Joe Davis – Announcer [00:00:00]:

The following content is not suitable for children.

George Faller [00:00:04]:

Boring sex. Who wants boring sex?

Laurie Watson [00:00:09]:

Laurie I’m so bored and bad. What are we going to do about this? Welcome to foreplay sex therapy. I’m Dr. Laurie Watson, your sex therapist.

George Faller [00:00:21]:

And I’m George Faller, your couple’s therapist.

Laurie Watson [00:00:24]:

We are here to talk about sex.

George Faller [00:00:26]:

Our mission is to help couples talk about sex in ways that incorporate their body, their mind and their hearts.

Laurie Watson [00:00:34]:

And we have a little bit of fun doing it right.

George Faller [00:00:36]:

G listen and let’s change some relationships.

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George Faller [00:01:11]:

I don’t know, Laurie. I’m feeling depressed. Boring sex. Sex wasn’t made to be boring. I mean, I’m sure there always may be moments in a relationship, but for the most part, if there’s any date that should be full of vitality and fun and curiosity and playfulness and laughter and kind of intensity, it’s sex. So if we lose that, if it falls into a place of that sucks. So if you’re having boring sex, I’m sure you have good reasons. Let’s figure out what those are and what we can do to shake it up a little bit.

Laurie Watson [00:01:40]:

Laurie yeah, I started thinking about this topic because I was also just wondering what makes people boring? Occasionally I will say in general, I am never bored with anybody, even people who maybe have disabilities. Intellectually, I still find their world interesting, the way they think about it. I was in a group with a guy who was mentally challenged for a long time. I mean, I was in this group for like three years with this man, and I was interested in the way he experienced the world. I don’t find people boring, but there is something that I do find boring about people, and that’s when they will not reveal anything about themselves. And it’s the withheld quality that no matter what you ask, no matter how long you’re with them, no matter how safe you make it, they stay on the surface. And over time, and that’s fine. I have relationship with a bunch of neighbors who pretty much they stay on the surface. We party, we have good times together. I don’t need to be deep with everybody. But there is a quality of some of them or some people sometimes that just that surface level without any hint of the inner life inside that at least. I don’t know if I’m so bored, but I’m not compelled.

George Faller [00:03:09]:

I like that you’re zooming out of sex and just trying to what are the traits of boredom in general? Right? And there is something about the predictability when I know what somebody’s going to say, and it’s that lack of engagement. I think those are the hallmarks of my brain starting to kind of disengage, too, and then it feeds further disengagement. I remember my mom when she was still alive, sometimes she’d be calling me. It’s like I knew what she was saying. I could kind of take the phone away from my ear and come back 30 seconds later and not miss a beat because she would stop playing these tapes. And we all have moments where we could miss each other and in other areas, our relationship was fantastic, but there was this side of our relationship that had gotten so predictable that it was harder for me to engage. So I think we’re trying to make those connections that similar things are happening then in a bedroom where you kind of are not surprised, where you kind of know exactly what’s going to happen, where it feels like the person’s not present. Those are pretty tough moments then.

Laurie Watson [00:04:16]:

Yeah, exactly. And I think if you go upstairs on Thursday night, pull down the sheets, get cleaned up, hop in the sack, I do this, you do that, bam, bam, we have orgasms. Go get cleaned up, go to sleep. Nothing wrong with that.

George Faller [00:04:39]:

What’s the problem with that?

Laurie Watson [00:04:41]:

I’m going to take that one. But on the other hand, this is how people have sex sometimes for 20 years, and it’s without risk. It’s without ever talking about it afterwards or debriefing it. Or like, you always talk about playfulness and the laughter that people have when they have sex, and that’s fun. That’s not boring if you’re being playful. And that also gives you flexibility to be playful because you can put your elbow in somebody’s hair and the moment isn’t ruined.

George Faller [00:05:19]:

Yeah. I appreciate, again, as Richard’s trying to get clear about some characteristics that if our listeners can identify, they don’t feel crazier, there’s something wrong with them. This is just what happens. So those low levels of engagement or when people are not intentional, they’re not putting effort into it, they’re not trying anything new, they’re not communicating. I mean, it’s the lack of that leads to boredom.

