Happy festive season! ’Tis the season for peace, pleasure and good will to all!

What’s this got to do with your love life?

Firstly - “’tis the season for peace”.

By peace I mean that inner stillness and calm that allows for presence. When you’ve got a head full of busyness it’s very hard to tune off and become still and present. You can still have pretty good sex, but it tends to be distracted, unconnected and therefore ultimately unsatisfying. So, during this time when most people have time off, focus on the peace, find the moments of quiet and tune into that. Then take that feeling into your lovemaking. It’s from that deep space that realness emerges and the sex can become whatever is real for you at the time, wild or tender or crazy as, whatever. The thing is that it’s real, it comes from within you, not some expectation or act imposed from outside.

Here’s something you can do to feel the peace. Christmas morning is the only time of the year when the country becomes peaceful. This is the one morning of the year when almost nothing is happening, when the energies are at their calmest. So go outside and notice... read more

I had a good chat recently with a woman who loves to make love with her husband, she said that she never refuses her husband, that she always comes from a place of "Yes!".

Apparently her mother had drilled into her that it was the best way to stay happy and connected in a marriage, and it was good advice - regular, quality love-making definitely strengthens a relationship.

I had to agree, I too like to say "Yes!" to sex (and when I say ’sex’ I mean love-making not just intercourse, not even genital interaction) - and I'd love it if you could too and definitely not in a “just do it” kind of way. I want you to say “Yes!", not “Oh well, if I must” or “Ok, if you’ll shut up about it” or “Well, OK. I suppose you did vacuum the house…”

I’m not asking you to say “yes” out of a sense of obligation or duty or as a trade-off. I’m saying say ‘Yes!’ to sex because it feels good to be intimate with your partner, because you know that even if you’re not really feeling it yet, if you focus on the beforeplay and then the... read more

I had a male client complain to me recently that after five years he still couldn’t get his girlfriend to want or enjoy sex. He said he’d tried everything - even anal sex and fisting, and she still wasn’t interested…

Oh boy, I think this guy was confusing sex with a porn shoot.

The poor girlfriend wasn’t frigid, she just wasn’t ready! Fortunately she was trusting her body and saying no, rather than going ahead and traumatizing herself.

I see so many women who have forced themselves to have sex when they weren’t ready (and by the way, if your sexual activity includes anal sex and fisting, she needs to be very very ready). They’ve been subjecting themselves to constant low level sexual trauma, and over time they’ve come to hate sex. 

In some cases, women have subjected themselves to high level trauma. Some of the things women get up to without truly wanting to are extraordinary - if they were getting paid for doing stuff they don’t want to it might make some sense, but they do it for free!

As I’ve explained elsewhere, a woman’s body opens in stages. You can’t go barreling down... read more

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. It’s true. Think about how much more attractive your partner is when they’ve been away for a while. Maybe they’ve been to the gym and they come back alert and refreshed and with a healthy glow about them; or maybe they’ve been out catching up with friends and have come back glowing and full of tales to tell; maybe they’re studying at night school and come home elated and wanting to share their new knowledge.

When your partner has been apart from you, doing interesting things, they come back fresher, more vibrant and with a desirable energy. You can look at them and think to yourself: “Mmm, I like you”

So beforeplay is not just about being together. It’s also about building the “Mmm” factor through time apart.

So many women in particular tell me they wish their husband would get a life of his own, rather than depending on her for stimulation and entertainment, which is tiring and unarousing. If he gave her some space and went and did something that he enjoyed for his own sake, then she would find him appealing.

How much time apart you need will depend on you as individuals and as a... read more

For people in long-term relationships, chilling out together is generally a prerequisite for good sex.

I always recommend that couples find some time, preferably every day, where you can just hang out and chill together. It only needs to be 15 minutes over a cup of tea or glass of wine when the kids have gone to bed, or similar. You can give each other a foot massage - anything conducive to time to chat in an easy, relaxed way.

When you’re in a good space like this it's also easier to raise the issue of whether you might move into some love-making that evening or not; and if you are open to the idea, what one or both of you might need to get there.

Clients have told me that this one small change to their relating – deciding that sex is no less sexy because it’s a little bit planned - has had a huge impact on their sense of connectedness and therefore on their sex lives.

Now let’s take this a step further and talk about where you have this together time. Of course you could do it around the kitchen table, you could do it on a balcony... read more

If you want a good night out, do you tend to plan it in advance or decide on the spur of the moment? If you’re playing sport, do you have your trainings and matches planned in advance, or do you just play whenever the whim takes you (and hope that everyone else involved is interested and available too)?

