The Blowfish Blog

Couple’s Couch: Having vs. Wanting

I’ve been thinking about sex a lot lately. To be more precise, I’ve been thinking about what happens to my body when a regular moment somehow magically becomes one that holds the whispered promise that sex is near. My pulse quickens. Blood swirls into my temples and warms my ears, down into my belly, and deep into my clit. My mind starts racing with the possibilities of what is to come.

Will the sex feel as good as it did last time—or the first time? When I come, what will my lover be doing? Saying? What toys will we use? Will I be able to hold myself back from spending the whole evening consumed in the moment?

In The House at Pooh Corner, the author A.A. Milne penned that for Winnie the Pooh, “Although eating honey was a very good thing to do, there was a moment just before you began to eat it which was better than when you were, but he didn’t know what it was called.”

I do. That moment is called “desire.” It is called the “moment of wanting.” What Pooh Bear knew for certain and we all know intrinsically from experience is that the anticipation of the most gratifying moments is almost always better than the moment itself.

With sex, the wanting is arguably the least celebrated aspect of the interaction. And yet, the wanting is often the most powerful. Consider what thoughts race through your mind when you see a lover’s tongue about to make contact with your nipple. Savor that awareness for a moment. Think about moments where the anticipation of touch was so strong that your body actually trembled, a moment where you felt your body become aroused. Potent stuff.

If you take a minute to remember what happened after those moments of anticipation, you may find that the burning hot memories get a little bit fuzzy once the sex has gotten underway. We remember the chase of a lover, the first kiss, the initial taste, the very moment where our bodies come together as if the whole dance around sexuality was more about the build up than the actual act.

But, what am I saying? That the wanting is more important than the having?

This isn’t a trick. I’m not trying to talk you out of having the sex that you crave any more than I want to diminish your moments of wanting in any other areas of life.

When we think about the act of wanting, however, it begs the question what we are wanting for? In the case of sex, I’m sure many would agree that we want the pleasure that comes from contact. But what else do we want? To feel adored? Fulfilled? To have orgasms? To feel pushed and pulled beyond ourselves? Do we not also want to feel as if we, ourselves, are wanted?

I’m not suggesting that feeling wanted will eliminate our desire for sex. We ain’t that easy! But I wonder what it would be like if we allowed ourselves to feel the depth of our wanting for what it is. It would take a radical form of self-acceptance to look into our desire and ask ourselves what it is that we are truly aching for.

I think the difficulty in digging into desire is fear of what we might find underneath. When I look into my “need” to have sex an X-number of times a week, I come eye to eye with the truth that the sex itself is not what I am asking for. If I needed the orgasms, I’m deadly certain that I can take care of that on my own, thank you very much. If it was the closeness or intensity, I’m getting that all week long in other forms. The same goes for nudity, for caressing, and for connection. What is it that I mean when I say I want sex, then?

I, personally, want to feel like someone wants me enough to take me out of my analytical, over-worked brain and force me to pay attention to my inner body. I want to relinquish control over myself and feel taken and swept-up and free. This is what wanting sex is for me. When I feel aroused, this is the feeling that fuels me.

But why go through the trouble of finding out what is “behind our desire” at all? Well, given the increasing levels of marital and relationship discord often centered around issues of sex, I believe we need to face up to the fact that we do not always get what we want. Not even close.

If we are willing to concede that what we really want from our lovers goes far beyond the ins and outs of sex, then we do not have to stand around in skimpy panties getting cold waiting for fulfillment to fall into our laps. We could then go about the business of finding ways to think about those feelings, to act upon them in some other way, or to talk about them with ours lover and take care of our relationship instead of feeling weighed down by the elements that we cannot change.

We are used to focusing on the getting, the having. What if we were able to shift our focus back to our core, back to our desire, and really question what is inside of our wanting. If Pooh is right, and I believe that he is, the wanting in and of itself can be even sweeter than the reward.

— Rebekah Skoor, MA

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This entry was posted on Thursday, 7 February 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.