Laurie Watson [00:05:43]:

Yeah.

George Faller [00:05:44]:

I love how you say, I’m curious. I don’t know this person’s world. It don’t matter who it is. I could kind of walk into a grocery store and like, I’m interested. Right. Not knowing that curiosity. It’s what keeps us fresh and alive. When everything becomes so predictable and the other person is not doing anything different and you’re not doing anything different. Well, there’s nothing wrong with your body saying, this is a bit bored. I know what’s going to happen with 100% certainty, and it’s getting harder and harder for my body to want to engage in that, because there’s just nothing new.

Laurie Watson [00:06:17]:

And I looked up this research, and I don’t mean to dis your gender g, but men in general are more bored in their lives. They experience more boredom and they experience more boredom and bad. And we know generally, I think, that men often they have more success with variety in bed. I mean, they can have orgasms in many different positions and it’s easier for them to reach climax in a variety of situations, whereas women kind of need this predictability sometimes to reach orgasms. So that’s attention. But I wondered about this. It’s like I also think men are withdrawers for good reasons. They’ve been taught to hold in their feelings and their thoughts. As children, we celebrate the independent male and I talk to so many men sexual pursuers and when I ask them questions about, okay, how do you seduce? Do you share your own sexual fantasies? I often get back no, I don’t. So it’s like this kind of like a dam inside. I wonder if their boredom is about not letting out the self, not letting out who they are in bed, not letting out who they are as a person. And I’m not blaming them for that. I think there’s good reasons men have learned not to do that.

George Faller [00:07:54]:

Well. It’s a script that you’re given, right, walls that you’re taught to use to keep out bad things also start to keep out good things. So with all couples that I work with, I do a quick assessment. I mean, the secret to any relationship is based on the quality of engagement. So I say, all right, I want you to think about on a one to ten. There I go with my numbers again.

Laurie Watson [00:08:16]:

I like you.

George Faller [00:08:17]:

How connected do you feel on the high road, the middle road and the low road? The high road is the great sex, the great vacations, the great dinners, fun stuff, positive affect, all the good stuff we need to make a relationship work. How do you do with that? The middle road is the grind, the teamwork, the partner, and somebody has to pay the bills and do the dishes and cut the lawn. And how do you do with that? Do you bicker the whole time or you feel like you do that pretty well? And then there’s the low road. The low road is sharing our struggles, our insecurities, our vulnerabilities, right? Typically when I ask men, they want to live in that high road, it’s where they thrive, it’s what they’re taught. A successful life is some are good at the middle road, but most avoid the low road. And what they don’t recognize in the setup in that is if you lose the low road, if you don’t know how to do the low road and that’s where most repairs happen and couples learn to kind of reconnect, the high road starts to disappear too. And before you know it, you’re stuck in doing all the work of life without any of the payoffs or the fruit, right? That is a set up for boredom.

Laurie Watson [00:09:24]:

That is a set up for boredom.

George Faller [00:09:25]:

And then they start to think there’s something wrong with me or there’s something wrong with my partner, when it’s just that they don’t know how to let those parts of themselves out. And when you start to lose access to parts of who you are, guess what? You disappear. Literally. You start to lose you over time.

Laurie Watson [00:09:40]:

Yeah. Boredom is I think what you said is hitting me. It’s like a lack of engagement. If we’re not engaged, if we’re not engaged with our careers, if we’re not engaged with the people in our lives, that isolation. We’re just kind of bored, like a sense of apathy about life. And I certainly think this happens in the bedroom, and especially when we make up in our heads without communication, without talking about it, well, this is just the way this is all my partner wants, or my partner doesn’t want this wild, crazy thing over here. And therefore, we generalize that they don’t want anything new. They don’t want anything at all that’s different. Whereas they might want if that’s a ten, they might want all the way up to a nine with you, but they just can’t do that ten. And so we start to make up judgments and things that keep us inside ourselves, keep us isolated from our partner. We have sort of false judgments about them. And without talking about it, without having good language, which september Eigth Y’all we’re doing a great sex, great love retreat. So please join us where we help you talk this through. But without that communication, yeah, it’s going to be boring.

