If ever there’s an area where we’re sold a bill of goods – where we’re fed an impossible ideal and told what we “should” be feeling, doing, and thinking – it’s around sex.
Here’s what we’re told:
- You should be having sex 2-3 times a week.
- You should be having simultaneous orgasms with your partner.
- The man should always be the high desire partner in a heterosexual partnership.
- Sex only “counts” if it’s intercourse.
- Desire should precede engaging sexually; in other words, you should “want” to have sex before you have it.
- Vaginal orgasms should be effortless.
- If you don’t experience all of the above, there’s something missing in your sexual connection.
Here’s the reality:
- The frequency of sex varies widely for couples. The “right” amount is what works for the couple.
- Having simultaneous orgasms is extremely rare.
- There’s usually one high-drive partner and one low-drive partner. Either partner can be either of these.
- Sex includes: kissing, touch, affection, sexual play, flirting, exploration, lying down naked together. Any kind of physical touch that you would only engage in with your partner is on the sexuality continuum.
- Desire often does not precede having sex, especially for the low-desire partner, and that’s okay. Starting out sexuality neutral is quite common and doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you or your relationships.
- When we statistically know that less than 30% of women are anatomically able to have vaginal orgasms, the myth that they’re common and should be effortless should be expunged from every media source. Furthermore, recent research shows that there’s no such thing as a “vaginal orgasm” at all, but that all orgasms for women are actually clitoral orgasms. This small bit of information can be life-changing for women who have spent years chasing after the unicorn of what we call “vaginal orgasms.”
- Sexuality can be one of the most challenging aspects of an intimate relationship, and struggling with it in any way doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with your partnership.
Before we continue, what do you notice after reading through these two lists? Is any of this new information, and even if you’ve heard it before, what is it like to read it again?
So… how do you have the greatest sex of your life?
As always, there are many spokes to the wheel:
Rewire Sexual Expectations (Sexpectations? ;)): Anxiety often has its roots in expectations, which can be simmered down to one word: “should”. All of the points in the first list above are “shoulds”, and when you work to consciously let go of them by replacing them with the second list, you will find more inner freedom. As sexuality and feeling open inside are intimately linked, whatever we can do to release ourselves from the straightjacket of “shoulds” will have a direct effect on our sexuality.
Now, this isn’t easy, of course. Just like part of rewiring from relationship anxiety requires examining the messages you’ve been conditioned to believe since you were born around love, romance, and attraction and diligently bringing each subconscious expectation to light so that you can replace it with the truth, so rewiring from sexual shoulds requires the same. This is, as always, warrior work.
Examine Shame: Shame is a silencer, and when we’re caught behind shame’s walls it’s very difficult to open sexually. There are very few places where we carry more shame than around our sexuality. When we begin to work with this shame, gently and skillfully, we notice openings in our heart and body that often lead to sexual openings.
Focus on Connection: The single most important element of creating a fulfilling sex life is to remove the focus on orgasms and frequency and instead focus on connection. For sex is empty and perfunctory if it’s not rooted in connection, both within each of you as individuals and between the two of you.
What does this mean? It’s means that holding each other and kissing can be just as or more fulfilling than what we define as “sex.” It means that the sweet moment where you hugged each other for a full minute, bodies pressed closely together, before going to work for the day, can fill your relationship well with warm, clear water as you recalibrate to each other’s physical and emotional bodies. It means that learning about your own body, reducing your sexual and body shame, examining the roots of the beliefs you carry around sex, and receiving a new template rooted in health and love can connect you to your own sacred sexuality, which will naturally ripple into your relationship with your partner.
Let me be blunt: Sacred sexuality has nothing to do with orgasms and intercourse! It has nothing to do with positions or frequency or any of the lies you’ve been conditioned to believe about sex.
Rather, sacred sexuality hinges on the three elements above, and this is what we explore in Sacred Sexuality: A 40-day course for women to heal body shame and ignite desire. Through this extended course (most of my courses are 30 days), we gently and deeply excavate the roots of shame, examine the core beliefs that cause sexual shut down, and tap into the tenets that ignite desire. The beauty and power of going through this course with a group of dedicated, safe learners is unparalleled, for one of the most effective ways of reducing shame is when we dare to share our stories in the company of others and hear that we’re not alone. I only lead this course live once a year, so if you’re ready to reclaim your sexuality and learn about what it means to ignite true desire, I hope you’ll join us. The next round will start on January 9, 2021, and you can learn more here.
Note: This course is for anyone who identifies as female, and can be taken whether or not you’re currently in a relationship.
