She Cums First
And other thoughts on how men should shift their approach to sex.
Series Introduction
I propose manhood isn’t about something defined that we become, but the journey from boyhood (being born male) to a healthy self-determined adulthood. With that comes six critical ideas on what the journey of manhood (as opposed to the journey to manhood) would entail:
growing beyond cultural expectations,
overcoming societal obstacles, and
healing your psyche, to
discover your most authentic self, and
use your gifts to serve the world.
Over several weeks, I will unpack these. This is the fourth post on growing beyond cultural expectations. Here are parts one, two, and three.
A Hard Difficult Post to Write
That header might be the one time I cross out the innuendo in this post because, as the title implies, this post is all about sex, and sex and I have a complicated and unhealthy history.
Why complicated and unhealthy, I mean, beyond the usual weirdness that comes with human sexuality? At one level, complicated is a common consequence of your in-home preschool teacher pulling you aside for private “extra lessons” because you’re academically advanced.
However, what we do with our experiences matters far more than the experiences themselves. Her assault on my four-year-old body was vile and left a lasting mark, but it doesn’t excuse my waiting decades to face that pain and do what was necessary to heal it.
Side note: If you’re holding onto pain, please reach out about the benefits of psychedelic breathwork (no substances required).
What did I do during those years when I heeded her command to not tell anyone? Initially my psyche did its best to suppress both the memory and the emotion, a common move, but one that only allowed what was infectious to turn gangrenous.
The complexity compounded when I spent the remainder of my childhood feeling functionally asexual. At the time I wined like some kind of modern-day incel, but the reality was, I didn’t offer anything a girl would find compelling. Sure I was nice, but as “No More Mr. Nice Guy” (affiliate) points out, nice isn’t good and it certainly isn’t appealing.
Then with the expansion of the internet came easily accessible porn. A few years later I discovered chat rooms. There the chaos I suppressed for all those years finally found an outlet and I created a second life where it could run rampant. Chats turned into sexting. Sexting led to hookups. When hookups weren’t available professionals were. In the summer of 2016, having lost a marriage and a career (as a pastor no less) and at risk of losing a second marriage, a sex addiction therapist bluntly described me as, “a walking dick.” As I said, it’s a history that is complicated and unhealthy.
So for me, writing a post on how men should approach sex, even after the work I’ve done over the past seven years, still feels a bit hypocritical. Some of that is the overall scope of my life, some of it is the lingering of my puritanical upbringing, and some of it is because there are moments where I’m not sold I’m fully taking my advice.
More than anything, it is because I know that there are several women I have hurt because of my behavior and a whole lot more that I have used in an attempt to make me feel okay about myself. In the end, even if they were willing participants who enjoyed the experience, it is never acceptable to use someone (more on that soon). Then of course there is the collateral damage to my now 17-year-old.
All of this leaves me feeling unworthy to say anything on the subject. But I am going to move forward, trusting that a mix of grace for my failings and the importance of the conversation will win out over any unworthiness on my part. And let’s face it, this is a conversation that needs to happen, especially in a society that says things like:
“Boys will be boys.”
“Men want sex more than women do.” and
“Men need to do something to get women to have sex with them.”
So, where do we begin? How about sexual ethics?
Consent, Pleasure, and …
When I sat down in that therapist's office in the summer of 2016, my goal was to fix myself. It wasn’t until late 2018 that I realized what I needed to do was learn to love myself, including those parts of me that were behind the very worst of my behavior (which is different than embracing the behavior).
This marked a significant turning point in my journey of manhood, but for at least one relationship, it was too little too late. In early 2019, the second wife I mentioned above did in fact move out, more because of my ongoing battle with vulnerability than ongoing fuckery.
As she moved out I found myself asking, “So what do I do with sex now?” Not trying to fix myself would mean no longer trying to restrain my impulses. At the same time, most of the sex I’d had since that first hookup was about trying to prove myself desirable which meant I entered the act not loving myself. Was there some kind of middle ground between the two?
In this context, I found myself at a book signing by public theologian and pastor, Nadia Bolz-Weber (she’s also on Substack). She was launching the tour for her fourth release SHAMELESS: A Sexual Reformation (affiliate).
While there’s plenty from the talk I don’t remember, the one thing that stood out was her framework for healthy sex. Two are provided by the World Health Organization, consent and pleasure. The third came from her faith perspective, care.
Two people can have a drunken tryst that is both consensual and pleasurable, but if one of them does the walk of shame the next morning, it is hard to argue that care was part of the equation. The same goes for most of the sex I had over the years, which lacked care for anybody, this includes the woman I was having sex with, my then wife, or myself.
This question of care has stuck with me over the past four and a half years, and I haven’t always done it well. At the same time, I have learned some questions I need to ask myself:
Why do I want sex right now? If there is any desire to soothe some kind of emotional ache, unless we are in an ongoing relationship and the ache is a desire to express our mutual affection, I am not acting from a place of self-care.
Why does the woman want to have sex? If it is to soothe some kind of emotional ache, unless we are in an ongoing relationship and the ache is a desire to express our mutual affection, I’m not acting from a place of care for her.
