Great friend. Caring father. Labor-sharer at home. Kind heart. Hot lover.
A lot of men fit most of these except that last one. Guys raised by feminist parents and determined to be kind, embrace-their-feminine whole human beings, not macho jerks, definitely make great life partners.
But often they wind up in my coaching practice saying “everything’s great between us except the sex.” And the same thing happened in my own marriage. Here are 3 reasons good guys often aren’t great lovers once they’re married:
1. Attuning to others’ emotional needs is different than tuning into your own erotic desires.
This goes for all partners, right? When we have kids and/or we’re close friends with our spouse and really “there for” them, there’s an emotional focus that feels like it runs directly counter to the (healthy!) selfishness that showing up fully with your sensual self requires.
Solution: Get okay with being “selfish” in the sense of knowing what you want and saying so, when it comes to sex.
If you’re the kind of nice person I’m talking about, you’re still going to be considerate and generous in bed, but you’ll also turn up the volume on your own passions and wishes. And that will turn your partner on.
Also: create a ritual to shift gears from kind-and-considerate mode to passionate-and-assertive mode. Take a shower. Have your partner show you a movie with a love scene they like, and then “channel” that character with yourself for a minute in the mirror, just to get your gears shifted. Sounds cheesy? It works. Try it.
2. Men confuse being assertive and passionate sexually with being domineering or brutish or selfish and they don’t want to be “that guy.”
Demonstrating caring, kindness, and consideration is fantastic. But the same person can ALSO, in private moments, step into the dominant role, share their desires (e.g. “I’m going to take you and _____” or “I love the way your ____”) and, inside the bounds of consent, which can be arranged beforehand, be as strong or even rough as both they and their partner enjoy.
Men tell me they want to be respectful. My husband has learned that pushing my back up against a wall and kissing me hard is one of the most sincere forms of respect he can show me, because I like it.
Solution: Talk with your partner about what turns them on. If what they share with you sounds more aggressive or less “nice” than you feel is right, be willing to experiment. Understand that this is a role, a temporary mode, inside the privacy of your erotic time. It’s not your new gender roles 24/7. It’s not how you’re going to talk to your partner or move with them all the time. It’s just for the pleasure of it inside this encounter. It won't make you a jerk… It’ll just turn your partner on!
3. When you know your partner to be a very assertive person themselves, it seems risky or even stupid to be very assertive with them.
Many kind, gentle men find themselves with strong, outspoken partners, and then they find the sexual chemistry fizzling. “Powerful” women often tell me they want more assertiveness from their partners, but their partners say “that seems dangerous.”
What I want their partners to understand is that a woman stays “on” and hypervigilant and seemingly “in-charge” when she feels like there’s no one to take over if she drops her guard.
Solution: If she can trust that you can hold her, if she feels like someone IS capably in charge, she’ll go off-duty, lie back, and relax. And be very very happy in your capable hands.
So plan in advance. Give her clear indications of what you’re going to do and when you’re going to do it. I often tell couples to pretend like she’s blindfolded and he has to pre-announce everything that’s happening and physically and energetically guide her every step.
Tell her explicitly and through how you show up: “I’ve got you. I’m making the decisions. You just lie back and enjoy yourself. You can make requests, but you don’t have to make anything happen or to straighten me out in any way. I’m the captain right now, and you’re my beloved, pampered passenger.”
We’re in confusing times, culturally. Women’s desire to be in the world and assert our own power doesn't negate our desire to have a strong partner. In fact, it intensifies our need to be able to come home and let down.
We’ve been navigating this thoughtfully in our relationship for 27 years now, and it still takes work. But it’s worth it, because I can both be strong and be totally surrendered and held.
I hope these three solutions help you understand the limits of the value of “nice” and integrate clarity into your kindness as a partner. I’d love to hear from you if you have wins to share or questions to ask. I wish you the deepest love and satisfaction!