Masturbation Monday - Part Three

The Act: From Camera to Skin

Hey Troop! Welcome back for part three of Masturbation Monday. If part one was about pulling pleasure out of the shadows and part two delved into the science behind rewiring your brain, then part three is where we come home to the body. This is where the journey matters more than the outcome, and I need you to keep reminding yourself that the joy is in the little moments, not the end result. You do NOT have to like the images you create to still find pleasure in the act.

Here is why….pleasure doesn’t live within the walls of your head or on your screen encapsulated in an image. Pleasure is a tangible thing. It lives in your skin, your breath, your muscles, your nervous system, in the base of your spine and that soft spot behind your ear. Your body was put onto this planet to feel joy, to experience pleasure and feel the feels. Somewhere in the process we got lost and have spent years dissociating from our bodies (thanks diet culture, trauma, religion, capitalism, and beauty standards), it makes complete sense that pleasure feels confusing, inconsistent, or hard to access.

Not only is pleasure fleeting, you may not even know where to look for it. We are taught from a young age that our partners pleasure is more important than our own, so intimacy looks like a chore. A means to an end. Something that is required to keep the relationship going. So instead of being present, you are thinking about the looming PTA deadline, the messy house, your upcoming hair appointment, the meeting you missed at work, how much your bra strap is pissing you off, how your body looks and so many other things. We disassociate from our body to get from point a to point b and the result….a turned off body that doesn’t even crave intimacy and pleasure.