GuidoWorld

Sexual Motives Revisited

In the last few posts I’ve focused on the beneficial role pleasure can have in intimate relationships, and how it can often be the bridge between men and women with different sexual appetites. Let’s take a quick inventory of the sexual motives of both men and women to see how they compare and contrast.

With men the most dominant sexual motivation is usually the sex drive itself or as I often refer to it “the biological imperative”. Adolescent boys are often unprepared for the hormonal onslaught they are engulfed in where thinking of sex and being sexually aroused are events experienced many times each day. The urge to have an orgasm to experience a sexual release is more often then not the number one sexual motivation of men.

Now the idea of orgasm and the momentary rush of ecstasy upon ejaculation are common experiences in male sexuality. Pleasure, is therefore, a typical component of the male sex drive. Yet, many men find the orgasm to be too fleeting and expand and prolong their enjoyment by making the pleasures of foreplay, touch and stimulating their partner intricate components of their sex life. This makes pleasure the second motive for most men.

The third motive for sex is built on the other two. The biological imperative and pleasure together lead many men to feel and seek a sense of connection with their sexual mate. This bond, this sense of closeness and intimacy often becomes the most rewarding aspect of their sex life. In this realm comes a sense of gratitude to their lover for what they share together, and a sense of devotion to the person who is such an intimate part of their pleasure and joy.

A fourth motive for some men is a desire to sire a child. For some men sex is a means of gaining immortality by securing a lineage and a link to the future. Yet, in the men who I have known that have seen procreation as a sexual motive, it has been more a secondary motive. The desire to procreate seemed to lead them to marriage, while the biological imperative remained the primary reason they wanted frequent sex. I have not known any men who declined having sex because their partner was not ovulating, and therefore, the sex act would not be procreative.

There have been some studies that suggest that men “unconsciously” choose a woman who is ovulating over woman who are not. One such study had men interact with females in an intimate environment and then asked each man which woman they most desired. The study found that a majority of men picked a woman who was ovulating at the time of the experiment.

Some concluded from this study that this showed that men wanted to have children. Though this is a possible conclusion, there are others. If the men were truly “unconsciously” choosing women who are ovulating there could be another practical reason, and that is that a woman’s sex drive is usually higher during ovulation. A man could be responding to the woman’s willingness or eagerness for sex rather than a desire to procreate.

I personally am not surprised that men are “unconsciously” aware of when a woman is ovulating. I have known men who have claimed to be able to know when a woman is ovulating by the scent an ovulating woman secretes. Though I’ve never been able to do this with women I don’t know well, I have been able to do this with women I have been intimate with for a period of time.

When it comes to the sexual motives of women few would state that many woman experience a true biological imperative for sexual intercourse. Women’s sexual inventory seems to start at the back end of the male sexual world. Many young women’s urge for sexual intercourse seems to be in feeling loved and feeling in love. One could make a strong case that the dominant female sexual motivation is in the realm of intimacy and the desire to be in a relationship.

The desire to procreate, to have a child, is another strong sexual motivation in females. Even before their sexual awakening many females play with dolls, fantasize being a mommy and dream of getting married. It is not unusual for young adolescent females to openly admit a desire to be a mom. The familiar cry of women that “their biological clock is ticking” is another example of how important the drive to procreate is in women.

While sexual enjoyment, even if fleeting, seems to be indigenous to male sexuality, sexual pleasure in females does not seem to be so automatic. Yet, as we mentioned before, the female orgasm and potential for sexual pleasure more than match their male counterpart.

While a woman’s desire to procreate can lead to sexual activity, it is limited. First, as we mentioned in the male desire to procreate, this desire could be limited to when a woman is ovulating and therefore, not to be relied upon to match the average male’s sex drive. When intimacy is the motive, once again many woman are offended when men equate frequent sexual intercourse with intimacy. Therefore, intimacy is limited as a way to bridge the difference between male and female sex drives because most men want sexual frequency to be an integral component of intimacy.

