investigators, my horizontalists! horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, & relationships of all kinds, recorded while lying down, and usually, while wearing robes.
If you’ve listened to either one of my ‘between two wizard’ episodes, 85. well-hung psychedelic sex wizard / no hookups or 86. you’re trying to porn sex me, or my most magical recent horizontal mashup episodes, 123. this ritual is horizontal, or 124. this horizontal is a ritual, you’ve become acquainted with my Wizard friend, Devin Person.
During both of our horizontal recordings (one in-person, in his former wizard bed in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and the other virtual, mediated by the magic of the interwebz, between Louisville, Kentucky, and Canggu, Bali, Indonesia) a remarkable fact about his relationship surfaced: he and his partner (now fiancé) don’t text. Ever. It’s one of their cherished relationship agreements, a social norm within the co-creation of their dyad. They just don’t text. If they want to communicate with one another, they need to actually pick up the phone, and dial their partner.
Well, that fiancé he doesn’t text with… is our storyteller today.
Typically on horizontal, each conversation is between 3 and 5 hours long and divided into two to four parts. The former half is available for all horizontalists everywhere, and the latter half is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts. With few exceptions, our conversations are languorous and long-form, as though post-coital, or stargazing, or staring out onto the open road in the wee hours of a very long road trip. I consider it consensual eavesdropping.
When you become a patron you receive a key to the horizontal city, unlocking access to over 50 exclusive episodes. Become a patron of the horizontal arts by navigating directly to www.patreon.com/horizontalwithlila ... You must click on or type in that link directly, because sex-positive creators are still in quite a bind with social media these days. You can’t just go to Patreon and search my name, or the name of my show, because the search engine pretends all of its mature content doesn’t exist! I guess that makes Patreon sort of like the boyfriend who doesn’t want the world to know that we are dating, but it is the best crowdsourcing subscription service that I know at this moment. So. I take it as an indicator of just how far we still need to go to eradicate sex-negativity, stigma, shame, and taboo.
Usually, my Patreon tiers begin at $7 per month, but this month I’ve opened up ten $5 a month spots for access to The Full Horizontal. Two spot already got snagged before this announcement, so as of this recording there are 8 left. Claim one, and all the horizontality shall be yours.
At the end of each long-form recording, I ask my guest to tell me a story. It can be any tale that falls under the broad umbrella of intimacy. My only requirement is that they have a burning desire to share it with me. Because these stories usually take place in the part twos (or fours) of our recordings, most of you horizontalists never get to hear such tales as being carried down a mountain on the shoulders of a hunky guide, or donating your father’s body to science and then insisting on a connection with the medical students who studied him, or getting married every year — to the same person.
Occasionally, in pre-pandemic times, I’d host horizontal storytelling pajama parties. My launch party in May of 2017 was a pajama party! This quickie was recorded live during Pride Month in June 2019 at horizontal storytelling: the summer pride edition. We all donned rainbow pajamas, noshed on milk and cookies, and curled up together, horizontally, all 50 of us, to listen to the tales of five storytellers from across the LGBTQIA+ community, one after the other.
In this particular quickie, I lie down with Lisa Ann Markuson, also known as LAMARKS, queer cis femme bisexual woman boss, founder + CEO of creative agency Ars Poetica, (which provides, among other things, experiential poetic entertainment for events and happenings). Her woman-owned, inclusive and sustainable business model celebrates the multitalented nature of her artists across entertainment, activist, consulting, and literary landscapes.
She was the co-host, along with Taz, of the National Poetry Month podcast, A Daily Dose of Poetry. I appeared on the show as their April 18th guest, and they wrote me poetic prescriptions for what ailed me in my romantic relationship. LA and her 35 artists have written poetry for celebrities & created a series of handmade poetic talismans to benefit Planned Parenthood.
You can find her, and them, on the interwebz at @arspoetica.us on Instagram.
Come lie down with us at a pajama party in the before-time, at Hacienda Studio in Bushwick, Brooklyn, as LA tells us a tale titled, “In Fact, a Switch Hitter.”
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Hello horizontal lovers & ritualists,
horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, & relationships of all kinds, recorded while lying down. this ritual is horizontal is part of my Season 4, the Season of Experiments.
Usually, I have a guest or two reclining next to me, sharing a pillow, but This Season in the Era of Covid, my guest is often lying down across the world from me, as Devin is here... and we have an intimate, vulnerable, long-ranging and long-form conversation that unfolds over the course of 3 - 5 hours, and gets divided into 2 - 4 episodes. Typically, the first half of our conversation is available in all the podcast places, and the latter half is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
In the latter part of our conversation, which will be episode 124 on horizontal, we discuss a bit of ghosting wizardry, dating reviews, self-holds, and parenting our inner child. Then I tell Devin a story about being photographed nude in a nest, and the most miserable sexy dance party, and Devin conjures a 3-point spell for alchemizing connection across distance. One way to gain access to episode 124 is to become a patron of the horizontal arts on Patreon.
Patreon is a portal to the work of the modern-day independent artist, like the love child of crowd-funding and a subscription service. A monthly contribution to my Patreon unlocks over 50 exclusive episodes, and a monthly contribution to Devin’s Patreon offers you access to magical rituals centered around numbers of, shall we say, modern-day interest — one of which I participated in. The number: was 69, and the episode is titled “How to Pleasure Yourself and Others.” Last night, I listened back to it (for the first time since the recording) and got turned on! so I highly recommend it. To become a patron, navigate directly to Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila or Patreon.com/thispodcastisaritual
The other way is this — as a rare gift in honor of our collaboration, you can gain access to the full episode if you head over to Devin’s this podcast is a ritual feed, even if you aren’t a patron of the horizontal arts! Which means, if you are listening to this on Devin’s feed, you get the whole thing right now.
The experiment of this episode, as Devin described, is a mash-up, and this is my very first mash-up episode. When I think about mash-ups, I think of some intrepid songstress like my friend Meghan Tonjes and the way she puts two pop songs in a blender on YouTube and makes something creamily delicious — both capturing the infectious joy and the hook-iness of the original songs, and somehow also more than that, the alchemy of two entities enjoined, creating something that does not exist before they are enmeshed. In other words: Magic.
In this part of our conversation, I tell Devin the story of Hamilton & the Hondalorian, and we talk about connecting across distance, phone calls vs. video calls, charting-new-territory friends and rerun friends, the nutrients of digital communication & joy of sexting, the Seamlessification of dating, resilience, rejection, & confidence, & icing on Tinder.
This mash-up was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury of IGrecording.com. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, whom you can hire on 99designs. The remix of my original intro music was created by kidmental, whose motto is “theme songs for everyone.” You can both support a Black creator, and get a theme song of your very own by supporting him on Fiverr or on Patreon.
Until next time, my horizontal ritualists, my ritual horizontalists:
May you have someone to love, something to do, and something to look forward to. I’m looking forward to assembling my camera kit with 4K video capabilities and proper studio lighting... and finally shooting my Master Class-style course on connection! If you want information on that, and future horizontal endeavors, follow @horizontalwithlila on Instagram, or sign up for my email missives on horizontalwithlila.com
And now, through the Magic of the interwebz, come lie down with us in Canggu, Bali, Indonesia, Louisville, Kentucky, and wherever you find yourself horizontal.
