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about suzie

Suzie Johnson, cpc

Marriage coach & Affair Recovery expert since 1999

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WELCOME!

This website is designed to be a two-way conversation. Where you can ask questions, read or listen to my answers, advice and insights about love, trust & overcoming infidelity.

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Testimonials

I WILL DEFINITELY BOOK SOME MORE COACHING WITH HER

It was a great session I had with Suzie, more than exceeded my expectations and was of great help. Thank you very much for organizing this and I will definitely book some more coaching with her.

donna,

an Affair Partner

Reigniting Passion In Marriage

How to Passion Up Your Marriage

Answered by Suzie Johnson

Updated:

Did you know?

One of the leading reasons couples seek marital counseling is due to the decline of passion in their marriage. And yet, few couples recognize how important it is to keep that passion, that chemistry and that sexual spark going between them… until their marriage begins to fade. So the question that begs to be asked is this: is the decline of passion just an inevitable occurrence over the long haul, and couples should just sit back and hope that love and shared commitment will be enough to see them through?

My answer is an uncompromising NO.

And here’s why: if you allow the passionate fires to fade… then soulmates turn into roommates, monogamy becomes monotony, and marriage life begins to feel like a prison — one which not even your principles would prevent you from wanting to escape.

The bad news?

While true love is like the sun — it burns forever — passion is more like a fire. If you leave it unattended, it goes out. This means that passion never spontaneously renews itself… it requires conscious effort and attention.

Now, for the good news.

Though it can grow cold due to neglect, passion never dies. Like a fire, even if passion grows cold, it can be rekindled, reawakened and brought back to life. The challenge, of course, is that most people don’t have a clue how to go about doing that.

Which is why I’m convinced…

What couples need now more than ever is not sex therapy, but something along the lines of “passion therapy”, where they are taught the skills and techniques to help them passion up their marriage — so they won’t ever feel the need to reach beyond its borders to feel fulfilled.

But let me ask you this.

Before today, has anyone ever given you a recipe for renewing desire, rekindling romance and reigniting passion and intimacy between you and your partner? If the answer is no, then you are in for a treat because I’m going to introduce you to what is both a process and a practice for doing just that. I call it Passion Therapy. 

What Is Passion Therapy?

Passion Therapy is the conscious weaving (integration) of rituals into your sexual practice so that it reignites and awakens the passion within.

It’s both a process and a practice. The main emphasis is on the rituals of pleasure and mindfulness, many of which are taken from ancient traditions found in tantra and the Kama Sutra, mixed with more modern sex therapy and conscious loving techniques and approaches.

The Mission Of Passion Therapy

Our mission is to help couples learn how to keep the passion fires burning all the way up to forever.

Think of it this way…

Passion Therapy is about learning how to increase desire for each other, rather than desire for sex. The rituals are designed to help you and your partner to practice bringing MORE than just your body to the bedroom so that your sexual connection goes beyond skin deep… to soul deep. The goal is to honor your own sexual experience as well as your partner’s by fully engaging with your mind, body and spirit. This includes weaving your conscious awareness into your sexual experiences.

What Makes Passion Therapy Unique?

Passion Therapy is a unique approach in four key ways:

  1. Our primary focus is on committed (monogamous) couples. We teach you the romantic skills, techniques and rituals to renew and rekindle your passion and sexual connection for life.
  2. Our emphasis is on practice. We teach you romantic rituals and best practices for igniting and maintaining passion and sexual happiness.
  3. Passion Therapy is an open source community. It’s our charter to collect and make available to everyone the world’s largest library of romantic rituals. And perhaps most importantly…
  4. Passion Therapy is designed to be a self-guided experience. This means that any couple anywhere in the world on any given day or night can try a tantric ritual or explore a tantric idea. 

SIDE NOTE: I do facilitate a Couple’s Retreat twice a year, for those who want a more hands-on experience of Passion Therapy.

Is Passion Therapy Right For You?