In the previous post I mentioned how important verbal communication and dialogue is to many women. Not many women would feel intimate with a man who talked to them only a few minutes a week, even though it is theoretically possible for two people to be intimate with almost no verbal communication. A couple that quietly did all their activities together and spent their days watching each other could become quite close. Yet, it is hard to believe that they could be as intimate with each other as a couple that openly communicated all their thoughts and feelings. Likewise, though a man and woman could be intimate with just conversation, it cannot compare to the kind of intimacy available to a couple through the realms of sexual pleasure.

In my life I have found a distinct connection between the experience of sexual pleasure and the potential of intimacy I have with a person. I find it hard to imagine me forming the depth of devotion and intimacy I have with my wife through a platonic relationship, or if I would have made my sex life with another as or more important than my sex life with her.

I can’t speak for everyone, but I do consider myself to be a sexual being. And though my wife would not claim to be as sexually driven as I, she would also be the first to admit that the intimacy we cultivated together would have been impossible through an asexual relationship.

Jim Guido

Monogamy by Decree

In the previous posts I’ve talked at length about the powerful and somewhat pervasive role the male sex drive plays in the lives of many men. In the most recent posts I’ve pointed out how a couples commitment to giving and receiving pleasure can successfully bridge differences in sexual desire and appetites.

Yet, what happens when a partner won’t commit to pleasure or into attempting to match their partners sexual appetite and instead just demands their mate to curtail their sex drive? What happens when a person demands monogamy while refusing to meet their mates sexual appetite?

The question I have is how fair is it to demand sexual fidelity when one is not committed to  meeting the sexual desires and needs of their mate? Does it bode well to expect a person to  repress or deny their sexual urges? Is it healthy? Is the person who will not attempt to meet their spouse half-way showing the same commitment to the relationship as they are demanding their spouse to be by being faithful and monogamous?

Fortunately for me I never had to answer these questions as we successfully bridged the sexual appetite gap by being committed to giving each other pleasure. Yet, I’m not sure I would have been able to get through my hormonally driven 20’s and 30’s in a healthy manner if I would have been demanded to cut my frequency of sexual encounters in half.

I know it would have been difficult and somewhat harmful to my sense of contentment and happiness. I know I would have felt less loved, and appreciated. I know I would have felt less connected and intimate with her. If I stayed righteous I would have been angry with her, but more often I would have felt that there was something wrong with me and begin to resent both my sex drive and myself.

My feeling of disconnectedness and being misunderstood would make me very vulnerable to straying and finding solace in the arms of someone who did not make me feel bad for wanting to touch, hold and make love to them. I would have been thrown back to my adolescence and felt rejected every time I desired my wife and she did not desire me. Each time I would have been drawn to her and wanted to devour her with desire would have been emotionally painful and accumulatively alienating.

Many recent gender studies indicate that female infants are far more interpersonally oriented than male infants. At a very early age female infants spend a great deal of their time looking at faces and listening to conversation. Male infants on the other hand tend to be more interested in objects. This gender tendency often results in female toddlers and tots developing strong language skills and seeking conversation. The focus of young females is often on forming best friends and their ability to make and maintain friendships is paramount to their positive feelings of themselves.

Male toddlers and tots are more object oriented. Their relationships are often less verbal and more geared towards activities. While the typical female child is talking and engaging in highly sophisticated social interactions the typical male child is usually indulging in highly physical activities that are more action oriented with less verbal demands. As always it is important to note that no one is saying that every female infant is verbal/relationship oriented, and every male infant is physical/activity oriented, but the tendencies are rather predominant. There are tomboys as well as verbally/relationship oriented male children, yet the majority of cases support the gender tendencies.

While the male sex drive is often a major component directing men into an increased desire for relationships, the female desire for verbal interchange and emphasis on relationships is ever present.  I point this out to make an observation.

In our society a man is expected to stay monogamous no matter how interested or open to sex his wife may be.  Yet, how successful is it when a woman is demanded to curtail her desire for verbal friendships to show fidelity. What happens when a society or partner views social interactions without the spouse present as a form of infidelity? What happens when an insecure and jealous spouse views all forms of individualized socializing as being unfaithful or a sign of not being committed to the relationship?

In many societies woman aren’t only expected to avoid forming friendships with males when they are married but are expected to avoid public interactions with other females without their husband present. My father was a very traditional Italian man who “forbade” my mother from socializing without his presence. Did she honor this?

