A Personal Note From Orion

Welcome to the Stellar Life podcast! I’m thrilled to bring you this episode that promises to be both spicy and transformative for your relationships and personal journey.

Today, I have Korenna Reynard with me, whose brilliant work blending Eastern and Western philosophies has helped countless individuals discover their relational blind spots and transform their relationships into ones that are more empowered, conscious, and aligned with their true potential and desires.

In this exciting episode, we dive deep into how kink can be used as a healing modality, explore the different sexual blueprints that shape our desires, and discuss practical ways to deepen our connections with ourselves and our loved ones. Korenna shares vulnerable stories about helping clients heal sexual trauma through role play, explains the science behind why pleasure can rewire traumatic experiences, and offers practical communication techniques anyone can start using today.

Whether you’re in a long-term relationship looking to reignite the spark, healing from past wounds, or simply curious about expanding your understanding of sexuality, Korenna’s wisdom offers something valuable for everyone. Ready for some sexual and relational healing? Listen now and let me know which insights resonated most with you! So, without further ado, let’s dive into the show!

In This Episode

• [00:45] – Orion introduces Korenna Reynard, highlighting her work in women’s sexual empowerment and the union of spirituality and sexuality.
• [02:52] – Korenna describes her transition into tantra and the kink-conscious community, finding excitement in these forms of sex therapy.
• [08:09] – Korenna explains how role play can help address and heal attachment injuries through sexuality and role-play.
• [12:56] – Korenna emphasizes the importance of safe words, contracts, and building trust in role-play scenarios.
• [18:34] – Orion and Korenna discuss the stigma around BDSM and Tantra, and how these practices can lead to healing and empowerment.
• [22:12] – Korenna introduces the concept of erotic blueprints, designed by Miss Jaiya, to help individuals and couples understand their sexual preferences.
• [26:17] – Korenna suggests practical practices for self-exploration, such as spending time with oneself in a sensual way and learning what turns one on.
• [37:06] – Orion inquires about the impact of Korenna’s work on her own sexuality and personal growth.
• [42:31] – Korenna shares her top tips for living a stellar life, including knowing oneself, setting boundaries, and pursuing what brings joy.

Jump to Links and Resources

About Today’s Show

Hi, Korenna, welcome to the show. I am so excited about having this conversation with you. I think it’s gonna be spicy and exciting, and you’re so exciting, and I love your hair. Let’s dive in. Tell me a little bit about yourself and how you discovered this purpose of helping people with their bodies, their sexuality, their connection, all that good stuff. 

Thank you. I’m excited to be here, too. Orion. I kind of have an interesting path into women’s sexual empowerment and the union of spirituality and sexuality, which is kind of two of my favorite ways that I support individuals and couples in expressing and exploring their sexuality. I studied psychology because my parents wanted me to be a lawyer, but I quickly realized that that was not for me. I kind of fell in love with mental health when I was volunteering as an undergrad at a free clinic. 

I was like, “Actually, I think I want to do this. I think I actually prefer the counseling and the psychology part,” even though it was originally a path towards law school, and then when I just finished my master’s degree, and I was doing my internship, I just kept getting a lot of clients who were struggling with sexual abuse, sexual assault, identity issues, etc. I just realized that the more clients I got, the more I felt like I needed to study, because in our program, we got one semester in sex therapy and sexual health, and then we were set free on clients.

I started studying women’s sexual identity. I started taking classes to help understand how surviving breast cancer or even having to have a LEEP procedure, if you have HPV or some sort of infection, being infertile, perimenopause, and those kinds of things, not really feeling in touch with or feeling betrayed by your body, and how things like that can affect a woman’s identity.

I just kept studying more areas of sexual health and sex therapy to keep up with the clients that people were sending me. And then the more I studied, the more people assumed that I wanted those clients. I almost accidentally carved myself a niche in women’s sexual health and sexual expression. About four or five years into my counseling career, I got a little burnout. I was tired of working primarily with sexual addiction and sexual abuse.

That’s really heavy.

It is really heavy. I intentionally sought out tantra and the kink conscious community, and for me, the more exciting forms of sex therapy we could do with a specialization in human sexuality. I just fell in love with the idea that both in the tantra classes, that union of spirituality and sexuality, and then what I learned from the kink and BDSM community of how sexuality can be a part of your personal expression. And interestingly enough, that from my psychology days in the attachment theory and then studying the kink conscious community, I really started to play in the field of how you can help address and heal attachment injuries through sexuality and role play.

