more satisfying sex Archives - Relationship & Sexuality Counselling Specialists

Not Getting What You Want in Sex? Maybe It’s Not in There!

June 20, 2023 By Annette & Graeme 2 Comments

You might be thinking you’re really hot to trot and you can’t wait to have some hot sex!

You might be feeling like sharing some orgasmic pleasure with the one you love.

Or, if you’re of the more enlightened type, you might be thinking you really desire to make love. To surrender into a beautiful place with your lover…

So…

the event happens.

And all the things you wanted to happen, happen.

Yet somehow soon after you have been left feeling unsatisfied, even disgruntled.

You might be left thinking that something was missing.

Or you may even have felt, or thought this, during the event.

You’ve got no idea why, or where to look for an answer.

Well, we’ve got the answer for you here

And it’s not likely because your lover did a bad job.

It happens because at a conscious level, you could see what you wanted and why.

Yet at an unconscious level, you were operating in a whole different way.

Your unconscious mind is very sneaky.

Well, it’s not really sneaky, it’s just that you can’t see it. It’s under the surface of your awareness.

Until it gets revealed by what seems like a lucky accident, which is really no accident at all.

As when you bite into an Anzac biscuit and get flooded with feelings and memories associated with the golden, crispy sweetness of Anzac biscuits in the past. Maybe even right back to childhood. Or, it might be an unlucky accident that takes us back to an unpleasant association, making our unconscious seem like a bad thing.

Your unconscious mind isn’t good or bad, as you’ll see, it’s just efficient

Our unconscious mind is not just this dark cupboard where things get stashed out of sight so we don’t have to deal with them.

Kind of like those now embarrassing fashion, or furniture choices we regret, or things we meant to throw out or repair, but never got around to it.

Our unconscious mind is not even a location. It’s a living, functioning psychological matrix.

Its job is to incorporate our unseen parts into a more integrated whole. So becoming aware of things that lie under your mind’s surface is not a lucky accident. It’s your unconscious mind at work.

How is this relevant to your lack of sexual fulfilment?

Your unconscious, ever the opportunist, can try and sneak your deeply held needs into sex, under the guise of sexual desire, in order to get them met. When the needs might not be about sex at all.

This not only detracts from the free flow of your life force energy and reduces your capacity for pleasure. It also leaves you more open to being hurt or triggered when these unconscious needs are met.

When you identify and acknowledge your unconscious needs they no longer act as blocks

If you’re not fully satisfied by the sex you’re having, ask yourself whether you’re really having sex to:

Be needed
Be validated
Get love
Act out or relieve shame
Express anger covertly
Be physically close but avoid intimacy
Have power over something/someone
Get high to avoid real life/relationship issues.

Do you feel any emotional or body response to any of the suggestions on this list? If so, they will be a good place to start looking.

One of the best ways to help you identify any unconscious needs in sex is through your emotions. As your emotions are messengers of your more primal, unconscious mind. Yet we mostly miss out on these gifts of understanding because we make these feelings wrong.

Making What You Feel Wrong

We all have moments in lovemaking where the pleasure, intensity, excitement or feelings of any kind seem to disappear, or even refuse to show up at all. Instead we can feel an emotion surfacing. We stuff it down, thinking that emotions aren’t cool in sex, missing an opportunity to learn about ourselves.

“Emotion plays an enormously important role in sexual desire, arousal and fulfilment. Feelings make sex matter.”
The Erotic Mind, Jack Morin

The emotion isn’t wrong, it just is. It’s your unconscious speaking.

How to Identify Your Unconscious Need:

Being with the truth of whatever is in the moment is the doorway to greater understanding.

take a moment to connect with the emotion
focus on where the feeling is in your body
take a breath into that part
accept it as a messenger
Stay present with it until you get some insight into what is going on under the surface.

Then come back and start making love again if you want.

Or you can do this after the lovemaking, when the sense of something wrong or lacking about the sex you had arises.

It takes acceptance and acknowledgment

When you discover what the real need is for you under the sex, you can just acknowledge it.

To yourself, and if you wish, to your partner. Sometimes this is all that needs to happen, just acknowledgment.

If the need still feels real, you can go about getting it met in another way.

Leaving your lovemaking a clear space for pleasure, connection and love to flow.

Without it being highjacked by your unconscious.

And with the bonus of you feeling better about getting your needs met in an authentic way.