While she never openly rebelled against this expectation, she had many friends she would see without my father present. Likewise, I’ve read a few books written by Arabian women who state that they are forbidden by their patriarchal societies from socializing with female or male friends without their spouse being present. Not one of the woman I’ve read has honored their husbands or societies wishes in this manner.

I would think that the biological imperative and hormonally driven sex drive of men is at least as strong as most womans desire and need for verbal interchange. If a man does not meet his wife’s needs for verbal discussion and disclosure most wives feel little if any  guilt about being unfaithful in this manner. In fact most would not deny they were being unfaithful and bluntly state that the expectation is sick and cruel.

I’m not going to disagree with this but it does seem a little odd that the desire for verbal interchange is viewed as something that cannot be curtailed and denied while  the biological imperative is.

I know most people are appalled by the fact that I’m comparing the male sex drive with the desire for social interaction.  I’m sure that many would state that talking to others is not being unfaithful and anyone who thought so was just a controlling, jealous person with unrealistic expectations. Yes, and I would agree with that. Yet, the fact remains that we have no trouble in demanding the restricting and curtailing one of the strongest drives in nature in one gender while thinking it is unreasonable to restrict a likewise strong proclivity in the other gender.

I do think this is worthy of thought. I’ll write more on this soon.

Jim Guido

Pleasure Shared is….

In the last post I talked optimistically of how being open to sexual pleasure is a way of bridging the gap between hormonally driven sexual appetites. In this post I will attempt to clarify a few points left somewhat unsaid.

When one person, more often then not the male, has a higher urge for frequent sexual intercourse, the easiest solution is for the couple to focus on increasing and intensifying the amount of pleasure involved in their sex life. A person who is less driven by hormonally induced sexual urges will be more open to frequent sex when sexual intercourse becomes a playground of pleasure. While the initial motive may continue to be sexual urges in one partner the other’s motivation may lie in the realm of pleasure.

If both partners are committed to both giving and receiving pleasure the chances of developing a rewarding sex life are quite high. This insures that each person is feeling cared for and also allowed the joy of being the source of their partners ecstasy and pleasure. If one is open to either only giving or receiving pleasure the pleasure circle is left open and one or both of the couple may feel inhibited or frustrated. When both can give as well as receive affection and pleasure, the intimacy and completeness of the experience can be quite fulfilling. Sexual intercourse is a vehicle for intimacy, maybe even the vehicle with the most potential for intimacy at man’s disposal, yet it is not in itself intimacy.

While much of my posts have focussed on the biological imperative and hormonal urge inherent in the male sex drive, this now brings us to some of the other components of a satisfying sex life. Though releasing and sating the biological imperative is an often unappreciated aspect of the male sex drive, it is not the only important element.

Many men have had the experience of being as sexually frustrated after sex as before it.  Many men have experienced unrewarding and unfulfilling sex. When sex is just a release and does not involve feelings of intimacy and mutual pleasure it often fails to sate  or fulfill.

Sexual intercourse and orgasms are vehicles for and components of sexual satiation, but are not in themselves sexual joy.

Just as I think it is unwise for a partner to equate sex with intimacy, I also feel it is unwise to remove or minimize the role of sexual intercourse in intimate partnerships. There are many forms of pleasure, but the potential for physical, emotional and visceral  pleasure in sexual intercourse is tough to match. In my book, available  on this site, Exploring Intimacy I define intimacy as the desire to become closer to, or familiar with. One can be come intimate with almost everything. They can become intimate with nature, themselves, knowledge, science, music, etc.

Yet, when it comes to becoming intimate with another human being it is hard to deny the privileged role of getting to know them sexually. Our bodies along with our thoughts make up our experience. We experience the world through our bodies. Letting someone touch and please our bodies is allowing someone to influence our experience at its source. There is much vulnerability is giving someone this much power over our experience, and there is so much potential for intimacy in having someone know what we experience as we experience it.

Can we experience intimacy and physical pleasure without sexual intercourse?
Yes, of course we can. Affection and massage are often very rewarding and pleasurable.  Conversation too, can be very intimate and pleasurable.  Yet, it is hard to deny the almost infinite potential for intimacy in sexual intercourse due to its visceral intensity and tangible, spontaneous experience of each other.

