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63 - Why Sex Can Leave You Dissatisfied (and Wanting More) · Masculine Containment

• 0:00
  One of the biggest issues I had in my relationship and I found in so many relationships is that sex can leave you feeling dissatisfied and wanting more.
• 0:11
  Or in some cases, this is called a libido mismatch or a desire mismatch.
• 0:16
  And by the way, this goes in both directions.
• 0:20
  Sometimes it's a woman who wants more.
• 0:21
  Sometimes it's a man who wants more.
• 0:23
  more often than not what I've encountered, what I've seen, what I experienced myself was it was I was wanting more sex with my wife and
• 0:32
  I thought that was just the issue.
• 0:34
  The issue was that I wanted it more and she wanted it less.
• 0:37
  And I went deep on this subject and studied it and I wanna share with you what I've figured out because it has completely changed my life and it's changed the lives of so many men that I've shared this with.
• 0:49
  Now before I do, I've never said this on a podcast before, but for this one, I think it's important.
• 0:55
  If you are a new listener and this is the first podcast you're listening to,
• 0:59
  or if you just randomly chose this one and you haven't listened to the last solo episode that I did called, Why Less Stimulation Can Create More Sexual Abundance, I would suggest you start with that episode first and then come back and listen to this one because that one's really the foundation of this episode because that episode covers intimacy with ourselves and this episode covers intimacy with another person, with our partners.
• 1:24
  And so with that, I wanna jump into this subject.
• 1:30
  One of the things that I realized in my life when I started becoming more sexually aware and when I started paying more attention to this and really understanding this is that often we would have sex, Katie and I would have sex, and I would want to do it again within an hour or immediately.
• 1:45
  It felt like there was never enough.
• 1:48
  I've had so many conversations with men and some women.
• 1:53
  who have said they feel like they never get enough sex.
• 1:56
  And sometimes they have sex in a few minutes, an hour, a few hours later, they're thinking, when can we do it again?
• 2:02
  And when are we going to do it again?
• 2:04
  And they're keeping score and they're watching the calendar and they're asking, why doesn't she or he want it as much as I do?
• 2:11
  And why am I not satisfied with this?
• 2:13
  That's not a question that enters into a lot of people's minds, but that's the question I'm addressing today is like, why is it?
• 2:19
  that for so many people, sex is dissatisfying and doesn't feel good, and there's this massive libido mismatch in so many relationships.
• 2:29
  Esther Perel has this quote that she says, most women want more sex, they just don't want the sex that they're getting.
• 2:35
  And in studying Tantra and Taoism and older belief systems, what I saw over and over again is that women are far more sexual than men and have more sexual desire and experience more sexual pleasure.
• 2:48
  And in the right situations, when they feel safe, when they feel grounded, when they're having sex in a way that's connected and intimate, they actually want more than men.
• 2:59
  And I had such a hard time believing that.
• 3:01
  Okay.
• 3:03
  And in some cases, I don't want to pretend like I know all the answers.
• 3:06
  In some cases, maybe there is a libido mismatch.
• 3:08
  Maybe there is a desire mismatch.
• 3:09
  Maybe there's something else going on medically or something for somebody.
• 3:16
  What I now understand is there's nothing inherently wrong with wanting to have sex and intimacy with your partner, but there's another question.
• 3:23
  Was the sex that you just had, or the sex that you are having, is it satisfying?
• 3:29
  Is it exciting and fulfilling, and does it make you feel grounded and present in your body?
• 3:35
  Or is it just another way to release?
• 3:37
  Because here's what I now know.
• 3:39
  You know, I spent a few years studying, not few, I spent a couple years studying this almost exclusively when I was on sabbatical.
• 3:45
  But prior to that, I was already studying this and wanting to understand sex and wanting to understand what was going on in my relationship.
• 3:51
  It was one of the real core issues in our relationship was this mismatch, this relationship
• 3:57
  this need for more intimacy, this, what I thought was just a, you know, like I want more and she wants less.
• 4:03
  And, um, the more I talked to people around me while I started studying this, the more I found that it was present in almost every relationship I talked to in some way.
• 4:12
  And what I started learning was release, um,
• 4:16
  what we're trained to do, conditioned to do, what so many of us have learned to do societally and through what we've learned and through watching porn and through all kinds of other stuff is so much different than fulfillment because here's what I now know.
• 4:30
  Like a man can become aroused.
• 4:32
  I could be aroused.
• 4:33
  I could having intercourse.
• 4:34
  I could orgasm.
