That was nice...but.
You lay there, swaddled by the darkness of night. Eyes search through the stalactites of a popcorn ceiling you’ve always hated. Through the apartment above. Up into the universe, you search. Search for more.
A sigh from your bedroom partner pulls you back down to earth. They roll to their other side, rocking the mattress like a ship at sea. You wait. Wait for them to say something. To reach out and touch you. Hold you. Kiss you. Instead, you feel the covers slip from your chest as they tug the comforter, hoarding it for themselves.
It’s your turn to sigh. Your eyes return to the ceiling.
“Isn’t there more to sex than this?”
The Early Years
In the first grade, I wrote “SEX” on a piece of paper. I felt like a rebel. The word was taboo and it sounded the part. The teacher cut the word off my piece of paper, stuck it in an envelope, and gave it to my parents.
I didn’t even know what the word meant.
Maybe everyone feared that I did?
Perhaps that’s the problem. The more teachers and parents hid the word away, the more forbidden it becomes. The more desire grows. The one word I could not say in the elementary Garden of Eden. Yet the more it’s shunned, the more it’s wanted.
The word does eventually take on more meaning, spilling over the brains of adolescents everywhere like ink poured over a ball.
All-consuming, the relentless drive to experience what once had seemed so forbidding often leads to fractured results. Amazing but short. Exciting but painful. Blissful but confusing.
Confusing.
Many of the results transform with subsequent experiences. The activity is (hopefully) refined, improved upon, extended. And yet, all too often, confusion remains.
Confused feelings. Confused desires. Confused conversations.
Confusion often comes when evolution does not.
Some Things Change. But Not Everything
For some, the adolescent drive for pure sexual relief evolves over the years. It becomes more about developing a personal connection and less about mutual masturbation. But for others, it remains the only motivating factor.
And yet this is where the need to evolve your sex life becomes necessary. At least in the quest for something more. Only so much can be extracted from continually seeking out partners just for a personal, physical release.
This isn’t to say the occasional one-off should be shunned. It’s when the one-offs are exclusively sought out. Remaining in the adolescent phase of one’s sex life stunts its development. While it might seem like the quick sexual turnaround offers faster rewards, the rewards are short-lived. The same chemicals within the brain are released. And, similar to the release of chemicals and hormones brought on by drug use, the brain grows reliant on its presence. Every subsequent hit becomes less impactful.
And yet you need more. Another taste. Another one-offer.
You know how the more you have sex the more you want it? It’s because your brain begins to crave it like a kid knowing there’s a box of cookies in the cupboard.
And yet it’s not that the sex is necessarily all that good. It’s just there. And the search for one-nighters or friends with benefits continues to feed the chemical craving. To go without leads to withdrawals.
Withdrawals are not evolved.
But outside of a chemical satisfaction, you’re left wanting more. Bad sex or great sex, you want more than a mental chemical bath.
The only way to come by that is to evolve.
Sex Into a Relationship Works. In a Way.
It’s happened to most of us. You meet someone, maybe out with friends, perhaps at a business convention. However it happens, the two of you wake up next to each other. Obligatory words are shared and you go your separate way the next morning.
And yet something connected. It might be as simple as not wanting to quantify it as a one-night stand, so you give them a call. Can’t be a one-nighter if there’s a follow-up phone call, right?
There might even be some attachment crafted. However, this is where it becomes challenging to decipher. Are the feelings accurate, or is it a mirage? Do they stem from true attachment, or simply from the chemical release they helped you experience the night before.
It can take some time to determine this. The flooding of hormones into the brain during sex casts a curtain over everything. Even if you try, it’s difficult to see through, because, at the time, the chemical release is what you focus on. On the other side of the curtain, is intrigue and friendship and love sitting in the crowd?
With the curtain closed, you never had a chance to see. And now, are you continuing because of what might be behind the curtain, sitting in the audience of your relationship, or do you continue, again, because of the adolescent connection to the basic fundamentals of sex and orgasms?
Do you even know if you’re doing one or the other?
It can work, but it’s tricky. Like building a house before setting the foundation. It might be possible to build a solid footing after the fact, but it’s challenging, and often there’s no way to do it without ripping everything down and starting over.
When I go on a date, two different sides of me want two different outcomes. The sex-centric side of my brain, which remains fully embedded in the same carnal attractions and desires as my teenage self, hopes it ends with someone making the walk of shame. The other side. The side craves more from a partner. More from what I can receive from someone because I know I can give back so much more, hope for a fun-filled date, and return to our respective beds. Because that side of me knows if I want something to last into the future, sex should come eventually.
The other side, the side not concerned with anything but the present, wants sex immediately. My own sexual scale of justice is hard at work throughout a date.
Return on the Sexual Investment
This isn’t an abstinence commercial put on by the Ad Council.
It’s anything but.
Instead, it’s a way to further your sex life. To get more out of it. And to get more out of it you need to avoid seeking it out immediately.
Immediate gratification is short-lived and leaves you unfulfilled. You might find yourself with an experienced sexual partner who dazzles and dazzles, which at first might seem like a blast the first time through, but it’s all for show. It’s not for you.
There’s a truly different experience when you’re mentally connected with your partner. When you can fully give yourself up to someone because you know them intimately inside and out. When you know what makes them smile and what secret spot on their body makes them tickle. When you know their favorite food and their childhood home. When they tell you anything and you tell them everything. When you begin feeling one with them, so too will your sexual experience.
The two of you will truly become one. And no amount of one-night stands or short-lived relationships can match the experience you have with someone you love so deeply, you don’t care about their little quirks or that they write their initials in their underwear or that their hand falls asleep after sex. In fact, you find whatever it might be endearing. It’s the same kind of thing that, if you had sex with them on the first date, the quirt might turn you off forevermore.
It’s not to say there isn’t a time or a place for the one-offs or other adventures in adulthood. But if you’re tired of looking up at the ceiling, satisfied yet not fulfilled, wondering if there’s anything more out there. Know that there is.
You just have to let your sex life evolve to discover it.