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Why Intimacy Breaks Down in Modern Relationships | Caitlin V | Ep. 427
02:41:43
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- [00:01]
Host
Okay, I got the red smoke. Sun runs north and south.
- [00:06]
Caitlin V
West of the smoke.
- [00:07]
Host
West of the smoke. Okay, copy. West of the smoke. I'm looking at danger close now.
- [00:14]
Caitlin V
Oh, wait a minute.
- [00:15]
Michael
Give it to me.
- [00:15]
Host
I mean, it cleared hot.
- [00:17]
Caitlin V
Coffee cleared hot.
- [00:19]
Host
What do you tell people you do for a living?
- [00:22]
Caitlin V
Well, it depends on the context.
- [00:25]
Host
Random. You're at a dinner with people you don't know.
- [00:28]
Caitlin V
So I will sometimes say I'm an intimacy coach or a relationship coach.
- [00:31]
Host
Do you go right out with that or do you start with an educator?
- [00:34]
Caitlin V
Yeah, no, no, no. I like to tell people that I'm a coach because that really is the best term that describes what I do.
- [00:39]
Host
Okay.
- [00:40]
Caitlin V
I learned early on in my career that when you say sex coach, certain people have, like, an automatic response. It doesn't even feel voluntary. They just have like a. Like a disgust response almost to the.
- [00:51]
Host
Fact that those people not have sex.
- [00:54]
Caitlin V
Of course they have sex.
- [00:54]
Host
Then why do they have such a response?
- [00:56]
Caitlin V
Honestly, you'd have to ask them. This happened to me early on. I was flying into Chicago, and towards the end of the flight, the guy next to me asked me what I did for a living. And I said, oh, I'm a sex coach. And he literally threw his phone down on the ground of the plane in shock. And then was like, what if my wife knew that I was talking to you? And I was like, then she know that you were talking to a stranger on the plane. She never let me come to Chicago again. I was like, this sounds like something to talk to a therapist because you.
- [01:21]
Host
Involuntarily sat next to somebody that you didn't know what they did for a living.
- [01:25]
Caitlin V
Have a conversation about sex at all. We hardly spoke. But there's such sensitivity around it. And I mean, that's kind of the thing, right? Is that, like, it's a thing that we all do. Imagine if we treated food or sleep with this kind of disdain.
- [01:37]
Host
It's not a thing that we all.
- [01:38]
Caitlin V
Do, that is true. But it is a thing that all of us have a relationship.
- [01:41]
Host
You know what I mean, Michael?
- [01:43]
Caitlin V
But even the.
- [01:44]
Michael
Very well.
- [01:49]
Caitlin V
Thank you for your honesty.
- [01:51]
Host
Michael, is your mom going to be okay watching this? Because I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions during this. Should she tune out now, I'll just.
- [01:57]
Michael
Tell her not to listen to this one. Yeah, sometimes she's like, I was a.
- [02:00]
Host
Parent and one of my kids were to say that, I'd be like, yeah, I definitely want in. The second they left the house, I'd be figuring out what they were getting.
- [02:06]
Michael
I mean, I don't care if she does listen to it, but I'll tell her. She probably won't like it.
- [02:10]
Caitlin V
Yeah, that's fair. I have to give. My mom has been absolutely incredible throughout my journey. I mean, I told her when I was like 16 that I was going to do sex something for a living. And she was like, okay, yeah.
- [02:19]
Host
How did you know?
- [02:20]
Caitlin V
I. So there's, there's. There's a couple things that happened. I figured out how to have an orgasm early on in life. Like, completely naively, innocently, like a lot of people do. I figured out how to give my body pleasure. And then when I got to the age where sex ed became a thing and I started learning about what that all meant, and that conversation turned towards avoiding pregnancy and avoiding disease, I had the natural inclination of like, but that's not what I've experienced. Like, this is a cool thing that your body's capable of doing. Why aren't we talking about the pleasure aspect of that?
- [02:51]
Host
Oh, that's not part of the traditional curriculum.
- [02:53]
Caitlin V
No. And I felt people were really being robbed of that part of the conversation, which is sort of like teaching driver's head, but only teaching about accidents. Right. Driving can be so pleasurable. It also gets you from point A to point B. It's like an incredible experience that you could have for pleasure as well. We don't just focus on accidents because that's not why people drive. So I had this sense that, like, my peers were sort of being robbed of the main point of sex in sex ed. But I knew even before I'd ever had sex and nothing traumatic happened to me. I didn't have, like a bad experience early on. I just knew this is what I was gonna do for a living. It took me a while figure out exactly how, because I didn't know that you could, you know, be that, like, you could really get a degree and work one on one with people outside of therapy. And I knew I didn't want to be a therapist. Like, I wanted to help people. I wanted to educate. My mission from early on in life has been get quality sexual education that is pleasure centric, out to as many people as possible.
- [03:48]
Host
Why do you think that the traditional. I'm trying to think of the sex ed that I got in the educational system. This episode is brought to you by Black Rifle Coffee. Patriotism isn't a marketing trend for Black Rifle Coffee company. It's the foundation of the company. And Black Rifle Coffee Company has built on it since day one. Their American Roasted coffee not only fuels your day, but gives back to veterans, first responders and their families with every purchase. Last year they eliminated medical debt, helped build homes, provided for natural disaster response teams, funded education for the children of fallen warriors, and so much more. So as America hits its 250th year, BRCC is kicking off 2026 with killer new products and the same great mission they've had from the start. Grab a bag or a box of tactisquatch, waken the neighbors or spirits of 76. Roast for people who get up early, train hard and don't quit. And to fuel the new year, they're dropping cold brew coffee cans in just black and vanilla. No fluff, no excuses, just caffeine. Need something with even more horsepower. Grapex brings 200 milligrams of caffeine, zero sugar and grape blast. That hits harder than a door charge. Find it at Walmart, Kroger or blackrifflecoffee.com Black Rifle Coffee veteran founded American Roasted. This is America's coffee. I don't know if I missed that day or just completely vapor locked my brain. I don't actually remember receiving any. Maybe like a little anatomy, physiology and science.
- [05:14]
Caitlin V
It's often like an afternoon. They often split boys and girls take you into like two different rooms. You'll have like a health teacher or maybe like a phys ed teacher.
- [05:22]
Host
Yeah. Because you want to talk about something you do together in a mixed company.
- [05:25]
Caitlin V
Can't do together. No, can't talk about it together. I actually write about that.
- [05:28]
Host
The buck.
- [05:28]
Caitlin V
And then for me anyways they would show a video that was often sponsored by like a tampon or pad company that would be like we're teaching you about your body. And I assume that I've never, I don't know actually what they show 8th grade boys, but I assume it's a complimentary video that's like here's what's going on with your body. And you might notice some things.
- [05:46]
Host
Maybe a condom sponsor.
- [05:48]
Caitlin V
Yeah, that seems too progressive. I mean with absence only sex ed you can't even discuss condoms. So I imagine that it might actually be. Well, I don't know. I don't want to speculate who sponsor it.
- [05:58]
Host
Yeah, but what would it be? Who would sponsor it?
- [06:00]
Caitlin V
I mean it could actually be a religious organization that sponsors it. That would not surprise me. But I don't know. I'm not hip on current modern day sex ed. I only know what I was missing. And again, it was like an afternoon very passable for me. The thing that sticks out the most that I remember. And we had really. I went to school in Michigan. We had a super quality educational class. They showed a six foot projection of a close up of syphilitic genitals. Like a vulva that was just completely covered in open sores.
- [06:34]
Host
Okay.
- [06:35]
Caitlin V
And I. That memory is never left in my head because again, I thought like, this is not what this whole. I appreciate that there are risks involved, but this is not what this is about. Do you think they were scared?
- [06:46]
Host
Absolutely.
- [06:46]
Caitlin V
They're trying to scare you.
- [06:47]
Host
Why? Like I get so. And of course I say why, but in the back of my head I'm thinking, okay, I remember being 16 to 18, your hormones kick in, things start to shift. But there are so. There is so much more in life than an unwanted pregnancy or an std. And you actually can protect yourself against the vast majority of those with about that much education in willpower and intelligence. Why would. It just seems as if it is shame based. I mean, Michael, you were in high school a couple years ago. What was your sex ed? So this is nice to be able to touch into the originality.
- [07:22]
Michael
It was actually. I remember 22.
- [07:23]
Host
Oh great.
- [07:25]
Michael
26. I remember two.
- [07:26]
Host
When did you turn 26? Last time I made fun of you saying you were 23. You said 25.
- [07:30]
Michael
Yeah, November.
- [07:31]
Host
Did you get yourself a good fourth?
- [07:34]
Caitlin V
Oh, happy belated birthday. Yeah.
- [07:36]
Host
What'd I get you?
- [07:38]
Michael
An insult probably.
- [07:39]
Host
Nice. I didn't even know it was your birthday. Mostly because I don't care about you.
- [07:42]
Michael
Yeah, I figured.
- [07:44]
Host
Go get your.
- [07:45]
Caitlin V
About your opinion. So what was sex ed like?
- [07:47]
Michael
Legitimately, I remember two. Like clearly I can remember two separate times. One was in eighth grade, one was in like freshman or sophomore year. In eighth grade, they actually didn't separate boys and girls. And a lady came in and she just basically explained. Basically just explained sex. And then she actually, if I'm remembering correctly, she didn't even teach abstinence only. She was like, hey, this is what it is. These are the consequences. It was actually pretty neutral.
- [08:23]
Host
When you explain sex, you mean like physiologically, like this is technically what meets.
- [08:28]
Michael
Okay, so yeah, she's like, this is technically what sex is. And kind of explained pros, cons and.
- [08:37]
Host
Sounds like a riveting class.
- [08:39]
Michael
It was actually very neutral. It's surprising for Butte, Montana was very neutral and just kind of threw it out there. And then in my high school class it went deeper into actual anatomy and so it was like kind of sex ed, but more like a physiology type.
- [08:55]
Host
Thing is that even really sex ed. I mean, what are you educating the audience with? Are you like. I would like to think education prepares you for something you might encounter later in life.
- [09:04]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [09:05]
Host
That description, what does that.
- [09:06]
Caitlin V
And if that were the case, I would say then communication has to be the primary thing that you teach in sex ed.
- [09:11]
Host
I would have to agree.
- [09:11]
Caitlin V
Yeah. Because you can. Like the anatomy and physiology is like pretty quick. You'll figure it out.
- [09:15]
Host
Yeah, well, you have 50% of the puzzle figured out with just yourself. Actually, depending on how you go, you might have 100% of the anatomy and physiology figured out.
- [09:25]
Caitlin V
Yeah, that part's like pretty simple. Right. Human beings have been doing that for hundreds of thousands of years pretty successfully. That's how we all got here. So that part's not actually the tricky part. Right. Giving people a heads up on, like, here are some of the things that can happen, here's how to prevent those things. But like, more importantly, I think about it from like a harm reduction mod. Teach people what the actual risks are. And I don't mean like the unintended pregnancy sti risk. I mean like the emotional risks, the mental risks. You know, here's what it's gonna. When you start having sex with someone, your neurochemicals start cooking up this soup that has you feel very strongly about them because that's your body's evolutionary response to mating that is gonna create this sort of like magnetic pull. It doesn't mean that they're a good partner for you or that that's the kind of person that you wanna create a life with, but you're gonna start feeling those ways if you start having sex with someone. Like, you can educate people on those things. And here's how to say no in preserve someone's dignity. And here's how to say no against aggression. And here's. And that there are ways that we can have a conversation about this where everyone can leave it feeling good and everyone can actually get what they want out of it. You ask why is it that we don't do that? I mean, I have a lot of theories ranging from that we just don't know any better and we're passing on what generations before us have done.
- [10:40]
Host
I think we know better.
- [10:44]
Caitlin V
On the other end of the spectrum, I do think that there is. I think when we keep people away from pleasure and we keep people away from being empowered in this area of their life in particular, they're actually a lot easier to control.
- [10:58]
Host
Really?
- [10:58]
Caitlin V
Yeah. And that may be my most conspiratorial end on why Sex ed is the way that it is. And I don't know that any individual person is thinking on that level. Like, you know, it would make them easier to manipulate if we took them away from pleasure. But I do think that when people are, like, empowered in their body, they know how to relate to themselves. They have the discipline, they understand that their sexuality is powerful and they're able to wield it as a tool of connection. Then they move through the world a lot differently. I mean, that's the world that I want to live in. But those people are a lot happier. They're a lot more satisfied. And I don't know that happy and satisfied people. I don't know that happy and satisfied is really, like, the goal for most folks. Yeah, unfortunately.
- [11:41]
Host
Yeah. Well, you'd have to have happy and satisfied and then things when it all gets messed up.
- [11:46]
Caitlin V
Yes. Right. If you're happy and you're satisfied, you buy less stuff, period.
- [11:49]
Host
You actually really do. You do, because you're happy and satisfied with what you have.
- [11:52]
Caitlin V
Yes.
- [11:53]
Host
Happiest I've ever been in my life is when I had the least amount of stuff and responsibilities.
- [11:56]
Caitlin V
Absolutely. And I would say that, like, the happiest I've been is when I had great relationships that were very fulfilling and then less tough. But, you know, this is, like, why sex sells. Right. Like, can you really use sex to sell a car? If someone knows that sex is actually a divine act that you share with.
- [12:11]
Host
A person, like, somehow they figured out how to do this. I don't even think they're selling the car. They just use it to get your attention and they slide the car in and hope that you buy.
- [12:20]
Caitlin V
Right. But if you're sexually satisfied and happy, I don't know that that works on you.
- [12:24]
Host
I don't think it would.
- [12:25]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [12:26]
Host
The better you know yourself, I think the less the outside manipulation or malleability actually occurs.
- [12:32]
Caitlin V
Yes.
- [12:34]
Host
I don't really know a lot of people who had went to religious schooling. Do you have any idea what they teach in sex ed? I feel like there's a little bit more of a shame aspect or abstinence or you're going to hell. And again, I want people to believe whatever they want to. I'm just curious what that experience is like.
- [12:50]
Caitlin V
So people who grow up, whether that's religious school or like, in a highly religious or a household that, like, had a more strict view of a religious view of sexuality, tend to experience more shame and they tend to actually, they will self identify as having problems with sex and sexuality more often. Than folks who didn't. And the best place to look at that is people who report to be addicted to porn are overwhelmingly people from a religious background, Specifically men from a religious background.
- [13:22]
Host
Really?
- [13:22]
Caitlin V
Yes, because folks who didn't grow up feeling that sexuality was shameful or that maybe even porn or masturbation was bad don't tend to self identify as being addicted to it. It is those folks who's. Because about, like, how much. How much energy there is behind doing something that you're not supposed to be doing, how much shame, how much. That's kink, right? Like, that is a definition of kink. It's just not conscious kink. It's an unconscious kink to do something that you feel you're not supposed to be doing and then to feel like you have a compulsion towards doing that, like you're not in control of yourself doing that. All of that is really, like, comes from a reading of sexuality that is based in religious upbringing, more often than.
- [14:02]
Host
Not from somebody who works in this world. What are your thoughts on porn? Positive or negative in the overall.
- [14:08]
Caitlin V
So porn has a time and a place just like anything else. I like to think of porn as a tool, okay? I think porn can be an incredible tool, and I believe that people should have access to more erotic creativity. One of my jobs as a coach is just to give people ideas that break them out of the box of what they think their sex should look like. Some of those ideas come from porn. So they come to me and they go, caitlin, you know, I need to be able to, like, jackhammer my wife for 15 minutes in order for her to be satisfied. And I'm like, have you asked her? Have you asked her? Yeah, I don't know that that's what she needs. Where did you get that idea? So that often comes important, but that's.
- [14:41]
Host
My concern with it is an unrealistic expectation that is applied to the real world. Especially when, I mean, I didn't grow up with one of these devices. I to this day remember the first Playboy that I found. It's a formative experience in most young men's lives. What are you laughing at, Michael? Just because you had a digital version.
- [15:03]
Michael
Of that, it's just funny.
- [15:05]
Host
He's just like, no, it's totally different, right?
- [15:07]
Caitlin V
I remember the first Playboy I found under my cousin's bed and being like, what is in my God? Wow. This exists, right?
- [15:14]
Host
But now people way younger than me, you're probably not an accidental keystroke away from it, but your access is just.
- [15:21]
Caitlin V
You're this Close to it at all times. Yeah, I mean, you can on a device, you're like three clicks away from the biggest repository of adult content ever made. You know, Remember, like, we didn't. Just the same way that we didn't evolve to have access to like corn syrup in all of our food. We did not evolve to have access to erotic visuals all of the time.
- [15:38]
Host
And that's what worries me again. I mean, if people are into porn, my thing is this. As long as it's adults and it's consensual, I don't actually give a shit what you're doing. Like, if you want to wear a dive mask and hit yourself with a shit filled pantyhose, if that's what turns your screws, as long as you're a partner or you're by yourself. Listen, I'm not going to judge you. Externally. I have thoughts, but I'll keep them to myself unless you ask. But that's an adult. Somebody in a formative years whose brain is informed, who has access to that. And there is a difference between finding a two dimensional image in real life. And then you talk about AI and what they can create too. I think that can break a young man or woman's mind. And I don't know how you unwind that later in life.
- [16:24]
Caitlin V
I don't know that you ever fully do. I think that the distinction there is, does someone feel like they can have a healthy relationship with their own sexuality despite whatever they were exposed to early on? And I think that's very doable for most people. But I totally agree with you. I think that porn is amazing at doing certain things. It can open our eyes to all kinds of erotic possibilities that we might not have discovered otherwise. And those don't have to be aggressive or violent. That could be like, oh, I didn't even realize that it turned me on to have my mouth be covered because then I can't make any noise and then that part of my brain turns off and now I don't have to think while I'm having sex. Great.
- [17:01]
Host
People are just some weird shit.
- [17:02]
Caitlin V
You could learn that. I wouldn't even say that's weird. That's pretty run of the mill.
- [17:05]
Host
Well, I was thinking you meant like duct tape or a Ziploc bag with like.
- [17:10]
Caitlin V
No, I remember there was a moment where we had a toy. It's okay if I tell like a personal story.
- [17:15]
Host
Here you are on the Internet. You can tell whatever you want to. Michael might pass it. I'm gonna be honest.
- [17:20]
Caitlin V
Keep breathing.
- [17:20]
Host
He's not that experienced.
- [17:21]
Caitlin V
Deep breaths. Feel your butt in the chair.
- [17:24]
Host
If you pass out and fall over, do you want us to revive you or just kind of let you go?
- [17:28]
Michael
Yeah, just let me go.
- [17:29]
Caitlin V
He's gonna be the one that revives you. Where was I going with that? Okay, so I had this.
- [17:34]
Host
Pineapple, Michael. That's your safe word. If it gets too far.
- [17:38]
Caitlin V
It would be great if, like, an hour from now, he's like, pineapple. I'm out. He runs out of the room.
- [17:42]
Host
Wouldn't be the first time.
- [17:46]
Caitlin V
So a former partner and I, we were having sex. They had this, like, little flogger. It had a plastic handle and, like, the little dangly threads coming out. It's like a little sensation toy. And you usually use it like this, right? Like smack somebody with it. And he turned the plastic handle to its side and, like, put it in my mouth as a bit. And my mind was blown. Not because, like, not because it necessarily felt, like, amazing, but it was more like the creativity that went into that. I was more like, oh, yeah, like, of course you could use that part as a bit. It didn't occur to me that that could be anything other than a handle, but of course it can, right? And like, this is just a matter of, like, using a tool creatively. We could think, like, you know, if you're a great chef, you know how to use spices creatively, you know, how to use, like, waffles creatively, whatever, you know, like, you. You have more access to creativity because you've seen more stuff, you've watched a library of things and people having ideas. And I think that's really, really beneficial because people really get stuck on what sex needs to look like. And then, you know, once that creativity is gone, they get really tunnel vision on anything that's wrong, anything that's getting in the way of what they think it ought to look like. And often that can come with a lot of self blame instead of reflection and exploration. Like, what is it that maybe I need to sh. Or do differently in order to have a pleasurable experience? It's like, damn it, why doesn't my body work to do the thing that I think it should be doing? On the other hand, there are some other risks associated with overusing porn for adults. Externalizing our turn on and putting all of what gets us going outside of us so we lose connection to our own internal wellspring of eroticism. And eroticism is a life force within us. It is literally life force itself in that it's how people come into the world. It's through sex and sexuality reach a point where your entire relationship to your own sexuality exists outside of your body. It's going to be really hard for you to control your ejaculation, to get hard when you want to, to feel like you can connect to another person Then especially for younger men in particular who grew up watching porn and having access to porn on the Internet, they are experiencing erectile dysfunction at higher rates than previous generations, really. And it's because a real person in front of you a cannot compete with the Internet. Right. This is a true story where you're seeing, you know, you could, you could be watching 20 or 30 people have sex in one evening. You could select the exact kind of woman and experience and position that you're looking for and only serve that to yourself. Or it could be 15 at the same time. Right. So. So real person doesn't really compare. And also real person, a lot more complicated. So much more nuance going on. Watching porn, very straightforward. You're not part of the action. Like I like to think about it like watching like reaction videos or watching like other people do stuff on the Internet. Like some people are really into like watching folks.