• 4:36
  I could experience a release.
• 4:37
  I could feel like I was close to Katie.
• 4:39
  I could feel like we were actually intimate, but I still felt like something was missing a lot of the time.
• 4:46
  And, you know, release is when tension is discharged and, and that's fleeting and ethereal.
• 4:55
  And it just, it's like momentary fulfillment is when something actually landed.
• 5:01
  Fulfillment is when you feel.
• 5:04
  Fulfillment is when you're present with the sensations.
• 5:07
  You know, fulfillment is like, what I learned was I felt myself.
• 5:12
  I felt her.
• 5:12
  I felt connected.
• 5:14
  I felt wanted.
• 5:15
  I wanted her.
• 5:16
  I was fully there in the moment with her, not thinking about what I was going to do next, not thinking about some video that I'd watched, not like worried about what she's feeling, worried about what I'm feeling.
• 5:26
  Instead, like feeling her, attuning with her, experiencing something with her together.
• 5:32
  One of the biggest problems that I think we have with sex and intimacy today, period, is that a lot of us have learned how to get a sexual release, but I know that so many of us, myself included, have not learned how to become sexually fulfilled.
• 5:49
  And I think part of this is so much of the framing, the conversation, the conditioning around sex, because for so many people, like especially those who have been exposed to some of the more dogmatic belief systems or have been raised in ways where there wasn't a lot of grounding with sexuality and discussion around this,
• 6:10
  Sex can become something you get, you know, it's like sex can become transactional without either person Consciously deciding this is gonna be transactional look something like I need sex.
• 6:21
  She gives me sex.
• 6:21
  I got it now when do I get it again and Again, you know, I like I said like so many men have shared with me and it's so relatable for me because I felt the same things It was like we would have sex and I would think okay like when is it gonna happen again counting score and
• 6:35
  Looking at the calendar saying like when that was great, but like how soon can we do it again?
• 6:40
  And this happens because as people, we can have sex.
• 6:48
  without having intimacy underneath it.
• 6:50
  We can have sex with almost intimacy being absent.
• 6:54
  It can be transactional.
• 6:55
  It can be physical.
• 6:56
  It can just be stimulation in the moment.
• 6:59
  And orgasm does not necessarily mean that it's satisfying or fulfilling.
• 7:03
  Sexual activity doesn't actually mean that we are creating connection.
• 7:08
  You know, one of the things that I started really thinking about for myself was, am I wanting more sex?
• 7:13
  Or am I wanting something that I'm not actually experiencing during the sex I'm already having?
• 7:20
  And in the last episode, I talked a lot about feeling myself.
• 7:23
  And the evolution of that question was presence with someone else is different than presence with yourself.
• 7:31
  And the question actually turned into, instead of can I feel myself, can I feel us?
• 7:37
  Can I remain in my body while also paying attention to Katie and to being with her and attuning to her?
• 7:45
  And what I learned over time is that it's crucially important to slow things down and notice her breathing and her movement and any tension or relaxation, what sound she's making, the pace that we're going, how she's responding to my touch, whether she's moving towards me or is she pulling away, what's happening in her body, and how my body's responding to hers, not to manipulate an outcome, not to rush to the end, not to get to a release,
• 8:12
  but to actually be with her, to experience those moments, to stay in my body, to hold capacity for pleasure, to actually be there, and in so many ways to stop performing sex for so long in my relationship.
• 8:32
  when Katie and I would have sex, there'd be a dialogue going in my head.
• 8:36
  Um, this may or may not be relatable for you, but I would have questions like, or I would have this dialogue of, am I doing it right?
• 8:44
  And am I lasting long enough?
• 8:45
  Or am I going to last long enough?
• 8:47
  Is she going to orgasm?
• 8:48
  Should I go faster?
• 8:49
  Should I go slower?
• 8:50
  What position are we going to do next?
• 8:52
  What techniques should I use?
• 8:53
  How should I be doing this?
• 8:55
  And ironically, the more I worked
• 9:02
  the more I was actually out of the interaction and the more I was out of presence and the more I was out of real attunement and connection.
• 9:11
  Here's what I learned.
• 9:14
  Presence is not only the highest expression of masculinity, but presence is the gateway to the most intense and pleasurable and extraordinary and connected and alive sex that you've ever had in your life.
• 9:30
  Technique definitely has value, don't get me wrong.
• 9:33
  But technique cannot replace attention and presence and being there.
• 9:37
  Great sex is actually responsive, not performative.
