With one salacious headline after another, everyone seems to be talking about sex and, for better or worse, we know a lot about exactly what certain well-known people like to do with their partners… and others. But, says life coach and Daily Health Newscontributor Lauren Zander, while we may be getting way too much information about famous folks’ sex lives, many of us are not sharing enough about our own.
Lauren believes this reticence is because our culture has built a strong taboo around the specifics of sex, muting our ability to talk about this very natural act… and she wonders why people are willing to accept such a great gap between the physical intimacy involved in making love and the emotional distance we create when we won’t discuss how it makes us feel or, frankly, the physical preferences we find most pleasurable. “It’s okay to ask for a back rub or a fun movie — both of which are pleasurable — but we have difficulty asking to be held in a certain way,” she points out. “Sex is riddled with all sorts of unresolved fears, and people don’t know how to tell the truth about these feelings.” If you can resolve those fears and learn to speak up, it can lead to a far closer relationship with your partner, Lauren explains. This is the potential benefit we can draw from all the chatter about celebrities and their sex lives — perhaps it opens us up so we can speak more honestly about our own.
In principle, there’s no reason to fear talking about sex, says Lauren. It is so totally natural and so much a part of our lives. None of us would be here without it, right? And yet the issues people typically have about sex, including a lack of confidence and concern about their own desirability, run very deep. Memories of a past rejection or an embarrassing moment with a partner can fester and grow over time. As with the principles of talk therapy, opening up and talking about those fears and feelings is a step toward granting yourself the freedom to fully become and accept yourself.
There’s a practical side of this as well — you’ll vastly increase your likelihood of getting and giving real pleasure and satisfaction sexually if you and your mate can discuss what you like. Lauren told me that she’s astonished at how many people are willing to give up getting what would really please them sexually just so they don’t have to talk about it. “I ask people if they’ve told their partner what they would like and they say ‘oh no, I can’t!’ What does that mean? Some have been married to the same person for decades, had children together, built their lives… and they can’t talk about sex?” It isodd, if you think about it. People have no problem asking for their deli sandwich just the way they like it, or giving instructions to a hairdresser, but they just can’t ask their life partner to touch them in a certain way. Getting past your fears about speaking up will dramatically improve the odds that you will be happy in bed — and brings another major bonus, says Lauren. These conversations will deepen your relationship because they’ll help the two of you to know each other so much better.
Still, while you may decide that openness is a worthwhile pursuit, there is that awkward problem of how to introduce what people refer to as a “delicate” subject into conversation. But, says Lauren, once you get up the courage, the conversation comes surprisingly easily and naturally. She says one good way to start is by asking your partner some intriguing questions. Here are some of Lauren’s suggestions…
“Why do you think it is we don’t talk about sex?”
“Would you like to talk about it?”
“What would you like to be different from what we do now?”
“What do you like in sex that you are embarrassed to talk about?”
If you really don’t feel ready to have such a conversation with your partner — or if you don’t have a partner at the moment — you can still start to get comfortable discussing sex by exploring the topic with a close friend or sibling. Lauren made some suggestions on how to get these conversations going, too…
“Do you wish you had done something different about sex throughout your life?”
“Do you have funny stories to tell about your sexual history?”
“If you liberated yourself to be as sexual as you might like, what would you do?”
You may find that there is much to be learned when you share experiences with people you trust, and great comfort to be gained from knowing that you are not alone in your insecurities or embarrassing moments. With sex and its related emotions being a core human experience, what could be more intimate than sharing those thoughts with people you care about? And… most especially… your partner.