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Hello horizontal lover.
This is the podcast about sex, love, & relationships of all kinds that’s entirely recorded while lying down.
Usually, I aim to make every recording more of a long-form conversation and less of an interview, but the world is topsy-turvy, and so is Season 4, my Season of Experiments.
This episode is a traditional interview (albeit, an explicit one) mostly presented in the style of NPR. Instead of my usual horizontal conversation, in which I share as openly and vulnerably as my guest, for this episode I’ll be your narrator, guiding you through the life of an oversexed little Italian boy who grows up to be an oversexed British man, utilizing choice clips from his tales.
In this and the following episode, I lie down with Iena: vast lover of womankind, kinkster, rope aficionado, photographer, former porn producer, and sadist extraordinaire. I met him through the Shibari community in Canggu. He once suspended me from a piece of bamboo in a pose that looked kind of like a praying mantis.
The first half of our interview is available in all the podcast places for all of you horizontalists, and the latter half is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts. So, if you want to hear Iena’s extreme tale of a bewildering sexual exploit involving a gorgeous Scandinavian woman on top, and something that he did not consent to, become a patron to listen to the second part of this interview. $7 a month gives you access to over 50 episodes not available to the general public, as well as contributing to keep horizontal independent, uncensored, and ad-free.
In this part, we traverse from:
* Iena’s 4 year-old erections through
* nudie mags in the crib
* his obsession with full bush, newsstands, and porn
* 10 years of sexual mentoring
* an abiding love of tits,
* foreplay & the orgasmic platform
* the first time in his life he felt like he was one cock short, and
* his first sexual experience, which includes a cruise, a crew, a short black bob, & some bushes
Now come lie down with us in Canggu, Bali, Indonesia.
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Hello horizontal lover. horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, & relationships of all kinds, entirely recorded while lying down.
Usually, I have a guest or sometimes two (and on one notable occasion, nine!) reclining next to me, or, This Season in the Era of Covid, my guest is sometimes lying down across the world from me ... and we have an intimate, vulnerable, long-form and far-ranging conversation that unfolds over the course of 3 - 5 hours, and gets divided into 2 - 4 episodes.
horizontal is Slow Radio. A kind of stargazing, or post-coital, or loooong road trip sort of conversation. And that’s what horizontality is to me. A relinquishing of pretense. A deepening of voice. A languor that inspires revelation. An invitation to unzip to our tenderest. It’s like consensual eavesdropping. We invite you in to lie down next to us, as we share our secrets in your ears.
Typically, the first half of our conversation is available in all the podcast places for all of you horizontalists, and the latter half is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts. Occasionally I’ll do a quickie episode, which consists of a single intimate story, usually recorded live at one of my horizontal storytelling pajama party events.
This is Season 4, however, my Season of Experiments. In it, I intend to be playful with form and format, interspersing surprises and dancing with theme and time.
The experiment of this episode, 120 is … poetry. I hadn’t written poetry in several years, and then three months ago I went to this Open Mic here in Canggu. The upswelling of personal expression, and the prospect of being on stage again, which is a rush my body craves, so inspired me that I started writing the first of these poems during intermission! You may recognize the subject (and the love affair) of the piece titled “climaxes and denouements” from my part two with Bevin, episode 62. we can be benefits, but not friends. The second poem, “exquisite cupboards,” was inspired by a disappointing young lover here in Bali. Does he know he’s the muse? Yes he does. I read it to him...horizontally, in bed.
They are both love poems, or, shall I say, lost-love poems.
For access to The Full Horizontal, plus monthly intimacy tips like the Fears / Boundaries / Intentions / Desires exercise, become a patron of the horizontal arts! Navigate to www.patreon.com/horizontalwithlila to join. You must go to that link directly, because creators considered “adult” will not show up on Patreon’s search engine! (Which lets us know just how far we have to go in creating a sex-positive world, eh?) Sigh.
If you are a non-poetry person, I hope you’ll still allow this episode to wash over you with the same receptivity as you do other horizontal installments. In fact, I’ve heard from multiple not-poetry-people (including my dear friend and guest of episodes 59 & 60, Samia) that they don’t like poetry, but they like my poetry ... which is basically how I feel about dogs, and Kristi Ann’s dog Stella. Please don’t hold this against me.
And now darlings, come lie down with me, in Canggu, Bali, Indonesia.
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Hello horizontal lover. horizontal is the podcast about intimacy of all kinds, recorded while lying down.
You’re listening to Season 4, my Season of Experiments. During this season, I’m playing with form and format, length and structure, context and content. I’ll be including mash-ups with other podcasts, themed episodes, crossovers, and shows with segments, among other things. Unlike the first three seasons, most of Season 4 will be recorded remotely, so I’m often horizontal across the world from my guest … which is a grand experiment in itself.
This is part three of my 4-episode arc with Kelsey Grant: Love Educator, boundaries expert, writer, singer, witchy woman, & creatrix of various kinds… known on Instagram as @radicalselflove.
Usually, my horizontal recording sessions are between 3 and 5 hours long, and divided into two parts (if 3 hours) or 4 parts (if 5). The first installment — or the first two installments — are available in all the podcast places for all horizontalists, and the second half — or the latter two parts — are available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts. One of my experiments with Kelsey’s arc is to divvy things up a bit differently. In this case, my first and third episode with Kelsey (which are episodes 116, and this installment, 118) are available to everyone, and the second and fourth are available exclusively to patrons.
There’s also a bonus sort of grab bag stream-of-consciousness episode we recorded that I’m considering releasing in full as a bonus episode for patrons, or, also in two parts. To be determined, horizontal lovers…
For access to The Full Horizontal, which includes all the part twos (or in this case, twos and fours) going back to the beginning, become a patron of the horizontal arts by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
Use that link precisely because creators dubbed “adult” are hidden by Patreon’s search engine. When you become a patron, I also send you a personal thank-you video (with a Happy Dance).
In part one, episode 116. planet friendship (my first episode that’s almost entirely about platonic intimacy) we talked about her nourishing female friend pod and 6-month vetting process, mother-wounds, getting kicked out of the house, emotional release, resisting the codependent parental undertow, & how Kelsey and her best friend heal by re-parenting each other.
In part two, episode 117. an emotionally safe connection (a patron-only episode), we discussed my best friend Marghe, inner circle friendship, virtual and in-person connection, the ability to hold simultaneous conflicting emotions, Harry Potter and nerding out, & the masterful, loving way Kelsey expressed her boundaries to me.
In this, part three, we deliberately got horizontal to talk about sex. We explored cervical, g-spot, and clitoral orgasms, devotional presence and the lack thereof, fantasizing about women during sex, self-reverence, Kelsey’s sexual evolution, from getting kicked out of the house to her Huntress phase to exploration with a virgin to going off the pill to kink to cervical orgasms & betrayal, to self-exploration & crystal dildos.
If you’d like one-on-one guidance from me on your intimate struggles, I now offer Personal Intimacy Roadmap Sessions: 60-minute sessions with a takeaway plan. In other words, sex-positive, judgement-free, compassionate support for what ails you in the realm of sex, love, & relationships of all kinds.