That is why monogamy is so attractive. Two people commit to each other and vow to share their entire lives together. Such a commitment cries out for intimacy. By definition marriage is a vehicle by which people commit to learning all they can about each other, their hopes their dreams, their thoughts and feelings. How can one not view this as a commitment to pleasing each other? How can one deny the potential for pleasure harbored in sexual intercourse and in the intimacy of the body?

Next post we will talk of what happens when the commitment of monogamy is not an invitation to bridging the gap between sex drives and appetites.

Jim Guido

Marriage, Monogamy and Fidelity

Our recent posts regarding the male sex drive have shown how pervasive it can be. As we have noted, in adolescence and young adulthood hardly a waking minute will pass for the average male in which sexual thoughts and fantasies are absent.

Males are fixated on the biological imperative and in seeking sexual encounters, in general, in a far more intense and frequent fashion than females. Feminist often bewail the males obsession with sex and sometimes go as far as to say that such a fixation on sex is unhealthy and immature. They view mens’ sexual desires as being dehumanizing and object oriented. And while I agree that this can and sometimes is the case, I feel it is more how we  treat and oppress the male sex drive which makes it so. In future posts I will explain this idea further, but for now we’ll just say that it is true that the average man focuses on sex to a much higher degree than the average female.

Women often point out that the male obsession with the act of sex and the male orgasm stunts relationships by overemphasizing the role of sex. Many strong arguments and examples can be given where the male sex drive relegates all other forms of human communication and intimacy in a relationship to a far too irrelevant position.

What is curious and a bit contradictory is the fact that while men focus on the biological imperative more than women, social convention sure focuses its attention on the sex act in the concept of monogamy. If sex isn’t so important than why the need for monogamy? Why is a relationship considered un-intimate and unloving if a spouse has sex with other people?

I’m not asking this because I’m opposed to monogamy or desire to espouse a state of pure hedonism. On the contrary I’ve been in a very rewarding and intimate monogamous marriage of some 24 years now, and I do feel the potential for intimacy in a monogamous relationship is hard to near impossible to match in an “open relationship”. My main reason for highlighting the social expectation of monogamy is to point out that while men are often more sexually driven, both men and woman place a high priority on sex in intimate relationships.

The question should be if society is to have the expectation that life partnerships be monogamous than how do we go about structuring marriages so that this can be easily accomplished? If we truly wanted to foster mutually rewarding monogamous partnerships than we should do more than just make the demand of fidelity? It would make sense that we should make an effort to understand the male sex drive and make the social expectations of it realistic and compassionate? Rather than blindly strive to regulate or repress the male sex drive we should try to find ways to unfold it?

Luckily for us nature has done as much to assist us in this matter as it has to make sexual fidelity difficult. In the all too common situation where a man’s appetite for sex is  higher than his mate there are some potential areas which can bridge the sexual desire gap.

First it would seem wise to find a mate whose sex drive is somewhat close to yours. A man who wants sexual intercourse daily should not try to form a monogamous relationship with a woman who only desires sex on a weekly or monthly basis. This is setting oneself up for failure as the priority gap is far too wide to successfully bridge.

Since sex is about pleasure as much as desire it offers many opportunities to reach a rewarding compromise. A man devoted to pleasing his mate and a woman open to the physical pleasures of sex have a very good chance of getting on the same page sexually. While a man often has a stronger and more pervasive sex drive, the females ability to experience sexual pleasure is as strong if not stronger than a man. So while a man has a built in sexual urge, the female has an almost endless ability to attain sexual pleasure.

While even the most potent of young men can have a handful of ejaculations  (pun intended) the females ability to have orgasms is relatively unlimited. Not only can the woman have more orgasms, but their intensity seems quite awesome as well.

A woman who enjoys sex is more likely to increase the frequency of their sexual encounters. The man who makes pleasing his partner his highest priority is likely to successfully bridge the sexual drive part of the gap. While many sexually gratified females don’t  ever become as sexually driven or obsessed as their mates, they do find ways to match men in the pleasure department, often making them open to frequency of sexual intercourse as their hormone injected partner.

In my next post I will explore some of the problems in bridging the gap in relationships where there is a significant gap in sexual appetites.

