john Selby - Cannabis for Couples ; Enhance Intimacy and Elevate Your Relationship

The muse of marijuana is valuable and trustworthy to share together with your loved one when approached mindfully and with an open heart.

Cannabis for Couples

If youve ever imagined that there might be a kind older person with decades of personal and professional experience on how to best use cannabis, who would share in depth a multitude of ways to improve your experiences, youre going to want this book. John Selby is all of the above and a lot more. This book will lead you into more pleasure, more awareness, greater depths, more sensory excitement, more fun, and more wisdom. Spoiler alert: the last few chapters take what youve learned from the rest to a whole new level. Consider this book to be a gift to yourself, your partner, and your relationship.

JAMES FADIMAN, PH.D.,AUTHOR OF THE PSYCHEDELIC EXPLORERS GUIDE AND COAUTHOR OFYOUR SYMPHONY OF SELVES

John Selbys years of experience supporting couples on their journey of intentional cannabis use shines throughout this wonderful book. Sharing the cannabis space with a partner is a deeply meaningful experienceand rich with connection and depth. When used intentionally, cannabis can bring couples together in ways that are truly magical. Johns teachings are sincere, incredibly skillful, and pragmatic. He takes all of the trial and error out of the equation, and this allows couples to immediately benefit from safe and sacred cannabis use. He outlines a wonderful foundation that can support years of sacred intimacy between loving partners. I highly recommend this book.

DANIEL MCQUEEN,EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER FOR MEDICINAL MINDFULNESS AND AUTHOR OFPSYCHEDELIC CANNABIS

John Selby has provided a higher education for couples. His chapter on marijuana and sex, Tapping Eros Transformation, is a true gift, especially for couples transitioning into middle age or beyond. With specific exercises designed to deepen intimacy, this book makes plain how cannabis can make love bloom anew. One can only imagine what such rarely spoken of information can do for a couple in their 20s or 30s! I highly recommend it!

CHARLES WININGER, LP, LMHC, AUTHOR OF LISTENING TO ECSTASY

John Selbys new book is an excellent guide for couples considering bringing cannabis into their lives or expanding the range of their current use. The guidance is also just as useful for individuals looking for reliable, extensively field-tested information. The book covers all the important bases, is direct and intimate in tone, and chock-full of accessible suggestions, checklists, affirmations, and anecdotes. Im confident that reading Cannabis for Couples and putting the information to use will revitalize many a relationship. And, again, its not just for couples.

STEPHEN GRAY,EDITOR OF CANNABIS AND SPIRITUALITY

Do you and your partner want to take your relationship to a whole new dimension of ecstatic interaction? Are you open-minded enough not to be bothered about our cultures mostly foolish admonitions against a simple, completely natural herb like cannabis? If so, heres a simply great guided program for you and yours on how to elevate your intimacy. Highly recommended!

WILL JOHNSON,AUTHOR OF CANNABIS IN SPIRITUAL PRACTICE

Acknowledgments

All relationships are a transformative experience.
Intimacy creates understanding, and understanding creates love.

Many people have helped me create this book and my Cannabis for Couples programs. I especially want to thank my early mentors and teachers: Krishnamurti and Humphry Osmond, Alan Watts and Chuck Kelly, Rebecca Oriard and Ralph Abraham, and Osho and Rico plus the research team at the Bureau of Research in Neurology and Psychiatry in Skillman, New Jersey. I was so often blessed with helpful guides whose wise insights permeate this book.

I also want to thank the many friends who explored all the various dimensions of marijuana with me and my clients and students over the years and revealed their personal insights and experiences with it.

And finally, as always, a million thanks to my partner, Birgitta Steiner, who both inspired this book and infused it with her poems, her special understanding of the cannabis muse, and her nonstop adventurous spirit. Also, a very special nod of appreciation to Jesse Smith and the tech team who created the Mindfully High app that accompanies this book, and to Paul Benedict for all his essential contributions.

A Cautionary Note to the Reader

This book is intended as an informational guide. The approaches and techniques described herein should not be seen as an endorsement to use marijuana. Although marijuana has become legal in many states, the purity of some of the available products is still inconsistent. Please use caution when using vaping products, edibles, and other forms of cannabis.

Through giving and receiving unconditionally while high and letting our hearts lead the way, we can connect soul to soul and respond in new ways that bring delightful surprises.

As the muse of marijuana stimulates inner harmony, may we experience a joy that goes beyond happiness, originating from deep within and radiating outward into new expressions of intimacy.

INTRODUCTION

How Cannabis Enhances Intimacy

By openly sharing your intimate feelings and sudden intuitions, you transform the mundane into vast realms of newness.

By surrendering to emotional authenticity, you can embrace each other unconditionally and express your compassion spontaneously.

By balancing your emotions while keeping your heart open, you can generously give comfort and provide your loved one with nurturing support.

All human cultures are built on the foundation of deep emotional bonding between two loving people. This intimate level of relating has always been the bedrock of our survival, economic success, and emotional fulfillment. But... what happens when we introduce the powerful and mostly untested ingredient of cannabis into the complex and intimate couples experience?

Just two generations ago, only the far fringe of our culture was using cannabis. Now over half of Americas adult population openly admits in surveys that theyve tried marijuana. According to a 2017 Yahoo poll, thirty-five million Americans enjoy cannabis regularly, and another twenty million use it occasionally. More than twelve million American couples say that they use cannabis to enhance their intimate experiences, with ten million more expected to do the same in the next few years. In fact, more than seven thousand people try marijuana for the first time every day.

So we certainly need to ask: how does cannabis impact a loving relationship and how can couples approach cannabis to maximize benefits while minimizing potential downsides?

Depending on several variables, pot can make us feel stoned and relatively unconscious or high and acutely conscious. Can we mindfully use this natural herb to expand consciousness, rather than collapse it, when were with our loved one? Specifically, can we get high together in ways that actively and predictably enhance our relationship?