Just like you can get into a boring routine with your girlfriend or boyfriend of six years who refuses to wear the leather fuck-mask you got them for Christmas, you can get into a boring routine when it comes to masturbation.

For men, it can be way too easy to do this. Society puts a lot of unnecessary shame onto male masturbation, shame that can limit a guy’s ability to flex the full force of his erotic capability. Irregardless of the endless pile of literature that says masturbation is both healthy and desirable, there’s still a heavy stigma around jacking off — it’s almost like if you don’t have a partner to have penetrative sex with, it’s somehow sad or less-than you’re doing that to yourself.

These mistaken interpretations of men’s need to auto-climax has led to to what blewIt! founder, sex educator and mindful masturbation expert CT Schenk calls “getting off before you get caught.”

Indeed, many men make masturbation rapid, impersonal and routine; the whole point is to spew semen as soon as possible, to get it over with before someone realizes they don't have access to the "better thing," presumably someone else's warm orifice.

This sort of goal-oriented self pleasure puts all the emphasis on ejaculation and none on the process that leads up to it. Because of this, men don’t take the time to touch themselves like they deserve to be touched; to experiment with their own pleasure so they can become more advanced and creative sexual beings. In doing this, men can become extremely limited in the how they’re able to function sexually, both alone and with a partner.

These behaviors are both reflected in and enhanced by porn.

According to data from Pornhub, men spend an average of nine minutes on the site. That’s not nine minutes masturbating — that’s nine minutes on the site total; nine minutes in which men search for the type of porn they want, try out several videos, frantically close the web-cam virus windows that opens up, and get turned off by the excruciating music or dialogue before finally settling on something that works.

Typically, that only leaves about two or three minutes to actually get off.

According to Scheck, this timeline translates into partnered sex, because dicks are like doggos: trainable. When you train them to come in two to three minutes, to a particular visual, with a specific touch, dicks expect that.

When they don’t get it, they run into problems. These are called sexual dysfunctions. The two most common for men are performance anxiety and erectile dysfunction. One in three men ages 18-55 have one or both of these, and 25 percent of those incidences have occurred in the past year.

The only solution to these dysfunctions, as well as sadly limited masturbation and pleasure routines is what’s called pleasure retraining (or “mindful masturbation” in some circles).

Pleasure training refers to an approach to male masturbation that’s about more than just jerking off and being done with it; it’s about exploring your own potential for pleasure and what you’re capable of beyond your tried-and-true routine.

Men who’ve undergone pleasure retraining after brief periods of masturbatory cessation report greater sexual confidence, longer endurance, harder boners, higher sensitivity to pleasure and more overall happiness. Those aren’t solitary benefits; their sexual partners benefit just as much, if not more, by these more confident, happy, long-lasting dude humans.

Alright, so. Pleasure retraining. How does it work to cure sexual dysfunction?

The full process can take anywhere between 3-6 months, depending on how set on your masturbation routine you are and how ingrained it is in your behaviors. But, there’s a huge payoff for waiting that long: once the process is complete, you will have reset your body and its arousal patterns, making you more sexually capable than you ever thought possible. Your body will learn how to respond to new and different types of stimulation, you'll be able to slow down and really focus on what you're feeling, you'll be able to stay more in the moment, you'll improve your sexual stamina and confidence, you'll address any erectile dysfunction or performance anxiety you have, and you'll get better at communicating with your partner about your arousal to improve your sex life.

Here’s what you do;

1. No porn, masturbation or sex for two full weeks. It’s totally fine to think about fucking or jacking off during these two weeks, and you will increasingly as time goes on, but you cannot, under any circumstances, ejacualate.

If you do, it’s fine. Don’t beat yourself up; you’re only human and not cumming is hard. You just have to start again.

While you’re abstaining, take the time and headspace to really feel what’s happening to your dick, and more broadly, your body. Be mindful of the sensations you’re experiencing (you’re probably frustrated and horny), as well as how your erections are forming. What makes you pop a boner, and why? Being mindful of this helps increase your awareness of your own body, how it works, and what it’s capable of. Later on down the line, this will be the root of your newfound confidence.

According to Schenk, after the two weeks, you should start to feel euphoric, more easily aroused, and much kinkier than you previously were.  The lack of masturbation and ejaculation should expand your concept of what could be considered hot and pleasurable, and you might find yourself fantasizing and daydreaming more fervently than ever.

Without your tried-and-true whack off song and dance … you suddenly become sexually creative.

 

2.  After two weeks, you can stroke the shaft, but not the head. And still no orgasm. By this point, your cock should be extra sensitive and excitable, but you don’t want to give it what it wants just yet.

Experiment with what it feels like to play with your shaft, testing out different sensations and modes of touch, realizing that you can get an immense amount of non-orgasmic pleasure from doing so.

Again, pay attention to the feelings you get from your shaft and what causes it to feel good or bad.