How do you do that? 

Well, it’s interesting. When you think about it, a lot of attachment wounds happen when the world is not how you expected, or you were hoping or expecting something to happen.

I get it a lot.

Two things we know about the human brain and the human body. You cannot do the same thing when you treat anxiety disorders or phobias. You cannot experience pleasure and relaxation at the same time that you are experiencing fear and anxiety. If you’re able to bring erotic energy and pleasure into a situation that used to evoke injury or fear, you can rewire the brain and take your power back, because you can’t occur in the same space at the same time.

When something confuses or frustrates you, it’s a sign you haven’t dug deep enough or shifted your perspective yet.

By designing role plays where you get to be empowered to act out what was formerly a fear for you, or was a powerless event for you, even if you’re in the same role, even if you’re in the role of like being held down by someone, but in the role play, you’re able to get up, or in the role play, you’re being held down by someone who actually has your pleasure and your best interest in mind, your brain will start to rewire that experience so that the injuries begin to dissipate, and you start to associate these things with pleasure. 

Because our nervous systems don’t know linear time, and the brain and the imagination are powerful, when you even create this in a role-play situation, you can rewire the memory and you can rewire your nervous system’s reaction, it’s no longer firing cortisol and adrenaline when these things happen. It’s now firing dopamine, followed by the pleasure hormones and oxytocin, when these processes occur. You can rewire some attachment wounds and some attachment injuries by bringing in the erotic energy.

Can you give me an example of someone who heals their trauma through role play like that? Are you alone in the room? Do you have other people who are conscious and assist in the role play? What’s the container? What are the rules that are happening prior to that game or reenactment? How does it work?

So funny, you did warn everybody that it was going to get spicy, and we’re just going to get spicy right away.

Imagination is powerful enough that even if you create a role-play situation, you can rewire your memory and your nervous system’s reaction.

I’ve done this in multiple ways in San Francisco. The powerhouse is this amazing kind of multi-story. It’s not necessarily a club, because you don’t need a membership, but it’s an area where people who are in the king conscious community can go to play, and they’ve got a lot of different rooms, and they’ve got a lot of different floors. There are like public arenas where you can go, stating that you do want to play out a scene. 

I have actually met clients in clubs and designed a scene, where I either hired doms or participants to be in the flow, or you bring your partner or the people you feel safe with. I’ve done it in those scenarios. I’ve gone to people’s homes and talked to them through role-plays with each other in the safety of their own home. But the most frequent way people enjoy doing this with me is to actually meet with me, either on Zoom or in my office, and have me help them or their partner sketch out the role-play of what’s going to happen and what they want. 

It’s a multi-stage process where they tell me, like, “This is what happened to me,” or “This is my fear. This is how it impacts me. This is what I’m wanting to get out of it.” Then we kind of piece that all together to design a scene for them to play out. What do they want? What’s the safe word? What are some key words they might need to hear? What are some key actions? Sometimes it is like, “Oh, I was attacked in college. I was date raped in college, and this is what he wore, and this are the things he said, and these are the things he did.” 

We want to kind of get as close to that, so we can rewire the memories as is, as safety allows, and we’ll work together to figure that out. Sometimes it’s just a fantasy of empowerment. Sometimes, I feel so held down by misogyny, by my culture, by my family of origin, that I want this kind of experience to help me break through that symbolically. We work together with imagery and the idea of what someone is trying to experience, and then create the scene for them to play out.

You know how they say that some captives fall in love with the person who kidnapped them or hurt them. It’s just like in the movie Beauty and the Beast. She fell in love with this monster, which, like, I just saw a little real thing about it. I was like, “Wow, that’s true.” That’s kind of dark, this movie. But do you think that sometimes people are super hurt and disoriented and traumatized by past events, but there’s also a sexual charge to that that lives in the same world of trauma, that there is also sexual charge from the abuse or the pain?

Oh yeah. I mean, it definitely can happen. Sexual charge shows up in many places. That’s actually how fetishes are developed, just because something mundane that has happened, or something shocking or intense that happens, got coupled with erotic energy, and then the person needs that intensity, or needs that specific visual, audio, or textural cue to be able to access their own erotic energy again. There are a lot of layers here, Orion. When there’s an intensity, our bodies can respond erotically to that intensity, and so then it does get confusing sometimes. 