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Obviously, Passion Therapy is not right for every couple. For example, this approach would NOT be right for you and your partner if…

  • You are in a relationship where safety is an issue.
  • One of you has been diagnosed with medical or sexual issues.
  • One of you has psychological or mental issues.
  • One of you is not healthy enough for sexual activities.
  • One of you is under the care of a licensed psychologist or medical practitioner.

However, Passion Therapy might be worth considering if…

  • Your relationship is stuck in a rut or trapped in routines, and you’re looking for ways to add spice, newness and adventure (without tricks or gimmicks).
  • The love and affection is strong in your relationship, but the sexual happiness could use a little tune-up.
  • You’re looking for healthy ways to increase sexual happiness and well-being within your relationship.
  • You’re looking for ways to deepen the trust and intimacy in your relationship.
  • You’re both curious to learn new ways to love, touch and please each other.
  • You’re curious to learn what else there is to learn about sex and sexual happiness.
  • You’re already a passionate couple, and Passion Therapy would simply be a next-level experience for you.
  • You want to ensure that the passion in your marriage continues to grow and evolve, rather than fade and decline.

If any of these rings a bell for you…

I believe it’s worth taking a few more minutes to explore and learn a bit more about this approach. Coming up is my crash course on basic Passion Therapy. It gives you the basic principles and presuppositions that make up the entire Passion Therapy philosophy. I encourage you to read them all the way through. By the time you get to the end of the crash course, I sense you’ll have an even better idea if this is right for you.

18 Secrets for Reigniting Passion in Marriage

18 Secrets for Reigniting Passion in Marriage

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1. The Emphasis Is Not On Sex... It's On Foreplay

What is foreplay? We define foreplay as any thought, action, image, ritual or experience taken with the specific intent to awaken, arouse and build sex energy. In Passion Therapy, the primary focus is on helping couples embrace, explore and expand their foreplay skills, which are referred to as rituals of pleasure.

Why do we place so much emphasis on foreplay?

We’ve observed that over the course of a long-term relationship, it’s never the sex that gets boring… it’s usually the foreplay. Therefore, we’ve observed that the key to better sex is better foreplay. It’s our goal to help couples increase the range (variety and creativity) of foreplay skills, so they can embrace, explore and expand their rituals of pleasure, thereby increasing their chances for long-term relationship successes.

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2. The Primary Purpose Of Sex Is Enjoyment

In Passion Therapy, we affirm that the primary purpose of sex is enjoyment. And when we say enjoyment, we mean pleasure for pleasure’s sake. From this frame of reference, we redirect the “goal-oriented” energy of sex into a more “holistic-oriented” energy, where wide-ranging sensual enjoyment (not just orgasm) becomes the primary focus.

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3. Everything (Including Sex) Begins With Thought

In Passion Therapy, we believe mindfulness is the key to sexual super health because for pleasure to be fully embraced, all blocks to pleasure must be removed — and 99% of what blocks pleasure is thought. Therefore, in Passion Therapy, we teach couples how to use positive imagery to shift mental energy (thoughts). We also teach mindfulness techniques to counteract the negative mental habits that restrict sexual well-being.

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4. The Path To Intimacy Is Transparency

The word “intimacy” can be scary and confusing for many because it evokes feelings of nakedness and vulnerability — all of which require us to risk being hurt or even worse… rejected. In Passion Therapy, the word intimacy is pronounced as IN-TO-ME-SEE which is another way of saying transparency. Rather than viewing transparency as a risk, we see it as the safest path to take because being transparent with your thoughts, intentions and actions is what frees you to be you. Allowing your partner to know you, see you and love you without masks or pretenses is what leads to intimacy.

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5. Desire Cannot Be Forced... It Can Only Be Inspired

The mind does amazing things, and one of those amazing things is that it gives birth to sexual desire. However, the mind can never be forced to create desire; it has to be inspired. When we say inspired, we’re speaking of a state of urgent curiosity that demands satisfaction. In Passion Therapy, we teach couples how to inspire desire using sexual thoughts (imagination, fantasy), words (conversation, tone, tempo), mindfulness, playfulness, sensate focus, savoring, and visual cues.

