The Way to Love Your Wife: Creating Greater Love and Passion in the Bedroom (Paperback)

Chapter One

This Isn't the NCAA

Georgetown and UCLA are in the college basketball finals. The players are hyped, the coaches are hopeful and anxious. You, having put your dibs on Georgetown, have planned your day around the event.

Every time Georgetown scores, you're off the sofa with excitement. The tension builds. The fourth quarter ends with a tie, and the battle moves into overtime. Then a second overtime. Finally Georgetown scores, the buzzer sounds, the game is over, and your team is the winner.

You are a winner-your team won!

That night you get into bed with your wife, and you want to be a winner again.

In other words, you try to score.

Your wife's sexual responses are the baskets you make. The faster and more often you get a response, the more your excitement builds. You go for the hot spots-you manipulate and maneuver in order to gain points.

If there's no response, you get tense, frustrated. You're playing by the rules, aren't you? It doesn't seem fair. As soon as you figure out the rules, she changes them!

The harder you try, the worse things get. You're desperate. After all, if you were a real man, you could bring your wife to orgasm, more than one orgasm. If you can't, she's a loser-and so are you.

SEXUAL COMPETITIVENESS IN THE MAKING

Early Input

When did this game of winning and losing at sex really start?

Your father may have been filled with pride when, at 21 months, you could catch the green sponge football or tap the keys on his computer. "He seems so coordinated," Dad said, or, "He's exceptionally bright!" Someday, he secretly hoped, you'd make the family proud by tackling for the NFL or developing the next "killer app" software.

A few years later it was T-ball, soccer, or using your own computer. You heard Daddy tell Grandpa on the telephone about your catch, your two runs, or your amazing skill at chess. The message was coming through loud and clear: To feel good about yourself, you have to score, hit, catch, run, block, and rush. You have to win!

Most girls, meanwhile, were spending their early years differently. While most boys were playing a competitive game or wishing they were, girls pursued less competitive, more process-oriented activities like dance or music. Some girls were active in sports, but tended to talk while they played-making it less of a battle and more of a social event.

Maybe you weren't into sports, either-and your parents weren't obsessed with winning. Still, you probably saw the competition around you and either disdained it or measured yourself against it. Chances are those comparisons helped to form your self-image.

Puberty and Beyond

In middle school and high school, perhaps you continued to compete. Maybe you didn't go out for a team, but still went to games or saw them on TV. Whether you played or watched, the stakes were high. In everything from swimming to track to wrestling, the point was to score.

If you went to college, maybe you kept playing or watching. Or your interest may have shifted to other arenas-competing for the best grade in chemistry, the lead role in the play, the prettiest girlfriend, the winning vote in a student body election. In the working world you started to vie for the highest pay, the most impressive title.

Competing, achieving, arriving, scoring, hunting, and winning are natural inclinations for men. It's no different when it comes to the sexual, romantic part of life.

IS SCORING WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT?

We're amazed how often we hear this complaint from women: "It really bugs me when I'm cooking dinner or washing dishes and he comes and grabs me sexually."

What's that man trying to accomplish?

He's trying to be a winner. He thinks that to be a winner, he has to score; to score, he has to get her parts to respond.

That line of reasoning seems to start during dating. Guys ask each other questions like these:

"How far did you go?"

"How much did you get?"

"Did you get to third base?"

"Did you score?"

The assumption is that a man should push a woman as far as she will go. The further he can get her to go, the more of a winner he is.

Not true! Sex is not about achieving or scoring.

You Don't Win by Pushing for More

Before marriage, the man who pushes sexually puts the woman in the role of limit-setter. If you pushed to touch breasts or genitals, she had to draw the line. If you crossed it, you taught her to resist. Even if arousal allowed her to go along, she may have experienced sadness and pain afterward. She felt she'd given in to you.

A man who pushed for more before marriage is likely to continue the same approach after the wedding. He pushes for as much as he can get, yet senses that he isn't getting what really satisfies.

The goal-oriented approach won't lead to greater love, passion, or intimacy. Sex is about relating-not about conquering, achieving, or scoring.

Ultimately, goal-oriented sex doesn't score anyway. It doesn't even get you to first base. True gratification doesn't come from how fast or how often you get your wife to agree, to get aroused, to get you aroused, to reach an orgasm, or to have more than one orgasm.

That kind of sex leaves one or both lovers disappointed. For example, when you grab your wife's sexual parts because that feels good to you or you hope to get her interested in sex, she'll be turned off. In contrast, the woman who's attended and listened to, who feels cherished and adored, who's affirmed and pleasured will invite more touching and more intensity.

IT'S NOT WHETHER YOU WIN OR LOSE; IT'S HOW YOU PLAY THE GAME

Love, passion, and intimacy are never about winning or losing; they're about how you play the game. In sex, you need to go for the Mr. Congeniality Award rather than the Most Valuable Player.

Great sex requires a total shift in attitude from your natural instincts. A woman doesn't want to be a conquest or a win chalked up. Since the man is never truly satisfied unless the woman is, he has to move from his results-oriented approach to the process orientation of the woman. He has to learn to soak in the beautiful movements and harmony of the symphony instead of going for the winning of his team.

That shift isn't easy. "It is natural for us to want to show affection. But for some mysterious reason, we equate tenderness with sentimentality, weakness and vulnerability. We seem to be as fearful to give as to receive it," wrote Leo Buscaglia.

No wonder it's such a struggle for a man to feel good about himself in his relationship with his wife and in his relationship with God. Men want to win, but relationships require a completely different approach.

You don't have to be a slave to the drive to score. You don't have to suffer the pressure, demands, and self-consciousness that results-oriented sex brings. You don't have to detach yourself from the good feelings of the moment.

In our practice of sexual therapy, we find that as couples learn to focus on the process of pleasure-rather than on the results of stimulation-they feel less demand. They're not merely satisfied; they're deeply fulfilled.

That's why, in the chapters that follow, we emphasize a focus on pleasure rather than on stimulation. If you want to have a mutually ecstatic sexual experience, you won't be trying to have one. You'll be attending to mutual pleasure.

To find out how that can happen in your marriage, read on.

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