Love, Sex

The 10 Big Turn-Off MISTAKES Women Make With Men In The Bedroom

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bedroom turn-offs

If you want a fantastic, fully satisfying, and long-lasting sexual relationship that supports a strong and healthy intimate relationship, then you would do very well to take the following 10 suggestions very seriously. Because as amazing as it may sound, most women make every single one of these mistakes and learning how to avoid even a few of them will really set you apart in the mind of any man.

Eventually, it becomes both boring and sad for both you and your lover. Because while men are often sexually drawn to this type of woman, the actual sex turns out to be more about the “bragging rights” than pleasure. In fact, we all know a woman like this, who constantly talks about sex and loves to say and do shocking things... and who seems to need an endless stream of attention to satisfy her ego. 

And while being around someone who has so many personas and so little authenticity can sometimes be fun, we usually become aware of the deep insecurity that drives this kind of mask. Here are 10 bedroom turn-offs that all women make.

1. You buy into the popular hype that being a great lover means you have to be a “bad girl.”

“When I’m good, I’m very good… but when I’m bad, I’m better.” I am guessing that even before Mae West made that line famous, both men and women had a fascination with the sexually forward “bad girl” for thousands of years. And in popular culture, characters like Samantha from Sex and the City to an intense fascination with celebrities like Pamela Anderson show that the icon of the “bad girl” is not going anywhere anytime soon.

And it does not take a scientific study to notice that men seem to respond very strongly to these women. And, of course, we all worry about the fact that in our modern media frenzied culture, our teen and even pre-teen girls have noticed that fact too.

But of course, you’re not a teenager. So you should know better. Yes, for most men there is a fascination with women who are hyper-sexual and use their sexuality to get attention. And if you have got some “bad girl” in you, then good news: your man will enjoy that side of you when you let her out. But if that’s your only trick, prepare for a life without any sexual depth and relationships without intimacy.

Part of the pleasure of being human is that we don’t have to be the same person all of the time, and knowing how to use a little “bad girl” to spice up your life is great, as long as you don’t let the attention cut you off from a more authentic experience of love and life.

2. You conform to double standards.

We have come a long way, but unfortunately, the double standard is alive and well in virtually all modern cultures. Most men I have talked to still think that if a woman has sex with him on the first date, then she probably did the same on all of her other first dates and that she is therefore “not relationship material.”

So what can a woman do? If she feels sexually drawn to a man, does she have to “hold out” in order to avoid getting labeled? On the other hand, is there such a thing as holding out too long? What if he gets frustrated and finds himself a more willing partner?

The truth is, there are plenty of very smart and savvy women who get themselves into emotionally difficult situations from trying to figure this out and “playing the game” from either end. There are women who try to gain “power” in their relationships by holding out longer than what feels comfortable. And there are women on the other side who fear to lose a man if they don’t “put out” and use sex to try to get an emotional commitment.

Both of these strategies almost always fail in the end. The only way to win this game is to not play. You can’t GET anything by either withholding or giving sex. The only thing sex can get you is sex. And trying to figure out how to trade it for love or attention is almost always a disaster.

So what should you do? Commit yourself to working as hard as you can to remain fearlessly authentic to your personal truth and ethics, no matter what they may be. You should not have sex with a man either a moment before or a moment after you are fully emotionally ready to do so.

If that means that you lose a man because he felt like it was “too soon” or“too slow” then you just saved yourself a lot of heart-ache in getting involved with a man who either can’t see or can’t appreciate true authenticity.

3. You make your pleasure HIS responsibility.

It’s easy to blame your lover if the sex is not what you wished it was. Especially if it does not measure up to another man from your past. Part of this is because we all carry certain imprinting — from early sexual fantasies, something we saw or overheard, or from experience — and we develop preferences for.

Obviously, we can’t expect our lover to have the same imprinting that we do, and so there’s a good chance that he’s got a different idea about what great sex ought to look like. Another common situation is that a couple gets stuck in a rut and they both wish things were different, but neither of them is willing to take responsibility for making changes.

It’s easy to see that HE just does the same thing every time. But for some reason, it’s just harder to notice that YOU might be doing the same thing every time too.

And finally, many women believe that if they are not having orgasms during sex that it must be their partner’s fault. It becomes “our” problem, and he gets sucked into feeling inadequate, or else she just keeps it to herself, either faking it or not, but secretly holding resentment. Most women make every single one of these mistakes and learning how to avoid even a few of them will really set you apart in the mind of any man.

4. You make your pleasure YOUR responsibility.

And of course, there are just as many women, if not more, who believe that if they are not having orgasms or if they don’t enjoy sex that is their own fault. Many women go around feeling humiliated or even “broken” because they either can’t have an orgasm or because they can’t have orgasms during intercourse.