Sometimes, people even experience a lot of shame around it, like, “I was sexually assaulted and now I have these rape fantasies, or I enjoy watching rape porn. It’s the only thing that can get me off,” and they feel a lot of shame around it. That’s why sex therapists and kink-conscious therapists are so important to help someone unpack what that’s about and to help them move through the shame and recognize, like, “Oh, that’s your body’s way of trying to take back your own empowerment.”

Yeah, because if it’s a fantasy and you’re the hero, then you’re not a victim anymore.

Sometimes I’ll meet with clients who will say things like, “Oh, I feel so bad because I have this fantasy about being molested by my gymnastics coach or the football coach that I was a cheerleader for in high school.” They’re so ashamed of it that they don’t even want to tell their partner about this fantasy and their desire to role-play it.

Sexual charge shows up in many places. That’s actually how fetishes are developed.

That’s again, why erotic blueprint coaches, sex therapists, and kink conscious therapists are so important because who do these people have to talk to to say like, “You’re not weird, it’s not bad, it’s not wrong, it just happens to be what your brain coupled erotic energy for whatever you could have heard about it on the news, and it was shocking to you, and it got fused. It could have seemed exciting to you.” 

This really gets into the gray area of the legal system; just because someone fantasizes about something, it doesn’t necessarily mean they want it to happen to them, but they want it to happen to them in a safe and controlled environment. Even in BDSM, safe words, contracts are important, discussing a scene beforehand, and building trust with your scene partners is so important, because it may look like the submissive in a scene has no power or no control, but the truth is they are in complete power and control, and that’s where the healing happens, where you’re recognizing that even though you may be in a receiving role, or you may be in a role where it appears that you are powerless, you actually have a tremendous amount of power. Then we’re coupling the erotic energy in there, and it can be really healing and really rewarding.

Yeah, and sometimes the dominant one is serving the other, because in that container that you’re doing, they’re there to actually serve them in their journey of healing. Could you perhaps share a story of a remarkable healing that occurred through this type of somatic play?  

The first one that came to mind was a young man who had been humiliated by one of his early partners when he was in his early 20s, who mocked the size and appearance of his penis. He was really reluctant and shy about sexual connection, and even in his marriage with his wife, he was anxious about sex, and he had a hard time maintaining an erection. He had a hard time conceiving, because he either would cum earlier than he wanted or not at all. He was afraid to talk to his partner about it. She started to think that it was her, that he didn’t find her attractive, and she started blaming herself, “Why can’t you get hard? Why can’t you stay hard? Why do you cum so quickly?” and things like that.

Just because someone fantasizes about something, it doesn’t necessarily mean they want it to happen to them, but they want it to happen to them in a safe and controlled environment.

When he was finally able to share about the mocking session and how self-conscious he felt, we developed a series of scenes for them. In some of the scenes, he did want his wife to kind of say some of the same things that his partner in his 20s had said. He wanted to ravage her, and his response would be like, “Oh, I’ll show you what this tiny dick can do,” with her consent, hold her down and forcefully have sex with him so that he could feel the masculine power and have a corrective experience of not being emasculated and not standing up for himself when someone was like, “Oh, yeah, I didn’t know. That’s what you were working with. No thanks. I don’t want that.” 

We did that, and they’d use that role play for a while, and then they were ready for another role play where she actually was adoring his penis and actually complementing what you can do with a soft penis, or a smaller penis, or a semi flaccid, semi erect penis, and role playing those kinds of things, and setting them up so that they knew, like, a menu of options, of things that they might do and say. It wasn’t like a choose-your-adventure novel. 

They wanted some spontaneity in their sex play, but there was, like, “Here’s the menu of what might happen, here’s the goal of this role play, and here’s the myriad of things that might happen.” There was some flexibility. They went from her humiliating him in the way that had happened early on and him forcefully be like, “I’ll show you what this dick can do,” and like taking back his power to then her actually admiring and adoring him. Then it took a little bit of the pressure off, “Am I going to stay hard? When am I going to complete? Am I big enough? Is it good enough?” 

They actually eventually moved into a very spontaneous and satisfying sex life and didn’t struggle with conception after that. They now have two children, and she no longer felt like it was all her, and that he wasn’t attracted to her. He was no longer afraid that if he came sooner than he or she wanted, or didn’t come at all, there was going to be drama. So it took a lot of pressure off of him, and they could just enjoy their sex play. They uncoupled this idea that orgasm has to happen at a certain time in a certain way, sometimes simultaneously. That’s my favorite myth that people come into my office with, like, if we don’t climax at the same time, it means we’re not meant for each other, or we’re not doing it right. There have been a lot of these myths, and that allows them to have such a rich and satisfying sex life with each other.

