Full Transcript: 0:00:00.0 Narrator: Welcome to Improving Intimacy, a podcast to help single and married, Latter-Day Saints strengthen their family connections and marriages. Daniel A. Burgess is the host of Improving Intimacy, Daniel is a Marriage and Family Therapist, father, husband, and author. Here's Daniel on this episode of Improving Intimacy. [music] 0:00:26.3 Mike Frasier: Alright men, welcome to today's episode. I've got a special guest for us today. This is Daniel Burgess. So he is a family therapist that runs a family therapy, and helps couples and individuals with their marriages, and I met him in his Facebook group, Improving Intimacy, and used to be called Mormon marriages. Now it's called In Latter Day Saint marriages. 0:00:52.7 MF: I complied. [laughter] 0:00:55.3 MF: So yeah, anything else you want the audience know about you Daniel? 0:01:00.0 DB: That's great, I love that. Yeah, come check it out. 0:01:03.2 MF: Yeah, yeah he does great work. And I've really enjoyed his... 0:01:07.6 DB: Thank you. 0:01:08.6 MF: Yeah, his group and the stuff he's doing. So yeah, so today we're talking about a more sensitive topic, at least in the LDS Community, which is masturbation, and Daniel has done a lot of study about this, a lot of work on it, it was coming into our group, actually, Daniel, that kinda got me thinking about it in a different way. And was really a good journey for me. 0:01:35.9 DB: Wonderful. 0:01:36.8 MF: Actually, so I appreciate your work on that, so I guess what I wanted to start with, and I think this is really the big question on most LDS people's minds, is whether masturbation is actually a sin or not, and when I asked that question, I wanted to look up what sin actually was. And so I think this is a good definition an immoral act that's considered to be a transgression against divine law, meaning there's a law that says, no masturbation. And then when you break that, you are breaking that law. So, yeah. Thoughts on that. 0:02:14.0 DB: That's a great question. It's one that I get quite frequently and to kinda set up the answer here, I just did an interview for my podcast Improving Intimacy for Latter-Day Saint relationships with Kari Ferguson, who wrote the book, The OCD Mormon. And the reason why I bring that up is a big part of our discussion is something that I've seen, definitely in clients who tend to ask this question is rigidity in their thinking around spirituality and sin, and how that negatively affects ironically, maybe even paradoxically, our spirituality, a fabulous book a wonderful person, and we explore those thoughts in deep and I'll reference you to that for further discussion. But in short, I love that definition that I learned at least on my mission was, Anything acting against the will of God is sin, and sin is essentially a guide for us to draw closer to Him, not to sin, to draw closer to Him, but to avoid sin or things that separate us from God, and when we can think about in that context, we can now see self-mastery in a different view. We even talked about transgression, Joseph Fielding Smith says there's a big difference between transgression and sin, transgression is one of the things that we as humans learn to be better at that heavenly Father expects us to make mistakes, that's why the atone is there. 0:03:42.4 DB: Now, to answer that question, is masturbation a sin? I don't wanna sound avoidant of the answer, but it really depends. It really depends on the person. Is this drawing you closer to God? Is this helping you understand your body, is this creating better self-awareness, self-mastery, is it creating peace in your life? If it isn't, then that needs to be explored and understood better, that's the whole purpose of this life is to master our minds and our bodies, and what does that look like? Especially when we're dealing with different biology, and sometimes people say you should never m********e. Well, that may be true for that person, that may not be a biological need, or when I use the word need here, I'm talking about experiences that provide enjoyment and pleasure, of course, we could go a whole lifetime without masturbating and not die. And I've heard people use that argument, you won't die, so you don't need it. Well, then we could go to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. We won't die without people loving us in our life, but our life will be pretty miserable, right? [laughter] 0:04:50.2 DB: There are cases actually that children have died out of neglect, of love, and that's true, but I think the point is, there is... I think when we look at this in a very rigid way, is sin black and white, we kinda cross in this line of obsessive compulsive thought process of or scrupulosity, and focus more on the growth in our relationship with ourself and the Lord. 0:05:16.9 MF: Yeah, I love that. I love that idea of those questions that you posed, of... Instead of, Is this sin? Which like you said, is about, oh right wrong did I