Speaker 1: Pushkin hi, and I'm going in. I have a question
Speaker 1: for you. The other day I realized I haven't masturbated
Speaker 1: in like six months, and I just don't feel like
Speaker 1: my old self. You know, I get this question all
Speaker 1: the time, and mostly people expect me to say things like, oh,
Speaker 1: watch more porn and use fuzzy handcuffs. But actually the
Speaker 1: answer is sexual interest changes all the time and it
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that there's anything wrong at all. And instead
Speaker 1: of worrying about how sexual interest comes and goes, can
Speaker 1: we focus instead on whether or not you're experiencing pleasure
Speaker 1: in your life. I'm Emmilinagaski and this is the Come
Speaker 1: as you Are podcast, where I answer questions about sex
Speaker 1: with science. In this episode, I want to introduce you
Speaker 1: to a really simple, but radical shift in the way
Speaker 1: we think about sexual interest. Pop culture teaches us it's
Speaker 1: all about getting turned on. Movies and TV portrayals of
Speaker 1: sexual desire have led us to a collective misunderstanding about
Speaker 1: how horniness really works, as in, how it works in
Speaker 1: our brains. So today we're going to talk about the
Speaker 1: real way horniness works. It's called the dual control model,
Speaker 1: and it is, in my opinion, one of the single
Speaker 1: most important, most life changing pieces of research on human sexuality.
Speaker 1: I'm going to be answering a listener's question today, and
Speaker 1: bringing me that question is my producer mo I'm hey, Emily.
Speaker 1: Here we are. It's our very first episode of the
Speaker 1: Come As You Are Podcast. How are you feeling about it?
Speaker 1: It's thrilling. Are you thrilled? I'm thrilled. I'm feeling really good.
Speaker 1: I also just feel really lucky to be on this
Speaker 1: show with you. Like one, I'm, you know, sematically incapable
Speaker 1: of chill, like I'm a very overeager person. But also
Speaker 1: it's very special for me to get to work with you,
Speaker 1: in particular because I read your book Come As You
Speaker 1: Are when I was in college. I went to the
Speaker 1: University of North Carolina UNC Chapel Hill, and your book
Speaker 1: was something I found on a suggested reading list, I
Speaker 1: think in a women's studies course, and I just fell
Speaker 1: in love with the message of your book, and I
Speaker 1: kept Come As You Are on my mantelpiece in my
Speaker 1: like off campus college house as a symbol for everyone
Speaker 1: that came over to my house that like, I own
Speaker 1: my body and I'm having sex for me and I'm
Speaker 1: pursuing my own pleasure, and it was a big part
Speaker 1: of like my young slut era. And I really appreciate
Speaker 1: that a gift you gave me. That's amazing. I love that.
Speaker 1: I feel like it could not possibly be random chance,
Speaker 1: like we were destined to work on this project together. Yeah,
Speaker 1: your book really did change my perspective on so many things,
Speaker 1: and so when I heard that you were working on
Speaker 1: this show, I was like, please pick me, pick me.
Speaker 1: It was raising my hand really hard. I love that.
Speaker 1: Another reason I'm so excited for this podcast to exist
Speaker 1: because like I grew up in a small town in
Speaker 1: North Carolina, and I had abstinence only sex said, and
Speaker 1: I was a like unknowing at the time, little gay kid,
Speaker 1: and I basically was horrified and scared by the sexual
Speaker 1: education that I got or the lack of sexual education
Speaker 1: that I got. But the little that I did get
Speaker 1: was basically like STDs can kill you, and if you
Speaker 1: have sex once, you're ruined forever and no one will
Speaker 1: want you after that, And that really it affected me.
Speaker 1: And I think having real and non judgment information, like
Speaker 1: the message that you have income as you are and
Speaker 1: in all your work, like having that out there actually
Speaker 1: makes a huge difference in people's everyday sex lives. Well yeay,
Speaker 1: And I see my work as being the opposite of
Speaker 1: absinence only education. Not because I'm like everybody should have
Speaker 1: sex all the time. I think people should have sex
Speaker 1: when and how they choose too when is right for themselves,
Speaker 1: but because I believe that sex need not be scary
Speaker 1: in our lives. I think that if we can embrace
Speaker 1: pleasure into our lives, That's really the whole basis of
Speaker 1: my work. It's the whole basis of the show. The
Speaker 1: Prelude episode with Adrian Marie Brown, if you haven't heard
Speaker 1: it yet, please go back and listen to it. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's really the foundation of everything we're going to be
Speaker 1: talking about. Heart agree. I put a lot of special
Speaker 1: love into the Prelude, But this episode is our first
Speaker 1: episode where we're going to be serring a listener question.