- [20:26]
Host
Oh, there's whole channels created around.
- [20:28]
Caitlin V
Oh, there's so much.
- [20:29]
Host
They create content by reacting to other people.
- [20:31]
Caitlin V
Other content.
- [20:32]
Host
Right.
- [20:32]
Caitlin V
Or like they, they, you know, I remember being shocked that there was a channels where like kids opened toys and other children enjoyed watching them.
- [20:40]
Host
Of millions of views.
- [20:42]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I was just. For me, anyways, maybe this is like giving me as a way, as an elder millennial. I was just sort of like, I don't really understand what we're doing here. Like what is the joy in doing that? But there is something that's very and very like sanitary about watching someone else do something. Whereas like having sex with another person is very, very vulnerable. It's very, it's raw. Right. It's like, it's very physical. It is like happening right now. It is a sensory experience. Whereas watching two people or five people have sex on a screen is like, it's very separated from your experience, very disassociated experience.
- [21:14]
Host
What do you find? It looks like when they externalize to the that point on the extreme end, are they just kind of detached from that sexuality and unable to even be interested, absent that external stimulus via specifically.
- [21:27]
Caitlin V
The porn that can happen. Or their performance anxiety becomes so extreme that it actually manifests in their body and then they end up coming to me. So those are the men who come to work with me primarily. They have premature ejaculation erectile dysfunction or delayed ejaculation, or they feel like they have no connection in their relationship or they lack the confidence to go and look for a relationship. Like they come to me because sex was part of their breakup or part of their divorce and they want to make sure that like that part of their life feels secure before they go out and looking for another partner. The role that porn plays in that is that it sets the expectations so high that they no longer have a grasp of what their own sexuality looks like. Or they, you know, for men who have been trying to get to orgasm as quickly as possible and they're watching porn so they're externalizing their or their turn on and then they're also rushing their body through it. And bodies are really good at patterns, right? They're like really, really good at getting from point A to point B over and over, over again and figuring out the shortest way to get there. And by the way, anything that has to do with mating or passing on your genetic material, your body is extra incentivized to develop patterns that allow you to get there faster and more efficiently. And so the consequence of porn is often that you have this unrealistic expectation for yourself. You've often trained your body. And then on the other hand, so there's the premature ejaculation guys who are going fast, but then there' category of guys who watches porn for an extended period of time, like two to four hours, maybe even every single day.
- [22:56]
Host
Do these people not have jobs or are they the pop up window dude at work and the boss comes in like hahaha, just doing an Excel spreadsheet.
- [23:03]
Caitlin V
I think this a guy asked me this one time live and I was like wait, let's just do some math together. Because if you're doing this two hours.
- [23:08]
Host
A day, that's 20 hours a week, a work week. If that's four hours a day, that.
- [23:12]
Caitlin V
Is a incredible amount of time to dedicate to anything.
- [23:15]
Host
And you know, on the weekends they're going well past four hours a day.
- [23:18]
Caitlin V
And so what they're doing is they're not letting themselves reach ejaculation. They're getting close to the orgasm and going over the edge.
- [23:24]
Host
He taught me that term also gooning. Oh, I heard that one recently. What does that one mean though?
- [23:29]
Michael
It's basically what you described of like hours at a time.
- [23:33]
Caitlin V
Yeah, Yep. Yeah, it's almost like onomatopoeia. You goon. Goon.
- [23:38]
Michael
Yeah.
- [23:38]
Host
What the hell people?
- [23:41]
Caitlin V
And it's sort of like our bodies were not Evolved to do this.
- [23:44]
Host
Right.
- [23:44]
Caitlin V
So this is like, you know, when I have like, you know what's an actual example? When I have like chocolate covered cherries in my house. My body did not evolve to like, walk by those and say no to them. Right. I'm just gonna finish the bag. That's how that is. So I don't buy them because I know that I would be putting two hours.
- [23:58]
Host
Yeah, yeah.
- [23:59]
Caitlin V
I just can't, like, bring it into the house. So for some folks, they have like a compulsion towards doing this. I also think it takes the place of having a romantic or intimate relationship a lot of the time. And they kind of tell themselves, like, this is. Maybe they're not even conscious enough to tell themselves, but they're like, this is some form of a replacement for the kind of relationship that I would like to have but don't feel like I could have. And therefore this is sexually.
- [24:21]
Host
But there's so much more to a relationship than just that. Yeah. Wow.
- [24:28]
Caitlin V
Yeah. So anyways, those guys end up often with delayed ejaculation, meaning that they cannot reach orgasm when they're with a partner. And again, it's like. It's just. This is what you were training your body to do over and over and over again. It is just running the pattern that you have been giving it. But people think that because porn is distinct from partnered sex that their body will somehow behave differently. But the lizard part of your brain, which is the part that really controls the majority of your sexuality, it doesn't know the difference. Lizards can't. They don't have imaginations. They can't project into the future or in the past. They don't know that that's a screen. Right. So that part of your brain does not know that what's happening on the screen is distinct from what's actually happening in your physical life. It cannot know the difference.
- [25:07]
Host
That's when you become the edgelord, which is a term my daughter taught me, which I once I looked it up. Once I looked it up and I said, hey, you can feel free to not share your entire vernacular with me.
- [25:18]
Caitlin V
I thought edgelords were people on the Internet that just said said stuff to drum up conflict.
- [25:22]
Michael
That's what I think that that's the last time I've heard that term used.
- [25:25]
Host
But let's. I think, remember this came from Julia.
- [25:28]
Michael
Yeah, she's younger than all of us.
- [25:29]
Host
Yeah, she's younger than all of us. She's the one who had gooning.
- [25:31]
Caitlin V
Oh, really?
- [25:32]
Host
Yeah. She knew that one.
- [25:33]
Caitlin V
Yeah. I mean, the language Is changing someone.
- [25:34]
Michael
Who deliberately tries to be shocking, dark, provocative or offensive. Especially online.
- [25:38]
Host
Whatever. That's your truth. That's your truth. Yeah.
- [25:41]
Michael
Edging lord might be. Yeah.
- [25:45]
Caitlin V
My truth is the edging lord.
- [25:48]
Host
Damn it. I can't keep up with the vernacular.
- [25:51]
Caitlin V
No, I mean, on one hand it's great that we have. We can decide that we have a shared language to describe things, I guess. But it is happening so fast.
- [26:00]
Host
Yeah.
- [26:01]
Caitlin V
Yeah. I mean, generational differences are so.
- [26:03]
Host
I've heard. 80, 20 or 90, 10. Porn consumption. Man, woman. Why do you think that is?
- [26:08]
Caitlin V
I actually think that that is only true in older generations. Really Younger generations. A lot more women. Like almost parody. Almost 50, 50. And it's actually different in different parts of the world.
- [26:17]
Host
World.
- [26:18]
Caitlin V
So I remember seeing. Oh, God. What is the big. This is how much porn I don't watch. What is the. What's the big porn site?
- [26:27]
Host
Only fans.
- [26:28]
Caitlin V
No, the actual orange pornhub. Thank you. Pornhub does an incredible end of the year review where they share the analytics that they have that they've collected over the year. No, it's incredible.
- [26:39]
Host
You should. I bet it is.
- [26:40]
Caitlin V
You should pull it up. And I think one year was like.
- [26:42]
Host
Hold that up, Michael.
- [26:43]
Caitlin V
There was one country, I want to say it was the Philippines where women actually watched more porn than men in the country. So I think it's younger. I think younger generations. My ex. So I live with a woman who's 10 years younger than me. And even just in that time, like smartphones happened when she was in high school, that didn't happen for me. I had a BlackBerry at one point.
- [27:01]
Host
I had one for a couple of years.
- [27:02]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I had a BlackBerry when I was in college. There was no such. We didn't get images like easily on our phones.
- [27:07]
Host
What did you find, Michael?
- [27:09]
Michael
It's probably a 30 page report because it's Montana. It's blocked.
- [27:13]
Host
What?
- [27:14]
Michael
Yeah.
- [27:15]
Caitlin V
Does it want your. Does it want you to put an id? Is it age gated?
- [27:18]
Michael
Yeah.
- [27:19]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [27:19]
Michael
I'm gonna see if we can find it somewhere else.
- [27:21]
Caitlin V
Upload your id. Use your vpn.
- [27:23]
Host
Yeah.
- [27:24]
Caitlin V
Do you not have to do that?
- [27:25]
Host
We would never skirt around.
- [27:26]
Michael
I'm sure the laws can do, but.
- [27:28]
Host
I'm sure the Australian social media ban is doing great. Actually, we were just talking about that on the last episode. We pulled it up. They're doing age verification and IDs, which actually is going to help. Even on a VPN, you still have to show your ID with a selfie.
- [27:42]
Caitlin V
Interesting.
- [27:43]
Host
Yeah.
- [27:43]
Caitlin V
So this is for social media.
- [27:45]
Host
Social Media in Australia.
- [27:46]
Michael
This is for porn. It's just like a very basic.
- [27:48]
Caitlin V
Okay, top 20 countries.
- [27:49]
Michael
US, we are again, I believe this is 25.
- [27:53]
Caitlin V
It is.
- [27:53]
Host
Look at this. We are a beacon to the rest of the world.
- [27:55]
Caitlin V
We are number one champ.
- [27:57]
Host
We are the champions. Jesus.
- [28:00]
Caitlin V
Top 20. Okay, so look at it. Follows the 2080 rule. 20% of countries are responsible for about 80% of traffic.
- [28:05]
Host
Yep, there you go.
- [28:07]
Caitlin V
Or 20 countries.
- [28:08]
Host
Okay, keep sending the Netherlands making the top 20.
- [28:10]
Caitlin V
Let's get to the other stuff.
- [28:11]
Host
Okay.
- [28:12]
Caitlin V
Most searched terms. Hentai was the most searched term, followed by milf.
- [28:17]
Host
I know the MILF one.
- [28:18]
Caitlin V
None of these terms change positions. Okay, so same as 2024.
- [28:23]
Host
SFW content.
- [28:25]
Caitlin V
I love that. Do you want to know something cool about milfs that I learned recently from a guest on the Holly Randall podcast? So, before the proliferation of OnlyFans, where content creators were selling directly to consumers, had porn studios that were making the majority of the adult content. Right. And it was the prevailing belief in porn studios that people wanted, like, young, virginal women. They wanted 18 years old and 20 years old. And. And so the majority of porn that came out while studios were in charge really preferred very young women. And by the time you were like, in your late 20s, you pretty much had to retire as an adult store star. OnlyFans comes around and now you have this, like, democratization of content. Right. Where people are, like, literally giving money directly to the creator. They're voting with their dollars for who they want. Suddenly MILF is the number one term. Which is awesome, right? It wasn't that, like, men and consumers of porn were not, like, really necessarily desirous of, like, barely legal women across the world.
- [29:20]
Host
No, they were looking at the soccer mom getting out of the Honda Odyssey. Yeah.
- [29:23]
Caitlin V
And I hear all the time, like, they want a woman who's sexually mature. She knows what she wants. They want a woman who actually experiences pleasure, knows, like, how to ask for things, how to communicate about sex. Like, people.
- [29:34]
Host
People.
- [29:35]
Caitlin V
When they're choosing who they want to, like, engage with sexually, they want a competent partner. I think that's cool. I think that's like. That was. That was a. That made me feel really, really good about the. The world. Okay, let's see here. Oh, okay. Role play fantasies increased in 2025, including driver rose by 98% and driver, plumber, and chef.
- [29:59]
Host
So they're looking for creative blue collar jobs.
- [30:03]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [30:05]
Host
Driver cheating in affair videos were of interest this year. That's not great.
- [30:10]
Caitlin V
Cheating grew 94 and Cuckold grew 73.
- [30:13]
Host
To be honest, Michael might be 40%.
- [30:17]
Caitlin V
Of all those searches.
- [30:19]
Host
Notice he's in a chair right now watching us.
- [30:21]
Caitlin V
He is. I can't see any of his screens from here.
- [30:23]
Host
All you can see is his mustache.
- [30:25]
Caitlin V
You know what, though? There could be correlation to just. Just like if the term cuckold made it into a couple major media outlets and people had never heard that term before, and then they start looking for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that could be more reflective of just mainstream coverage of these issues.
- [30:38]
Host
Oh, Coldplay, Kiss cam fiasco.
- [30:41]
Caitlin V
Oh, there we go. Yes.
- [30:43]
Host
You think it might have contributed to the Office of fair searches here?
- [30:45]
Caitlin V
388% increase for the term CEO. All right, well, yeah, see, like, sex is so reflective of the world that we live in. And just like whatever is in the cultural conversation.
- [30:58]
Host
What's number five there? What is a femboy? Just an effeminate angle.
- [31:01]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I believe so. And then safe for work. Content increasing. Safer work. ASMR is up 56%. Meanwhile, the podcast category, I think that means actual podcasts. I don't think that means.
- [31:17]
Host
What are you doing in this studio?
- [31:20]
Michael
You know how you've been gone the last couple weeks?
- [31:23]
Caitlin V
It seems pretty sturdy.
- [31:24]
Host
I thought we were standing the table after I got back, and it's like.
- [31:29]
Caitlin V
There'S like a cool waterproof blanket under here. Yeah, yeah.
- [31:32]
Host
Michael, why have you not clicked on this? You can peruse the year in review.
- [31:35]
Michael
Well, it's going to take us to.
- [31:37]
Host
Well, click yes.
- [31:38]
Michael
You're pornhub seat.
- [31:40]
Caitlin V
Okay, so this is interesting, too.
- [31:42]
Host
Well, verify your age. Click yes.
- [31:44]
Caitlin V
As you know, you're a Montana, so you need to have an account. Say, go sign into your account.
- [31:50]
Michael
Right.
- [31:52]
Host
You don't have to pretend this is your work computer.
- [31:54]
Caitlin V
But we've all been there.
- [31:57]
Host
There.
- [31:57]
Caitlin V
The unexpected hosting panic. Like when the big game party finally makes it out of the group chat. But you volunteered to host. Host the big game. And suddenly you need snacks, drinks, dips, cups, and all the other game day essentials no one else planned for. With Instacart, you can get all those groceries delivered in as fast as 30 minutes. No extra errands for you. One quick order for everyone. That way everything shows up right on time, making hosting easy and making it look like you had it planned all along long. Download the Instacart app and get game day deals.
- [32:30]
Michael
Yeah, I'm not sure if there's a way we can.
- [32:32]
Host
There's not. That's fine.
- [32:34]
Caitlin V
Oh, okay. I didn't actually read a content you. So. Okay, so this is One of the ways in which adult companies are responding to the AV laws is by just taking their content down. So like, I know you can't access some browsers and some other major porn sites in at least Florida. I wasn't sure about Montana. And so you talked a little bit about like the risk of, of people who are underage getting exposure to porn early on in life. That is obviously something that we need to solve for. Right. But we need to solve for it in a way that preserves people's adults, consenting adults abilities to access those things. And right now, because of the shame based culture that we live in, we have a pretty high number of people who don't want to be associated with a porn site. Right. Like I understand. I don't want to upload my ID for print. I don't want to upload my ID for anything.
- [33:19]
Host
Agreed.
- [33:20]
Caitlin V
When they're like verifying your bank account. No, like, why do you need my pick and you need me to turn left and right? That feels like a huge violation. So I understand why someone would not want to do that in order to access adult content. And at the same time, folks like me who do not make adult content that is meant for sexual gratification, but do make content that is sexual in nature for educational purposes, are also not sure where we're gonna shake out in this law. So, you know, I hope that my content can be accessible to folks who are over the age of 18. And we're clear about age gaining folks and telling them that it's, it is only for people over the age of 18. But that said, 99% of everything that I have ever made is, is like appropriate for anyone who's having sex.
- [34:04]
Host
Yeah.
- [34:04]
Caitlin V
You know, I only want 18 and over to reach it, but, but it is also not like meant to cause people to experience like arousal and.
- [34:12]
Host
Yeah.
- [34:12]
Caitlin V
To be gratified in that way.
- [34:14]
Host
No. You're an educator.
- [34:15]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [34:16]
Host
I mean I would say for that who is, is targeting the under 18 crowd? Because most people are probably either at that point of being sexually active plus or minus a couple years from 18. I mean at some point you almost would, you would want to target the most. I'll use high risk.
- [34:36]
Caitlin V
Yes. Yeah. We want to get people early on in life before they develop bad habits really. And when they're really impressionable. One of the things that I actually write about in the book is the outsized effect that early sexual experiences have on, on us. Like your first, first time, first few times, first relationship have a way bigger impact on the rest of your sex life than any other partner you're gonna have. And if you're conscious of that and you. You're aware of that, you can choose wisely or you can, you know, do the work to sort of, like, unravel the impact of that, Especially if it had some, like, negative impacts.
- [35:07]
Host
Yeah.
- [35:08]
Caitlin V
But for folks who have, like, an early, healthy, you know, emotionally stable relationship in which they're exploring sex and sexuality, that's a beautiful foundation to build the rest of your life from. But for those folks who weren't so fortunate, they have more undoing to do later on in life. So, yeah, we do want to reach them.
- [35:26]
Host
Yeah. I mean, they seem to be the most vulnerable population.
- [35:28]
Caitlin V
Yeah. And there are people doing some incredible work on educating folks who are under the age of 18. And there are all kinds of excellent resources that are age appropriate because, you know, it's not. We talk about, like, the talk or the birds and the bees, but it's not a single conversation.
- [35:42]
Host
I never even got that from my parents.
- [35:43]
Caitlin V
No, really?
- [35:44]
Host
No.
- [35:44]
Caitlin V
I insisted on it because I was like. I was like this when I was younger.
- [35:49]
Host
Yeah. How'd it go?
- [35:51]
Caitlin V
You know, it went great, actually, because, you know, I demanded it because I was already hearing it from other people. So people's older siblings, my friends in middle school, they were sharing details. And so I went to my mom and I said, we need to talk, and I need you to confirm that this is true or not. And she was like, you know, she heard out everything that I had heard and said. Like, that's true, and that's not really true, and that shouldn't be true for people your age. And, you know, if you have any additional questions. I think she was shocked at how early that came up for me. I think she was hoping that it had not yet, and it was actually way late. It would have been nicer to have that conversation with her instead of, like, piecemealing it together.
- [36:26]
Host
Yeah. So how did you go from 16 and knowing you wanted to work in this field to where you are now? I mean, your YouTube channel has almost a million subscribers. It's very clear that people are searching for this type of content. Many of the videos or multiples of millions of views. I mean, it. And again, people can pretend that sexuality isn't a part of their life. I mean, those people are called liars. Except for, I guess I'm sure there's people out there where it's legitimately not. I mean, I think they're probably a fractional percentage, but, I mean, I think.
- [36:53]
Caitlin V
It affects all of us, whether we're interested in it or not. We live in a culture that has a lot of sexual messaging and advertising and all that. So I did not discover that I wanted to work directly with people right away. I decided to do sex ed. And so I was, like, working with groups and young people in the evening. But then I went and got a degree in conflict studies, actually, and in, like, art history. And I have a minor in Japanese. And I got to do this, like, very nice, like, liberal arts school. And my thesis then was on sexual health as a human right in International law. Like, all of the things that had been codified to that point that were, like, designed to protect sexual sovereignty and autonomy and just like, the, like, lovely international things that lacked any teeth and any sort of, like, actual. I don't know, I don't wanna say they lacked impact, but that's what I was interested.
