Kevin Anthony 0:00
Welcome to the Love Lab podcast, the place to be for honest and real talk about relationships and sex, whether you’re a man or woman, single or a couple, this is the show for you. I am your host, Kevin Anthony, and I am here to help you have the relationship of your dreams and the best sex of your life.

Kevin Anthony 0:23
All right, welcome back to the Love Lab podcast. This is episode 370, and it is titled Real Life Stories from 25 Years of an Open Relationship. Now, if you’ve been listening to this show for a long time, you know that my wife, Celine, and I did a few more episodes on Poly and open relating early on in the show, but we haven’t spent a lot of time talking about that because we did notice that our audience tended to be more in the monogamous range. However, it is worth talking about from time to time, because one of the things that I’ve always noticed is that people can get really, really comfortable in a monogamous relationship to the point where they don’t grow at all. They’re not challenged, really, ever. And they can get stuck in some patterns. And if you’ve ever practiced any sort of you know what, we will talk about today as ethical non-monogamy. You would know that that’s not possible in that situation. It will push all your buttons. It will force you to grow; it will force you to uplevel your skills.

Kevin Anthony 1:37
And so there are lessons that you can learn from that, whether or not you ever choose to go down that road, you can take some of what you’re going to learn today, and you can apply it to your monogamous relationship as well. So there’s value here, regardless of whether or not you think this is something that you want to try, and so what we’re going to do today is we’re going to talk about stories. I have a couple joining me today, which, if you’re watching on YouTube, you can see them already, and they’re going to share some of their stories over multiple decades of being in an open relationship, and they’re going to share with you what they’ve learned, what the lessons were along the way. And I think it’s going to be fun and interesting. I think there will be some good points for you to learn from, and if nothing else, you’ll probably get to hear some good stories, so you’ll at least be entertained.

Kevin Anthony 2:29
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Kevin Anthony 3:19
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Kevin Anthony 4:10
All right. My guests today are Candace and Gregory, and they have been married for over 44 years and in an open relationship for the last 25 years. They are also authors of three books on ethical non-monogamy, so they’ve got some experience which they’re going to share today. Welcome to the show. Candice and Gregory.

Kevin Anthony 4:30
All right, we have to start at the beginning. So we already know from my reading of your bio that you’ve been doing open relating for 25 years. But then the question becomes, like, what got you into that you were married for 44 years? So there’s almost 20 years, right? 19-ish years where you were monogamous, and then something shifted, something changed, where you guys were like, Hmm, maybe this is a good idea. Yeah, what was that?

Gregory 5:02
Well, first, we’ve been together for 48 years, which is how long we’ve actually been together. We met each other in Sunday school, and we were seven and eight. Gives a bit of a background, as far as you know, where we’re coming from with our upbringing.

Kandace 5:14
That was all in Sunday school.

Gregory 5:18
You know, wondering where it began. And it was really, you know, we had kids. They were small, young, you know, we were wrapped up in our careers. We were wrapped up in raising our children. It was our identities that became all about that, and we were, we discovered. I’m not discovered, but we realized that we’re just getting blurred, like there was just life was boring at that point. You know, we just love each other deeply. We’ve never argued. We’ve never had that kind of a relationship. We’ve never had that back and forth. But we were just bored. We weren’t being stimulated anymore. And we’re both artists. We’re both, as we say, we’ve got the variety gene. We like change. We like things new. We like to experience different things, and we weren’t getting it at the time. And, you know, as with most of these stories that started in the hot tub, and, you know, a little bit of alcohol, a little bit of warm water, a little bit of, you know, being naked with your friends. And one thing led to another, and we entertained each other that night, and the next day, woke up and and went, wasn’t that fun?

Gregory 6:28
And like, there was, there was no, well, you did this, or you did like that. There wasn’t any of that. I mean, it brought me such pleasure to see Candace having pleasure that it erased any doubt, you know, any other feelings, I think that were happening, and that’s kind of where it started, you know, we realized at that point with, you know, this is interesting, but we should maybe explore this a little bit. There’s, there hadn’t been any previous conversations about it and and even afterwards, there wasn’t a huge amount of diving deep into it. It was just, I think we both kind of realized that…..

Kandace 6:59
It was a moment, it was a good thing, and neither one of us felt guilty, and that was the big point of it. And then we decided that we were going to have an adult holiday every year, every year.

Gregory 7:11
That was a big thing, and that was a big change for us and our kids.

Kandace 7:16
Yeah, we would just go on our own, make a romantic trip out of it. And of course, the first trip that we decided to do was Hedo, which is in Jamaica. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it.

Kevin Anthony 7:28
I have. So let’s, let’s slow down. Hold a little bit here.

Kevin Anthony 7:37
I want to make sure that we really lay a good groundwork here. I mean, the first thing you shared was, you met in Sunday school. Yes, there’s a big departure from where you started, right? Yeah. The second thing is, is, what you shared was, I think, something that a lot of people feel when they’re in your position, which is, you know, we’re busy with careers. We’re busy raising our kids. You know, we’re so focused on so many other things than us, right? And our sex life and how we connect intimately, that things start to get kind of boring in the relationship or routine is another word that a lot of people use, it’s just like, we’re just going through the motions, right?

Kevin Anthony 8:23
And so what you were looking for, whether you realized it or not at the moment, was something to kind of spice things back up again. Now that’s it. Yeah. Now, the route that you guys chose is certainly one way to do that. And I just want listeners to know that. You know, there are many different ways to do that. The important thing is, is that you recognize that that’s where you’re at in the relationship, and then you take some steps to change it, right?