Also during this time, start to focus on what’s happening with your prostate during arousal.

Also called the male G-Spot, the prostate is famously engorged with pleasurable nerve endings that can help you experience kinds of heightened pleasure you never realized your body was capable of.

If you’re feeling really pro, or are comfortable with butt things, Schenk recommends you insert a prostate stimulator while you retrain your pleasure centers. A really good one is the Aneros; it’s a small, unimposing insertable device you can leave in for as long as you want; you can wear it to work, touch yourself with it in, go down on your partner without them knowing it’s there, exercise, and even have a productive conversation with your veterinarian about your dog’s legs, all with it inside you. If you squeeze your PC muscles around it in your ass, the intensely pleasurable sensation of it rubbing against your prostate will “change you life,” says Schenk.

These two things — fucking around with your shaft and beginning to consider your prostate as an erotic organ — in tandem are meant to help you interpret pleasure in a new way. You should be noticing that new, previously un-thought-of things feel really good; things you thought either weren’t for you, or never thought about at all. You should also be noticing that you’re becoming more and more capable of experiencing diverse types pleasure, not just simple dick pleasure.

The shaft and prostate things lasts about a week or two.

 

3. Start edging. Edging refers to getting yourself right up to the point of orgasm, then stopping before you cum. To do this, you have to understand what your “point of no return” is. Schenk explains this is the point right before you’re about to come; when your semen starts to build up and you’ll explode if you keep going. If ejaculatory inevitability were a 1-10 scale, the point of no return would be about a 7 for most men. It’s helpful to learn to think of ejaculation in this numerical way, because recognizing your own stages of orgasm will allow you to control them.

When you reach your point of no return, stop for between 30 seconds to one minute while your system calms down. Focus on deep breathing and what it felt like to almost get there. Then, start again. You can do this as many times as you can stand it before you come.

Scheck recommends a few 20-minute edging sessions over a two-week period with no ejaculation. Keep your point of no return near, or at a 7. Doing this will help you rewire your brain to expand your definition of what sex means; it’s not just all about getting off. When you legitimately understand that, you can truly break out of own routine — suddenly you’re competent at finding pleasure where you never have before.

 

4. Take this approach into your relationships. Learning to control your body and retraining yourself to feel pleasure teaches you so much about what you’re capable of and able to achieve. Think about it — you just went from a one trick pony kind of guy who could only cum from a few variations of one type of pleasure. Now, you’re a more omnipotent being, capable of finding arousal in orgasm in multiple places and controlling your sexual behaviors to suit whatever situation you’re presented with. This should give you a shit ton of confidence both in the bedroom, and in life.

The next step is to translate this sense of confidence into your personal relationships.

When you’re confident about your body and ability, it’s easier to share with you partner what you like and to include them in your newly expanded repertoire of pleasure. You’re more able to help them please you in the most fulfilling ways, which is a great feeling for the both of you.

Even better, this newfound intimacy with yourself might motivate you to encourage your partners to explore their own capacity for pleasure as well. You may find yourself being more attentive to your partner’s needs, asking them what feels good for them and what they want, and realizing that sex, pleasure and orgasm don’t always have to mean one, routine thing.

It also doesn’t suck that once you’ve re-trained yourself to masturbate with this process, you’re also likely to last longer, have harder boners, and be more sexually creative as well.

 

5. When you finally start ejaculatig again, use these tips from Scheck's website:

— Set a new goal – taking your time and lasting longer, experimenting with a different type of stimulation, trying to discover a new technique that you like, or anything else that will help you approach the whole experience differently.

— Switch up the basics of your routine – a different position or location or even time of day from whatever you normally do.

— Focus on what you’re feeling in your entire body – mindfulness teaches you to become more aware of sensations in your body, which is a skill that has obvious benefits in the bedroom.

— Rethink your accessories – add lube if you normally don’t use it, and if porn is part of your routine try skipping it sometimes to see if you feel less distracted. If you usually use a sex toy to masturbate, try going without it or try a different type of toy. And if you usually just use your hand, try incorporating some toys into your routine.

As Scheck says, "Once you start to become more aware of your thoughts and feelings, most mindful practices recommend trying to accept whatever comes up in a non-judgmental way. This can be a really helpful concept to apply to sexuality, which is affected by so many external factors like sex education, the opinions of partners, and stigmas and stereotypes in society. Approaching your sexual thoughts and feelings in an accepting and non-judgmental way can help you to put less pressure on yourself to perform a certain way and reduce expectations around how things are “supposed to” go so you can focus on what you and your partner actually want. It can create space for desires, fantasies, and feelings to come up that you might want to explore."

Your masturbation routine is as a great place as any to start bringing that kind of mindfulness into your sex life. 

So, penis having members of society: go forth and conquer with this new knowledge. Be the sex god you wish the see in the world.