To schedule, email [email protected]. If you desire ongoing support of your intimate growth, join the $100 Patreon tier on Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila, and receive a 30-minute coaching session every month!
In next week’s patrons-only episode with Kelsey, we delve into sex that disturbs the neighbors, woundmates and heartmates, the runner & the chaser, dating with intention, the fantasy of her former relationship, overfunctioning & underfunctioning, losing sexual desire, and whether woundmate relationships can become healthy.
Until next time, may you have someone to love, something to do, and something to look forward to. I’m looking forward to the Wednesday night public speaking club I’ve been attending, and getting put on the spot.
Thank you for listening. Thank you for getting horizontal.
Now come lie down with us again, in Canggu, Bali, Indonesia, and Vancouver, BC, Canada.
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Hello, horizontal lover. horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, and relationships of all kinds, recorded while lying down.
This is Season 4, my Season of Experiments. This season marks the first time I’ve ever recorded remotely. So, many times, I’m no longer in the same bed as my guest— which is already a grand experiment in itself, as every single episode of my first three seasons was recorded in person, lying down, wearing robes, shoulder-to-shoulder, right next to my guest. As though stargazing, or post-coital, or in the deep hours of a very long road trip.
I’m always saying that I want to expand people’s notion of what intimacy is, and can be. Remaining overseas during a global pandemic has encouraged me to expand my own notion of intimacy. I used to disparage the value of virtual connection... and suddenly, that’s most of what most of us have. And we must figure out how to make it nourishing for us… or go hungry.
My mission holds steady: To make the world a more intimate place. One episode, one conversation, one essay, one video, one session, one workshop, one course, one talk at a time. So here is my current pursuit: to weave the kind of empathetic cocoon that I cultivate in person, in bed, to inspire a blossoming conversation full of raw, revealing, vulnerable, genuine intimacies, with someone who is horizontal literally across the world.
In this, and the following three episodes, I lie down with the delicious Kelsey Grant, known on Instagram as @radicalselflove. She is my new friend. And I feel very proud to say so. Apropos of this season’s overarching intimacy-across-distance motif, we have not yet met in person. I look forward to the day when I can put my arms around Kelsey and squeeze. Kelsey is a Love Educator, an incisive writer, a boundaries expert, a singer and creatrix of various mediums, and a powerfully tender woman. She has a generous laugh, and her wisdom is free of bullshit. She’s in it, she doesn’t pretend to be otherwise, and that’s what makes her a whole, human, and a great leader. I have much to learn from her, and I imagine you will, too.
Half of our episodes will be available in all the podcast places for all horizontalists, and the other episodes will be available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
You can become a patron right this instant for access to The Full Horizontal by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
When you become a patron, I send you a personal thank-you video (with a Happy Dance).
If you seek guidance for your intimate struggles, I offer Personal Intimacy Roadmap Sessions: 60-minutes of judgement-free, sex-positive guidance… with a takeaway plan (your roadmap)! What ails you in the realm of sex, love, & relationships of all kinds? To schedule, email [email protected] and I’ll send you a fun form to fill out (well, I think it’s fun; I made it) so I can best prepare for you. One of my happy clients said, “I’ve had a lot of therapy. But you give advice a therapist cannot give.” Bam!
Here, in my first experiment with Kelsey, we scrap the structure, and instead of starting at the very beginning (a very good place to start), as a classic horizontal episode does, we start from the very right now (also a very good place to start) with the question, “What is alive in you?” And that is how this episode came to be all about nourishing female friendship, envy, & backstabbing, the 6-month inner circle vetting process, mother-wounds, getting kicked out of the house as a teenager, emotional release & worrying about the neighbors, swamping, resisting the codependent parental undertow, & how Kelsey and her best friend heal by re-parenting each other.
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury of IGrecording.com. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, whom you can find on 99designs. The remix of my original intro music was created by kidmental, an acapella beatbox musician, and a Black creator you can support right now on Fiverr or Patreon.
In next week’s exclusive, patrons-only episode, we talk about my best friend, the defining factor of a tier one inner circle friendship, virtual and in-person connection, the ability to hold simultaneous conflicting emotions, nerding out, my weekly Covid-era ritual of Escapist Animated Movie Night, & how Kelsey’s ability to express loving boundaries with me, marks the beginning of a beautiful friendship. To gain access to the next episode (and all the other part twos, or threes and fours going back to the beginning), navigate to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila and become a patron of the horizontal arts!
Now come lie down with us, in Uluwatu, Bali, Indonesia, and Vancouver, BC, Canada.
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Hello my horizontal lover. horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, and relationships of all kinds, recorded while lying down.
This is Season 4, my Season of Experiments. I’ll be playing with form in all sorts of ways: with coaching sessions and mash-ups and crossovers, happenings and themes and advice sessions, horizontality in unexpected places, and other intimate surprises.
In the first four episodes of this season, I (virtually) lie down with Lemarc Thomas, global matchmaker, relationship expert, sweetheart, psychology-versed purveyor of kindness, native St. Helenian, marriage equality advocate, husband to Michael, and, as he has been dubbed by The Telegraph, “the gentle but determined Cupid.”
Our first two episodes are available in all the podcast places for all my horizontalists. Parts three and four will be available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
Become a patron for access to The Full Horizontal by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila !
In our first part, episode 112. broken a few hearts, Lemarc interviewed me as if I were his newest matchmaking client. It’s a particularly revealing and tender episode for me, as I disclose my visions for a romantic relationship, struggles with belief & sexual attraction, past experiences with some of the men I’ve hurt, and some who’ve hurt me, my pattern of choosing unavailable men to love, fear of feeling suffocated, whether I’ve experienced emotional and sexual attraction at the same time, what I love about being me, and what I imagine my future partner will love about being with me.
You could use episode 112 to Think Like Your Own Matchmaker, and get closer to envisioning the core of your heart’s desire. Check the show notes on horizontalwithlila.com for the series of questions Lemarc asked me, and perhaps try journaling on them, or getting together with a beloved friend to ask them of each other. If you do so with a friend, I suggest you record it, so you can listen back and see: am I exploring love in accordance with my values.
This is the second episode of my four-part arc with Lemarc. Our experiment is my very first themed episode. I interview Lemarc all about matchmaking. We discuss:
* the differences between traditional matchmaking and Lemarc’s modern take on the industry
* his 4-step process
* love coaching vs. therapy
* being our full rainbow & sharing our crazy
* how to not to date like a teenager
* non-negotiables & deal-breakers
* cultivating communities that will hold the love that we meet
* The Matchmaking Experiment
* becoming a matchmaker
* how Lemarc keeps his vast network in mind, &
* his signature love advice.
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury, IGrecording.com on the interwebz. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, whom you can find on 99designs. This remix of my original intro music was created by kidmental, an acapella beatbox musician, and a Black creator you can support right now.
If you’d like one-on-one guidance from me on your intimate struggles, I now offer Personal Intimacy Roadmap Sessions. They are 60-minute sessions of sex-positive, judgement-free, kink-aware, LGBTQ+ celebratory, gender-affirming support for what ails you in the realm of sex, love, & relationships of any kind. A session includes exercises, techniques, recommendations, homework, & a tailored roadmap of resources to use as you navigate the terrain of your intimacy challenge. One happy client said, “I’ve had a lot of therapy. But you give advice a therapist cannot give!”
