The 4-Hour Body_ An Uncommon Guide to Ra - Timothy Ferriss [105]
She also realized that she’d been suppressing a critical part of herself, and that without a developed sexuality, she wasn’t a fully developed person. It took discipline to overcome old habits and subconscious sabotage:
“It was really tempting to come home from work and say, ‘Oh, I’m tired,’ and go to bed without doing it. I really had to view it as practice, just like yoga. Practice is something you do even when you don’t want to.”
Rediscovering her sensual self went far beyond the bedroom. Giselle started taking salsa lessons and was finally comfortable as a sensual being. Comfortable in her own skin, she finally felt free to express herself. Not in a haphazard manner, but free from unwarranted guilt or shame. The mind can rationalize terrible voids, and there is no need for it.
Life is short, and sex should be a wonderful part of it. It’s a fundamental part of our natural hardwiring.
Isn’t it time you let your hair down and had some real fun with it?
All it takes is 15 minutes.
It’s no secret that I’m fascinated by pharmaceuticals.
I was buzzing on one of my favorites, caffeine, as I listened to my friend Violet Blue wax poetic about drugs at a sidewalk café:
“Antihistamines can make you taste bitter, but it’s simple to fix. Just add cucumber, mango, pineapple, papaya, or citrus to your diet.” Benadryl was now on my blacklist. Cucumber was on the shopping list.
The week prior, Violet, one of Wired magazine’s “Faces of Innovation” and sex columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, had kept Oprah rapt onstage for more than an hour. I wasn’t surprised. Self-proclaimed sex educators often fall in the extremes, whether involving sex parties or worshiping the sex goddess Ix Chel. Violet was a different breed. Between lecturing to MDs at UCSF and speaking about sex to Google executives at their world headquarters, she had a simple person-to-person mission: to teach people how to safely get what they want in sex.
“Stimulants like caffeine also make it harder to come,” she added.
I looked down at my coffee, and I looked down at my twins. Something else to experiment with. I’d come to our lunch date armed with a list of must-answer questions, and she had already knocked most of them off like a major leaguer at a Little League game.
But there was one question, the question, remaining:
What would you recommend, step by step, to a woman who wants to have her first orgasm?
Violet bounced a little in her chair and smiled, and I prepped my wrist for note-taking. She first brought up the cornerstones, erotica and self-exploration, and then added the details:
1. First, ask yourself a few simple questions: Have you ever felt anything close? Were you previously interested in sex but now you’re not? Are you even interested in having an orgasm? Then watch Mary Roach’s TED presentation entitled “10 Things You Didn’t Know About Orgasm.”
2. If embarrassment is an issue, get a copy of When the Earth Moves: Women and Orgasm.
3. Know thyself. Learn as much as possible about what turns you on. Give yourself permission to explore all fantasies. After all, they’re just fantasies. Read some quality erotica written and curated by women. Violet has edited hundreds of erotica stories, and her top two picks were The Best Women’s Erotica 2009, which she edited, and 60-Second Erotica by Alison Tyler.
4. Get a variable-speed vibrator. Violet recommends a simple egg vibrator with a cord for starters, such as Smoothies or Bullet Vibes. If money is no object, get a JimmyLane Little Chroma ($125) or Little Something ($195–2,750[!]). Practice masturbating with your hands as well, inserting the vibrator just prior to orgasm or when you’re close. Be playful and try it all. Her favorite supplier for all such goodies is the women-run BabeLand.
5. If you want to take it to the next