Kevin Anthony 8:53
So that could be just experimenting more with the two of you, that could be potentially opening up to ethical non-monogamy. It could be something as simple as bringing a new toy into the bedroom. The idea is, don’t allow your relationship to get into that place where we’re basically just roommates, right? Or co-parents, where there’s no spark anymore, where it’s not fun, where there’s no turn on, right? Because that is a death sentence for your relationship. So let’s go back to your very first encounter, because that was definitely something I wanted to talk about. Everybody wants to know what was the first time like? Now, what’s interesting with your story is that you didn’t actually plan this to be your first; you know exactly.

Kandace 9:40
It wasn’t planned at all. And I think that’s how we’ve kind of run our whole life, is just don’t overplan anything, because then you’re disappointed when it doesn’t turn out the way you want. Maybe you wanted special toys, or whether you wanted just a casual, or maybe you just wanted, I don’t know. Of could be anything to fulfill your fantasy, but then you have high expectations, and that never turns out, never turns out exactly how it is best not to.

Kevin Anthony 10:12
This is a really good point that you bring up because I actually was at a sex party recently, and a lot of the ones that I’ve gone to over the years, they usually start with some sort of a like circle, where everybody introduces themselves, talks about what they’re looking for that evening, or whatever. And when it came around to me, like everybody had God said, I’m looking for this, and I want this, and I want that, when it came around to me, I said, I don’t have any expectations. I have learned not to create any expectations in these situations. And people kind of looked at me a little weird, but I completely agree with you, like the best way to do it, because, yeah, if you have a lot of expectations going in, you’re likely to be disappointed coming out. That’s a total aside, that one there, but let’s talk a little bit about it in that moment.

Kevin Anthony 11:01
Because what typically happens when people experience things the way that you did, which is we were not planning on, you know, having sex with another couple in the hot tub that night like that wasn’t something that we were planning on doing. And so maybe people have a few drinks, their inhibitions are lower. They have an experience like that, but then they wake up the next morning, and they go, What the fuck did we do? Or, I can’t believe you did x, right? And there. And there can be some significant drama, guilt, jealousy, all that kind of stuff. How is it that after that experience was over, you guys woke up in the morning and didn’t experience any of that?

Kandace 11:43
I think because we’re always very open and honest with each other. And, you know, we do talk about, back then we said, you know, what is your fantasy, you know, and, and at some point, we kind of went, at some point we’re going to have to, you know, actually act on our fantasy. And I think because of talking so openly, it made it easier for us to discuss and to feel into if this was going to be the right direction to go or not. And it wasn’t like all of a sudden, let’s go online. Well, first off, we couldn’t go on that sort of thing out there. You know, it was one of those things. You just hear about different clubs, and then you kind of go, oh, okay, well, this club, we can go, and we can be ourselves. It’s, it’s a naked club. Great. We were used to going to naked beaches here in Vancouver, so it wasn’t a big deal to hang out naked. So we thought, well, that’s a good place to start. And of course, when we got to hito, we didn’t realize it was a big lifestyle takeover into the deep end of the pool. It scared the heck out of me.

Gregory 12:54
I’m just going to back up a little bit because what we’re always like, because we’ve been together since we were teenagers and and I guess it’s just our person, our personalities, and our personalities together. And there are all sorts of assumptions, even when we’re young, that we were Swingers, or we were doing this, we were doing that, you know, just little, just little things. Don’t know why. You know, I’ve always had more girlfriends than guy friends. I don’t have, even now, a huge amount of guy friends. I have way more girlfriends. And for Candace, that was something, you know, going through high school, my three best friends were girls, so I’d go up with them, drop them off, and then go pick up Kandace, or vice versa, drop Kandace off, then go up with the girls. So we already had that trust.

Kandace 13:39
It was at that point that you got to realize that we had puppy love when we were 12 and 13, way back then. So we’re talking about a Christian outing and youth, youth night.

Gregory 13:42
You know what happens on roller skating? It can lead to all sorts of things.

Kandace 13:58
It was like a big hug at the end of the night, and all I could dream about for years was I was going to marry that guy, and we’re going to have a big house and a color TV, because that’s all you care about when you talk.

Kevin Anthony 14:12
Okay, so let’s talk about some of the things that made this possible for you, just so that people can really understand what they need in order to really have this kind of a relationship. So one of the things that I hear from you is that you had a very high level of trust established from the beginning. Part of that probably comes from the fact that you’ve known each other for so long. But even still, once you start to date, you know the fact that you know that Gregory, you had more girlfriends than guy friends. I mean, that would be an issue for a lot of women right from the start, but it doesn’t seem like it was for you. Kandace, from the beginning, is that, is that correct?

Kandace 14:50
I don’t know what I know if it was just in me because of how I felt when I was 12, and now I’m dating him at 17, and I’m just going, you. Yeah, this is the guy I know. This is the guy I’m going to spend the rest of my life with. And yes, he’s got girlfriends, and I know who they all are, and they all had boyfriends, but they all just hung out together, and I was okay with that, because I knew them, and I just totally trusted him.

Kevin Anthony 15:19
So yeah, again, coming back to the trust, there’s a second thing that I heard you both say when describing, you know, basically what made it easy to navigate that first situation, and that was the idea of communication. This, this idea that you knew you could talk about it the next day without it being an issue. How, how were you able, in your relationship, to establish that level of communication where you could come to each other and talk about pretty much anything, because that’s what it seems like you’re describing to me.

Gregory 15:52
We just did. It’s odd, but we just did. You know, I guess we had no formal training. We had no, you know, we didn’t read books about relationships. We didn’t read anything. It was what was working for us, and we discovered many years later, actually, upon writing our books about the description of conversion and understanding conversion. And it was never something that came across our vocabulary or our thought pattern previously. But in reality, I mean, what brings me joy is to see Kandace enjoy Candace enjoying herself and being able to be true to herself. That brings me satisfaction. You know, I’m very I’m very proud that she can do that and but we’d never defined it previously or discussed it previously, and the underlying tone that’s kind of what’s been happening all these years is the fact that I want what’s best for my beloved. I want her to have the best life possible.