To schedule, email [email protected], and I’ll send you my welcome form, so I can best prepare for you. If you desire ongoing support of your intimate growth, become a patron of the horizontal arts at the $100/month level and receive a 30-minute coaching session every month! To peruse all the patron tiers and sign up, navigate directly to Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila, and thank you for being a part of making the world a more intimate place.
In next week’s patrons-only episode with Lemarc, we explore his childhood as a effeminate boy growing up on one of the most remote inhabited islands in the world, belonging and outsiderness, chameleon-like behavior, and codependency.
Come lie down with us in Uluwatu, Bali, Indonesia & Stockholm, Sweden.
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Hello my horizontal lover. horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, and relationships of all kinds, recorded while lying down.
This is the kickoff of Season 4, my Season of Experiments. I’ll be playing with form in all sorts of ways: with coaching sessions and mash-ups and crossovers, happenings and themes and advice sessions, horizontality in unexpected places, and other intimate surprises.
In all my visions for Season 4, I never considered recording virtually as one of the experiments, let alone the central experiment. But the world changed.
I never wanted to record virtually. I was, in fact, entirely adamant about recording in person, right next to my guest, sharing a pillow, shoulder-to-shoulder, wearing robes. That’s how it went. I felt the vibe depended on it. The depth. The felt intimacy translated from our proximal bodies, through the magic of the recorded sound waves, and into you. I thought the only way you would truly feel as if you were lying down next to us was if we were, in fact, literally lying down next to one another.
But then the world changed. And in this world, recording in person becomes… less of an option. In this world, our intimate struggles have only intensified.
I’ve started giving Free Love Advice on Instagram, and offering Intimacy Roadmap Sessions on Zoom — 60-minute coaching sessions with a takeaway plan.
Our need for nourishing connection remains central to our wellbeing— the difference is: now, pretty much everyone is aware of that. Therein lies the paradox for us to manage, as Esther Perel says. We are more aware than ever that we require intimacy, and Covid times make it exponentially harder to meet those needs.
The struggles people bring to me are so often about distance now. We ask: when will it be okay to hug our friends again? Go to a party? Dance with strangers? Do anything at all in a crowded room? How can we connect across distance? Have sex at a distance? Cultivate intimacy despite distance? Feel nourished by the kinds of intimacy available to us at a distance? How can we date responsibly, in a way that feels real? I grapple with questions like these daily, in parallel to you.
It feels like a test of my superpowers, in a way. But, perhaps this is just the sort of thing I’ve been preparing for. I have a toolbox full of ways to connect, that I’ve been honing for most of my life, and my mission holds steady: To make the world a more intimate place. One episode, one conversation, one essay, one video, one session, one workshop, one course, one talk at a time.
So here is my current pursuit: How can I weave the kind of empathetic cocoon that I cultivate in person in bed, with someone who is horizontal across the world?
I have so many opportunities to find out! Once I embraced the idea of recording remotely, and grappled with the technical learning curve, I became enlivened by the possibilities. I could potentially lie down with anyone on the planet!
In the first four episodes of Season 4, I virtually lie down with Lemarc Thomas, global matchmaker, relationship expert, sweetheart, psychology-versed purveyor of kindness, native St. Helenian, marriage equality advocate, husband to Michael, and, as he has been dubbed by The Telegraph, “the gentle but determined Cupid.”
Our first two episodes will be available in all the podcast places for all the horizontalists. The second two (in which we explore Lemarc’s childhood as an effeminate boy growing up on a very small island, belonging, and his landmark marriage to his Swedish husband Michael) will be available exclusively to my patrons of the horizontal arts.
Become a patron for access to The Full Horizontal by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
In this, my first horizontal experiment with Lemarc, he interviews me as though I were his newest matchmaking client. (Full disclosure: I am the only horizontal one for this episode. Lemarc is in consulting mode, seated in his office in Sweden and I am, in a way, on the matchmaker’s couch, across the world in Bali. And just in case you were concerned, Lemarc does get horizontal with me in our upcoming episodes.)
In this episode, I reveal myself deeply. I share my visions for a romantic relationship, my struggles with belief & sexual attraction, some of the men I’ve hurt, and some who’ve hurt me, my pattern of choosing unavailable men, a fear of feeling suffocated, whether I’ve experienced emotional attraction and sexual attraction at the same time, and what I would need to feel free be all in. At the end of the session, Lemarc asks me what I love about being me, and what I believe my future partner will love about being with me.
If you’d like one-on-one guidance from me on your intimate struggles, I now offer Personal Intimacy Roadmap Sessions. They are 60-minute sessions of sex-positive, judgement-free, kink-aware, LGBTQ+ celebratory, gender-affirming support for what ails you in the realm of sex, love, & relationships of any kind. A session includes exercises, techniques, recommendations, homework, & a tailored roadmap of resources to use as you navigate the terrain of your intimacy challenge. One happy client said, “I’ve had a lot of therapy. But you give advice a therapist cannot give!”
To schedule, email [email protected], and I’ll send you my welcome form, so I can best prepare for you. If you desire ongoing support of your intimate growth, become a patron of the horizontal arts at the $100/month level and receive a 30-minute coaching session every month! To peruse all the patron tiers and sign up, navigate directly to Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila, and thank you for being a part of making the world a more intimate place.
Next week, in part two of our four-part arc, I interview Lemarc. Our second experiment is my very first themed episode. The topic? Matchmaking. I have so many questions!
Thank you for listening to this experiment. Thank you for getting horizontal.
And now, come lie down with me for one of the most vulnerable episodes I’ve ever recorded, in Uluwatu, Bali, Indonesia & Stockholm, Sweden.
