Howl

The Erotic Dance of Male Restraint and Female Abandon

How sexual hunger can heal

Lately, I’ve been encountering something interesting. While I’m over here exploring and celebrating my hunger as a female (something I’ve never been encouraged or felt like I was permitted to do), I’m seeing many men do the opposite — work to control their hunger or even sometimes deny it for long-term gains (increased intimacy with a partner and more satisfying sexual experiences).

As I’m encountering more and more men experimenting with self-denial while I’m here pushing myself to throw my legs open more often, to masturbate regularly, to keep identifying all the things I’m hungry for and try to find ways to satisfy that hunger, I’m stunned by this balance we’re entering into: women tumbling headfirst into the satisfaction of their hunger, and men holding back, learning to control it.

It makes me wonder about the beautiful things that might be born from these explorations.

A shift in focus

One of the changes I see when I encounter another man who is experimenting with the mastery of his sexual desire, is evidence of men who are interested in de-centering themselves in a sexual experience. In fact, I’d go so far as to say they are making a major effort to center their female partner(s), which very interestingly (in an act of mystical, sexual alchemy), often makes the experience much more satisfying to both partners — even more so than if he’d been solely focused on increasing his own pleasure.

It’s almost as if focusing on a woman’s sexual fulfillment has the power to enhance the pleasure of everyone who is involved. Hmmm…let’s ponder that for a moment, shall we?

One of my favorite people here, Teadad, who I’m convinced is a shapeshifter who can turn into a mystical bear, at will, expressing both intensely protective, nurturing energy, as well as powerful, primal sexual energy (just read his work — it oozes off the page) recently wrote about his explorations into controlling his sexual hunger and focusing it on the most prized object of desire — his wife:

… I decided to try an experiment in withholding. I stopped getting myself off between our sexual encounters. And you know what? Our sex increased in intensity. By a wide margin. There was something about saving up and holding my sexual energy exclusively for her that turned what we already thought was great sex into something beyond.

And don’t let me skip over the most important part. This experiment, he writes in his article, was inspired by his feeling that, by masturbating, “…it was almost like I wasn’t saving the best for her.” (Ladies, can you even handle that?)

I find it incredible to see men demonstrating this kind of deliberation and intentionality with the expression of their sexual desire. Maybe it’s just because I have never experienced this in my life with a partner, nor really witnessed it in other women’s relationships with their partners. But, honestly, I think it’s more than that.

I suspect there is a biological and even spiritual re-balancing going on…

Giving her control

I’ve been privileged to hear a similar journey from fellow writer (and wild stallion) Alan Tegel. He has also been exploring exercises in control with his sexual expression and fulfillment. In conversation (which I have his permission to recount here), he mentioned the desire to be able to master control over his sexual energy for the purpose of giving that control to a female partner.

I can’t wait to cede the control to a female partner so she can feel the raw power of controlling it herself. …by learning this fine-grained control, being able to cede this and tell my partner, ‘You control the nuclear reactor that is me, please love me and take care of me while I take care of you’ is the ultimate balance between femininity and masculinity.

Again, I find myself fascinated with this idea. What a beautiful image — to be able to participate in sex in such a way that the people involved are able to give their partners complete control over their sexual energy and expression.

As you can imagine, as a woman, I find this even more intense to think of from the male-to-female experience, as Alan is describing here. What an incredible notion, to think of having a male partner who would allow a woman to be in control of his sexual expression and fulfillment during sex. It’s not just a gift but an amazing re-balance of power and beautiful tribute to female sexual sovereignty, which has, for so long, been denied.

Hunger as a tool for healing

There are aspects of sexual hunger that can be incredibly harmful — dangerous not only to ourselves, but to other people. Sexual starvation, in particular. It can make us forget who we are, to fail to honor what we want, to betray people we have made certain promises to, to even become wolves lurking in the shadows, waiting for someone tasty to pass by.

But I’m learning that not all sexual hunger is dangerous. In fact, I’m seeing it as a tool of healing.

My first venture into this has been, as I mentioned, my explorations into encouraging my own hunger and other women’s hunger. We have been taught for so long that female sexual hunger is inappropriate, wanton, even perverted. We’re not supposed to be hungry and if we are, we’re supposed to at least hide it.

Over the past year, I’ve felt compelled to challenge that by insisting on demonstrating my hunger, on expressing it, on celebrating it. I diligently work to satisfy it (and I mean, I am committed), but I don’t want to satisfy it as a practice of quelling it — the fulfillment of my hunger is my attempt to deepen it.

I want to let myself be ravenous.

And I want other women to be able to express and grow their hunger, too.

Now I am seeing even more ways in which hunger can be a method of healing. I see men like Alan and Teadad working with their own energies and within their relationships to control hunger, to focus it, to master it. I see them directing hunger toward what they want: pleasing a partner, deepening intimacy, and increasing pleasure.

And unlike me, they’re doing this by carefully controlling their hunger. By selectively denying it.

Where is our hunger taking us?

What I’m witnessing makes me think of two common beliefs:

1. Men are hungry for sex all the time, but only get one shot (in each session) of experiencing the apex of pleasure.

2. Women aren’t hungry for sex, yet can experience the culmination of sexual pleasure over and over again.

First of all, let’s dig into the mythology there. Sexual hunger varies from person to person, regardless of gender. All men aren’t hungry for it all the time, and all women aren’t essentially disinterested.

But what about the rest? I love the idea of men working with this “one shot” energy — syncing it with their hunger to make it the most intense experience possible. And of course, I love the idea of women taking advantage of their ability to experience multiple orgasms by encouraging and feeding their sexual hunger.

The only problem is: there’s a flaw in this, as well.

Male orgasm and ejaculation aren’t the same thing. We know men can orgasm without ejaculating and can ejaculate without having an orgasm. So the whole “one shot” thing isn’t entirely accurate.

Perhaps this idea of controlling and focusing on sexual hunger can help men experience more culminations…? And/or perhaps they are starving for more intimacy, more emotional depth, more focused contact, and attention, as so many women need and want in a sexual experience, and this practice of focusing one’s hunger helps them achieve that…?

Perhaps women are more carnal than our culture would have us believe (we are) and the encouragement of our hunger is an expression of our determination to reclaim that. Perhaps we long to be wilder and more uninhibited in our pursuit of pleasure, as men seem to so easily demonstrate.

I wonder if all this playing with hunger is our way of healing the false gender-based stereotypes our culture forces upon us. Of healing the sexual imbalances we’ve suffered from. Of healing the way we’ve been forced to starve, when we were created to be such hungry, wild creatures.

Whatever the reasons, I feel certain there’s a kind of karmic, erotic magic happening in the world today to people who are yearning for their own freedom, but who also understand that none of us will be free until we all are.

Those are the people who are spinning this magic, undoing these damaging knots, reweaving the strands of sexual karma.

Their hunger is healing the world.

This article was written for Howl by Yael Wolfe, a weekly column. © Yael Wolfe 2020

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