- [37:48]
Host
They may well have lacked impact.
- [37:50]
Caitlin V
Yeah, they did, I think, across the board. But that was a while ago. So, anyways, I left that and I decided to go get a master's in public health because I knew that I could go and study sexuality at that level, at a population level. And I was living in Indiana at the time. So Indiana University was the home of the Kinsey Institute. It's a fantastic institution for studying sexuality. So I went there, I got a master's in public health. I got invited to follow my advisor there to the University of Texas School of Public Health to work on my doctorate. And I was in my doctoral program and so miserable. I did not like being in the ivory tower. I did not like the feeling of, like, we're gonna just continue to publish and publish and publish, and other academics and researchers are gonna read it. I had this feeling of, like, what about the people who need this? What about the folks who are, like, suffering right now today? And a little bit of information could change the rest of their life. I mean, it could keep their marriage together. It could have them, you know, seek the kind of support that they need. It could have them have a conversation that would change the course of their entire sexuality. Like, that's what I was living for. So I was always teaching at night and holding groups. And eventually I realized that I did not want to continue to pursue an academic path because I was good at it and I was going to keep going at it, right? Like, I was going to end up being a tenure track professor, and I was just never going to get out of the ivory tower. So I left that and I. A friend kind of Gave me the word coaching. I was out for lunch and I said, I just want to help people. Like I just want to help people enjoy what I believe is a birthright. And she was like, oh, that kind of sounds like a coach. So I started wearing that moniker and as soon as I started identifying to people like I'm a sex coach, I. People would just like waterfall me with all kinds of information. Like I didn't, I didn't need to ask any follow up questions. They would be like, oh my God, it started when I was 14 in the babysitter and let me tell you. And I'd have to be like, look, I'm not your sex coach. You know, like we haven't. I am a lawyer. I'm not your lawyer, you know. But I knew that I was onto something and that's been me my whole life. I was the girl that when my friends had to take a pregnancy test at the Burger King bathroom, like I was in the stall, right? I was the one of my friends called me and told me he put Icy Hot on on his balls when I was in high school.
- [39:56]
Host
Classic mistake.
- [39:57]
Caitlin V
Called me and was like, what should I do? And by the way, that guy's dad was a doctor. I was like, I'm not qualified. Yeah, you don't share that with your parents. What was you wait it out. He called me on my parents landline at 10pm to be like, my dick's on fire. You know, I wash it off. I have no further information for you. What life was like before we had the Internet that we do today.
- [40:16]
Host
Michael, just out of curiosity, if you were to Google, what should you do if you put Icy Hot on your balls? What does it come up with?
- [40:23]
Caitlin V
I think it's just, I'm going to say something like wash with a castile soap would be my guess. And then give it 20 years later.
- [40:28]
Host
And give it some time.
- [40:29]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah. I've had some time to think about it and it turns out it's going.
- [40:32]
Host
To suck for a bit regardless of what you do.
- [40:34]
Caitlin V
Breathe. Breathe.
- [40:36]
Michael
Icy Hot is applied to the testicles. Immediately rinse the area with large amounts of cool water to remove the chemical as it can cause severe burns, blistering and intense irritation.
- [40:45]
Caitlin V
Can I call, I guess if you're allergic to it. Your reaction to icy hot? Yeah, 20 years too late.
- [40:51]
Host
Google. Wow.
- [40:52]
Caitlin V
Anyway, there you go.
- [40:53]
Host
That's the pearl of wisdom for the listeners for today.
- [40:56]
Caitlin V
That's what you're getting out of this episode. Goodbye.
- [41:01]
Host
Inquiring minds might want to. We might have saved Somebody at Google we could have.
- [41:04]
Caitlin V
Milks are still number one and cold water.
- [41:07]
Host
So how'd you get your first client?
- [41:09]
Caitlin V
I was just posting on Facebook, actually.
- [41:11]
Host
Facebook.
- [41:11]
Caitlin V
I just literally, I went on Facebook, I went on Reddit. I was like, hey, I'm in Chicago. I am a sex coach. I was charging $25 an hour because I felt like I could just give someone $25 back. Like, you know, if they were like, you didn't do a good job. Job good, have your money back. You know, the coaching industry is unregulated, so there wasn't like, I didn't have a need to go get a certification. I had already been teaching this stuff and learning about it since I was 16 years old. I used to have my dad drop me off at Barnes and Noble and I would read the science sex books. Like, not the erotic fiction ones. Like the Anatomy and Physiology of Sexuality and Women's Anatomy of Arousal. Like, I had been studying that stuff for a decade at that point. And so I just realized that the quickest way to helping people was just to offer my time in exchange for money. Like, that's it. I'm a coach. You can have your money back if I fail you.
- [41:57]
Host
And how quickly did you get your first inquiry?
- [41:59]
Caitlin V
It's still. I don't even remember who it was. You know, actually, I do, I do. There was. There was a client early on that like, changed how we ended up here in particular, because at first I was working with anybody. I worked with women, I worked with couples, I worked with men, like gay men. It didn't matter. Like, you have sex problems, I'll you solve them. And then I worked with a young rideshare driver, and he came to me because he was dealing with premature ejaculation. And he also, because of that, was like completely lacking in confidence. Just felt like his self esteem was low. He didn't know how to date or approach women. And so we worked together for several months. And then, like, I couldn't get him to schedule our last session. He was kind of dodging me. And at first I felt like, oh my God, like, maybe his P.E. came back. I failed him. He doesn't want to talk to me anymore. I don't know. And then sure enough, he. He's like, can we have the last session in person? And mind you, I was just. I wasn't on the Internet really at the time. I was just doing everything locally. And he goes, I want to meet you at a park. And I was like, oh, my God, he wants my kidneys. All right.
- [42:58]
Host
But like, I'll be the guy with the ski mask.
- [43:00]
Caitlin V
Totally. Yeah. So I was like, a public park, Fine. All right. And sure enough, I get to the park and I see him like, trudging through the park with like a giant cooler over his shoulder. And I was like, that's what he's gonna put my kidneys in, right? And he sets it down in front of me and opens it up and it's full of. Of like cut up frozen watermelon. And he's like, I brought this for you. Like, it's just something to say thank you. I figured we could just.
- [43:23]
Host
It's not laced with anything.
- [43:24]
Caitlin V
Yeah. He's like, I figured we could just sit in the park in the summer and eat some watermelon together. And then he. And this. I cannot make this up, reaches into his pocket and hands me like, the stickiest, gooiest wad of cash that I could imagine. Watermelon juice on it and everything.
- [43:38]
Host
And he's like, I'm sure it was watermelon juice.
- [43:40]
Caitlin V
And this is the tip. This is a tip for you because you, you changed my life. He's like, literally, he gave me like, his rideshare driver tips because he felt like what we had done together had changed his life so significantly that, like, he wanted to go out of his way in that way to thank me. And that was a huge eye opening moment for me because I realized that this thing that, you know, I had not intended to set out to do, which, like help a guy overcome performance anxiety and help him to figure out how to last longer in bed, like, had changed his world in such a significant way that I needed to pay attention to that. I really believe in answering the call that's being presented to you. And I had a couple other really intense experiences like that where I was able to help someone. It was easy for me. It was fun for me. I enjoyed helping these guys figure out what was going on for them. And then they expressed to me the level of transformation that that had allowed them throughout their entire life. Helped them to heal a relationship with their parents. Help them to ask for, raise, or leave a job with a boss that was abusive towards them.
- [44:45]
Host
And these are sex related issues that cascaded well beyond outside of that particular zone.
- [44:50]
Caitlin V
The way you do one thing is the way you do everything.
- [44:52]
Host
It's very Musashi of you. What is it? Once you know the way broadly, you can apply it to everything or. I just completely love that.
- [44:58]
Caitlin V
Oh, I love that quote. Yeah, Same thing, but different, right? If you are kind of like stucked up or you feel like you have to do things just the right way in order to be worthy, or you feel like not enough in one area of your life. Chances are, chances are that that does spill over into the majority of other areas in your life. And if you are always rushing to get something done or feeling like you can't perform up to the expectations that you have and you're not allowed to actually ever speak about that aloud or you have a great deal of shame. All of that I like to think about sex is sort of one on ramp to self inquiry or self reflection or personal development. And there are other on ramps. You can explore your relationship with money, you can explore your relationship with your parents, you can explore your relationship with like your physical body and exercise. All of those are perfectly valid on ramps. They all kind of lead towards the same thing, right. Which is developing, I think anyways, a relationship to yourself of knowing yourself, of having some degree of practice of discipline, of like you develop as a person. Yeah, they're all on ramps to the same place. And I like to think that if you choose the on ramp of sex, that we're starting at a particularly deep point in the person person, we're going to like a very deep, vulnerable core piece of you as an individual. And so if we work on that, it is naturally going to start to unfold as sort of like if you unravel this one knot that's sort of like very deeply at the center of all the other knots, you're gonna loosen up everything.
- [46:24]
Host
Yeah, I find those knots can be. Regardless of what it is, if there's an area in your life that you are struggling with or it is consuming your attention. This is just me speaking for myself. It's like a black hole. It has gravity that pulls. It doesn't pull things into a different dimension. It just pulls everything closer to that knot and it all starts getting intertwined. So that makes sense.
- [46:43]
Caitlin V
Yeah, that's true. I think that that's true especially for like things that feel like addictions or. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
- [46:49]
Host
So how long working with men and women and couples until you started seeing patterns?
- [46:55]
Caitlin V
So I'm a researcher. Right. So I came from. I came from the ivory tower. I came from, you know, I had 24 hour access to a clinic. I used to drive samples.
- [47:02]
Host
That's a really weird sentence.
- [47:04]
Caitlin V
I know. It's one of the weirdest things. I used to receive urine samples in the mail. I had such an interesting job and it was my job, by the way, to like Reach out to and find these people and convince them to join our study and to get tested and to, you know, pee into a cup and mail it to me in downtown Indianapolis, that I would drive it over to the lab before they defrosted, by the way. It was such a. What a time that was. So. So I went from. From like, having this, like, very, very intense background in scientific rigor to being in the wild west of coaching and just taking on clients who, you know, had no real relationship to each other. But I was sort of using them as. As controls against each other to test different things. So I also was fortunate in that, like, in my formal education, I had not been exposed to. And it's partially because there isn't a lot of research that was specific to premature ejaculation or performance anxiety. So I was going in and able to actually develop a theory from pretty much nothing. It was like doing grounded research because I didn't have exposure to that. And when I did look into the scientific researches, it was very limited at the time. This is 10 years ago. It's still very limited. It's not a subject that gets a lot of funding. There's not a lot of money to be made off of premature ejaculation. In particular, they do prescribe SSRIs off label to treat premature ejaculation, but that's not the major source of income for anyone developing and selling SSRIs, so there's not a lot of money to be made in it. So there's not a lot of research going into it. So I instead would speak to client A and then tell him to try test A and then speak to client B and have him try B and C and then switch it up and then see what client B did with C's protocol. And I would just keep notes across all of them. And eventually I would say that there are certain patterns that really developed. The biggest pattern is across the board, and this is true for all performance anxiety is, I think, tension. That's the word that I use to describe it, and that is physical tension, especially, like, tightness in the pelvic floor, tightness throughout the hips. A lot of people are carrying around.
- [49:16]
Host
Literally, like, literally punching for lack of just being.
- [49:19]
Caitlin V
Yeah, because think about it. When you. When you feel a certain degree of, like, pressure to perform, that often does manifest in the body as, like, a whole holding. Right. Like, I gotta roll my shoulders back. Maybe I stop breathing very deeply. Okay, maybe not.
- [49:31]
Host
You have.
- [49:32]
Caitlin V
You have specialized training in, like, how maybe not to do that.
- [49:34]
Host
I just accept moderate and mediocre performance in all aspects of my life. So I let go and just like, fuck it. It's gonna be what it is.
- [49:40]
Caitlin V
Let go is exactly it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is releasing tension. Totally.
- [49:44]
Host
Like, I don't know if I'm good enough to do this, but, like, I'm probably not. So fuck it, let's go.
- [49:48]
Caitlin V
We'll find out, right? Yeah, it's. Exactly. But if you're coming into something going, like, I have to do this, and I have to do this.
- [49:51]
Host
I know what you're talking about, and.
- [49:52]
Caitlin V
The future of my relationship depends on it. And whether or not she stays with me or whether or not I'm a man, man depends on this. Right. Especially if you're. If you're. You know, they say that, like, it's money. Muscles and mojo is what makes a man feel like a man. Often the triple M. And if you feel like you don't have access to, you know, a, like, solid core in any of those, or if you feel like you're, you know, maybe like, you. You don't have a. A lucrative job, or you don't feel like you're a traditionally attractive or tall or handsome, like, there. There are a lot of ways in which sex comes to mean a whole lot more than. And pleasure for people. So you come into sex with all of that baggage, right? And then you're holding tension in your physical body often. And people literally hold tension to treat. To reach orgasm, right? So you're coming in with a bunch of tension already. You're putting yourself up to having an orgasm a lot faster. But there's also quite a bit of tension that occurs in your mind and in sort of like your heart and your emotions as well. If you feel like you can't maybe speak these things out loud because you can never let your partner know that you. You're feeling fear or you're feeling insecure. All of this kind of adds up to someone who's not actually capable of being present and just doing the dance.
- [51:08]
Host
You know, which probably makes it even worse, especially if they have historical failure in that. Like, that's a. That sounds like you're on a water slide to hell.
- [51:16]
Caitlin V
Totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And each time it gets worse because each time you have that experience, you're thinking, oh, my God, I hope I'm gonna use Ed, for example, like, okay, so I lost my erection the last time that I had sex with this person. Oh, my God. If it happens to again. What if it happens again? I can't like stand the thought of it happening again now, you're way to.
- [51:31]
Host
Stay in the moment, buddy.
- [51:32]
Caitlin V
Totally right. Like, what chance does your body have of performing when you're like, you know, like you're watching yourself from outside of yourself? How, what prayer do you have of being present? Right. And this is why I say that, like the things that I have noticed that are true across the entire spectrum, this is true for men, it's true for women, are the same things that allow us to be present and to slow down enough to relate to another person and relate to ourself. Going back to porn and porn, allowing us to put all of our attention outside of ourself in order to have sex with another person and have it be really fulfilling, you have to be willing to put your attention inside of yourself. Tracking your own body, your own thoughts, et cetera, and tracking their body at the same time. It takes practice to develop that sort of skill. And if you're overly tracking yourself or if you're overly tracking the other person and then you're not remaining balanced, you're not centered enough to really be present in the experience.
- [52:27]
Host
That makes sense. Yeah, that makes sense. Other than tension, what else do you see causing? Maybe in couples there's gotta be. I just, I think one of the human conditions is thinking we're incredibly unique. And I've come to the realization that we're pretty much like 98% the same and we all have kind of the same thoughts and we're capable of negative self talk or getting stuck somewhere else. I just, I feel like there's probably patterns and couples that you see as well. And I would imagine this is a hypothesis. A lot of it stems from communication as well.
- [52:59]
Caitlin V
I would argue that pretty much all of it stems from communication and can also be cleaned up, at least in part through communication. A lot of people jump straight to tactics and skills and they want to like, you know, like, teach me how to touch her in such a way that like, she, she melts or she has an orgasm or whatever the skills and the techniques are. They're simple, actually. And honestly, I can't tell you exactly what's going to work for your partner. The best thing I can do is teach you a system that will help you to assess and work with her, to figure out what works for her on any given moment. All of the things that have to come prior to that are related to your ability to communicate about your intimacy.
- [53:34]
Host
And is that where the issue comes?
- [53:37]
Caitlin V
So I think that my sort of central theory is that we all evolved to have sex successfully.
- [53:45]
Host
Right.
- [53:45]
Caitlin V
Again, this is literally how we all.
- [53:46]
Host
You and I wouldn't be sitting here if that weren't the case.
- [53:48]
Caitlin V
Exactly. 400,000 years of uninterrupted sexual reproduction and only, like, recently, IVF and options that don't involve sexual reproduction. Really, 99.9% of all humans, anything that is stopping us from having a sex life that is at least satisfying is something that is actually like gumming up the works that we are born with. It is something that is coming from outside of us or internally in the sense that it's like a thought or an emotion or a pattern that's coming from inside of us or inside of the relationship. But it's really. I like to think about it. It's like it's all blockages. This is meant to flow like you have. You are born essentially with a system where the flow is unobstructed. And then the things that we pick up along the way, the things that our partners say to us, digs, the pain that we spe experience, heartbreak, shame, messages from our schools and our peers and our parents, like, all of these things start to plug up the flow. And the cool thing about what you can do as a couple, if you're willing to do it and you have to have two people that are willing to do it, is you can sort of highlight for each other where those blockages are. And sometimes the blockages are too intense for you to just work together, and you need to bring in a third person or professional. But the cool thing is that what I have found in the couples that I've worked with is if there is a will, there is a way you can find a place where both people can experience what it is that they want sexually and beyond. But you have to be willing to put in that work. And a lot of that work is communication. A lot of that work is in the nature of communication.
- [55:22]
Host
Do you find that maybe the issue begins because they don't know how to start the communication or have the conversation? Because, I mean, sex or sexuality, I mean, if you're with a partner or with somebody for a long time, I would hope that it could be easier, but I think sometimes it could actually even be harder because you could be more ingrained in your own personal BS or your habit or routine or whatever that is. It's not the easiest conversations to have. Right? There could be a level of embarrassment or like, you know, fragility, or you feel like you're a little bit too vulnerable. Like, I get that. Is it but are you just seeing people that are not willing to have the conversation or they just don't know how to start it?
- [55:58]
Caitlin V
It's definitely both. We don't have great models for communication. Right. And when I talk to clients, sometimes they have a level of resistance around even developing and, like, adhering to those models of communication because it can feel a little forced, a little too structural. Maybe even, like I've heard a client say, like, this is too corporate in nature. I don't want to do that. But the truth is that models and structures allow us to have great results. And we know that from running a company. We know that. Right. Like, when we have a repeatable system, when we have a breakdown at my company, I know exactly how we're going to repair it. I know exactly what we're going to do in the next meeting. We're gonna spend time on that one thing. We're gonna use the system that we have put in place and that allows everything to run really smoothly. But for some reason, we're like, that takes the romance out of relationships.
- [56:40]
Host
No, the nightmare in business is if you don't have a system and you're winging it every single day.
- [56:44]
Caitlin V
And the same is true for relationship. So I think that makes sense. Yes. These conversations are difficult to have. Sometimes we're totally unpracticed at having them. Sometimes we've just never done it before. And so our lizard brain is like, this is for sure gonna kill me. I'm definitely gonna to die. Right. Skydiving, for example. Right. Like you the first time, every part of your brain, I've not done it, but I'm assuming has to be going, like, I'm going to die. And then you land, and then you're like, oh, I didn't die. I can do that again. Right. And then the like, I'm going to die part has to quiet down a little bit over time. Same is true for having conversations about sex.
- [57:16]
Host
I never had the I was going to die. I think the resounding narrative in my head was, you're an idiot, you're an idiot, you're an idiot.
- [57:21]
Caitlin V
Why are you an idiot? Because you might die. Yeah.
- [57:24]
Host
Actually, though, the equivalent quiets once you leave the aircraft the first time. And then I actually think you need a little bit of the I'm gonna die always. If that totally goes out, you're not paying attention to the risk.
- [57:36]
Caitlin V
Absolutely.
- [57:37]
Host
In that particular genre, you know, testing gravity is not a low risk activity. Right.
- [57:42]
Caitlin V
And it shouldn't be. We should never. And the same is true with relating. Right. I think that for the most part, our parents probably didn't show us how to have those conversations. If they had them, if they did a good job with that, they didn't do it in of front front of us. And maybe they did demonstrate that with us, but maybe we haven't seen other. Other elder couples in our lives demonstrate that. So we just don't even know that it's possible. So for example, my. My partner and I, when we need to have a conversation, like, we need to have a. Like a relationship level, we've had like some kind of breakdown where we're like circling a conflict. We don't see it eye to eye in something important. You ignore it, we bury it and.
