#58 - How to Anchor Your Sexual Integrity
Does the concept of sexual integrity overwhelm or intimidate you? Do you get confused by what you are feeling, what you’ve been taught, and what you are seeing around you, and all of them seem to be contradicting instead of intertwining?
Andrew and Sammy are at it again, this time talking about anchors of our sexual integrity. Why is it important to know what grounds you when it comes to your sexuality? And how is this helpful to you as you traverse daily life? Listen to know more!
Without anchors, life would become very intolerable and unmanageable
Exercise of focus and avoiding distractions
Routines and habits to anchor you and give you a clear mind
Orderliness and organization help people feel at ease.
Having control helps anchor a person
The more you're wrapped up in your own life, the more dramatic your difficulties seem
Being grateful and knowing there are people who are there for you anchors you
Definitely important to always have something to look forward to
Anchors let you see the sunshine again and help you focus on all the many things that can go right and are going right for you
Stay positive and create some very intentional anchors in your life so that you can always find calm even amidst the storm
Episode Transcript:
Andrew Love: Welcome back to Love Life and Legacy, a podcast dedicated to helping you win at the game of life and love, and lineage. And today's episode, we're talking about anchors. Sammy and I are going into how to anchor yourself in the good when it seems like everything's going bad, because there's a lot of wild stuff happening in this world. And a lot of people are being swept up in the tides of pessimism and fear and doubt, because they don't really have a strong reason to stay positive. So Sammy and I are going to go into some personal testimonies, but we're also going to give a little bit of tips on how you can develop your own anchors, so that no matter what's going on around, you stay positive and keep moving forward towards your Northstar goals, towards building a life of sexual integrity and just being happy. Sounds good? Let's go ahead.
Andrew Love: Hello everybody and welcome back to the podcast. My name is Andrew Robert Love. And this is..
Sammy Uyama: Sammy Uyama. We'll leave it at that. Last time I worked out the full name, you almost had a heart attack.
Andrew Love: Yeah.
Sammy Uyama: So we'll stick with that.
Andrew Love: So many letters and numbers. Today, we're going to talk about anchors, and I really do have to define that for you because we needed definitions and angles that you can take from this. But for us, what we're talking about is, when we were at a crossroads, when our life could have gone one way or the other, there are certain things that we have in place in our lives that we've used, incorporated in order for us to go the good way, the productive way, the healthy way, has led us to a life of sexual integrity and fulfilling marriages, and better mental health, spiritual health. And so we want to get into some instances in our lives and some tools that we use, because we want you to be able to have as much ammunition as possible when you're faced with the temptation to be negative, or pessimistic or to give up on yourself, or to give up on High Noon, or if you're going through our programs or to give up on your sexual integrity, when there's so much temptation, pushing you in the opposite direction to be selfish, to be critical. It's really good to have Batman in the original 60s version, Sammy I don't know if you were alive back then. I was just a young young man. But there's an old..
Sammy Uyama: Like a utility belt.
Andrew Love: Yeah, yes.
Sammy Uyama: Famous yellow belt.
Andrew Love: Yes, so bright and it had six pockets, but somehow it had a million different gadgets in it. Whatever you happen to need was in one of those six pockets.
Sammy Uyama: The main buckle was like a grappling hook, and he would shoot it out at stuff and it would pull him by his waist, and go to where he needed to go.
Andrew Love: Perfect analogy. We want to give you a Batman tool belt that is for all different occasions, so that when your computer's telling you: Hey, watch me, be distracted by me, you'll have internal ammunition, you have your internal Batman belt, to get out of that scenario to do something meaningful with your time, with your energy, with your mind, with your heart. So we want to get into that. Sammy, would you like to go first?
Sammy Uyama: Well, no, you should start. I appreciate you wanting to balance out us talking but I think it's good for you.
Andrew Love: There's definitely a point in my life where I blink and I realize I've been speaking for 20 minutes straight, and I think it's a disease. Well, one thing that I did want to mention that we spoke about earlier is within the relationships, it's super important to understand what you're committed to in a relationship, with yourself, with God, with other people, but specifically with me. I just thought about it because it was exactly a year ago today that there's a lot of tension in my family, with my wife and all three of my kids are sick, back to back to back to back to back to like they all got sick twice. The same week, super high fevers are horrible. My wife and I were fighting constantly in the heat of the moment, I said to her if it weren't for the blessing, and my commitment to the blessing, I don't know if I could keep this going right now. I wasn't accusing her or anything, I was just saying I have nothing in me, personally, to humans a human to be okay right now. But since my connection to our blessing is beyond just you and me, I can find the wherewithal to get through this difficult time. That's not just because I went through the blessing ceremony, it's my commitment prior to the blessing and all that I've invested into the blessing itself that allowed me to continue even when I was done. I was empty. If I were a car, my fuel tank was empty, I was on the side of the highway. But the blessing was the tow truck that picked me up and took me to the next leg so that I could refuel and all that. That really saved us, that was exactly a year ago, I think to the day, honestly. And since then we've had an amazing year, absolutely, probably one of our best. And we would have never experienced that if I didn't have that really important tool in my tool chest. So that's one thing, and again, it was from yours, you mean..
