And just as importantly, what turns YOU on?
When being sexual with our partner/s, it’s normal for partners to have different agendas for what they want from the sexual encounter. It can help reduce conflict if partners are willing to discuss what they are hoping for from a sexual encounter and can reduce a lot of anxiety and hurt and hard feelings if partners can accept that they might have different agendas.
Learning about the different arousal styles and being open and flexible can increase our enjoyment and our ability to adapt to complications that might interfere with our sex life.
Let’s talk about the different types of sexual arousal styles partners might experience, prefer, or be seeking in a sexual encounter.
Partner Interaction Arousal:
In this type of arousal, our focus is on our partner/s. We are active, eyes open, looking at the partner, talking with them in a romantic or erotic way, and engaged energetically. This is the kind of sexual style we’re most likely to see in tv and movies: Passionate and impulsive. This is often a stereotypically male style of arousal.
Self-Entrancement Arousal:
In this type of arousal, we are focused on facilitating our own arousal. Often our eyes are closed, and we are focused inward, being quiet and mindful while we focus on our bodily sensations. We might be focusing on how it feels to touch ourselves, or how it feels to be touched, or how it feels to touch our partner. Often, we use well-practiced types of touch that we have experienced during masturbation or previous encounters with our partner. Often our partner/s find observing us during self-entrancement arousal to be arousing. This is a stereotypically female type of arousal.
Role Enactment Arousal:
This type of arousal focuses on role-play, fantasy, variety, and experimentation with new activities and experiences. It might include dressing up, trying on different roles, acting out a scene from a movie, trying out having sex in new locations, or using toys or erotic materials to enhance our playfulness.
Why should I care about this?
If we communicate with our partner/s about our arousal styles, we can create more pleasure by attending to what everyone is looking for in the sexual encounter. If your partner gets off on watching you masturbate, you won't know unless they tell you, or unless you ask! If you really want your partner to try out a fantasy you've had in mind for a while, the best way to make it reality is to tell them! If we expect our partner to automatically know what we want, or to magically figure it out somehow, we're probably going to be disappointed.
We are each responsible for our own pleasure. If we don't know what we want, don't talk about it with our partner/s, and don't go after it, we're missing out on pleasure. Talk to your partner, and then get busy using what you've learned about what each of you wants!
We can also get the mistaken idea that we're sexually incompatible with our partners if we have different arousal styles or if our partner doesn't automatically know what we want. If we understand the different styles, and that it's okay if we have different styles than our partner/s, and that we might want different styles in different sexual encounters, we can figure out creative ways to bridge those differences. Let yourself feel secure in the fact that you and your partner/s are different people who enjoy different things, and that's okay. Explore the many wonderful ways that you and your partner/s can experience pleasure together!
Ask yourself these questions...even better, talk about them with your partner!
What types of arousal are you most likely to pursue and experience in your sexual encounters?
What about your partner/s?
How do you think you/your partner/s learned to pursue this/these styles?
What differences do you notice when you’re engaging in the different styles?
What type/s of arousal would I like to experiment more with?
How am I going to explore these arousal styles with my partner?
Need help having these conversations?
Check out the AASECT (American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists) Provider Directory and connect with a Couples Sex Therapist who can help guide you through these conversations.
Prefer to do it on your own? Check out Dr. Tammy Nelson's book, Getting the Sex You Want, for activities and step-by-step conversations to help you communicate with your partner and get the sex you both want.