Gregory 16:45
So how do I accomplish that? You know, I support her. I support her in whatever she’s going to do. You know, we often say that we can’t be everything to everybody. You know, I say You’re my everything. That’s bullshit. You can’t be somebody’s everything. You know, you can be there 70% you can be there 80% but you’re not gonna be able to be at all. If you are, then you’re not being true to yourself, and you’re trying to spread yourself too thin or be something that you aren’t. So I’m bringing myself to this relationship as much as I have, but Kandace might want something else, and I by allowing her to explore that part of it, it makes her much happier and our relationship much stronger, because she can return that favor to me, you know, she sees how much I love her, that she’s able to express herself, you know, fully and freely.

Kevin Anthony 17:31
So, for those listening who aren’t familiar with the term Compersion, Gregory actually defined it after he used the term, which is this idea that, you know, you receive joy and happiness from watching your partner receive joy and happiness? So when your partner is in their ecstasy, their joy, you actually feel good about it. It’s basically the opposite of jealousy. If you think about it in terms of sexuality, like for most people, seeing your partner with somebody else would create massive jealousy and insecurity, and fear. Well, for some people, when they can experience conversion, it’s actually exactly the opposite of that. So just for those who might not be aware of that term, and then, you know, it’s interesting, right?

Kevin Anthony 18:12
You guys have said a couple of things that I think are interesting in a sense that, you know, Candice, you shared that, Well, I just knew from the beginning that I was going to marry this guy and we were going to have a big house with a color TV, right? And then Gregory, you’re saying, well, we didn’t really learn any books. We just always were able to communicate this way. I would say that for the average couple, neither of those two things is actually true, right? But that’s okay, because what’s important is that you understand that you can learn those skills and that those skills are important. So I think the message there for others who are looking at you is not to look at themselves or their relationship and go, Well, I didn’t have that. So I guess we’re not going to be successful, right? I think the important thing to learn from that is, oh, okay, here’s what I need to learn to be successful.

Kevin Anthony 19:03
Because this is, these are skills that they may have naturally had. It’s just like, you know, some people you know have never had a music lesson in their life, and somehow they just, you know, can pick up an instrument and play and are amazing, right? And others have to put in a lot of hard work. It doesn’t really matter which one it is, because they can both eventually get there, right? And I think that’s maybe the best message I can pull out of you guys, because you know this idea that well, we just knew how to communicate like that. I spend every day of my life trying to teach couples how to communicate like that.

Kevin Anthony 19:37
I can tell you that it is not normal for most people, but it’s amazing that you had that, because that is one of the key components to navigating anything tricky in your relationship is the ability to create what I call an atmosphere, or a space, where you can come to your partner and talk about anything without fear of repercussions. Is without fear of, you know, losing their trust, or having them get angry, or flying off the handle and having a big reaction. That is a must. I have an entire, you know, breakdown that I give to couples when I coach them. It’s the communication best practices. And the very first thing on the top of that list is exactly that we need to have this, this environment in our relationship where we can talk about anything.

Kandace 20:26
So one thing in particular, we always made sure from the very beginning that we never went to bed angry at each other, and just knowing that you knew that you would resolve whatever it was that day, because by the time you were in bed, it would have been done.

Gregory 20:44
It’s one of those cliché stories. You know, never go to bed angry. It works. We have little rituals, I guess. And one of them that, you know, I don’t recall even when it started, but when we go to bed at night, when we climb into bed, it’s like the last thing just before we’re going to roll over is we kiss each other three times, just quit, just, and that’s all it is. But it’s just, there’s, there’s a connection that happens there. There’s that, you know, electricity, that energy, that share. There’s the, you know, and quite often, depending on how the day is going or what we’ve been up to earlier in the night, you know, sometimes we have to say, Are you present? Yes, I’m present. And then you do it because, you know, so many times we do that, and then a minute later, it’s like, you didn’t kiss me. Yes, I did. You just weren’t present. I’m present, no. And then you do it again.

Kandace 21:38
Then you make it funny, and then it’s light, it’s, it’s interactive, it’s, it’s loving, awesome.

Kevin Anthony 21:47
So let’s get into what you talked about, the fact that you know you had this first experience. It wasn’t planned, but after that, you decided, hey, once a year, we’re going to take an adult vacation, meaning we’re not going to bring the kids. It’s just going to be the two of us. And you actually booked the next one for going to Hedonism, which is, which is, apparently, you weren’t necessarily aware, but basically a lifestyle community, yeah. So you mentioned that it was like getting thrown into the deep end. Tell me what it was like. So you’ve had one experience. I don’t know if there were any in between, but, like, basically, you show up to Hedo and you’re like, Oh, shit. What did we get into? How did that go?

Gregory 22:33
Well, there was a little bit, you know, there was a little bit previous to that, you know. So it wasn’t gonna be a completely new thing going into it. And, you know, as we said earlier, the internet wasn’t a thing then, so it wasn’t just a matter of going on and checking out their.com, we had to go to a travel agency, but we had read about it, heard about it. It sounded interesting to us. We were, you know, we liked the fact that it was clothing optional. We liked the fact that it was open to whatever. And we go through life going, you don’t know what you don’t know. So we wanted to find out what we didn’t know. And but going into it with open eyes, and not really, you know, being no limitations really, you know, and we didn’t put any limitations on each other going in, I don’t think at all. I guess, you know, I don’t want to see you doing this or doing that, because that would show my insecurities, going through whatever my insecurities happen to be. And for a man going into a thing like that, there are lots of insecurities that can that can come up.