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Hello horizontal lovers. horizontal is the podcast about sex, love, & relationships of all kinds that’s recorded while lying down, wearing robes. A typical recording is long and languorous, and lasts between three and five hours. When I release it, I divide it into two parts (if we recorded for three hours) and four parts (if we recorded for five). The first half of the conversation is available in all the podcast places, and the second is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts. For access to The Full Horizontal, and to be a part of eradicating shame, diminishing loneliness, & alchemizing human connection, become a $7+ patron of the horizontal arts by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila At the end of each longform conversation, I ask my guest to tell me a story, and the story marks the conclusion of our patron episode together. It can be any personal story that falls under the broad umbrella of intimacy — sex, love, or relationships of any kind. I’ve had stories of being carried down a mountaintop by a hunky guide (episode 10 with Elaine), watching your wife have a miscarriage, giving your father’s body to science (episode 92 with Dr. Alexandra Solomon), a friend breakup, and a particularly epic tale about the Cretan Resistance, thievery, journeying, and a real human skull (episode 31 with Matthew Stillman). One of those stories on its own is a horizontal quickie. My live event, the horizontal storytelling pajama party, is an eveningful of quickies. I get horizontal with my guest just like we do when we record a full episode, wearing robes, sharing a pillow, microphone above us, gazing upward as though stargazing, or post-coital, or whispering into the wee hours of a really good sleepover. At horizontal storytelling, there’s a whole audience getting horizontal with us in their pajamas. When I ask my guest to choose this story, I tell them that it can have any kind of tone or outcome, as long as it’s a story that they truly desire to tell me — because if they have the impulse to tell it, and especially if they’re also a bit trepidatious to do so, it will be the right one: a narrative that others need to hear. This quickie was recorded live in June 2019 at horizontal storytelling: the summer pride edition. We donned rainbow pajamas, noshed on milk and cookies, and curled up together, all 50 of us, to listen to five storytellers from across the LGBTQIA+ community. In this quickie, I lie down with Christopher Burris. Christopher Burris is an actor, director and visionary creative from Asheville, North Carolina. He’s the Director of the Afrofuturistic Queer Sci-Fi Funk musical BRING THE BEAT BACK, by Derek Lee McPhatter. I first met Chris when he directed a reading of "America's Favorite Pasttime," by Dennis A. Allen II, in which I got to play one of my favorite roles of all time, a Dominatrix mother, in a story with complicated issues of race and sex and transaction and correctness and parenthood. The first day I showed up for rehearsal, the guy playing the young white friend of the young black male lead wasn't there yet, and Chris read the part. CHRIS IS A GENIUS. He read that part (the part of a white kid who uses hip-hop slang and the n-word in casual conversation), better than any of the white guys who I saw read that part. He was Hysterical. I basically barely stopped laughing for long enough to read my own part. So not only he is a generous, warm, thoughtful, space-holding director, but his talents as an actor and a mimic can't help but infuse the room with a robust sense of someone who understands the theatre deeply — like a dancer, a partner dancer, who knows both how to lead and how to follow. Any chance I get to work with him, I jump — I LEAP to it, because I know it will confront me with the complexities of being human. And I know that in the rehearsal room, there will be laughter. So much laughter. Christopher is also a patron of the podcast, and when I found out that he became a patron on Patreon, I wrote him this: Dearest Chris. From one artist to another. You have my deepest thanks for your patronage of my work. I am moved to tears by your belief in me. Thank you thank you thank you. You can find Christopher Burris on Twitter @misterburris. In this episode, Christopher tells us a story about driving while Black, his best friend Satchmo, a Sponge Bob car, contact lenses, relationshipping, & really, really seeing. Come lie down with us in Bushwick, Brooklyn, for a story Christopher titled, “Black Men Can’t Drive.” ***
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury, IGrecording.com on the interwebz. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, whom you can find on 99designs. This remix of my original intro music was created by kidmental, an acapella beatbox musician, and a Black creator you can support right now. Get a theme song of your very own by hiring him on Fiverr (recommended!) or becoming his patron on patreon.com/kidmental
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Hello horizontal lovers.
horizontal is consensual eavesdropping on conversations about intimacy of all kinds, recorded while lying down, wearing robes.
In this and the following episode, I lie down with Kai Mata, Indonesia’s rainbow-toting, openly LGBTQ+ singer-songwriter. She is a thoughtful rock star, an articulate activist, a love advocate, an outspoken woman with a bamboo guitar living a love life of liberation in a country that expects its women to be neither outspoken nor liberated. I love her. And her meter-long hair.
Kai wears maroon and black almost exclusively, right down to her motorbike helmet. She displays or wears a rainbow flag at every single show, at every single gig, and she will continue to do so until all of her people are free to love who they love.
She battles internet trolls, social media harassment, hate messages, homophobia, discrimination, and erasure by her culture of origin on a daily basis. She is publicly out in a country that persecutes its LGBTQ+ citizens. She is out for all of her fellow Indonesians who cannot be yet, in the hopes of a new era in which they all can feel safe to be.
By the way, she’s 22 years-old.
I first encountered Kai through a Facebook post she made, raising awareness of the persecution of anybody with a queer identity in Indonesia, and the government’s attempt to slip their discrimination into law.
These are Kai’s words, posted on February 21st, 2020:
I need your help.
Indonesia is trying to label all LGBTQ+ people as deviants dangerous to society, legally requiring us to go to conversion therapy.
I am one of the only publicly LGBTQ+ Indonesian Women🏳🌈🇮🇩. Why are there so few of us?
Because my beautiful country has created a society and laws that ostracize and discriminate against my beautiful rainbow community🥺.
This flaming heart breaks with the new “Family Resilience Bill” draft in Indonesia. I am truly in tears.
This new bill would define any LGBTQ+ Member as a sexual deviant. It would require mandatory reporting to the government of anyone suspected to be LGBTQ+.
Those who are reported would then be forced into conversion therapy to be “treated.”
This draft is supported by four major political parties in Indonesia, who claim gays interfere with the future of humanity. It pains me knowing they choose not to realize the humanity within those of us who might love someone of the same gender.
And so I sit in Indonesia, my homeland, with the thought of fleeing ringing in my mind, fearful for my livelihood and scared as to how Indonesia can be developing so quickly with its economy and middle class, yet degenerating with basic human rights.
What booms even louder than my fear: the recognition of the choice I have to stay, the advantage of an international support, and the privilege of a voice.
These laws, regardless if passed, are meant to silence us. And it’s worked at keeping 99% of the LGBTQ+ Indonesians in the closet, frightened by not just legal implications, but the social suicide of coming out and being viewed as the shame of the family. Had I been born in a different situation, I’d be in the closet too.
And thus, I am rooted in my country with a clear message.
I am Indonesian🇮🇩. I am LGBTQ+🏳🌈.
And I am proud of both. They can threaten me and tell me I deserve to die. They can put me in conversion therapy or put me in jail. Nothing will change the fact I am Indonesian and I am flaming gay.
If you’re reading all the way down here, thank you for listening. I encourage you to please share this message to your friends, family, and anyone you know, especially those traveling to Indonesia. This isn’t a solo project. We need a choir of voices singing this message.
Update: please help by sharing (spreads the message for we need the world to recognize what's going on), commenting (it shows support to all the Indonesians like myself who are feeling scared and isolated) and signing this petition: http://chng.it/nGVCh79W2J
That’s the conclusion of Kai’s post from February 2020. This quote “Family Resilience” Bill would require families to turn in their non-heterosexual members for conversion therapy. Let me say that one more time. It would require you to turn in your trans sister, your gay brother, your lesbian aunt, your bisexual daughter, your pansexual cousin — to be tortured by the government, in the name of families.
In this, the first part of our conversation, we talk about the persecution of Chinese Indonesians, Kai’s California childhood, falling in love for the first time (and with a girl), coming out before she was ready, songwriting as emotional awareness, high school in Jakarta, a fateful spring break in Bali, public displays of affection in Indonesia, tourists & nudity in Bali, cultural sensitivity & admitting our privilege, modesty, menstruation, temples, & tampons, the illegality of sex toys, and the fact that our current sexual partners don’t define our sexual orientation.
Each horizontal recording is between 3 and 5 hours long, and divided in two to four parts. My recording with Kai was around 3 hours long, so this episode, 109, the first part of our recording, is available in all the podcast places, and next week’s episode, 110, the second part, will be available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
Patronage makes it possible for me to share these intimate conversations with the world. Patreon is like the Love Child of crowd-funding and a subscription service. Navigate directly to www.patreon.com/horizontalwithlila (you cannot search for horizontal on the Patreon site, because all adult creators are hidden on the website — letting us know just how far we still have to go), so click the link or type patreon.com/horizontalwithlila in your browser, and become a patron of the horizontal arts. Your patronage keeps horizontal independent and uncensored, as well as unlocking access to all the part twos, the secret patrons Facebook group, & intimacy tips videos like the Inner Mentor visualization.