Great lovers don’t just give fast yes-or-no feedback — they offer rich, gourmet communication to get to the peak of their pleasure.

That’s beautiful. It’s amazing. You know, some people are like, “Oh, BDSM is such a dirty thing,” but look at that dirty thing, and it led to two beautiful boys. The healing on both sides and the beautiful relationship, because you have the “I’m only trying, I’m only connected, like videos and me,” so dark. I’m just like, “Love and peace and Shiva, whatever.” 

Then you have the BDSM. Like, “No, we just wanted really hard, and we’re only into that stuff.” How do you combine the two, and how do you create an opening for people to understand that there is nothing wrong with tantra, there is nothing wrong with BDSM, there is nothing wrong with you and your fantasies the way you want to do them, as long as you don’t want to hurt someone.

Exactly. As long as what is happening is between two mutually consenting adults, enjoy it. I think many people across the world, not just in US cultures or in Asian cultures, are kind of conditioned to be afraid and ashamed of their fantasies. “They’re kind of dirty. Keep them private. You don’t dare share them with people.” I think that’s why people have such an extreme reaction to the BDSM or kink conscious community, because they’re breaking the norms. 

They’re kind of letting their freak flags fly unabashedly. I mean, despite good lighting. A good moisturizer. I am 50, I’ve been in this field for a while, and I’ve been around a while, and I think it’s gotten markedly better in the 25 years that I’ve been a therapist, but it’s still miles behind where I’d like us to be. The first thing I do with couples is talk to them about their fantasies. We talk about, like, the hottest sexual movie. 

“If you were going to be the director and producer of what you think is a hot sexual film, what would it be?” and to be able to talk freely about that, and to be able to talk about turn-ons and turn-offs. Some of the things I do with my clients include having a multi-page sexual communication checklist. Some of my clients affectionately call it the ‘yes, no, maybe so’ list. It’s a list of hundreds of things that could or could not turn you on, and you read through it on your own, and you’re like, “Yes, I would like that done to me. No, I would not like that done to me. I don’t know, maybe.”

As long as what is happening is between two mutually consenting adults, enjoy it.

Then, “Yes, I’d be willing to do that to someone. No, I wouldn’t be willing to do that with someone. I don’t know, maybe.” Even introducing things like scat play, water play, spanking, breath play, restriction, and role play, simply by listing them on a check sheet, starts to normalize them already. Here are the myriad things that other people find erotic on this list. 

What do you already know you find erotic? What do you already know you don’t find erotic? What are you curious about? That’s one of the ways I bring it in right away. We don’t ‘yuck’ anybody else’s ‘yum’ in my offices. It’s like, if that does it for you, let’s figure out a way to safely either get it for you in your relationship, or if your relationship allows, outsource it to someone else who does enjoy it, doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be your partner.

Did you ever get a couple where one is a hell yes for most things, and the other one is a hell no for most things? And how do you get both?

It happens a lot, not only for specific sexual encounters, but what happens a lot is also frequency. There’s that old joke of the couple comes into, maybe it’s just a joke in my field, the couple comes into this therapist’s office, and you say, “How frequently are you having sex?” The husband goes, “Hardly ever. We have it about once a week.” And then the wife says, “All the time. We’re having it once a week.” Because if they had their ideal, he’d be having it three times a day, and she’d be having it once a month. All the time, I have people who have kind of a gap in their desire for frequency, or a gap in their desire for what they’re looking for out of a sexual encounter. 

Honestly, the remedy for all of these things is good communication. What has you wanting sex in such vastly different frequencies? Sometimes this is where the erotic blueprints come in. Sometimes it’s because someone is a sexual blueprint and someone is an energetic blueprint, and so their road to turn on, or erotic pleasure, looks one way, and this person’s looking completely different, they’re missing each other. And so briefly, for your listeners, erotic blueprints are kind of an Enneagram for your sex life that was designed by Miss Jaiya. You can find them at eroticblueprint.com.

And there’s one on this podcast; It’s episode 3. Nine years ago.

