In Manhattan, Woody Allen’s character, Isaac, is chatting about sex with a group of well-coiffed partygoers when an attractive young woman admits, “I finally had an orgasm, and my doctor said it was the wrong kind.”

A bit taken aback, Isaac responds, “I’ve never had the wrong kind, ever. My worst one was right on the money.”If there’s one lesson to take from that scene, it’s that you shouldn’t attend cocktail parties full of neurotic intellectuals.

If there’s a second lesson, it’s that you shouldn’t over-analyze your orgasms. But that’s just what many couples do in their search for the much-hyped, yet often-unattainable, simultaneous orgasm.

Coming at the same time can indeed be a mind-blowing experience, but focusing only on that and nothing else can ultimately kill the mood and leave both people in the dust on the orgasm trail.

The key—at least, initially—is to approach simultaneous climax the way you would S&M, anal sex, or inviting a truck-stop hooker into bed with you both: as a way to augment your sex life, rather than its end-all and be-all.

“People tend to think that you simply get caught up in the moment, the stars and planets align, and then—boom!—it just happens,” says Yvonne K. Fulbright, sexologist and author of The Hot Guide to Safer Sex. “In reality, it takes a great deal of time and practice. Yet couples assume that since they’re not having them—or not having them enough—they don’t have a good sex life.”

Which, of course, is baloney. Women typically need a different kind of stimulation than men—rarely obtained from vaginal sex alone—and they typically need it for a longer period of time. If you don’t approach it correctly, those basic physiological discrepancies could turn coordinating your climaxes into a tedious, unsexy logistical nightmare.

Luckily, there are ways to help close the gap between woman and man that don’t require both parties picturing an oiled-up Brad Pitt in a French sailor uniform.

For starters, since many women find it easier to have their second, or even third, orgasms after they’ve enjoyed their first, the woman can come once as a warm-up before both partners go for the gold.