Jim Guido

Ironic Gender Tendency

Before I get to the post I had promised to write a couple of blogs back dealing with sexual appetites and monogamous relationships, I thought I’d take a few moments to expand on an idea tacitly expressed in the last post. That would be that although females have a tendency to focus on beauty, they often don’t emphasize this when it comes to sexual partners.

Often times one finds woman choosing or actively pursuing sexual relationships with men for other qualities than beauty. While men often blatantly seek sex with beautiful or voluptuous women, they seldom make celebrity a major decider. Women, on the other hand, often seem to gravitate towards men who are famous, wealthy and successful regardless of their physical beauty. While the musicians, actors and athletes who find themselves surrounded by groupies are often viewed as handsome hunks, there are just as many who have groupies despite not being particularly attractive.

Wealthy professional men and celebrities who border on the hideous can often find themselves eager female sexual companionship while poor or common men with firm bodies and relatively handsome faces will find sexual companions a rather scarce commodity.

This again is perplexing for the average man who hears women pepper each and every conversation they have with constant references to the beauty of this person or that thing. If a woman’s world is so dominated with the concept of beauty than why do they not find many men beautiful and why do they than seek sex with men who they often acknowledge not being particularly handsome?

Anyway this is just an observation that came to my mind during the last post.

I so want to reiterate a few things about these observations regarding male sexuality and gender differences covered in these posts. First, they are obviously tendencies and are not intended to suggest that every male or female fits these qualities to a tee. Second, all of the observations I’m putting forward are based on heterosexual males and females. This is done to one, keep things simple, and two because this is the sexual world I live in. Though I have many gay and lesbian friends it is not an emotional and sexual  world I can understand well enough to provide any insights.

This brings us to a thin line I seem to be walking in these posts exploring male sexuality and its impact on heterosexual relationships. On one level I’m starting from my own personal sexual world and experiences and using them to form some basic observations of human relationships. I’m then using conversations with others and reading of sexual literature to help validate and expand these theories.

I’m hoping to base my observations on real life experience, without doing some sordid tell all diary. I’m trying to use my sexual life as a litmus test and reference point so that I don’t stray too far from the real and just spout forth theory after theory.

I also realize I’m making a lot of generalities which some may find offensive and others will react to as being too stereotypic.  Yet, how can  one talk about  gender without  being broad and judgmental? Of course there are going to be overstatements and inaccuracies. Yet, tending to the hundreds of exceptions in every general tendency would water down the power of the observations and one would end up saying nothing.

It is absurd to think that all of humanity can be broken down into just two categories, or a thousand for that matter. Yet, I think looking at some major tendencies of the genders can be very instructive and potentially have a great impact on improving the quality of life for many of us.

The goal of exploring and discussing male sexuality is to help us create reasonable expectations of men and to understand the hurdles their sexuality poses for their ability to find happiness and successfully exist in intimate relationships with others.

One of my working hypotheses is that the structure of our society is often blind to and unnecessarily negative regarding male sexuality. The result of this is that many men are often emotionally damaged and ill prepared to flourish in a monogamous intimate relationship.

The solution to this seems to be in engaging in a frank discussion of male sexuality and then in some tweaking in the way we structure and view relationships. For those of you who are upset at my focusing so much energy on sexual behavior and thereby missing the other vital aspects of healthy and successful interpersonal relationships I ask you to be patient.

The male sex drive is very strong and deserves to be fully appreciated and respected before we move on. The biological imperative is not everything, but it is central and important. A rewarding monogamous relationship involves much more than sexual gratification, but it appears to me that the visceral aspect of the male sex drive usually gets demonized and undervalued. I’m attempting to give the male sex drive its primal role and importance before integrating it into a balanced healthy relationship.

Jim Guido

Beauty: Form and Function

There are two basic modes of appreciating beauty. The first is in finding something pleasant to see, touch, hear, etc. In general this is when we find the form pleasing. The second type of beauty is when we appreciate the efficiency or usefulness of an object or quality. This is when we find beauty in the function of something.

Form is the mode of beauty most commonly stated and is the preferred mode of most females. Since many males seldom comment on the pleasantness of form we are often categorized as being blind to beauty or at least indifferent to it. Yet, the truth of the matter is that most men do see beauty in the world, but our preferred mode of beauty is in appreciating excellence of function.

