This week and next week’s episodes are the last ones recorded on my horizontal does america tour, which took place in October & November of 2017. Lucid Studios NYC provided a car, and I went on a solo road trip adventure, circumnavigating the U.S., covering 10,700 miles and recording with people in their homes, in their cities.

We recorded this episode in Austin, Texas, in a color-saturated cottage sanctuary filled with art and altars, called the Blue Star Temple.

In this episode, I lie down with Epiphany Jordan. Epiphany is a nurturer by trade, a professional cuddler, aka the Chief Oxytocin Provider of Karuna Sessions, described as the “rolls royce” of cuddling experiences,” a 2-on-1 deepdive immersion in mothering energy and loving touch. Her forthcoming book, Somebody Hold Me: The Single Person's Guide to Nurturing Human Touch. Keep your eye out over the next few months for its release, by going to the website somebodyhold.me

You can also find her on karunasessions.com and bluestartemple.com

She is a reader of the tarot, proprietress of the Blue Star Temple guest house and sanctuary space. We recorded this episode there, and I can attest to the coziness, color therapy, and great good juju of the place.

At Blue Star Temple, Epiphany offers services like Cross-Dress for Success, Design a Ritual, and the iconically-titled Sanctuary. I love that she offers Sanctuary as a service. We could all use some Sanctuary, don’t you agree?

In this part of our conversation, we discuss Epiphany’s Muslim / Jewish / Catholic upbringing, being a sexual rebel in Reno, Nevada in the 70s, the cyclical nature of sexual mores, society’s touch deficit, and my complicated relationship with my mother, and my mother’s touch.

If you enjoy lying down with us, and believe in my mission to spread intimacy across the globe, that’s how you can make sure that this podcast remains ad-free, and remains a podcast. Become a patron of the horizontal arts. Patreon is the love child of a subscription service and crowd-funding. You offer a monthly contribution, and you get a level of special access to me and my work. Beginning in the next couple of weeks, the second part of my conversation with each guest will be gated, meaning roughly every other episode will be free, and every other episode will be paid — but all episodes will always be available to patrons at $5 a month and up. So, download all the episodes while you can, and become a $5 a month patron for full access going forward.

Thanks to my newest patrons: Evyn, Melani, Mark, Christopher, Antonio, and Rex, I’m now halfway towards breaking even on the current podcast expenses! After breaking even, the next goal is to hire a transcriptionist. I’ve been painstakingly transcribing my show notes by hand in order to create gorgeous, informative, accessible to differently-abled folx blog posts. (And pssst, you can get my writing and photos and links to the blog posts in your inbox weekly, by signing up on horizontalwithlila.com and adding [email protected] to your address book.)

Since I am both unskilled and extraordinarily meticulous, each set of show notes takes me about 10 - 12 hours to put together. When I hire someone, 90 percent of those hours will be freed up to conduct more interviews, offer more live events, and create more horizontal goodness for you!

Just before we dive into the episode, I want to make this super clear: a lot of friends have told me that they've been hesitant to become my patrons because they feel embarrassed to only be able to give $2/month. Oh My goodness, if everybody who loves the podcast or my writing became a patron at $2 a month, it would CHANGE MY LIFE. Every patron is so incredibly valuable to me, and the beauty of crowd funding is precisely this - when many people give a little bit, it adds up appreciably, and with each new patron, I can feel how many people out there believe in me and my mission to spread intimacy across the globe.

Plus, I do a happy dance every time.

Go to: Patreon.com/horizontalwithlila

You can also follow the link in my Instagram bio that reads “patron of the horizontal arts.”

Dear Ones, did you know that I send what I call “missives” to my email list once a week? They include my personal writing, resources from the episodes, links, videos, saucy photos, and other miscellaneous bits of ephemera, like articles about my sex-positive intentional community … To receive all that goodness directly in your inbox, sign up on horizontalwithlila.com and add [email protected] to your address book, for good measure. I’ve heard that my missives have gotten buried in some “Updates” in Gmail, or even that they’ve gone to (gasp!) Spam. They are not Spam. Please rescue them.

Season Two has been edited by Chad Michael Snavely. Check out his slew of podcasts on chadmichael.com. Shana Shay drew my sensual cover art, and you can hire her through 99designs. And the rock star / father Alan Markley created my intro music. He’s plasticcannons on Instagram.

In next week’s episode, the second part of my conversation with Epiphany, we talk about her forthcoming book, Somebody Hold Me, about getting your touch needs met, what exactly is involved in a Karuna Session, and getting together to cuddle your friends.

Now darlin’, come lie down with us in Austin, Texas.