- [58:17]
Host
We move on with a steamroller because it'll never come up.
- [58:20]
Caitlin V
We usually buy a flight somewhere and we. And we put on our.
- [58:24]
Host
Yes, tell me more about this.
- [58:26]
Caitlin V
Get out of there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then we just wait.
- [58:28]
Host
And then we never argue about the same thing again on a merry go round.
- [58:31]
Caitlin V
And then the range of things that we can talk about gets slower and slower and smaller and smaller and smaller. And pretty soon it's just like, what do you want for dinner? And what are we. Where are we getting ice cream. Yeah. Like all healthy couples. I was professional. That is why I do it that way.
- [58:42]
Host
The goal of every relationship, to get to a point where you actually do not talk and don't feel comfortable in your own home. That is the apex of.
- [58:51]
Caitlin V
I wish that for everyone.
- [58:53]
Host
It's when you. It's. It's. It's the chef's kiss. It's when you've arrived. It's the top of the mountain.
- [58:58]
Caitlin V
When you have to hide each other's.
- [58:59]
Host
You just exist and get a.
- [59:00]
Caitlin V
You hide your browser history.
- [59:02]
Host
Yeah. Get a house with two wings.
- [59:03]
Caitlin V
Yes, yes, yes. Two checking accounts. Never talk about it. No transparency.
- [59:06]
Host
Perfect.
- [59:07]
Caitlin V
What we do is we actually. We've named that. There's a beautiful garden that we go to and we have conversations. We schedule them and we do them in the garden. We start them before dusk, usually around like 2pm if we can do it.
- [59:20]
Host
Okay, so you're giving yourself a couple hours.
- [59:21]
Caitlin V
We give us multiple hours of daylight, but not too much time because we actually need. For the garden closes at five. Like I know we have from two to five to have this conversation, which actually is very important because I need to know that it's going to end at one point. Right. And we don't have endless capacity to hold emotional space and keep track of all the things that we've discussed. And you know, I said to a client recently, take notes. He said, oh, I keep having these deep conversations with my partner at like 9pm at night. And then I don't remember all the things that we discussed the next day. But it was really important stuff. Well, then take notes.
- [59:53]
Host
Notes.
- [59:53]
Caitlin V
Okay. Why would you treat your work as if it is so important that you're willing to write things down, but you wouldn't treat your primary romantic relationship that's gonna have a way larger influence on the course of your life and maybe that you'll stay with longer than any job you'll ever have, but you won't treat it with the same level of respect and dignity to just, like, write some things down. And if you don't wanna write some things down, ask if it's cool to record it, have a conversation and have it recorded. And then throughout the conversation, go back and say, hey, let's just summarize what we've done discussed so far. I want to make sure that I'm understanding. Let me rephrase what I just heard to you so that I know that I got it. Really basic communication tools that work outside of romantic relationships that make a huge difference and make it a lot safer if we know, okay, we got to have a conversation about the sex life. We're going to do it during a time where we have space before to, like, take care of ourselves. I'm going to. I'm not going to be rushed. I'm going to get a shower and a lunch.
- [60:48]
Host
Your insults and arguments.
- [60:49]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [60:49]
Host
I'm going to open with this, this, and then they're probably going to say this, and then I'm coming right over.
- [60:53]
Caitlin V
Oh, you have no idea that you're described. I am. I am that person. I am. I. In fact, I spend that hour unwinding all of the insults. I say them to myself so that I'm not going to say them. Yeah, totally. Yeah.
- [61:04]
Host
It's time to go into those conversations with your guard actually down.
- [61:07]
Caitlin V
Yes.
- [61:08]
Host
I mean, everybody goes into every situation, whether they realize it or not, with their combined life experiences. And they're not all the same and they're not all great. And especially if you've been hurt or burned. It's tough to go into those without having like a. Like a little bit of a force field up.
- [61:21]
Caitlin V
Oh, my gosh. And not wanting to, like, defend ourselves. Right. Like, I desire to defend myself 100% of the time. I did what I did for a reason. Right.
- [61:29]
Host
And sometimes, though, I think the Danger in that is, is the person isn't attacking you. They're seeking clarity, but you take it as an attack.
- [61:34]
Caitlin V
Exactly, exactly, exactly. And we're not giving them grace when we are defending ourselves. We are jumping into. We are jumping beyond the part where we can be curious and understand what it was that they meant by that and straight to. But like, you don't get it and don't tell me how I think and, and, and like, I am not coming to you as someone who is so evolved that they don't do those things. Right. Like, the reason that I had to learn all of these systems is because I have a wicked tongue. My ex husband said to me at one point, you've said things to me that I can never unhear.
- [62:04]
Host
Because that's true of everything you've ever heard, dipshit. You know, like, oh, I hope my.
- [62:09]
Caitlin V
Ex husband gets to see you calling him a dipshit. That would be delightful.
- [62:12]
Host
I don't know him personally, but that, that's like, I've just seen things that I can't see. I'm like, yeah, that's how vision works.
- [62:21]
Caitlin V
That is true.
- [62:21]
Host
If your eyes were open and you saw it, you might be able to get past it. But yeah, I can't get into a time machine and put my hands in front of your eyes.
- [62:27]
Caitlin V
So your work is to actually be able to forgive or move on. And that's why we're divorced, because we reached a level where we couldn't continue to forgive.
- [62:35]
Host
How long were you guys married?
- [62:37]
Caitlin V
Married for five years.
- [62:38]
Host
Together for nine, 19 years and 11, seven months that you were married together for two years before that and divorced. Remarried now.
- [62:46]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, I knew you were married now. How long have you been married now?
- [62:49]
Host
Just over three years. Yeah, it. I learned and I don't execute it perfectly or even well. I would leave that up to my wife's choice. Even though she'd probably be wrong in how she described my excellence in.
- [63:03]
Caitlin V
I have many reasons as to why.
- [63:05]
Host
Do you want to go alphabetically or, or historically. No, I know communication. I was very. We were both very young when we got married. And I'm not saying that people can't get young married when they're young. I would, I would put a little bit of caution into that. Like, yes, 22 years. I don't even remember who I was when I was 22. And I look back now, I'm like, God, I wish I could choke myself and just wring my own neck for a little bit. However, out of that came three beautiful Kids. So I actually would go through all of that again even with the same outcome because they are amazing in their own ways. But I, you know, and I couldn't. My wife is amazing. But I am trying to take the lessons learned from my previous relationship and own my part of it as well. Because it certainly was a two person dance. It wasn't just one person. And so it's not like I spent a lot of time thinking about my ex. I tried to spend time thinking about and identifying where I. Where it went wrong and what could have gone better. And the communication, I think was always large aspect of that, but it was lack of communication or it was really, I think, a little bit of a gap that got filled with some resentment. Damn. I don't know if there's anything more insidious than that because it breaks down communication even more. And then you start making assumptions about behavior and you tell yourself this story in your head. And I personally, like, I. If I never went past high school, but I feel like I have an honorary doctorate in negative self talk given from my own university that I created about negative self talk. I could teach people if they want. A course usually starts in the morning when I turn the lights on. What's up, you piece of shit?
- [64:40]
Caitlin V
Yeah, a lot of successful people do, right?
- [64:43]
Host
It's, you know, there's actually a healthy. I don't ever want to get to a place where I'm like, you've nailed it. I would always rather feel like I have more that I can do than I have arrived, but that, you know, you can start telling yourself things that aren't true based off of assumptions that if you really go backwards, it was a breakdown on communication with resentment that is like a parasite. And it grew and it grew and it grew and it grew. Now there's a lot of other things, but that is one of the lessons that I have learned. But yeah, it's tough. Especially no relationship is perfect. The people who tell me they have a perfect marriage, I'm like, oh, I know many other liars just like you. Not that they're like a liar, but you're lying to me right to my face in this moment. But it, you know, sometimes it's hard to schedule those conversations and you do get emotionally involved and it's tough to stop yourself short of saying something that you can't unhear. I understand what he's saying, but like, do you live in the world of the real. Like, we all are stuck with the things that we have heard and have to deal with and So I try not to repeat those mistakes. Not perfect at it by any stretch, but those conversations are tough, especially if you're in that heated emotional moment to say, we need to put a pin in this and come back to. To this. Especially if one of the parties likes resolution.
- [65:47]
Caitlin V
Yes. And if they like it urgently, which is me, I'm like, we could just talk about it right now. Let's just get it done right now. I don't care that it's midnight. I don't care that we haven't eaten. I don't care that I want that done right now. And fortunately, today I'm with someone who is wise enough to say, we can wait three days. Everything will be fine. I love you. Very good at validating and saying, you're safe. Our relationship is safe. It is secure. You have nothing to worry about. But we're not going to talk about it until we have time to talk about it. And that's that. That quiets all those parts of me down that just need to hear that. So there's a super healthy night, right? Yeah, incredibly healthy. The, the distinction that I think I try to learn from my relationship with my ex there is that I have my. My go to is to use words to cause harm. And it took me 30 years at least of, of like doing that repeatedly and seeing the impact that it had on the people that I loved before, I was really, really willing to, to let it go. To say like, this is not. This isn't. This isn't a weapon I want to wield anymore. And it's been actually like an unlearning for me because sometimes now I have to remind myself like that there. That actually words do need to be used to, to. To put people like, onto the right track.
- [67:02]
Host
Right.
- [67:03]
Caitlin V
There's there. There is a needle to be thread there. And I am certainly trying to do that all the time. It's different in my personal life and my business because in business you're kind of allowed to be like, hey, get back in your lane. Right. But in your personal life, there's a different balance there. So what I had to unlearn is that just because you could. Just because my brain can think of the worst thing possible to say, to go directly for the jugular and drain them.
- [67:27]
Host
Right.
- [67:28]
Caitlin V
And leave them feeling absolutely just destroyed, that's not a win for me. Right. In my partnership, like, if it is me versus them, we've both lost. So if I'm on this person's team and we are working together against something that we have identified to be a problem for both of us, then it is not up for me to destroy them. That is not how either of us is gonna get out of this better. And so I had to work through this. So the hour that I spend driving to the garden is undoing all of those things in my mind and saying, okay, we don't have to go there. I don't have to go. They're assuming the best intent. You know, he probably didn't mean to do what I think he did, and therefore, I don't need to attack and I don't need to defend. And also, there's this big softening that happens, I think, also just as a consequence of growing older, because we get smoothed out all of the relationships, whether they, like, succeeded because we stayed together long enough to die, which is a pretty tough definition of success, or the relationships that have come and gone with ease. I see myself, personally as like a stone that's just been tumbled and tumbled and tumbled and is getting smoother and smoother all of the. Until my, like. Until I have, like, a smooth, glossy exterior that, like, is easier for me to let go of things to say, you know what? Like, maybe I am the person who should have behaved differently. Maybe. Maybe the thing that I did was what escalated that or what led to that additional conflict. Or maybe I didn't communicate myself clearly, and therefore they had incomplete information. And it wasn't that they were trying to hurt me. It was that that's all that they could operate with.
- [69:00]
Host
I think it's a good thing. It's an hour away for a drive for you as well. I think that preamble and maybe even the post afterwards, I actually think that's really healthy. If it was just around the corner, you probably wouldn't have time to prime yourself to be ready for that conversation.
- [69:14]
Caitlin V
And here's the other thing. I have a lot of support. I have a network of friends who I know I can pick up the phone and they will answer, and I can say, hey, can I just work out this situation with you? He said this thing to me. It brought up that for me. And here's what I'm thinking now. And they can hold that perspective. They can gas me up if that's what I need. Need. They can come at it from my partner's perspective and add, you know, like, well, if I were him, here's how I would be thinking about it. I also have professional support because I am a coach. I've got a lot of resources. A lot of people do not. And they don't utilize the resources that they do have accessible. And this is especially true for men. More men than ever are reporting that they don't have any close friends or that they have very few people that they feel that they can share vulnerable information, information with. Have you seen these staff?
- [70:01]
Host
No. Why do you think that is?
- [70:02]
Caitlin V
Like, I think it's like one in seven men now report that they don't have any close friends.
- [70:07]
Host
See, and technically with our anxiety rectangles, we are living in a world where we're supposed to be the most interconnected ever. Yeah, but I think it's very transactional. I think it's very shallow. Why do you think that people are reporting less and less close friends?
- [70:21]
Caitlin V
Well, I think exactly for that reason that you pointed to. You have access to every single person on the Internet in one way or another. Right.
- [70:27]
Host
Receive, mostly probably receive. But some you can transact super broad.
- [70:31]
Caitlin V
But very shallow interconnectedness as opposed to like very deep but like limited mile.
- [70:38]
Host
Wide and an inch deep versus an inch wide.
- [70:40]
Caitlin V
Exactly. You can, you can, you know the exact thing that you like, what did you like wearing a dive mask and hitting yourself with a pantyhose filled with.
- [70:48]
Host
Like, or someone else. If they're into it, you can find.
- [70:51]
Caitlin V
The other person that's into it out of all of the people. He's right over there.
- [70:54]
Host
No, I got that. He left his Google search history open one time. Unfortunately, he's logged in under my account.
- [70:59]
Michael
So it's on incognito mode.
- [71:00]
Host
But I guess, listen, I don't care. Whatever, like I said, whatever turns your screen.
- [71:04]
Caitlin V
No yucking. You're young. But the cool thing is you can find that person now. But the thing is that you may not know your neighbor now. Right? Yeah, like I, I, I think it's, it's a, it's a, it's a number of factors that have all led in this to this point. Why do I think it's worse for men than it is for women? I think men more acutely feel like, I think that the impact on men is just that much worse than it is on women. I think the way that women are socialized, the way that women sort of interact with each other is already to build more of a network of relationships.
- [71:38]
Host
Well, you guys communicate at a higher level, even just from a word count.
- [71:40]
Caitlin V
Use per day and more frequently and with more folks. And again, we evolved also to do that because this is part of what allows us to communicate, care for and raise children. Right. And so women have had all these like protective factors against extreme social isolation. And they're still experiencing it, too. So men have less of those protective factors, and so they're feeling it even worse. I mean, what are your thoughts? Why do you think that is?
- [72:07]
Host
I don't. I don't know. I do think it has something to do with people thinking. Thinking that they know somebody or in interacting just with the screen in front of them, there's. There's something missing there. It might provide at a very shallow level what they think that they're looking for, but there's no depth to it, like you said. And also, we're bombarded with negativity. And I think people get. I mean, I don't think. I don't have the stats on natural disasters, but if there is an earthquake in somewhere across the world, we're going to hear about it in our feet almost instantly. I don't think that used to be the case. And I don't think our brain is designed to deal with the amount of negativity that we have access to. So I think it shuts people down and isolates them. And since men, statistically, even though there are some men I couldn't get to shut up if I wanted to, they talk less. And so I think they just build themselves into a little cave and they just go a little bit farther and farther and farther. The problem is there's nothing great in there.
- [73:05]
Caitlin V
No, no, no. There's. There's literally nothing in there.
- [73:07]
Host
Yeah. Actually, there's very few people I know that actually thrive. Like, if Covid didn't show people anything, there were a couple people. They're like, this is the best. I want Covid to last forever. Almost everybody else was. My mental health is horrible. I feel completely disconnected. I hate this. I want to be around other people.
- [73:26]
Caitlin V
I think we realized, for me, anyways, I realized really, the ways in which I took those relationships for granted because I thought that they would just always be there. I didn't even know what they were doing for me, but the power of community was really holding for me. Yeah, I think the. The. The. The consequence of the amount of isolation that people experience, combined with the fact that when you reduce another person to, like, a single picture, right, Like a profile picture, they're this big, and that's.
- [73:55]
Host
All who they are. The totality of their being.
- [73:56]
Caitlin V
Everything you've got, right, you've got like 150 characters or so many words of an Instagram bio and then some images from their life. And then you feel like you have. Have enough information to make an assessment about this person, about their character, about their interests, about whether or not you would ever be friends. And then furthermore, you feel like you have space and freedom behind the screen to say anything to them, anything at all. If that person was behind you at the grocery store, you would realize that you have a full person in front of you with a life who, who had a history at a morning and has kids and a family and has their. The shit that they're dealing with. Right. But when you reduce them to a two dimensional object on a screen, they're not really a whole human anymore. Right. They're a sparring partner in the comment section. And I think that that also further isolates us because we experience people treating us like that. I don't know what your experience is existing as a person on the Internet or like comment section, just like everybody else's. Yeah, but like people feel like they'll say things about us in this conversation as well, right?
- [74:56]
Host
For sure.
- [74:56]
Caitlin V
And you know, one of the. I try to be really selective about reading the comments because one of the things that like kind of comes up for me whenever I see something particularly like hateful towards me is like, I'm a person. I can't see you saying that to me.
- [75:12]
Host
No, they wouldn't. Another thing in the grocery store analogy is you better be real careful who you mouth off to because you might just get punched right in the face.
- [75:18]
Caitlin V
That's true.
- [75:19]
Host
And there's no consequence of that on the Internet, right? Yeah. I was listening to very recently, recently an episode with Rogan and Ethan Hawke and he was talking about critics of his performance. And I would totally agree that those people, they're artists for sure. And you know, art can be interpreted by different people. And he was talking about the negative reviews and how he would love to say it doesn't impact him, but it does. And Joe's point, and I've heard him made it a few times, and I think I've talked about this particular type of comment on the show is he basically said, do you think Michael Jordan is online in your comment section trying to tear you down? He's not. The guy's out there crushing it. The most successful, fulfilled, happy people are not to be found online. Not because they're not capable of it. It's just not how they became the person that they are. So remember that when you're seeing the negative comment. And also we have a negativity bias. So I don't know about you. You get a thousand. This was the most. You changed my life and you'll get one comment. Comment. Like your shoes make you look like a moron.
- [76:19]
Caitlin V
Totally. Yeah. And that's the only one you remember.
- [76:21]
Host
100. I'm gonna find you and use all of my law enforcement contacts. And I'm not going to kill you. I'm going to kill your family. Hypothetical.
- [76:31]
Caitlin V
Forget the thousand nice things. You guys don't matter at all. This one guy.
- [76:35]
Host
And then you don't know the person. And I suspect, of course, I have no data to show this, but I suspect that the people who are the most likely to make the negative comments are probably in a place in their life where you wouldn't want to trade with them.
- [76:46]
Caitlin V
Yes. Yeah.
- [76:47]
Host
So why do we pay attention? It's. And I literally can say all that, and then I am as susceptible to getting cooked by it.
- [76:54]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah. But. And then I wonder, like, in terms of the. The loneliness epidemic and the experience that men are having is, like, how much of this is just happening on an individual level where, like, they're. Whether they're the subject of those or the recipient of those, but they're. They're like, just swimming in this sauce. And so this becomes reality. Right. If you're not spending a significant amount of time in, like, the default world reality, like, out interacting with the people, maybe at a job, maybe community service, maybe in a men's group or maybe whatever it is, like, you're not in the tangible world.
- [77:25]
Host
Just go play an organized sport. You're gonna work on communication, teamwork, pros and cons risk, all of these things.
- [77:32]
Caitlin V
And just feeling strong in your body helps you to feel strong in your mind.
- [77:35]
Host
Yeah, Right.
- [77:36]
Caitlin V
Like, pushing yourself allows you to know that you have. You. You have limits beyond that which you knew. Like, you. You can go much further than you thought that you could. You can have conversations that you didn't know that you could. I think especially younger people and the. The stats that are coming out, particularly around, like, young men in their early 20s who have, like, never been on a date or never asked a woman out on a date or had any sort of romantic relationship.
- [77:57]
Host
Like, what are you laughing at, Michael?
- [77:59]
Caitlin V
I think so much of that.
- [78:00]
Michael
I saw that.
- [78:01]
Host
What did you see?
- [78:02]
Caitlin V
Are you watching the monitors?
- [78:03]
Host
Did the camera happen to see that? Are you making this up?
- [78:06]
Michael
Oh, no, I saw it.
- [78:07]
Host
Did the camera see it? Nope. Didn't happen. Yeah. So here, let's roll you in here, Michael. You went to Rome and Japan. Yep. How many women did you talk to on your trip?
- [78:19]
Michael
A handful.