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6. Mood Matters

Emotions make or break the moment. And while desire can be inspired, a sensual mood usually needs to be coaxed and charmed into cooperation. In Passion Therapy, we teach couples how to charm and disarm resistance, reluctance and rejection using mood-brightening techniques and mood-enhancing rituals, actions and activities.

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7. A Loving Relationship Has No Room For Inhibitions

We define inhibitions as any thought, concept or belief that results in a frigid (diminished) response to pleasure. Although sexual inhibitions are common in our society… like colds and flu, that doesn’t make them desirable. In Passion Therapy, we encourage couples in loving relationships to drop inhibitions rather than cherish them because while modesty is nice, it has no place in the bedroom.

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8. Be Mindful Like A Geisha

In Japan, the geiko (geisha) is trained to practice sensual mindfulness. This means careful attention to all details (large and small), attentiveness to concrete details of a task (from pouring tea to flirting with eyes), and to stay aware of her inner sensual and emotional responses. The result of this mindfulness is heightened moments of sensual awareness that results in state of blissful engagement. In Passion Therapy, we help couples learn how to be mindful like a geisha so that they are able to experience heightened moments of sensual and emotional engagement with each other.

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9. Orgasm And Ejaculation Go Together But Are Not Attached To Each Other

While orgasm and ejaculation go together like apple pie and ice cream, they can also be enjoyed separately. In Passion Therapy, we teach rituals that reward deferred gratification as well as techniques for sustained pleasure-amplification that include orgasm independent of ejaculation. This is, by far, one of the most challenging (and rewarding) processes of discovery for our Passion Therapy couples. 

SIDE NOTE: Most of these techniques are taught in advanced Passion Therapy workshops.

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10. “Yes” Is The Secret Password

In the world of improvisational comedy, saying yes to everything is a secret that comedians use to make you laugh hysterically. This is because in improv, players agree in advance to accept everything and anything that happens onstage. Good players never negate, contradict or invalidate the work of another player… they simply build on it. Without knowing the secret password (yes), improv looks scary, but in reality, it’s the safest type of comedy. Since the players already said yes to everything that’s going to happen, nobody and nothing ever goes wrong. In Passion Therapy, “yes” is the secret password and life-affirming mantra used to open up couples to a hidden world of possibilities and creative self-expression. It’s used as both a remedy for strengthening trust bonds, as well as an aphrodisiac for pushing past limits.

The Power of Newness in Marriage

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11. Embrace The Power Of Newness

There are more positive feel-good emotions available for us to experience than ever could be experienced in one lifetime. Alas, most couples never explore more than a handful of these emotions, and deprivation from new feel-good emotions is a leading contributor to apathy, boredom, restlessness and depression. In Passion Therapy, we believe that newness is a big key to living a passionate life. With newness, indifference disappears. Everything becomes a surprise, a fresh discovery. Therefore, we encourage couples to embrace newness like a good friend. We encourage couples to try new things (hobbies, books, sports), explore new feelings (edgy, tender, blissful), test new experiences (foods, wines, music), and find ways (big and small) to integrate planned newness as a way of life.

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12. Celebrate Uncertainty

If life has one universal quality, that quality could be called uncertainty. This rule of uncertainty is, in fact, the most “certain” principle we can observe. In other words, change is certain, and a certain amount of randomness is guaranteed. Unfortunately, our culture has developed dread or fear associated with uncertainty. The result is an underlying sense of strain, heaviness, self-consciousness, hesitation and reluctance that shows up in the bedroom as fear of intimacy. In Passion Therapy, we help couples learn how to celebrate uncertainty rather than run from it, to lean into the discomfort of not knowing, and to learn how to enjoy the unveiling/revealing/unraveling process of life.

