Pleasure Mechanics

 
 
Do you ever wish you could read the private diary of your next door neighbor? Or hear about the sex life of that cute server at the local diner? Ever wondered what it is like to be a military wife? 

Our sex lives are private by definition, but there are many benefits to learning about the authentic sex lives of others. Hollywood romance pales in comparison to the passion, complexity and diversity of our everyday private lives. 

That's why we participated in The Sex Diaries Project, a fabulous collection of 7 day sex diaries from men and women all across the United States. Arianne Cohen has been collecting sex diaries for five years, and has read over 1500 diaries, and this book features the most entertaining and inspiring diaries along with Arianne's wise editorial perspectives. 

We are usually pretty private about our personal lives here at The Pleasure Mechanics, choosing to focus instead on creating videos and ebooks that teach the skills of pleasure. The Sex Diaries Project is a rare opportunity to read about our personal lives, as you read through our 7 day diary featured in the book. Arianne named the entry "The Sensual Lesbian Sex Educator" and, accurately enough, the edited diary celebrates the daily touch, erotic playfulness and integrated work-life balance of the Pleasure Mechanics headquarters. 

We highly recommend you check out the book, or log onto Arianne's site where you can keep a diary or read about other people's most intimate diary entries. While you read, pay attention to what turns you on, what scares you, what you have judgement about. Your reactions to these diaries will reveal so much about your desires, goals and boundaries. 

Here is an excerpt from our interview with Arianne about her experience collecting 1500 sex diaries. Click here for the full Sex Diaries Project interview. You can read about Christine's experience as "The Lesbian Sex Educator" here. Our video interview with Arianne can be found below, or on the Pleasure Mechanics YouTube Channel.

Pleasure Mechanics: You say the unhappiest of all your diarists are those who don't know what they want. Can you tell us how you noticed this pattern in the diaries? What does that mean about the importance of desire?

Arianne Cohen: I noticed it because it was a little counterintuitive, and kept popping up: The happiest diarists were not the ones for whom everything was going well. The happiest are the ones who (1) know, generally speaking, what they want, and (2) feel that they're on a path toward getting it. So perhaps it's a single woman who has just moved to a new town, and she's signed herself up for a whole bunch of activities. She's on the right path. Or perhaps it's a person in an unhappy marriage who has committed to 6 months of couples therapy. It's the diarists who aren't sure what they want who tend to be unhappy and generally angsty, and also to blame their partners for their lack of happiness.
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As we read through the newly-released sexual survey by Indiana University's Center for Sexual Health Promotion, we are finding many statistics that make us even more committed to sharing our techniques of sexual pleasure. It is clear from the data that while Americans are enjoying a more varied sex life than we were just 20 years ago, there is a lot of room for improvement when it comes to sexual pleasure and fulfillment.

Here is one data set that we have a lot to say about: "in all age cohorts, the largest proportion of men and women reported having engaged solely in PVI [Penis-Vaginal Intercourse] (32.9% men, 39.0% women). Contrast that with only about 6% of participants reporting that they combined "partnered masturbation" (what we affectionately refer to as Handjobs and Fingering) with intercourse.  To add insult to injury, the study reports that "for women and men, the presence or absence of partnered masturbation was not associated with orgasm."

We are dismayed that nearly 40% of women reported intercourse alone with no warm-up or foreplay activities. Solo masturbation, oral sex or stimulation with fingers is an essential part of lovemaking. Intercourse without warm-up can lead to pain during intercourse, lack of lubrication, lack of arousal and inability for the woman to experience an orgasm during intercourse. Most women want and crave more foreplay - so why are all of these couples having intercourse alone with no other arousing activities?

We know that, with skill and confidence, stimulation with hands is one of the most reliable ways to bring a woman to orgasm. With your hands, you can stimulate every part of a woman's sexual anatomy, fine-tune your stimulation to match her arousal, create a wide range of sensations and bring women to powerful and multiple orgasms. The hands are the most dexterous and sensitive tools we have to stimulate our lover. Skipping ahead to intercourse without warming up with pleasurable touch is a wasted opportunity - women are much more likely to have orgasms during intercourse if they have already climaxed, or brought very close to climax, before being penetrated. Oral sex is great - but it is even better when it is combined with touch and penetration with skilled fingers.