Sammy Uyama: Your Batman belt.
Andrew Love: So that's one example that's really practical, it's when you have a belief set, every time you engage with that belief, you're feeding it or you're starving. By ignoring your prayer life or anything, it's either strengthening it because you're doing it, or it's weakening it because you're not doing it. And so, with our blessing, I'm always trying to feed it with understanding and belief, and that helps me get through the times when practically it's unbearable, which it has been a few times. But we've been together for eight years, and of course, there's ups and downs, and all sorts of stuff but it's what you are committed to, at the end of the day. Are you ready now, bro?
Sammy Uyama: One incident that comes to mind for me was, about a year and a half ago now and we're actually hanging and was touring in Korea. We were in Yeosu, we're doing this tour and speaking in churches, different cities in the country and one of the beautiful, beautiful cities, and I think is Yeosu, and we're staying at the church center there. Many of you have your own room, and I don't remember the details of it. We're fighting. We are upset about something, argue about something and I remember feeling so frustrated that I had this complaint, it's not accurate, it’s not entirely a thing. But at the time, my perspective was that I'm always the one who has to make amends and say sorry first and be the humble one. You never do, and I was really annoyed and frustrated with that. And so I felt like I'm clearly right here, she's in the wrong and so we set up, I moved my futons across the room or something. So I was thinking by myself, and I'm like: If she wants to make amends, just come here and then I'll talk it out with her. But otherwise, I'm just going to eff this, I'm just going to go to bed and mind my own business. And then I was like that for a few minutes then I changed my mind, and then it can't be like that.
Sammy Uyama: For me, the thing that really got me was I don't know, I work a plan in my mind. I heard it from a bunch of places or something but I just had this really, really strong mindset that there's no one-offs and that everything is the beginning of a precedent for something. There's two things, one advice we heard was don't go to bed angry as a couple, which I always like to work it out. So that was one thing that was on my mind, that we tried to do really diligently though, even if it religiously. Even if we had to stay really late, we'd always try to work it out. And then the other one was running away, I don't want to end putting responsibility on the other person, on my wife, and making her be the one that needs to make amends and fixing that.
Sammy Uyama: So those are two things that I didn't want to have in my relationship. It was really hard for me to do, I was so on my high horse about how right it was and how I was always one that had to be humble and just for once, she needs to feel it. I get to be the king that has everyone serving his every whim. A lot of pride going on, I just had to swallow that up and just go to her, and then she was giving me the cold shoulder so even that moment, again, I was like, eff this. I'm trying to be humble, and she's just being a witch about it.
Sammy Uyama: The second time I had to be humble, and that we're able to talk about it. And I was letting her get out whatever she wanted to get out and vent her frustrations, and then we're able to dig past all that and resolve what we need to do as often. I'm so glad I did that because she told me that she was really scared actually, when I went to sleep on my own because I always would be the one that would come first, and be really sorry like that. She thought that: Oh if I'm not doing that now means that I gave up on our marriage, and she started to have all these fears running through her mind.
Sammy Uyama: So anyway, after hearing you talk, that's one incident specifically that comes to mind, and the anchor that brought me through that was of foresight. Knowing the kind of relationship we wanted and then knowing the dangers that were putting that at risk, and just knowing that not wanting to start down a direction. It doesn't really have that mindset, there's no one offs and that just everything is the beginning of something and acts as a precedent. A new habitual way of relating.
Andrew Love: Yeah, that sounds like your anchor was a standard of communication. That's really important. You feel it so viscerally when you breach a standard that you care about that you've been upholding. It hurts, right? If you never swear, that one time that you do swear feels dirty. You want to know anything about that Sammy, all you do is swear. To that story we learned, but yes, when you hold this standard and you have a relationship with, you feel it in your bones when you violate that standard. I would like to talk personally, because I think there's a lot of single folks out there that would relate to this, but I am an extremely anxious person. I'm a paradox because I'm super anxious, plus I live a very high risk lifestyle. Doesn't really add up, so traveling the world right now during a global pandemic, with three little kids, lots of mosquitoes and whatever, there's plenty of reason to freak out.