Men see beauty in a well designed machine, in intelligent tools, in the elegance of a mathematical or scientific theory. We will see beauty in the efficiency, excellence or creativity of a particular play in a sports contest or in an athletes performance.

While the average woman will like the look of a statue or hardwood floor the average man is more likely to be impressed with the beauty of the craftsmanship involved. Obviously if a woman is an artist or a craftsman she will appreciate the talents of the artist, but even these women are often initially drawn to the piece due to its striking beauty. Many men on the other hand will have the opposite experience, whereby he firsts is drawn to the craftsmanship and then to its visual splendor.

Yet, even the most beauty oriented man in both form and function would acknowledge that the majority of women are as or more devoted to beauty than he. As mentioned before, the frequency in which the concept of beauty enters female conversation is astounding when compared to male verbal interchanges. In addition to this, the percent of time that female conversation revolves around the form of beauty rather than its function is also quite amazing to the average man.

As I also observed in a previous post the female body is the center of the male concept of beauty. Especially as the form of beauty. Men never tire of looking and admiring the female form and recent studies suggest that watching or ogling the naked female body might actually lengthen the life of the average male.

Yet, one has to wonder if even this love of the female form is structured in her function as the source of sexual pleasure. Could we not say that the promise and function of pleasure is at the source of men’s obsession with the “beauty” of the female form?

What is most depressing and confusing to men is how little women seem to appreciate and focus on the male form. While woman often complain about men obsessing over female bodies, men are often flustered with how indifferent woman seem to be about the average man. Sure woman will swoon over an occasional handsome face or comment on a particularly shapely behind. Some men can get positive recognition for a muscular or well toned body, yet the majority of men have to adapt to the reality that woman don’t find their bodies sexually intoxicating.

While there are men who are sexually aroused by almost any body type, there appear to be very few male body types which are sexually provocative.

One of the easiest sight gags in movies is for a man to parade around in his underwear or be naked. Yet, seldom if ever does one use the female form as a source of comedy in motion pictures.

Adolescent boys are often blind to the fact that girls don’t find their bodies and faces particularly attractive. They assume that since girls are flirting with them because they are too hot for words. Boys assume that since they are attracted to so many females that girls must find them as irresistible. When they start to notice that girls aren’t swooning over them, they usually don’t take this to mean that girls don’t get sexually aroused as often as men, but rather that woman don’t find them attractive. Most adolescent boys with the least shred of sensitivity only end up feeling personally rejected and interpret their flirting with other guys as a sign that they do in fact find other men enticing.

I will end this post with the lyrics to one of my songs. I think it sums up this post rather well.

Preening Like A Peacock 6/7/06

Preening like a peacock hormones out of control
Preening like a peacock putting on the show

Women find beauty in natural things
Sunrise/sunset, seashores and gems
Women see beauty in many things
Flowers, colors, in fashion and rings

She sees beauty everywhere, preening like a peacock
Why is she looking way over there, preening like a peacock

A woman feels beauty in every touch
In satin, silks and in a baby’s flesh
A woman smells beauty in every sniff
In perfumes, herbs and floral scents

Spending hours smelling roses or buying a new top

A man sees beauty in the girl of his dreams
His temptress, his partner, his goddess his queen
A man finds beauty in a woman’s form
A breast, a thigh, a hip bone exposed

She is the goal of art
She is his anchor and spark
She gives the milk of life
Without her he shrivels and dies

A man feels beauty in the passion of curves
Flowing from buttock to the small of the back
A man feels completion with a woman in tow
She’s his altar, his Eden, his castle and throne

While I preen my feathers I feel oh so hot
Every time I feel I’m pretty I hear the bubble pop

Nothing pleases like a maiden in heat
Itching for pleasure from her head to her feet
Yet lust fades as quick as it comes
From an 8 course banquet to a stick of gum

In a woman’s world of beauty men don’t make the cut
A few handsome faces maybe and the occasional butt
But we’ll never really get it, we’ll continue to strut
We’ll shake our tail feathers thinking we’re too much (we’ll strut our stuff)