Routines are for ribbon dancers; keep things interesting with these boredom-slaying tips.

Routines are for ribbon dancers; keep things interesting with these boredom-slaying tips.

>> You actually have to plan sex sometimes.

When you get close enough to someone that they go to the bathroom while you shower, it’s time you talk about your needs and desires in more blunt terms than ever before — in ways you might have been too timid to in earlier stages of your relationship. There’s no scaring off the person whose estranged hairs you clean off the bathroom floor; they’re already in it to win it. They like you. Tell them exactly what you want and need, and let go of the idea that sex should always be spontaneous, or that two people should psychically intuit what each other wants.

Of course, this raises an eternal conundrum: good sex in an LTR means verbally communicating what you want to your partner, but doing so can send the hot spontaneity askew. It’s easy to get around this, however. Talk about your desires, needs and how to carry them out so that you both feel satisfied before you start having sex. Takling about this on an entirely different day is ideal; that way it seems like whatever you’re doing came from a more authentic, spontaneous place.

>> Try things that don’t naturally turn you on.

You don’t have to love it, it doesn’t have to turn you on, and you don’t have to do it again if you weren’t into it, but the novelty of trying something new has two benefits.

First, it increases the brain’s dopamine output. This creates a positive feedback loop of horniness that can’t hurt at a point in your relationship when arousal is basically mediated by the poking of a morning wood into your lower back.

Second: you can’t be bored if you’re trying something new. If it sucks, laugh about it and try more weird stuff.

>> Have exploratory, rather than orgasm-oriented sex.

After a while, couples in LTRs learn exactly how to make each other climax. That’s fun for a while until the orgasms become routine and having sex is dependent on which night of the week you’re feeling somewhat randy. But, if you can learn to see sex as less orgasm-based and more as an exploration of each other’s bodies and what other kinds of sensations are pleasurable, it forces you down new avenues of touch and fantasy you wouldn’t have encountered otherwise.

>> Have sex even when you’re not horny.

Believe it or not, there’s an upside to having sex more often. The more you have sex, the hornier and more invested you’re likely to stay. So avoid long dry spells by fooling around even when you’re not feeling like perpetuating the human race.

As long as the sex or foreplay or whatever you do is consensual, you might find that once you get going, arousal will follow. Indulge each other when you can to keep up the pace of a sex life you both want. And remember, in relationships, you’ll have to put in a little extra work.