Bodies entwined, the sun beats down. Ten days in the oven of the African desert. What had started as an excited swim to cool off in a rare pool hidden in a small oasis, had evolved into a different kind of excitement. With a cursory glance around to make sure we didn’t share the pool with any crocodiles (not a eulogy my mum would enjoy on my headstone: ‘Eaten by a croc while …’) we got down to business. It never ceases to amaze me how incredibly invigorating water is. I guess in the western world we become desensitised to how precious it is, it literally being on tap, and safe. Whereas, when it is a rare commodity, stumbling across it sparks a primal energy in me. It is the knowledge right down to a cellular level that the entity as a whole will survive another day. It is relief and with this relief comes an output of built up unconscious stress. If you’ve ever watched a David Attenborough show when the rains return to the Savannah, you’ll see the world come alive with the vibrancy of colour as the plants grow and the animals bounce around with renewed energy. They play and they reproduce, whereas when the land is parched, they quite frankly look blinking miserable. Reproduction is arguably the ultimate survival mechanism for an organism, a chance to pass on genetic information, create a legacy and survive into the future.

Recent studies show that the average male thinks about sex several times an hour and the average female around half as much as the average male. Interestingly, the recent studies haven’t shown that men think about sex in about the same proportion that they think about eating and sleeping and women think about it slightly less than they do these other basic needs.  If we are thinking about sex as much as other basic human needs that we freely talk about, why then do we still struggle to talk about it? What the heck is wrong with society that it is still taboo? This stigma holds us back in a very fundamental way, arguably it denies one of the most fundamental and primal of mind-body connections. As humans, alongside dolphins, bonobo monkeys and a few other species, we have the ability to experience sexual pleasure which most other species as far as we are aware of, as yet don’t. If we feel awkward about and deny the ultimate of mind-body connectivity and this pleasure are we not punishing ourselves? I’d like to stress that I am talking about consenting, adult interactions here.

It is also an incredible connective power with your partner. Certain hormones such as oxytocin are released which trigger you to fall in love and connect with your partner on a deeper level. With our every day lives becoming increasingly fraught and stressful, we have this tool, this incredible way to release stress, to connect with your partner on a biological and chemical level as well as on a more conscious level and also connect with yourself (whether you have a partner or not).

 So this evening or heck, why wait, get your survival training started.