Kevin Anthony 23:23
Yes, we’re going to talk about that.

Gregory 23:26
So we got there, and we thought we’d explore the grounds, and unbeknownst to us, that week happened to be a lifestyles organization takeover. And at the time, I don’t even know if they’re still around, but at the time, it was like the hardcore of the hardcore, you know, that’s what these people were to us. Anyway, our procession was going in, and from across the resort, we heard, you know, this, this pounding music. And so we went over there. And there’s a quad that’s there with a large swimming pool that kind of is the whole central area of it, and with a swim bar, and, you know, the whole thing. And there was women that were on top of the bar naked on all fours with their back arched, and they were pouring booze down her back.

Gregory 24:09
And there was guys licking the booze out of her ass as it was swimming through. There were people getting blow jobs sitting there. It was just like it was. It was shocking, you know, but, you know, I think we both kind of took it at pace, but we looked at each other, went, maybe we should go find someplace a little bit quieter to start with. And so we exited there. We went to another pool that was close by, and it was very quiet. There’s hardly anybody there. There was a couple that were there that we ended up approaching and just introducing ourselves, and had this amazing conversation with them, and they ended up becoming our mentors. They were, they were, they’re a lifesaver throughout that whole trip for us, just finding somebody like that that could sort of walk you through all the processes of it.

Gregory 24:55
And, you know, there were some other experiences right off the top, you know, that were pretty interesting. And, you know, as I. I had to go to the bathroom at one point, and I was going to go to the bar to get some drinks. And as I was walking through the pool, it was a fairly shallow pool at that end of it. And as I was coming back, these two girls approached me, and I was wearing a watch, and they asked me what time it was. So I gave them the time, and they both looked at each other, went, Oh, well, I guess we owe you a blow job now. And all of a sudden, on the fours they got. And they started, you know, two of them right there. And Candice was 20 feet around, holding my drinks. And, yeah, and so that was, that was the introduction going into it.

Kevin Anthony 25:36
There’s every man’s fantasy right there. I was just getting some drinks, and two women decided to just give me a blowjob.

Gregory 25:43
Exactly. You bring upon what you you bring about what you believe.

Kevin Anthony 25:47
And let’s talk a little bit about some of those realities, right? Because when somebody’s listening to that, you know, I’m sure there will be a lot of guys listening to this, going, Yeah, I want that. Because that sounds amazing. Right? It’s something that they’ve probably dreamt of their whole life, but you alluded to something earlier, right? About, you know, the potential, like, okay, so both of you are going in as a couple. You’re a man, you’re a woman, right? There’s this idea that men think that, you know, because you’ll hear men say this all the time, like they’ll often be the ones who will approach their woman and say, I think we should have an open relationship, or I think we should have a threesome. Is another big one, right? Because in their mind, it’s going to be two women, they’re both going to be amazing, and they’re going to focus all their energy and attention on him, and it’s going to be a great experience, whereas the reality of that is significantly different, right? So you kind of alluded to that same idea a moment ago. Talk a little bit about the realities for a man versus a woman when you go into situations like this.

Gregory 26:52
Well, I think, I think a good example would be, we put a couple’s profile together on social media, or, you know, whatever, whatever the site is we’re going to field, or whoever. And, you know, we get responses. We get people, you know, sending us letters. But now, if I were to make a personal one for myself and a personal one for Candace, she would get 50 more requests than I would for every one that I got; she’d get 50. That’s what it’s going to be like in the real world. You walk out there, and it’s not going to be you with a bunch of women and your choice of whatever you want. It’s not that way. All the men’s eyes are going to be on your wife. Half the women’s eyes are going to be on your wife, and they’re not going to be on you.

Gregory 27:34
So you need to understand that going in, that’s part of the reality. We also find that it’s men who talk about it more, talk about being the one doing this and getting into this, and wanting to do this. They’re also the ones that are pulling back at the last minute, or when it comes real. And it’s the women who are moving forward, and they’re exploring, you know, they’re exploring and enjoying themselves, and the guys are pulling back. So, you know, that’s, that’s, that’s a huge reality, you know, in the lifestyle.

Kevin Anthony 28:06
Did you all hear that? Did you hear that? This comes from 25 years of experience, and I can tell you from my years of experience that that is 100% correct. The women will always get far more attention. They will get that attention from the men, and they will get that attention from the women. And you’re right, it’s really interesting, right? Because I have seen quite a few men in, you know, situations like this, who, when it’s time for the rubber to hit the road, they can’t get it up.

Gregory 28:38
And it happens a lot. Performance anxiety is huge.

Kevin Anthony 28:42
Total performance anxiety, absolutely, and when, when a woman finally decides in these situations that she’s gonna really let go and open up and like, really go all in, she is an unstoppable dynamic, like, all night long if she wants to, right? And that is something that most men are not prepared to handle, like even if he can rise to the occasion and has some decent stamina and can go for a while if she wants to, she’ll outpace him by miles, right? And that is something that a lot of men don’t think about and aren’t necessarily prepared to handle in those situations. So I’m glad that you could share some of the realities of what that’s like.

Kevin Anthony 29:31
Okay, we’re about halfway through the show. Let me pause for a break, and when we come back, I want to, I want to talk about, I have a bunch of questions about, you know, your worst experience, your best experience, the craziest thing, right? And what I want to obviously, we want to hear those stories because they’re probably going to be fun, but also, what each one of those things taught you is another important thing that I want to pull out. So we’re going to do that just as soon as we are on the other side of this break.