How will we respond tomorrow? If there is any shame or regret involved, then there is a lack of care.
Do we both agree on the nature of the relationship? If there is any confusion about what is going on or any manipulation in hopes that sex will change the nature of the relationship, then care is missing.
In the end, when you stop to think about it, care really covers all of it. After all, if there isn’t mutual consent or pleasure, then care hasn’t happened.
While you might have additional components to your ethic, I would argue if you are missing any of these, something is in your approach to sex needs work.
Something else that needs work is our cultural stereotypes about the sexuality of men and women.
The Numbers Challenge
We’ve all heard the saying:
A guy who sleeps with 10,000 girls is a hero, a girl who sleeps with 10,000 guys is a zero.
From one side, so much of this stems from the “boys will be boys” mindset that we’ve already debunked. On the other side, it stems from the puritanical and patriarchial idea that a woman’s value lies in her innocence, never mind that many men will happily pay for a woman to be anything but innocent, which literally means they don’t value a woman’s innocence. In other words, it’s universally bullshit, and as Cordelia Fine unpacks in “Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society” (affiliate), evolutionarily unfounded (unless you happen to be Gengas Kahn and have an army of eunichs dedicated to managing your 10,000 woman herem).
The only thing you can say with any certainty is that anyone, male or female, who has had 10,000 partners, is that there has been a lack of care for someone along the way and there’s a good chance there’s some shit that needs to be worked on.
But since the vast majority of men appreciate a challenge, and a challenge often inspires a man to be better, how about we swap out that saying for another one, one I picked up from Dominick Quartuccio:
The real challenge isn’t to have sex with 10,000 different women, it’s to have sex with one woman 10,000 different ways.
Here’s where conventional thought might say, “Men want sex more than women so what woman is going to want to have sex 10,000 times?” And maybe that’s part of the challenge, but I am going to suggest that conventional thought is wrong.
This means the challenge is not one of developing some sort of covert contract where you aim to do some things she likes so she feels obligated to do something you like (have sex) and then do it enough that you’re able to explore 10,000 variations.
Instead, the challenge begins with recognizing that most women want sex just as much as men do, they just don’t necessarily want it the same way men want it. Here’s where the five sex languages and the mantra, “She Cums First.” prove helpful.
What’s Your Sex Language?
Most people have heard of the five love languages, which is a helpful relationship tool. But there are also five sex languages connected to your Erotic Blueprint. They are:
Energetic - You either vibe or you don’t, but when the vibe is right, it’s game on.
Sensual - Light some candles, break out the roses, pour a glass of wine, and light a fire … because that’s how they get the fire going.
Sexual - This describes many men and you’re ready to go because the wind changed.
Kinky - It might be positions, toys, pain, restraint, or something else, but these folks are turned on by some kind of exploration.
Shapeshifter - However you come at these folks, they’re good, because they want it all.
So the question is, what turns you an and and what turns your partner on? It could be any combination of the above. For example, I am predominantly energetic but have both sensual and kinky streaks. I do break from the typical man in that if energetic vibe isn’t right, I have no interest in going there.
That said, by the numbers, I’m unusual. So your typical man might lead with a blend of sexual and kinky while your typical woman would lead with something like energetic or sensual and then, once she feels comfortable, she’s ready to get creative.
But if you come at her with sexual or kinky, and she’s craving energy or sensuality, of course she’s not going to want what you’re offering, but that doesn’t mean she wants sex less than you do, it just means she wants a different kind of sex than you do. So how can you meet her where she’s at?
Rather than trying to figure out what she wants and then getting irritated when she doesn’t respond the way you hope she will, I would say you start with a conversation, one where you recognize how you’ve been approaching her and apologize for not taking the time to get to discover her erotic blueprint.
You can even follow it up saying you really would like to improve that part of your relationship dynamic and, if she’s curious, suggest you both take the Erotic Blueprint quiz and then talk about the results. You might even pitch taking a class together so you can learn more about each other. Then see what happens.
And yes, you can consider that a bit of complementary holistic life coaching (albeit, a bit more directive that I usually go).
She Cums First
Whatever the two of you decide to do, once things get going, it’s always wise to make sure that she cums first. That’s right, make it about her and her delight, after all, her body was made to feel pleasure.
Not quite sure about that? Let me fill you in on a little secret. Do know where to find the highest concentration of nerve endings on a human body? The clitoris, a part of the female anatomy that serves no purpose other than pleasure. For more on the power of this unusual organ, I recommend you check out “Pussy: A Reclamation” (affiliate) by Regena Thomashauer.
While the penis most likely has the same number of total nerve endings (after all, they form from the same embryonic cells), the nerves on the penis are less concentrated because they spread out over more surface area.
And yet, despite this amazing organ that is there for no other reason than her delight, far more women report not orgasming than men, which doesn’t mean that there’s a problem with women, but with the sex they are having. So how do you become the lover she needs? A great opening guide is “She Comes First: The Thinking Man’s Guide to Pleasuring a Woman” (affiliate).
When you move beyond cultural expectations and take the time to prioritize your partner’s pleasure, everything will start to change.
I’d love to hear your thoughts.