Seven Tips to be a Better Lover

(1)  Open your eyes. 

       Or better yet open all your senses.  Being present is THE KEY to being good at giving and receiving pleasure. If you find yourself paying your bills, preparing your grocery list, re-painting the ceiling or re-playing an earlier discussion, get out of your thoughts and into the moment.  Unless you’re an amazing multi-tasker, seeing your partner in a sexual way and preparing your grocery list should be mutually exclusive activities.

(2)  Slow down. 

       Move everything slower. Sex can be a passionate experience with reckless thrashing about, and it can be a tender experience of paying slow attention to nuances. Even passionate, thrashing sex is better when you alter the rhythm. 

(3)  Change the drama.  

       If you are like most couples, you’ve established a pattern that is comfortable but perhaps a bit too predictable.  Think about the roles that you and your partner play as lovers.  If one of you tends towards being more dominant and the other more submissive, switch it up. 

(4)  Masturbate together.  

       This may be as connected or as disconnected as you feel comfortable; pleasuring yourself in front of your partner can be an extremely intimate activity. 

(5)  Masturbate alone. 

       To evolve your sexual potential, you need to be intimately familiar with what your own body likes.  Touch yourself in non-sexual and sexual areas and pay attention to the sensations.  

(6)  Communicate about what feels good, before, during and after sex.  

       If words are tough, use your body or your hands to show your partner what you like.  If you are afraid to give feedback because you don’t want to wound your partner’s ego, orient the conversation thusly: “Let me tell you a secret about what I really like” as opposed to “Here’s how you keep messing up…” 

(7)  Read sexy literature or watch pornography together that is at least close to comfortable for you.  

       Notice I didn’t say completely comfortable; the touch of anxiety that results from stepping out of your comfort zone can spice things up. Reading something like Tinamarie Eshel’s blog often is a good place to begin.  

To do all of the items on this list you are going to have to start thinking of yourself as a sexual being, which is a good thing.

Gerald Drose is an Atlanta-based couples’ sex therapist.   Visit Dr. Drose at Powers Ferry Psychological Associates, LLC.