Mastering Multiple Position Sex (4 page)

Masturbation as Sexual Rehearsal

In the coal-mining village of Midlothian, Virginia, our marching band director taught us this axiom: “Practice doesn’t make perfect.
Perfect
practice makes perfect.” That axiom defines a crucial portion of this chapter and a substantial portion of this book, because masturbation could bring good or bad news to a relationship. Unless the goal is a quickie, haste makes waste. So take your time, change up your positions, and enjoy it. Give yourself permission to become a better lover through self-love.

Masturbation as Self-Discovery

Just as there are shortcuts and scenic routes to your favorite destinations, there are neural (nerve) paths to get you to an orgasm with speed and precision, or at a snail’s pace, through discovery. Discovering yourself through self-exploration makes you the expert on your body, your erogenous zones (your sexual trigger points), and the things that make you hear the
Hallelujah
chorus, that moment when everything lines up and comes together in sexual syzygy.

Our bodies are brimming with erogenous zones—areas that bring us sexual pleasure—and marking them with ink might conceal one person’s entire body while appearing as a single freckle on another. Your goal, before you read the chapters that follow, is to discover where those points are for you and what stimuli make them respond. One of the joys of discovering your own anatomy is learning what works for you—not what works for your friends, the people in the porn movie, or even your identical twin sibling.

Explore yourself, have fun doing it, and then explore some more. I am not a sexual cartographer who instructs every woman to go to this spot or that one, because you might have different places on your body that arouse or annoy you. Find them and make your own mental map to return yourself—and your lover—to them. You might find that the combination of caressing the back of your left knee and tickling your right ear makes you scream with orgasms. And don’t just memorize your erogenous zones or be like Hansel and Gretel and leave a trail of bread crumbs that vanish before you can discover your way back again. Instead, take yourself lovingly and slowly back to those zones and learn to describe them and to lead others to them as well. Here’s how to begin. (Unlike the rest of the chapters in this book, this section will have the same directions for both sexes.)

A Laying of Hands

Set aside several hours a week for self–exploration. It doesn’t matter whether you are a twenty-something or a centenarian, you need time and solitude to compose a sexual symphony. Don’t laugh (well, laugh a little), but when I am asked to speak on time management to college students, I ask women to block off time for vulvular sexploration executed with such attention to detail that it would be worthy of its own Discovery Channel series or a light game of penile tug-of-war.

You want your exploration space to be well-lit, warm, safe, and inviting. Ask yourself, “Would I want my dream lover to have me right now, right here, in this space?” Because you are your dream lover for self-pleasuring, take the time to ensure that the answer is an unqualified “Yes.” Clean the space, add elements of romance (because it’s all about you), remove distractions, gather pillows that allow you to sit up or recline, and arrange whatever other props you might need. Put out your favorite drink and snack (a small treat that gets Santa to come once a year is likely to help you come as well). I also suggest a hand mirror for women and men, and toys—the various adult items that we are embarrassed to buy, yet love to own—are optional. Make the surface on which you’ll recline warm and comfortable, with blankets and plenty of towels, so you needn’t worry about soiling sheets or ruining your grandmother’s throw.

Now it’s time to christen the space with the thought, intention, and hope that your sexual practice studio holds no judgment or negativity. Here you can laugh, cry, rejoice, learn, explore, orgasm, not orgasm, question, and just “be.” Let it serve as your “love lab,” and that love can be for anyone or anything.

Aphrodite—born out of foam—and mermaids remind us that water can be highly erotic, so we’ll begin in the shower or bath. As the water awakens your skin, wash your body with your hands—not a loofah or wash cloth—so you can feel your muscles, scars, hair, smooth patches, and rough spots. Notice where you want the water to go. Does it feel best cascading down your head? Your back? Both? If you have a handheld showerhead, how does it feel when you spray under your arms, behind your legs, between your legs? (Ladies, a word of caution: Never aim high-pressured water, such as a handheld showerhead or a hot tub jet, into your vagina. It risks sending air bubbles deep into your uterus and fallopian tubes, which could result in an embolism.) In the bathtub, do you find yourself scooping water with your hands and pouring it on certain areas of your body? If you like to shave in the shower or bath, how does your body feel with or without hair? Find out the difference with pre- and post-shave touching. Another great advantage of conducting any sexual activity—including masturbation—in the shower is easy clean-up.

Before you step out and dry off, grab a bottle of light oil—almond, coconut, grape seed, even light olive oil—and rub it over your body. Imagine that you are an ancient ruler receiving a daily unction from one of your attendants. Take your time to see what feels good and what strokes in which direction make it feel even better. Pat yourself with a towel to absorb any remaining water and excess oil. Look in the bathroom mirror as you touch yourself. Where are these sensations coming from? Is there a reference point for the pleasurable feeling that you can use later to steer you or somebody else back to that spot? (“It’s an inch below the freckle.”)