Speaker 1: So we got a message on the come as you
Speaker 1: are hotline six four six, three nine seven eight five
Speaker 1: five seven. I chose it because it really speaks to
Speaker 1: the time we're in right now, like the pandemic has
Speaker 1: changed a lot of our relationships with ourselves and of
Speaker 1: course with sex and with masturbation, but also just pleasure
Speaker 1: on the day to day, like just everyday pleasures and happiness.
Speaker 1: I think you're absolutely right. Rates of mental health struggles
Speaker 1: have vastly increased. People's sense of overwhelm and exhaustion and
Speaker 1: acxistential dread have increased vastly just over the last couple
Speaker 1: of years. And is that going to interfere with our
Speaker 1: sex lives? You bet your bippy right exactly. Yes. I
Speaker 1: wanted to pull a question from a caller whose sexual
Speaker 1: desire or horniness has basically changed drastically during the pandemic.
Speaker 1: All right, so here we go. Hi. My name is Sarah,
Speaker 1: my pronouns are she her. I'm thirty four and single,
Speaker 1: and I used to have a lot of fun with myself.
Speaker 1: I had and I still have all these fancy toys.
Speaker 1: But over the last few years, it's like my desire
Speaker 1: to masturbate has just completely faded away. Like the other day,
Speaker 1: I realized I haven't masturbated in like six months, and
Speaker 1: I just don't feel like my old self washing porn
Speaker 1: does not cross my mind. I bought this new toy
Speaker 1: to even help me get back in the mood, and
Speaker 1: I've only used it once, I don't even want to
Speaker 1: get out there and date because I'm just not motivated
Speaker 1: by sex. It sounds like work to me, and I
Speaker 1: don't know what's wrong, Like by the time I get
Speaker 1: home from work, walk my dog, make dinner, I just
Speaker 1: want to sit down and watch TV. And I feel
Speaker 1: really tired all the time. And so I wonder if
Speaker 1: you can help me figure out what's wrong with me.
Speaker 1: This answer might shock you, but no, I can't explain
Speaker 1: what's wrong with you because there is nothing wrong with you.
Speaker 1: Everything that we're hearing in this question is just Sarah's
Speaker 1: brain responding normally to an abnormal world. What science do
Speaker 1: we need to understand to answer this question for Sarah? Okay,
Speaker 1: this is thrilling for me. It's like I'm introducing you
Speaker 1: to my most famous friend. Welcome to the dual control model,
Speaker 1: how our brains process sex related information. Dual control model
Speaker 1: means there's two parts. In the first part is that
Speaker 1: sexual accelerator that gets turned on. It notices all the
Speaker 1: sexy information in the environment. That's everything you feel with
Speaker 1: your basic senses, what you see here, smell, touch, taste,
Speaker 1: but also the things that you think, believe, or imagine
Speaker 1: and also the sensations inside your body, the sexual excitation system.
Speaker 1: The accelerator notices all of that, and it sends that
Speaker 1: turn on signal the many of us are familiar with.
Speaker 1: But also at the same time, in parallel, you have
Speaker 1: breaks that are noticing all the good reasons not to
Speaker 1: be turned on right now, everything with your basic senses,
Speaker 1: the everything you see here, smell, touch, taste, and everything
Speaker 1: you think, believe or imagine, and all the sensations in
Speaker 1: your body, it notices everything that's a potential threat, and
Speaker 1: it sends the turn off signal. So arousal is not
Speaker 1: just the process of turning on the OS. It's also,
Speaker 1: and more importantly, the process of turning off the offs.
Speaker 1: When people are struggling, the usual advice of how to
Speaker 1: deal with any difficulty around arousal pleasure, desire, orgasm, The
Speaker 1: usual advice you hear is like, let's add stimulation to
Speaker 1: the accelerator, watching porn, doing roleplay, handcoffs, all that stuff.