• 9:42
  It's feeling the other person and responding to what's going on with them and feeling the moment and feeling what should come next.
• 9:50
  For so long during sex, I was in my head.
• 9:53
  I was having sex from up here.
• 9:55
  The stimulation was in my head.
• 9:56
  I wasn't actually feeling my body.
• 9:58
  I wasn't feeling her body.
• 10:00
  I wasn't feeling how present she was.
• 10:01
  I wasn't feeling how present I was.
• 10:04
  And that was where so many of our challenges came from and maybe where so many of your challenges might be coming from.
• 10:11
  You know, what happens to dissatisfaction and a libido mismatch is kind of interesting.
• 10:16
  You know, I've talked with couples where, like I said, so many of them, one person wants more sex than the other.
• 10:22
  And sometimes it might be a genuine baseline difference in desire.
• 10:25
  And I don't want to pretend that like presence magically erases every libido mismatch.
• 10:30
  I don't know if that's going to happen.
• 10:32
  But here's what I've seen over and over again in so many relationships and so many men that I've worked with is that.
• 10:40
  When there's presence and when we attune into our bodies and we create intimacy with ourselves and then we stay present with the other person and we're in the moment, not like trying to get external stimulation and not thinking about what's next and not judging ourselves.
• 10:55
  For me, the sex became way more satisfying for so many men.
• 10:58
  That's what they've said.
• 10:59
  It's like so much more satisfying.
• 11:00
  They have so much more capacity for pleasure.
• 11:02
  They feel so much more.
• 11:04
  And we leave that encounter feeling further, not further, feeling fuller rather than wanting further experience, wanting something else, wanting something next.
• 11:16
  And for her, so often, sex becomes more connected.
• 11:21
  and less performative.
• 11:23
  Performative is the opposite of responsive.
• 11:26
  When you're performing sex, when you're trying to get it right, when you're trying to do it, you're not really present in the moment.
• 11:32
  You're leaving that moment.
• 11:34
  And for so many of us, when we leave the moment, our partner leaves the moment.
• 11:38
  And we're two disassociated people having sex because we're not present with each other.
• 11:42
  When we slow down and it's less performative and less transactional, what happens so often, and I've seen this over and over again, not once or twice, but tons of times now, when we are present and leading that interaction and holding space for the interaction and actually there and responding rather than reacting and performing,
• 12:09
  it becomes so much more fulfilling for both people.
• 12:11
  And it becomes something that in so many cases she genuinely wants to return to more often.
• 12:18
  And suddenly the question of frequency carries much less charge because when both of us are satisfied, not only is it not a rush to the next time, but the next time doesn't feel like a threat.
• 12:28
  It doesn't feel like putting up with something.
• 12:30
  It doesn't feel like objectification or obligation.
• 12:34
  And in some relationships, the mismatch can become dramatically less important or disappear altogether.
• 12:41
  Sometimes what looks like a disagreement about how much sex you're having may partly be a disagreement created by the quality of sex that you're having.
• 12:51
  Like that Esther Perel quote.
• 12:53
  You know, when...
• 12:55
  We aren't present when we are performing, when we have transactional, when sex is out of obligation.
• 13:02
  All of that does not feel good to the body.
• 13:05
  Yeah, there might be pleasure, there might even be orgasm, there might even be some level of connection, but all those things get in a way of us actually connecting with that person and feeling them and responding to them.
• 13:18
  And that's where sex becomes exciting and intriguing and fun and in the moment and fulfilling.
• 13:24
  And it creates confidence and presence and grounding everywhere in our lives.
• 13:30
  You know, the challenge, I think, not just in sex, but in life today, is that so many of us barely practice presence anywhere.
• 13:38
  Modern life today trains us to leave the moment.
• 13:43
  So much so that, you know, for years, I share this often, for years I...
• 13:47
  I worked with top producers, with people who ran multi-million dollar companies.
• 13:51
  A lot of them were millionaires and were successful by every measure.
• 13:56
  But if you told them to close their eyes and sit still in a chair for 10 minutes, they couldn't do it.
• 14:01
  If you told them to lay down on the ground in neutral and just do nothing, they felt anxiety and panic and like they needed something and they needed to do something else and they were broken and they couldn't do it.
• 14:13
  And it was like watching...
• 14:15
  people not be able to do nothing, to not be able to do nothing, actually like showed me just how trained we had become to needing constant stimulation and doing something all the time.
