the case for masturbation

After the smashing and unexpected success of this week’s what if wednesday, What IF: I Start Making Sex a Priority? I have decided that the topic certainly warrants some major elaboration. For example? I didn’t even broach the topic of masturbation in the original post, and, well, ahem, masturbation is kind of crucial.

Now as women, we are overall conditioned not to talk about our sexual needs, and certainly not expected to be agents to our own sexuality, making demands and taking things [literally] into our own hands should there not be a willing suitor nearby. Or simply because we feel like it, suitor or not. Even in the era of Sex and The City and Blogging Dangerously, masturbation is still a topic that makes people, lets say, twitchy. As in, they start looking over their shoulders and making sure no one that they know is within earshot, before conspiratorially whispering about their new favorite sex toy.

The reality is: if sex is important, and we are all busy people with big, busy lives, sometimes we need to just get the job done ourselves.

Masturbation is important for a VARIETY of reasons, but these are the most important:

1. How the HECK are you supposed to know all of the many things that bring you pleasure if you don’t experiment?! This is crucial, because, seriously, there are many, many, many exciting things you could be taking part in. How are you supposed to know what you like? You could experiment with a partner, but if you are a bit of a control freak like me – maybe you feel the need to just, you know, test the waters, before making a bunch of promises you might not want to follow through with. Try it out. Take your time. Have fun.
2. Knowing what you like makes it much easier to communicate your desires to others. And we all agree that communication is the lynchpin for creating sex positive experiences, right? Right. Knowing what you like can ease a lot of that, erm… no, not there, no maybe, yeah right there, no wait.. kind of conversations.
3. Sometimes your partner is busy or there is no partner in sight. Should that keep you from having an orgasm if you want one? Absolutely not. We are all busy, and sometimes our schedules just don’t quite gel. But does that mean we should allow ourselves to become all stressed out and sexually frustrated? No no no no no.
4. Sometimes.. [and I almost feel like I need to whisper this lest it should be considered a betrayal] you just want to get off without all the rigmarole of involving our partners. Selfish? Perhaps. Crucial if you’re in a time crunch? Yep. Easier? Sometimes. It’s true, sometimes it’s easier to just kind of get in and get out and get on with your day.
5. You can play with all the toys you want, and you don’t have to ask anyone’s permission. Ha. But it’s so true. You are free to have sex your way, according to your fantasies, utilizing all [or none - if that's your style] of your favorite sex toys. Speaking of which – What are you favorite toys for masturbation? I’m not much of a toy girl myself, but I love sex toy stores and watching all of the awkward purchasing and clerk/customer interactions.

So what do you guys think? How important is masturbation to your perception of healthy living? On a scale of one to ten?

I’m going to go with a solid seven eight.

Tagged as: masturbation, relationships, sex, sex positive, sex positive culture, sex toys