Speaker 1: And sometimes that can work and can be great. But
Speaker 1: a lot of the time when people are struggling, it's
Speaker 1: not because there's too little stimulation to the accelerator. It's
Speaker 1: because there is too much stimulation to the breaks. Our
Speaker 1: listener says, it's been a couple of years. What's been
Speaker 1: happening the last couple of years, right, I don't know,
Speaker 1: a global pandemic where your breath could potentially carry a
Speaker 1: lethal virus that might hit the break as like a
Speaker 1: good reason not to be turned on right now as
Speaker 1: a potential threat. She says, the dating feels just like
Speaker 1: a lot of work, no kidding. The first time I
Speaker 1: heard this, MLA, this truly blew my mind. May do
Speaker 1: and what I especially love. So this is one of
Speaker 1: my favorite things about the dual control model is that
Speaker 1: there can be some stimuli that both hit the accelerator
Speaker 1: and hit the brake, especially someone like you who grew
Speaker 1: up being told that sex is like dirty and dangerous.
Speaker 1: Sex related stimuli will activate the accelerator because it's sex related,
Speaker 1: but also you were taught it's dirty and dangerous, and
Speaker 1: so it's also going to hit the break. And what's
Speaker 1: effect is that going to have on your sexual arousal
Speaker 1: sexual interest? WHOA if you try to drive a car
Speaker 1: with your foot on the accelerator and on the brake
Speaker 1: at the same time, how does that go? Wow? Wow
Speaker 1: wow wow? Okay, listeners can't see me. But I just
Speaker 1: took my cowboy hat off, so I can process what
Speaker 1: you just said. A lot of feelings about that that
Speaker 1: I didn't know. We're there, Like, of course something can
Speaker 1: hit my accelerator, but if I was told my whole
Speaker 1: life that it shouldn't hit my accelerator, then it can
Speaker 1: also that same thing can also be hitting my brake. Oh,
Speaker 1: this is something I should process later with my therapist.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say that sounds like something you should
Speaker 1: talk to your therapist about, but I want to make
Speaker 1: sure that you know that your breaks and accelerator can
Speaker 1: be trained. So in the same way that your breaks
Speaker 1: learned to respond to sex related stimuli, they can learn
Speaker 1: not to respond just by practicing having a little bit
Speaker 1: of exposure and relaxing, feeling calm and safe, and allowing
Speaker 1: the shame that you absorbed from culture to let go.
Speaker 1: Like your sex life will only get better because of
Speaker 1: this revelation. So that's one of the really powerful things.
Speaker 1: Way beyond just like turn ons and turn offs? Is
Speaker 1: this just a like in just like one is Ambivalence
Speaker 1: is totally normal because of the way your brain has
Speaker 1: been trained to respond to stimuli. And the other thing
Speaker 1: is that the same stimulus in one context might activate
Speaker 1: the accelerator, but in a different context it'll hit the brakes.
Speaker 1: Like if you are like private and the door is
Speaker 1: locked and you know you're not going to be interrupted,
Speaker 1: and you're feeling really aroused and turned on and trusting
Speaker 1: of your partner. If you have a partner, it can
Speaker 1: feel really fun to be tickled. But if you're in
Speaker 1: the grocery store having a fight with your partner and
Speaker 1: they try to tickle you, that sensation is not going
Speaker 1: to activate the accelerator. And that is normal. I cannot
Speaker 1: tell you how many people have asked me if there's
Speaker 1: something about their body that's broken, because a sensation that
Speaker 1: really turns them on in one context either doesn't turn
Speaker 1: them on or is actively annoying in a different context. Right,
Speaker 1: breaks an accelerator, girls, what you need to know? Okay,
Speaker 1: I think it's really important to clarify that, Like, you're
Speaker 1: not talking about the break an accelerator as a metaphor, right,
Speaker 1: This is not a metaphor. This is the literal way
Speaker 1: our brain's process information. Yes, because it's a real thing
Speaker 1: that is really happening in your real, actual brain. You
Speaker 1: are an animal with a body. You have a head,
Speaker 1: there's a skull, and inside that skull there's a brain.
Speaker 1: And inside that brain is a cluster of neuroconnections that
Speaker 1: respond to sexuality, some of them to activate arousal and
Speaker 1: some of them to stop arousal. I literally remember the day.
