Introduction: Yes, you are normal#

Glossary#

• Negative feelings: Feelings like hate, angry, frustration, despair, disappointment and shame.

Social messages#

Includes moral, media and medical messages.

• Moral messages: You are evil.

If you want or like sex, you’re a slut. Your virginity is your most valuable asset. If you’ve had too many partners (“too many” = more than your male partner has had), you should be ashamed. There is only one right way to behave and one right way to feel about sex—not to feel anything about it at all but to accommodate the man to whom your body belongs. […] If you are sexually desirable, you are, by definition, unlovable, and a slut.

• Media messages: You are inadequate.

Spanking, food play, threesomes… you’ve done all these things, right? Well, you’ve at least had clitoral orgasms, vaginal orgasms, uterine orgasms, energy orgasms, extended orgasms, and multiple orgasms? And you’ve mastered at least thirty-five different positions for intercourse? If you don’t try all these things, you’re frigid. If you’ve had too few partners, don’t watch porn, and don’t have a collection of vibrators in your bedside table, you’re a prude. Also: You’re too fat and too thin; your breasts are too big and too small. Your body is wrong. If you’re not trying to change it, you’re lazy. If you’re satisfied with yourself as you are, you’re settling. And if you dare to actively like yourself, you’re a conceited bitch. In short, you are doing it wrong. Do it differently. No, that’s wrong, too, try something else. Forever.

• Medical messages: You are deceased.

Sex causes disease and pregnancy, which makes it dangerous. But if you’re ready to take that risk, sexual functioning should happen in a particular way—desire, then arousal, then orgasm, preferably during intercourse, simultaneously with your partner—and when it doesn’t, there is a medical issue that you must address. Medically. With medication. Or possibly surgery. To the extent that a woman’s sexual response differs from a man’s, she is diseased—except for pregnancy, which is what sex is for.

Normal and broken#

Note: When “normal” is written without italics it’s because it is not referring to a concrete meaning, but to the ambiguous meaning that people have in their heads—e.g. when people ask “Am I normal?”, but if you ask them “What is normal?” they are not clear about it.

• Normal (social meaning): You are like social messages says you should be.

Which is totally impossible because many social messages are opposites.

• Normal (most frequent): You are from the most frequent group—e.g., the most frequent sexual orientation is heterosexual and you are heterosexual.

Notice that the most frequent group is not what social messages says—e.g., the most frequent way for women to reach orgasm is through clitoral stimulation, but social messages say that penetration is the way to reach orgasm.

• Normal (positive meaning): Just same parts as everyone else, organized in a unique way.

Everyone is normal by this definition.

• Usual: One of the types in the diversity, regardless of whether it is the most frequent, none better than the other—e.g. all eye colors are usual and equally valid.

• Broken: Not normal (social meaning). Usually implies damaged, inadequate, or diseased. It’s something wrong with you.

Typical questions#

Some typical questions this book answers:

• Once my partner initiates, I’m into it, but it seems like it never even occurs to me to be the one to start things. Why is that?

Answer: You have responsive-desire. What is usual.

• My boyfriend was like, “You’re not ready, you’re still dry.” But I was so ready. So why wasn’t I wet?

Answer: You experience non-concordance. What is usual.

• I saw this thing about women who can’t enjoy sex because they worry about their bodies the whole time. That’s me. How do I stop doing that?

Answer: By non-judging. It’s a usual problem.

• I read something about women who stop wanting sex after a while in a relationship, even if they still love their partner. That’s me. How do I start wanting sex with my partner again?

Answer Maybe chasing dynamic (set a rule against sex temporally), stressed (complete the cycle) or context (create a sex-positive context).

• I think maybe I peed when I had an orgasm…?

Answer: It’s a squirt, vaginal fluids, not pee. It’s usual to feel like you were to pee at orgasm, enjoy it, don’t hit you brakes.

• I think maybe I’ve never had an orgasm…?

Answer: If you doubt, probably don’t. Do you know where is you clit? Take a mirror and look at it, pay attention to it the next time you masturbate or have sex. Clit stimulation is the most usual way to reach orgasm for women. Make your partner know it.

