Develop Alternative Sexual Scenarios
Michael Metz & Barry McCarthy
Enduring Desire, 2010
You can learn to value erotic, non-intercourse scenarios, as well as sensual and playful scenarios (Exercise 10.1). You can also learn to value both mutual and one-way scenarios rather than expect equality at each sexual encounter. While many people are only comfortable with intercourse and mutual outcomes, the majority of partners and couples appreciate a variety of scenarios and levels of satisfaction. For example:
•When the woman is not interested, she is open to enjoying being the giving partner and manually pleasuring him to orgasm.
•She requests a prolonged pleasuring session so she can bask in sensual feelings and the encounter ends in his enjoying a slower form of intercourse.
•One partner finds the encounter erotically fulfilling while the other is content to "go along for the ride."
•She plays out a role enactment scenario that is very involving for her but neutral for him. Sexual involvement, response, and satisfaction can be quite variable and complex, both during specific encounters and over time.
Exercise 10.1 Alternative Sexual Scenarios
In order to feel comfortable creating an erotic, non-intercourse or a sensual, cuddly scenario, you need to practice it several times. That's what this psychosexual skill exercise asks you to do.
We suggest that the woman initiate an erotic scenario and the man a sensual scenario. Ideally, you would play this out two or three times so that you are comfortable and confident with both scenarios. Some couples have a strong preference for one scenario over the other. For example, one couple finds mutual manual stimulation to orgasm highly erotic and satisfying. Another couple has a strong preference for a mutual cuddly, sensual scenario, which they agree providesalmost as much bonding and energy as an intercourse experience. Still another couple's preference is for an alternative erotic scenario. She might orally stimulate him to orgasm, then choose whether she wants him to stimulate her to orgasm, hold her while she engages in self-stimulation, or perhaps just cuddle with him after he was orgasmic.
In playing out erotic scenarios, the emphasis is on choice and sharing pleasure. What feels comfortable and fits you as sexual individuals and a sexual couple? Do not fall into the trap of coercion or feeling you have to perform for your partner. The whole idea behind variable, flexible GES is acceptance of couple sexuality as inherently variable, while valuing intimacy, pleasure, and eroticism.
A valuable family investment for couples with children (from babies to adolescents) is to go away at least once a year without children. The most important bond in a family is the husband-wife bond, which needs time and energy to flourish. Don't treat your sexual relationship with "benign neglect." Many couples find their best sexual times are when they are away without children, which offers the freedom and privacy for both nudity and a range of sensual, playful, erotic, and intercourse experiences.