CC25 Keynote 04 - Intimacy as Insurrection: Love in an Unloving World - Terry Real, LICSW

Leading men, women and non-binary people into true intimacy is synonymous with leading them beyond patriarchy. Traditional gender roles were never built for intimacy, but for stability. For example, the traditional term masculinity MEANS invulnerability—the more invulnerable you are the more manly you are and visa versa. Yet, you cannot be intimate and invulnerable at the same time. Leading men into intimacy means nothing less than reconfiguring who they are as men. Traditionally women and partners of men are socialized to over accommodate and resent. More modern women and partners have been taught to speak up with individual empowerment, but rarely with ‘relational empowerment.’ RLT (Relational Life Therapy) teaches people to stand up for themselves and love and cherish their partner in the same breath. “Loving power” also goes beyond the morays of patriarchy, we therapists are intimacy merchants. Our work is at once therapeutic and social activism. This address invites participants to acknowledge this concept and learn to use it skillfully.

Participants will be given the tools they need and invited to:

1. Understand the intimacy people are wishing for now is historically new.
2. Leverage the desire of increased intimacy to move beyond traditional masculinity.
3. Teach dissatisfied partners to stand up for more of what they want in new loving ways.