Wet does not always mean horny and dry does not always show disinterest.

February 7, 2023 By Annette & Graeme 2 Comments

This belief about wetness = horniness has been around sex for decades now.

It’s one that has totally messed with both women’s and men’s heads, by making them think something is wrong if it’s not happening.

It’s just not necessarily true.

The porn fallacy of wetness

This belief has been paraded around in pornography with women showing up wet and horny for sex no matter what the occasion.

Whether it’s for the car salesman who has just offered her a discount on her new Subaru if she’ll put out.

Or for the policeman who has offered to wave her ticket for a blowjob. Or it might be for the cowboy who has just turned up on his horse with a slow, lazy twang in his voice. (Hmm…that could work).

Women in porn are shown as hot and wet even in the hard core versions where there are no corny scenarios, they just get into it. (Which can sometimes be a relief to be honest…)

Romantic books and movies more subtly, yet still undeniably, hint at a woman’s readiness, assuming wetness. With lovers being able to get right into it without having to reach for the lube.

Being wet and hard is taken for the ultimate indicators of sexual readiness.

‘Getting wet’ is seen as important as ‘getting hard’ is, to the idea of sex. (Although less biologically necessary, like male nipples, but still very pleasurable.)

The really important thing to know about a woman’s state of lubrication is that it can be, and often is, separate to her desire for sex.

Just like a man’s erection can be.

Even though a man with an erection is rarely portrayed outside of a sexual context.

An erection can be stirred into being by sexual thoughts, or the proximity of a gorgeous woman.

At other times, especially during the painful teenage years, erections can arise at the most inopportune moments. Like wearing speedos at the school sports. They also happen two or three times a night with no sexual context at all, not even an erotic dream.

Even though this is rarely portrayed outside of a sexual context.

An erection is often stirred into being by sexual thoughts, or the proximity of a gorgeous woman.

At other times, especially during the painful teenage years, erections can arise at the most inopportune moments. Like wearing speedos at the school sports, or two or three times a night with no sexual context at all, not even an erotic dream.

Wetness and hardness are physiological responses.

We learn to relate them to sex.

They’re just not necessarily related to sexual desire, which is more complex.

How can wetness and hardness be a learned response?

For example, the last time you went to this restaurant you and your partner had great sex in the car going home. So, you feel a little aroused, and a little wet just ordering dinner there. Or, if you had been caught masturbating and shamed as a child you might not have a full erection when you feel aroused, in order to avoid the shame. Though in this case, you unlearn having an erection.

Men can be wet too.

It’s interesting to note here too that men also have sexual wetness. This is because both genders start out with exactly the same genitals in the womb. They just get organized differently, according to their biochemistry during conception and foetal growth.

Women have lubricating glands at the mouth of the urethra, called Skene’s glands. These glands swell during sexual arousal making it difficult to pee during sex. They’re also believed to produce the fluid known as female ejaculate. (Now women have fluids that they ‘shouldn’t’ emit, such as urine, and fluids they ‘should’- wetness and ejaculate. What does my body want again?)

Men have corresponding glands found just below their prostate. These are called Cowper’s glands, (it would be great if we name things after their function rather than who discovered them) that emit something known as pre-ejaculate. Which happens very little for some men, just a drop or two sometimes, and quite a lot for others. It’s the way they’re made.

The difference is, there isn’t such a song and dance about it.

So as difficult as it may be, we seriously need to totally unhook this belief that wetness and horninness automatically go together.

Because wetness can be a learned physiological response to a sexual situation that has very little to do with desire. It’s why both men and women can have arousal and even orgasms whilst being raped. It in no way means they wanted it.

It also used to be believed that a woman couldn’t get pregnant without having an orgasm so if she got pregnant during a rape she was believed to have enjoyed it, really.

Listening to what she says is important.

On the other hand, a woman can really desire sex and be totally wanting it without being wet. It’s happening everywhere else in her mind and body except there. It’s just the way she it. It doesn’t mean she is broken, or disconnected from her body or lying.

How does a man know this woman is wanting sex? By understanding this difference and listening to her. If she says she really wants it (excluding any trauma responses she may be overriding) then she likely does.

Just smile and pass the lube…

Undoing our conditioning

We can undo decades of confusion, shame and invalidation for women right here.

And some for men too.

And help women love their bodies exactly as they are.

Which is the number one pathway to expanding a woman’s sexual pleasure.