Kevin Anthony 29:59
Are you a couple? Are your relationship and sex life where you want them to be? Are there changes you would like to make, but just don’t know how? Maybe you think there is nothing that can be done if you’re not 100% happy with where your relationship or sex life is, then get help today and change your life. Go to https://www.kevinanthonycoaching.com/couples/, and schedule a strategy call with me today so we can map out a strategy to get you where you want to be, so that you can have it all your way. That is https://www.kevinanthonycoaching.com/couples/ and book your strategy call today. If you are thinking about potentially opening up your relationship and you want to do this with some help, maybe in a safe, guided way, that is definitely something we can work on. Maybe if you know you are experiencing what they talked about earlier, which is, we got kind of bored, and we’re just going through the paces of life, and you want to know how to spice it up, I can help you with that, too. If you just want to have the best sex of your life and the most amazing relationship. Well, we can work on that as well, and many, many more. That is https://www.kevinanthonycoaching.com/couples/. The link is in the description.

Kevin Anthony 31:08
Okay, I always like to leave people uplifted on a positive note. So let’s start with what was the worst experience you ever had and what was the major lesson that you learned from it?

Kandace 31:27
Don’t take one for the team. Yeah, don’t take one for the team.

Kevin Anthony 31:32
Okay, so the lesson is, don’t take one for the team. But tell me, how did you come about learning this, like what happened in the actual, you know, situation where you learned this?

Gregory 31:45
Well, this is, this is actually a, this is, this is a good indicator for being both supportive and not looking after your own art, like wanting the best for your partner, and being willing to sacrifice yourself for it, that’s not a good way of approaching it. That’s not a good thing to do, no matter how brilliant it seems at the time, that this is what he really wants, and this is what I want to give him. If it means that it’s going to put you into a position that you’re uncomfortable with, then it’s not a good decision, because you’re never going to come out of the other side. I’m feeling good about it.

Kandace 32:24
I’ll carry on. So it was a lovely lady that Gregory had approached. And of course, they hit it on. And you know, he had asked her if she was interested in and going off, and she says, Well, I only play with my husband. So now Greg called me over and he said, Let’s meet this couple. And of course, he did nothing for me, and I could tell it was vice versa. We just had no chemistry between the two of us. But I know that this was something that Gregory really wanted.

Gregory 32:55
And so he must have felt the same about her, because, you know, they quite well. And, you know, she was very participatory, you know, participatory, I guess.

Kandace 33:04
So of course, those two jumped on each other and then kind of left us there, and, you know, we’re on the bed, and we kind of go, Okay, well, let’s just go through the motions. Okay, I’m gonna kiss on. Okay, maybe I’m gonna give him a blow job. But nothing is connecting. I’m just kind of, oh my god. I just can’t do this. It just feels wrong. It felt wrong for me to do this. I went, Why am I doing this? And it was making me sick to my stomach. That’s what it was doing. It was making me sick to my stomach. It’s not like he was a bad guy or anything, but like I said, there was just no chemistry.

Kandace 33:36
So eventually I kind of, at the very end, I said, Can we just sit over on the couch? Let’s just watch, you know, Greg, Ryan, you, and your wife just go at it. And then he deeply agreed with me too, which was really nice at the end, but I still had gone through all that motion and making myself feel just dirty and almost like it wasn’t coming from the right place. I was doing this for the wrong reason, and then later that night, I said, Okay, oh, I can never do that again. I just can’t. It was wrong. It was just, it was it just made me feel, feel just nothing, nothing. That’s exactly nothing in that for me. And I said, I just can’t do that again.

Gregory 34:27
She made me aware that I wasn’t aware, like it made me aware that I was just so focused on what I was interested in that I wasn’t aware that I’d lost Kandace in the process. And, you know, big lesson.

Kevin Anthony 34:42
Knowing what you know now, what would you have done differently? So, Gregory, you shared that you’d be more aware of what was going on for Kandace. And Kandace, what would you do differently today?

Kandace 34:45
I would just say go have fun if you want to. But then in a situation like that, she wouldn’t have gone with him if I weren’t there.

Gregory 35:08
Which would have been totally fine. Even back then, it would have been totally fine.

Kandace 35:12
Because now I’d know I’d be approaching it differently, and go, Great, this is my chance to be a voyeur. And I would approach you, know, that husband and say, Hey, let’s sit on the side. Let’s just watch the show.

Gregory 35:25
And that’s how I would approach and turn it into a real positive, you know, turn it into an agreeable situation for all four.

Kevin Anthony 35:34
So basically, speaking up for what it is that you needed in that situation, rather than just going along with it because you felt like you knew you should do it, because you know this is something that Gregory wanted you would actually speak up and say. You know what? This isn’t working for me. Here’s what I would rather do.

Gregory 35:49
That’s it, yep, not accusatory. Like, no, no accusations, no, this, not that. And you know, I don’t want you doing this or No, I don’t want you doing these things. We’ve never said that to each other, you know, it’s just this is how I feel. This is what it makes me feel like.

Kandace 36:07
This makes me feel uncomfortable. I would tell him, I would say, you know, that that situation was uncomfortable for me.

Gregory 36:14
And because she’s my beloved, I’d walk away from it, you know, like I’m mature enough and strong enough and smart enough to understand that it’s not all about me, you know, like it’s about us in the situation.

Kandace 36:25
And that happened in a large orgy that we were invited to, the second time at Hedo. Can’t remember the first or second time.

Speaker 1 36:33
It was the first time that we were going to be going into it. And this became one of those, okay, we need to prim and and, you know, we were invited to this thing, so let’s go back to our room and let’s make sure that we shave every inch of our bodies and that we’re clean and we’re this or that.

Kandace 36:52
Drinking more. I got liquid courage.