Speaker 1: It was nineteen ninety nine. I was sitting in the
Speaker 1: counseling office at Indiana University in John Bancroft was explaining
Speaker 1: the dual control model. He drew a picture of the
Speaker 1: brain and the spine as he was explaining, and I
Speaker 1: was like, Oh, there's a break that this was a
Speaker 1: physical mechanism that literally existed in the central nervous system,
Speaker 1: the excitatory and inhibitory impulses. This is not a metaphor.
Speaker 1: This is the literal way our brain's process information. Right.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons I chose this question is because
Speaker 1: she is just talking about her experience with masturbation, and
Speaker 1: I never really thought about masturbation having these same levers
Speaker 1: of turn ons and turn offs before. I've only thought
Speaker 1: about that in the context of like partnered sex. But
Speaker 1: you're saying it's the same system whether it's masturbation or
Speaker 1: partnered sex. Right, Yeah, it's the same brain. What about
Speaker 1: this question makes you think that the dual control model
Speaker 1: is the answer the breaks and the accelerator is the
Speaker 1: answer to Sarah's question. You know, there are two phrases.
Speaker 1: First of all, there's I don't feel like my old self,
Speaker 1: which indicates that there was a change. And often when
Speaker 1: there's a change, people think it's something about themselves that
Speaker 1: has changed, when actually what has changed is the text
Speaker 1: in which her brain is interpreting all this information. So
Speaker 1: she's not broken. Something happened in the world that made
Speaker 1: her brain adapt and adjust, and that's totally normal when
Speaker 1: you understand that, yes, there's an accelerator, and also, yes,
Speaker 1: there's a break that's responding to a global crisis. Oh,
Speaker 1: it's not me, it's the world. This is my brain
Speaker 1: responding normally to some very nutso stuff that's happening in
Speaker 1: the world. And the other sentence was it just feels
Speaker 1: like a lot of work. It sounds like a lot
Speaker 1: of work to me. Yeah, right, that's there being a
Speaker 1: lot of pressure on the brakes. Oh interest, especially for
Speaker 1: a person who has a history of really enjoying masturbating
Speaker 1: their accelerator. We know responds really well because they have
Speaker 1: this history of being aroused and enjoying sexuality, and now
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff that's hit the brain, and it
Speaker 1: feels like a lot of work. What's changed is nothing
Speaker 1: about this person, but just the world that their brain
Speaker 1: is processing. More stuff is there that hits the brakes.
Speaker 1: So like if, for example, she made a list of
Speaker 1: today all the things she knows activate the accelerator and
Speaker 1: all the things that she knows are hitting the brakes,
Speaker 1: and then she thought back to you know, twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: for example, or twenty sixteen even better, and made a
Speaker 1: list of things that activated or accelerator then and things
Speaker 1: that hit the brakes then, and compared, you'd be able
Speaker 1: to see, Oh, it's not that I change, it's just
Speaker 1: the context changed, right. I actually have worksheets for this
Speaker 1: in the company you are workbooking, and you're getting download
Speaker 1: them for free from my website, where you think through
Speaker 1: multiple and it actually really helps to think through multiple
Speaker 1: experiences because if you get up to three, you're gonna
Speaker 1: start noticing patterns in what activates your accelerator and what
Speaker 1: hits your breaks. Yeah, I'll put the link to that
Speaker 1: worksheet in the show notes, and I'm going to text
Speaker 1: my girlfriend right now and be like, let's fill out
Speaker 1: these sexy worksheets tonight. I think we should take a break.
Speaker 1: What do you think perfect? And then when we get
Speaker 1: back we can talk about how to apply this science
Speaker 1: in the real world. And I think we can answer
Speaker 1: Sarah's question. Okay, I want to recap the question. So
Speaker 1: we got to call in at the commas. You are
Speaker 1: hotline six four six three nine seven eight five five seven,
Speaker 1: and it's from a listener who uses the pseudonym Sarah.
Speaker 1: She's thirty four in single and she used to love
Speaker 1: I actually found a few synonyms for masturbation online. That's
Speaker 1: what the internet is for. It is, in fact, for that.
Speaker 1: So let me just try out of few, and you
Speaker 1: tell me which ones you like better. Okay, Oh my god.
Speaker 1: She used to love poaching the egg. This is my
Speaker 1: personal favorite. She used to love debugging her hard drive.
Speaker 1: What that's hilarious. Sorry, She used to love softening the peach.