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13. Play Is Serious Business

We’ve observed that playfulness plays a huge role in keeping passion alive. When couples stop being playful and stop seeing themselves as playmates, their relationships (in and outside of the bedroom) become rigid, inflexible, stuffy, stifling and trapped in routines — all of which eventually lead to boredom (the opposite of passion).

We believe that if passion is the goal, then play is the way. And when we talk about play, we’re referring to any form of self-expression where there is nothing to gain and nothing to lose — just total engagement for the pleasure of pleasure. This is free, self-creating and self-organizing fun. It should never be confused with competing, which has goals and agendas.

In Passion Therapy, we encourage couples to adopt playfulness as a sexual skill — the kind of play where sex + pleasure + play merge to create a state of total immersion. You forget the Ego, lose yourself in the moment, and get your own taste of divine delight.

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14. Expect Mastery

In many areas of our lives, we expect mastery: driving a car, flying an airplane, etc. Yet when it comes to sexual skills and knowledge, most are willing to settle for good enough. In Passion Therapy, we believe that sexual mastery is a totally worthy pursuit. And the best part? It’s fun! Because every time we reach for that next level of experience, we gain the instant rewards of ever-increasing pleasure that accompany each new sensual breakthrough.

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15. Relaxation Is The First Sexual Response

In Passion Therapy, we believe there’s no more precious state than the state of total relaxation because it’s through the door of relaxation that all other sexual responses flow. Think about it. In order for the body to be truly responsive, the mind must be calm and relaxed to allow sex energy to animate the senses, and the body must relax and allow the blood to flow unrestricted into nerve receptors and pump unrestricted into pleasure centers.

In other words, nothing happens until you relax!

This is why in Passion Therapy, we treat anything that interferes with or blocks your ability to relax (stress, anxiety, hunger, anger, resentment or fatigue) as “sexual dysfunction,” and anything that helps you naturally relax as “sex therapy”. Therefore, we encourage couples to embrace and adopt a relaxed lifestyle that includes daily rituals of relaxation, mini-vacations, multiple yearly honeymoons, monthly massages, and therapeutic self-hypnosis, all of which help to create mind and body relaxation.

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16. The Power Is In Your Hands

Very few of us realize how much sexual power we hold in our own hands — literally. The human hand is one of the most important (and pleasurable) sexual tools we have. In Passion Therapy, we teach couples the high art of touching consciously. We help them learn how to channel energy and intention into every caress. They learn how to use their hands like musicians, to develop a special sensitivity to coax responses, and to put their heart energy into every touch, stroke and connection.

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17. Embrace Rituals Of Pleasure

Think about this: how do you feel when you’re at the edge of an experience that promises massive amounts of pleasurable enjoyment? The answer is, you feel alive, inspired, motivated, eager, enthusiastic and blissfully optimistic. The next logical question then is, what does it take to create (and recreate) that state of urgent optimism? The answer is a ritual of pleasure: an action, thought or activity that massages and stimulates your pleasure centers and takes you to the edge of anticipated pleasure.

What are rituals of pleasure?

Rituals of pleasure are purposeful actions, activities and experiences that you take to animate and stimulate your physical and emotional pleasure centers. The purpose of embracing rituals of pleasure is to help you open up your mental and emotional capacity to give, receive and experience pleasure. One of the charters of Passion Therapy is to help create, collect and make available the world’s largest library of rituals of pleasure for couples.

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18. Know Your Partner's Signature Ritual of Pleasure

We teach four styles of pleasure rituals in Passion Therapy. Here, they are ranked in order of popularity:

  1. Romantic Rituals
  2. Adventurous Rituals
  3. Sensual Rituals
  4. Mindful (sacred) rituals

Although everyone finds pleasurable rituals in all the categories, what we’ve observed is that at the end of the day, most people have a favorite, a signature style they prefer. For most couples, what works is a mixed bag. She might like romantic rituals, while he prefers adventurous rituals. Therefore, in Passion Therapy, we encourage couples to develop mastery in all four styles.

