The obsession with male performance in the bedroom is a misguided intimacy killer. Michael J. Russer explains why
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Conventional wisdom tells us that great performance in the bedroom means you’re more of a man. The main thing to remember is that women want a guy who can go at it for hours with a blue-steel hard-on. Performance problems? Not to worry! Just get yourself a prescription for Viagra or Cialis. Not a mainstream-medicine kind of guy? Try one of those mysterious herbal concoctions available all over the Internet.
Far too many men have bought into these unfortunate myths. The truth is that great, fulfilling sex for both you and your partner has nothing to do with performance. In fact, the focus on performance is the very thing that will kill great sex.
Replace the idea of performance with the possibility of presence. Then, you’re beginning to open the door to a world of physical intimacy beyond yours or your partner’s wildest dreams.
Even if this notion seems foreign to you—and it probably does, if you’ve been immersed in a world overloaded with pharmaceutical advertising and online porn that revolves around men who appear to be able to stay hard for hours—stay with me.
Men typically think of sexual performance in terms of:
1. Equipment (how big, how hard)
2. Stamina (how long we can keep hammering away)
3. How much we can drive our partner crazy with #1 and #2
Some women, especially those under the age of 40, tend to agree with this view—not necessarily because they prefer to be ravished this way but because they think that this is what most satisfies their man! When women get to talking honestly about what they most enjoy in the bedroom, it rarely matches the acrobatic stunts found in the average porn episode. Don’t believe me? Talk to some women about this yourself. Ask them what they like most in the bedroom. I’m pretty sure you’ll hear some variation on the theme of greater presence. Women want men to be right there with them, playing and connecting intimately in the moment—not perseverating on some athletic ideal of performance.
The quality of presence is something you find in great leaders, listeners and otherwise ordinary human beings who are totally comfortable being in the present moment. It’s a state of being rather than doing. Where performance is goal-oriented doing, presence is a space of goalless connection that may or may not involve any doing at all.
When you are with someone who is fully present, you feel accepted for who you are. You feel the warmth of a deep connection, even if you’ve just met. In the bedroom, performance requires a strong heart and a hard dick. Presence requires an open heart and the willingness to create space for your mate to experience her total emotional and sexual self without fear of judgment or expectation.
Performance demands, presence allows.
The easiest way to achieve presence in the bedroom is to allow yourself to be truly vulnerable, which results in opening your heart. Vulnerability is something often treated as the opposite pole of the masculine. It’s not often seen as sexy in popular culture, and it’s rarely taught or encouraged in most men. But if great sex is your goal, and presence is your vehicle, vulnerability is the key to the ignition. Just relax. Put performance aside, take a few calming breaths, and just be with your partner. Release all your expectations of yourself and your partner. Let your next encounter be all about her, and be ready for some surprises.
Invite her to candidly let you know what works for her. Let her know that your sole focus is to give to her in the way she wants, and that she need not worry about climaxing. Her role: to fully receive and enjoy the loving you give her. When you sincerely create an intimate space like this, you free her up to fully express her sexuality in a way that she has probably never experienced before. And this tidal wave of emotional and physical connection/experience will carry you both away.
I had to learn this distinction the hard way. After prostate cancer surgery and radiation treatments, I was left fully impotent. I can’t get it up to save my life, even using those highly touted male enhancement remedies. This meant I could forget about any notion of experiencing sexual performance as it is typically understood. My acceptance of this condition allowed my partner and I to explore other ways of being intimate. And without question, one of the most important discoveries for us was the idea of being fully present for each other while making love. This alone transformed our experience from great (when things were working as they should) to extraordinary—so extraordinary that our intimate experiences continue to boggle our minds and those of everyone we share them with.
Forget the pills, male enhancements, locker-room bragging and all fears associated with performance. Being fully present for your lover will take some practice and patience, especially given that our culture does everything in its power to distract us into oblivion, which is the very antithesis of presence. If you hang in there, you will both be rewarded beyond your imagination.
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image credit: Flickr/Felixe
Other articles by Michael J. Russer:
Why ED was the Best Thing to Happen to My Intimacy
I wanted to echo the sentiments of the author. One of the most rewarding sexual encounters I’ve had was with a mostly lesbian woman. Taking the spotlight of my penis oriented us toward pleasuring one another, and relieved me of any performance anxiety. Grinding, licking, fingering, holding – all of these things lifted our libido higher and higher. We swam in a sea of one another’s hormones, we looked into one another’s eyes, and when we did have intercourse, it was organic to our connection. And then we slept a bit in one another’s arms, woke up, and did it… Read more »
Oh my God, this is so true. So many guys think it’s all about performance when it’s really about presence and connection. In fact, a guy could do the exact same thing and it feels completely different if he is present and connected versus a cold hard machine. It could even be the exact same guy and the experience is completely different depending on how you’re feeling about him. You will notice that I added “connection” there. That’s because most– but not all–women enjoy sex much more if it involves emotional connection, which is related to the vulnerability the author… Read more »
Still, I think David is probably right.
Haha a brilliant article like this and two guys show up with their ‘my penis is so big I will hurt women if I do it too long’ bullshit. See???? This is what we have to work with…. *sigh*
I would hope one can make a comment on this site without receiving condecension or insults. I think Dave and I have been misunderstood. I have kissed over 4 women and even with this small sampling the range of likes and dislikes is enormous. So, I think Dave probably has a point.
1. I thought that Kelly’s response to David was perfectly said, and Petite’s response to yours, while humorous, wasn’t condescending.
2. Nobody has misunderstood you or Dave.
3. “…over 4 women.” what?
4. Dave has no points.
Poor David and John; never have i seen the comments on an article make it more clear that the people commenting need to actually read the article. You guys are making us look bad.
great piece of writing, esp: “Where performance is goal-oriented doing, presence is a space of goalless connection that may or may not involve any doing at all.” This is applicable to almost all endeavors of life, not just sex. sports, art, academics, discussions, everything.
sigh. yes. Thank you!
Thank you for sharing, and congratuations to your newfound intimacy and happiness.
However, I’ve never found an erected penis to be mutually exclusive to using other bodily appendices or fabricated devices for intimacy and sexual pleasure.
David, honey, did you read the article? When you categorize entire classes of individuals, “the petite ones”, for instance, you are completely missing the point about being present with the unique individual you are sharing your sexuality with. You are back to performance. You might find your way to a satisfying physical experience, but you will not come close to the depth and intimacy of connection that I believe the author was talking about. And what your partner is experiencing? You may not know, because she may not let you in that far. That only comes when you see, really… Read more »
For a lot of women, particularly the petite ones, if a man does it right, all you need is about 10 minutes of good sex. Sometimes going too long can be painful for some women.
You need to go as long as it takes to please her. Maybe you meant 10 mins of intercourse? My sessions are much longer. But, I am crazy about fucking.
Also, you’re wrong about small women. Just proves you really don’t know a damn thing about women.
Hi Jules
Happy New year!
It is great to see you are still alive and kicking…
I love you 🙂
Smiles