We’ve heard it works pretty well for other genders too.

The Myth Called Porn Addiction

July 29, 2022 By Annette & Graeme 1 Comment

Porn addiction is a myth.

On numerous occasions, we have come across people in relationships who are struggling with what they believe is an obvious problem. They believe their problem is one partner’s addiction to big bad porn. We commonly find it is not actually the porn addiction that is the the problem. It is a symptom.

In his article “Why we Should Stop Calling Porn Addiction an Addiction”, Sex Psychology 2015, Dr. Justin Lehmiller has measured brain waves of drug addicts and porn users. He found that porn has the opposite effect on brain waves that drug addicts experience This indicated that porn should not be called an addiction, the word addiction should be replaced with something else.

Porn is easy to blame

It is confronting for couples to realise that blaming porn merely shifts the focus away from what is really going on in their relationship. It shifts responsibility to something that is cloaked in shame and conveniently easy to blame.

Anything which is done in secrecy and isolation usually leads to shame. Isolation and shame then make it difficult for those involved to share true intimacy with others. Especially with society turning up the heat by publicly blaming or shaming porn.

Many men are already afflicted by sexual shame, due to unresolved sexual projections from society, religion, the media and even therapists’ unresolved issues about sex. Demonising porn just makes it worse.

We believe that porn itself is not wrong

It’s the behaviours that go on around it that make it so.

Porn targets sexual desire and sexual vulnerability. It’s also reliable, and without fear or rejection, something sex in the real world is definitely not! It gives the watcher a place to indulge their desire for sexual variety without risking going outside their relationship. Porn creates a fantasy of fulfilled sexual desire, enticing with its easy access and its privacy. Particularly when the watcher doesn’t have to deal with any messy emotional crap. It can leave men thinking this is how all sex should be, instant gratification with little effort or emotion.

This pisses most women off, and rightly so.

Many men struggle with the emotional intensity of relationship. Not because they are incapable of feeling. But because they have been shamed about, or indoctrinated not to feel or express their emotions. It is important to understand that, given the opportunity, men are highly capable of emotional work. We see it all the time. Especially with the right motivation – the potential for truly fulfilling sex.

A different perspective

As a woman, you might be feeling the hackles on your neck standing up at this image of a man taking the easy way out. Take a moment to see things from his perspective, through an example a bit closer to home. The romance industry, widely available through movies, books, advertising and chats with your girlfriends is like porn. It exerts an equally manipulative effect on a woman, similar to the impact that porn has on men. Stories of instant attraction to a perfect man offering a woman everything her heart desires with very little real effort on her part is the female flip side of porn. These romantic fantasies have a similar “passive making” impact on women. They create many false expectations for men to live up to, and leave women frustrated when they don’t.

The difference is, romance has general society’s support and its effects slip beneath the radar. While men carry the worlds’ unconscious judgment and shaming of their desires for sex and porn. This adds even more intensity to their feelings of sexual shame and emotional inadequacy. Shaming any man about his porn habit is shaming the man deep into his core. This shame accumulates and can eventually shut him down, both sexually and emotionally. Leaving women frustrated at his increasing lack of availability.

Whether we like it or not, porn is spreading

According to Pornhub, women are the fastest growing demographic of porn consumers, especially younger women. Women are reported to watch porn out of curiosity, to spice up their sex lives and learn new techniques. Some women, like men, watch it to satisfy their lust. Children as well are becoming exposed to porn, and doing so at earlier ages due to its easy availability. This is a concern if they are viewing it without the context of real life sex to balance it with. Yet the vast majority of porn users remain men.

There are some positives with porn, as is it can be way to keep sexuality alive when sex is not available. It can also spice things up in the bedroom for a while… But, by targeting these desires, pornography creates a fantasy experience for the watcher that will still ultimately leave them “high and dry”.

It’s a visual performance, not a reality.

Because that is all porn can ever do is create an illusion of satisfaction.

One that will ultimately end in frustration for the user. This frustration usually results in more porn watching in an unconscious attempt to achieve the fulfilment is truly longed for. This is desensitising, ending in a loss of sexual and emotional feeling. Either numbing it down, making it difficult to get, or maintain an erection, or to ‘come’ without intense stimulation. More and more young men are resorting to use of Viagra to deal with what is essentially, a disconnection from self.