Gregory 36:55
It was, you know, it ended up that we ended up coming to the party a little bit late. And what we learned, if you’re invited to a party at six, be there at six or five after six. Don’t be there at 634 to seven, because everybody’s going to be sweaty. They’re all going to look at you. It’s like fresh meat Monday, and it’s going to be like the second go around, and you’re staying at the tour with big eyes going and you know, but by that time, we had learned that, Ken said, I feel uncomfortable like this, this, this, they’re already too far into it like it’s just, it just didn’t feel right.

Gregory 37:29
But props to the hosts, who were actually these mentors that you know, that we had met, and through their not rules, but ways of negotiating the lifestyle, embrace that decision. Great. That’s good that you said, No, we’ll see you for dinner like there was no, you know, we get dropped because we didn’t go with them. So that means we’re on the A list. You know, we’re off the list. And so it wasn’t like that. They could recognize it, and they saw that. And we went back the next day and had a fantastic time with everybody, but we showed up. Everybody, but we showed up on time, and, you know, we knew what to expect going in, because I think the whole time before that getting ready, you know, Kandace is, like, I’m not sure, like, if this is, like, an orgy, I just don’t know. Like, there were all these questions, all these things that were bubbling through the mind at the time, and I couldn’t answer them, because it’s something that I’d never experienced. We were going into it with an open mind, and open mind and and open hearts. And when we got there, it was like, No, it’s not right. We learned that it’s okay to say no.

Kandace 38:31
But this guy was about ready to jump on that bed, oh, yeah, but he knew that I wasn’t ready. And he said, Okay, dear, yeah, we can go, you know, and it wasn’t like that big, I can’t believe you didn’t want to get laid today, damn it. Yeah, so the beginning of the week, we knew we had a whole week.

Kevin Anthony 38:52
Well, and there, there are themes emerging here, right? Which is that communication, that speaking up, that not getting, you know, mad or angry at your partner, because you know you needed a moment, and you called an audible in the middle of it and said, You know what? This isn’t working for me, right? And so all of these skills are things that you can absolutely apply in your relationship, even when you are in a monogamous situation, right? So this idea, like not creating expectations about what it’s going to be like, making sure that you have good communication, trusting each other, when your partner says, You know what, this isn’t working for me, regardless of what it is, right?

Kevin Anthony 39:30
That you are aware, that you’re present, that you take that into consideration, right? And you don’t just run off. Well, I want to do this anyway, right? So these are all really, really great sort of relationship tools or skills that everybody should have. And I think, as I mentioned in the intro, you know, one of the things that you know open relating does is make it really obvious. So if we’re trying to talk about a situation with just a monogamous. In this couple, it may not be that obvious, right? These, these sort of, you know, lessons that we’re talking about, but when you show up a half an hour late to an orgy, right, all of a sudden it’s really obvious.

Kevin Anthony 40:13
Okay, so you know that all came from me asking you, sort of like, what your worst experience was, and what you learned from it. But you can learn, of course, from things that don’t go right, you know, things that maybe you wouldn’t have chosen to go through. But you can also learn through fun and through positive things. So I’m wondering, what was the best experience you’ve ever had, and what did that potentially teach you?

Kandace 40:47
Okay, I would say overall it is not being with another couple, but being with a single.

Gregory 40:54
Threesomes for us are really good.

Kandace 40:57
Your energy is all focused as a triad, and you can make it happen and flow way easier than you can with four people.

Gregory 41:07
My answer was going to be COVID. You know, which sounds kind of sounds kind of odd, but it was. We had just gotten back from multiple experiences with Ayahuasca in Costa Rica, and we were pretty open. We were pretty, you know, we were discovering we’re into the whole integration phase. And the world got shut down right after that. So, you know, we weren’t allowed out of our homes. We weren’t allowed to do a lot of things, and the circles got to be quite small. And so instead of, you know, being disgruntled and, like, just, you know, being bitter about this whole thing, we spent an hour and a half, two hours every morning, lying in bed and just figuring shit out, you know. And one of the first things we kind of did automatically was we took penetration Off, off the board at that particular time.

Gregory 42:00
And it just became a connection. It just became, you know, we were starting to experiment with things because, you know, we were starting to read a little bit. We’d never been really involved in tantric stuff any, you know, previously, but we were learning all about careta methods and other sorts of forms of connection and connectivity. And that got us into energy work that, you know, after we were reading things, and we’re doing these things, then reading about what we’re actually doing afterwards, which is, which is fun and exciting, but that also kind of opened us up to now bringing in a third and it was usually women, and it was usually covid, or it was covid, and, you know, they needed somebody in their bubble. They were missing that human connection. They were missing that were missing that that’s that intimacy.

Gregory 42:44
And so it’s really just a period of time that we used and we just developed this whole energetic work between us, and really understanding how that communication works between us and the partner. And you know how to keep that energy flowing three ways, evenly. And so that to me, you know, that’s not just one particular thing, but that’s one thing that really changed my approach to lovemaking, my approach to sexuality, and just more of that intimacy and that energy work.

Kevin Anthony 43:14
So both of you shared something slightly different, but similar. And what I’m hearing is the common thread between them is this idea of connection and focus and attention, right? So, you know, like you shared that in a threesome, it was easier to focus your attention right than it is when there’s four or more, right? And then, of course, you were also saying that in COVID, you guys were experimenting, and you were focusing on some practices like Tantra or just different ways to connect outside of just the penetration. So what I would like people who are listening to hear out of that is that when I ask them, What was your best experience and what did you learn from it?

Kevin Anthony 44:01
They’re basically telling you that once they learned to be able to connect on a deeper level, whether it’s with each other or with another person in the context of a threesome, that that actually took their experience to the next level. And that is absolutely true, and it’s something I spend a lot of time trying to teach people is this idea that, you know, yeah, the physical like, you know, penis in vagina, like there’s vibration and friction and that all feels good, that that’s nice, but if you really want to take it to the next level, you got to go deeper than that, right?

