Maintaining desire within long term monogamy
By Jenny Soudlenkov
When tasked with writing an article with a nod to my upcoming book titled “It’s never about the toothpaste; A discourse on navigating long lasting relationships in a world where the next “the one” is a click away”, I thought about what people wanted to get to the bottom of the most. The answer, at least for most of my clients, is almost always sex. Not just the physical aspects of sex, but specifically how to maintain desire and yearning within a long-term relationship. I recall asking a dear friend of mine who has been successfully married for several years this same question. “How do you keep passion and desire alive in your marriage?” After a few moments, she answered very thoughtfully; “It changes.. it’s no longer a glaring fire that you don’t need to pay attention to, but rather burning embers that you need to stoke and maintain in order to keep it ignited.” With this beautiful metaphor in mind, let’s break down the basics of desire.
In order to desire something, essentially, it must be out of reach. By its very definition, desire implies a strong feeling of wanting or wishing for something. Which is perhaps why desire feels so natural in the beginning of a relationship; because we have the titillating factor of the unknown. The unknown of what is to come, the unknown of whether this person will become “ours”. The irony is that once we have what we want, it is no longer out of reach and therefore “desirable”, at least not to the same extent as it once was. This is unfortunately why volatile relationships often span over months or years of agony, confusion and excitement. Because we continue to re-introduce the factor of the unknown. I often give my clients the metaphor of buying something that they have lusted over for a long time. In my case, its almost always handbags or shoes. When we have our eyes set on something, we drool over it, idealise it, lose sleep over it and continue looking at it over and over again. Once we have obtained the object that we wanted, we are thrilled and elated that it is now ours. However, that thrill and elation overtime turns into comfort, boredom, and sure, sometimes gratitude, and we agonise over fresh ways to use this once coveted object or we forget about it all together. Sex and desire are very much the same. If we don’t keep stoking the fire, so to speak, we risk letting the embers die out.
The wonderful psychotherapist Esther Perel so eloquently stated; “foreplay begins at the end of the last orgasm.” Once my clients stop giggling when I share this quote, we discuss what this actually means in practice. What is the “foreplay” that she is referring to? Foreplay, in this context, is referring to the continual bids for connection between ourselves and our spouse. It may be the lingering look over at our partner whilst they are folding the washing. It may be making our partner coffee in bed or it may be the playful grope in the kitchen whilst making dinner. These small gestures build up and create anticipating and ignite a desire to connect with our loved one on a deeper level. After all, sex is not just a physical act of pleasure-otherwise everyone would be doing it! Great sex, at least in my opinion, requires a mental and emotional connection in order to transcend into something that surpasses well beyond the physical realm.
The second component that I wanted to explore in this article is the concept of “the other”. In long term monogamy, we encourage interdependence and symbiosis. Afterall, is this not the underpinning of our search for “the one”? This is a wonderful, comfortable, reliable, warm and fuzzy state of being; which unfortunately subsequently leads to complacency and often sexual dissatisfaction. Remember, we cannot desire for what we think is ours, and if we view our spouse as an extension of ourselves 100% of the time, guess what is going to happen. After all, even fire needs oxygen to breath. Desire is created in the space between us. When we see our partner engaging in their passion, performing at work or engrossed in something that they are really good at, we see them, even just for that moment, as “the other”. This ignites the proverbial fire, and longing for the person that we see in front of us. Because in that moment, no matter how many years we have been married, we see them not as an extra appendage, but rather an independent being who we realise, we do not possess. So how do we do this? The answer lies in cultivating our own individual interests and continuing to build and thrive in our own domains. This is not to create division and separation, quite the opposite. The purpose of this task is to continue to feed and nourish your relationship with what you bring from the outside world. Think about how you feel when your partner lights up and shares something new in their day? This sharing of worlds is what separates co-dependency from interdependency.
In summary, desire is not a perpetual state of being. It is a dynamic process that requires both partners to continue engaging in each other, being curious and learning about each other and continue to reach out to each other by extending bids of connection and turning inwards to one another. After all, arousal and eroticism all start with the flicker of connection and our brain is our most powerful tool when it comes to great sex. Happy love making everyone!