At this point, the issue IS porn

It’s vital to track back to what is behind the need for porn, the need to dissociate from the full spectrum of feelings we are capable of. A something else that makes it so much easier to blame porn and overlook what is really happening.

Each couple are different, unique, so one size does not fit all, but the negative influence of porn can be beaten, all it takes is the right approach and mindset. Each couple must find their own solution. It starts with understanding the solution is ultimately found outside of where they believe the problem lies.

Learning the skills in tantra is a great next step

Porn is something that we watch, it’s focussed on the visual. Where women are effortlessly wet and men are permanently hard. In tantric sex, thrusting doesn’t need to be continually hard for pleasure to be had. In fact, a man does not even need to be hard at all to experience full bodied orgasm.

Tantric sexuality
Truly satisfying sex, as in Tantric sex, comes from how it feels rather than how it looks. In fact, when it’s really good, we don’t give a damn about how it looks! Tantra is actually pretty boring as a visual medium, as the action (and the magic) is more internal…(Tantric sex would never become an Olympic sport..) Tantra teaches us that there is incredible pleasure, and satisfying connection to be found in the slower, deeper moments, as much as the active ones. Especially if you consciously deep breathe, which is not something you’ll see actors doing in mainstream porn…

Men and Women Touch Differently

July 21, 2022 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Have you ever recoiled from your lover’s touch because it was too much, too soon?

Or have you ever got bored waiting to be touched where you really, really want it?

This is not always your lover’s fault.

It’s about understanding each other’s bodies more accurately.

You’ve probably noticed that men’s and women’s bodies are different.

Even though they start life in utero exactly the same in baby girls’ and boys’ bodies.

Then at a few weeks old a nifty little thing called the ‘Y’ chromosome develops, causing the male genitals to shift to the outside (with occasional exceptions). This shift, along with the different hormonal framework in men and women, causes a difference in how they respond to touch.

Understanding this difference makes it much less confusing, and much more rewarding, to touch each other.

A Woman’s Body

In her body, woman’s sexuality works from the outside in, from her extremities to her genital centre, her yoni. She’s capable of a high level of energetic intensity and touching her from the outside in really pays off. It it isn’t her body will not only not awaken fully, it will turn right off.

When you touch a woman, to keep it simple, no matter where you’re touching her start from the outside and work slowly towards the centre. This helps her feel safe enough to relax and open more deeply.

Imagine that she has a bikini on and the parts covered by the bikini are touched last.

– With her body start at the top of her head and the tips of her fingers and toes, and work your way to her centre.

– If you touch her breast, start at the outside and slowly make your way to its apex, the nipple.

– If you touch her sexual centre, her Yoni, start outside with her belly, inner thighs, pubic area and her perineum- these last two are important parts of her arousal system.

– If you move to her Yoni itself, start at the outer lips, then the inner lips (whether the inner lips are smaller or larger than the outer lips), then the clitoris. The clitoris and internal arousal tissues extend underneath these lips, so including them assists in her overall arousal.

– If you touch the inside, begin at the entrance, taking your time, and then move to the GSpot then eventually the cervix area.

– Vary your touch in pressure, speed and between stroking, massaging, tapping, licking and even holding it still.

Given time and proper awakening, a woman is capable of high states of bliss, where relaxation, pleasure and love merge into one in her body, heart, mind and soul. A woman’s sexual energy is magnetic, attracting, and negative in polarity. Lovemaking transforms this negative energy into positive, which is why a woman often has an excess of energy after sex and wants to talk. When her energy is fully transformed, she feels whole in herself, and open to her lover but not needy of him. Her breathing deeply and exhaling through her mouth as she is being touched helps create this energetic shift.

Nb. There may be times when a woman doesn’t want a slow approach, it’s always best to check in with her desires first.

A Man’s Body

His sexuality works from the inside out, from his genitals to the rest of his body. When you touch a man’s body, start at his sexual centre, his Lingam.

A man’s sexuality has traditionally been thought of as straightforward like a microwave: give him two or three minutes and beep, beep, beep, he’s done. His ejaculatory orgasm is generally seen as the apex of his experience, with sex and love being completely separate. This is of course a gross misunderstanding. It’s merely the outcome of his conditioning, rather than his ultimate sexual reality. Given time, a man is capable of matching a woman’s sexual intensity, including her capacity for multiple orgasms (both with and without ejaculation). Given time he can meet her in her multi-dimensional sexuality too, that includes intimacy, emotion and spirituality.