Kevin Anthony 44:35
And it seems like that’s what you guys spent, that COVID time is learning how to really go deeper in that, and that really made a difference in your relationship and in the encounters you were having. So we have a little bit of time left. I got a couple more questions. One, I have to ask you, just for sheer entertainment value, if there’s a lesson to be learned. Please share it. And if not, that’s okay, too. After 25 years of experience, I don’t even know how many years, maybe 15ish, maybe close to 20, I’ve been around that world. I can tell you, I got some crazy stories to share. I’m curious, what’s the craziest story you have after 25 years of being in an open relationship?

Kandace 45:33
The craziest penthouse orgies, the penthouse one? Yeah, yeah, the Vegas, Vegas takeovers.

Gregory 45:41
Yeah, we were to take over one time, and it was, they called it the Canadian double ender. We’re from Canada, by the way, and it was a full hotel takeover in Vegas. And the Canadians, multiple couples, ended up renting two Penthouse Suites on either end of the building and having parties one night. It was called The Great Canadian double ender. And, you know, completely different atmospheres, different music, different vibe in each one of them. You know, we enjoy both of them, but we went back to the one. It was literally like 80 people who were naked in this penthouse suite. There was like there was no room on the floors. There was no room anywhere. And there was a very attractive couple that was one of the only ones that were still semi-addressed and standing in the middle. And so we immediately walked up and approached them. We chatted for a little while, and they were really cool.

Kandace 46:35
We connected, and I think I began the conversation was, Have you ever had a blow job with an Altoid?

Gregory 46:44
With one of an Altoid in your mouth? No, and then it became this, this bizarre sort of walk with this couple that we had met minutes previously, you know, hand in hand, stepping over bodies, walking through rooms….

Kandace 47:02
Trying to find a space, you know, get in on.

Gregory 47:07
This girl and I ended up on the floor beside the bed because there was no room anywhere else in the bedroom, and kind of stuck between the mattress and the wall. And Candice ended up…

Kandace 47:17
We started in the shower, and then we found that it just wasn’t comfortable enough. So then we’re trying to find space in the bathroom. Because, as said, even the bathroom was busy and there was a toilet seat. And I went, I’ve never done this before, so, yeah, I think I straddled over the top of the toilet seat. He was going to squirt, make me squirt. And all of a sudden, some random woman just kind of went, Can I be underneath you when you squirt? And so her head was basically in the toilet, upward, right on top of it, and he was fingering me.

Gregory 47:57
Not something you see every day. No, you don’t see that. It was one of the more interesting ones. But there have been so many that we walked away from. And, you know, even after 25 plus years, we walk away, we look at each other, go, that was new, or that was different. You know, that was interesting. You know, whether you ever explore that again? You don’t know. But, you know, it’s always there on the table.

Kevin Anthony 48:21
Yeah, if you do it long enough, you will definitely collect this a number of stories.

Gregory 48:28
And the one visual that still strikes, and it was only because I was telling some of the other day, is we’re at this convention, and there were 2500 people in this convention room, so just packed various sort of stages of undress. There was no nudity, but it was pretty much there. Everybody’s dressed to the nines. You know, that’s a big party. And then I saw this guy walking past, who must have been, I don’t know, mid-70s, at least, aged. And he was walking along, and he was pushing his little oxygen tanks, and he had his oxygen going into his nose, and he was walking through the party. And part of me was like, oh, you know this. And the other part of me was like, dude, go on. Go for Wagner is here, whatever you can, you know, it’s just so if there’s, there’s no there’s no line, as far as you know, crossing the line, you have no more of this for you. It’s like, however long you have in your heart.

Kevin Anthony 49:25
Yeah, so indeed, and yeah, I have been there. I’ve been to those parties where there’s not a square inch of floor space, and you’re just like, What do we do? I did a whole episode on this show a while back. I think I called it something like sex party fails or something like that. And I basically just told stories of, like, all the ones I’d been to that had gone wrong. Like, what? What happened? There was enough to fill an hour of the show.

Kevin Anthony 49:56
Okay, we only have a few minutes left. The next question I want to ask you. We’ve been sort of covering this a little bit all along the way, but you know, if couples want to explore ethical non-monogamy, what are the top three skills that you think that they need to have before going on this journey?

Gregory 50:21
Obviously, they need to have open communication skills. They need to be self-confident. They need to have confidence in themselves and in their relationship and in relationship. But if you don’t have confidence in yourself, if you don’t love yourself for what you are, it’s gonna be really hard to let you know, anybody else in around you, because you’re just going to be protecting yourself the whole time. I’m not enough, you know, and that’s, I think, one of the biggest contributing factors to, you know, relationship breakdowns in a situation like that is, you know, the couple feeling I’m not enough.

Gregory 50:56
So I don’t want him to do that, because he’s going to find all of this that I’m not able to give him or not willing to give them. So you need to, you know, you need to have that skill. You need to have, obviously, the communication skills to go along with that, you know, just to explain what that is. And you need to be open-minded enough that if your husband tells you that he’s interested in playing with a man, that you’re not going to kick him out, that you’re not going to shame him. Because people have got so many, you know, desires that they’ve got that are that are unexplored, that, you know, a lot of people get into em or non monogamy, whether it’s em or not, just to be able to explore, just to be able to try that side of their their their personality, that their spouse, may or may not, you know, be comfortable with.

Gregory 51:48
The problem is it’s limiting me. I’m limiting her. I’m living myself by what I believe her beliefs to be. Well, those might not be her beliefs, but there’s something that I’m projecting onto her that she’s not going to like the fact that I want to go and suck a cock. That’s like that. That’s something that you have to be able to have in a relationship, that you’re able to explore that part of it, whether you ever do it or not. That’s immaterial, the fact whether or not you like it or again or do it again, but it’s just something to allow yourself to explore. Yeah, and we’ve done that so many times, like we don’t have, you know, we’re very much no regrets. We’re very much living in the now. We’re very much, you know, 15 seconds of anger, let it go. You know, you can’t change anything back then.

