10 Ways to Screw Up Your Sex Life: Lesson 3

Most of us are looking for a quick fix to our sexual dilemmas. We want a pill, a DVD, or a series of complex finger movements that will magically make us less anxious and more confident about exposing our true sexual selves. While no such pill exists, and I don’t believe anyone can guarantee that their way is the best way to have sex, I do think there are a few things many of us do that work against the chances of us getting the sexual pleasure we desire.

Over the next eight days I’m going to be blogging a bad-sex tip a day. If you’ve got bad-tips of your own please consider sharing the wealth.

Today’s Bad Sex Tip: Only Listen to the Experts

If you really want to screw up your sex life, just do every thing sex experts tell you to do.

It’s not clear to me who gets called an expert and why. My main complaint with the term (other than it’s slipperiness) is that it’s meant to say something about a person, rather than a person’s skills or knowledge. If someone is an expert it feels like we’re supposed to listen to what they have to say, period. If someone has expertise in a particular area then I understand that they may know more than me about that one area, but nothing more or less than that.

People with expertise do (I hope) have something to offer. But in sexual practice, I maintain that it’s inappropriate to think of anyone as an all round expert. There are people who know a lot about the science of sex, people who have had a lot of sex, people who have a lot of compassion for the pain that sexuality can cause others. But sexuality is so personal and unique that the final expert must be you and/or the people you’re having sex with. Anything else is an educated guess.

Sexual growth comes from paying attention to your own experience, your own feelings, and your own body first. Many of us don’t feel like we have good instincts when it comes to dealing with sexual problems. This may be true, but it doesn’t mean you can’t develop sexual instincts (or put another way, you can learn to listen more carefully to them). Simply following a sexual path someone has laid out for you, without interrogating your own feelings and others motivations won’t go very far in helping you develop those instincts.

If all you do is what everyone tells you to do, if you only go down those paths that have been well worn and cleared of any risks or dangers, you miss out on the chance to explore the off road terrain. You miss out on the chance of clearing your own path, and maybe meeting other people who are doing the same. Your sexual potential is limitless. Sex experts can be helpful but only as signposts (or maybe rest stops) on a journey that you are in control of. Give control over to them, and your sex life will start looking an awful lot like everyone elses.