I’ve heard the word “solosexual” used a lot lately—probably because I have been spending some time at Bateworld—and it got me thinking about some of these adjectives we use as nouns to describe ourselves.

I think that virtually all men and women have a solosexual life, a special relationship with their own body. For some, it’s a dysfunctional relationship to be sure, but we all have it. It’s probably the place where we are most intimately ourselves, most authentically the way we really are sexually, if there is any place where we are mostly authentic about sex… It’s generally hard to see the ape libido inside the human wrapping.

I’m going to write more about this later (or a lot sooner) but like “addict” and “compulsive masturbator,” I think “solosexual” is generally misappropriated by masturbation enthusiasts, even though there are certainly a lot of genuine solosexual people out there, I wonder how many who claim this identity are genuinely satisfied to forever eschew sex with others in favor of sex with self. That is, after all, the true definition of a solosexual person: sexual to the exclusion of others.

I do feel that a regular, positive masturbation practice is a healthy part of any person’s life, and that having a good sexual relationship with the self is necessary to have a fully satisfying relationship with others. I also feel that this is a solosexual space that such healthy individuals cultivate for themselves, but that for most people, it will not exclude the experience of sex with a partner, a series of partners or a social group.

And those are the three potentials of sexual experience that comprise all others: solo-, partner- and social-sexual realms of experience. In modern culture, most of us grow up in a solosexual space and then move into more partner-based sexual relations, with most never fully leaving the solosexual space but either maintaining it as a secondary or even primary practice. A small number will also experience the social-sexual opportunities that a JO club or other more open sexual community may provide.

I consider myself a mix of all three, moving from one to another area of sexual potential and overlapping them, which is how I feel most balanced within myself. Sometimes, I am more solosexual, but at other times I desire partner sex, and then I have this desire for regular social-sexual activity, which I experience at the Jacks. I know that many of the Jacks feel differently about it than I do, but I wonder how many share this social experience of sex, of feeling intimately part of a community that is not just supportive of one’s sexual health, but actively invites group sexual experience.

I think this social/communal sexuality is the heart of the experience that sets the Jacks apart from what we do alone or with our wives, husbands, boyfriends and girlfriends. I also think that it is so foreign to the way most of us have learned and integrated the common narrative of human sexuality, that it’s difficult to even conceptualize a healthy group experience much less accept it.

I’ll get into this more… I welcome your thoughts and insights in the comments section.