Sexuality and Bioenergetics

“If we think of the image as including autonomic nerve processes, it is not too strange to think of the orgasm as being an act of discovery regarding the nature of the opposite sex and of the particular sexual partner.”

– Raymond Peat, PhD in Mind and Tissue

The father, akin to the movement of energy (or function), creates the son, and the mother, resembling the pooling of energy (as structure), sustains him. The female reliance on the male, and the male’s desire for the female respectively, resemble the impetus of either. Without the yoke of the feminine (as the means for new life), the male cannot create, and without the passion of the masculine (as the impetus for creation), the female loses her maternal role.

Insufficient energy precipitates scar tissue and fibrosis as a thermodynamic necessity, but also as a structural adaptation against continued energy restriction. Fibrosis impairs tissue function, and psychological “scar tissue” parallels a breakdown in human sexuality.

Thyroid function determines the organism’s resistance to stress and toxins and maximizes androgen (testosterone and DHT) production. Similarly, a masculine (but not necessarily male) sexual orientation exhibits mastery and resilience against the environment. Intrauterine stress can cause homosexuality, and environmental factors are a reverberation of a breakdown in creative energies. Psychological dysfunction is common for many homosexuals. The breakdown therein may be thought of as stress. Stress degrades dihydrotestosterone (DHT), the primary driver of the male sexual response. The breakdown in heterosexual function as a result of stress. Maternal hypothyroidism predisposes the fetus to develop autism, another pathology with impaired learning and repetitive behaviors. Female autists often appear as tomboys or bisexual, and autistic members of both genders have lower sex drives.

During sex, the masculine force experiences desire in opposition to his default state of mastery as being the desired, whereas the feminine feels desirable as opposed to her prior state of insufficiency and longing. Feminine sexuality employs hypergamy, whereas masculinity prefers hypogamy, and any equalization between the two sequesters sexual polarity.

As the most fundamental stressor, survival pressures precipitate male endangerment during a famine (or war), and a subsequent patriarchy reduces men. Females readily impose an artificial stressor as a test. The value of masculine energy lies in its resilience, and the feminine amplifies the stressor, while the masculine sequesters (or controls) the stress. Similarly, sociopolitical “sexuality” features a consistent conflict.

The phenomenon of laughter demonstrates that serotonin promotes verbalization and laughter, and both rejuvenate the stressed organism. Verbal artists such as poets and writers die young, whereas painters, sculptors, and architects live longer, and scientists have the longest lifespans. Greater achievement correlates with a longer lifespan. Social status increases DHT.

DHT relieves anxiety, and females have lower levels of DHT and higher levels of anxiety. In male, but not female monkeys, DHT muffles the stress response and decreases cortisol.

Child abuse reflects a rejection of the parent and an inherent breakdown in the psyche, in effect, a rejection of the parent who may be thought of. With adequate energy, the fibrotic heart can reverse itself, and the current fortress of academic authoritarianism either requires a tremendously expensive and intensive metamorphosis, or the transplant of the entire organ.

Albeit with high energy requirements, creativity carries intense efficiency, so much so that creative insight actually improves the “efficiency” of any given framework, as with a new mechanical invention. Similarly, the learning processes of movement may be thought of as a manifestation of creative impetus, where a young child adapts rapidly to feedback and adjusts motor neurons to develop a novel approach to tackling the needs of gravity.

Depressed functionality often appears “good enough” for allopathic care, whereas psychiatrists optimize the mental functioning of the patient as independent of physiology. Psychiatrists have offered relief to many, but the newer serotonergic antidepressants shorten lifespan, leave the heart fibrotic, or even worsen the long-term neurological health of the patient. Greed and relativism both benefit the criminal, and deconstruction of universal behaviors of certain hormones (such as hormones) serves to benefit the distributors of “medications” that damage the organism.

