Sex is a beautiful thing…. and a good time, right? It’s full of love, intimacy, and passion. It’s a core driver of human behavior…. and plays a large role in relationships. But while we all like to think we’re really good at it…like the best ever…the truth is, we could each probably be better. Like almost everything else in life, your bedroom performance can be enhanced by being in shape.
Although having deep feelings for someone can make sex great, no matter your physical shape, sex is still a physical act. The better shape you are in, the better you can be at sex. We go to the gym to improve our bodies and everyday life. Why not use the gym to also improve our sex lives?
Lifting weights is not the only way to boost your performance in the bedroom. Numerous studies have demonstrated the many benefits of practicing the ancient tradition of yoga, including improving the sexual response. Practicing both has been shown to benefit our physical health in a number of ways, such as reducing stress, improving sleep, lifting depression, lowering blood pressure, and expanding lung capacity. Research also suggested that some yoga practices may improve certain sexual responses: premature ejaculation and ejaculatory control in men, sexual desire, lubrication, and arousal in women. One study in particular found that practicing yoga twice a week for three months improved blood pressure, sexual arousal, vaginal lubrication, and overall sexual function.
Becoming more mindful of and present to what our bodies feel as we exercise can help us more easily receive exercise – induced arousal and orgasm. Fortunately, we can invite, even train, our minds to work with us rather than against us, and exercise is an excellent means of doing this. Even if you don’t experience such arousal, or if you don’t particularly seek it, becoming more mindful of and present to what our bodies feel at the gym can only help us feel more mindful and present in the bedroom. Relaxing into and receiving the feeling your body experiences, knowing that exercises, like sex, can be fun, playful and exploratory. Help connect your body and its sensations so you can notice your body’s natural inclinations toward arousal and desire.
Research has shown that those who physically challenge themselves to fatigue – allow to better relax and receive and achieve orgasm quicker. Such as a reward at the end of a workout. During sex it takes a while for your body to reach orgasm, which is very similar to exercise… it takes your body some time to warm up and get the muscles moving. This is an example of what’s called the mind-body connection, which plays as much a role in exercise as it does in sex. Your mind and your thoughts either work with you – encouraging you to keep going, reminding you that you’re powerful and sexy and lovable – or they work against you – telling you to quit or give up, that you’re not worth it. Your mind has such a powerful influence on sex that sex educators commonly cite how “the brain in the biggest sex organ.” For one thing, the brain activates certain kinds of arousal and orgasm. But our brains also control how we feel about ourselves as people, how we feel about our bodies, and what we know or don’t know about sex. Our brains house all the pleasant, painful, scary, exciting, and arousing memories and feelings about sex from our pasts – and all those old thoughts and feelings influence our sex lives in the present.
Practice training your brain. Ask yourself these questions when you exercise. When you exercise try to notice how you feel all over. Do you feel warm? Sweaty? When do you start to sweat? Which exercises feel playful or fun to you? Which exercises make your heart pound and your muscles quiver? Try to pay attention to how your body feels so you can include more of these exercises you like and fewer of those you don’t, so you can make sex a more positive experience. This is your workout – you should have fun doing it! Try to notice when you feel warm or breathy, or when you feel happy or aroused. Awnsers to any and all of these questions indicate an increasing awareness of your body, listening to what it has to tell you. You can transfer this awareness to sex, too, noticing exactly how you feel with your partner. How do you feel when your partner kisses you, let’s say, on your ear? What about the neck? Or your inner thighs?
In the next few paragraphs, I will go through various sexual positions and what needs to be strengthened, then I will give you a program on how to strengthen them.
Missionary:
While this is the most common sex position, believe it or not, you can still get a good workout from simply laying on your back. But despite being one of the most passive contortions for a woman, man-on-top can still provide a pretty good workout. Missionary mimics the same action of the bridge workout. If your partner is thrusting toward you, you want to have an equal and opposite thrust back, and that requires a lot of core strength. It actually will start burning. You can strengthen your core by focusing on pelvic lifting using your core, not your lower back. That's where women tend to get stuck — they tend to rely on their lower back to give them propulsion. Missionary position can also provide a good butt workout. The more she does buttock squeezes, the more she could accentuate her riding toward him to give herself a good glute workout. While the position seems pretty light in exercise, exerting a little extra energy goes a long way.
Missionary - Legs up position:
This legs-up position requires a decent amount of hamstring flexibility, so to warm up, touch your toes a few times beforehand. Lie on your back and put the backs of your thighs against your guy's chest. You can either stick your feet straight into the air or bend them over your guy's back, depending on what's most comfortable for you. Then if you want to work your core exercise during sex, lift up your head and shoulders into a crunch.