- [78:21]
Host
She's lying about that. I think this episode is brought to you by Better Help. We did it. We're into 2026 through the holiday season. And if you're anything like me, especially in years past, you know, the holidays can be a little bit rough. There's stress, there's buildup, there's anxiety. And there's no better time to check under the hood to see how your you're doing than in January. Start your new year off by reinvesting in yourself. I've had a lot of problems in my life. Some of them small, some of them big, some of them I had the answers to and the tools that allowed me to be capable to work through them and others I didn't. And I needed to reach out to a higher level of care. In the digital world that we live in, you are always going to have access to talk to somebody, even if you live geographically very remote. So with Better help, there's over 30,000 therapists. It's the world's largest online therapy platform, having served over 5 million people globally. And it works with an App store rating of 4.9 out of 5 based on over 1.7 million client reviews. It's extremely convenient. You can join a session with a click of a button from your mobile device so it fits right into your busy life. Plus you can switch therapists at any time. As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. Expertise. Talk it out with Better Help listeners get 10 off their first month at betterhelp.com ClearedHop that's Better Help. H E L P Hotel echo Lima papa.com ClearedHot Back to the show. Okay. Went to Japan and took pictures of architecture.
- [79:51]
Michael
Here's your question. How many women did you talk to?
- [79:53]
Host
Yeah.
- [79:54]
Michael
A handful.
- [79:54]
Host
Yeah, but I know you're lying though because you're embarrassed to say zero.
- [79:57]
Michael
No, I legitimately did talk to a handful. Now was it an actual conversation? No, not really. It was like a server.
- [80:04]
Host
Yeah.
- [80:05]
Michael
But I did talk to women.
- [80:06]
Caitlin V
That's any other like people that were tourists or like women that were expats or.
- [80:11]
Michael
I talked to other people like a couple other people. I generally don't really like talking to new people anyways, so I'm just kind of keep to myself. But yeah, I talked to a few other people.
- [80:20]
Host
Really good way to develop a social circle.
- [80:23]
Michael
Yeah, social circle in a different country of people I'll never see again.
- [80:26]
Host
That's what the Internet's for. You could face FaceTime them. Checkmate.
- [80:30]
Michael
Yeah, I don't really want to do that.
- [80:33]
Host
So what he is describing, though, I've also seen some stats, not only around. And I mean, again, I, he, Michael and I know each other really well. People think I give him a hard time, which is 100 accurate. I'm trying to forge him into a weapon that he doesn't even understand the lethality that he'll have. And he's going to crush the world at some point after he's not 23 anymore. But it's. I, we. And we've talked about relationship stuff off air, and obviously I'll leave that stuff off air. But I've also seen stats that are showing men of his age are. That's a little bit more of the trend. And also young men and women are avoiding engaging in sexual activity. Now. What do you think that is? What do you think that's about?
- [81:16]
Caitlin V
Well, I think that online dating has made a pretty significant shift in the way that people meet each other. And there's been some positives that have come from that, and there's been a lot of negatives that have come from the shift towards online dating. Because when you meet someone in person, you have a chance to actually see them in motion. Your nose actually responds much faster to a person than your eyes. Do. You actually get information?
- [81:38]
Host
Yeah.
- [81:38]
Caitlin V
Cause your nose developed first, so it's older technology. And your nose also will tell you so much more about whether or not a person is a good genetic match for you to mate with. Right. Which may or may not mean that they're a great partner for you, but they will let you know that there's attraction there. Your eyes, which are younger in evolution, they will tell you whether or not you're physically attracted to another person. Right. But they can't tell you if the two of you are gonna have, like, any sort of chemistry in the same way that your nose can and in the same way that interacting with someone in a physical space can. I learned how to partner dance in the last couple years. I learned how to swing dance. And you can pick up so much about a person from partner dancing with them. The way that they move and they engage, like, so much more than you can get from just having a conversation and. And certainly so much more than you can get from a photograph. Right. So when we're dating online, we're choosing people with our eyes, and we're not choosing them based off of, like, how they actually move in a space and do they make us laugh and how do they smell? We're choosing them based on, like, five to seven images that they curated and a handful of words. And then online dating becomes a very, very miserable game that people are playing, and they feel like it's just a numbers game because it sort of is how many times you have to roll the dice on someone that you look. That looks attractive to you before you find someone who smells attractive to you, who your body actually feels good around, who you have chemistry with. And so people burn themselves out. They go on 50 or 100 dates to find one person that they want to go on more than one date with.
- [83:05]
Host
That sounds exhausting. It is.
- [83:07]
Caitlin V
It is exhausting. And I'm saying this, like, having had very limited experience with it. All of my partners made significant relationships. I met online or I met in person rather than not really spend a lot of time online dating, because every time I've tried it in my past, I've gone, oh, this is. This. The juice is not worth a squeeze on how much effort this takes. And that's for me.
- [83:27]
Host
Yeah. What did you describe it as, Michael? The last time you described online dating, was it a dumpster fire?
- [83:32]
Michael
Oh, yeah. I mean, something similar to that.
- [83:36]
Caitlin V
You're an attractive guy. I imagine that you would do well. I imagine. Take it easy.
- [83:39]
Host
We don't really use compliments in this, Don.
- [83:41]
Michael
Boost my ego like that.
- [83:43]
Caitlin V
Let me revisit complex. You're not the most hideously ugly person.
- [83:47]
Host
I mean, I could guess a reason or two why somebody might give you a second look.
- [83:51]
Michael
Yeah. It's horrible.
- [83:53]
Host
Yeah. I have zero experience with it, thankfully, because I have heard that version, a dumpster fire version, more often than not.
- [83:59]
Caitlin V
Yeah. Did you find that it was exhausting, like, mentally, emotionally exhausting?
- [84:02]
Michael
It's incredibly exhausting. I mean, even. Even trying to set up a date is like. It's like pulling nails. It's ridiculous.
- [84:09]
Host
Or teeth.
- [84:09]
Michael
I guess the expression pulling teeth and then getting to the date, it's like, half the time, it's not even worth it. You're just like, this person is not what I want at all. And it's just like, oh, my God, it's. It's so exhausting.
- [84:22]
Caitlin V
Whereas, like, if you're in a room with a whole bunch of other people, you can, like, assess.
- [84:26]
Michael
Yeah.
- [84:27]
Caitlin V
20 or 30, maybe. You go to, like, a house party, you can assess, like, 50 other people of the opposite side.
- [84:33]
Host
House party, Big party guy, dj Big Mike.
- [84:40]
Caitlin V
But there is a certain advantage to being in person with other folks or.
- [84:45]
Host
Like, in other countries where he didn't talk to anybody.
- [84:47]
Caitlin V
Yeah. You and I had different.
- [84:51]
Host
I have hope.
- [84:52]
Caitlin V
I travel differently. But it's not for. Again, I'm super extroverted. So everywhere that I've traveled, I've wanted to meet people and date people and have, you know, explore and meet the locals and do all the things.
- [85:03]
Host
So you think the online thing, though, is what's causing the decrease? Do you think it's a decrease in desire to have sex from younger men and women, or they're just tired of the tools that they have to play with?
- [85:12]
Caitlin V
I think that vulnerability is cringe, and I think that. And I'm not shading gen. Michael, write.
- [85:19]
Host
That down for a T shirt.
- [85:20]
Caitlin V
Vulnerability is cringe.
- [85:22]
Host
It might actually sell quite well.
- [85:23]
Caitlin V
I think that. So here's what. I live across the street from middle school.
- [85:26]
Host
Yep.
- [85:27]
Caitlin V
And I don't know if you are familiar with this. This is maybe specific to Los Angeles. I live to. But, like, everyone dresses the same now. Like, every middle schooler, they wear the same clothes. They look indistinguishable from one another. And I mean, you know, no disrespect to the middle schoolers I live across from, but I can't help but notice, like, I'll see them walk in a pack of, like, six or eight, and they all look like carbon copies of each other. There is this sort of move towards a singular, like, acceptable, very sort of lowest common denominator aesthetic that I think we're seeing in public plastic surgery. So we're seeing that in people's faces, and we're seeing it in certainly in younger generations. And I think that's sort of like, across the board. We're seeing sort of like a neutralization of our aesthetic. I mean, you can see it in apps. Like, apps are moving overwhelmingly to, like, black and white and grayscale. They used to be a lot more colorful. So I think we are across the board. We're experiencing this sort of, like, move towards things that. That feel maybe safer, feel a little blander, feel a little more neutral. And I think that the. The experience of online dating is already, like, rife with rejection. It's already a place in which you have to be vulnerable to get a result. But the very act of being vulnerable means that you're putting yourself out there. When people do not want to meet with you or they cancel or they ghost you or they say, but like, that. That hurts on a pretty deep level. And so it's just a lot safer not to. It's just. It's a lot safer to not express yourself outside of what is considered acceptable. It's a lot safer to just not be Vulnerable. And I don't envy people who are growing up a younger generation today who have had their entire life on camera, who have had selfie mode on their phones since Cloud with the selfie. This is the other thing that's true about middle schoolers, at least from my experience I'm not a parent, is that they look a lot older. They, they know more about makeup and hair and all of these things.
- [87:31]
Host
Like when I look at anxiety Rectangle.
- [87:33]
Caitlin V
When I look at my images from middle school, like I, that girl could not exist today. She had braces and a funny haircut and she didn't know any differently. There was no makeup tutorial on YouTube telling me otherwise. I was just like slapping on whatever glitter I had, you know, know, from clients.
- [87:49]
Host
I think your life is better though, at that age, not worrying about the makeup.
- [87:52]
Caitlin V
I agree. But I think that all of that absolutely leads to a world in which we are less excited to engage with one another because we are constantly monitoring ourselves for acceptability.
- [88:02]
Host
That's a lonely place. It also, over a long enough period of time, will destroy populations.
- [88:09]
Caitlin V
I think so, yeah.
- [88:10]
Host
That's not good.
- [88:12]
Caitlin V
No. Well, and here's, you know, what else is interesting about younger generations, that Gen Z drinks a lot less alcohol.
- [88:16]
Host
That's probably for the better.
- [88:17]
Caitlin V
It is for the better. And also, and Jeff Galloway makes this point really eloquently, it means that less people are making sort of like sexual mistakes, which on one hand is great.
- [88:26]
Host
Right.
- [88:26]
Caitlin V
That that probably leads to reduced consent, regret and unconsensual encounters and mixed communications and like, you know, just regretful experiences. Right. And at the same time, a lot of folks, early sexual encounters, at least like for my generation, came with alcohol's assistance 100%. Right.
- [88:43]
Host
And we have a social lubricant candidate to get you outside of your own skin.
- [88:47]
Caitlin V
So really good thing that people are not drinking as much and they're staying in, in their bodies and they're, you know, they're experimenting with other things. But like, you know, alcohol is like a particularly, it's got a lot of negative consequences on the individual and society as a whole. Phenomenal. And we don't have like a replacement social lubricant that allows people to sort of like relax and find a little bit more courage to engage with each other. So there is a bit of a trade off there.
- [89:10]
Host
How do you think we fix that? Because all you're doing is kicking the can down the road, I think. Oh, you think for, for the Gen. Well, here's the thing. How old are You. I'm not supposed to ask when I'm 36. Okay. I'm 48. So basically an elder. It's not a big group.
- [89:29]
Caitlin V
Do you identify as Gen X?
- [89:30]
Host
I don't know. I don't identify as anything. Just show up, show up. I mean, in this world, I could be a Gen Z radio, right. I can identify as whatever I want to. If I can pick a gender, why can't I pick an age? I want Social Security.
- [89:41]
Caitlin V
I know folks who are very Gen z in their 40s. So you can, you can.
- [89:45]
Host
I don't even know what Gen Z.
- [89:46]
Caitlin V
You can identify with. Your identity.
- [89:47]
Host
I was born in the late 70s, whatever that is. I look back on those experiences of being uncomfortable and having to talk yourself into saying hello to somebody and not having the words and just being like, swallow the bug. I gotta go. You need those little micro uppercuts in your life because they in totality, they of course suck in the moment. And you feel like, I am an idiot. I'm never doing that again. And then you're like, oh, I'm gonna go do that again right over here. Really?
- [90:18]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [90:19]
Host
And that helps you later in life. So these people, the young men and women who are devoid of those experiences, they're still gonna have to work through this awkward phase at some point. I guess I'm glad now, looking back at how old I am, that it happened at that phase of my life and because I wouldn't want that to happen in my late 20s. Let's do that in your late teens, early 20s, because then you can build on those things. I'm worried they'd be a little bit behind the power curve.
- [90:42]
Caitlin V
Right. Get that out of the way. You know, it's easier to fall down and get back up when you're young.
- [90:45]
Host
You're the most capable of doing so at that time. Like, yeah, I'm not saying go embarrass yourself where you live, but you're probably going to move away from where you live growing up. So maybe I'm not saying be an asshole, but be the fullest expression of yourself and you might not have to see those people ever again.
- [91:01]
Caitlin V
Be willing to. To make mistakes.
- [91:03]
Host
Yeah, take the little micro uppercuts.
- [91:04]
Caitlin V
Right, right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that those, those little moments of discomfort are exactly what forms you so that you have the capacity to do the things that you want to do later in life. Because life only becomes increasing shades of uncomfortable, but hopefully you get a higher degree of choice as you go.
- [91:20]
Host
Well, that cohort, I think, is Just pushing that can down the road and I don't know if there's a lot of benefit in that.
- [91:24]
Caitlin V
That's an interesting thought. I like your perspective that they're going to have to go through it eventually.
- [91:29]
Host
I don't know how you skip that phase.
- [91:31]
Caitlin V
Well, I. I guess if you want to date, marry, have kids, then I don't know how you skip it.
- [91:37]
Host
I don't think exactly.
- [91:38]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [91:38]
Host
You are gonna. Hey, spoiler alert for everybody on life. You are an idiot. You are going to be an idiot many times.
- [91:44]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [91:45]
Host
The more you're an idiot now, I would like to say, the less you will be in the future. It depends on the person.
- [91:49]
Caitlin V
Well, the good news is that we're all idiots. Like you are not special for. You know, I think that's the other piece of this is like we all, we. You said it earlier. We all kind of believe that we are alone and we're the only one who's dealing with the thing that we're dealing with.
- [91:59]
Host
Such a dangerous perspective.
- [92:00]
Caitlin V
Everybody's got it. A version of the thing that you've got. And when you don't talk to other people about it, even if that person is like a professional, but certainly if you don't talk to another human being, especially one who looks like you, especially if you're a man, if you don't talk to another man or another guy your age or roundabout about the thing, then you are going to continue to live with the illusion that you are alone and you're not. And feeling that you are alone is the thing that causes you to isolate. Then you do become alone.
- [92:27]
Host
Well, then you feel like you're alone, but you're connected to your device. So you have access to the world. It has access back to you, but you're not actually physically interfacing with it. I don't know what comes from that because, I mean, we're in a place now where for the first, my kids do not remember a world pre Internet. I do.
- [92:44]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [92:45]
Host
And My oldest is 22. I have 22, 20 and 17. Boy, boy, girl. So who. I mean, we'll see. I guess what the long term is is because we don't know.
- [92:54]
Caitlin V
Right? We don't. But here's what I think. If I had to like, offer a prescription for the world, I actually think I would take it all the way back to pleasure. I would teach people how to experience and prioritize and feel like they have autonomy in the things that bring them pleasure. It doesn't necessarily. It shouldn't be limited to sex. In fact, if sex is your only source of pleasure, you are setting yourself up to fail because you're gonna put way too much pressure on sex. Right? But if, if it is doing hot yoga that brings you pleasure, pleasure. If it is fishing that brings you pleasure, if it is working and building with your hands that brings you pleasure. If it is like being in community and making food and feeding the people that you love, but focusing on the things that allow for you to feel good, just good for good's sake, things that bring light to other people, that bring joy to other people, because those are the most satisfying things anyways. Those are the things that inoculate us against feeling isolated. Right? You love baking. Yeah. Bake and share what you've baked with other people. I guarantee that will be a source of pleasure for you that you can go back to over and over again. You're digging a well for yourself, right? The cool thing about the things that bring us pleasure is that they are unique to us, right? We share them with other people. But there is a sense of like, autonomy and sovereignty and self expression in that because it doesn't have to. It's not for anyone else. Like it doesn't have to. You can, you can wear the thing that you love so proudly because it is just the thing that you love, right? It gives you an opportunity to connect with other people who are also in that thing or can benefit from that thing. And if you can have a relationship to pleasure as a whole that is not situated in shame, you can allow yourself to enjoy something and you can allow yourself to hold that thing gently because you love it. You don't have to be perfect at it because it brings you joy. You're going to continue to learn about it for the rest your life of rest of your life. Because you're not trying to be perfect at it, you just are receiving satisfaction from it. And then you can bring that into the rest of your world, the rest of your life. If feeling joy and satisfaction and connection for you are associated with getting things right, being perfect, being impeccable, not being vulnerable, it's going to be very, very hard to share your world with other people. And again, just to bring it all the way back to sex. Like sex is a great place for you to start doing that. It's a great place for you to connect with yourself and connect with other people around something that feels good and can be done thoughtfully and intentionally and healthily. And you know, if we, if we, if we just were to focus on that aspect of sex and relationships, I think it would be a lot easier for people to sort of set down the rest of it and just see the inherent good that can come. Come from us in getting involved with one another.
- [95:35]
Host
Yeah. Which is basically what these devices take from you.
- [95:41]
Caitlin V
It is, it is an illusion of pleasure.
- [95:42]
Host
Correct. Yeah. The dope, I mean, the research is resounding. The dopamine, the micro. And then what it does, you get used to it. It destroys self image. It destroys your real world dopamine receptors. It's like you have to keep escalating. Escalating, Escalating. Yeah. It's a wild way to live. I mean, curious in 30, 40 years, looking back on the data, like, oh, yeah, that was a real good job, everybody. Real good.
- [96:03]
Caitlin V
Yeah, it'll be interesting.
- [96:04]
Host
Society's population is just diminishing because, you know, nobody. We end up. What's the movie with Sylvester Stallone and Sandra Bullock when they're in the future and sex was a headset and they sat on couch. Demolition man.
- [96:17]
Caitlin V
Oh, yes.
- [96:19]
Host
100. You haven't seen that movie. Michael, he's like, God, you are unbelievable. Unbelievable. One out of ten he catches.
- [96:25]
Caitlin V
I'm gonna look it up right now.
- [96:27]
Host
You're gonna see Sylvester Stallone and Sandra Bullock and they're probably in some weird police uniforms.
- [96:32]
Michael
Yep, that's exactly what.
- [96:33]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But the illusion of connection, illusion of satisfaction. I mean, talk again about like people who have an unhealthy relationship with porn. Like, illusion of connection there that like you're getting this, this need met. If it's. It's not. It's not the thing itself. It's not the thing that you're actually looking for. It is like a simulacrum of relationship, of romance, of sexuality, of intimacy. It's not the thing itself. The thing itself is like way scarier and more vulnerable, but it's also way higher reward. I think maybe you could look at it like this. The more that we play it safe, the less that we get out of our life. Right. Higher risk anything, the more that we put of ourselves into anything that we do. We do risk failing and falling on our butt. We. We risk the discomfort. We risk being humiliated. We could fall on our face. And we will if we're doing it right.
- [97:26]
Host
Yeah. And you need to do that. You have to get stung. In my opinion, at least. I have learned the most success and failure you can learn from both. The failures have stayed with me a lot more than the successes. Yeah. I don't want to rob People from that. It's hard to look at my kids and think in my head, man, I can't. I can't wait till you. Till you fail. Not like macro failure in life, but. And it happens to all of them. They get the little uppercuts along the way. And sometimes I see it coming. I'm like, I'm not saying a damn thing. As long as they're safe, like, we'll let this happen.
- [97:56]
Caitlin V
An interesting person, you know, Like, I. I'm not a. I was learning about hydroponic plants the other day, and, like, I was, like, growing, like, green onions. I learned that if you cut all the green onions off, you can just stick the bottom in water and they grow back.
- [98:09]
Host
Really?
- [98:09]
Caitlin V
I had. Okay, I. Thank you. I was today years old when I learned this. You just, like, chop them all off, throw them in water, put them in a windowsill. They'll grow back. And they're growing back, and I'm on, like, the third or fourth round of them growing back from just water. And they're, like, not as strong as they were.