Start at the man’s sex centre, then invite him to spread his sexual pleasure through the rest of his body, rather than remaining and being released from here. Beginning at his centre, he can relax and expand, seeing that he doesn’t need to wait until those few moments right at the end for his pleasure. (The one exception to this is beginning at his PSpot (his prostate gland) – he needs to warmup to this one!)

He can spread his pleasure by breathing deeply and exhaling out through his mouth, imagining as he does so that he is lifting his sexual energy up into his heart as he inhales, and is spreading it through the whole of his body as he exhales. Where the mind goes the energy follows.

Help him by keeping one hand on his Lingam and use the other (and the rest of your body) to stroke his pleasure outwards to his extremities. Do remember that his breasts and nipples are pathways to pleasure and heart opening just like a woman’s so don’t be afraid to give these some attention along the way.

Man’s sexual energy is electrical, positive and discharging in polarity. Lovemaking transforms his positive energy into negative, which is why it can be draining for him to discharge his energy and send him to sleep This is where Tantric-style lovemaking, where he moves his energy up and through his body first, is a more restorative pathway. It allows him to charge his body with positive energy and retain more of it when he ejaculates.

Connecting together

Though you might start in different places one way to connect both of you to your bodies at the same time is that while the man is pleasuring the woman, she can hold his Lingam, either in stillness or lightly stroking it. Using lubrication will help him to relax into her touch. Because this connects him with, and validates his sexual centre, he’ll be happy to touch and stroke her, taking all the time she desires. It’s also a great motivation for him to practise his energy spreading practices so he can enjoy for a long time.

She can just hold him, or occasionally lightly stroke him, without distracting her from her own experience. She can also benefit from feeling the rise of his sexual energy in his lingam and feel it echo in her own body’s response.

It’s a win win.

If you would like more details on how to touch each other contact Annette or Graeme here.

Active Receiving…it’s so much more than just lying there!

June 7, 2018 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

It’s obvious when we’re actively giving in lovemaking, those moments when we completely lose ourselves in service of our partner, totally there for them and loving every moment of it.

And there are those delicious moments when it seems like you’re just flowing together, not knowing where one person ends and the other begins, and nobody appears to be giving, it’s just happening (called entrainment by the way).

It’s less obvious when we’re actively receiving, for men or women. It’s less talked about and a skill not often understood.

The experience of it can transform our lovemaking experience from ordinary to magnificent!

It’s a mindset firstly, an opening of your mind, a letting go of control and allowing whatever is happening to be utterly as it is.

Yet it’s not just passively laying there.

It’s having your mind fully engaged in the moment, actively breathing and feeling your sensations fully.

Letting go of any inner fear or resistance you might have.

Totally surrendering to yourself through your lovers touch.

Rising to meet your lover’s touch, with your lips, hands, breasts, legs or hips.

That’s the thing about surrender here- it’s surrender to yourself, not to your partner.

Although you automatically feel more connected to your lover as a result, and they to you.

Surrender to yourself can look like surrender to your lover but the internal reality is very different, for you remain connected to and safely in charge of yourself, trusting yourself that you will be ok in whatever happens.

It does not mean tolerating something that feels uncomfortable, but asking yourself the question of are you letting it in?

Can you move your body in a way that opens it further?

Can you breathe in the sensations you’re feeling, transforming them?

Can you open your eyes and let your lover see you?

Is there any resistance you can drop? Emotion you can acknowledge?

This can help us go underneath yourself into something unforeseen yet wonderful.

Expressing gratitude to your lover for the gift you’re receiving builds the connection and trust between you.

Sometimes surrendering invites activity, a rock of the hips, a surge of energy, heat, movement, coming from deep within.

At others it invites even deeper stillness, a sigh that opens into freedom, melts like wax in fire or expands into bliss with intuitive imagery of waterfalls, stars, mountains, earthly or spiritual beings. The potential is unlimited.

If what your lover is doing still doesn’t feel good, then ask for it to be changed.

Active receiving is one of the most precious gift you can give to both yourself and your lover as it opens not only the heart through the gratitude it brings, and the spirit through the acceptance it takes, but also the doorway to greater pleasure through the expansion it offers.

Give it a try sometime soon!

Lingam Massage

February 8, 2018 By Annette & Graeme 2 Comments

Lingam Massage.

It’s The Hottest Thing You Can Do For Your Man In Bed Tonight (and one that is good for you too!)

