G is for Great Sex
G is for Great Sex
Hi everyone! Welcome to the A to Z of Sex. I’m Dr Lori Beth and I am your host. We are working our way through the erotic alphabet one letter at a time. Just a reminder this podcast deals with adult content, so if you don’t have total privacy, you might want to put on your headphones. Today the letter is G and G is for Great Sex
When I am out and about meeting people I am often asked what makes great sex. Since individual tastes and desires are so unique, it might seem a hard question to answer. But with a bit of research, I found that great sex has a number of things in common.
1 High levels of attraction. Face it, if you don’t fancy the person, the sex won’t be that great. Fancying goes way beyond visual appearance and attraction. All of our senses come into play with attraction as does energy or presence. Did you ever feel drawn to someone? Like you just had to be near them? Standing next to them causes you to feel a burning through your body? That’s the energy of attraction. My sense of smell is super important when it comes to sex. If someone doesn’t smell right, I can’t even consider sex no matter what else is attracting me. Many years ago, I tried to override this because the man was so sexy, so loving and the relationship was excellent. Robert was neat and clean so it wasn’t poor hygiene. But even using a cologne or a parfum that I adore did not change the fact that his own personal scent turned me off. I have a friend for whom voice is the most important sense in her attractions. If someone has an accent she doesn’t like or a high squeaky voice, she’s done.
2 Presence. I know I mentioned presence and energy under attraction. It bears mentioning again. Great sex happens when you and your partner are full present in the moment. What do I mean by this? You are fully present when you are completely focused on what you are doing and experiencing and being in the here and now. This is true mindfulness. When you are able to be fully present during sex and your partner is too, the sex is usually mind blowing. Everything flows. You feel like one being – merging and separating and merging again. Completely connected on all levels. When you aren’t fully present, you know it. You are in your head working through your to do list or thinking about the row you had last night. You may still reach orgasm and have a good time but it won’t be great sex.
3 Plenty of Time. Now there are some exceptions to this rule. I can think of at least two quickies I had that were fantastic – however, when I actually look at those experiences in detail, they really did take plenty of time. Sex starts long before the physical connection between bodies. Arousal beings in the mind so great sex always starts there. There is the anticipation from fantasising about the love making to come. Sometimes foreplay begins with phone calls, emails, letters or texts and anticipation begins there. This can go on for ages. One of the quickies I thought of actually had a 6 week build up until I could finally visit my lover. The actual physical sex didn’t last long but that was just the finale. As a rule, if you take your time with foreplay, build anticipation, come close to orgasm and then back off of it only to build up again, you will have great sex. Many women feel that well planned sexual escapades and experiences are the ones that produce great sex. It is the time involved that take these experiences from good to great.
4 Being an expert on your body and your desires. Great sex happens most often when you really know what trips your trigger. If you are an expert, you can guide your partner during their exploration of all that is you. You don’t have to tell them everything in words (though that can be useful and also really hot). You can leave hints and let them know as they touch you what feels hottest.
5 Being a great student. When you are a great student, you study your subject and take the time to learn in as much detail. If you apply yourself to learning your lover like you would to preparing for a major exam, you have a much better chance that sex between you will be great sex. Listen for the fantasies in their stories. Learn what they loved from past sexual partners. Find out what didn’t work for them. Use all of your senses to learn. Pay attention to the books, music, TV and cinema that they enjoy for clues. Notice what environments they love being in and the ones they shun. If Emily absolutely hates being out in the country, planning a dirty weekend away in a country idyll is not going to produce the best results.
6 Be an expert listener. Everyone loves someone who listens well. It just feels so good to be heard. In fact, it is essential to mental health for us to be heard and seen for who we are. If you are able to listen with no judgement and total acceptance to another person, you will have your choice of partners forever. Part of being an expert listener is learning how to pay attention and be interested in the other person instead of being interesting. Focusing attention on another can be challenging in intimate situations, especially if your experience of emotional intimacy is that it always turns painful. This is a skill that can be learned. I often have people I coach practice focusing attention on another and just staying present. Being interested is easy once you can focus on someone without wavering. You simply encourage the person to talk and respond with acknowledgements and without judgement. If you focus your full attention on something or someone you will always find something interesting. Try this the next time you are stuck waiting in a dentist’s office or a doctor’s office. Instead of heading for the internet, email or social media, pick up one of those out of date magazines in the waiting room. Put your full focus on a couple of the articles. Then notice how you’re feeling about the articles changes. Finally, make sure that you are not judgmental. Expert listening requires you be open to all that a person has to say to you. If you are judging, you are no longer paying attention to the person. It is incredibly sad to me that people rarely experience conversations and interactions where they don’t experience judgement from others. If you grow up with a parent (or parents) judging you, you will internalise this and so even when others don’t judge you, you may be judging yourself. Work on turning off that inner critic and this will benefit you and the person you are listening to.