You can find them in Orion’s library. If you are interested in sexual self-expression, do watch that episode with Orion as well. We have energetic blueprints. We have sensual blueprints. We have sexual blueprints, which is kind of the mainstream, visually turned on by breasts or bulges or things like that. These people want to go directly to sexual contact, where a sensual person might need the lighting to be right and the mood to be right, and an energetic person is going to need the connection to be right.

And to be far away from across the room.

A lot of energetic blueprints enjoy that tension, the tease and the longing; the build-up is what they need. If you’ve got an energetic blueprint trying to have sex with a sexual blueprint, the sexual blueprints like, “If it doesn’t happen within the first five minutes I get bored and I’m checking out,” and the energetic blueprints, like, “I need at least 15 to 25 minutes to warm up,” you’re just gonna miss each other, and then we’re not enjoying sex. This is where good communication comes in—knowing how much foreplay you need and finding the win-win with couples. 

I worked with many couples where one partner has a sexual blueprint, the other person’s essential or energetic, and we help the partner who’s the sexual blueprint understand that foreplay begins at the end of the last orgasm for you, you need to be texting her to let her know you’re thinking about her. Or in some partnerships, a central blueprint will be like, if the dishes aren’t done or there’s dog hair on the bed, that’s going to turn me off.

Honestly, the remedy for all sexual gaps is good communication.

If you want your partner to be readily available on your shorter timeline, vacuum the comforter so that there’s no dog hair on it, or put the socks in the hamper. Maybe your partner’s distracted by overhead lighting, or he’s distracted by clutter. If you want to shorten the journey towards him being fully turned on and ready, then do the things necessary to get him there. If you’re wake up ready, and then you’ve got to keep in mind, like, “Oh, like, what’s my partner’s trajectory, and how did they get there?” Usually, 90 to 95% of the things that people thought were incompatibilities or mismatches can be resolved by a little communication or a little creativity.

Give me an example of some practices, practical practices that somebody who’s listening right now can do on their own or with their partners.

Well, it depends. What goal are we aiming for? And I’ll give you some action.

I guess with self is the goal of self-love and connection to the body, or healing. I guess with a couple, it’s probably igniting the fire, finding better communication, all that. I know you have so many tools, so choose wisely.

It is actually one of my favorite things I haven’t done in a really long time. I used to run a closed group for women. It was an eight-week group that we would I called “reclaiming your sensuality.” One of my favorite things to do with women is finding your own turn on and finding your own erotic expression in and out of the bedroom. What is it that actually makes you feel beautiful, sexy, and juicy? It’s funny, like some of this is about masturbating or using different toys.

If you want to shorten the journey towards him being fully turned on and ready, then do the things necessary to get him there.

And many women I meet are like, “Oh, like, I feel guilty about masturbation,” or “I don’t do it,” or “I try to get myself off as quickly as possible.” And then they’re upset, then sex isn’t as good with their partner as it is when they can get themselves off. Well, are you talking to your partner and learning what you like? Because some people are even afraid to do that. My first step for individuals would be to go slow with yourself. Date yourself. I really am a huge supporter of uncoupling orgasm from sexual pleasure. 

Orgasm is something that might happen at the height of sexual pleasure, but there is so much delicious pleasure available that doesn’t necessarily have to end in an orgasm. Do you like the feeling of someone washing your hair? Do you prefer males on your skin? Or would you prefer a light, feathery touch or a minky blanket dragged across you? Or even playing with yourselves or each other? Do you enjoy that hot fog up a window, breath on your skin? Or do you prefer the cool, blowing a candle out, breath across your skin? 

Learning the things that ignite your senses. There are individuals or couples. One thing I highly recommend is spending some time being with yourself in a sensual way and just testing out. Is it better like this, or is it better like this? Do I like this more, or do I like this more? On a scale of one to five, what is this for you? And to do this outside of the expectation of orgasm or climax, set time aside to just be and play with each other and understand what turns you on, what words turn you on, what music turns you on, what lighting turns you on. 

These are things you can do to take back your own sensuality, and then the better we understand what our bodies like, the better we are able to teach our next partner or current partner what we like, and to be able to give them feedback in a way that you’re not crushing their ego and be like, “No, not like that,” or “You didn’t know that you’re not doing it right,” but “Oh, I liked it more when you did this,” or like, “Oh, I like that, but try a little firmer,” a constructive feedback.

Approximately 90-95% of the perceived incompatibilities or mismatches can be resolved through effective communication or creative solutions.