And all you need to grab for it, is a handful of oil or lubricant and your man…

“I didn’t know how to feel, so I learned to touch” sings Leonard Cohen

This is true for so many men. Young boys feel just as much as girls, until they grow up conditioned by society to toughen up, “not be a pussy” or worst of all to “man up!”

In our work, we see that men DO feel, deeply and powerfully, in a way that is more of an internal experience rather than an external expression (anger and sex are the two exceptions here).

We see it in our work because the place where men are most motivated to risk feeling fully is in sex. The bonuses of him doing so pay off in many more ways than just the few seconds of his orgasm.

From not having permission to feel, and with his way of feeling made wrong, many men learn to perform and touch in sex, rather feel, connect and open.

Rock His World

The simple but profound practice we’re offering today will give him the chance to do just that. In fact, it can help break his heart wide open! For the woman who loves him, if she’s looking for more ‘connection’ in their lovemaking this is a great place to find it. And as we said, it impacts on more than just the bedroom.

This practice can leave him happier and more connected to himself in the rest of his world too. The practice we’re referring to is Tantric Practice called a Lingam Massage (Lingam is the Tantric name for his penis or cock, but use whatever works for you. Many men enjoy knowing they have a light sabre between their legs, one that emits love and light, not just semen).

In preparation for writing this article we asked some men who’ve experienced it for their own words on the subject.

If there’s anything that will render a man poetic, it’s this place

One man described a Lingam massage as “joining all the dots of sex, intimacy and connection. It validated a very deep part of me and made me feel comfortable with myself in a whole new way. It may sound over the top, but for me it was life changing!”

Another mentioned finding “a place of spaciousness, a timeless experience of my authentic power that lies beyond the mind.”

Still another said “I found I was not only able to feel more but was able to open my heart to my partner and really receive her love.”

One said “I now see how much more I can be. I’m now able to fully love my beautiful wife as she deserves to be loved, and I feel deserving of hers.”

And last but not least this: “I found it powerful yet subtle. It was very pleasurable and enjoyable without the need to perform in any way. I could just open and experience what was happening in my body. It helped me remove shame and guilt around my sexuality and sexual desire. It also connected me to a deep, yet quiet, sense of myself and my own power.”

Letting Go of the Need to Perform

Lingam massage gives a man the chance to feel without having to perform, or give, in any way other than by being himself. It’s a rare and precious opportunity for him. One that will change his lovemaking forever as he relaxes into himself. He’ll learn what it is like to feel full bodied, heart connected pleasure. It’s likely that he’s never experienced himself in this way before.

The bonus for the woman who shares this practice with him can be life changing too. As helping him to feel himself this way ensures he will feel her more easily too…yummy for both the giver and receiver!

As this is not about performing, he doesn’t even need to get an erection. He may have the best erection of his life. If he doesn’t nothing is wrong, his body may just be profoundly relaxing. There is still much pleasure he can experience, as surprisingly he doesn’t require an erection to feel it! You both just need to let go of attachment to the idea that an erection is the only measure of his pleasure. Instead notice what else is going on and enjoy that.

Lingam Massage

Setting the Scene

Invite your man into the bedroom by letting him know you have a special treat for him, and that all he has to do is just relax!
Have him lie on his back with you sitting on a cushion facing him, with his butt in your lap and his throttle in your hot little hands. (You can rest your legs along either side of his chest). This is actually quite a vulnerable position for him to be in so be gentle and loving in how you approach him.
Invite him to rest his hands on your knees so he can feel connected to you but make sure he doesn’t caress you as this is about him receiving and feeling himself. If he’s doing he’s more likely to be outside of himself rather than connecting within.
Rest both hands over his genitals for a few moments and look him in the eyes whilst reassuring him all he has to do is breathe, relax and receive.
Move one had up to his heart and ask him to take a few deep breaths, exhaling out through his mouth.