7 Become an expert communicator. When you are able to talk about your needs, desires, interests, sex is always better. When you are able to talk about your gender and sexual orientation, your sexual identity, sex is always better. The more authentic and congruent you can be with your lovers, the better your relationship and your sexual experiences. To be an expert communicator, you must identify and own your feelings. Expert communicators are able to describe their feelings, thoughts, needs, desires and limits in a variety of ways. Expert communicators are open and willing to answer questions.
8 Be spontaneous. The number one killer of a great sex life is boredom. Recent research highlighted that by introducing regular spontaneous sex, couples relationships improved, overall life satisfaction improved and they gained 1 ½ days per week of happiness over what they had prior to becoming more spontaneous. Spontaneous sex doesn’t mean quickie at the end of the day. It doesn’t necessarily mean no planning. Spontaneous is outside of your normal routine. So, if you take your partner to a romantic hotel on the spur of the moment and ravish her once you get there – the whole experience is spontaneous.
9 Play. Sex isn’t always serious and play isn’t always light hearted. People who are able to relax and explore find it easier to turn sex into adult play time. They explore new roles, using toys, creating role plays, kinks and new sex positions. Sometimes things are funny before they become intensely sexy and some of the best sex can come after the role play goes wrong and you are laughing uncontrollably. Role plays can be deep, sexy and serious. Kink and BDSM sessions are often called ‘play’ yet they are often intense sessions and scenes. Draw on the skills you had as a child to be imaginative. You can be imaginative when creating a role or character, a scene or in finding uses for everyday items. You can use your imagination to change a place into a fantasy location. Be willing to look silly or be silly and know that your lover will enter into the game with you. Experiment.
10 Surrender. Great sex requires you to surrender control at some point during the proceedings. Orgasm demands at least a partial loss of control and the best orgasms are the ones where your walls dissolve away and you lose complete control. If you are able to surrender to your partner, they can take you on an ecstasy filled dance. Letting go is often one of the hardest things for people to do in many areas of life. I never tell a client to just ‘let go’ of something or ‘let it go’ because so often the response is ‘if I knew how to let go, I would do it!’ People usually don’t choose to hold on to their issues and traumas. They just don’t have a method to let them go. A good therapist or a good coach can help you learn to surrender and also help you to transfer this skill into your sexual and intimate life.
11 Follow your intuition or gut instinct. The best sex I have ever had has been the product of following my intuition and surrendering. Your intuition will lead often you towards the best connections and warn you when you are following a path that isn’t healthy.
12 Be comfortable in your own skin. The more comfortable you are in your own skin, the easier it is for you to stay in the here and now, be present with your lover and enjoy the sensations that arise from what they are doing to and with you. When you are uncomfortable in your skin, you tend to focus on the things that worry you about yourself and this takes you away from the sexual experience. When you are comfortable in your own skin, you are free to focus on your lover and not worry about any judgement about your body, yourself, how you look.
That completes my list of the things that make up great sex. If any of these areas cause you difficulty, consider working with a sex therapist and/or sex coach so that you can be on your best form and so you have consistently great sex.
Thanks for joining me for the A to Z of Sex this week.
Write to me with suggestions for the show, questions you want answered at drloribeth@atozofsex.com , follow me on twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
Check out my YouTube channel: Dr Lori Beth Bisbey.
For a free 30-minute strategy session with me, go to https://atozofsex.com/ and click the button that says Schedule Now!
Are you ready to find out what turns you on?
Take the Test . If you enjoy the show please leave me a review on iTunes and Stitcher. Join me next week for the letter H.
