Article written by Le Floc’h Pauline & Gendreau Alexane. M2 PCPI
The components of optimal sexuality: A portrait of “great sex”
We decided to work on a study about optimal sexuality conducted by a team of researcher from the University of Ottawa. Their aim was to develop a useful conceptual model of optimal sexuality by identifying and describing its main components.
Why conducting such a study ? (The purpose)
Their desire to conceptualize the components of optimal sex emerged for several reasons. Back in 2009, there were very few focus on what they call “great sex” and what can lead to it, the main researches were dealing with sexual dysfunctions and the problematics linked to sexuality. This lack of clinical knowledge led them to wonder what would be considered as “optimal sexuality” (meaning beyond functional, positive or good). Also, loads of these researchers had patients who were referred to them in order to treat low desire or sexual desire discrepancy. What kind of sex would be worth wanting, they wondered. They first asked their patients themselves, to describe their greatest sexual experiences. A lot of them recalled souvenirs whose happened even before ever experiencing genital contact, souvenirs from their teenage years, leaving the researchers to wonder not only what optimal sexuality would be but also what “sex” would refer to in people’s representations.
Most books or magazines put the emphasis on performance, technique, novelty, spontaneity and incredible orgasms as the route to great sex. These beliefs can create anxiety, shame and guilt, and marginalize people who have a different experience. Their will was also to gather new knowledge in order to help and contradict speculations and unrealistic expectations about sex, and their detrimental effects.
How did they do ? (Method & participants )
In order to do so, they decided to conduct semi-structured interviews with key informants recruited by announcements. These latter were mentioning the term “great” sex which the authors thought to be a bias considering its non neutrality. They had been put in several different places depending on whom they wanted to interview (community groups for elders, through listservs for self identified people belonging to sexual minorities and also through listservs for sex therapists and researchers).
This recrutment led to a sample organized like so :
- 25 elders
- 20 sex therapists
- 19 self identified members of sexual minoritiy groups.
The interviews were then conducted over the phone. The questions asked were, for example, about the common features of their best sexual experiences, and how they would distinguish “good sex” from “great sex”.
What did they find out? (Results)
The authors underlined 8 major components,
- Being present, focused and embodied
Being fully and completely present during sexual experiences was a component articulated first by most of the participants. Concretely, it implies to be totally absorbed in the moment, without having anything else in mind, being fully aware of the sensations being experienced at the time, “having an intense focus on what’s happening right here, right now that just excludes everything else”.
2. Connection, alignment, merger, being in synch
A key component of great sex is having a strong connection with one sexual partner, regardless of the duration of the relationship.
Some participants mentioned the “energy”, the “alignment” experienced among and between partners, “not being able to tell when I stop and they start”. They mentioned the feeling of connection as a merger with another person, like a “loss of personal boundaries”.
Good and clear boundaries, self-knowledge and self-acceptance are essential to reach this level of connection.
3. deep sexual and erotic intimacy
the relationship had to include deep mutual respect, caring, genuine acceptance and admiration. This intimacy is an aspect of the relationship, participants basically defined facets of love, without using that term (caring, feeling loved and wanted, accepted, cherished). A major component of that intimacy is trust, described by many as a necessary prerequisite for the experience of great sex.
4. Extraordinary communication, heightened empathy
This two aspects were crucial for the experience of great sex. Participants emphasized complete and total sharing of themselves, verbally and non-verbally, with their partners before, during and after sex. They emphasized the importance of real attention and “paying attention to little things”.
5. Authenticity, being genuine, uninhibited, transparency
Participants valued the freedom of being relentlessly honest with themselves and totally transparent with their sexual partners. For some of them, letting go and being unhibited made great sex possible.
Participants said that this freedom left them completely emotionally naked with another person.
Some of them mentioned that in order to become authentic and genuine, they first had to acknowledge the inadequacy of existing sexual scripts and rules. They felt able to be truer with themselves once they had rejected previous constricting beliefs.
6. Transparence, bliss, peace, transformation, healing
When descripting an exceptional sexual experience, many participants mentioned the experiences of transcendence and personal transformation. Participants described moments of bliss, peace, awe, ecstasy and soulfulness. They often reported a sense of timelessness during great sex, as if the notion of time disappeared. They described this feeling akin to the experience of meditation.
7. Exploration, interpersonal risk taking, fun
Participants described great sex as an adventure and an opportunity to discover things about themselves and their partners. They enhanced the importance of interpersonal risk-taking and exploration, in a context of play and fun. Laughters and humour was vital for many, in order to allow exploration and risk-taking. Many participants likened great sex to an ongoing “discovery process”, exploration or journey where it was necessary to continually push and expand the personal sexual boundaries of each.
8. Vulnerability and surrender
Participants believed that “giving oneself”, letting oneself be vulnerable and surrendering to a partner were prerequisites aspects of great sex. This is the consequence of being authentic and genuine, leading to “being able to put your entire being in somebody else’s hands”. Several participants identified this ability to “go with the flow” and surrender as a particularly desirable attribute in their partners.
What to keep in mind from all of this ? (Conclusion)
Overall, the participants emphasized the uniqueness of their answers, the fact that their sayings were to consider only “for them”. However, even though they all differed completely concerning their sexual orientations, age, relationship status, level of physical abilities and sexual functioning, their answers were rather similar. What is to keep in mind from this study is that “great sex” has very little to do with proper physiological functioning nor with some kind of secret techniques. It would mainly be about intrapsychic and interpersonal elements, the ones mentioned above.
For clinicians, these news are at the same time good news and bad news. The authors suggested it was good news seing that “normal sexuality is not a prerequisite to great sex” but at the same time bad news, considering treating one patient’s sexual dysfunctions is not necessarily going to help him have a sex “worth wanting” and solve his sexual problems.
What’s been underlined is that the major components had to do mostly with the relationship established between the partners above everything else, meaning that the therapists will need to learn how to help couples create relationships that are safe enough to allow the partners to be vulnerable and authentic with each other.
To finish, it was important for the authors to warn everyone that this article is not to set the sexual performance’s bar higher. On the contrary, “everyone who experience optimal sexuality have learned to ignore conventional performance expectations in order to listen to and take responsability for their own’s heart’s desires.”
Through our reading, we learned some new words, you can find the translations below:
- merger – fusionnement
- listserv – liste de diffusion
- bliss – béatitude
- embodied – incarné
- awe – admiration
- akin – proche de