Moving Into the Massage

Using a natural oil such as coconut or a long-lasting lubricant massage his genitals. Include the whole area- his lingam, inner thighs, pubic area, balls, ball sack, and his perineum (the area between his balls and his anus). Don’t be afraid to explore. Keep one hand stroking his lingam (or keep coming back to it) to keep his attention focussed.
If he’s particularly sensitive stroke gently, if he likes it more firmly then use more pressure, keep checking in with him how he likes it in each area.
Keep encouraging him to breathe deeply, exhaling at the back of his throat.
If his arousal starts to peak, pause your movements (but keep your hands on him) ask him to inhale and imagine he’s breathing his pleasure up to his heart. As he exhales he relaxes his pelvic floor muscles (the ones between his legs) and imagines his pleasure spreading through his body. This is called surfing the edge and will bring his arousal down enough for you to keep playing. It might take 3 or 4 breaths for his arousal to shift, you’ll know it’s working when his lingam softens slightly.
To help take his pleasure up to his heart, run your hand from his lingam up his belly to his heart. This gives his mind a concrete sensation to focus on. He may feel an ‘energetic block’ between his lingam and his heart, if he does trust this is real, invite him to keep relaxing, breathing his energy up and see what happens. With practice this block will dissolve or shift.

You Have his Heart in Your Hands

You might just be massaging his genitals yet in reality you’ve got his heart in your hands as well. Be fully present with him, allowing his heart to gently crack open a little each time. You keep him safe by being present, loving and connected.

Spend about an 30 mins to an hour here. Take your time, relax into the moment rather than seek any particular outcome.

You don’t need any specific techniques (if you know 2, you’ll know one more than him). Vary your speed, pressure, location (base, middle, tip) and make sure you keep lots of oil or lube up. If you don’t he’ll get sore, and this is not what you want!

Mostly just put your love into your hands and eyes and invite him to drink it in. This is better than any fancy technique. And the more you’re in your own heart, the more you’ll give him permission to feel his…

Keep His Attention on Himself

Keep his attention on what he’s feeling inside himself, whatever it is. Ask him about what he is feeling occasionally. He may not even have any words for it as yet (he’s probably never been asked to explain it before!). He may be feeling heat, tingling, desire, pleasure, pressure, softening, connection, opening, expansion.

As you massage remember to breathe yourself, as this keeps your energy flowing and you relaxed too. Enjoy the feeling of having your man allowing you into his most vulnerable of places. Validate him for going there and keep your words to those of love and encouragement. As you imagine you would most like to receive if you were in his position.

Pleasure Can be Separate to an Erection

If your man happens to not get an erection there is nothing wrong. It just means he has some shame, fear or anger being activated for healing. Keep stroking with love and invite your man to stay present in his body and to keep breathing. He might like to rock his hips backwards and forwards as you stroke, this can help shift the emotion.

Be open to whatever happens.

As we said, you might just be massaging his genitals but it is so much more. Such is the power of this practice it can open up all sorts of previously undiscovered places and feelings in a man. One of which will definitely be enormous gratitude!

Getting him used to feeling, and being safe in it, will increase your man’s desire to take his time in lovemaking. To trust opening his heart and to trust you in the process- serious gifts for any relationship!

This practice is the beginning of a man experiencing full bodied pleasure and lasting longer. It is also the path to non ejaculatory orgasms and multiple orgasms. So it’s worth doing regularly and his experience will be different each time. As his lovemaking will become.

If you like this practice and would like to explore further consider bringing in some sexual healing as outlined here on our Sexual Healing page

Despite his conditioning, a man hugely benefits from the chance to explore his ability to feel. Especially when it comes to the bedroom and it in no way makes him less manly. Rather, it makes him just the opposite!

We respectfully teach Lingam Massage in our Couples Retreats and, where helpful in our Couples Sessions!

If you have any questions about this practice please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Layers of Lovemaking

December 4, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

What comes to mind when you think of making love?

Is it connection, sensuality, pleasure, excitement, orgasm, release or something else?

Is it one or two of these things, or all of them?

Do you even call it making love? Or for you is it having sex, getting laid, rolling in the hay, even hiding the banana in the fruit salad? Apparently there are over 400 different words we have for this one act and what you like to call it can give you some clues as to the layers in it for you.

Think about it, no matter what you call it or do with it, making love is a multilayered ritual going on all around the world, in each country, city and town in each moment and has been since the beginning of time, no other human ritual is as primal as this one.