Fact: Less than a quarter of woman are reliably orgasmic by intercourse.

People have so many questions, the most of them hide behind the question “am I normal?”

What is normal?#

See normal and broken meanings.

People’s most important concern is “Am I normal?”.

Why feel normal is so important?#

Because we are social beings, so not being normal involves danger. See to feel normal.

People are different#

Each person is different from each other, even twins.

We’re all made of the same parts, but in each of us, those parts are organized in a unique way that may change over our life span.

people are so different from each other that there is often more difference between two people of the same gender than between the averages of the genders.

People are normal (positive meaning)#

Is mandatory to see normal and broken meanings.

Same parts#

But being different doesn’t imply being broken. Indeed, “we’re all made of the same parts”.

Women and men both experience orgasm, desire, and arousal, and men, too, can experience responsive desire, arousal nonconcordance, and lack of orgasm with penetration. Women and men both can fall in love, fantasize, masturbate, feel puzzled about sex, and experience ecstatic pleasure. They both can ooze fluids, travel forbidden paths of sexual imagination, encounter the unexpected and startling ways that sex shows up in every domain of life—and confront the unexpected and startling ways that sex sometimes declines, politely or otherwise, to show up.

Differences are usual#

Even the differences in these parts are usual.

No organization is better or worse than any other, and no phase in our life span is better or worse than any other; they’re just different. An apple tree can be healthy no matter what variety of apple it is—though one variety may need constant direct sunlight and another might enjoy some shade. And an apple tree can be healthy when it’s a seed, when it’s a seedling, as it’s growing, and as it fades at the end of the season, as well as when, in late summer, it is laden with fruit. But it has different needs at each of those phases in its life.

So, what is the problem?#

The problem is that people are not aware of the different meanings of “normal”; so when they ask “Am I normal” the culture imposes its social meaning “No, you are not normal (social meaning) because you [any social message here]”.

So, what is the solution?#

The solution is to first realize that when society tells you—not literally, but when you realize that you are criticizing yourself or you have negative feelings about yourself—through social messages “you are not normal (social meaning)” what they are really saying is “you don’t fit all my impossible myths, so you are broken” and then tell yourself “that’s not true, I’m completely normal”.

It seems very simple, doesn’t it? Indeed, is not that simple. You have grown up with these social messages, so it takes time and courage to change those self-destructive thoughts in your head. But don’t give up, it’s worth it, you can do it, little by little you will feel that you are getting better and better.

See Chapter 9: Love what is true for more.

History of sexuality#

The history of sexuality is still very influential today—as the new science is still very new and sexuality is still very taboo. But don’t worry this book is about new science.

How? and Why?#

Historically researches about sexuality was based on the behaviour—the “how?”. But to really understand sexuality it is also necessary to know the psychology behind this behavior—the “why?”.

Trying to understand sex by looking at behavior is like trying to understand love by looking at a couple’s wedding portrait… and their divorce papers. […] Without better evidence, we’re mostly guessing.

Women as men#

Historically women’s sexuality has remained in the shadows of men’s sexuality.

Men reach orgasm by penetration and have spontaneous desire—most of them, not all. But science was very dogmatic back then—so women should too. Are you a woman who does not reach orgasm by penetration or do you have no spontaneous desire? You are deceased.

Science nowadays#

Good news. Nowadays, science about sexuality is also asking about the “why”? and acknowledges the importance of women’s sexuality.

How this book will change your life#

The information in this book will show you that whatever you’re experiencing in your sexuality—whether it’s challenges with arousal, desire, orgasm, pain, no sexual sensations, whatever—is the result of your sexual response mechanism functioning appropriately… in an inappropriate world. You are normal; it is the world around you that’s broken.
 That’s actually the bad news.
 The good news is that when you understand how your sexual response mechanism works, you can begin to take control of your environment and your brain in order to maximize your sexual potential, even in a broken world. And when you change your environment and your brain, you can change—and heal—your sexual functioning.