So why does this massive study of 5,865 men and women not reflect the pleasurable potential of the hands? Why are men and women skipping stimulation with their hands all together? How is it that being touched by your lover is not a predictor of orgasm during a sexual encounter? Perhaps it is because our culture has lost the sexual skills of erotic touch. We do not learn how to use our hands to touch our lover, how to bring our lover to multiple orgasms with our hands and fingers. Unless you dedicate thousands of dollars and months of your life to go to massage school, there are few options to learn how to touch with skill. Our video guides are dedicated to sharing what we learned in professional massage training and our somatic sexology certification with men and women all around the world. We believe hands can be powerful tools of pleasure, opening up new realms of arousal and orgasm, if we learn how to use them. We hope that as our erotic techniques spread across the country, more men and women will include erotic touch as part of foreplay and lovemaking - and perhaps the next national survey will have new data to report on the orgasmic potential of Americans.
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After last night's midnight showing of Sex and The City 2, it is clear that you probably won't go see SATC for the sex advice. Go for the reunion with Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte. Go for the fashion and extravagance. Just seeing Liza Minnelli perform "Single Ladies" is well worth the price of a ticket.

But in between the shots of high heels and couture, the Sex and the City ladies offer us an abundance of sex  and relationship advice, targeted squarely at those in long term relationships and struggling to keep the "sparkle" of excitement alive.

As sex educators, here are the top 7 lessons we noticed in the film:

1. Take Time Alone 
How much time do you take to nourish your own needs and desires? Whether you are a busy mom, overworked at your job, or both, taking time to be alone and replenish yourself is essential to a happy relationship and fabulous sex life. No matter how many demands there are on your time, taking a few moments each day to nourish your own needs will go a long way towards giving you more energy to share with your partner, kids and friends. Most of us don't have a second home to escape to like Carrie - we need to create that oasis within our own busy lives. What would you do with ten minutes a day, just focusing on your own needs and desires?

2. Capture the Sparkle
As their relationship matures, Carrie misses the "sparkle" of the romance, excitement and glamour of their early life together. When she sees this sparkle return to her lover while he is talking to another woman, her upset is more than jealousy - it is craving. She wants to be wooed again. The longer a relationship endures, the more effort we need to invest in capturing the sparkle of the initial lust and romance. The best way to do this is returning to the source - remember the first days, weeks and months of your relationship. What did you do to capture one another's attention? How did you seduce one another? It worked the first time, it might work again. Replay some of the moments every now and then - do the activities you did on your first dates, go to your favorite places you've been together, remember what it felt like as you were falling in love. Just like Big pulling up in his limo, ready to whisk Carrie off into the New York night, create the opportunity to remind one another of how you fell in love in the first place.

3. Pay Attention
Carrie Bradshaw unzips her gown to reveal sexy lingerie and lots of bare skin. The movie audience notices - but her lover doesn't pay any attention. He has seen her body before. He is more interested in what is on TV. This is the fatal flaw in many long term relationships: we stop paying attention. We take one another for granted. When your lover undresses, do you notice? When they make an effort to look nice, are you paying attention? What is more worthy of your attention - your lover or your television screen?

4. At Your Service
Arriving for their all expenses paid trip in the (once) glamourous city of Abu Dhabi, each of the ladies is presented with their very own butler. The excitement in their faces is palpable as they respond to the concept of a young, attractive, gracious man who is completely at their service. The film doesn't linger too long on this relationship, but as Carrie's butler warms milk for her on a sleepless night, we have to wonder- who is taking care of us? Service is a luxury, usually thought of as the extravagant indulgence of the very rich. But we can all have the experience of being taken care of, of having someone "at your service" if we bring this into our love relationships. Bring your lover a cup of coffee. Notice if she is getting cold and bring a sweater or blanket. Anticipate their needs. Small acts of service translate to big feelings of love and desire.

5. Jealousy: Use it or Lose It!
Jealousy is a natural response, and is to be expected in any long term relationship. It is one thing to be jealous when there is due cause. If your partner is beginning to stray, jealousy might be the first warning sign that a major intervention is called for. But if you are like Charlotte, getting jealous when she sees Harry noticing another (younger) woman's breasts, you either have to use it or lose it. Lose it - let it go if your jealousy is over something trivial and is not actually a warning sign of your relationship being threatened. Or, better yet - Use it! Notice your lover's desire and respond. Charlotte could have tempted Harry with her own breasts, bringing his gaze back to his own body. Transform your jealousy into desire and seduction - allow that emotion to fuel your passion.