- [98:24]
Host
Yeah.
- [98:25]
Caitlin V
The flavor is not happening so much. Right. So then I'm looking up and, like, how is it that we grow plants in water and they give them just the right amount of potassium and nitrogen, all the things that they need. Right. But what ends up happening is that you grow these, like, really big, beautiful, stunning plants, and they have no flavor at all. Because the thing that makes for an interesting plant, this is true. I mean, Psalms know this about wine, and I'm sure there's a ton of other examples out there, is that they are made interesting by their hardship. It is not having enough nitrogen that made that lettuce look a little funky, but taste incredible. Right? Like, it. It is the conditions of hardship that actually shape us to have flavor.
- [98:59]
Host
Yeah, I agree. I completely agree. What is it? Have you noticed anything when people find you, men or women, a lot of people, probably myself included in this, you'll try to solve it. You try to solve something, anything you're dealing with, and then you get to a point. And the a point is different for people and depending on what it is. And then finally you're like, I can't do this on my own, and I try to seek help. Where is that point? Or have you found any patterns in that point for people coming to speak with you?
- [99:29]
Caitlin V
Oh, they're at that point.
- [99:31]
Host
Yeah.
- [99:31]
Caitlin V
They're beyond that point. Right. Because I work with men who, for the most part, would prefer to just not have to deal with this or.
- [99:39]
Host
Let Anybody know that they are dealing with it for sure? Absolutely.
- [99:42]
Caitlin V
It is inherently a courageous act to reach out to me or my team in order to get support. Because it requires this tremendous first step of saying, I actually cannot do this on my own. I need help with this. Which requires us even saying that. This is a challenge. One of the greatest barriers that I have to entry is men just not wanting to. To admit that there is a problem at all. Right. Because it is. It is. It is scary to even say that. Right.
- [100:04]
Host
I'm looking forward to the place in my life where there are no problems of any kind. I feel like it's next week.
- [100:08]
Caitlin V
Right, right, right.
- [100:10]
Host
2026 is going to be my year.
- [100:11]
Caitlin V
Yeah. There's always. I don't have a single problem. There's nothing to look at over there.
- [100:15]
Host
I'll have all the money I've ever wanted it, and that will solve all problems.
- [100:17]
Caitlin V
But don't live to the rug. There's nothing under there to see.
- [100:19]
Host
And don't worry about the backyard. The back goes back there. Just because I like gardening.
- [100:22]
Caitlin V
Yeah, it's perfect back there. So they have to have already done these really courageous things of saying, like, there is a problem and I'm not capable of solving it on my own huge steps. So I do coaching. But what I actually sell a lot more of than coaching is courses. Because I realized really early on that if I put what I was doing with a client into a video course and told men that they could just take it privately at their own pace without having to actually talk to another person, that they would do that and.
- [100:55]
Host
Actually be their first step.
- [100:56]
Caitlin V
For most people, it is incredible. They actually adhere to these courses. Like, really. Because I will buy an online course and kind of like, dabble a little bit, but I do really well in a container with another human being. That's where I really thrive. Unless it's maybe like learning a really specific skill, then I can stick with the course for a long enough time. But either way, I developed all these courses because I realized that was a way better way to reach people. I remember my mission was just get this to as many people as possible. YouTube is a medium for that. Mission to get to as many people as possible. My TV show on Discovery and on HBO Max is just a medium for that. The courses, just a medium for that. The book, just a medium for that. How do I get this information to more hands and you get it to more people by decreasing the barriers to entry so that they can just do it on their own, on their phone. In the privacy of their own home. No one has to know that they're going through the course and they can work that out to the degree that they're capable. It's. You're still kind of doing it on your own, but you're doing it with help.
- [101:53]
Host
You have a framework and then. Yes, exactly.
- [101:55]
Caitlin V
A structure. And then if you're not able to, or that's not satisfying, or you find that you're not able to like, complete the online course, you have adhd like, I do. And so that's not the ideal framework for you.
- [102:05]
Host
Have you been diagnosed with adhd?
- [102:06]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I have.
- [102:07]
Host
I'm seeing a rash of people who have told me they have adhd and I say, who tells you that you have that? They're like, me. Like, that's not how that works.
- [102:13]
Caitlin V
Yeah, you know, I was, I was first diagnosed at 18 and I was like, that's not me. Me at all. That's like, I was just kind of like, screw you.
- [102:18]
Host
I swear. And trust me, I legitimately, I get it. But it's hilarious to me if you ask that one question, like, oh, did you go to a doctor? Like, no, no.
- [102:28]
Caitlin V
Yeah. My dad and my uncle used to tell me all the time, ADHD is not real, because open up your brain and tell me where the ADHD is. And like, there's no gene that has. I mean, this is, you know, two guys kicking back beers and saying this to a 12 year old. But a lot of wisdom.
- [102:43]
Host
So much wisdom.
- [102:43]
Caitlin V
They were very wise men. I did. I love them as them every day, but. So you find that the online course isn't for you. Great, like hire a coach. The reason that I put this all down into a book with like, what, 75,000 words is because I wanted people to be able to access it in an even easier to afford format. In a format that you need not sign into anything. I mean, you can have it on an e book or on an audiobook, but like a format that you can just, like, you can digest this even more so at your own pace. The power can go out and you can have a single candle and you can still get this information. Like, just put it into as many ways as possible so that men can receive it.
- [103:19]
Host
Yeah. How'd the TV shows come about?
- [103:21]
Caitlin V
The TV show? They found me on YouTube, actually. So for a while when I was kind of like coming up on YouTube, I would get casting calls on a pretty regular basis. People would reach out to me and they'd say, you know, we're thinking about, we're developing a show on this or that. We want to talk to you. We want to film it. You've gotten casting calls.
- [103:36]
Host
I get them. Generally, it's host to the potential to be a host on a show that has some tangential connection to the military or. Okay, we would love to come on and talk about the different calibers of guns. I'm like, listen, I understand how to use a gun. I'm not an expert in how they're made. And people ask me about bullets. I'm like, where did you get your bullets? I'm like, from the green box. They came out of the green box into a brown one. Like, what kind were they? I'm like, the kind that went bang. I don't know. I don't care. I know how to use the tool. I. I'm sorry. I never got into the gun thing. It was. That didn't turn my screws. Sorry.
- [104:04]
Caitlin V
Yeah, There is someone who is an expert at that.
- [104:07]
Host
100%. Go find that guy. As a hook. I don't know.
- [104:09]
Caitlin V
Do you have any interest in doing those larger media productions?
- [104:14]
Host
Only because what I value the most right now is my time.
- [104:18]
Caitlin V
Yeah.
- [104:18]
Host
This, what we're doing right now is, I think, my favorite thing. And I accidentally fell into this years ago, and, I mean, you and I would not have met otherwise.
- [104:26]
Caitlin V
It's true.
- [104:27]
Host
And I'll be honest. I've never. Until. Who was it? It reached out. Were they part of your team or a publisher?
- [104:31]
Caitlin V
Yeah, it was a publisher.
- [104:33]
Host
So before that, I had never come across your content on YouTube, but that's a matter of my own algorithm. Like, I'm very heavily into sovereign citizens getting thrown on the ground and arrested. Very. And it's like, I wonder why that's the case. Like, because I click on every single one.
- [104:47]
Caitlin V
Oh, yes, yes, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [104:49]
Host
Especially on airplanes. I'm like, yes.
- [104:50]
Caitlin V
Yeah. Mine's all pop culture criticism, which I'm.
- [104:52]
Host
Yeah. And so I wouldn't have naturally encountered that, but. So you and I would have never had the chance to have this conversation. And I would much rather do this with my time than travel somewhere and be on a set for eight to nine hours, be told what to wear, kind of where to stand, what to say. I am not against any of that. I value this more.
- [105:11]
Caitlin V
Yeah. And that's why, having had a TV show, I can say absolutely that there is a distinction that you have a level of control that you. You do not enjoy when you're not paying the bills. Someone else's production.
- [105:22]
Host
Yeah. You are not paying the bills for what's making the production go. So at some level, you're somebody's employee.
- [105:28]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [105:28]
Host
And I've been working for myself now for almost 10 years, and I don't think I could go back.
- [105:31]
Caitlin V
Yeah, it's very hard. It's. It is very hard now. I loved doing the show, and again, it's. It was a fabulous vehicle for fulfilling my life mission of getting it into the hands of as many people as possible. I got to work with couples on the show, which was also a tremendous opportunity too, because we get to actually show what people are like behind closed doors in a way that you just can't really capture, I think, anyways, in an honest and very vulnerable way. So on my show, we actually had cameras inside folks bedrooms. And so we actually had bedroom footage of them being intimate.
- [106:03]
Host
Feel like there's some waivers associated with this.
- [106:05]
Caitlin V
Oh, there were so many waivers. But I was not the legal on the show because it was a real production, so I didn't have to do all those things. Whereas on my YouTube channel, I am the legal team. And in Charlotte, I feel like the.
- [106:13]
Host
People who signed up for that there was a slight level of exhibitions voyeurism or that might have been a little bit of a change.
- [106:18]
Caitlin V
Yeah, you're not signing up for that without having like a degree of.
- [106:22]
Host
Because that sounds mortifying to me, by the way. I would not even pitch that idea to my wife because even if she were to say, yeah, I guess I'd be fine doing that. I'd be like, nope, not my thing. No way. Thank you.
- [106:33]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, the. The thing that was really cool about it was that they. These cameras were running 247 throughout the, you know, half a year or something that we shot. And so it wasn't just sex that we saw in the cameras. I would literally give them an assignment. They'd have to go like, you know, practice.
- [106:49]
Host
It probably was a fraction of, but we would.
- [106:50]
Caitlin V
Yeah, we would see all kinds of other things. And as a coach, someone coming in and trying to describe a sexual encounter, it is very difficult. I was involved in a study during my master's degree that was trying to sort of pinpoint a moment where an STI was transmitted. And we created. My advisor, Vanessa Schick, made this calendar that are like, tool to collect data that would be like, person A hand A person B hand BM Very clinical toy. This is, you know, iu and then like across time and then it would be like mouse to toy to hand to this and then you're trying to have people like, actually remember what happened first. And then what? And then what? It's very difficult for someone to describe a sexual encounter, like to remember it and describe the actions and behaviors faithfully. But then there's all of this subjective terminology that doesn't mean the same thing to me as it does to anyone else. Right. Like, what is hard, what is soft, what is fast, what is slow. We may have a very different definition of what hard and soft are. And so I have a client come in and they say, well, we started really slow, okay. And then we did this and we did this and we did this and then this, this happened. Right. 10 seconds of video. I know way more than they're able to put into words. And we don't have to argue over what's slowest because we can now have an exact conversation. Where I could pinpoint here is the moment where this shifted. And if you had gone in a different direction, you would have gotten a different result. So that part was really, really powerful and I enjoyed that part of the show. But yeah, they came to me and asked me if I wanted to be involved. And I'd done so many of these casting calls at this point, they were all just like, like zoom interviews. That on that one in particular, I was just like, here's what we gotta do. And I just laid it all out. If you want to make that show succeed, here's exactly how I would do it. And they were like, when can you come to la?
- [108:42]
Host
Damn. Would you do another one? Would you do another show if they offered it?
- [108:46]
Caitlin V
Yes, there are things that I would do that I would like, insist on doing differently. That we filmed the show under pretty intense COVID policies. And so now it would be very different be, I think, a lot easier for us to film the show because there would just be like less red tape and restrictions in the way. But I have some ideas over, like, how the length of time that is really necessary to see the kind of transformation that I want to see. I mean, we did several one offs during the show. There's a great one off session that I do with a adult virgin. I think he is around the age of 30 and he's never had any sort of sexual conduct to the woman. And it's phenomenal. I talked to him for like an, I don't know, it's an hour and a half. It's cut down to maybe like three minutes in the show. It is so many people's like, favorite moment in the show. Yeah. And it's partially because he's so earnest in, like, his learning. We have, like, a sex doll, and I like. I, like, show him, you know, like, here's a vulva. We do an anatomy lesson. We, like, kind of go through the whole system so that he feels a little bit more comfortable.
- [109:48]
Host
Is mine just blown?
- [109:51]
Caitlin V
Yes. Yes. But, like, what's even cooler about that is, like, you know, I'm actually, like, having him, like, interact with the doll and try some different, like, techniques on it. And you can just watch the gears turning. I think that's the cool part, is that because he's not under pressure because he's not with a real woman to be like, yeah, I know what I'm doing. I've got this right. Instead, he's, like, really feeling it out, and he's really, like, thinking about it. And you can just see him, like, putting all of these gears in place again. It's like being willing to just, like, try and do it imperfectly.
- [110:19]
Host
How do you arrive at 28 without any sexual experience? And I say that without any judgment. I know life is different for people. How did he get to that point?
- [110:27]
Caitlin V
I think for a lot of folks, they sort of believe it's going to happen and that they don't necessarily need to do to be an active participant in making it happen. And they sort of assumed that, like, by now it would have happened. By now it would have happened. Oh, and then they get to college, and then they think, well, it's just. It's definitely going to happen at one point in college. And then maybe they get through college and it didn't happen. And then they start to, like, at.
- [110:49]
Host
Each turn, now it's becoming an issue, probably.
- [110:52]
Caitlin V
And then they start to pull themselves out of the field. A lot of men are across the board. Even the most sexually experienced men I have ever worked with will say to me, I'm not very experienced. I have less experience than other men. Because they assume the story that they have about other men is that they have more sexual experience.
- [111:10]
Host
Everyone else has more hearing those stories from. That's interesting.
- [111:14]
Caitlin V
I think it is just sort of part of the air that we breathe. Is that part of the way that men in particular feel insecure about themselves sexually is that they feel they should have had more. More experience?
- [111:26]
Host
I mean, you're the professional here. What's more important, quality or quantity?
- [111:31]
Caitlin V
I mean, I. I would take quality all the time.
- [111:34]
Host
I think so, too.
- [111:35]
Caitlin V
Yeah. But then again, you can have sex 100 times with one person and learn their body really, really well. Or you can have sex one time with a hundred people and learn a whole bunch about bodies. You're gonna learn either way.
- [111:44]
Host
That's true.
- [111:45]
Caitlin V
Okay, and, and, and there's no, there's no like, right way of going about getting those experiences. But I think, think if you just assume that they will happen to you and that you're not being an active participant in making them happen, then you might wake up one day and realize that those, those early ships have sailed. And now the barrier to entry is a lot higher because partially because you didn't go through and have those little like micro experiences of fucking up, but now the assumption of your peers is going to be that you do have experience and so you're going to be a little bit more in your head and more self conscious because of the lack of experience.
- [112:24]
Host
Did he find a partner?
- [112:25]
Caitlin V
He did have intercourse after that. And you know, how'd it go for him? That I don't know. The running joke in the set though was that like, once this, once this airs, you're gonna have people being like, I'll take your virginity.
- [112:39]
Host
What's his Instagram like? Don't go into your inbox.
- [112:42]
Caitlin V
There were producers on set that were like, I'll fuck him. Like that.
- [112:46]
Host
That's kind.
- [112:47]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah.
- [112:48]
Host
They're giving and I think, you know.
- [112:50]
Caitlin V
It'S doing it for the plot a little bit too. But I think, you know, we have a lot of assumptions about our desirability or attractive. Attractiveness. And then, you know, you see something like that and you're like, actually there's like. They're totally. There's multiple lids for every jar, it turns out.
- [113:02]
Host
Yeah. Have you followed at all or seen the P. Diddy documentary?
- [113:08]
Caitlin V
No, but only because I'm very, very sensitive to these things. And even just reading the files from the court case was a lot for me. Did you watch it?
- [113:17]
Host
I was just on the road in Texas, had a little bit of hotel time. I had watched the first episode before I went. It was a quick turnaround. But yes, stripping out the abuse, which was horrendous. And there was nothing that I would like to do more to people like that than to beat them to death with my own hands. For clarity, I cannot stand that type of violence against victimizable community. It just it at my baseline level, I want to do something about it. Stripping that aside, the. And again, I'm not anybody to judge others sexual proclivities, but my God, they were essentially first off for years. Spoiler alert for anybody who hasn't watched the documentary, which by the way, was produced by 50 Cent, was one of his mortal enemies.
- [114:09]
Caitlin V
That's a great backstory, by the way.
- [114:12]
Host
Well played, Netflix to hand that over. Man, they dug deep.
- [114:17]
Caitlin V
Oh, yeah, because 50 Cent had been on it for like 10 years, by the way. 50 Cent knew that. No, no, no. He and Josh Johnson actually is an amazing YouTube comedian and has two hour long specials where he explains the backstory. And it is hysterical how that man.
- [114:31]
Host
Played the long game.
- [114:32]
Caitlin V
Wanted.
- [114:33]
Host
He played the long game game. And let me just say, as somebody who didn't know much about the situation, 50 months in prison is not enough.
- [114:40]
Caitlin V
Is that what he's got?
- [114:41]
Host
He got 50 months with time served. So he, I think, will be out in four plus years. Wow. It was pretty amazing. And again, I wasn't a juror and they, they actually did interview a couple of the jurors. And one of the issues that it came back to was clear understanding and definition of consent. And if it wasn't consensual, why did some of them stay for years and stay involved? And again, I'm glad I wasn't in that room having to make that decision. I don't know the legal threshold for these things. I was just looking at it from the perspective of sexual behavior. So I hate the name Diddy, by the way. Sean, one of the women that was featured, he was married before and actually at the end of his marriage to the woman I think, who has the majority of his children with him, there was a woman named Cassie, and she was the one who was actually very physically abused in the security camera footage.
- [115:38]
Caitlin V
Right, right.
- [115:39]
Host
Four years. They, I mean, it started, they were in a hotel in New York and they hire a gigolo and Sean comes down with like this mask on. Going back to a term that is one the of my favorite cuckold, which once I understood what it meant, I tried to apply it very broadly in my life to things that have absolutely nothing to do with it. And he would sit there and kind of direct and there was this power play of she would have to ask to do, you know, kind of anything. And sometimes the answer was yes, and sometimes it no, you're not ready. But. So this went on with this particular man who was in the documentary and was interviewed, but they would have. They would have sex for a day and a half, for two days. The baby oil, the 10,000 bottle. He described the first time that they handed over a bottle of baby oil to me. He's like, I put it on like a normal human being and he Said that the woman was like, no, no, that's not how we do it. She's just like, sh. So I don't know what that's all about, nor do I know what the laundry bill was like at that particular hotel.
- [116:41]
Caitlin V
Oh, my gosh. You're just throwing sheets out at that point.
- [116:43]
Host
But is that. Is that. And it's interesting. Interesting. It seems as if you get into socioeconomic statuses where nothing is outside of your ability to procure it, that kinks start to present themselves. I would have to describe. And so eventually Sean participated, but they would call him out on. He would travel with them sometimes like this for years, and eventually they introduced. I think it was either ecstasy or mall. I don't have experience with either one. But that's because he was asking. He's like, how do you guys do this for so long?
- [117:15]
Caitlin V
There's no way that you doing this for multiple days sober.
- [117:17]
Host
No. And so that all of the chemical stuff came along a little bit later on, but for years. And then, you know, that behavior was obviously repeated and it was all over the place. And I just. I'm like, was this person always like this? Or. When you have access and the ability for everything is within economic reach, is that the only way that you could actually feel alive or normal? Yeah.
- [117:41]
Caitlin V
I think that from everything that I understand with this case in particular, so much of it comes down to power.
- [117:47]
Host
There was again, she would ask for permission, and sometimes it was yes, and sometimes it was no. And it didn't seem to be any justifiable in air quotes, determining factor as to why he said yes or no.
- [117:57]
Caitlin V
Right.
- [117:57]
Host
But there wasn't. I mean, you could tell in just the way he was physically abusing her. And the physical abuse in that. In the security cam footage, which I think came from a hotel, was one of many. Many. Oh, I.
- [118:07]
Caitlin V
Yes, yes. I imagine that wasn't the first or the only time that that happened. But in the case documents that I read, some of the earlier allegations against him were coming actually from college women when he would perform on college campuses, and that he would again was accused of drugging and assaulting college women after performing on their campuses. And the thing that really stuck out to me as fascinating about that is that I should think that as a music performer at a college campus, it would not be difficult for you to have consensual sex.
