Whether you’re getting busy between the sheets or have a slightly lagging libido, here’s a strategy to add fire and pleasure to your sex life that you may not have thought of: meditation.
“Your state of mind has a huge influence on your level of sexual satisfaction,” says Jill Blakeway, director of The Yinova Center and author of the new book Sex Again: Recharging your Libido, which offers modern ways to apply ancient wisdom and practices to your sexcapades and comes with an accompanying six-week sex-boosting plan.
“Women would tell me they get distracted during sex, that they’re going over their to-do list in their heads,” Blakeway explains. (Can you relate?) “I realized that it’s about mindfulness, and by training people to be mindful, I start training them to enjoy sex more. And studies have verified that meditation can quiet the mental chatter that keeps women from enjoying sex fully.”
And, it turns out that daydreaming about tomorrow’s big meeting while getting it on is nothing new. Blakeway found that many of the ancient strategies for enhancing sexual pleasure in Taoist, Tai Chi, and Qigong traditions addressed that very problem.So how do you calm the chatter and focus more on foreplay?
“The exercises designed to enhance sexual pleasure were about helping to maintain mental focus; they’re more like meditation techniques than just sexercises,” she says.
They also teach you to circulate your energy, or chi, in a way that allows sensation to travel way beyond your sex organs. “It means that orgasms become a much more full body experience,” says Blakeway. “The Taoists were training people to have much deeper, profound, whole body orgasms. The ancient texts have nine levels of orgasm.” Um…sign us up, please?
Thankfully, the meditations that Blakeway outlines in the book—like breathing exercises and visualizations—are all simple and doable—even for meditation newbies. And she shared one of her favorites, The Loop, with us, so that you can get started right away.
If it still seems a little too Tantric, you can start with this super simple meditation. “Spend five minutes per day thinking about sex,” says Blakeway. “Where your mind goes, your chi will follow.”
—Lisa Elaine Held
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