Thu, 13 Nov 2014
Psychotherapist Esther Perel gave an excellent talk at TED about maintaining sexual desire. In essence, long term couples needs to reconcile 2 opposite needs - love and desire. Love is associated with security, safety, dependability, permanence. Desire, in direct contrast, is fuelled by things like adventure, mystery, risk, journey. The raw materials of desire are readily available in the early stages of a relationship, as you are still discovering your partner, but as the relationship matures, love (security, dependability, permanence) sets up and surprise and discovery can be forgotten. If your partner feels they know every room in your personality, and there is nothing left to discover, love maybe strong, but the “erotic élan” (sexual energy) between you is probably spent.
It is also important to note that Perel asserts that the “crisis of desire is often a crisis of the imagination”, which is an indication that much of eroticism comes through the way your brain interprets your environment and relationships. Along these lines, adventure, mystery, novelty and the unknown is referring to the relationship generally rather than new sexual techniques or lingerie.
In good ways, slowly and regularly introduce more adventure, surprise or imagination into your interactions with your partner. Develop a skill, pursue a passion. Don’t become 100% erratic, but don’t make your daily interactions so predictable it becomes boring. Strengthen and develop other identities outside your one as a loving partner - remember fire needs air, and desire needs space to develop. Just like a fire needs the wood not-too-close and not-too-far, sexual attraction in couples needs the right balance between love and desire.