Gregory 52:28
So now let’s be present, and let’s move forward and see where we can make this an enjoyable and fun experience. And so it’s very it’s critical that couples are able to, sort of, our person is able to think that way going into their relationship with their spouse, and how they and the relationship with themselves. You know that, you know, to have that confidence going in and understanding that, you know, it might not be what I want, but it’s what they want, and to understand that and to allow that to happen, you know, to be true. You know, if I can’t allow cams to be true to herself, how do I ever expect her to allow me to be true to myself? You know?

Kandace 53:08
So in the back of a couple of our books, we have this whole section on yes, no, maybe.

Gregory 53:16
So sexual preferences questionnaire, we’ve been getting people to go through that with us and or amongst themselves. And it’s, it’s interesting to see, and it’s, you know, we always say, Well, go back and revisit the list six months from now, and just see if that maybe, maybe as a yes, or maybe that yes is no and no. But you don’t know until you can explore that. So if you can use something like this, and you know, we did get it alphabetically. So the very first thing is, are you into anal or not? Get them hard off the top. You know, it was something that I if I could choose a bunch of questions, I’m going to skirt the ones that are a little bit more difficult, we don’t, you know, put it straight up there. And if a person wants to answer, they should, or they can. And if there’s pushback on it, then, then it’s time to look at other parts of the relationship, or, you know, how people are sort of positioning each other or thinking about each other?

Kevin Anthony 54:05
Yeah, that’s always a great tool. I have one of those as well. I call the sex bucket list that I give to couples. And you know, the great thing is, it doesn’t have to be just for, you know, people exploring ethical non-monogamy, like every couple should go through this.

Kandace 54:19
Exploring sex between the two of you.

Kevin Anthony 54:23
Okay, I have one last question for you, and it’s a question I used to ask all of my guests at the end of the show, and after a while, I kind of stopped doing it because, you know, I was starting to interview a lot of like experts and people with big reputations, and it was they were very, very uncomfortable with this question, but I thought today, you guys are the perfect guests to just dust this question off again for a moment and ask you, and you each get an opportunity to answer, and that is what is your best sexual talent.

Gregory 55:05
Uh, presence.

Kandace 55:14
Touch and energy, sharing the energy and and teaching the other person how to let that energy flow from your base chakra and flow it and explode out your head, and teaching them and showing them how to get that energy flowing through breath, through touch, through eye contact. I think that’s pretty amazing when you work on that.

Kevin Anthony 55:42
Nice, like I said, I asked that question to every guest for hundreds of episodes, and it was always fun. But then I started getting like these, you know, pretty well-known, like psychologists or like MDS on the show, and they were like, backed up on that. But I want to thank you for playing along and answering that question. Those are great skills, by the way, and they are things that I think are sort of higher-level mastery skills that you know when, if people don’t know, and I did, they hear me ask that question, they probably think, Oh, I’m really great at blow jobs or whatever. Okay, that’s good.

Kevin Anthony 56:20
But when you’re talking about bringing presence as the masculine or moving energy as either of you, those are some pretty big skills. Those are things that really take sex to the next level. So I’m glad you answered it that way. All right, before we wrap up here, can you please tell the listeners, I know you’ve written some books, I know you have a website, anything you want to promote, tell people how they can find out more about your work.

Kandace 56:45
Sure. Well, we have a website, and it’s called evolutionarysex.org, that org is short for orgasm, an easy way to remember it. And we now have three books.

Gregory 56:59
So this is our first book fucking our way to enlightenment, and that’s one that came about after our journeys through and our exploration. So it really gets into a lot of what we discovered during COVID. It gets a little bit woo, woo. So some people like that, woo, woo. Part of it, but we’ve also then kind of rewrote the whole book, and we just approach it from a slightly different direction, and that’s just towards monogamy. And then the latest is our triangle of trust, and it’s trying to focus on that back here, someplace in there, and that’s, you know, how to have successful threesomes. And then we’re right in the middle of writing another book that we’re getting for getting pretty close to, and that’s called Unreasonable Happiness. And it’s all about the church of unreasonable happiness, which is something else that we’ve lately discovered or established. So it’s just a way of going through life joyfully.

Kevin Anthony 57:54
And I assume they can find all of those at evolutionarysex.org?

Gregory 57:59
Yes. Well, they try. Evolutionary sex has all the books, and it’s got the descriptions, it’s got everything else, and it’s got direct links to Amazon if you want to buy them through Amazon and and the other book is, is on our website, Church of Unreasonable Happiness, the straight Church of Unreasonable Happiness, com. And that’s where some of our other things are coming up with her joyful, joyful lives, and having fun, lots of blogs that sort of stuff in there. Yeah, so just how to stay happy.

Kevin Anthony 58:26
Well, those links will be in the description, so you can find them there. And I want to thank you both for coming on the show, sharing openly about your experiences, your lifestyle, what you’ve learned, and all of that.

Kandace 58:40
Thank you for having us. Really appreciate the time it was fun.

Kevin Anthony 58:44
All right, everybody, that’s all the time I have for this episode, and I will see you next week.

Kevin Anthony 58:56
I hope you like this episode of the Love Lab podcast. If you enjoy this show, subscribe, leave me a review, and share it with your friends, and for more free exclusive content, join me in the passion vault at https://www.kevinanthonycoaching.com/vault/. That’s https://www.kevinanthonycoaching.com/vault/. Thanks for listening, and remember, as Celine used to say, you’re amazing!