Mastering the Mystery of Orgasm Series – Week 3
Voltaire once said, “Pleasure is the object, duty and the goal of all rational creatures.” And truly, regardless of the many painful, frustrating, or embarrassing moments we experience in the seeking of it, we all long to feel the seismic shift and profound emotional and energetic releases associated with orgasm.
The good news is that the more orgasms you have, the more orgasms you’re likely to have in the future. Learning about your own sexual response and developing your orgasmic potential will bring both immediate gratification and long-term satisfaction. All bodies come equipped with the tools for orgasm and can develop the courage to surrender to the wisdom of your body’s capacity for release.
Below is my list of seven surefire steps to orgasmic pleasure. So go ahead – flirt with arousal, don’t judge your experience or compare it to anyone else’s, and enjoy the ride. If there is any journey worth taking over and over again, it is the one to our most innate and miraculous experience of human pleasure.
1. Awaken Arousal with Your Nose
Having an orgasm starts with feeling aroused. No arousal, no orgasm. Arousal begins in the brain, specifically the limbic area of the brain where our sense of smell intersects with our emotional process, our memory store and our sexuality. Vibrations of arousal – and eventually orgasm – live in the body, and are triggered in the brain.
Trust your sense of smell and indulge your olfactory in whatever scent(s) turn you on. Napoleon was well known for requesting his wife to not wash for a week when he was coming home; whereas, for other people Axe body spray is the ultimate in sexy smells.
Whatever it is, know that our olfactory system has always been foundational to the art of mating, so use it to your advantage.
2. Use Your Whole Body
Arousal is a visceral experience and our bodies are built for motion. Nowhere is this more useful than in sexual exploration. Although this may seem like stating the obvious, it is not a small percentage of people who tense up and stop moving around in their sexual activity. There is more than hip thrusting to experiment with. Experiment with moving all of your limbs – rolling your neck and stretching into new positions can trigger arousal points that you didn’t know you had.
If you can think of no other reason than wanting to understand more about your orgasmic potential, try and fit in a little bit of core strengthening exercises into your life. Being able to hold onto someone you love from the inside will make you feel both strong and sexy.
3. Focus on Your Breath
Arousal is expressed through our breathing. Becoming aware of breath in sexuality will bring life and orgasm into focus like nothing else.
Whether you tend towards long and slow breaths, or short, fast inhalations, stop and notice how your breathing affects your connection to your body, your lover, and your orgasmic possibilities.
Try changing your breathing pattern and see how it transforms the experience. Making an agreement with your partner to synchronize your breathing and movement is a remarkably simple step which can have a profound impact on lovemaking. Refocusing your breathing will not only deepen your connection, but may also expand your idea of orgasm.
4. Experiment with Time
Extending the space between arousal and orgasm is the art of lovemaking. Do your own solo experiments so you get to know the sensations that lead you to the point of no return. Once you know where that line is, try retreating and introducing another form of touch or breath and move towards it again. I am a big believer in waiting as long as you can to surrender to your orgasm. The longer you wait, the more power and energy is built up and the sweeter the release.
Some spiritual techniques suggest that the movement up and down this arousal tunnel – coming as close as you can to your orgasmic edge without going over – is a deep spiritual practice. Trusting in waves of ecstasy ebbing and flowing is a worthy form of meditation, and learning to wait has incredibly powerful results.
5. Augment the Moisture
One powerful way that arousal messages come through our body is as genital secretions.
Surprisingly, as many as one-third of all women do not have a strong natural lubricating response, which is oftentimes associated with feelings of low libido and disinterest in sex. For me, after years of birthing and nursing babies, I never regained the natural lubricating response. But, I was heartened to discover that the application of a great, clean lubricant will kickstart the arousal cycle as well as how I remember natural lubrication did.
Not only that, but adding healthy lubricant ingredients ensures painless friction, which in turn provides more time to experiment and is a critical companion to experiencing orgasm. I would be hard pressed to not admit to making the best lubricant on the market, but many people enjoy other types of lubricants, so find what is best for your body.
6. Invite Your Fantasies to Bed
Fantasy recognized can be really helpful to your orgasmic journey. It's like built-in rocket fuel, where our imagination can elicit a powerful sexual response. Keep in mind that this is different from thoughts about other experiences or people that conjure up guilt and take you out of your physical experience and away from your partner. These are not fantasies in the true sense, and they are not going to move you closer to orgasm.
Internally generated fantasies get to the source of what turns you on, whether it is politically correct or not. If this is a new exploration, try reading some erotica anthologies about submission, or strangers – or whatever is intriguing for you. I think reading is more fantasy-producing than watching because when you read erotic stories you create your own images that endure and morph over time. Although I rarely repeat the strange and fantastical thoughts that go through my head during sex, the more that I have been able to invite them in, the more that I have experienced explosive levels in my orgasmic potential.
7. Lastly – Don’t Focus on the Finish Line
The most important revelation about orgasm is that you can’t make yourself or more importantly anyone else have an orgasm. And in fact, it is often our efforts to cajole them into being that makes our orgasmic potential even more inaccessible.
As soon as we set orgasm as the finish line, we unintentionally invite in the performance anxiety about whether we will be able to cross that line. This explains why so many women opt out of expecting their own pleasure, and are willing to substitute the orgasmic pleasure of their partner as enough. It also offers a window into the myopic focus that many men get lost in when it comes to their sexual behavior. They too, struggle with performance anxiety and so focus all their attention on proving that they can climax, rather than experiencing the moment they are sharing.
This same performance anxiety also drives many a sexual rut, as we easily get lost in the same old groove that we remember worked like a charm before and spend all our time trying to recreate the last time, while losing the moment we are in entirely.
