And yet
techniques
—ways for lovers to have the
“great sex” that we see advertised on the covers of women’s magazines and countless books and videos—
are often disparaged by sexual purists. There are five major lines of attack:
• Sexual techniques can be used to seduce and exploit the innocent.
• Sexual techniques are associated with casual, loveless relationships.
• Sexual techniques make intercourse more complicated than it needs to be.
• Sexual techniques are superficial; sex should express our true inner selves.
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• Sexual techniques are artificial; good sex should come naturally.
These are valid
concerns, especially in
today’s sexually
Mutually satisfying
obsessed world with
lovemaking—where both
so much exploitation
partners have an orgasm—
all around us. So it’s
is learned, not instinctive.
important to explore
each of these concerns
in some depth.
Techniques Are Used for Seduction and Exploitation
The worst fear of those who trash sexual techniques is that they can be used to seduce the innocent in liaisons that are “casual” for the abuser (usually a sexually experienced man) and traumatic for the victim (usually a naive young woman). There is certainly a long history of this dynamic, but if girls and women have their wits about them and know what to look for, they can easily see through an exploitative seduction attempt.
In the diagram on page 134, the upper left-hand quadrant is where seduction might take place—no love but sexual techniques used skillfully and unscrupulously.
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T h e G r e a t S e x S e c r e t
Sophisticated sexual
techniques
No knowledge of
sexual techniques
Not in love
Deeply in love
The good news is that most cads and sexual exploiters tend to stay in character: they don’t give a hoot about their partner’s satisfaction (takes too long; too much trouble) and are unlikely to use techniques that bring their seduction target to orgasm. As young women venture into the world of men, this provides a way of spotting sexual exploitation. A red light should start flashing with any sexual technique that tilts more toward his pleasure than hers. The bottom-line question is this:
Do his actions (not just his words)
show that he cares about my sexual satisfaction at least
as much as he does about his own
? Females who keep this question in mind can immediately tell the difference between an exploitative sexual gambit and the behavior one would look for in a true lover. In addition, girls and women have legal tools that previous generations did not have: our heightened consciousness of sexual harassment, sexual abuse, and rape has
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raised the stakes for men who might be thinking about playing the old seduction game.
Techniques Enable Casual Sex
A second concern about
sexual techniques is that
they will lead young
Do sexual techniques
people into superficial,
interfere with spontaneous
loveless relationships.
lovemaking? Are they
The worry here is that
necessary when people are
lust has a life of its own.
really in love?
It’s always been possible
to enjoy sexual pleasure
and orgasms quite apart
from a loving relationship (masturbation, sex with a prostitute, casual sex, etc.). In her 1973 novel
Fear of
Flying
, Erica Jong coined the term “zipless fuck” to describe a passionate liaison with no emotional strings attached. Recent accounts of contemporary teenagers “hooking up” sexually (this often means the girl performing oral sex on the boy) indicate that this pattern is very much alive today.
Years after writing her novel, Jong penned a provoca-tive follow-up in which she wondered if we are asking too much of our primary relationships and suggested that the best sex may occur outside of marriage.
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T h e G r e a t S e x S e c r e t
The problem with Americans is that unlike the French, we want all our emotional eggs in one basket. We crave passion, sex, friendship, and children all with the same partner. Can such miracles occur? And if they occur, how long can they last…since passion is about fantasy and marriage is about reality, passion and marriage are the oddest of bedfellows. Yes, wild passionate sex exists. It can even exist in marriage. But it is occasional, not daily.
And it is not the only thing that keeps people together.
Talking and laughing keeps people together. Shared goals keep couples together.
Jong goes on to say that passionate sex is too intense for many people, and this is why they shy away from it: The busyness of marriage is real, but we also use it to protect us from raw intimacy, from having to be too open too much of the time. Pleasure is terrifying because it breaks down the boundaries between people.
Embracing passion means living with fear.
If Jong is right, some couples may actually
prefer
“parallel play”—you do me, I do you, and let’s call it a night.
Is the promotion of sexual techniques by sex books and videos adding to the number of superficial, loveless
“hook-ups” in our society? Maybe it’s the other way
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around. It seems more plausible that adults and teenagers who want to avoid true intimacy
choose
sexual techniques that distance them from close emotional contact and
avoid
techniques (such as mutual orgasms) that bring them face to face with a lover, eyes wide open, at the peak of sexual and emotional passion. The avoidance of intimacy among many couples is beyond the scope of this book, but it does suggest that sexual techniques, however widely disseminated, may not be the driving force behind the number of “zipless fucks”
we’re hearing about today.
Techniques Make Sex Too Complicated
Those who disparage sexual techniques say that all this methodology is gimmicky, distracting, and antithetical to the way love should be—and they have a point. With hundreds of variations of foreplay and sexual position, many sex books and videos are not only complicated; they’re intimidating. For a couple earnestly pursuing this kind of advice, sex may seem like an Olympic event—a
project
!
The truth is that most of these techniques, while titillating and intriguing, aren’t essential to mutual satisfaction. Sexual positions (all of which are variations on five basic ones: missionary, woman on top, side-by-side, standing up, and rear entry) can add variety, but they are not at the heart of good lovemaking. Nor are the 1 3 8
T h e G r e a t S e x S e c r e t
toys, gizmos, and other accoutrements of so-called advanced sex. What matters is having a mutually satisfactory way for both partners to have orgasms (not necessarily simultaneous) when they make love. And as we have seen in the two previous chapters, there are few reliable, accessible ways that this can happen—none of them very complicated.