Step into your sexploration studio feeling reverence for yourself and the activities that are about to unfold. Sit up or lie back. Let your hands run over your body, without touching the genitals. Are the same parts of your anatomy that responded to water equally sensitive to touch? How can you change your touch to excite the nerves in your skin? Allow fantasies to play in your mind, as your hands continue to probe and caress your body. Because not everyone uses vibrators, anal beads, handcuffs, feathers, or other toys, the goal here is self-exploration
au naturel
. Trace your fingers lightly over your chest, letting them explore your nipples and the area around them (the
areolae
). Men, you have permission to do this as well, because we know that many of you respond to “playing chest.”

What other areas turn you on? Behind the ear? Your inner thigh? Your lips? Outline your mouth with a finger on your dominant hand and then bring that same finger across your lips where they come together. Does it tingle? Open and let your finger enter your mouth as you suck or nibble on it. This is a double lesson: You discover if your finger is sensitive and what parts of your mouth are sensitive. You can switch out or add as many fingers as you’d like.

Fingers moving inside a warm, moist area might lead to thoughts of sex. Let your wet finger inch down your body toward your genitals and let one hand grab the mirror. (Gadget gurus might prefer to use a camera and laptop—not for posterity, but rather for mastery.) Study your genitals: Genitals of one sex or the other tend to look similar but they are never the same. Let your hand explore the parts of you that a sexual partner would see. Use the mirror or laptop as a second set of eyes. Notice the folds and the location of everything that feels good. Let your fingers rub and stroke you on the outside, allowing them to enter you if you wish. By the way, you can let your fingers enter anywhere on your body that you wish.
Anywhere!

Once you have experienced and discovered enough to satisfy you—perhaps horniness has started to take over—put down the mirror so both of your hands are free. Though the male and female erogenous zones tend to differ, six elements of orgasm remain the same for many men and women, and you can remember my BEST SEX tips that work magic, no matter how you explore. As you progress through and revisit these steps—which I have drafted in order of orgasmic importance whereby breathing comes before you do—your body will crest toward an orgasm, a combined corporal and spiritual experience that will result in feelings of exhilaration, breathlessness, wholeness. If you pay attention to the last step, the exaggeration, particularly vocalizing your sexual emotions, your body and mind will continue to do most, if not all, of the other steps, as though you were on autopilot, or autoerotic pilot, as the case may be.

•
Breathe
through the diaphragm, whereby the navel, not the chest, rises and falls. At the fullest part of the inhalation you feel relaxed, and at the most extreme point of the exhalation, it should feel close to doing an abdominal exercise.

•
Elevate
the pelvis from the ground toward the ceiling. No matter the position, the key is to curve the bottom of your spine toward your navel.

•
Squeeze
the puboccygeus (PC) muscle with each elevation. This is the muscle that starts and stops urination and for which people do Kegel exercises.

•
Think
and fantasize about images and situations that turn you on.

•
Stimulate
any parts of your body that bring you pleasure.

•
Exaggerate
your sexual emotions as well as the sexual tension that announce an orgasm. If you need to scream into a pillow to prevent the family or neighbors from calling the police, please feel free to do so. If you want to experiment with erotic conversation (“dirty talk”), try that as well. It is important to release both the muscle tension that precedes an orgasm and the emotional tension surrounding sex. Don’t be afraid to laugh if you feel like it. Laughter is great sexual medicine, because it lets the tension flow out of your body.

“If you are tempted to tattoo your erogenous zones for ease of locating them, don’t. First: The tattooing process might alter the surface’s sensitivity; and second: Erogenous zones can move
or change over time.”

Crescendo

Explore yourself after an orgasm to see what parts are hypersensitive and too sensitive to touch, what can still be stimulated, and what has little or no feeling.

Repeat your self-exploration in different positions, not only for continued discovery, but also for practice. When using a vaginal sleeve such as the Fleshlight, a man can place it between the mattress and box spring, rest his hands on the mattress, and imitate sex from a rear-entry position. This will help build his core muscles, as he simulates sex. Similarly, a woman who has a Hitachi Magic Wand or similar vibrator can straddle it with her legs, or lie down on her chest, and adjust it beneath her—a position that requires little or no effort—if she wants to relax and orgasm, two words that go hand-in-hand.

Finally, after you know what your labial/vaginal/clitoral/anal/prostatic/penile orgasms feel like by themsleves you can begin to combine them for a blended orgasm, where men might have a penis/prostate experience or a woman might have a clitoral/pubic mound experience. Many clients report that they enjoy blended orgasms as a whole-body experience, and others like them for their intensity. Similar to how you would concoct a smoothie, you can blend two or more ingredients to make your orgasms scrumptious and good for you.

Brava! Bravo!

Mastering Multiple Position Sex
makes you the composer of your orgasms and, FAA regulations notwithstanding, the sky’s the limit. Before you turn another page, let your body become a mystical city of gold, and each finger can be a daring archeologist sporting a leather coat and fedora or short-shorts and calf-high boots, to explore every hill and every valley, every pit and every peak, in search of hidden treasures. Bullwhip optional.