Speaker 1: She used to love burping the worm. Oh my god. Okay,
Speaker 1: what that makes sense of a person who jaculates? It's
Speaker 1: burping a baby. Oh Emily, that got so much worse.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I'm sorry you hadn't. No, of course
Speaker 1: you hadn't thought of that. No, um giving herself a
Speaker 1: hand typical. That's good. Okay, you got the picture of
Speaker 1: how Sarah used to be. I do. Okay, great, um,
Speaker 1: But recently something has changed, so hang on, let me
Speaker 1: play the clip. Over the last few years, it's like
Speaker 1: my desire to masturbate has just completely faded away. Like
Speaker 1: the other day, I realized I haven't masturbated in like
Speaker 1: six months, and I just don't feel like my old
Speaker 1: self washing porn does not cross my mind. I bought
Speaker 1: this new toy to even help me get back in
Speaker 1: the mood, and I've only used it once. I don't
Speaker 1: even want to get out there and date because I'm
Speaker 1: just not motivated by sex. Before we even get into
Speaker 1: answering this question, I want to start with an even
Speaker 1: more basic question to you, which is is this is
Speaker 1: there something wrong with like losing interest in masturbating. Let's
Speaker 1: say you know you don't masturbate. Somebody doesn't masturbate for
Speaker 1: five years and they just don't want to, like, does
Speaker 1: that mean that something has broken in their brain? Oh
Speaker 1: heck no. It is absolutely normal for interest in sex
Speaker 1: to come and go if you will. There is a
Speaker 1: natural ebb and flow to our interest in sex that's
Speaker 1: influent by the larger context. So, for example, at the
Speaker 1: beginning of a relationship, the hot and heavy, fallen in love,
Speaker 1: that creates a context that makes it really easy to
Speaker 1: think about sex kind of all the time. Compare that
Speaker 1: to being in the middle of a I don't know,
Speaker 1: global disaster, and that creates a context that really puts
Speaker 1: sex on the back burner. Science has shown us all
Speaker 1: along that nothing bad happens to you if you don't
Speaker 1: experience sex per se. So if we are still maintaining
Speaker 1: adequate love and connection, then sex can go away, and
Speaker 1: it is no kind of emergency. It's just an indication
Speaker 1: that other things have piled up in our priority list
Speaker 1: that have to be cleared away to free up the
Speaker 1: break so that our accelerator can do what it's there
Speaker 1: to do. What I also noticed in this question is
Speaker 1: that she says she doesn't even think about it. Sex
Speaker 1: drops off the priority list. We're thinking about all this
Speaker 1: other things, dealing with family and dealing with work and
Speaker 1: life and all that stuff, and sex goes away. It's
Speaker 1: that we've deprioritized pleasure in the midst of all of
Speaker 1: our stress and strife and struggle. And we've also given
Speaker 1: the nature of the pandemic, we've lost access to the
Speaker 1: resources we used to spend on self care. And we
Speaker 1: know from the statistics that women and fems have had
Speaker 1: this hit them especially hard. They're the ones who have
Speaker 1: had to leave their employment. They've been at home maybe
Speaker 1: with kids. And when you are stuck in parenting mode
Speaker 1: and caretaking mode, that is a million miles away from sexy,
Speaker 1: aroused pleasure in my body mode. Right, So we know
Speaker 1: that it has taken a toll on people's well being,
Speaker 1: cutting them off not just from social support, but also
Speaker 1: from the mental wherewithal to transition into a space of
Speaker 1: appreciating and loving the sensations of their bodies. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: so true. Like we talk about the toll it took
Speaker 1: on our social well being and how actually we realized
Speaker 1: all these social connections are really important to our mental health,
Speaker 1: but there hasn't been that big conversation about how the
Speaker 1: pandemic that we're living in has changed our sexual well being.
Speaker 1: And fair enough, like the social connection is a literal drive.
Speaker 1: We die without it. It is more important, But sex
Speaker 1: is one of the key ways that humans give and
Speaker 1: receive love and care. Could you talk about some of
Speaker 1: the common things that hits people's breaks, Like what is
Speaker 1: an example of something that hits the breaks that's a
Speaker 1: habit or a pattern in our lives. The daily habits
Speaker 1: mostly are a matter of getting just absorbed in the
Speaker 1: management of life. So like the amount of time we
Speaker 1: have to spend working or dealing with our families, or
Speaker 1: taking care of our basic fundamental needs, feeding ourselves, cleaning ourselves,
Speaker 1: managing schedules and time with other people, and writing checks
Speaker 1: to pay bills. Like life is complicated and we are busy,
Speaker 1: and it is so easy for pleasure and sexuality to
Speaker 1: just feel like they're off, way in the distance. In
Speaker 1: the same way that these daily habits interfere with our
Speaker 1: access to pleasure, it takes a daily habit of prioritizing pleasure.