Here we identify the many layers that make up making love so you can see what is in it for you right now and what else you might like to explore:

The 9 layers of Lovemaking:

Arousal is the awakening of your physical sexual response- that hot, tingling, aliveness in your body, commonly accompanied by body tension.
Desire- the strong feeling of wanting to make love that can come from a thousand different places, often varying each time ie. the desire to feel pleasure, connection, wanted, ravished, to take or be taken, nurtured, loved, released etc.
Eroticism: the actions intending to arouse sexual desire.
Sensuality is gratification of the five senses- sight, sound, smell, taste and touch, which can involve sexual pleasure but is not limited to it.
High states of arousal can equally be found in high levels of relaxation when activated by the breath.
Emotional connection though the sharing of intimacy and love within sex.
Polarity play between masculine and feminine energies of action/dominance/penetration and beingness/surrender/receptivity.
Orgasm is where sexual pleasure rises to a peak, explodes and then subsides, with or without pelvic floor muscle contrations. During the explosive peak there is an experience of “little death’ or loss of the Ego rational mind, a moment of freedom from the idea of Self.
Transcendence where we go beyond the conditioned mind into a spiritual like state of freedom, being or bliss.

How would you choose to bring in new layers to what you’re currently experiencing?

If you would like some support in doing so contact us here and begin the conversation about what might be possible!

Have You Ever Said No To Sex?

October 10, 2017 By Annette & Graeme Leave a Comment

Saying NO To Sex…

Saying Yes to sex, especially a hell Yes! is an affirmation of yourself, of sex and even of life- it is after all an expression of your life force energy, and the more the you say Yes to it the more it will say yes to you!

And the opposite is also true, a no dampens your response. We can all say no to sex now and again… after a hard day at work, when we’re feeling low in energy or frustrated in our relationship, even men can turn their back at times. It’s important to honour our No’s and not make them wrong. (Nb. If you have a regular no you need to look at that).

But what about a time when you’ve said no without even realising it? If you find you’re just going through the motions in bed, struggling to find pleasure, connection or meaning in your lovemaking ask yourself the question: Have you made a decision to shut your sexuality down?

Our minds have a powerful influence on how we experience ourselves, including our love lives. If you’ve ever not been able to turn your mind off in sex, or daydreamed in an all too real fantasy you’ll know what we mean!

As funny as it might sound, it’s common for people to make the decision to say no to sex (or even pleasure) somewhere inside themselves even if they’ve long forgotten it since. Human beings are very logical creatures and our decision no doubt made good sense to us at the time. Now your internal decision maybe still lurking beneath the surface denying you the pleasure you’re capable of, even making it difficult for you to be fully present in your body. If this is the case, perhaps it’s time to explore your decision and let it go.

There are many and varied reasons you might have chosen, consciously or unconsciously, to shut down sexually, here are just a few. Perhaps you have:

Been continually rejected.
Negative judgements about yourself that make it difficult to feel good.
Been having a really stressful time in your life and just gave up on sex.
Been physically unwell.
Been unhappy in your relationship.
Fears about the emotional vulnerability in good sex.
Become older and believe your lack of desire is hormonal or natural.
Wanted to punish your partner in some way and so shut down and withheld.
Had someone cross your sexual boundary and you shut down to protect yourself.
Had a sexual experience that scared you in its pain or intensity.
Been conditioned by your family, society or religion that sex is wrong.
Had a traumatic time giving birth.
Made such a connection with your newborn child you have no room for your partner.
Been caught masturbating as a child and shamed about it.
Been sexually assaulted.

It’s important to realize that though you might not be able to change the external circumstances in which you said no to your sexual self you can change your belief about it and so change the way you experience your sexuality from here on.

How do you find what your own reason might have been?

Take out a pen and piece of paper, centre into your body (close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and let your attention settle inside yourself) and give yourself permission to write unfiltered. Begin each line with ‘I shut my sexuality down because…’ and write as fast as you can, almost without thinking or stopping to judge your answers. Just let them flow out of you, even if they might not be totally true when you look back at them later, just get them on paper for now.

When you have an answer that has a lot of energy or feels right in your gut take a few minutes to pause, reflect on the thought you’ve stopped at, breathe deep into the feeling(s) that comes with it. Let this feeling(s) flow through and out of you. Notice any details that fill themselves out in your mind as you do so.

When you’re ready, forgive yourself or anyone else involved in the situation that needs forgiving (if you you’re not ready to do this just focus on yourself for now. You might have some further feelings that need to be felt before you find your heart opening again).

Now feel into your body, breathe into your genitals and see what they’re feeling – perhaps more awake, energized, lighter or more ready to open and explore. If so, go to it! You may need to let go of your decision a few times, even during lovemaking, if it’s an old one but with practice it will happen.