George Faller [00:11:05]:

I so appreciate you adding the good intention. So often what leads to boredom is, I don’t want to hurt my partner. I don’t want to bring something up that will be judged. So I’ll just keep it to myself. I’ll keep it to myself. And what people don’t realize is every time they swallow who they are and they don’t express it, they lose more of themselves to bring in both. People do that. Like, I don’t want you to think badly of me. I don’t want to hurt your feelings. I don’t want to tell you a little slower, a little faster. All this lack of feedback is coming from a beautiful place, but it just kills the levels of engagement in a relationship vitality.

Laurie Watson [00:11:47]:

I don’t know you then I don’t know who you are, what you want. I can’t see into your erotic mind. And so, yeah, it just kills that sense of excitement. I do think, and we’re going to take a break here in a minute, but I do think that there is a possibility, right, of safety and security in a relationship where actually we open up more and more and more and more deeply about who we are erotically.

George Faller [00:12:18]:

Yeah. So let’s get a little bit more depressed first and talk about more that contributes to this boredom, and then we’ll kind of pull out of that and talk about how we get out of that.

Laurie Watson [00:12:29]:

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George Faller [00:13:57]:

Nice. And we just completed training therapists. Two days. Right on. Sex. Had over 100 therapists. How much fun was that, Laurie, to just kind of, again, get all these questions? We don’t have all the answers, but we’re just again, that excitement is just trying to help us all get clear and clear and start leaning in this direction because it’s such a great need to help couples talk about their sex life.

Laurie Watson [00:14:19]:

It was really fun, and we’re excited to do it again for our couples. We always have fun with people who are wanting to work on their sex life and come to us. They’re always anxious, what is it going to look like? And I’m glad to email you a little bit about that talk with you.

George Faller [00:14:34]:

So you can get comfy and who don’t want to be comfy, right? So, Laurie, again, these good intentions, and I think that low road stuff, it’s so why this podcast? We’re trying to get couples to go to the low road sexually and talk about these things, like when you’re afraid of being rejected, when you’re afraid there’s something wrong with your body, that you’re going to fail, you’re going to disappoint, you’re going to lose your erection, you’re not going to have an orgasm. These things make it all about you. When it’s all about you and you’re lost and preoccupied in your own world, you’re not present. Guess what? When you’re not present and your partner is doing the same thing, you get two people at some of the loneliest moments that you could imagine, when two people are intimate and they’re both lost in their own worries. Right. How could that be high levels of engagement? How could that not feel bored? It’s like I’m not really with you.

Laurie Watson [00:15:33]:

Yeah, exactly. And I think when people focus on sometimes just pleasing their partner, I just want you to have a good time and then it’ll be over. It’s like that focus, that worry. Like, are you going to be happy with me? They are not in tune with the self at all.

George Faller [00:15:54]:

Right.

Laurie Watson [00:15:54]:

And I do think in part, certainly, we want to be gracious, we want to be generous to each other sexually. But on the other hand, it’s like if always the focus is on making your partner happy, then you’re not necessarily taking enough. And I think sex without taking is boring. I want to be with a partner who says, hey, do this to like, that, to me, is so exciting.

George Faller [00:16:27]:

That was a turn on there, Laurie. Hey, do this to me.

Laurie Watson [00:16:31]:

No, I mean, it’s exciting when your.

George Faller [00:16:34]:

Partner.

Laurie Watson [00:16:39]:

It is a turn on. When your partner is willing to put that out there and to ask and even demand a little bit. It’s like that give and take. It has to be kind of rigorous back and forth. It can’t just be one person pleasing the other. It’s also about they’re willing because, you know, they’re engaged. If they’re asking for something and if they’re a little bit focused and they know their body, that’s exciting.

George Faller [00:17:08]:

That’s the good news. Here, let’s turn this around. Right. There’s nothing wrong with boredom. It’s just your body telling you where you’re at and you’re not where you’re supposed to be. Yeah. It’s a signal, like depression or anything else. It’s saying you need to pivot, you need to do something differently. Something’s not working here. Let’s listen to it and not judge it. If your level of engagement is down, let’s do things. I mean, I think too often, sex therapists or try to fix this problem with novelty. And there’s nothing wrong with bringing in toys and different things. Right. But at the root of the problem, if that’s just now you’re preoccupied with your toys and you’re not present, it’s really not going to fix anything. How do we get people to be more present with each other, to be more embodied, to be more relaxed? Right. To be able to communicate, which is going to be the key to doing that with each other.