Andrew Love: But the anchor, and that is, I was having this conversation with somebody recently that if I didn't have meditation to calm my spirit on a daily basis, and if I didn't have breathwork to calm my stomach, because that's one thing, I hold a lot of tension and anxiety in my stomach. I know for a fact that I would be on a lot of medicine, prescription like Xanax or whatever, to calm me down, and that would grow into a pretty big problem. I feel like I would have a lot of physical problems, I probably have acid reflux or something that starts in the stomach, and due to stress, and just your body being in a stressed out state constantly. That's been my anchor, even when I'm tired, I've got it, even when I don't want to, I have to do some sort of breathing. I got to fit it in, otherwise, I start to get sick, I start missing or whatever. I can see I start getting more pessimistic or I start to physically get more tired, or I started to feel sick physically. Without those anchors, my life would become very intolerable and unmanageable.
Andrew Love: So if you have anxiety, know that there are many things that you can do to train your nervous system to not react as much. And also, there's things that you can do to your mind to not focus on all the trillions of things that could go wrong at any given instant, instead to focus on all the many things that can go right for you and to invest. Because for me, that's the only way that I've been able to live a fun life because otherwise I think I would be honestly close to being bed bound by my anxiety, since I was a little kid.
Sammy Uyama: For me, in my life, now I've got some routines and habits that help me a lot to keep me anchored and clear. The problem is that I can name examples of times in my life when I didn't have that, and I also managed fine, and so there's no one really glaringly obvious, consistent thing. Exercise is a big thing, eating really well, having clear routines, all those, but then, I can go through big periods where I don't do any of those and manage fairly well. I think part of it is knowing that it's a time period, it's not just my life. And when we're traveling in Europe, for two months straight, nonstop and we ate whatever people gave us, we have no idea of what our next meal was going to be. Seeing a lot of airplanes and on trains, and knowing how they exercise, I mean, quite a bit of walking. It was exhilarating. It was a great time, but also knowing that that was just for a time period, and then we'd be able to go back to normal. And so I'd say that one thing is knowing the cycle of things, and what am I experiencing now.
Sammy Uyama: Is this a long term permanent thing that I need to do something about? Or is this like a stage? But there's one thing that I can look on actually, that I rely on when I need to feel at ease, and that's just some kind of orderliness, if I'm overwhelmed and frustrated, flustered and unable to focus and all these things, and the thing that reliably helps me is maybe it's the physicality of it, like moving and getting my mind off stuff, but putting things in order. To me, that's just incredible especially my house, and just taking an hour to get all the dishes done, and put all the baby's toys away and put all the clothes, all that just make it look orderly and put everything in its right place is something over the years and some form of another, has tremendously helped me. Maybe it's just the feeling of being in control of something that can be very empowering and supportive.
Andrew Love: That's funny because I remember that tour as well, and I remember sometimes we were in very humble spaces to sleep in or sometimes nice places but regardless, my suitcase and all my clothes were folded and organized, as much as possible, because that's the one thing that I could control. My backpack with the computer and my notes and all that, that was really orderly and then my suitcase because we can't control all the places we were in. Sometimes we were just on a couch, but at least you could control that one area and that gave me definitely some anchor that, at least my own personal stuff is I know that it's not crammed into this space looking nasty. When I open, it's going to be confusing, where's my underwear? Why is my underwear stuffed inside my shirt or whatever it's like. I know where everything is in my suitcase.
Andrew Love: People with OCD, they touch things a lot of times because they just want to make sure that it's there or just gives them a sense of comfort. And there's a healthy version of that as well, which is just knowing that some aspect of your life is within your dominion. It's from biblical times, you want to have dominion over something for God's sake. I wanted to say something too that probably you and I can both relate with, and probably a lot of people listening too, is an anchor for your virtuousness, for your spirit. That's why I love High Noon because I can always give, I can always help somebody.
Andrew Love: In a time like this, when there's so many questions and society is going through so many changes politically, educationally, everything's changing, and it's hard to find an anchor in anything, at least, you can help somebody. You can give your time to somebody, High Noon is giving that to us and I think it's feeding us in a way that we just take for granted because that's just what we do. But honestly, without this, if you and I were just working in stocks, day trading or I don't know, some job that we had no part behind, I think we would be in a very different place mentally and spiritually. So just the fact that we're able to give so much, I think, is a real important anchor.
Andrew Love: And that's a shout out to anybody who's being a facilitator, an AP, we'd love to hear how it anchors you. And if you aren't yet, we do challenge you to take that up. It doesn't take much to become an accountability partner for somebody, but it gives you a lot by merely just helping to receive somebody's report every day, and to give them words of encouragement. Actually, to know that somebody needs you is really important for your soul.