I think movies actually do us a disservice when it comes to sexuality, because basically, if you like that, then it’s yes, and it’s no, but that’s not how things work. I like to tease. That’s kind of like a kitty menu fast food drive-through feedback. We want you to be giving each other gourmet feedback. “Oh, I’d like it a little firmer. I’d like it a little lighter. I’d like a little more to the left. I’d like it to go on a little bit longer,” not just yes or no. That is not going to help you get to the peak of your own pleasure. 

Some of this is about self-exploration, but a lot of it is about having the courage and the capacity to communicate and even communicate about what you’re unknowns are, like, “I’m not like this, but I heard this.” That’s another thing I really recommend for people. Whether you like to listen to erotic stories, read erotic books, or watch erotic movies, don’t burden yourself with having to create all this stuff from scratch. Go ahead and consume some of the stuff that’s already out there so that you can create your own menu. Like, “Oh, I think I might like to try that. Oh, that did not sound good to me. That kind of did sound good to me.” And then you build from there.

I like what you said about gourmet feedback. I think gourmet is always good, gourmet feedback, gourmet communication, gourmet touch, and gourmet eye gazing.

Sometimes you want a cheeky little something off the drive-through menu. You want it fast, you want it dirty. You know that can be nice when it’s what you want, but to have an eye on the higher-quality, more nutritious kind of feedback, as my recommendation. There’s nothing wrong with wanting something a little fast food now and again, but it shouldn’t be the majority of our everyday consumption in our sex lives.

You’re doing really intense stuff, and some of them are taboo. How was your journey as far as the outside acceptance? Of course, everybody who is like, “Oh, she’s a sexologist,” and they go online, and it’s normal, but for people in your family, it’s like, “Oh, what is she doing?” Or people that grew up with you, “What is going on?” How is that for you?

We’ve been conditioned to fear and shame our fantasies — to treat them as dirty secrets instead of parts of ourselves longing to be embraced.

It is really interesting. Even in my own family of origin. I’ll have people who will say to me, “Oh, I would never tell your sister this,” or “I would never talk to your aunt about this.” But you’re a sex therapist. They’ll just launch into things, and I’m like, “Well, no, I’m not your sex therapist. I did not need to know that about you and my uncle.” Some of my relatives are grateful for it, while others react a little standoffish about it. I’m in my 50s. My parents are in their 70s.

My father owns a financial planning firm, and it’s like we’re at a corporate event with some of the people that work for his firm, and they’ll go, “What kind of therapist are you?” I can feel my dad’s all being tense. “I just do a lot of different things. I work with individuals and couples, and I’ve worked with an attachment lens.” I don’t always go, “Oh, you know, I’m a board-certified kink-conscious therapist.” You kind of have to read the room. 

At one point, my daughter was enrolled in a Catholic school, and I had a meeting with the principal right away, and I was like, “I just want to know, is this going to be a problem for you if someone wants to come over for a play date? I Googled her mom to see how I felt about her coming over for a play date and found out that she’s a kink-conscious therapist. I saw this other podcast that I have done talking about erotic blueprints or BDSM. Is that going to be a problem for you?” Luckily, that school is like, “Nope. We’re fully in support of whatever you do.”

Can we have a session, please?

You know that the principal said, “I think you should do a workshop at the school. I want more. I want to know more about the erotic blueprints?” It was really funny. It’s getting easier. A decade ago, I did have these worries. I have a giant six foot wooden panel that a client gifted me after I’d been working with this couple for a couple years, and when they finally think they’re ready to graduate, they gifted me this carved panel from a Kama Sutra temple, and it does read kind of like a picture menu of different sexual positions. 

It’s kind of a starter panel. It’s not an advanced panel, but it’s up in our house. I have occasionally left dildos out or things like that in my office when the cleaning lady comes over, and I was teaching a Dallas erotic massage to a couple, so I’ve just got a giant dong on a folding table, and I’m teaching these different techniques. Then I rushed out of the house so the cleaning lady can clean, and when I got back to my office, the table had been moved, but the giant eight-inch dong was just still in the middle of the table. 

I was like, “Oops, I’m so sorry.” And the cleaning lady did have questions. And then I was like, “Oh yeah, one of the things I do is sex therapy.” But I’ve actually been there. There have been a couple of, like, people in neighborhoods, like, “You’re not allowed to play at Dr. Reynard’s house.” They didn’t want their kid around me, but most people lean in. I think I have a church-going soccer mom vibe about me.

