The relationship between physical intimacy and love is one of the most contested territories in human life — celebrated in the Song of Songs, theorized by Plato, honored in tantric traditions, and viewed with suspicion by others. Sexual intimacy can be an expression of love's deepest vulnerability or entirely separate from it, and both are real possibilities. The question worth examining is not which is right but what role you are choosing it to play in your life.
Each step builds on the last.