Better sexuality

'Good sex is like good bridge. If you don't have a good partner, you'd better have a good hand' -Mae West (the Rosetta Vase, Grayson Perry.)

“If our sex life were determined by our first youthful experiments, most of the world would be doomed to celibacy. In no area of human experience are human beings more convinced that something better can be had only if they persevere” - P.D. James.

This article offers advice on how to persevere. It describes four ways, to make two mistakes, in sex. Providing ways as to how they might be avoided. The two mistakes are considering other people too little and sabotaging our wider goals. Mistakes that have traditionally been set apart.

This setting apart has come at a cost. It disregards everyone's capacity to make these mistakes. Making those mistakes more likely to happen. As if the mistakes could not be understood and minimised. This blog is my contribution towards ending that oversight. It aims to complement the 'me too' movement (Delavingne, 2022.) We begin feeling too much.

Feeling too much

You may have had the experience of feeling too happy, too anxious, too sad, too disgusted or too angry. At these times you may have felt out of control. You may not have known what to do. At the same time, as we grow up, we learn that, experiences of intimacy and sexuality can help us regulate our emotions. It would be reasonable then to imagine that making an experience more intimate, or sexual, might help when we feel too much.

To do this safely we must remember these experiences may involve another person. So mistakes can happen if we indulge in private fantasies, or choose to act them out with other people. In these ways we may intrude into another person's experience without consent. Imposing our unregulated emotions. An experience that may be distressing for the other person.

It makes sense that, the better we are able to experience emotions, without having to immediately act upon them. The less likely we are to make these mistakes. The skill of emotional regulation in other words. I think language is key to this skill.

So the more able we are to talk about sex, the more likely, we will be able to safely engage in it. Specifically, talking with the person we would like to have sex with, before we have sex with them. What's more, while we are having sex with them. This habit should help us to not consider other people too little or sabotage our wider goals. These two mistakes can also occur when we feel too little in our intimate and sexual encounters.

Feeling too little

'Who has done that?'; 'Why did you / I do that?'; 'Why didn't I / you do that?'

Sometimes we make unconscious mistakes when feeling too little. These mistakes can be understood as the result of a dissociation. Dissociation is when we disconnect from our immediate environment. Providing an escape when it feels like there is no other escape. Perhaps, an escape from particular feelings or memories.

Feelings, or memories, we may not want to identify with or re-experience. Depending on what we have found unbearable in the past. Feeling this way again may lead us to dissociate. Then behave in ways that we normally do not want to. Perhaps unconsciously playing out an avoided memory.

'Sex is always about emotions. Good sex is about free emotions; bad sex is about blocked emotions.' - D.Chopra

Reducing the chances of these mistakes involves pausing when we feel detached from our intimate or sexual experiences. Moreover talking about these experiences when they occur. Developing our ability to stay consistently connected to ourselves and our emotional experiences. Another way we can consider other people too little, or sabotage our wider goals, is by separating our intimate attachments from our sexuality.

Separating intimate attachments from sexuality

Separating our intimate attachments from our sexual experiences may be a conscious decision or an unconscious habit. Sometimes, to preserve an intimate attachment we are scared of losing through making it more sexual. Sometimes, to preserve a sexual experience we are scared of losing by making it more intimate.

Separating intimate and sexual experiences prevents their interaction. Eliminating helpful blended intimate/sexual experiences . So, in the context of this separation, neither our intimate attachments nor our experiences of sexuality may feel sufficient. Requiring more attachments and/or sexual experiences, to meet our needs. This may neither consider other people sufficiently nor fit with our wider goals. If this is the case, we might consider connecting our intimate attachments to our sexual experiences.

This reconnecting is a skill. It involves meeting our needs for security and adventure in a limited number of relationships. There are three habits which may help. 1) Having periods of absence from your partner(s). 2) Observing your partner(s) in their element. 3) Surprising, or being surprised, by your partner(s.) In these ways sex, with an intimate partner, may 'stop being a thing we do and instead become a place to go together' (Perel, 2013.) The final experience which leads to mistakes is having an excess of sexual desire.

Excess sexual desire

'We are excessive when something about ourselves needs to be recognised and we need other people to help us work out what it is' (Phillips, 2008.)

For example, excessive violence may be a response to unrecognised injustice. However that may not be immediately obvious to the excessively violent person or the witness of the behaviour. So the same excess behaviour, that indicates that something needs recognition can also blind us to what that something is. Overwhelming our abilities to think by flooding us with emotion. Circumstances which prevent people understanding what we need (Ripley & Ward, 2023.)

When the excess is sexual desire, our resultant behaviour may demand recognition of an unmet need but not actually achieve it. Possibly because excessive desire considers other people too little. Excess sexual desire that feels like an irresistible urge to act. The individual, and people who come in to contact with that desire, may end up feeling 'mad' about sex. As if they had 'lost their minds' or had no choice.

Consider John Malkovich's character in the film 'Dangerous Liaisons;' who asserts (to Michelle Pfeiffer's character) that his aggressive seduction of her is 'beyond my control.' When in reality this is not the case and the character actually needs something else. The excess preventing the discovery, and recognition, of the unmet need. Interestingly Pullman (2015) suggests that 'we only seek what we are denied.' This suggests an excess may be unwittingly reinforced by an environment.

Finally, an individual may also rely on intimacy and sexuality to meet other unidentified needs. So sabotaging their wider goals. Avoiding these mistakes involves increasing our awareness of our sexual desire, talking about it and considering our actions as choices. As well as finding additional ways to identify and get our needs met. In each of the four possibilities, outlined above, an insufficient understanding can lead to mistakes of intimacy and sexuality. Therefore, to conclude, I describe how we could increase our understanding.

Habits that could increase our understanding

'He'd noticed that sex bore some resemblance to cookery: it fascinated people, they sometimes bought books full of complicated recipes and interesting pictures, and sometimes when they were really hungry they created vast banquets in their imagination - but at the end of the day they'd settle quite happily for egg and chips. If it was well done and maybe had a slice of tomato.' - Terry Pratchett

Healthy intimacy and sexuality, can occur through a combination of shared play, talking, stopping/starting, and restraint. Marking safe enough relationships by negotiating boundaries. Being present without overwhelming each other. Acknowledging and apologising for mistakes that occur when our minds are flooded by emotional experience.

So with thought, insight, and practice, we can provide ways for each other to tolerate each other's feelings without violating each other's boundaries. So making intimacy and sexuality, a safer and healthier container for our emotions. Mastering these tasks seems to be made easier by talking about these issues. As individuals, in therapy, as couples and in wider discourse. So we may become, for each other, someone we are not too much for : a partner, in other words.

References

Benjamin, J., (2017). 'Another take on the riddle of sex,' in Beyond the doer and the done too, (chp 4,) Routledge.

Delevingne, C., (2022). Planet sex, BBC series [Video file]. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0df25jx (extracted 12/12/22.)

Pullman, P. (2015). Northern Lights: His Dark Materials 1: now a major BBC TV series. Random House. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000b1v2

Perel, E. (2013). The secret to desire in long-term relationships [Video file]. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sa0RUmGTCYY (extracted 23/10/2022.)

Phillips, A., (2008). 'Sex Mad' BBC Radio 4. [Video file] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hpbu3QmNIdM (extracted 11/10/2022.)

Ripley, B., & Ward, S., (2023) Lust, Seven Deadly Psychologies, (BBC Radio 4.)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001t3dt

n.b. I have also collated a number of other helpful resources on intimacy and sexuality. To access them : CLICK HERE