Here are some of my commitments during this American Revolution, during Pride month, and beyond:
I commit to further amplifying the voices of people with marginalized identities — Black people, People of Color, people in the LGBTQ+ community, and more folx, whose voices are squelched, censored, under-represented, or unheard, in the United States and across the planet.
I commit to loving them fiercely and uplifting them in all the ways that I can.
I commit to showing this love personally, by caring for the beloveds I cherish.
I commit to showing this love at large, through anti-racist action that calls for justice in myriad ways, including, but not limited to—
donating to anti-racist organizations donating directly to folx in need— such as through The Black Fairy Godmother Official’s Instagram — using horizontal to express anti-racist and pro-Pride statements listening to and broadcasting the stories of Black people, Indigenous people, People of Color, and LGBTQ+ folx in all mediums listening to, reading, watching, and financially supporting work created by and starring marginalized folx participating in education on anti-racism, led by BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ folx continuing to unveil and excavate my own racism throughout my life.This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury from IGrecording.com.
My cover art is by Shana Shay — find her on 99 designs.
This remix of my original intro music was created by the beatbox musician kidmental. I first came across kidmental when he remixed Ear Hustle’s theme song. He is a self-contained orchestra. He is a Black creator you can support right now. Get a theme song of your very own by commissioning him on Fiverr, or become his patron on patreon.com/kidmental
If you have an LGBTQ+ friend living in an intolerant place, or among people who provide little support for their true identity, would you share this episode with them? They are not alone. People like Kai are fighting for their right to love who they love.
In next week’s episode, the second part of my conversation with Kai Mata, we discuss Kai’s ideal relationship, the Bali cacao ceremony, age discrepancies & the sexiness of power, the dream marriage tour, Indonesia’s proposed “family resilience bill,” how existing laws are currently used to target Indonesian queers, Kai’s intolerance escape plan, turning her adversity into an advantage, & a story about the self-proclaimed greatest dancer in the world.
To listen to next week’s episode, become a patron of the horizontal arts by navigating directly to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
And to find out about all things horizontal, including upcoming workshops, my How to Connect course, and Intimacy Advice sessions, sign up for my email missives on horizontalwithlila.com.
Until next time: may you have someones to love, something to do, and something to look forward to. I’m looking forward to leading a workshop on 20 Emotional Release Techniques at the Virtual Intimacy Retreat July 10th - 12th!
Now, my horizontal lover, come lie down with us in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia.
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In this episode, I lie down with myself.
I share:
* the WOC Podcasters solidarity statement
* my personal commitment to ongoing anti-racist action
* the names of a few of the many Black lives lost to police brutality, and:
* the story of that time I didn't talk about race (for 11 years) and how that is a textbook example of white fragility and privilege
***
I stand with my sisters from the WOC Podcasters Community, lead by Danielle Desir and crafted by change-maker Tangia Renee [TAN-gee]. These are Tangee’s words. These are our words:
We are podcasters united to condemn the tragic murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many many others at the hands of police. This is a continuation of the systemic racism pervasive in our country since its inception and we are committed to standing against racism in all its forms.
We believe that to be silent is to be complicit.
We believe that Black lives matter.
We believe that Black lives are more important than property.
We believe that we have a responsibility to use our platforms to speak out against this injustice whenever and wherever we are witness to it.
In creating digital media we have built audiences that return week after week to hear our voices and we will use our voices to speak against anti-blackness and police brutality, and we encourage our audiences to be educated, engaged, and to take action.
***
Come lie down with me in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia.
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Hello horizontal lovers.
horizontal with lila is Slow Radio.
Consensual eavesdropping.
Intimate talks about intimate topics recorded while lying down right next to each other, wearing robes.
This is part two of my four-episode arc with Eri Kardos Patel and Jaymin Patel, recorded in February 2020.
Eri & Jay are world travelers, long-time digital nomads, co-parents of two young children, and American expats in Bali. Eri is the author of the book Relationship Agreements, Jaymin the creator of The Integrated Father.
In part one, episode 104. good kids gone wild, Jay and I told our origin stories, and Eri began hers.
Jaymin’s story involved a strict Indian family, sisters and aunties aplenty, bi-cultural identity, being a model Hindu and a very very very good boy, doing right by his parents, musical theatre, people-pleaser recovery, embracing his weird, Adlerian psych, and positive discipline.
Eri’s involved 3 siblings, constant uprootings, dance, 5 or 6 baptisms, being a very very very good girl, backpacking across the world, youth hostel life, sex addiction worries & Christian counseling, one excellent Sugar Daddy, Seattle, sex-positivity, and her longtime open relating partner Adam.
In part two, we pick up with:
Eri’s sexy Seattle life BDSM as a highway to vulnerability the art of submission aftermath of a fight or regrettable incident being seen, heard, & loved reprogramming people’s erotic lives open relating vs. open relationships and how the longtime nomad couple finally settled in Bali.This conversation was recorded over the course of approximately 5 hours.
It’s divided into four parts: the first two, episodes 104 & 105, are available in all the podcast places, and the last two: episodes 106 & 107, will be exclusive to patrons of the horizontal arts.
For access to The Full Horizontal, including 106, 107, and all the part twos (or in this case, threes and fours), become a patron of the horizontal arts!
Become a Patron!
This is my livelihood for the foreseeable future, so, to all of my current and future patrons:
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Thank for my subsistence.
And thank you for making the world a more intimate place.
Now come lie down with us again, in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia.
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Hello horizontal lovers.
horizontal with lila is Slow Radio. Consensual eavesdropping. Intimacies of all kinds. It’s us lying down right next to each other, wearing robes, sharing secrets, in your ears.
Welcome in, and welcome back! It’s been a few months since my last episode — This winter, I got mired in a boggy swamp of depression, stared at the ceiling for a while, binge-watched a lot of dystopian TV, and then journeyed to Bali, Indonesia, to get my juju back.
It’s back!
And... I suppose I live in Bali (for) now!
I’ve missed you. I’ve missed this.
It’s a whole new world out there. And yet. I am more than ever convinced that we need to make private conversations public. I am more than ever convinced that interdependence is the word of the century. I am more than ever convinced that intimacy is the way.
Connection is my wheelhouse. And so, I renew my vows: to dispel shame, combat loneliness, and alchemize human connection.
Most of us are treading water. We might be back with families we haven’t lived with since we were 17, or spending 24/7 with children we’ve never cared for full full-time, or quarantined with our romantic partner, absent any of our usual letting-off-steam rituals, like work or the gym or matcha with friends or anything literally anything besides constant togetherness.
Humans probably haven’t related this month since agriculture was invented. But probably not even then. They had different tasks on the farm then. Homo sapiens probably haven’t related this much since cave-dwelling times. But perhaps not even then. Somebody had to hunt or forage. Somebody left the dwelling-place for hours at a time.
Compressed in our domiciles by the undeniable force and magnitude of this virus, we might very well be relating more, as a species, than at any time in human history. And if we are quarantining alone, we might be lonelier than ever before in our lives.