Arch Position:
If you don't want to try anything that's super acrobatic, try something that's somewhat simple and keeps you very stable by pumping up good old-fashioned missionary sex with the arch. The arch is a modified bridge pose, with a woman resting on her shoulders while using her legs to hold her lower body off the bed. Extending your back and arching and holding your core helps to work out your glute muscles, hamstrings and lower back. Try keeping your abdominal muscles as tight as possible as you work the lower half of your body to get the full benefit of the workout.
Bridge Position:
With the bridge, the woman is facing upward, using all four limbs to hold her body weight. It's like a plank, only you're facing the ceiling instead of the ground. Sex experts agree: this pose is not for the weak. This is a highly advanced position, and she needs to stabilize herself so as he's thrusting in and out, she doesn't crash. Even if you pile a tower of pillows under your back to help support your weight, you'll still definitely be working your buttocks and inner-thigh muscles. Unless she's really strong, she shouldn't expect to hold this position for long. This single move will target muscles in both the upper and lower body, including the glutes, abs, biceps, triceps and deltoids.
Scissors Position:
The scissors position is the least strenuous of all — there's no suspending of body weight, and it generally makes for gentler and slower penetration (which is recommended for pregnant women). Scissors is for when you're tired, not for being an acrobat in bed. Still, that's not to say you won't still be engaging muscle groups.
With your legs intercrossed with your partner's, there's limited movement for both the man and women, so a lot of inner-thigh strength and core stabilization will be at work. When you squeeze your inner thighs, the core will naturally contract as well.
Doggy Style:
Like with the missionary position, penetration-from-behind sex engages the woman's core because she has to stabilize herself on all fours. You'll also be working your quadriceps and glutes to help brace yourself against the impact.
However, you can use a modified position to get a good arm workout, too. Rather than having your hands flat on the bed, "if the woman has her hands on a wall in front of her and sort of uses her upper body to help thrust, that would be a good shoulder and upper body workout. This position is certified gold when it comes to getting in some good exercise. The position mimics a move that targets the glutes. Kicking this position off a notch comes with a big pay off in more ways than one. There are many modifications as you see below. With focus on the core and glute muscles, you’ll strengthen multiple parts of your body while receiving maximum pleasure!
Cowgirl:
Get into the cowgirl position and then turn it into more of a frog position. It may not sound sexy, but it's effective! You're on top, but rather than rest your knees on the bed, rest your feet on the bed. As you move up and down, the position essentially becomes a low squat, which largely targets the quads (the front thigh muscles). You can even move forward and backward to work that muscle group more and burn extra calories.
Lotus:
Like the missionary position, the lotus sitting position is one of the more passive sex positions. However, many of the same muscles worked in the cowgirl position are going to be used in this contortion: the core is engaged to stabilize the body, and the glutes are worked during thrusting.
Standing Position:
Standing is one of the more challenging positions because often the woman has to allow her partner to lift her in some way. If the man and woman are facing each other, core and upper-leg strength comes into play: if she's standing on one leg, those leg muscles are worked to keep her upright, and core muscles are engaged to keep her balanced. If she's wrapping both legs around her partner, she'll need good arm strength to hold onto her partner. And regardless which one of these contortions she's in, she has to have stamina if she's standing. If the man and woman are facing the same direction, the same muscles engaged in doggy-style are used: she'll work her core for balance, and her arms can be worked if she's bracing herself against a wall or headboard and using them to help thrust.
Wheelbarrow:
Think of this move as doggy-style with a twist. You're on all fours on the bed and he's standing behind you, next to the bed. Then he grabs your upper thighs, lifts both of your legs up into the air and holds them wheelbarrow-style while he thrusts. Instead of supporting yourself mostly with your upper body, you'll be supporting yourself only with your upper body, so it's an excellent workout for your deltoids (shoulders).
One arm side plank scissor wheel barrow:
Think of this move as doggy-style with a twist as well. This is probably one of the most challenging postitions for a female if they lack upper body strength. In a side plank position, with the leg scissored between his legs, he grabs your upper thighs and lower torso and holds her while he thrusts. Instead of supporting yourself mostly with your upper body, you'll be supporting yourself only with one arm.
Lunge Position:
Sure, you might hate doing lunges at the but you might not mind them so much in the bedroom. The lunge position both the woman and man lunge, with one leg planted in front of her and the other leg extended behind her in between the man's legs. This move is good for the quad, front of the leg, hamstring, core, and butt. It'll also work the deep stabilizer muscle of the leg in the front — both inner and outer thigh — as well as stretch the back leg's hip flexor.
Stay tuned for the program in Part 2.....