Spend some time being with yourself in a sensual way to ignite your senses.

Then people are like, “You’re a sex therapist?” If they get to the point where they’re willing to ask questions, and then they realize, like, “Oh yeah, it’s about healthy sexuality.” Like I talked to a couple, when a woman had a mastectomy after breast cancer, you don’t want the first time that your partner sees and feels those scars to be in a sexual act, because they will flinch or cringe, and now you’ve tainted sex. 

We’ll have conversations about doing this in a more neutral way, and how you want to go about showing your partner your scar, letting them touch the scar, and letting them ask you questions about whether this hurts. Does this feel good? What are you comfortable with? You want to be having that in an intentional container, not, “Oh, we’re finally feeling amorous a couple months after my surgery, and we’re making out. I have to take my shirt off in front of them for the first time, and they gasp.” Now we’ve set ourselves back six months. Once people realize, like, “Oh, that’s what you do?” 

Yeah, I do the whole gamut, like, whatever it is about your sexual embodiment and your sexual expression that you either want to heal or enhance. I want to meet you there and make that easier. It’s not just about extreme fantasies or taboos, it’s also about healthy sexual expression. After they get that, they usually warm up to me, but people often are either standoffish or interested for all the wrong reasons. That happens, too, but people just assume that I’m freaky and kinky because I’m a board-certified kink-conscious therapist.

It’s very, very, very deep. You had spent many years doing this and working in the most intimate settings with numerous wounded people. I mean, most of us are wounded. Any one of us who hasn’t gone through something has some hurt on some level. But how did it change you and your own sexuality? Or how do you change you and the way you see people?

I think I was interested in sex as a teenager. I think I was always interested in it, but I had that kind of idea that women aren’t supposed to enjoy it. You do it for your partner. You’re only supposed to do it with a heterosexual partner. I think it was funny, like, as I got to learn more academically, I really started to open up more to the idea of being queer, opening up to the idea of being more verse. I don’t just have to be a submissive role. I can be in a more dominant role.

I can ask her what I want. I think it has really helped me feel more confident. It’s interesting also, as a woman over 50, and some of the things that reflections I’ve gotten back from the women who would take my reclaiming sensuality class are like I feel sexier now in my perimenopausal late 40s, early 50s, than I did in my 20s and 30s. I was so insecure. I didn’t know what I wanted, and I didn’t know what I was good at.

I didn’t know how to ask partners for feedback. I actually feel more in touch with and more expressive in my own sexuality here in my 40s and now 50 than I did when I was young. That has really helped. I think I was always drawn to the idea of being a little more open and a little more curious. But I do think in 2026 or 2027, I did assist in a research project for the World Health Organization. We were researching the differential diagnosis and treatment of sex addiction versus porn addiction, and the tiny, tiny little role I had in this like multidisciplinary international crew was to interview self proclaimed porn addicts, and talk to them about their journey of when you first found porn, to when you decided you were an addict. 

What was that journey like? I think that really helped me be even more open and understanding, kind of like what you said about everybody has their own journey. Everybody has their own wounds. If you zoom out far enough and you’re patient enough, all behaviors make sense. If something doesn’t make sense to you, it’s because you haven’t dug deep enough or you’re not looking from the right angle. To understand that, I think it has really made me a lot more flexible and a lot more accepting and a lot more open, whatever you’re strong in. Giggling with whatever turns you off, whatever turns you on. 

What I hope it helps me do with the couples that I work with is I like to think I have this uncanny knack for, like, sucking judgment out of a room.

Wow, that’s a big deal.

Yeah, we used to be judgmental or critical of each other. I really like to help them slow down and try to take on the other person’s perspective to understand why they’re asking for this or why they’re afraid to do it. Where can we bring in curiosity, empathy, and compassion rather than judgment or criticism? I mean, that’s one of the things I’m most proud of, and what I try to help the people that I supervise, and what I try to help the couples that I work with understand when we constrict or we brace of something we heard from our partners, that’s usually because there’s some fear or some shame involved.

We all just want to be accepted, chosen, and adored for who we are.

If we can try to slow down, relax, and get curious about what caused me to flinch, brace, or reject, and what has led them to suggest this, there’s likely some common ground to be found. Maybe no one gets their first choice or the top idea, the original strategy they had. But when you start talking to each other, you usually find, like a commonality that you can both be excited about, and then that’s where you can meet each other. Then things grow from there. 