6. Forbidden Pleasures
In the sexually conservative landscape of Abu Dhabi, Samantha discovers a new sexual challenge: sublimating her sexual desire and tendancy to show off her body. As she tries to reign in her sexual displays, she meets a handsome stranger who shares her lusty personality. He describes his added arousal of being in the sexually conservative Middle East - by taming his desires they only grow. No matter where you live, there are places where sexual desire is less welcome than others - and you can use these "forbidden pleasures" to your advantage. If you notice desire in a "forbidden" place, allow the taboo to turn you on.

7. Design Your Own Relationship
The movie opens with a lavish gay wedding, as unlikely lovers Stanford and Anthony tie the knot. As Anthony reveals their "rules for marriage" the ladies talk about what it means to be married. Leave it to the gays to remind us what we knew all along - every marriage is a unique agreement, and every relationship has its own character. Designing your own relationship happens whether or not you do so consciously. So take the time, and together with your lover to create the guidelines that support your relationship. What are your hard and fast boundaries? What do your vows mean to you? If a marriage is a contract, surely it is worthwhile to remind yourself of why you got married, what it means to you, and what kind of marriage you want to have together.
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In yesterday's Savage Love podcast, sex columnist Dan Savage coined a new sex idiom and is encouraging us all to use it as much as possible - "Lifting the luggage."  Dan Savage is a master of coining new sex terminology - and some stick, such as the term "pegging" for a woman anally penetrating a man with a strap-on. Pegging has stuck because it is a useful term for a sex act that is gaining popularity and more men are naming their desire for anal play. But "lifting the luggage?"
 
Earlier this week, the Miami New Times broke the story of anti-gay activist George Rekers coming home from a vacation with a young gay male prostitute. He found the escort on the gay website RentBoy.com and spent a 10 day vacation in Europe with the young man. When asked by the press about their relationship, professional bigot George Rekers said he didn't know about the sexual nature of the escort service and hired the boy to help "lift his luggage." Of course, the photos snapped by the newspaper show the older and self-claimed injured Rekers pushing the luggage cart! Read the Miami New Times article for the savory details.
 
So enters the term "lifting the luggage" as the new euphemism for sexual activity. We don't know what George and his young male escort did or did not do on their European holiday together. But George Rekers certainly had some heavy baggage to deal with: Shame and Guilt.

Shame and Guilt are toxic emotions that get in the way of living an authentic, healthy sex life. We all suffer the effects of shame and guilt to some degree - none of us are immune from living in our shared sexual culture that denigrates sexuality and erotic expression.

But some of us are so weighed down by the baggage (er - luggage) of Shame and Guilt (and their sidekick, Fear) that we self-destruct. Shame can be a completely debilitating force, creating a lifetime of self-denial, self-hatred and dishonesty with ourselves and those we love.

George Rekers has built an entire career on advocating for Shame and Fear. His book "Shaping Your Child's Sexual Identity" and his political platform are part of the "cure the gays" movement that encourages parents to discipline homosexual behavior out of their children. His work at the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality, or NARTH, is part of the troubling and continuing trend to promote the idea that people can pray their gay away.

His escapades with a young male escort indicate that this work stems from shame and guilt about his own desires for men. This is not the first case of the most bigoted homophobic people being exposed in a gay sex scandal.

Clearly, we at the Pleasure Mechanics disagree with Reker's anti-gay platform. We find targeting anxious parents a cowardice act. But we also have sympathy and compassion for George Rekers, and hope that this incident helps him unpack his own baggage of the lifetime of shame and guilt. He did not create sexual shame. He is simply perpetuating it.

We all have baggage when it comes to sex. We all suffer from Shame, Guilt and Fear to some degree. Our work here at the Pleasure Mechanics is dedicated to the vision of a world where all adults are sexually satisfied and fulfilled. To reach this goal, we all need to confront our own Shame, Guilt and Fear and work together to create a culture that celebrates the gifts of human sexuality.

George Rekers, we wish you healing and integration of your desires. We hope you will stop projecting your own shame onto parents and others in the Christian community.

Dan Savage, we salute you for coining yet another term into our shared sexual culture, and for your work in alleviating the Shame and Guilt of millions.

So next time you are "lifting the luggage" - alone or with a lover - notice if your bags are weighed down by shame or guilt. See if you can lighten the load by honoring your sexuality and your desires, and letting go of one little ounce of these toxic emotions.
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