• 14:29
  You know, we look at, you look at your life today and we have our phones and there's notifications and there's content everywhere and we can work and we multitask and we're onto the next thing, the next hit of dopamine, the next distraction, the next thing we're looking at.
• 14:45
  slowing things down and understanding that if we walk into intimacy with that same fragmented attention, with that same need for novelty, need for new, inability to just hold ourselves in that space and be there,
• 15:02
  we actually start disassociating during sex.
• 15:05
  We're not really there.
• 15:06
  If you're thinking about what you're gonna do next, you're not really there.
• 15:09
  If you're thinking about what's going on for her not feeling it, you're not really there.
• 15:13
  If you're thinking about what's going on for you, like am I lasting long enough?
• 15:16
  Am I stimulated enough?
• 15:18
  Am I aroused enough?
• 15:21
  All of those things are taking you out of that moment, out of that presence, out of attunement, out of feeling, out of responsiveness.
• 15:27
  So one of the questions I started wrestling with was, do we disassociate during sex because we already disassociate everywhere else?
• 15:37
  Or does disassociation during sex cause us to even further disassociate everywhere else?
• 15:46
  To me, the distraction you feel in a board meeting may be the distraction you're allowing in your bedroom.
• 15:54
  And let that land.
• 15:57
  You know, like if we're in this intimate, pleasurable, connected experience and we're not really there, does that carry over into everywhere else in our lives?
• 16:07
  And if everywhere else in our lives we're not really there, does that carry over into here?
• 16:11
  Here's what I now know is that how you live affects how you have sex and learning how to have present life.
• 16:20
  responsive, connected, attuned sex will affect everywhere in how you live.
• 16:27
  Because what it's done for me is changed everything.
• 16:32
  It really has changed everything.
• 16:34
  It's made me a more present person with myself and with my feelings.
• 16:37
  It's made it...
• 16:40
  It's made attunement during sex has actually become like relational training for me with every person in the world that I know.
• 16:47
  Over time, during sex, by slowing things down and no longer performing and no longer transactionally approaching it and really breathing and feeling and staying in the moment,
• 17:00
  I learned how to stay connected while intensity increased.
• 17:04
  I learned how to feel another person instead of retreating out of my body and into my head.
• 17:10
  I learned how to feel myself instead of retreating into my body and into my head.
• 17:13
  I learned how to remain curious, to respond rather than execute or react, and to stay present when I didn't completely know what was going to happen next and just allow it to happen next.
• 17:26
  And here's what I know now after years of practicing this, after years of attunement with Katie, after spending time in intimacy with her and in connection with her without reacting, without performing, is that this is what relationship asks of me outside of the bedroom.
• 17:45
  You know, when you think about that.
• 17:48
  being present, being connected, remaining curious, not wondering about what's going to happen next, allowing it to happen next, not preparing your response before you've actually heard the person, not objecting to or raising the intensity when you don't need to.
• 18:02
  All of those things are what happens when we are intimate with another person and we're not connected and they happen over and over again in our lives.
• 18:10
  And what this has shown me and what this has trained in me is learning not to leave another person.
• 18:16
  Being present sexually made it easier for me to stay in conversations that previously made me want to escape, especially with Katie or with my daughters or with people that I work with.
• 18:28
  with other people, you know, I always wanted to escape when someone was upset or I felt uncomfortable or I felt accused or I disagreed or I wanted to explain or I wanted to get away from the feeling and often that like look like I'm bored with this conversation or this isn't necessary or this isn't important enough or this isn't getting anywhere.
• 18:47
  Instead of just being able to slow down and relate to the other person to respond instead of react to the other person.
• 18:54
  And instead of immediately disassociating in some way, you know, my go to was usually to raise intensity and get out of the situation.
• 19:00
  Or sometimes I would withdraw and shut down and like not be present in the situation.
• 19:05
  But either way, you're leaving that conversation.
• 19:07
  You're leaving yourself.
• 19:08
  You're leaving the relationship.
• 19:10
  And what this has shown me is instead of immediately disconnected to stay.
• 19:15
  to feel myself, to understand what's going on, to remain aware of the other person that I'm with, to understand what's happening, to respond with presence instead of reacting, instead of just what's coming up for me, to respond with presence.
• 19:29
  Learning not to leave myself changed my relationship with myself.
• 19:34
  Learning not to leave Katie when we were intimate changed my relationship with everybody I know, with everybody I interact with.
• 19:43
  You know, I feel like,
• 19:45
  a lot of what I focused on learning was about sex.
