Moving for pleasure

Forget trying to hold yourself perfectly still on a meditation mat. Gabrielle Roth, founder of 5Rhythms embodied movement practice, had the right idea when she observed that “the fastest way to still the mind is move the body”.

If you’ve ever been rock-hopping, or dancing – or anything which requires you to move fast and freely, with split-second timing and co-ordinated movement – you’ll know that you don’t have time to ‘think’ you just have to ‘be’ – you have to trust your body.

It’s hard to overthink things when you’re in motion. So movement is a great way to help you out of your head and into your body.

And it also has physiological benefits when it comes to arousal and pleasure.

Movement is your natural state

Your body is always in movement – even when you think you’re standing still there are tiny micro-movements happening all over your body, enabling you to you keep your balance.

Every time you breathe in or out it creates movement in your body.

And it works the other way around too - when you start to move it activates your breath, and raises your heart rate, which helps oxygen and energy move around your body – from your core to your extremities.

In pleasure terms this means that when you move more you’re helping stimulate the parts of you which have the highest concentration of nerve endings – your genitals, and your fingers.

Why sitting is the enemy of pleasure

If you tend to sit in a chair when you self-pleasure you’re definitely not alone! But you’re not doing yourself any favours…

Sitting in a crunched position restricts blood-flow - and therefore oxygen - to the whole central section of your body, which contains many of your vital organs, including your genitals.

The lack of movement associated with sitting also tends to reduce circulation to the outer parts of your body – like your hands - too.

So one easy way to help increase your experience of sensation and pleasure in your body is to stand up when you’re self-pleasuring, as this will bring much more opportunity for movement (and therefore stimulation) to your pelvis and hips.

Your hips don’t lie

Your pelvis and hips are literally at the core of your erotic body so having freedom of movement there is crucial to pleasure.

Unfortunately a lot of men have been socialised to keep this area rigid – in western culture it’s not usually considered ‘manly’ to have swinging hips!

In most cultures dance is an integral part of courtship and attraction rituals (remember the coveted ‘slow dance’ at school?).

But many people feel awkward when it comes to moving their body, inhibited by a notion that they need some kind of technique to be any ‘good’.

There’s no need for fancy moves, however!

Try it now: just start moving your hips, swinging them gently from side to side, or in a figure of eight, and you’ll begin to feel a stirring of energy. Magnify that movement from your hips out into the rest of your body and you’ll be well on your way to heightening erotic sensation.

Being in the moment

If movement is something you feel unsure or awkward about a great starting place is to bring more movement into your erotic experience when you’re alone with no-one watching.

But what about when you’re with a partner?

Karen B K Chan has a great ‘Jamming Model’ approach to sex, where she compares a good sexual experience to a musicians’ jam session – something which requires you to be tuned into both what you’re doing and what your jamming partners are doing.

And, just like dancing with a partner, the best experiences in the bedroom generally happen when you’re fully present, and in the moment, with what your body AND your partner’s body is doing.

When you’re perfectly in sync with another moving body there’s a special kind of magic that transcends moving by yourself. As they say: it takes two to tango…