I imagine you’d say in both cases that you plan in advance, that you schedule those enjoyable activities.

So why not schedule sex?

Planning ahead and creating the space in your busy lives for making love needn’t be any less romantic or enjoyable than scheduling other pleasurable activities.

So for example:

• If you know you like a lazy, sensual Sunday morning lie-in, then keep Sunday mornings free.
• If Wednesday is the only day of the week when no-one in the family has evening activities so the kids can go to bed on time and you can have an ‘early night’, then make Wednesday your nooky night.
• If you both have jobs where you’ve got flexibility of time, consider starting late or working from home on a Tuesday and spend some time in the bedroom.
• If you go to the gym together after work on a Thursday and tend to come home feeling... read more

You might be in the mood…

…but by the time you’ve put the dishwasher on, put out the rubbish, checked on the kids, locked the house, brushed your teeth, got changed and hopped into bed… well, somehow the urge has disappeared.

How do you stay in the mood as you lead-up to sex?

Make the lead-up erotic!

If the two of you have had a good cup-of-tea (or cup-of-coffee) connection, or gone for a walk, or watched a happy movie together or whatever, and that’s got you both in the mood, then keep that happy banter up as you both do the last minute chores. Or divide the tasks with a sexy: “Meet you in the bedroom in 20 minutes…first one there lights the candles!”

Either of those approaches will keep the desire bubbling away as you finish the mundane matters of the day, with the anticipation of some delicious pleasures to come.

Then there’s the teeth brushing, the face-washing and the undressing and all that end-of-day body maintenance that needs doing.

Well, if you’re showering, I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you how to make that erotic - just jump in together! Or one of you watches while the... read more

Breathing together is one of the best ways to sync in and get in the mood for some loving. Here are five breathing activities to do:

For all these activities, you sit opposite each other and I suggest you play some cool music and do the activity for one song (two if it requires you to take it in turns).

Alternate Breathing
As one breathes in the other breathes out. You feel the breath travel across from one to the other. If you’re having trouble noticing the breath you can place your hands on each other’s chest.

Sound the Breath
As one breathes out, the other makes a sound. It could be a simple ‘aaahhh’ sound, or something more song-like. Do this for one song, then swap roles.

Name the Breath
As you breathe out, say the name of your partner. You can take it in turns to do this, with one breathing and saying the name of their partner for, say, five breaths and then the other doing it for five breaths. Another version is when you both do alternate breathing while saying your partner’s name on the out breath. This way you alternating saying the partner’s name while you are alternating the breathing.

Fire Breath
As you... read more

What level of desire do each of you have to:

• Cook
• Visit the in-laws
• Learn a foreign language for an overseas trip
• Go running in the morning
• Help the kids with their homework
• Plant a vegetable garden
• Renovate the bathroom
• Have sex?

Were you equal on any of those? Probably not. Chances are there’s a higher and lower desire partner for each one; just as you’ve probably got different levels of desire for sex.

There’s always a lower desire partner, and always a higher desire partner. Every couple has to come to terms with that basic difference and work with it.

I’ve had three major relationships in my life (well, four actually, but the first was as a teenager so we never found out if there was a higher or lower desire partner - we just grabbed the chance whenever we could!).

In the first I was the higher desire partner; in the second, we were pretty equal, with periods of variation, such as when our three children were babies where some modification and negotiation was required to see us through; and in my current relationship I am definitely the lower desire partner.

I sometimes stamp my feet (light-heartedly)... read more

Once you've been practicing the basic exercises for a while, you should feel a change in your pelvis, feeling more present and connected to your genital region. This is a good thing.

Give your pelvic floor a squeeze now, notice how it connects you to your pelvic area. Breath into your belly and do some more squeezes, nice and relaxed.

Let’s look at some advanced pleasures;

Connect with your Pelvis
 The first advanced pleasure is simply that - to connect with your pelvis. So many people are disconnected from their pelvises. Increasing the connection will help men last longer and men and women to have better orgasms.

Recharge Yourself
 You can also use your pelvic floor to draw energy up your body, to recharge yourself. Visualise an energy centre in your pelvis. It could be a flame, a cloud of electricity, a pulsing gem, whatever comes to mind. Then as you squeeze and relax, keeping your breath low and calm, imagine that with the squeezes you are drawing energy up your body, either up your spine or up your middle.

Please note that if you’re doing a lot of energy raising in this way, it’s important that you also lower and centre the energy at the end of... read more