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What does intimacy mean for you?


Rainbow~Sprinkles

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Rainbow~Sprinkles

So many different people have different ideas of what intimacy means to them, what the definition of intimacy is, what kind of actions or experiences it involves, what it feels like etc.

So here's the question:

What does intimacy mean for you?

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The feeling of being safe to be completely honest with someone, without a crippling fear that they'll dump you immediately for daring to speak your mind or letting them glimpse into the madness inside your skull.

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For me, intimacy means mutual understanding. Intimacy means being able to talk to each other freely about anything, whether it is science, philosophy, or personal issues. Intimacy means caring for each other when problems arise.

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ItWasNiceKnowingYou

Intimacy = Into Me See, which is basically when you allow someone outside of yourself to get to know you on a deeper/personal level without any apprehensions about it.

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Intimacy for me is having a connection with someone that is so strong that you can tell them anything and be 100% yourself without fear of rejection. Someone who understands you and you understand them in a way that very few others can or do. Intimacy is born out of security, love and acceptance for me.

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existentialia

Hello all,

I am glad and excited to see that AVEN members are interested in engaging in discussion around their understandings of 'intimacy'. Thank you Rainbow~Sprinkles for creating a thread around this topic (and for liking my research participation request post!). It is interesting for me to read the variant responses already. Whilst I am not going to use what is posted here as 'data' for my research, it is an interesting first peek into the topic. Please be assured that this space remains 'safe' and there is no research agenda per se, it is just informative for me and my research.

However, if anyone is interested in engaging more with the topic of 'intimacy' in the context of a doctoral research project, then I would like to cheekily direct you all to the Research Participant Request announcement that I had posted in the Announcements section here on AVEN yesterday evening, and to please contact me if you are interested in participating.

I shall now stop hijacking this thread... But please all do continue to contribute to it - it will help to inform my research endeavour and help contribute to my ability to critique dominant and normative assumptions.

All the best,

Nina

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Intimacy to me is extreme closeness. Psychologically or physically.

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The feeling of being safe to be completely honest with someone, without a crippling fear that they'll dump you immediately for daring to speak your mind or letting them glimpse into the madness inside your skull.

I was going to come in here and say something cheesy sounding, like the mutual freedom to bare your hearts and souls with each other...

but yeah, pretty much that.

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I always like to think of intimacy as Platonic love in the original sense. A deep connection built on a common drive: a link or total fascination with one another.

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I will never find out what it means, ie placing your trust in someone. Thats what it basically means, trusting someone.

Like when people lose there virginity, they are first time placing trust in someone. Its probably one of the reasons for people doing it, and why its important to the human psyche, as vast majority of people do it. Losing ones virginity to someone, is very important it seems, as the vast majority of people do it, and they do it early with those drives, and nature drives people to do it.

Intimacy, means trusting someone, and learning to trust someone.

I never had no privacy all my life since 17, so for people like me, trusting someone will never come, thankfully. I was better of really, but trusting people is important for the human psyche, and when people do not learn it, they live a very isolated life.

Nature with its drives, gets the vast majority of people to lose there virginity, so it must be very important for the psyche of the person, and to learn to trust others.

If it was not important, people would stay virgins like us. So the act of losing your virginity to trust is important for your psyche. Without it, many people would become very isolated later probably.

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I think intimacy is being so close to someone that you can share all parts of yourself with them, without the constant fear of them judging you, or leaving you, for being yourself.

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I guess it's being able to engage with another person in a manner that just can't be done with anyone you might encounter or know. A mutual understanding and engagement with another, where perhaps things don't need to be said to be understood as a gesture is enough.

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Rainbow~Sprinkles

What kind of actions/gestures do you consider intimate?

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Squirrel Combat

For me, it's being openly honest, being able to come to grips with any unfavorable aspects of their background, mutual trust, the absence of fear of them ditching you, and sharing a close bond you don't share with anybody (with the possible exception of immediate family).

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What kind of actions/gestures do you consider intimate?

Held hands, general physical intimacy really. A shared look that need be no more than that, closeness really. Definitely anything in grounds of stuff like hugging and on would be intimate...or at least, derived from a sense of being willing to be that close.

Physical intimacy is very...reserved in those permitted in, personally.

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What kind of actions/gestures do you consider intimate?

Well, I am (pretty severely) touch averse, so the mere fact that I would let my partner touch me at all without getting upset/stressed would be, in and of itself, really intimate for me. Beyond that, if we're talking about specific touching, I guess little things like holding hands, cuddling, letting them brush their fingers through my hair while cuddling, etc. Non-physical things would be knowing one another so well that we can communicate without words, sharing our things, etc.

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I suppose it’s different for everyone. I’m all over the place when it comes to physical contact, no barriers there. Holding hands, quick hugs, lots of touching while training or playing, stuff like that. Though that’s all innocent and platonic, and I consider it very different from intimacy.

All I can think about when I hear that term “intimacy” is the warmth of another person. In the physical sense yeah, but also mentally; like you are allowed and welcome in someone’s personal space. Hugs and cuddles and being at ease together. Just a mutual affection and enjoyment over being as close as you possibly can without having sex. An understanding, I guess, knowing someone and be known in return. And this is a rosy cloud because I’ve never actually had anyone like that.
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Understanding and trust, at a level beyond which you engage in with the average person. There's usually some physical element to trust each other with your bodies and respect each other's physical boundaries.

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To be open about your own and their weaknesses/faults/ignorance while working together in a way to grow both individually and together.

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  • 2 weeks later...
SpeedinThroughSpace

Knowing you can be yourself with someone else. Trusting them to accept and love you just the way you are. Feeling like you can share the depth of your soul with someone else

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RoseGoesToYale

Connecting on a deep emotional level (i.e. I feel that sadness is the most intimate emotion to share since it's very vulnerable and telling) and sharing thoughts and ideas with each other, without fear of being judged.

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