That’s amazing. What did you learn about people? Is there an insight where you look at people and be like, “I know something, and I love you for that?”

I think the most common thing I learn about people is that we all just want to belong. We all just want to be accepted for who we are and chosen and adored for who we are, and we’re all really scared of being rejected. A lot of the behaviors that come off as people like, “Oh, they’re so selfish,” or “They’re narcissistic,” or “They’re this,” it usually is because they’re either protecting themselves from being rejected. They’re preemptively rejecting you so that you can’t reject them, or they’re afraid of how something will reflect on them anytime that anything does feel off. I’m like, “Ooh, where’s the wound? What are they protecting themselves from?” If we can use that lens and get curious about that, it just opens the way for collaboration and understanding.

Beautiful. What are your three top tips to live a stellar life?

At this moment, I would say, take the time to know who you are and investigate who you want to be. What jazzes me up, what makes me feel alive, and then I unabashedly pursue that. Do not be afraid to set boundaries, make requests, try new things that are aligned with what turns you on, what lights me up, what fills me with energy, what makes me feel excited, dig in research, experiment to know it, then pursue it, and then the third and final thing I would say about living a stellar life is approach everybody that you encounter as if you already understand they’re going through something, and you’re going to be patient and generous with them and be curious about everyone you encounter. Some people we immediately like, and it’s easy to be patient, generous, and curious with them, especially those who initially rub us the wrong way. Are you kind of skeptical about whether you can find a way to be patient, generous, and curious with them? Who knows what you’ll learn and experience?

That’s so beautiful. Well, it’s really easy to be generous, curious, and loving with you. You are such a light in the world. I’m so honored we got to have this conversation, and I really enjoyed it, and I really appreciate you and the wisdom you shared here today, so authentically and from the heart.

Thank you for inviting me to speak with your audience. I hope that they learned a little something here that can help them be more sensually embodied and maybe curious about their own erotic worlds today.   

Yes, I’m into that. Thank you, and thank you, listeners, remember to search, learn, and pursue what turns you on. Approach everyone with curiosity, patience and kindness, because you never know what you’re gonna get. You might be surprised, and it might be something really important for you, and have a stellar life. This is Orion till next time.

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Your Checklist of Actions to Take

{✓} Complete a sexual communication checklist. Read through hundreds of potential activities and mark them as “yes,” “no,” or “maybe” for both receiving and giving, which normalizes various preferences and helps you understand your own desires.

{✓} Practice giving “gourmet feedback” during intimacy. Move beyond simple “yes/no” responses to more specific guidance to enhance pleasure and communication.

{✓} Explore your sensuality through self-dating. Take time to understand what makes you feel beautiful, sexy, and “juicy” by exploring different sensations without the pressure of reaching orgasm.

{✓} Design healing role-plays for attachment wounds. If you have past trauma, create controlled scenarios that bring erotic energy to formerly fearful situations.

{✓} Uncouple orgasm from sexual pleasure. Recognize that orgasm might happen at the height of sexual pleasure, but there’s substantial pleasure available that doesn’t need to end in orgasm.

{✓} Identify your erotic blueprint. Determine whether you’re primarily energetic (requiring tension, teasing, and buildup), sensual (relying on the right mood and environment), or sexual (preferring direct physical contact).

{✓} Consume erotic content to expand your menu. Rather than creating everything from scratch, listen to erotic stories, read erotic books, or watch erotic films to discover what appeals to you.

{✓} Create intentional containers for vulnerability. For sensitive situations, design specific moments to share outside of sexual activity. This prevents inadvertent reactions from tainting sexual experiences and allows for questions and adjustments.

{✓} Investigate your true self and pursue it unabashedly. Take the time to discover who you are, what excites you, and what brings you to life. Don’t be afraid to set boundaries, make requests, and try new things aligned with what energizes and excites you.

{✓} Connect with Korenna Reynard for expert guidance on sexuality and relationships. Korenna specializes in sexual empowerment, addressing relationship blind spots, and helping individuals and couples develop relational skills.

About Korenna Reynard

Korenna Reynard believes that relationship quality directly impacts life quality. She recognizes how connections with family, loved ones, friends, and self fundamentally affect both physical and mental well-being.

In her practice, she integrates clinically-supported neurobiological and body-based approaches with talk therapy to help clients achieve rapid, effective, and sustainable changes.