Now here’s the million-dollar question:

If everybody has a signature ritual that works best for them, do you know which one is yours, and (perhaps most importantly) which one is your partner’s? If you aren’t sure, don’t worry. Coming up is a quick overview of the four styles.

Discovering Your Partner’s Ritual of Pleasure

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What are Romantic Rituals?

Romantic rituals open the way for relaxation and emotional connection. In romantic rituals, attention is the secret sauce, and conversation is king. Compliments are the keys that unlock the gates of paradise, and the kiss is like a handshake — it makes or breaks the deal.

The three keywords: attention, affection, and admiration

Password: Take it slow

Magic phrase: It’s all about you

Signature technique: The Goldilocks kiss

What are Sensual Rituals?

Sensual rituals awaken, animate and massage the five senses. The goal of sensual rituals is to shift attention from thinking (the head) to sensate feelings (the body). In sensual rituals, everything you hear, taste, smell, touch and feel is merged into one sexual experience. Therefore, touching is high art, music influences mood, lighting is seduction, food is foreplay, and your hands are your most important tools.

The three keywords: taste, touch, feel

Password: Savor

Magic phrase: Touch me

Signature technique: Savoring

What are Adventurous Rituals?

The goal of adventurous rituals is to break through to new dimensions of eroticism. Adventurous rituals build sex energy, tension and desire through power exchange games, role play and forbidden allure. Most adventurous rituals are layered in explosive tension, edgy taboo, seductive power, erotic suspense, submission and control. 

Note: This style requires more creativity, openness and trust between couples than any other style. However, we’ve also observed that it’s the one style that is most lacking in most marriages where passion is in decline.

The three keywords: power, control, forbidden

Password: Adventure

Magic phrase: Let’s play

Signature technique: Power exchange

What are Sacred (Mindful) Rituals?

Mindful rituals build sex/orgasm energy while deferring ejaculation. Most mindful rituals are done with eyes wide open. Couples that engage in mindful rituals don’t just want intimacy, they want transparency. Their goal is not just to have sex; they want to have a sacred sexual experience. (This is why mindful rituals are also called sacred sexuality rituals.)

The three key words: ecstasy, intimacy, love

Password: Transparency

Magic phrase: Lost in your eyes

Signature technique: Lotus control

So, there you have it — a snapshot of the four types of rituals you’ll learn in my Passionate Couple coaching session which is part of my Happiness After Infidelity home study course. Now, the question becomes, which style will work best for you? Which style will work best for your partner?

Here’s a little recap of the 18 Secrets to Passion Up Your Marriage…

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Final Thoughts

I believe those are questions worth finding answers to because if there’s one thing I can reassure you of, it’s this: while there is nothing new to learn in sex, there is a new world of adventurous, sensual and romantic rituals of pleasure waiting for you to explore.

I have an intuition about you…

The fact that you have read this far tells me you’re willing to learn what you need in order to get the results you want. That’s a great step forward, yet it’s not enough to read — you must also experience the reality of learning.

Because when it comes right down to it…

You might wonder, think, ponder, or be curious about the rituals, ideas and techniques presented here, but until you applyfeel, understand and experience them for yourself, my words are just placeholders.

Today could be the day you make quantum leaps in your sexual happiness. I invite you to discover this new world of Passion Therapy for yourself. Now might be a great time to to get more information about my Rebuild Your Marriage for Online Course for Couples. It’s my very best ideas, strategies and secrets distilled from 17 years of helping couples (and myself) to have an incredible marriage after infidelity.

You want to know the best part?

It only takes a single moment for happiness to sneak into your life. All you need is a surprise breakthrough to come in and shift the equation of your relationship. I believe my Passion Therapy coaching session could very well open the doors for that to happen for you.

Until we speak again…

Remember… Love Wins!

P.S. I created an entire process on rebuilding your marriage after infidelity. Learn More Here