- [118:43]
Host
You would think so, right? Somebody who is relatively famous, especially as their ascent.
- [118:49]
Caitlin V
In my personal experience, someone with a microphone and any degree of talent, they're.
- [118:54]
Host
Throwing panties at that Person.
- [118:56]
Caitlin V
Yes. It's not. You do not have to drug or coerce women into having sex with you.
- [119:01]
Host
Ties into the control aspect, though. Yeah.
- [119:03]
Caitlin V
Unless you enjoy having power over other people. Unless the actual joy that you are getting is in doing harm to other people. And then sex is just the vehicle for that. The other piece about that that I think is interesting, like, if you do have that degree of power and socioeconomic status going, like, circling back to the conversation we had earlier, your life is easy, right?
- [119:25]
Host
In many ways, yeah.
- [119:26]
Caitlin V
Right. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not necessarily all easy, but, like.
- [119:29]
Host
People say money doesn't solve all problems. It's quite a few.
- [119:31]
Caitlin V
It solves. It solves a lot of the core ones that most people deal with. Right. And to a degree, if you can, you know, pretty much buy anything in any store, like, and there's no real, like, adversity. We think that we don't want adversity. Right. We think that we want the beautiful butter lettuce that was made under perfect conditions. We actually do want adversity. We want a little bit of adversity. We want. We want it. We call it. In my partnership, we call it mild adversity. You know, the things that, like, make for an interesting experience. If you go on a vacation and everything works out exactly right. Like, they have your car ready and the hotel room is just fine, and the beach was perfect that day, and the lobster was not adventurous or whatever. Like, there was no. Yeah. Like, what was memorable about that? Oh, yeah. But that was a nice sunset, wasn't it? That was the sunset that. Remember, we had to race across the island because you left your toothbrush or whatever, and then we almost missed our flight. Like, those are the things that we really remember.
- [120:23]
Host
And.
- [120:23]
Caitlin V
And so I think that we get to a point for many of us, because we are so comfortable where we actually begin to manufacture adversity or we begin to need to entertain ourselves through seeking increasing levels of intensity in order to have us feel alive. My thinking on that as, like, someone who's not an expert on the case and hasn't followed it that closely. Again, just because my own sensitivity towards these things is that if you are in a position where you wield a lot of power over folks and you are able to coerce people into staying with you for many, many years, and I think we don't fully understand, and courts are not an ideal place to really flesh out the dynamics that exist. The psychology that exists between, you know, someone who's saying, I love you, I'll Protect you. I'm the, you know, I'm the only person who can make your career or give you what you want or give you access to the people that you need access to in order to succeed. But in order for me to do those, you have to. To behave in this way or do these things or, you know, submit yourself to me in these ways. Like, there's an incredible dynamic there that, yes, of course, we're talking about adults who do have free will and have the capacity to go and leave. I'm glad that I'm not the person who has to decide or be in that jury to determine whether or not that person's, like, staying because they are consenting to this. I do think that there's, like, a great degree of coercion that is involved. Involved in this. And I think sometimes about that quote, everything is about sex except for sex, which is about power. And I don't agree with it wholeheartedly. I think it's a bit of an oversimplification of something that is not explicitly about power. I think sex is about union and can be about divinity and can be about connection and can be about a whole lot of things. It doesn't need to be a power exchange. But in those instances, I think sex becomes just the theater in which power is executed. And I think because it is particularly often very secretive, because people experience quite a bit of shame, because it is inherently taboo. Like, I teach a system that was invented by my mentor Jaya called the erotic Blueprints. And the blueprints are energetic, sensual, sexual, kinky, and shapeshifter. And I'm happy to describe all this.
- [122:40]
Host
Shapeshifter.
- [122:41]
Caitlin V
Shapeshifter.
- [122:42]
Host
Are we talking about ghosts or werewolves?
- [122:44]
Caitlin V
The shapeshifters. Someone who can just play in all the other roles.
- [122:47]
Host
Okay.
- [122:47]
Caitlin V
Who, like, can speak all of the languages. If we were to think about each of the blueprints as a language, like the shapeshifter is just multi language.
- [122:52]
Host
Go through it. Go through the blueprint.
- [122:53]
Caitlin V
Okay. And then I'll. I'll circle back to Kate. But you may have to remind me how we got there, so I may forget the. Okay, great. The. The. So a system of five different ways that arousal exists in the body, that the arousal occurs. So Jaya is a tremendous body worker, sexological body worker. Literally got to, like, interact and witness people's bodies over years. And what she noticed is that there are sort of like five arousal patterns that exist in people. And the first one is energetic. And these are folks who are turned on by tease and anticipation. And like almost the space between. They're very, very sensitive and they need for the energy between them and their partner to feel right. Like the intangible aspects of the relationship have got to feel good before they can feel aroused and turned on and be interested in.
- [123:38]
Host
They have to be connected.
- [123:40]
Caitlin V
Yes. They also can have like full body, non touch, non genital orgasms. And they are. But the downside, their shadow side is that they are so sensitive that they can sort of short circuit. These are folks that like if you go straight for their genitals or straight for their nipples or straight for their breasts that they might be like ah, that was too much. And then they're not actually able to get back into the flow or to get interesting because antennas, finely tuned antennas. So that's the energetic next blueprint is the sensual blueprint. These are people who are turned on by things in their five senses. So the way that something looks and tastes and touches and smells and they also are very, very sensitive. They can also have like non genital, non touch orgasms. They often give themselves away because they'll moan when they're eating something. Like they'll take a bite of something and be like so good. That's very sensual in it nature. They also tend to like surround themselves with things that are like sensorily pleasant. So they may like have select fabrics and they might be playing music all the time in their home. They have a specific kind of music that they like to be surrounded by or candles. They like to arrange the pillows in such a way. And their superpower is that they have a super high tolerance for pleasure. They can really be in pleasure for a long time because they can get pleasure in their five senses. So they may like to go from trading massages to a lot of cuddling, a lot of closeness, lovemaking. Like all of those things might be things that they want to do and have like a lot of capacity for. Their shadow side is that they can get. They can get lost in their head if they're not staying grounded in their body through their senses. So that can look like being close to having an orgasm and then having it disappear. They, they also can, can kind of like get disrupted by things not being, being sort of right. So the pillows being off or there's a dirty pile of laundry or I hate this song. They can like need for those things to be correct for them to actually like stay present and stay in their bodies. So that's energetic and sensual. And then we have sexual. And this is what most of us think of when we Think about eroticism and arousal. This is like genitals and porn and orgasms and strip clubs. And it is like very body based. It's very straightforward, forward. It's, it's, it's really hyper focused on performance and genitals and orgasms. And for people who are primarily sexual blueprint, they can like get turned on by looking at a naked body or thinking about sex. And they can fail to understand why the other blueprints need the bells and whistles that they do. It makes sense in order to be erotic. Right.
- [126:15]
Host
They'll understand themselves totally.
- [126:17]
Caitlin V
Their superpower is their simplicity. But that can also be their shadow side and the other. The other thing that's interesting about sexual blueprint folks is that sex for them is just sort of like a basic need. It's like, I need to have air and water and food and some sort of sexual connection. And so they can sort of see it like their daily meal or like the bread that they have or the rice that comes with every meal. And so when they're not having it and they don't know that they're going to have sex again, they can start to spin out a little bit. They can start to be like, but it's been since last Tuesday that we had sex and I don't know when the next time that we are going to have sex is. And that can make them feel a little ungrounded. So that is energetic, sensual, sexual. Next is kinky. So kinky in the erotic blueprints has a really broad definition. I think it's really, really genius in this way. So kink in the blueprints means anything that is taboo. Anything that's taboo to you. It's highly subjective.
- [127:10]
Host
Shifts all over the world.
- [127:11]
Caitlin V
Exactly, yeah. And person to person.
- [127:13]
Host
Yeah.
- [127:13]
Caitlin V
What is taboo and not allowed and kinky for me may be very, very different than what is not allowed for you. The thing that makes it kinky for an individual is just that it is taboo to that person. And that can fall under psychological kink or physical kink. So sometimes when we think about kink, we think about whips and chains, but it can also be calling someone by a name or doing dom subplay that is strictly psychological in nature. There need not be any pain exchanged in order for something to be kinky. It could even be role playing. What did we see earlier? Like driver and chef and all of that.
- [127:48]
Host
Like that plumber.
- [127:49]
Caitlin V
Plumber. That can be kinky because you're like not supposed to have sex with the plumber, therefore it's kinky. So their superpower is their creativity. Right. Like, real kinksters can. Can use kink for healing. They can turn, you know, any appliance in your kitchen or any, like, you know, they can turn a spatula into a sex toy, or they can, like, you know, use. Use something. Almost like an improv actor can take something and, like, make it into a sexual scenario that can turn someone on. Like, that is a real superpower. Their shadow side is shame. So that's in the blueprint system. Shame is sort of housed inside of the kinky blueprint. And then last, as you noted, is the shapeshifter. Now, shapeshifters have the capacity to do any of the other four blueprints. And so what they do is they shapeshift to meet their partner. So your partner, let's say they're primarily sexual. Like, little sidey kinky shapeshifter can do that because they speak all the languages. Okay. Like, I'll totally meet you, you there. But what ends up happening is that they don't get all of their needs met because they're constantly shifting to meet the other person.
- [128:47]
Host
Okay, that makes sense.
- [128:48]
Caitlin V
And so often what they're told is, like, you're too much. You need too much. You're asking for too much. You're too voracious. When actually what's going on is just, like, they have a lot of capacity, and sometimes in order to meet those needs, they want to pile on a lot more because they want to experience all of the other blueprints, and they can have the superpowers in the shadows of all of those. The other blueprints.
- [129:10]
Host
Is this. Under this model, are you supposed to. Or do you naturally find somebody that is similar or are there, like, one aligns better than another one?
- [129:19]
Caitlin V
Or, like, do opposites attract? So it's not. It doesn't divide cleanly along gendered lines, but it is true that there are a lot of women that are energetic, sensual, and are paired with a lot of men that are kinky, sexual. And so a lot of those folks find the erotic blueprints because it's a language and a system that makes so much sense because it describes their experience. Right. She wants him to slow down and breathe and make eye contact.
- [129:41]
Host
She wants to bring a rubber ducky.
- [129:42]
Caitlin V
Exactly. And he's like, what do you mean by why do I need all this? She's like, bend over. Let me spank you. Right. So it's a great system for those folks.
- [129:48]
Host
Yeah.
- [129:49]
Caitlin V
And it is also true that, like, people of all different kind of Blueprints find each other. A lot of people that I have worked with, men in particular, have come to me and I'll describe that system, and they'll be like, I'm a sexual blueprint. Right. But men were also all conditioned to be sex. All of us were conditioned to be sexual blueprint. We didn't realize that, like, this other stuff could actually be arousing and considered erotic.
- [130:08]
Host
Especially when all the education is kind of really aligned towards the. Again, the sexual. Very clinical description, anatomy, physiology. Like, that didn't surprise me at all.
- [130:17]
Caitlin V
Exactly. Right. Yeah. We don't even know that, like, these other things could qualify as erotic in nature.
- [130:23]
Host
Yeah.
- [130:23]
Caitlin V
Right. So. So they'll come in and they'll be like, you know, I'm a sexual blueprint. And then when I work with them, I'll say, you know, maybe over time, I don't identify that they're actually energetically very sensitive. Like, they, they. They can pick up on little things being off in their partner or in the relationship. You know, they're the kind of person who says, like, hey, is there something that you. You want to tell me? Yeah, like, you know, I feel like there's something in the vibe. The vibe is off. Right. And then they wonder why they, you know, are ejaculating so quickly. And it's because they're so extremely sensitive. And. And then as soon as they sort of, like, close that gap, it's overwhelming for their sense and system, and their system responds in kind. And it can look. That's just one example of the ways that it. That it kind of exists in bodies, but the system as a whole. I remember, I remembered for myself why we got over here. So kink in particular. Right. I think that there is a lot of power in the transgressive. I think people who are kinky or have, like, already explored their kink, and there's two ways of looking at the blueprints. You could say that some people. People are sort of just born with their. Their blueprint stack. And. And I think everyone has access to more than one. Certainly it's very rare that I've met someone who just solely identifies as one blueprint. But for most people, like, they're gonna need sensual first in order to get into sexual, in order to get into kinky, or they actually need to start with kinky before they can move over to energetic. I think all of us sort of like, have an entry point and then other areas that. That makes available to us. Jaya herself believes and teaches that not everyone has all of the blueprints in them. I and some other blueprint coaches believe that actually everyone does have access to all of the blueprints. And the way that I like to go about that is by actually taking them outside of the bedroom and showing folks where they have access to these in other areas of their life. So you have access to the kinky part of you when you are enjoying breaking a relationship rule. Like when you're kind of like getting away with something. You know, whatever, whatever that is. It's highly subjective, like I said. So there is a lot, a lot, a lot of power in working up against something where we experience any degree of shame. Right. Especially thinking about porn in particular and people who grew up in religious households. So you asked, do people end up having kinks when they have a lot of power? And I think that when everything is on the table, it's very hard, hard to find things that are taboo enough to sort of like excite a response in someone. I'm not saying that what Diddy John Combs did falls within the erotic blueprint framework, but when I think about kink very broadly, I always think about it in terms of what was that person getting access to that was taboo for them and therefore gave them a rise out of it. Because the other shadow side to the kink blueprint is that you can need higher and higher and higher degrees of intensity in order to feel the same level of stimulation.
- [133:21]
Host
Makes sense.
- [133:21]
Caitlin V
And that sort of sounds like part of that case.
- [133:24]
Host
It seems like what they were doing grew in size and scope to me. The power dynamic too. It makes sense of the Epstein's of the world and tied to very powerful people who honestly, they could pay for whatever they want and kind of do whatever they want. Why would you do that? Why would you associate from a person like, like that? And it. Not that it. I'm not justifying it in any stretch, but it makes more sense to me. Oh. It might actually just have been about the power dynamic, which if your power dynamic is to prey upon people. I hope that I meet you one day with a potato peeler.
- [133:59]
Caitlin V
I hope that you find some just good old fashioned adversity in your life so that you can know what it feels like to overcome a challenge and not have to victim, minimize marginalized and vulnerable people for, you know, to get your rocks off.
- [134:15]
Host
Yeah. Do you recommend for couples, even if they think the classic like, our marriage is perfect, our sex life is perfect, do you still recommend they sit down and have a conversation about this?
- [134:25]
Caitlin V
It's analogous about the erotic blueprints in particular?
- [134:27]
Host
Well, erotic blueprint or just sex in general? Are you getting out of this or being honest about what it is for you? Because the easiest thing to say is, everything's great, everything's perfect. But that's. I don't think that's the reality for anybody. Like I said, I know those people just go into the categories of lying about that particular thing. But to me, it's analogous of checking under the hood before the check engine light comes on.
- [134:47]
Caitlin V
Right? Yeah. I choose the check engine light a lot as an analogy. I think that just because something is good doesn't mean it can't get better. And it can be really scary to kind of like peel back and say, like, what is it that is actually going on? And are there ways in which this could improve? Especially when it can touch on insecurity for so many people. It can go straight to, like, I'm not enough. Straight to defensiveness. Like, but it was fine before. It doesn't mean that anything is wrong. Nothing has to be wrong for something to improve. Like, there's nothing wrong with my home or my, you know, my, like, skiing technique. But I'm still gonna take a lesson because I want to enjoy it more and I want to get better. This is not about fixing anything a lot of the time. So I think often, especially in long term relationships, probably on both people's sides, there are some things that they would like to say. Right? Maybe it's often, and I teach that this always has to come first in having these more vulnerable conversations. We gotta begin by clearing the air and cleaning up anything that hasn't been said or hasn't been acknowledged. Right. Because if we don't do that, then we're sort of like working in a field that has, like, a whole bunch of, like, rocks and twigs.
- [135:51]
Host
Landmines. You're gonna step on one, too?
- [135:53]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You absolutely are gonna step on one. So go through and, like, do the work of clearing all of those out. And then you've got a free space that, you know, you can run around in. And when you can run around everywhere, then. Then you're. You're safe to go everywhere. Right. So clean up everything that needs to be cleaned up. You know, we never took care of that. I never apologized for this, et cetera. I let resentment grow. One of my coaches said to me, this line I'll never forget. Resentment is the biggest boner killer.
- [136:20]
Host
Michael, write that down for a T shirt as well.
- [136:22]
Caitlin V
That's really good. You can buy it. I have it on my Merch. That's T shirts. Take it. Yeah.
- [136:27]
Host
Damn it.
- [136:27]
Caitlin V
But I think you could also say, and I haven't made this T shirt resentment is the biggest lady boner killer too.
- [136:32]
Host
Okay. All right, fair enough.
- [136:34]
Caitlin V
So we gotta clear up that stuff first, and then we can go from, like, where is it that we would like to go from here? And I always tell people to make the distinction between fantasies that you want to stay as fantasies and fantasies that you want to make into realities. Because we all have some fantasies that are exciting and interesting to us, but, like, they don't need to come into fruition. We don't really want to have sex with a plumber. Right. We don't really want to have that experience. But, like, it's nice to think about. It's exciting to think about. So those fantasies that you can bring forward, that. That fall under that category, if you feel safe to share those with a partner and they feel safe to share with you, that's cool. Maybe there are ways that you can, like, role play and, like, have an experience of that. Then there are those fantasies that you would like to see happen. Maybe it's, like, as straightforward as, like, having sex outside of the bedroom. Like, maybe it is bringing a mirror or a toy or restraints into bed. It could be just experimenting with a prop or something that you haven't allowed yourself to experiment with. On a more extreme end, it might be like going to a sex club or even having a threesome, you know, but these are very, very, very common things that people name that they do want to experience. They want to work with a partner to experience. It is a skill that we can all develop to be able to hear a partner's desires and fantasies and not make them about us or about us lacking anything. You know, if a partner comes to you and they're like, I want to have a threesome, and your initial response is like, what am I not giving you? That you need, like, understandable response. But probably you don't get that it's actually not about you. You can't give them two bodies at once. Wants. You can't. If you could, you would, right?
- [138:15]
Host
Do you ever see that actually working out, though, in the long term?
- [138:18]
Caitlin V
People who, like, see group sex, group.
- [138:21]
Host
Sex or open marriages. I've actually. If you extend the timeline long enough. Not that I have a huge, you know, data set to support this, but I do know of a couple of people, and over a long enough timeline, it doesn't seem to work that well.
- [138:34]
Caitlin V
Well, you could say the same about monogamy. Too.
- [138:36]
Host
Sure.
- [138:36]
Caitlin V
Over a long enough timeline, very few monogamous. Really?
- [138:38]
Host
Relationships work, I think, if you're the right person. And again, consensual adults doing consensual stuff could care less. I could tell you, for me, that one wouldn't work. Like, I. I would not be a secure enough human being to be okay with that.
- [138:50]
Caitlin V
Well, I think we got to make some distinctions here too, because there is, like, the couple that occasionally has a threesome with someone who they met online while they're on vacation. Right. And then they go home and they don't. They. That that's just a fun thing that they, like, sometimes fantasize about. They don't remain in contact with that person. There's a. A pretty big gap between them and someone who, like, is in a throuple and has a ongoing intimate, emotional relationship with another person. Yeah, exactly. There's so much range. And then we also have to, you know, there's sexual exclusivity and then there's romantic exclusivity. And these are things that I've played around with a lot in my personal life. And where I eventually landed is like, I prefer romantic and emotional exclusivity. I want to be one partner with one partner. Part of that is because I really value my time and. And I don't want to spend a whole bunch of time talking about feelings with a bunch of people. It gets exponentially larger the more people that you involve, the more conversation and time goes into the relationship. When I was younger, in my early 20s, that sounded fun and I enjoyed doing it. Today, it's not how I want to spend my time. I prefer just, like, the simplicity of having one person knowing that I am their person and that they are mine, feels a lot easier. In terms of sexual exclusivity, though. I've been bisexual, I've identified as bisexual since I was a teen. Actually, it was my dad who told me that I was bisexual. He was like, when I was, before I even clocked it in myself. Yeah, yeah. I kept, like, wanting to rent movies with, like, lesbian and bisexual leads. And my dad was like, you know, I'm onto you, right? And I was like, what do you mean? And he was like, are you not seeing this? Are you not seeing this in you?