Much of our relating has become virtual. We have less kinesthetic & energetic cues, as a large part of our intimacy is mediating by electronic boxes.
We need stronger communication skills than ever before. We need a bigger toolbox. At last, I have something to offer the world that the world at large might finally recognize it needs.
During Seasons 1 and 2, I got horizontal with one guest at a time.
In Season 3, I’ve had mostly threesomes: myself plus two guests who are in some kind of relationship with one another. Typically, each recording is between two and three hours long, and divided into two parts — the part ones are available in all the podcast places for all the podcast people, and the part twos are available exclusively for my patrons.
This conversation was recorded over the course of five-ish hours. I’ll divide this conversation into four parts: the first two, episodes 104 & 105, will be available in all the podcast places, and the last two: episodes 106 & 107, will be exclusive to patrons of the horizontal arts.
Become a Patron!
This is my livelihood for the foreseeable future, so, to all of my current and future patrons:
Thank you for my subsistence,
and thank you for making the world a more intimate place.
In this and the following three episodes, I lie down with Eri Kardos and Jaymin Patel: world travelers, long-time digital nomads, co-parents of two young children, and American expats in Bali.
Friends of Mirelle, my housemate and guest of episode 1. feed your delight, Eri & Jay offered me one of their guest rooms in Ubud. I stayed in their home my first two weeks in Bali. Jaymin told me that in their years of travel, they’d been hosted by legions of people. So they were paying it forward. It was a soft place to land. I'm grateful for the lily pad.
Eri is a Relationship Coach (for busy professionals in both traditional and alternative relationships). She is a Public Speaker, and the author of the book Relationship Agreements: A Simple and Effective Guide for Strengthening Communication, Reducing Conflict, and Increasing Intimacy to Design Your Ideal Relationship.
Her new program, Beyond Mom-Mode, intends to nourish the nurturer.
Jaymin is a serial entrepreneur, serial author, Public Speaker, and creator of The Integrated Father. His new venture endeavors to guide men as they design a version of fatherhood that nourishes them, their relationships, their kids, their work, and their creativity.
Many of the parenting skills that Eri & Jay mention in our conversation are not just parenting skills, but parenting-ourselves skills. Human-ing skills. Relating skills.
In this, part one of our conversation, we told our comic-book-style origin stories.
Jaymin’s story (let’s call it “The Young Prince,” or, “Jaymin & the Quest for Authenticity”) involves a strict Indian family, sisters and aunties aplenty, bi-cultural identity, being a model Hindu and a very very very good boy, doing right by his parents, musical theatre, people-pleaser recovery, embracing his weird, Adlerian psych, and positive discipline.
Eri’s story (let’s call it “Ode to a Puerto Rican massage,” or, “Sunshine Likes Sex”) involves Polish Roman Catholic & Swedish Lutheran parents, 3 siblings, constant uprootings, dance, 5 or 6 baptisms, a vacation bible school, being a very very very good girl, backpacking across the world, youth hostel life, sex addiction worries, Christian counseling, one excellent Sugar Daddy, Seattle, sex-positivity, her longtime open relating partner Adam, and creating agile relationship agreements.
Come lie down with us in Ubud, Bali, Indonesia.
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Usually, our conversation is long and languorous, and lasts between three and five hours. When I release it, I divide it into two parts (if we recorded for three hours) and four parts (if we recorded for five). The first half of the conversation is available in all the podcast places, and the second is available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
You can become a patron for access to The Full Horizontal by signing up on patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
At the end of each conversation, I ask my guest to tell me a story, and the story marks the conclusion of our final episode together. It can be any personal story that falls under the broad umbrella of intimacy — sex, love, or relationships of any kind. In episode 102. you can’t have dibs on a person, Dennis’s story was about how he met his biological father. In episode 97. let me show you what I can offer, Leidy’s was about the best sex of her entire life. I’ve had stories of being carried down a mountaintop, watching your wife have a miscarriage, giving your parent’s body to science, a friend breakup, and a particularly epic tale about the Cretan Resistance, thievery, journeying, and a skull.
When I ask them to tell me a story, I say that it can have any kind of tone or outcome, as long as it’s a story that they truly desire to tell me — because if they have the impulse to tell it, and they’re also just a bit afraid to do so, it will be the right one: a narrative that others need to hear.
My live event, the horizontal storytelling pajama party, is an eveningful of these stories. I get horizontal with my guest just like we do when we record a full episode, wearing robes, sharing a pillow, microphone above us, gazing upward as though stargazing, or post-coital, or whispering in the wee hours of a really good sleepover.
This quickie was recorded live in June 2019 at horizontal storytelling: the summer pride edition. We all donned rainbow pajamas, noshed on milk and cookies, and curled up together, all 50 of us, to listen to five storytellers from across the LGBTQIA+ community, one after the other.
In this quickie, I lie down with Kaleena. I asked her what I should share when I introduced her that night, and this is what she told me: Kaleena is a pansexual poly kinky Latinx woman, and a first generation Dominican American. She loves 80’s horror movies, powerlifting and dancing. Her favorite author in elementary school was Edgar Allen Poe. She played roller derby for 7 years, skating under the name Sugar Smacks. She was one of the few Latinas in derby when it was making a comeback. She loves dogs, and has a soft spot for the difficult adoption cases. She is a former high school prom queen (although it was completely chosen at random)! She believes food is a great expression of love, and enjoys cooking (although she cannot bake a single thing successfully). She is currently an office manager, and hopes to try and combine her administrative skills with her love of dogs into a career working with both disadvantaged humans and canines.
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadhoury, IGrecording.com on the interwebz. My cover art was illustrated by Shana Shay, whom you can find on 99designs. The remix of my original intro music was created by kidmental, an accapella beatbox musician. Get a theme song of your very own by hiring him on Fiverr or becoming his patron on patreon.com/kidmental
Come lie down with us in Bushwick, Brooklyn, for a story called, “If You’re So Proud.”
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This is THE 100TH EPISODE OF horizontal!!!
Naturally, this one is a bit different than the others. In celebration, I am releasing a never-before-heard experimental episode, recorded on May 21st, 2019 — the 2 year anniversary of horizontal.
In every other episode, I lie down with one or two people at a time. In this special, I lie down with 9!
I gathered as many previous horizontal guests, patrons, and supporters as I could, and asked my boyfriend at the time to join us. We recorded at Hacienda Studio, the event space of Hacienda Villa, my intentional community. We had three beds and three microphones. None of us were sure how it would go. What would come up when the 9 of us tried to have one conversation?
In this episode, I lie down with:
Kristi Ann, spectacular dancer and movement artist, and my friend who, behind the scenes, has quietly helped me choose between the titles for my episodes.
Mirelle, horizontal’s very first guest! Resident of the Villa, my housemate and friend, and, as you may recall, a consummate connoisseur of delight.
Steve Dean, my friend the Superconnector, dating coach, dating industry consultant, and guest on episodes 82. 200 dating profiles, and 83. you do not have voting rights in this startup (relationship).
Jillian Richardson, creator of The Joy List, author of Unlonely Planet, and my most recent horizontal guest on episodes 98. withhelds & unsaids, and 99. indiana jones is my father.
