When my business partner Dr. Dain Heer and I set out to write The Five Elements of Intimacy, we did not set out to write a book about relationships. We set out to understand why so many people we met were lonely, even when they were in relationships. Especially when they were in relationships.
For decades, I have been facilitating personal development classes all over the world. People come to these classes because they want to change something. They want more money, better relationships, greater success, deeper happiness. And what I’ve consistently seen over and over is this: people are giving themselves up in order to be with someone.
They would come to me and say, “My relationship is falling apart.” And when we dug into it, I would discover that they had given up the friends their partner did not like. They had stopped doing the things they loved because their partner was not interested. They had made themselves smaller, quieter, less of who they truly were, in the hope that if they just became the right version of themselves, they would finally be loved.
And then they wondered why they felt so alone.
I call this “divorcing yourself”. You divorce parts of yourself to stay in the relationship. And here is the strange thing: The very act of divorcing yourself is what kills the intimacy you were trying to create!
The Woman Who Changed Everything
The idea for this book came from a beautiful friend of mine named Mary. Mary was born in England in 1913. She and her husband Bill were together for over fifty years – and in all that time, Mary never once divorced herself.
Mary had a large circle of friends. She loved art, philosophy, and deep conversation. Bill did not. Bill was an advertising executive. He liked golf and conservative restaurants. Mary did not. And yet, for over fifty years, they created one of the most alive, generous, joyful relationships I have ever witnessed.
How?
Mary honored herself. She did not ask Bill to be interested in what she was interested in. She did not make him wrong for being who he was. And Bill did the same for her. When she wanted to host a dinner party with artists and philosophers, she did. When Bill wanted to play golf, he did. Neither of them required the other to change.
I remember Mary telling me about a time Bill invited her to join him at a business dinner. She put on a conservative dress, white gloves, the whole thing. As they sat down, Bill leaned over and said, “Mary, please do not talk about your radical ideas tonight.” And Mary said, “Of course, darling.”
She did not make him wrong. She did not take it personally. She simply honored what he needed in that moment. And later, when she hosted her own gatherings, Bill honored her by letting her be exactly who she was.
That is intimacy. Not needing the other person to be different. Not abandoning yourself to keep the peace. Just allowing each other to be exactly who you are.
The Five Elements
Watching Mary and Bill, I started to see a pattern. There were five elements that made their relationship work. Honor. Trust. Allowance. Vulnerability. Gratitude.
And here is what became clear to me. These five elements are not something you do with another person. They are something you do with yourself first.
You cannot honor someone else if you do not honor yourself. You cannot trust another person if you do not trust your own awareness. You cannot allow someone to be who they are if you are constantly judging yourself for being who you are.
Intimacy does not start with finding the right person. It starts with being willing to be you.
That is why Dain and I wrote this book.
What I Hope You Learn
I see so many people looking for someone to complete them. They think if they just find the right partner, the loneliness will end. And what I know is this: no one can fill a space you refuse to occupy yourself.
If you are not willing to honor yourself, you will demand that your partner honor you in ways they cannot. If you do not trust yourself, you will require constant reassurance from them. If you are not grateful for yourself, you will always be looking for someone to prove your worth. The relationship becomes a transaction. “If you give me what I will not give myself, I will stay.”
And that is not intimacy. That is dependency.
What I hope this book gives readers is permission. Permission to stop abandoning yourself. Permission to stop making yourself wrong. Permission to recognize that you are not too much, or not enough. You are you. And that is the gift!
When you choose the five elements with yourself, everything changes. You stop asking, “Will you give me what I refuse to give myself?” and start asking, “What would we like to create together?”
That is intimacy.
The Journey of Writing This Book
It is one thing to teach these tools. It is another thing to live them.
What I discovered in writing this book is that intimacy is not a destination. It is a choice. Every day, you get to choose. Will I honor me today? Will I trust what I perceive? Will I allow myself to be who I am, even if that is not who I was yesterday?
These are the questions I have learned to ask myself in my own relationships, and the questions this book invites you to ask.
What If You Stopped Divorcing You?
Here is what I know. Most people spend their whole lives waiting for permission to be themselves. They wait for the right partner, the right job, the right circumstances. And they miss the most important thing.
You do not need permission. You just need to choose!
What if you stopped making yourself wrong? What if you trusted your own awareness? What if you were willing to be as kind to yourself as you are to the people you love?
What would that create?
Dain and I wrote this book because I got tired of watching people abandon themselves. We wrote it because Mary showed me a different possibility. We wrote it because we believe that intimacy, real intimacy, is not about finding someone who completes you. It is about being willing to be all of you in every relationship.
And that changes everything.
By Gary M. Douglas
Gary M. Douglas Biography:
Gary M. Douglas is a bestselling author, international speaker and business innovator. The founder of Access Consciousness®, a global movement that transforms lives with simple-yet-profound tools, Gary has become an internationally-recognized thought leader, facilitator and pioneer. Gary M. Douglas is co-author, with Dr. Dain Heer, of The Five Elements of Intimacy (Access Consciousness Publishing). Learn more at accessconsciousness.com and www.acpublishing.com/intimacy
ABOUT THE BOOK:
The Five Elements Of Intimacy
Purchase Link: www.acpublishing.com/intimacy
First Chapter: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11vUa4LqueYV-8ethtv2I3R4kzmJSLAjt/view?usp=sharing
About the book: What if intimacy wasn’t something you had to earn, work at, or get right, but something you could choose to be and have?
In this book, Gary Douglas and Dr. Dain Heer invite you into a radically different conversation about connection and relationships. One that doesn’t begin with rules, expectations, or self-improvement, but with awareness, curiosity, and choice. Through the Five Elements of Intimacy Honor, Trust, Allowance, Vulnerability, and Gratitude, you’ll discover how true intimacy starts with you and expands smoothly into every area, and every relationship, in your life.
You don’t have to change who you are to create deeper intimacy. You don’t have to be perfect, healed, or “ready.” You only have to be willing to choose. What if having true intimacy with yourself is the greatest gift you could bring to any relationship?