Laurie Watson [00:17:59]:

Yeah. And I read a bunch of articles, like, on what other people thought about boring sex, and I read ten articles about, hey, spice it up, bring in some toys, do this. But I’m really thinking about a deeper way to have enlivened sex. And I think what you’re saying, yes, you can use all the toys in the world and you can maybe even have great orgasms, but if you’re not engaged with your partner, I just think there’s this qualitative problem that doesn’t foster more eroticism.

George Faller [00:18:38]:

Exactly. So if you’re listening you’re already going down this road. You’re already starting to think about how can I introduce these new elements, these new communication kind of questions, or engage. This is a constantly moving target. Like what I liked yesterday, I might not like tomorrow. So I need a partner who’s going to attune to that. When I’m teaching therapist, I’m like, the goal isn’t perfect attunement, it’s learning and celebrating the attunement. But you’re always going to fall a little bit behind or get a little bit in front. And misatune, misattunement is our friend, too. It’s information. It’s saying, you know what, you’re not where you need to be. You’re moving too fast, you’re going too slow. You busted out that toy too early. For people who could communicate that this is easy to repair. It’s easy to get back into that spot of attunement. But if you’re in a relationship with no attunement, which boredom is, you have two people who are just misattuned and not doing anything to change the misattunement, that’s going to lead to distance, it’s going to lead to loneliness, it’s going to lead to more pressure. And that’s what leads so many couples to stop having sex. They don’t want the bored, bad sex anymore. Their body’s saying, I don’t want that. It doesn’t feel good. And then now we stop having sex altogether, which is a whole nother kind of episode.

Laurie Watson [00:20:01]:

Yeah. If I were a sexual pursuer, if I had advice for a sexual pursuer, it’s about being courageous. And I’m not saying, okay, I want to do you dirty and do it anal and do it in a park, I wouldn’t say that startling your partner is the best technique. I would say, what about the inside? What about for you is seductive? What can you imagine, you know, your partner, what would you do that would seduce your partner? I asked this guy, I found him boring. I really did. He was so complaining about his you’re.

George Faller [00:20:49]:

Talking about a client?

Laurie Watson [00:20:51]:

A client, yeah. Thank you.

George Faller [00:20:53]:

You’re talking about a previous boyfriend.

Laurie Watson [00:20:54]:

No, we’re not going there. No. I found him so boring because he was so invulnerable. I don’t know. My wife is so boring in bed. And I had been talking to her, I’m like, she was stark, raven beautiful. George and all he could do was complain about one thing or another about her body. And she was very beautiful and very fit. She was too short. Her legs were too short. I’m like, really? This is what you’re focusing on? On this? Like, every man that I know would think she was an eleven. And anyway, I asked him, if you were sitting at a bar and let’s say you’re single, your wife has died. I’m not talking about something immoral and you have to pick up a woman, what would you do? And he’s like, all his game was gone. He could not think about how he would flirt, how he would come on to her. Maybe he did know. Right? I mean, my assumption was deep down inside, he absolutely knew how to do that, but he would not play the game. He would not reveal that he because to reveal it meant that he was not doing that with his wife, and he was contributing to the boredom between them, that he was not putting out the energy that was necessary to really enliven them.

George Faller [00:22:24]:

Yeah. It’s so important for both people in a board sexual relationship to take ownership for their side of it? Because if they’re in a negative cycle, they’re both. He has good reasons for his criticism, I’m sure, through the years and the rejections. But can he see how he’s creating an environment that would make anyone not want to have sex? You’re a receptive person, and all you’re getting is criticism that’s probably not going to turn you on or kind of get your body going. And the flip side of it, if you’re that receptive person and you’re going to pathologize your partner for wanting sex too much, like, that ability for both sides to take ownership, I think that’s freedom in that. I think too often partners in relationships don’t. They’re so focused on the other and changing the other that they don’t actually focus. And we know that most successful people focus on themselves. They focus on what they can change, which is their own actions. So that’s what you’re inviting this guy to do, like change your game, man. Maybe she won’t respond to it, but if you do, you have a chance instead of always focusing on changing her. I don’t think her legs are going to grow. But you know what? If you tried to pick her up at a bar, you might get it away. Yield. I don’t know. Find that better dance.