With every other issue of the women’s magazines telling you that you’re entitled to “the big O” and that if you’re not getting it then you are missing out on what it means to be a fully actualized woman, it’s easy to start to feel like you’re a below average human if you’re not screaming into your pillow for at least an hour a day.

And there are just as many women who walk around believing that they “just have a low sex drive,” or they “just don’t enjoy sex,” and that’s just the way it is. The fact is, all women are capable of orgasm, because every woman has the anatomy and the circuitry for orgasm. And yes, having orgasms, both clitoral and vaginal, is something that can be learned, and powerfully intensified with the right information.

Getting past “fault” and the silly idea that sex is “supposed” to be a certain way is the essential beginning for any woman who knows that she could be getting more out of sex.

5. You think foreplay begins in the bedroom.

Men and women are equally guilty of this one, and both men and women suffer because of it. I am constantly hearing from women that say “my husband isn’t attracted to me anymore,” or “his sex drive has disappeared.” And it almost always has nothing to do with what’s going on between the sheets, but rather what’s going on during the day.

While we like to think that men are all about the physical and that women are the ones with all of the emotion, it’s been my observation time and again that if a couple has not been getting along well during the day, that the man is often the one who becomes disinterested in sex in the evening.

For women, returning to the intimacy of touch is often a way to heal wounds carelessly inflicted during the day. But frequently for men, getting intimate when they are feeling frustrated and unheard is just out of the question. 

Being in the right emotional frame of mind for lovemaking is something that usually does not “just happen” in the bedroom. It’s something that happens through intention and care, and in every interaction throughout the day.

6. You're ashamed of your body.

And it’s the one that seems hardest to avoid for most women.

There was a time when the kind of female beauty that we elevate to celebrity status would have been something you might see only a few times in a lifetime.  Humans evolved in bands of 100-150 individuals, and encounters with other tribes was not overly common. If you take a random 100 people from the street that might be what your tribe looked like, and all the people you’d ever see.

Today, however, we live in a global community, and those chosen for jobs as the models for magazines and catalogs and to appear in television and movies are a tiny handful of all of the humans alive on the planet. They are literally the 1 in 100 million.

But that’s just the beginning because these humans of rare beauty are then put into the hands of the best makeup artists, they are carefully lit by the most masterful photographers, and then, finally, they are digitally enhanced by another set of artists who perfect even the tiniest flaws.

But here’s the really scary part: Because we live in such a media-saturated world, on any given day you probably see MORE of those people than you do REAL people. So if you have got 20 people in your office, saw 8 people at the coffee shop, rode public transit and saw another 30 people, that’s maybe 60 real people for the day.

But if in the same day you watched 2 hours of television and skimmed a magazine, you probably saw 300 impossibly beautiful people, leading you to believe that the average human looks something like a Victoria’s Secret model.  And if you have looked in the mirror lately, you are probably aware of a certain disconnect between the way you look and the way that they look. And it is probably a fact that BOTHERS you.

So, like I said, it’s not your fault, but it IS your responsibility. Nobody can tell you how to feel about yourself but you. And I could give you at least 100 good reasons why you ought to not only make peace with your physical appearance but even learn to cherish the body you have been given.

But I’ll give you just 1 reason: Of the many men that I have worked with, over 90 percent of them rated your self-image in the top 3 or 4 most important factors to being “good in bed.” In fact, in answer to the question, “what turns you on,” no answer got a higher average response from men than a woman with a “positive body image” who is “comfortable with her body and her sexuality.”

When you are fully confident with your body, it is something that men find nearly irresistible.

What parts of your body are you afraid to show off?  Where are you being critical and judgemental about your SELF?

7. You tell him what he's doing wrong.

This is a difficult one because, first of all, a lot of men will tell you that they WISH women would tell them what they want in the bedroom. But the fact remains, telling a man what he’s doing wrong in the bedroom is an almost certain recipe for unleashing all of his insecurities.  And ending up with a man who is defensive, resentful, or worse, a bad case of performance anxiety.

Sorry ladies, we lads like to think we are big and tough, but the fact is, most of us are quite weak when it comes to critique of our sexual skills. Tell a man what you want him to do in the bedroom and you might get an appreciative partner who gives you exactly what you asked for.

But more likely you’ll end up with one or more of the following male reactions: How does she know about that? She must sleep around a lot! She’s more experienced than me, I must look like a fool. What’s wrong, I am not good enough for you?! Sorry, I can’t be as hot as your last lover!