- [140:29]
Host
Seeing it. Seeing it in one thing, recognizing it is another.
- [140:32]
Caitlin V
Yeah, yeah, right. So it's so. So. But my, like, desire to approach women, by the way, my comfort approaching women, to go back to, like, how scary it can be to approach the same sex, opposite sex, has, like, waxed and waned over time. But I really appreciate that in my relationship. I can express that. Like today on the flight, on one of the airports on the way here, I saw this, like, incredibly beautiful TSA agent in her uniform and her, like, tight bond and her glasses, and I.
- [141:00]
Host
Was like, did it for you?
- [141:02]
Caitlin V
Wow. Yeah, really? Really. Unexpectedly, surprisingly, just like, smack in the face, like, hello, did it for me. And so, like, I like that I can express that to my partner and that, like, you know, that's not where we're at today, but there may be a future in which, like, I wanted to pursue a sexual relationship with a woman that's something that he can't give to me. And so it falls under sort of like a different. Like a different category. So you asked, have I seen it work long term? There are couples that I have had the pleasure of knowing or working with or being friends with for whom that really, really works. Like polyamory. Having relationships with multiple people just. It serves them. They're not like, always open necessarily. Sometimes they have other relationships, sometimes they don't. They, the couples that I see it really works for, they really practice, prioritize the primary relationship. And then, of course, there are individuals that practice what's known as solo poly, and they don't have a core couple. They're like individuals that are doing their thing, and I guess it works for them. I don't see we can't measure them by the long term relationship because that's not sort of the orientation. I think that polyamory and non monogamy and open relationships became really popular over the last couple years in media. At least they did in my world.
- [142:21]
Host
You see more of it, for sure.
- [142:22]
Caitlin V
And I think it gave people the idea that they should try it. And I don't think that was accurate. It's not for most people. To me, it's like an orientation. If you grew up suspecting that you could love and have relationships with more than one person, if you had a relationship with one person and then you really felt like you wanted to add another person into that relationship, even early on in life, as early as 14 or 15, when you were first kind of dating and trying these things out, you might be a really good candidate for polyamory. If you have not felt that before, and all of a sudden you, like, read an article in Vogue that describes this relationship style, or you watch the.
- [143:01]
Host
Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.
- [143:03]
Caitlin V
Right, right. And then suddenly you're like, oh, that's an interesting option. Maybe we should try that.
- [143:07]
Host
You might Lose it all, buddy.
- [143:09]
Caitlin V
And I would say, I think a lot of people are going, they're looking at their primary relationship and they're going, you know what I would like more? I don't want to. To do this is my very hot take. I don't want to do the hard work that is involved in really taking care of this and making sure that like, I can get all of my sexual and erotic needs from this relationship. That takes us. That takes a lot.
- [143:30]
Host
Just the new flashy shine.
- [143:31]
Caitlin V
There's a new thing. Yeah, don't. We're gonna bring her home and that's gonna like revive our sex life. Right now you're adding another person into the works. Everything becomes more complicated. Not to mention the that that person also has feelings, wants, needs, desires, rights. And yeah, I think, I think a lot of people think that they will solve something or fix something, and all they really do is complicate and often make things worse.
- [143:57]
Host
Yeah, I can see people taking that option or choosing that option as an escape. How big have you grown your team now? Obviously you started off at 16 knowing you wanted to go this path. How big have you been able to grow it?
- [144:08]
Caitlin V
I have two full employees that are absolutely incredible. They are the machine that makes the entirety of Caitlin V exist and like, operate in the world. So I'm very blessed to have those too. And then we work with a team of seven coaches who I oversee and send clients and referrals over to those coaches. And then I have the pleasure of sort of like working with a lot of people through them, even though I, as a coach, can only work with a few people a year. And then we have so many contractors and agencies that are overseeing and supporting different parts of the business. So I have a web developer who I've worked with for a decade now who oversees my website. I have a social media team that supports me with like content posting and clipping and all of the things that, you know, go into it and can be.
- [145:02]
Host
There are a full time job ecosystem in and of itself.
- [145:05]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I. And I have, I'm supported by maybe 14 or so contractors in any given moment, people that like, come and go as, you know, as a per project basis. Right now we're doing a virtual summit on January 17, which I thought was like. I will admit, I'll be the first to admit that I really thought you just kind of like jumped on Zoom and then you put people up and you had their slides up. And what I have learned is that yes, that is an option, but if you want to Deliver something that, like, really gives people an incredibly high quality experience. It takes a huge team in order to do that. So that's my humbling lesson right now, is, like, waking up every day and being like, oh, we. We need to hire one more person to. We gotta hire. Oh, and one more person.
- [145:48]
Host
Okay, here's something else I didn't know about.
- [145:50]
Caitlin V
Yeah, right. Oh, we need one. Oh, got it. Okay. And we also need that other software. That software is very expensive. Are you sure we couldn't have just done that with software that we already had? No, no, no, no, no. Buy the software. Buy the software. It's a humbling experience, but, yes, it's grown. I never thought I was gonna be a CEO. I started a YouTube channel because I wanted to respond to the need that I was seeing. There was a lack of people having the conversations that I felt they should have access to on the Internet. And YouTube was pretty ripe for that at the time. And to this day, it's. I don't think that there's a really advanced and nuanced conversation about the subjects that I talk about in particular happening. Part of that is censorship. Part of that is just the lack of communication and connection that exists when we're all sort of in our own little boxes. It's certainly been a surprise to end up here with the size of the team and the business that I have.
- [146:46]
Host
Do you like it?
- [146:48]
Caitlin V
Most days? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [146:49]
Host
Well, again, there's no perfect job. Yeah, it's. I'd never. If you would have given me earlier in my life a piece of paper, as many pieces of paper as there are pages in this book, I would have written down everything that I thought I would have potentially done. Nothing I do now would have been on that list. Not a single damn thing. Except for the first job in the military. Beyond that, it's like, ooh, didn't really forward think beyond that one. So let's figure it out along the way.
- [147:11]
Caitlin V
And I'm curious on your thoughts on this. I was thinking about this earlier. Earlier. Like, I think there's wisdom in. In driving towards the things that we know that we want. And I think there is also wisdom in. In being open to moving where the flow of our life seems to be pushing us.
- [147:28]
Host
I am leaning the older I get to the latter. I do think it's great to have goals. Otherwise you're kind of a compass that doesn't have a true north. And so this macro goal, I think is great. But does it matter how you get there? I think, and I have found in my life that, you know, lift your head up like, okay, cool. I can still see it. I'm heading in that direction. I'm not farther away than I was when I started. But you get to a fork in a road and you're like, God, I have to make the right decision here, or otherwise I'm never going to get there. And now it's like, I'm going to be okay either way because I can backtrack and, oh, I've done that. I was like, okay, we're in a cul de sac. We need to get out of here.
- [148:01]
Caitlin V
Climb back down that mountain and you.
- [148:03]
Host
Can, but you learn from that. And then maybe you recognize that in the topology and the next split intersection that you come up to. But the more I have tried to control things in my life, the less it has actually benefited me. And I don't think you can short circuit the experiences. You need to have to get to that place because it is tough to. I'm not saying surrender yourself to the, you know, the. The winds of life, but I'm also kind of saying surrender yourself to the winds of life. But you have to be able to. You have to have enough experiences along the way to recognize that if you do that, you're going to be okay because you have the tools necessary to serve. Solve the problems in front of you. I don't know how you short circuit experience. I'm yet to figure out a way where you can actually shorten that other than reps in time.
- [148:42]
Caitlin V
Right. Yeah. I don't know that you would want to.
- [148:45]
Host
Yeah.
- [148:45]
Caitlin V
And I think, as with most things, like what you're pointing to is that the answer is both.
- [148:50]
Host
Yeah.
- [148:51]
Caitlin V
The answer is, like, have goals and.
- [148:52]
Host
Flow and what works for me may not work for somebody else. Because again, I. My n. In life, my data point is one. It really is. And I really try to remember that, especially when people ask me for advice or, hey, they ask me, what should I do and how. How should I do it? I'm like, I can maybe help you with the how. I can give you a template, the why. You're gonna have to figure out that one on your own. Because if you have the wrong why, which or something I might think is the wrong why, maybe for you, it absolutely clicks and that's your true note. And you go, who am I to say? Because your ends won too.
- [149:20]
Caitlin V
Right?
- [149:20]
Host
You know? Yeah. What else? How big do you want to grow it? I mean, what else do you have that you want to accomplish? Is this your first book?
- [149:26]
Caitlin V
This is my first book.
- [149:27]
Host
Yeah. You're gonna write another one.
- [149:29]
Caitlin V
I have a lot more that I want to say. There were a number of things that were a little bit more topical or timely that I took out of the book. Some of the stuff that we talked about today, like the state of men and boys and masculinity. And that was because putting that into the book in the way that I had initially envisioned would have made the book, like, very of this moment.
- [149:50]
Host
Yeah, it locks you in time.
- [149:51]
Caitlin V
And I really wanted it to be timeless, because sex is timeless. It's existed as long as we have and even before and will continue. So I wanted this book to, like, stand.
- [149:59]
Host
We don't know.
- [150:00]
Caitlin V
It might continue.
- [150:01]
Host
Demolition man might become a documentary.
- [150:03]
Caitlin V
Let's not be so sure. I did want the book to just exist as its own and to be found on a bookshelf 10, 20, 30, 50, 100 years from now and still be relevant. And it will be. But there is more that I wanna say on what I see as a coach. A lot of the conversation that we had today, that is a little bit more of this moment. So I have a vision of where it might go if I was to write a second book. I don't know for sure. Where is it that I want to take it? The mission for me is still the mission. It's get this information into the hands of as many people as possible. The question that I wake up trying to answer every day is how do I empower more people to carry this message forward? Not for me, but for what I perceive to be the good of all? Like, how do we restore pleasure as a birthright? How do we make an army of people who have access to quality, pleasure centric information and have audiences of folks who will listen to them and take that message further and further and further. I am one person. I can get it as far as I can, but I can get it much further if I empower people to carry it themselves and to carry it everywhere that they go. And so I think my job is to translate it well for the masses. I think coming from the world of science and research to YouTube has is a, first of all, a tremendous jump. But it does give me a chance to take things from the evidence base, combine them with the anecdotal experience that I have from coaching, and put it out in such a way that people can really digest it and learn from it. I would love to continue to train coaches and work with coaches, because at the end of the day, as much as I'm a Content creator and now an author and a show host. Like, my heart is in coaching. I love working one on one with someone and watching them transform their life. That is what thrills me more than anything else. And so I want to empower other people to be able to do that. There are a lot of obstacles that exist for professionals in my industry and the people who are like really phenomenal sex coaches, like their heart is just in helping people to do this. They're not necessarily great business people as a whole. Generally I tend. I actually was just pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed business building and so that's something that I was able to do. But I want to make it easier for folks who have that gift to, to make a living giving it. I want to put sex coaching on the map. Sex therapy exists for a very good reason. It will continue to exist. Sex therapy is really excellent for folks who are doing, dealing with co occurring instances of like, anxiety, depression, have severe trauma, have cptsd, have like, have, have needs that are beyond just like what the average person needs in order to like have a great sex life. Right.
- [152:59]
Host
What's cptsd?
- [153:01]
Caitlin V
Complex ptsd, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
- [153:03]
Host
What makes who finds it as complex?
- [153:05]
Caitlin V
So I, it is a, from what I understand, it is the, it is a collection of symptoms and experiences that comes from like repeated trauma.
- [153:17]
Host
Okay.
- [153:18]
Caitlin V
And it is like a diagnosable cluster of symptoms that is, that is distinct from ptsd. But I'm not an expert on that and I'd have to verify. But there are a lot of people, I would say the majority of people who, who could just have a better sex life. And, and that if they had like a little better, a little more connected, little more pleasurable, satisfaction, satisfying sex life, would have a better marriage, would, would sleep better at night, would be happier co parenting, like, it's just little tweaks would make a huge difference in their world and they may also feel a little bit more like excited to wake up and go to the gym or take their supplements or whatever it is. And so I want for sex coaching to exist in such a way that people feel like they, they can just access that and that, that is a really simple and effective way to see a positive shift inside of their life and inside of their relationship. Like, that is my ultimate dream.
- [154:17]
Host
That's awesome. We have been at it for over two and a half hours.
- [154:20]
Caitlin V
Is that true?
- [154:21]
Host
Yeah, I just looked over at my phone. Your boyfriend will kill us if I don't get you out of here soon. We gotta get you to the hotel we'll end with where people can find you. But before for that, what, where would you start? Couples. What's your advice you have for couples? Obviously there's advice for couples listening. Yeah. Couples listening or just. Well, yeah, anybody who, I mean at some point, you know, whether it, whatever preference you have, hopefully you don't live your life by yourself and you end up with a partner. What advice do you have for them?
- [154:54]
Caitlin V
So this is, it's going to be two prong. Start with yourself because you are the person who you have access to. You are the mind and the brain and the body that you can know to the degree that it is knowable. And so you have to start with you, your sexuality pre existed your current relationship. And it, it is something that you will have until you die. And, and so it is something that like you need to understand and even nurture for yourself and reflect on for yourself. It exists independently of the other person and then it also exists with the other person in the couple. So start with you get clear on what it is that you're thinking about struggling with, where those things came from. Like know yourself sexually first and also like understand that you can meet your own needs to a degree sexually and that you, you. Well, it may not be a perfect solution and it may not be a permanent solution like taking care of your own needs. If you have a partner who isn't or can't or is not willing to for whatever reason, like get right with you first, that's number one. And then as a couple, the, the place where I would start is I would go back to the things that we've kind of like addressed today, which is make some time, elevate the conversation.
- [156:19]
Host
Find a garden.
- [156:20]
Caitlin V
Find a garden. Find a garden. You know, actually that's it. It's find a garden. It really is find a garden. Schedule some time in the garden and don't just schedule like a one off in the garden. Part of doing that process of self reflection and self discovery is going to be being able to have that conversation with your partner is going to be the part that allows you to not get defensive or go on the attack when you go to communicate with the partner so that you can have a quality communication. Take breaks, don't communicate past your edge, write things down, develop a structure for communication, repeat what they said, go back and review it, summarize it, do all of the things that allow communication to be successful. You will find again in the process of self discovery that you might think I want to have a threesome, but Then you ask yourself one question further, which is like, what is it that that would give me? Oh, it would have me feel really desired. Oh. What I'm actually looking for is to feel really, really desired. Okay. I can take that to my significant other, and I can take that to them. Not from a place of, you're a bad job of desiring me, but from an earnest place of, you know, what would be really fulfilling for me? If I felt like you really deeply wanted me. And here are the things that would indicate to me that you. That I was really wanted. And then revisit. Come go back to the garden. You know, take it. Take it to a professional. Take it to a coach, a therapist. Take it to a friend who is supportive, not a friend who has a lot of spicy opinions and. And, you know, isn't gonna be able to actually, like, hold quality space for you. We've got those friends. And then come back. Come back to the garden. Come back to the garden and keep making the garden safe. You know, I think that if you're a couple that keeps struggling, if you go to the garden and you end up fighting every time, what that is pointing to for me is that there's a lack of foundational safety in the relationship. You might feel like you're at risk of being broken up with. You might be in the habit of threatening, if you keep that up, you know, we're gonna get divorced, or you joke about divorce or whatever. Like, you might feel like your. Your previous relationship was so unsafe that you're now projecting that into the current relationship. But if the communication isn't landing, if it's not going forward, and if you're not seeing progress in time, that's an indication that the foundation of safety isn't there. And then for you, the thing to start with then would be to go back and get safe with one another, get safe with yourself, get safe for the other person and help them figure out how to be safe for you. Once you have that, you can go anywhere.
- [158:52]
Host
The sky is a lot of Runway in front of you. If you can get to there. It's good advice. Where can people find your stuff? The book comes out what? The book comes out on February 27th.
- [159:00]
Caitlin V
January 27th. January 27th.
- [159:02]
Host
That's close. I got the.
- [159:03]
Caitlin V
I got the right. You did. It'll still be on sale February 27th, too.
- [159:07]
Host
That's true.
- [159:08]
Caitlin V
But it will start being on sale.
- [159:09]
Host
You'll get a much better chance of being on the bestseller list if they buy it in January.
- [159:12]
Caitlin V
Yes. And you know what? A book like this on men's sexuality. Quick side. When I. When I took this idea to agents and publishers, I heard over and over again, men don't buy books and men don't buy books on sexuality. And thankfully, I found an agent to represent it and Hay House was excited to publish it. Yeah, but I would love to prove those people wrong by saying, yes, they do.
- [159:37]
Host
Actually, I bought a book on the last trip I was on.
- [159:40]
Caitlin V
Men. Men read. Yeah, they read. And you know what? A lot of men read like, you know, a handful of books every year. So, like, why not this? Like, let this be the book then, right? Read this book.
- [159:50]
Host
I agree.
- [159:51]
Caitlin V
So the book comes out January 27th. You can get all the bonuses and free downloads. And I made a whole thing on what I couldn't say in the book so I could get all that off of my chest@hblsbook.com that's harder, better, longer, stronger.
- [160:03]
Host
Hblsbook.com there's some little Easter eggs on the COVID You probably can't see them.
- [160:07]
Caitlin V
Maybe you can, but you have to get the book in order to get the. And like I mentioned, we're doing a summit on January 17th and it's free. It's totally free. It's called the Pressure to Power Summit. You can get more at the. the HPLS book website. And if you sign up, if you. If you join as a vip, you can get a signed copy of the book.
- [160:28]
Host
Sweet. And then you have your YouTube channel.
- [160:29]
Caitlin V
Have YouTube. Caitlin V on YouTube.
- [160:32]
Host
Do you do all the other social media?
- [160:34]
Caitlin V
I am mostly on YouTube. I've been kicked off of every other social for talking about sex. And you can find me on Instagram. You can find me on TikTok. I'm on like my fourth TikTok. But find me on YouTube. That's the corner of the Internet that I exist in. And then, and then if the. I have 14 courses like I mentioned and you can get those at my website by. You can search Caitlin V or CaitlinV.
- [160:54]
Host
Neal.com Awesome. Well, let's get you back to your boyfriend. I appreciate you making the travel.
- [160:58]
Caitlin V
Thank you so much for having me.
- [160:59]
Host
Well, of course. I am sorry that the snow can be. Conditions are what would be called by locals. What do you think, Michael Dog? Would that be an accurate.
- [161:06]
Michael
Horrible. Yeah.
- [161:08]
Host
Snow conditions, flood warning in December. You were born and raised in Montana. Have you ever heard of a flood warning in December?
- [161:13]
Michael
No, I've barely ever heard of a flood warning in Montana.
- [161:16]
Caitlin V
Yeah, that's fair. Actually, I only learned how to ski at like 33. And I feel like I got hip to skiing just as soon as skiing became impossible. Like, there's no snow here, there's no snow at Mammoth.
- [161:31]
Host
So here's what you're going to do tomorrow. You're going to go up chair one, which is the top of the mountain, and then go down the backside. It is the most sheltered. And if there is going to be fresh snow or better riding conditions, spend your time on the backside of the mountain and you'll be okay.
- [161:44]
Caitlin V
I will be there. Thank you.
- [161:45]
Host
Awesome. How long are you in Montana for?
- [161:48]
Caitlin V
I'll be here until Sunday.
- [161:50]
Host
Awesome. Well, hopefully by then. And I'm lying when I say this we'll get some better weather because I've already looked at the weather report. It's not going to be good, but.
- [161:58]
Caitlin V
I know well, this would be a great opportunity for me to learn how to ski in in various conditions.
- [162:02]
Host
Oh, that's definitely a glass.
- [162:04]
Caitlin V
I'm like, relatively new to it.
- [162:05]
Host
Half full approach. I like where your head's at.
- [162:07]
Caitlin V
Yeah, I plan on skiing for a long time, which means I got to get those reps in now while my body isn't as fragile as it as it will be in the future.
- [162:14]
Host
Cool. Well, excuse back to your boyfriend. Thank you so much.
- [162:15]
Caitlin V
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