Social engineering prefers a worldview of knowability, as with political authoritarian structures such as National Socialism and Marxism. Genetic and environmental determinism both undermine the response of the organism to its environment and reflect feelings of powerlessness. The draw to political authoritarianism could be thought of as a form of “addiction” to compensate for feelings of lack. Leftist authoritarians dissolve group identity for inclusion as an obvious relinquishment of the energetic requirements placed on the individual, while authoritarianism with an in-group preference seeks the destruction of other non-members to the current group. Identity politics, a form of environmental determinism, employs social engineering to free the individual from any obligations through an “outsourcing” of identity to a particular group. A similar externalization of responsibility appears with genetic determinism and the belief in the organism as a fixed template or an unveiling tapestry. A rejection of novelty and reliance on mental fabrications underlie all authoritarian worldviews.

Stress prompts a demand for control, and social engineering relies upon a worldview of knowability, as with political authoritarianism. Genetic and environmental determinism undermine the response of the individual to their environment and reflect feelings of powerlessness. This is not to say that the environment should be discounted, nor that agency in isolation exists as the only factor in individual success, but rather that the interaction between an organism and their environment matters the most, and the impetus of the individual will decide the degree of sacrifice to overcome a stressor. The concept of “eustress” refers to activity without compulsion, and indeed defining “eustress” as “stress” lacks a developed understanding of the mammalian hormonal response to a stressor.

The stress hormones serotonin, estrogen, adrenaline, and cortisol (among others) mediate shock and preserve the integrity of the organism in the context of scarcity. With continued pressure placed upon the individual, the stress hormone cortisol can cause feelings of euphoria and hypervigilance (which may be mistaken for “eustress”). The same stressor can become dangerous in a less favorable context. True “eustress” would be something akin to a concentric movement (where a muscle flexes and exerts control over a load). Activities such as these include “stimulating” activities, such as spontaneous movement, reading, playing games, listening to or creating music, painting, writing, interacting (in the correct circumstances), and mathematics or similar challenging activities (such as games involving dexterity, fine-motor skills, or acute perception, as with pool or crossword puzzles, respectively).

The expansion of an organism to correct its environment may be thought of as “distress,” whereas the desire to go outwards and expand (and the subsequent activity that results) resembles “eustress,” similar to the concentric movement of a muscle (or in this case, person) struggling against a load (or environment) with adequate energy. Within Mr. McNair’s quote, desire remains contextual. In college, for example, one person may have a strong desire to escape or sequester the stress of college life through either completion, withdrawal, or a modification of the complementary habits of the person. Many students take antidepressants, others engage in alcoholism, some engage in compulsive strenuous exercise regimes, and still others find divergent activities (for a more compatible expression of their creative energies), such as drama, music, podcasting, writing, sports, or the social aspects of Greek Life.

My own journey of understanding parallels my ideal career path. I founded the Foster Your Health podcast and blog some time ago to communicate an integrated understanding of biology, psychology, and philosophy. Recently, I launched Foster Your Health Radio, which will allow me to produce more content with greater interactivity, and I plan to conduct interviews on my show as well. After losing my mother to multiple sclerosis and seeing my father succumb to Alzheimer’s, I’ve devoted my life to understanding the underlying pathologies of these conditions and diseases in a more general sense. This has led me to explore happiness and how it can be better understood by extrapolating from this knowledge.

Initially, I had aspired to attend medical school, but the authoritarian knowledge structures, social isolation, and the prevailing issue of physician suicide all reflect a glaring failure of the educative system. Doctors from various specialties must undergo a minimum of 20 to 30 years of continuous schooling before they can begin their clinical practice. The notion that such a system produces “the best and the brightest” is far from reality. Instead, the allure of the medical profession, including the appeal of being addressed as “Dr.”, often attracts some of the most competitive and skilled individuals in our society to a system that deliberately limits its supply of professionals.