The good news: There are plenty of ways to get exactly what you want in the bedroom. You have just got to know the right way to do it so that he thinks it was HIS idea.

8. You try to substitute techniques for passion.

Imagine that you are in bed with a man who read about some technique that is sure to give you the orgasm of your life, and he proceeds to get to work on your like a project. He’s furiously working his fingers or tongue and restlessly checking now and then to see if it’s working yet. He’s completely absorbed in his eager task of trying really hard to please you, and demonstrate to you what an expert he is in the bedroom.

In fact, as he continues to saw away he may become increasingly worried if his plan is not working the way the magazine article he read, assured him it would. Finally, he asks that dreaded question, “what’s wrong?”

Almost every woman I talk to can relate to this one. So it’s a bit shocking that women do EXACTLY THE SAME THING. And for men it is received in exactly the same way. Sure, it can be fun if you decide to spice things up for us with a new technique you just read in.

But it could also just as easily become a huge bedroom turn-off to be with a woman who is trying so hard to make something “work”. And nothing is more awkward than the woman who is full of fake bravado because she thinks her secret oral technique is going to make us fall down at her feet and worship her skills.

And if you find that you’re working really hard to get something to work and your lover begins to lose his erection, please save yourself and him the embarrassment of asking, “what’s wrong?” Nobody wants to be treated like a project. And men can tell just as well as women can when our partner is not engaged in what we are supposed to be doing TOGETHER.

There is simply no substitute for authentic passion. If your attraction isn’t real, if you are trying hard to impress, instead of just allowing yourself to get lost in the fun; if you are not really in the mood but doing it for the sake of peace and harmony in the relationship, then you really need to rethink why you are doing it.

Unfortunately, for many women, authentic passion does not come naturally. Society, upbringing, and often religious background, and sometimes even sexual abuse from the distant past, often conspire to make women feel awkward about what ought to be natural, easy, and fun. Getting in tune with what is essential and honest about your sexuality is one of the most fundamentally important things a woman can learn.

9. You kill his soul.

Okay, I know it sounds obvious that killing his soul would be bad, and yet so many women seem to make this mistake. Here’s the deal: men are men. And we are not exactly like women.

I know there is this popular idea that men and women are equal, but that turns out to be just wrong. Equal is a mathematical term meaning identical. Anyone with a pair of eyes can see that men and women are not identical.

There is another mathematical term, “equivalent,” which means “of equal VALUE.” And men and women are indeed equivalent. But trying to figure out how to make them the SAME causes a lot of problems in our society.

What I mean by “killing his soul” comes down to the following: There are certain things that men want and need sexually and in our relationships that might not make sense to a woman. There’s nothing wrong with it not making sense. The only time the problem comes in is when you make us “wrong” for it. MAKING HIM WRONG for things he likes because he’s a man.

Once you have made a man feel like he’s wrong for just acting like a man or having masculine desires, you run the risk of having him censor important parts of himself around you. He feels like you don’t accept him for who he truly is. And one of the casualties of making him feel like his masculinity is unacceptable to you is often his sexual passion.

Couples that celebrate their differences instead of trying to conform to each other are the ones that build relationships of lasting passion.

10. You get help in all the wrong places.

When I work with both men and women, this is the most common mistake. For men, asking for advice about sex is often embarrassing or emasculating. But women, by and large, love to talk about sex and they love to offer advice and ideas of how sex ought to be.

Women think that sex ought to look like it does in romantic movies, or they learn about what men want from magazine articles, and they are endlessly fascinated by “experts” talking about relationships. In my experience, it appears that men who write articles about sex frequently talk about what they themselves like.

Women who write these articles talk about what their current lover likes. And experts seem to think that relationships boil down to the things that are discussed in couples therapy, and fill discussions of sexuality with mature and sterile discussions of such trivia as “using fantasy to spice things up at home.”

Nothing wrong with that,  but to think that these simple games can somehow substitute for learning how to be authentically sexually aware is simply never going to lead to a powerful, deeply intimate, and passionate sexual relationship.

Worse still, so many younger women and couples are looking at the endless stream of pornography that crowds the Internet and feeling like they should be doing all of the strange things that they are seeing. This leaves a lot of women feeling powerless, frustrated, and confused. What if you really don’t WANT to do what every actress does in pornography?

The good news is that it turns out that you don’t have to. The things you need to learn to completely blow a man’s mind in the bedroom turn out to be surprisingly simple.

The fact is, most men don’t even know the kind of sexual pleasure that their bodies are capable of, and many men don’t realize how the right woman can unlock their desire for lasting passion.

This article was originally published at Gender Education for Human Relationships . Reprinted with permission from the author.