follow the rule right or did I not follow the rule right. It's like, No. Is this bringing me closer to God, is this helping me enjoy my life more? I think once you're married, an important question with however you're using your sexuality is, is this bringing me closer to my spouse or not? And I think with that too, you mentioned, I think for women, this happens maybe sometimes more than guys where that exploration process, maybe it hasn't happened as much as it has maybe with some guys before marriage, and actually exploring that and figuring out what works for you can be a gift to yourself and to your marriage. Thoughts on that. 0:06:22.6 DB: Yeah, absolutely, and I think that's the main goal, and that's why I set up my group in proving intimacy in Latter-day Saint relationships is for us, what are we doing in our relationships, our intimate relationships that we can improve on to draw us closer to God that is the underlining and the core focus here, how can we understand and learn God and draw closer to Him and in our relationships? And so that could involve... Often we sacrifice or we ignore, or we neglect our sexual self and don't really explore and understand that, like we do the other aspects of our spiritual life to draw closer to God, and so this is very much a negotiation a discussion with our partner and with the Lord, and as long as it's in that confined, I believe it's healthy, whatever that decision is, I have seen masturbation benefit and reward relationships like no other thing has in their life. It provides options. It provides a discussion, and I think as long as you're taking it to the Lord, and you address it with your spouse and you come up with what works for you, then you're doing what the Lord wants you to do, drawing closer to Him and your spouse. 0:07:37.2 MF: Yeah. Awesome, so with that, to look at the other side of this, because I think some people hearing that, they're gonna think, Oh well then you know that I can do whatever I want, like if I wanna go have sex with a bunch of other people and we're both okay with that, then that should be fine. Right. So what would you say to that thought? Well, you know, I prayed about it. And that was my answer. It's fine to go do that. 0:08:15.6 DB: Yeah, well, it's interesting 'cause I heard kind of two different comments there's one, kind of this non-monogamous exploration, as long as you agree with it, it's fine, and the other one is anything... Well, I guess they're kinda the same thing. Anything goes now, and the first thought I would have or question is, This seems to fall under this black and white thinking is either it's absolutely right or it's absolutely wrong, and I think the Lord is definitely, at least in our day, made some clear guidelines in the temple, we specifically commit to each other and in this relationship, and now does that mean anything goes or not? I think there's definitely a constraint there, we've committed very specifically to each other, that we will figure this out between each other and the Lord, I don't think there's a cart blanche there that says, yeah, anything else on your relationship is okay, the purpose, like I was pointing out is, is it drawing you closer to your spouse and to the Lord, do you feel like you're honoring your temple covenants that you specifically made? Now, when we talk about masturbation and things that help improve desire towards each other. I think those things are open for discussion and prayer with Heavenly Father. 0:09:43.5 DB: Now, going back to your question, some can argue, Well, we've both decided we feel closer to each other when we could explore outside of the relationship, and I'll be frank, if that's what you have decided, I personally don't think that's what the Lord has said, and I don't see any justification for that. And so I'm not gonna tell somebody that they got false revelation, that's not my job as a therapist, my job is to help them understand how to live a healthier life, and so there's an argument for everything, and I could totally see where people can... And I've seen it, well, I'm gonna go and do whatever. And when I hear that phrase though, that triggers this kind of black and white thinking, going from one extreme of rigidity to another, and I would push on that, I would really explore that, is that really what you're doing? Are you going from a... I'm gonna just say kind of like a repressed or rigid thinking to, wow, the doors just blow open, I'm gonna do whatever I want. That would be a concern to me, and I would explore that first. That's a concern to me. 0:10:52.9 MF: Yeah, I think that you brought up something super important, I think they're both basically immature reactions. 0:11:00.3 DB: Excellent, Yeah. 0:11:00.8 MF: Yeah, it's like, Oh, either somebody has to tell me everything I have to do, or nobody can tell me anything that I have to do, like they're both pretty immature versus saying Like look, Okay, here's my read of the scriptures, or if t
