I once heard that empathy is best delivered through humor. Humor tends to lower barriers to difficult conversations and intimate experiences. Jokes about scary things make them approachable, adding silliness to intimate experiences lowers collective seriousness. Even though I am kind of playing an April Fools joke on people that Empathy Lab is shutting down and becoming Intimacy Lab, I am hoping to harness the power of humor in order to gently slip in the uncomfortable subject of intimacy (yes, pun intended).
All too often we only equate intimacy to sexual relationships and while it is true that sexual experiences CAN be intimate, sex is just one of MANY ways to experience intimacy with others. I won’t even go into self-intimacy yet, but intimacy between family members, friends, co-workers, and complete strangers happens all the time. We know it, we feel it, but we don’t often call it intimacy. Two friends sharing deep belly laughs over dinner is intimate. A team of co-workers supporting each other as they struggle together to meet a deadline. A group of Crossfitters cheering each other on early in the morning because they share an understanding of the pain and joy of the workout. It’s all intimate, yet doesn’t include sex. It is intimate in that we have built enough trust and information with each other in order to share an intimate moment.
My definition of intimacy
An experience where deep trust and vulnerable experiences allow two or more people find flow together.
No Empathy Lab is NOT going away…but I believe that all that I’ve learned and taught over the past several years feeds very well into an Intimacy Lab offering. I am serious about intimacy and yes, I own IntimacyLab.io! Maybe there is a near future where I offer empathy informed intimacy workshops around certain subject matters.
Hello, I am Shelton. 