Wondering How to Have Better Sex? You Only Need These Three Things

When it comes to having more intimate, exciting, and fulfilling sex, most of the advice tells you to add new, sexy, fun things to your routine. Variety indeed keeps things exciting, but it doesn’t take long before you get comfortable and your routine expands to include that something new.

Then there’s the fact that, for many people, there isn’t a sex toy, position, or move that solves their struggles with low desire, body image issues, orgasm difficulties, relationship issues, systemic oppression, etc.

For long-lasting answers, you have to look outside the bedroom.

Over the years, researchers have examined the question of how to have better sex for a lifetime and discovered just three factors most people need. Here’s what those three keys are—and some ideas to achieve them.

1: Manage Your Stress

For many people, stress kills libido. For fewer, it ratchets up their sex drive, sometimes to an uncomfortable point. Either way, managing (not decreasing or eliminating) your stress is a powerful way to have better sex.

Stress, like all emotions, needs to be experienced and resolved. Otherwise, it takes up residence in your body, wreaking havoc on your sleep, mood, libido, and more. One of the best ways to manage stress is to physically release it from your body. Here are a few ways to do that.

Use sounding breath

Here’s how:

1. Place your hand on your chest, just below your collarbones
2. Inhale deeply, filling your pelvis, lower belly, ribs, and chest
3. Sigh deeply as you exhale. You want to feel your chest vibrate beneath your hand
4. Repeat multiple times, throughout the day, and anytime you feel tense

A good ol’ scream or two also works great, though this can be a bit harder to do in a public place or even your home, depending on your living situation.

Read more: Simple mindfulness Techniques for Better Sex

Shake it like a polaroid picture

Ever notice that after a dog gets spooked they shake it out? Shaking is one of the best things you can do to manage stress. After experiencing an acute stressor—say, a loud noise—let that shudder out. For chronic stress, try a daily rebounding or shaking (or dancing that’s mostly shaking) practice.

Cry it out

Feel silly crying? Put on that show or movie, the one that always wrecks you, or grab thatbook, and let it flow!

Inhale peace

Essential oils are another tool to help manage stress. Try this Sweet Oasis blend to shift you from argh to ahhh.

0,So…You Think You’ve Tried It All?

2: Increase the trust, intimacy, and connection with yourself and your partner(s)

The second major factor? How you feel about yourself and the person you’re getting it on with!

Now, this does not mean that good sex only happens in a committed relationship, simply that most people have better sex when they trust and feel connected to their partner. That can happen in any relationship structure, from a hookup to a committed relationship.

Feel disconnected from your lover? Here are 21 intimate ideas to help you reconnect instantly

And don’t forget yourself! Your physical and mental health, body image, self-esteem, and trust in your body’s ability to experience pleasure all impact how good sex can be. Some ways this can look include unearthing and healing internalized-isms and ancestral trauma, going on a social media diet, and practicing mindful masturbation.

3: Make it explicitly erotic

Let your brain know: it’s go time! There are as many ways to make something explicitly erotic as there are people on this planet. However, there are a few that anyone can do, no matter their sexual desires.

• Keep the bed for sleeping and fucking. This signals your brain that only relaxing, fun things happen here.
• Have a signature, aphrodisiac scent like this candle that doubles as a massage oil. The key here is to only use it for and during sexy times.
• Know what turns you on…and off. Incorporate more of the former throughout your day and remove, heal, or dismiss as much of the latter as possible.

Not sure what revs your engine? Try this sexy date night in, solo or with your beau. Need inspiration? The So…You Think You’ve Tried It All? workbook features hundreds of sexy fun ideas to help you discover and uncover new desires.

The only three things you need to have better sex for a lifetime

Each of these is simple but not easy. All of them are the foundation to help you address any sexual issues you experience, from trouble experiencing orgasm to low desire to premature ejaculation and everything in between.

At the end of the day, it’s not just about knowing the right moves or having the best toys. It’s as simple—and complex—as these basics, whose impact will ripple through your sex life, relationship, and entire life.