Speaker 1: If half an hours too much, make it three minutes
Speaker 1: where you just notice something pleasurable. If it's mindfully eating food,
Speaker 1: that's a pleasure. If it is standing in the shower
Speaker 1: and feeling your skin like as you wash your body,
Speaker 1: really noticing the sensation of soapy water dripping down your skin,
Speaker 1: like notice the pleasure, and remember that you are actually
Speaker 1: alive in your body, not just moving from task to task. Right,
Speaker 1: So it doesn't necessarily have to be like a sexual
Speaker 1: thing that is hitting the brakes or hitting the accelerator.
Speaker 1: It could be it could be something like a great shower,
Speaker 1: not necessarily sexual hitting the accelerating. The most important things
Speaker 1: about understanding the breaks is that most of the things
Speaker 1: that hit the brakes have nothing to do with sex.
Speaker 1: Even though I feel like it probably is the case
Speaker 1: that when people are raised with sex negative education, a
Speaker 1: lot of those breaks that they're learning are related to sex.
Speaker 1: Most of it is just like the rest of our lives, interfering.
Speaker 1: Do you have any other practical advice for Sarah? It
Speaker 1: seems like she wants to masturbate again and wants to
Speaker 1: really enjoy that connection, like wants to want it again.
Speaker 1: That seems like her question. She's like, I want to
Speaker 1: want it again? Why don't I? What's the problem? Do
Speaker 1: you have any sex specific advice? I'm not actually sure
Speaker 1: because she feels like there's something wrong with her that
Speaker 1: it's gone. So I believe that step one is grand
Speaker 1: your self permission not to be interested for a while,
Speaker 1: Deliberately choose to feel normal, healthy and happy and not
Speaker 1: interested in sex for a while. No one is ever
Speaker 1: under any obligation to be interested in sex ever, So
Speaker 1: try that first and then begin to explore other pleasures.
Speaker 1: Create space, the space that you've been using to worry
Speaker 1: about sex. Use that instead for space to experience all
Speaker 1: the many different ways that we experience pleasure in our
Speaker 1: daily lives, from the satisfaction of like lying down in
Speaker 1: bed with clean, fresh sheets. Showers are always a big one.
Speaker 1: Food is always an opportunity for a pleasure, walking outside
Speaker 1: and feeling the breeze and the sun and watching leaves
Speaker 1: change if you live in a place where leaves change.
Speaker 1: And then see if interest in sex begins to bubble
Speaker 1: back up, and if it doesn't know worries, and if
Speaker 1: it does, gently pursue it. I love the suggestions that
Speaker 1: you have for like activating the accelerator again are they
Speaker 1: don't involve spending any money. They're just experiences that you
Speaker 1: have in your body of like taking a shower, eating
Speaker 1: something really delicious, Like they don't It's not about buying
Speaker 1: the two hundred dollars dildo, right, Those are the shower
Speaker 1: and the food or things you were going to do
Speaker 1: any exactly. Yes, Yes, I love that. And I think
Speaker 1: a lot of times we're told and she even says
Speaker 1: she bought a new toy and thought that was going
Speaker 1: to do it, and no, it didn't work. Right, it's
Speaker 1: just another piece of hardware to ignore. Yeah, a lot
Speaker 1: of times we're told like, oh, are you losing interest
Speaker 1: in sex? Buy stuff by this thing, buy that thing,
Speaker 1: and that that'll rejuvenate your sex life. But I think
Speaker 1: that really gets to the point you were saying earlier,
Speaker 1: that like, it's not necessarily about juicing the accelerator more
Speaker 1: and more and more I'm buying more stuff. It's about
Speaker 1: like finding a way to turn off the brakes so
Speaker 1: that you really are noticing you. Even more than that,
Speaker 1: I think people do feel this sort of obligation to
Speaker 1: be interested in sex. We're told that if you're not
Speaker 1: interested in sex, there's some sort of problem with you
Speaker 1: and your body. You need to always be trying to
Speaker 1: want sex, to try sexy new things, and we can't
Speaker 1: just allow our brains and bodies to just shift away
Speaker 1: from sexuality for a while. And here's the irony. If
Speaker 1: you believe you are supposed to be interested in sex,
Speaker 1: all the time and you are not interested in sex.