This suggests the need
to distinguish between
Sexual techniques with a
sexual technique with a
small “t”—pointers on
small “t”—foreplay meth-
foreplay, positions, toys, etc.—
ods, positions, toys, and
can enhance lovemaking but
devices—and sexual tech-
don’t address the deeper
nique with a capital
issue of mutual satisfaction.
“T”—finding ways to
reliably bring both part-
ners to orgasm when they
make love. Both kinds are integral to making love, but technique with a capital “T” goes much deeper and is essential to finding mutual satisfaction in a love relationship.
Techniques Don’t Allow the Expression of One’s
True Sexual Self
In their 2001 book,
Sexual Intelligence
, Sheree Conrad and Michael Milburn wrote: “The key to a great sex life is not what we
do
in bed—anyone can learn a new
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technique—but rather what is going on in our minds, often without our clear awareness, while we are engaged in sexual behavior.”
True enough. Struggling to learn and apply a new sexual technique can produce superficial, inauthentic behavior, and there’s a
plausible argument for
allowing our untutored
Techniques with a capital
sexual personality to
“T”—addressing the perennial
express itself in bed.
challenge of both partners
But if we do this,
will
having orgasms—are at the
our partners like what they
heart of a fulfilling sex life.
see?
A lover’s actions during sex usually place him
or her somewhere on each of
the classic “OCEAN” personality dimensions: Open to experience <————————> Incurious Conscientious <——————————> Undirected Extroverted <———————————> Introverted Agreeable <———————————> Antagonistic Neurotic <——————————————> Stable A person who is more toward the neurotic or incurious end of the spectrum, for example, may not be a good lover right off the bat.
The question is whether learning a sexual technique 1 4 0
T h e G r e a t S e x S e c r e t
can mask these personality traits (and others that work against good, mutual lovemaking). Maybe, maybe not.
It depends on whether a person is willing to listen and learn and change what’s not working in bed. But there are limits here. Lovers tend to
choose
sexual techniques (or balk at learning them) based on their personalities and their innate sexual likes and dislikes. This means that if people are being authentic (no play-acting, no techniques), sex is an ideal arena in which to catch a glimpse of a person’s true make-up (and to ask whether he or she is a good match). The difficult part is knowing what’s authentic and what’s not.
To complicate things even more, basic temperament is not the only thing that is revealed during sex.
When two people climb into bed, they both carry a lot of baggage from a lifetime of sexual experiences. Many of us still harbor feelings of shame and inhibition from times when parents scolded us about nudity, touching ourselves “down there,” and using “filthy words.” We also carry our culture’s idealized images of
“perfect” male and female bodies, which can cause intense self-consciousness during sex (even with the lights out). Many of us have a personal template for sexual arousal and pleasure derived from masturbation and sexual fantasy, and it may or may not be a good fit with our partner’s template. Often we carry baggage from previous sexual partners, including emotional bruises,
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embarrassing moments, and wistful memories that can haunt us with a new lover. And all too many of us have deep wounds from sexual abuse or betrayal—feelings of hurt, humiliation, and shame that can greatly complicate the enjoyment of sex
with another person.
Psychologist Donn
“Great sex” is a way of
Byrne believes that based
having mutually satisfying
on previous experiences,
intercourse that is
people tend to fall into
sustainable over time.
two groups: erotophiles
and erotophobes:
• Erotophiles have been shaped by generally positive experiences with sex, while erotophobes have traveled a bumpier road, sometimes involving sexual abuse.
• Erotophiles believe that sex is an important part of life; erotophobes would like to tuck it away in a corner.
• Erotophiles have no problem talking about sex; erotophobes are uncomfortable using sex words.
• Erotophiles tend to be sexually liberated and move easily into physical relationships; erotophobes are more conservative, but are driven by the same biological urges as everyone else and usually end up having sex despite their inhibitions.
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T h e G r e a t S e x S e c r e t
• Erotophiles are comfortable enough to raise concerns about getting pregnant and are likely to use birth control; erotophobes, inhibited about using sex vocabulary, tend to be swept up in the inarticulate passion of the moment and are less likely to use birth control and therefore have a higher rate of unintended pregnancy. (This research was done before HIV/AIDS; if Byrne surveyed people today, he would probably find that erotophobes have a higher rate of sexual infections and HIV/AIDS
than erotophiles.)
Byrne’s theory suggests that the imprint of early life experiences plays a major role in shaping sexual attitudes and behavior. Do our personal histories and basic temperament create a hardwired sexual personality? If so, we are what we are, and learning a new sexual technique isn’t going to have much effect.
So are all those instructional books and videos a waste of time, beyond the titillation? It’s certainly naive to think that learning sexual techniques can overcome deep inhibitions and transform people’s basic temperaments, turning erotophobes into erotophiles and selfish jerks into great lovers. But people aren’t programmed for life. It’s possible to come to terms with past experiences and even neutral-ize the damage done by sexual abuse with skillful counsel-ing and therapy. It’s possible for a person to reflect on how certain patterns of behavior are repeatedly causing
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