Humans distrust each other. We have these large structures to mold our consciousness, as if we need such contrived avenues for development, and also as if society itself does not provide enough incentives for development, growth, and prospering that we need artificial systems in place to regulate the flow of knowledge. Licensing in itself borrows many problems from “regulatory capture,” and while a few institutions benefit from the strenuous (and often superfluous) requirements placed upon doctors (such as international volunteer requirements, as if the most masterful members of our society have no philanthropic impetus, which historically has not been the case), it might seem trivial to dispute the layering of requirements due to the tendency for individuals to meet similar milestones on their own. But on a more subtle level, it corrodes the individual involvement in a task. It’s the difference between treating children as independent humans or property, or the same may be said of a spouse. Although similar requirements arrive either way, lacking compulsion leads to self-actualization, enhanced creativity, efficiency, and an experience of indescribable richness when compared to the cold, methodical, legislated bureaucracy.

I struggle with the balance between impetus and convention. I retain my individuality, but I also need to operate within a system that bears no favor toward outlandish ideas. I once viewed the struggle as a balancing act between my own beliefs and the beliefs of those around me to meet somewhere in the middle. However, this happens without my consent as I grow and change in response to others. My purpose lies in presenting myself unconditionally and without concession unless met with another modicum of truth that contradicts my own biases. McNair’s perseverance mandates a dedication to the self, and a strong will (entirely the result of an organism’s health and sense of identity in relation to its environment) facilitates the continuous development process that directs me, both as a force that informs the direction and methodology for proceeding.

Initially, stress (as with shock) increases the activity of estrogen and serotonin, which causes energy to be used rapidly (particularly in the nerves), and the latter of which blunts the appetite, so as to limit energy consumption and maximize expenditure. With a continued perception of stress, the adrenal glands secrete adrenaline, which itself increases the pulse and starts burning fat for immediate energy. If the stress continues unabated, then cortisol breaks down muscle tissue (and eventually organs) for glucose. Serotonin acts upon the hormone ACTH to produce cortisol (known recently as “the stress hormone” for its causal role in aging and disease). Cortisol increases energy expenditure while also causing a desire to destroy both the organism and its environment.

Further manifestations of a “harm-avoidant” pathology appear in psychology and its emphasis on “normalcy” and indeed any collectivist institution that sacrifices individual actualization at the behests of the dominant narrative.

Instinctively, we all crave greater realization of our own potentials. After obtaining wealth, celebrities soon descend into debauchery and drug use, the former often precipitated by the latter. Estrogen promotes hypersexuality, and inflammation. It’s valuable to think of a craving as a striving to remedy the acute rise in inflammation, where long-term, chronic inflammation derails developmental processes and leads to manifestations such as personality disorders as a sort of “cancer of the mind.”

The pursuit of substances that deliver us from our momentary experiences of stress has a great degree of evolutionary value, as the organism seeks to maximize its energetic potential in the moment and thereby not only delay the process of aging and inevitable death but also promote greater expansion in the realms of social, familial, and spiritual life, which also leads to greater survival through greater ingenuity and intellectual discovery.

Therefore, we should not criticize drug users for their behavior, but rather we should dissuade them from their inferior approaches. Stressed individuals seek “pleasurable substances” such as alcohol to alleviate the burden of stress, and in the short-term, all “hedonistic” desires tend to alleviate stress. Hedonism in itself exists as a state of chronic energy insufficiency, albeit not enough to merit the category of “disease,” but enough to disturb the highest reaches of our developmental processes.

Adaptive pleasure-seeking results in satisfaction, with the sexual response and pursuit of orgasm being the best example of such. During the orgasm, the intense rush of dopamine, release of endorphins, and secretion of prolactin lower cortisol levels. Strong thyroid function promotes rapid recovery from the “refractory period” of an orgasm, and the prolactin sharply declines. Hypothyroidism itself tends to promote prolactin secretion through stimulation of the pituitary gland, and the derailment of proper glucose metabolism often features high cortisol. A certain subtype of hypothyroidism termed “hypersexual” for lack of a better word features chronic elevations in cortisol and the act of lustful “addiction” as a therapeutic aide to attenuate the state of chronic “near-exhaustion.” Total exhaustion would lead to depression and eventual suicidal ideation, and the “teetering” oscillation between normalcy and insanity appears in puberty, mid-life crises, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, and other disorders of impulsivity such as hypersexuality, OCD, ADD, and so on.

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