Have self-respect
Learning to love ourselves is simultaneously an identity and existential quest. Without liking ourselves, it is difficult to fully savour and enjoy life.Restoring and developing self-respect is a decision to grow up, to agree to become singular and autonomous, to free ourselves from the judgement of others, while being grateful for what we have received and from what we became. It is a personal maturation.It is about looking at ourselves with benevolence and indulgence, learning to accept and to like ourselves with our imperfections and qualities. It is to accept our individuality, both light and dark sides.A fulfilled sexuality begins with this: learning to like ourselves, including sexually, to share this love with our partner in intimacy and pleasure. The intimacy thus comes later: when we feel “safe” enough to show ourselves as we are to the other; openly, without mask nor false pretence.I invite you, every day, to look in the mirror and find three positive aspects of your body - three parts that you like - and focus on them for a few moments.
Know your body
Sexuality is an intimate learning esperience. It builds itself slowly, through the exploration, listening and the recognition of your needs and desires. And it is expressed by the body throughout life.This progress requires curiosity, courage and motivation, without negative judgement of yourself (which is not easy to achieve). Only then can you pay less attention to protection, let go and stop “controlling yourself” or watching your gestures and so on during the contact with your partner.Every woman is different and has her own erogenous zones. It’s up to each of you to discover what gives you some pleasure. You can guide your companion provided that you have explored your body already.
Listen to your sensations
Your body is an excellent indicator of what you feel deep inside yourself in relation to your environment. The more time you take to observe your sensations, the more refined they will become and the better you will feel. It enables you to settle, refocus and welcome what takes place inside you..The abdominal breath is a natural breath that most of us don’t practice anymore. Experience it. Every day, even for three minutes, sit or lay down and take time to breathe quietly using the stomach. Take several deep breaths and become aware of contact points of your body with the ground or the armchair. Continue to breathe. After a while, you will feel that the contact points are becoming zones of contact that are going to widen little by little, as the contact area increases with the relaxation. Stay quietly on the lookout for all the sensations that you also perceive internally.
Make peace with your past
In our sexuality, lies all our stories: the story of ourselves and our history with others. It replays ceaselessly, often without our knowledge.I invite you to revisit your story, your sex education, your wounds, your various love affairs, your parental models.The good news is that, whatever your story, there is always a way to repair what was hurt or damaged to develop or find fluidity, well-being and fulfilment.But, in some cases, it requires a real approach of personal fulfilment, even a therapy.
Forget false beliefs
Women, hardly rehabilitated in their right to have a body and to decide what they want to do with it, are again dispossessed of it in the name of performance, the latest trends, draconian aesthetic models, diets, surgery (including genital), or sexual practices.
Here are two examples of preconceived ideas:- Sex would have to be good every time! No, we don’t always have a 5-star orgasm! Indeed, they are rather rare. Do you make a gastronomic meal every day?! It is like everything, there are little ones, big ones, short ones, long ones and flops. The advantage is that we can start again when we want and it is free.- We have to have the orgasm at the same time... No! We all have different rhythms. According to the moment, according to the excitement. The simultaneous orgasm is a double constraint. First, we have to have an orgasm! And moreover, we have to have it at the same time!
Desire to please vs sexual desire
A number of women, particularly young women, often confuse the desire to please with sexual desire.The sexual desire means to have sexual pleasure; adducing, even breaking (faiths, taboos, education), at first for ourselves and then for our partner. The desire to please corresponds to the desire to be watched, to be chosen.By focusing on the desire to please, we become lost because we disconnect from our being and our sensations.
Communicate well with your partner
It is about daring to tell your partner what you want, what gives you pleasure. When I accompany some women in an approach of responsibility and autonomy regarding their sexuality, I invite them to tell to their partner what they don’t like, to name what they want, in the tenderness and the complicity, without requirements or blame, to express what excites them.The sexual agreement is a co-responsibility, in the shared intimacy and thus from regular mutual adjustments. It sometimes asks for efforts and especially to dare to speak about it, to communicate.
Maintain the desire
The desire (as the sexuality) does not come alone. Spontaneous desire is rare, incidental or passionate: a new meeting, a particular event, menstrual cycle time. Wishing that it comes automatically or instinctively when we live together, is somewhat unrealistic.Conversely, the desire can be built up, called on, provoked, cultivated, fed, reinvented… As for fire, it requires to be fed by its evocation, its preparation and its steady realisation.Cultivating small habits, like compliments, is necessary to perpetuate the desire in the relationship. The desire is already very mysterious; subdued in so many hazards as it is advisable to take care of it, together.
Indulge yourself
Take time every day to please yourself, however small; whether it is a five-minute break to breathe, gaze out the window, listen to some music, dance, see a good movie, read a novel, go in for sport, apply some cream to your body, go shopping, play, eat something sweet, call a person that you love...List your desires on paper and realise one of them each day. And not necessarily when all your chores are finished... The household is less important than you! Respecting your desires is as important as respecting your needs because it means respecting the alive person within you.The same applies to sexuality. Do not assume that your partner knows or can guess what pleases you, you have to discover it and give it to yourself first. And then, share it with him.
Develop your imagination
This means daring to look at what moves and exhilarates you; read comics, erotic books, go through magazines and let go yourself by dreaming. Why not participate in an erotic writing workshop? It is about (re) starting the processes of desire and excitement, but also maintaining them.