Speaker 1: Does that activate your accelerator? No? Right, It just that
Speaker 1: feeling of like I'm supposed to want sex, but I
Speaker 1: don't want sex. It just hits your brakes some more So,
Speaker 1: if you believe you need to juice the accelerate, that
Speaker 1: belief is probably just making it more difficult for you
Speaker 1: to want or like any sexual experience than might present
Speaker 1: itself to you. Oh my god, I love that you're
Speaker 1: saying this. So you're saying like Sarah's sitting on the
Speaker 1: couch watching TV. At the end of the day, she's
Speaker 1: feeling guilty about the fact that she has masturbated in
Speaker 1: six months, and that is not helping her have a
Speaker 1: great experience of wanting to masturbate next week. It's it's
Speaker 1: doing the opposite instead of getting the full pleasure that
Speaker 1: she could be getting from watching she Hulk. Yes, I
Speaker 1: was gonna say great British Bakoff, but she Hulk. Same, same,
Speaker 1: same difference. We're going to take a quick break and
Speaker 1: when we get back, Emily, I want you to like
Speaker 1: sum up the basics of the dual control model a TLGR.
Speaker 1: If you will, I hope you enjoy the company of
Speaker 1: my most famous friend. I did enjoy the company of
Speaker 1: your most famous friend, and I have a feeling we're
Speaker 1: going to be seeing her again and again and again
Speaker 1: on this series. Yes, indeed, we'll be right back. We're back,
Speaker 1: and it's time for a classic Emmally Nagowski tlgr let
Speaker 1: us recap. So sexual response is actually a dual process
Speaker 1: of turning on the os and also crucially turning off
Speaker 1: the offs. And when we're struggling, the solution is more
Speaker 1: often about turning off the offs than it is about
Speaker 1: turning on the odds. And that's especially true when we
Speaker 1: are still living through a pandemic. There are so many
Speaker 1: things hitting our breaks these days, so I want to
Speaker 1: make sure we offer some practical tips for how to
Speaker 1: turn off the offs. I have five practical tips for
Speaker 1: you ready. First, consider what activates your accelerator and what
Speaker 1: hits your brakes. This can be as simple as writing
Speaker 1: those pairs of lists off the top of your head.
Speaker 1: Like you already know, the smell of your partner's skin
Speaker 1: when they come in from having done yard work is
Speaker 1: something that activates the accelerat. You know that reading romance
Speaker 1: novels in the bathtub activates the accelerator. You know that stress,
Speaker 1: body image stuff, parenting stuff, especially a bad day in
Speaker 1: the news, hits the brakes. It might help instead to
Speaker 1: think about two or three different experiences you've had sexually
Speaker 1: that were great or just okay, and compare what happened
Speaker 1: in those experiences that it activated the accelerator and what
Speaker 1: hit the brakes. That's step one. Step two is to
Speaker 1: assess your current context. Once you have a sense of
Speaker 1: what impacts your sexual response, compare that to what's happening
Speaker 1: in your life right now. If you're struggling to find
Speaker 1: a new romance author to spend some time within the tub,
Speaker 1: or if you can't be close to your partner because
Speaker 1: they're traveling a lot from work. Is there news consistently
Speaker 1: that turns your experience of the world into like navigating
Speaker 1: a hellscape. Those are things that are influencing the way
Speaker 1: your brain is processing sex related information and potential threats.
Speaker 1: So assess your context is number two. Third. Categorize these
Speaker 1: aspects of your context as things you can control and
Speaker 1: things you can't control. You can ask folks for book
Speaker 1: recommendations so you can have some control over I can't
Speaker 1: find a new author to read. You can set limits
Speaker 1: on how often or how deeply you consume the news.
Speaker 1: You have permission not to consume the news. You have
Speaker 1: some control there too. To have control over your context.