This 100th episode interrupts my 4-episode arc with Jillian and Dennis, but they will be back next week, and the week after that, with episodes 101 & 102. Those episodes are available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts, so for more Jillian & Dennis, plus The Full Horizontal, which includes all the part twos (and in this case, threes and fours) going back to the beginning, become my patron on Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila — You’ll get all the independent, uncensored, sex-positive horizontality, and you’ll be a part of the mission that I share with Jillian: to make the world a less lonely, more intimate place.
Also in this episode, we lie down with:
Owen Muir, MD, my friend, is a child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist, half of the team behind Brooklyn Minds, and the audiophile who made the first season of horizontal possible, by somehow mixing & mastering every episode in the midst of fathering, psychiatrist-ing, and running a business that is changing the world of mental health.
Tiana & Orion, my dear friends, poly partners, leaders in the POC (Person of Color) kink community in New York City, and my guests on their own 4-episode arc, episodes 78. surprise surprise he liked black chicks, 79. not gonna be the abusive guy, 80. definition of a primary partner, & 81. sneak attack group sex. These are some of the episodes I am the proudest to have made, and I’m ever-grateful for their bravery and generosity.
Venus & Jason, who have been patrons of the podcast and delightful, avid participants in nearly every horizontal event I’ve produced, including the podcast launch pajama party, 14 Rooms (my immersive Valentine’s experience), The Art of Trust (my connection games workshop), and horizontal storytelling (a live recording of the quickies).
And Patrick, Engineer, fixer of things, fearless explorer of self… my ex-boyfriend.
In this episode, we do a round of “If you really knew me,” which is probably my favorite of all the intimacy games I lead, and then a round of Brags. We discuss the experiences that Jillian and I had with the man that we both dated, disassociation, novelty drive, feelings as puppies, healthy narcissism, narcissistic personality disorder, emotions at 110%, opt-ins and opt-outs, normative dating behavior, and needing other minds to support us in not losing ours. Then we conclude with a round of gratitudes. This episode is unlike any other, because, with Owen present, we have the benefit of a psychiatrist’s insight.
Happy 100 episodes to meeeeeee! If you have any ideas for else I might celebrate, reach out through the @horizontalwithlila Instagram or on horizontalwithlila.com
This episode was recorded by Owen Muir, with mixing and mastering by Irving Gadhoury. Find Irving at IGrecording.com on the interwebs, to hire him for your Tri-State Area based audio needs. My cover art was created by Shana Shay, whom you can find on 99designs. And this episode features a remix of my original intro music by kidmental, an accapella beatbox musician. I first heard kid’s work on my favorite podcast, Ear Hustle, when he remixed their theme song. He creates theme songs for everyone, podcast or no, and you can snag one by becoming his patron on patreon.com/kidmental
Next week we’ll pick back up with Dennis & Jillian in episode 101, part three of our conversation. To gain access to part three, in which we delve into Jillian’s household growing up, that incident with the vibrator, Dennis’s high school work as a peer-to-peer Sex Educator, his biological brothers, the topography of our friendship lives, and how Dennis used to rely entirely on his long-term relationship to get his intimacy needs met — become a patron of the horizontal arts!
Until next time, dear ones, may you have someone to love, something to do, and something to look forward to. I’m looking forward to attending Samia’s anti-wedding, today! Samia, of episodes 59. i’m gonna fuck him forEVER and 60. consexual experiences, is getting married, wearing a skeleton catsuit. I’m gonna be their social media maven, so you better believe there’s gonna be loads of videos! Check my Instagram if you wanna see ‘em!
If you haven’t yet, do me the honor of clicking the Subscribe button in your podcast player of choice. It makes a difference in my world.
Thank you for listening. Thank you for inspiring me to make 100 episodes, and beyond. Thank you for getting horizontal.
And now come lie down with all of us in Bushwick, Brooklyn.
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horizontal is Slow Radio about intimacies of all kinds. I think of it as consensual eavesdropping — we’re lying down, wearing robes, sharing secrets, in your ears.
In this, the second episode of a four-part series with those who consider themselves chosen brother and sister, I lie down with Jillian Richardson, creator of The Joy List and author of Unlonely Planet & her housemate Dennis E. Sarkozy, Lifestyle Designer and co-lead of Personal Development Nerds.
Each horizontal conversation is typically between 3 and 5 hours long. When it’s 3 hours long, it gets divided into two parts: part one is available to everyone in all the podcast places, and part two is available exclusively to my patrons. When the conversation goes for most of the night, like this one did, it gets divided into four parts: parts one and two are available to everyone, and parts three and four are available exclusively to patrons of the horizontal arts.
In part one of this conversation, episode 98. withhelds & unsaids, Jillian and I cleared the air after our cancelled event, I shared how I feel about Dennis, and we talked about the difference between being drawn to someone and being attracted to them, The Touch Gauntlet, safeporting, and a distinction between sensual and sexual energy. Then, I made an erotic confession. One that’s still giving me a vulnerability hangover.
In this, part two, we discuss Dennis’s creative family tree, including Indiana Jones, his communal roots, and his mother’s indomitable matriarchal strength. We discuss his biological father who preferred not to be a father, the crush in kindergarten that lead to a bit of violence with a block, and his grade school infatuation with each of the girls in his class, in turn. We discuss passing the torch, becoming the patrons and matrons and caretakers of our families. Jillian presences that she’s feeling distant, and we grapple with my intentions for making our clearing part of the recording. We discuss having a good public image, the Wounded Healer syndrome, and the brief personal essay Jillian shares at the outset of every Joy List email, which often reveals something she is actively struggling with. And then Jillian shared the story of how she induced her parents to attend a 5-day family therapy retreat. I am in awe of it.
To listen to part three, in which we get into Jillian’s household growing up, that incident with the vibrator, Dennis’s high school work as a peer-to-peer Sex Educator, his relationship with his biological brothers, the topography of our friendship lives, and how Dennis used to rely entirely on his long-term relationship to get his intimacy needs met — for access to The Full Horizontal, including part three and four of this conversation, become a patron of the horizontal arts. Be a part of my mission to make the world a more intimate place, continuing to create independent, uncensored, sex-positive work by navigating to patreon.com/horizontalwithlila
This episode was mixed and mastered by Irving Gadoury. I highly recommend him for all your audio needs, including live shows! You can hire him on IGrecording.com . My cover art was created by Shana Shay, whose character illustrations you can find on 99 designs. And my intro music was composed by Alan Markley, on Instagram as plasticcannons.
If you haven’t yet hit the subscribe button in your podcast player of choice, would you do that? It makes a difference. Thanks!
This is episode 99, and since the next episode is 100, (100! Something to celebrate!) I may have a bit of a surprise experiment coming next week… or maybe just a surprise. I'm not sure.
But until next time: May you have someone to love (I’m especially wishing that for myself right now). May you have something to do. And may you have at least one thing to look forward to.
I’m looking forward to Samia’s wedding! Can you believe it? Samia, of episodes 59. i’m gonna fuck him forEVER and 60. consexual experiences, is getting married to a man on November 19th. The theme of her wedding is death and rebirth. She is wearing a skeleton catsuit, to the great chagrin of her mom. I can’t wait. There will be photos.
Thank you for listening. Thank you for getting horizontal.
And now, come lie down with us again in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.
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