Sammy Uyama: Yes. That's a huge anchor. And for me in that, it provides perspective in a really clear way. The more you're wrapped up in your own life, the more dramatic your difficulties seem.
Andrew Love: Yeah.
Sammy Uyama: Versus when you're involved in other people's lives, you can put things in perspective really well. I think there's a lot of things to it, that's gratitude, it's what I'm talking about. It helps you be grateful for what you have, but also knowing people that they will rely on you and that you're needed in some way, that's very anchoring. It makes a difference to somebody whether you're going to get out of bed or not.
Andrew Love: Yeah, I agree. And also guys, we know that a lot of people are going through a lot these days, and to ask somebody for accountability is giving them the gift of being responsible and for carrying to exercise that muscle. So a lot of people don't get an accountability partner for a variety of reasons, but one of them is they don't want to be a burden to another person. So please understand that in many ways, it's a gift to allow somebody the opportunity to be an accountability partner. So we really do encourage people to get an accountability partner and to become an accountability partner, because that helps you grow a lot quickly. Got any more anchors there, buddy? Anything else that you want to mention?
Sammy Uyama: Routines? I mean, if I'm in my day to day life, routines help tremendously. Just having a clear schedule and having things to be excited about, things to look forward to that's like...
Andrew Love: You schedule those in, or do you just find a way to satisfy the stuff that you are already doing?
Sammy Uyama: Yeah, well, okay. I'm talking about a few different things. But let me talk about one, since finding things to be excited about, like me and you have gotten really into walking so we get to look forward to long walking, four or 5 6 7 hour walking with pushing the kids in the stroller.
Andrew Love: What are the kids doing during the seven hours?
Sammy Uyama: Yeah, so my second one, Leo, he basically sleeps the whole time, he's on my shoulder. And then Luna, if we go to the park or on these trails in the river, so it's safe, so we just lay around and run around, and we just stop. We can't go anywhere when she's playing because she just basically walks in circles or back and forth, and she doesn't go anyway. So it's a break for us and then we'll put him back in the shoulder, and she also likes to sit and just watch, and look at things. So definitely an hour or two and then we'll do it, then we'll take another break.
Sammy Uyama: Anyway, I digress. So really long distance walking, that's what we look forward to doing the weekend. And then we just talked about where we are going to go and what we're going to do and so as an example, it's we're excited about now and longer term things. Just knowing that we're building towards something, and it can be in a significant way, like my life, what it's building towards, but also just insignificant ways too, I think they are really important to help us keep going.
Andrew Love: Yes, that's definitely important to always have something to look forward to. It compels us to get out of bed and to get through difficult stuff. For me, having delicious breakfast and really good quality coffee is a good anchor, even if I get up super early, just have a coffee and silence because my kids definitely, I believe them to be members of the Chinese Communist Party. Because anytime that I want to wake up early, they discover this somehow through the ether, and they'll wake up earlier than me. And it's this game where they try to not give me peace and quiet, but I'll just keep on stepping it up and wake up early. Yes, something to look forward to, even a little thing, even a little habit, a nice chair. For my wife, having a really nice reading chair was an anchor piece for her. She had her place of solitude where the kids would go to bed, she would have her happy place and be in her happy chair just perfect lighting, perfect little nook.
Andrew Love: That kind of stuff makes a huge difference like moments and spaces in order to achieve calm and peace. That's a big anchor when times are tough to have some sort of reliable moment, that's some of your physical senses. That's some good examples, we're just trying to pepper the requests, that we're making a view to look at your life and see what anchors you already have in place, and also the areas that you don't have an anchor in place because this is a very interesting world that we're presently in. And it's very easy to get distracted and to focus on all of the many difficult or wrong things that are going poorly, and that can consume you. And when it consumes you, you can start to see a dark cloud, overshadowing all the possibilities in your life. And so that anchor is really to help let you see the sunshine again, and to focus on all the many things that can go right and are going right for you because if you're listening to this podcast, you have ears, you have the internet, there's a lot of possibilities.
Andrew Love: So, we just want to help you in your journey. Stay positive, and also create some very intentional anchors in your life so that you can always find calm even amidst the storm. We seem to be going through a very collective storm in our world, so we hope this helped. And we also would love to hear from you, if you have any suggestions for things that worked for you because the more that people share, the more that other people get ideas, and then we all create a culture based on winning together. So email us or post on social media, or post in your High Noon groups, different anchors that you have that are working. If you need some ideas, we'll be happy to help.
Sammy Uyama: See you guys next time.
Andrew Love: See you guys later.
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