Speaker 1: Maybe you can't control your partner's work, travel, And remember
Speaker 1: I recommend that you focus especially on the stuff that's
Speaker 1: hitting the brakes, since those are more likely to have
Speaker 1: an impact, but some of them you may have no
Speaker 1: control over. You have no control over the actual what
Speaker 1: the news is, but you do have some control over
Speaker 1: your degree of exposure to it. Fourth, choose a small
Speaker 1: number of the things that you can control and make
Speaker 1: a plan to create change. To help you select what
Speaker 1: to focus on, it can help to rank the controllable
Speaker 1: variables of your context by how easy or difficult they
Speaker 1: would be to change, and by how much of an
Speaker 1: impact they would have. Right, so the easy to change
Speaker 1: big impact factors those are the low hanging fruit. Easy
Speaker 1: to change low impact factors may make a small difference,
Speaker 1: but they're still worth doing right not just for these
Speaker 1: small change they make, but also they increase your experience
Speaker 1: of self efficacy. Like see I can make a change
Speaker 1: if I decide to do it, which can help you
Speaker 1: feel more confident when you go on to tackle those
Speaker 1: more difficult to change but higher impact factors. And then, finally,
Speaker 1: above all, especially in a situation like this, listeners, remember
Speaker 1: the goal is simply to spend pleasurable time with your body.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be about adventure or novelty or wildness.
Speaker 1: It's not furry handcuffs and porn. It certainly doesn't have
Speaker 1: to be about orchasm. God knows. It's just time to
Speaker 1: practice engaging pleasurably with your own body, mind, and spirit,
Speaker 1: so that as your context shifts more toward an accelerator
Speaker 1: activating less breaks hitting life, you have plenty of experience
Speaker 1: connecting you erotically with yourself so that you're ready when
Speaker 1: the moment comes. So to speak, no pun intended. A
Speaker 1: moment comes. The amount of cumpuns we're gonna have on
Speaker 1: the show is about to be simply irresponsible. Make sure
Speaker 1: that you subscribe to Come as you are so that
Speaker 1: you are notified about next week's episode when it comes
Speaker 1: out on Wednesday. And we're going to be answering another
Speaker 1: real listener question. This time it's about a very crooked penis.
Speaker 1: And if you're like me and you're thinking penis as
Speaker 1: you yawn, I'm over them. This episode is about much
Speaker 1: more than just the penis. Emily teaches me a mind
Speaker 1: blowing anatomy one oh one lesson about genital structures, and
Speaker 1: I come away a changed woman. I see by clitterists
Speaker 1: like an entirely different organ Now, so you know it,
Speaker 1: hit subscribe. How was that? Was that? Good? Amazing? God?
Speaker 1: This is so fun and it's your job. Do I
Speaker 1: get better than that? No, it doesn't get better than that.
Speaker 1: Welcome to My World, Come as You Are is a
Speaker 1: production of Pushkin Industries and Madison Wells. It's hosted by
Speaker 1: Emily Nagosky. You can find Emily on Instagram at e
Speaker 1: Nigowski and on Twitter at Malin Nagowski. You can also
Speaker 1: sign up for her newsletter at emil Nagosky dot com,
Speaker 1: where she writes about everything from the clitterest in your
Speaker 1: mind to orgasm after having hysterected me. It's an incredible newsletter.
Speaker 1: Highly recommended. This show is co hosted and lead produced
Speaker 1: by me Mola Board. You can find me online at
Speaker 1: Mola Board and on TikTok at podcast dot slut Sorry mom.
Speaker 1: My co producer on this show is the Fabulous Britney Brown.
Speaker 1: Our editor is Kate Parkinson Morgan Sound design and mixed
Speaker 1: by Anne Pope. Executive producers are Mia LaBelle and leetal
Speaker 1: Malade at Pushkin Thanks to Heather Faine, Carly Migliori, Sophie Crane,
Speaker 1: Courtney Guarino, Jason Gambrel, Julia Barton, John Schnars, and Jacob Weisberg.
Speaker 1: At Madison Wells thanks to Kylie Williams, Elizabeth Goodstein and
Speaker 1: Gg Pritzker. Additional thanks to Rich Stevens, Lindsay Edgecombe Frolic Media,
Speaker 1: and Peter Acker at Armadillo Audio Group. Original music for
Speaker 1: this series was composed by Amelianagowski and arranged and recorded
Speaker 1: by Alexandra Kalinovsky. Additional music from Epidemic Sound. You can
Speaker 1: find Pushkin on all social platforms at pushkin Pods, and
Speaker 1: you can sign up for our newsletter at pushkin dot Fm.
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