• 19:49
  But what I really learned was
• 19:52
  that this is way bigger than just sex.
• 19:55
  This is way bigger for so many of us than just the act of having sex with somebody.
• 20:02
  Because if you have sex regularly, or maybe not regularly, but you feel like you're not getting enough and it's dissatisfying, and it's not where you want it to be, the answer may not be more sex or more frequency or more stimulation or more technique.
• 20:22
  The answer may be, was I actually present?
• 20:26
  Was I connected?
• 20:27
  Was I attuned to her?
• 20:29
  Was I really feeling my body or was I thinking about what was going to happen next?
• 20:33
  Did we experience this together or was it two people disassociating and then having an experience?
• 20:40
  Did I experience fulfillment and a feeling of grounding and presence and love and connection or just release?
• 20:48
  And then zoom out because this level of presence is capacity.
• 20:54
  Every time we practice presence, we're more capable of it.
• 20:58
  Every time we leave ourselves and leave each other, that's a pattern too that will perpetuate throughout our lives.
• 21:05
  And so when it comes to having sex, slow things down.
• 21:11
  In the Brotherhood, we talk about slow is fast and fast is slow.
• 21:16
  When you slow things down and you're not in a rush and you're feeling and you're communicating and you're understanding each other and you're attuning to each other, you're breathing together, you're feeling each other, that slowness is what creates connection.
• 21:32
  And that slowness is what creates presence.
• 21:34
  And slow does not mean boring.
• 21:37
  slow does not mean it's not exciting.
• 21:39
  Slow does not mean it's not intense.
• 21:41
  In fact, like slowing things down and getting connected to where it feels more present, more exciting, more intense, you know, slow is fast and fast is slow.
• 21:50
  The more that you do that, the more intensity there is and more pleasure there is, the more you increase your capacity for both intensity and pleasure.
• 21:57
  And when you are able to stay present and experience intensity
• 22:08
  the ability, the capacity to experience intensity and pleasure everywhere in your life that so many of us have forgotten.
• 22:15
  So many of us want to distract ourselves from our actual life, from the intensity, from the excitement, from the pleasure, from the things that are around us, getting quick dopamine hits and release.
• 22:27
  And instead, when we practice presence and attunement, it carries over into everywhere.
• 22:32
  Like I said, how you live affects how you have sex, and how you learn to have sex can affect everything in how you live.
• 22:41
  And this has completely changed my life.
• 22:45
  It's not the easiest thing to talk about.
• 22:47
  This is uncomfortable.
• 22:48
  We don't talk about sex.
• 22:49
  We don't talk about intimacy.
• 22:51
  We don't talk about, for years of my life, I was having sex in a way that was disassociated and disconnected and not good for me and not good for her.
• 22:59
  But when we do and we start to actually communicate around it and have real conversations and stay present and stay in the moment and respond and attune.
• 23:13
  In my experience for me, it changed absolutely every relationship in my life for the better.
• 23:19
  And maybe most importantly, my relationship with myself for the better.
• 23:22
  And I feel more connected and in love and turned on and excited by Katie that I have in our entire lives.
• 23:30
  And we've been together for 22 years.
• 23:31
  So...
• 23:35
  I feel like the question isn't how do I get more sex?
• 23:37
  The question is how much of the sex, intimacy, and connection already available to me am I present enough to experience?
• 23:46
  Answer that second question and I think you'll feel more capacity, more joy, more fulfillment, more pleasure, and more excitement everywhere in your life.
• 23:54
  I know that's what happened for me.
• 23:56
  And if you're a man who's listening to this and you relate to this and you want to move in this direction and learn more and understand more about yourself and your body and get into your body and be able to hold containment and be present with the world around you and achieve the life you've always wanted, go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
• 24:15
  We'll help you not just improve your relationship.
• 24:18
  That's like the first step.
• 24:19
  That's the initiation.
• 24:20
  That is like the practice of containment happens there, but we will help you improve everything in your lives.
• 24:28
  In teaching this information, in teaching masculine containment to men and showing them how to have more capacity, more intimacy, better sex, better relationship, I've seen them earn more, have record months in their lives, get better jobs, experience so much more fulfillment, more excitement, improve their relationships with their immediate family, with their parents, with their kids.
• 24:48
  It changes everything.
• 24:50
  So go to thebrotherhoodsociety.com.
• 24:52
  It'd be my honor to meet you in person and to walk this path with you.
• 24:56
  And thank you so much for being a podcast listener.
• 24:58
  I appreciate you.