Laurie Watson [00:23:44]:

Yeah. And I would say for receptive people, this is one thing that has been proven to me as a sex therapist over 25 years or however long I’ve been doing it is often the and it’s usually female. She comes in and she says, yeah, I just never want sex again. And when I talk to her over a period of time, what I learn is she does have an erotic core. She does have ideas and fantasies, but there’s been injuries. I told him this, and he never did it again. Or I’ve told him multiple times what I need, and he doesn’t do it. And she sacrifices her eroticism to make the relationship go more smoothly. She’s afraid if I really make a big deal about this, he’s going to hear my criticism. He’s so macho. He’s going to think he’s not doing it right, and then we’re going to shut down or something. And sometimes it’s true. I talked to this one woman who said, he’s rough on my clitoris. Like, I get going, I’m almost there, and he just goes harder and faster. And I’ve told him a hundred times, that hurts and he won’t hear it. And he’s sitting in the room with us, George, and he says, but it’s so exciting. And I just want her to get there. So I go hard and I’m like, okay, she’s told you privately a hundred times, she’s telling you in my presence and you’re still protesting. Like, no wonder she doesn’t want to have sex with you. It wasn’t that she didn’t like sex. It’s that this communication glitch. It’s like he could just not get through his head that what he thought would work. And maybe for him, harder and faster really worked. So he has a biological truth about harder and faster, which he can’t let go of in that moment to give her what she needs. And so her reception, she gets bored and she turns off because, okay, I’ll just do it your way. We’ll do it as fast as we can. I’m not even going to give you an opportunity to touch me because it’s not going to work. And then she lets go of her fantasies. I mean, lets go of her own eroticism in service of his pleasure. Even as I say it, my heart is like squeezing right now. It just hurts me when this can’t sort of work, especially when the more receptive person actually does have an alive eroticism inside. And it’s not just their partners. I mean, culture shuts down women and I think trauma shuts down women and men. There’s so many things that turn us off.

George Faller [00:26:46]:

We don’t have to settle for that again. That’s the good news, that we want to leave you all with that. If you’re having board sex, you have really good reasons to be having board sex. Something has happened. It’s a signal.

Laurie Watson [00:26:59]:

Signal.

George Faller [00:26:59]:

It could be you’re trying to protect your partner. It could be there’s been bad things happening that you couldn’t talk about. But whatever the level of engagements that are really poor, your body doesn’t want to do that over and over again. There’s nothing wrong with that. Listen to your body and figure out what is it that’s not working? How do I communicate that with the partner? And if you’re able to just kind of address that together, you’re already addressing it. Together is increasing the levels of engagement. I guarantee the next time you get in bed, it will not be the same way it always has been. And you’re going to start to feel the signs of what? Curiosity. Sex was designed to be an exploration. It’s a journey. It’s supposed to be high levels of engagement. And if there’s bumps in a road, that’s fine. Bumps also create levels of engagement. It was never designed to be a flat kind of parked kind of job. So let’s get at it.

Laurie Watson [00:27:52]:

Let’s get at it. Boring is a signal. It means that something needs to change. And so we invite you to change. Keep it hot.

George Faller [00:28:01]:

Keep it hot and talk about boring.

Joe Davis – Announcer [00:28:04]:

Baby, call in your questions to the Foreplay Question voicemail, dial eight three three my. Foreplay. That’s eight three three my. The number four play, and we’ll use the questions for our mailbag episodes. All content is for entertainment purposes only and should not be considered as a substitute for therapy by a licensed clinician or as medical advice from a doctor. This podcast is copyrighted by Foreplay Media.

Laurie Watson [00:28:28]:

Hi, I’m Sarah May, and I’m the host of your new favorite show, help Me, Be Me. It’s a self help podcast for people who hate self help. Help Me, Be Me is full of practical tools to help you overcome a variety of emotional challenges delivered in a way that’s hearing but frank. So if that sounds up your alley, I would invite you to check out Help Me, Be Me on the Iheart app on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks.