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skipper wrote:
I was shocked at the level of sexual intensity I experienced after about two weeks. After two weeks it become restless and even affected my dream state.
I have experienced something similar. It is like sleep walking but sleep initiating of sexual contact after prolonged periods without sex. Once when my wife and I were apart for several months, when we came together again she was not happy with me and we went to bed without sex. Several times in the night I would initiate sexual contact in my sleep and then, when we both woke up enough to exit the dream state and remember that she was cross with me and not wanting sexual contact at this time, we would disengage and go back to sleep. This repeated several times until we came to the conclusion that if we didn’t proceed with sexual activity then neither one of us would be getting any sleep.
I don’t know how my experience might apply to others. One lesson for me personally is that I should never attempt anything similar to Gandhi’s sexual celibacy experiment.
Roy: Thanks for sharing this. Sexual aspects moving into a dream state is very real. But there is a part of me that finds this so humanly disappointing. I think it is more common (related to men but that there are some women with a high sex drive) and certainly more common than I use to think.
To Roy and Others:
This is why my thinking has changed over the years from believing masturbation was a significant enough sin that needed to be confessed to a bishop to now a minor sin that a person can repent of by the bed side. But I do believe it is a sin, and a man needs to do everything he can to manage it. In addition, I have come to believe that in some unique situations, that I have explained in my past posts, it can even be done with good intention to save a marriage or to be thoughtful toward a partner. But I still think it is a sin. Not sure if this makes sense to others. Others are welcome to challenge it.
I know I am repeating myself, and I am doing this because I find this so very weird about men (and some women). In the first 20 or so years of my marriage I never thought about how much control I had over sexual feelings and behaviors, including how the male body responds and acts. I always thought this was a fun part of being male and I was deeply fortunate that my wife and I have had very similar sexual and biological rhythms. But in the last five or so years I have come to realize that these biological aspects of manhood may be something like 80% out of my control and I find that a little bizarre. I can think of a few times, after marriage, when I saw or heard something I should not have (by accident) that caused my body to react sexually but then never really thought about it and was able to be sexual with my wife as a way to manage it or get it out of my system. It was only when my wife had to leave for over a month, just in the last five years, where I realized that after two weeks that sexual behaviors might be very difficult to manage. And I have to confess that I have wondered if this was by design, and do not like the idea that it might be by design. I have never liked men who make arguments that “this is who I am” or “this is how God made us” related to sexual desires and management. Sadly, some men have made this argument in support of polygamy. But I have seriously wondered how I would act if my wife was out of my life for an extended part of my life (e.g. car accident and rehabilitation, had to travel for family reasons and was away for 6 months).
Like you, I think a better way to manage sexual behavior is not to replicate Gandhi’s sexual celibacy experiments. But there is something I find deeply disappointing in this reply – that a better control technique is to prevent this. There is a part of me that thinks it would it be grand if men could resist a naked woman or two right in front of them – to prove one can manage this part of their life. There is a part of me that thinks I could pass Ghandi’s tests, but then I realize that I cannot go longer than two weeks before the tension become ubiquitous, and I am grateful I have a wife with similar biological rhythms. The former fits with the general counsel in the Church to control our bodies, so lets have a test, like the test of life to prove it, but the former of staying away from temptation is extremely wise counsel that comes from scripture and mouth of church leaders. I am obviously to follow the latter and stay away from temptation.
How much control do men have over their sexual feelings? Is masturbation one way to help manage, only in unique situations? And is this how God designed men or are their sociological aspects in today’s life that makes it more difficult for men to mange this?
It seems to be quite common that one partner is the higher desire partner and the other is the lower desire partner. That mismatch appears to exist on a spectrum, sometimes it is minimal and sometimes it is extreme. In the circumstances of extreme mismatch the lower desire partner can feel smothered and this can cause a further dampening of desire. They can’t ever desire sex because they never get a break of sex being requested/demanded from them. Sometimes the higher desire partner is so sex starved that they interpret any display of affection as a sign that sex is on the table and will push to initiate. This can cause the lower desire partner to avoid non-sexual affection.
The higher desire partner faces continuous rejection and feels unwanted.
Some couples go many weeks or even months without sexual contact.
This is not a great situation. Should the couple divorce and look for someone with whom they are more sexually compatible (also sexual desire levels can shift over time due to life circumstances and biological issues)? Should the couple just not have sex unless the lower desire partner is interested? Should the lower desire partner have sex despite not being interested (some refer to this as “duty sex” and it can lead to long term resentment)?
I don’t see any magic bullet, however, I think that there can be some techniques that can help. I am a big fan of scheduling sex at a frequency that both partners can get on board with. This helps to take a large part of the rejection out of the equation because the lower desire partner can plan accordingly and basically block out some time to avoid distractions. The higher desire partner can also know that sexual fulfilment is coming and this can help to stave off the panic of having no idea how long the sexual drought might last (“is it a week or a month?”). In short, both partners can schedule time to prioritize sex and cultivating behaviors that strengthen the couple.
The lower desire partner can feel more confident in showing non-sexual affection without fearing that this could be misinterpreted by the higher desire partner as an invitation for sex.
In these circumstances, the higher desire partner may use masturbation as a technique to help get from one scheduled sexual encounter to the other.
I don’t know that declaring what they do as a sin does them (or any future spouse(s) ) any favors – especially our brethren. And judging our single brethren as “sinning” winds up spiraling to future relationships as well – it’s hard to bring your best self to the table when you are constantly holding yourself back as inferior because of “temptation” that is biological component – and has little to do with your character. And if you are “the wife” in the situation – do you culturally shame your husband for doing those things, ignore it, take it personally (he’s not asking it from you after all – and so you may not be “enough” – whatever that looks like), make yourself available (making you the gatekeeper for when your husband does – and your fault if you are not the “off valve” when he needs it), or just normalize it is a thing that happens? These are just a few of the options I have encountered in my experience – and most of them just put more distance between the partners because of bringing “judgement (and shame) to the table”.
skipper wrote:
I am grateful I have a wife with similar biological rhythms.
That is very fortunate for you. I am genuinely happy for your similar match in sexual desire levels with your spouse.
skipper wrote:
But I do believe it is a sin, and a man needs to do everything he can to manage it. In addition, I have come to believe that in some unique situations, that I have explained in my past posts, it can even be done with good intention to save a marriage or to be thoughtful toward a partner. But I still think it is a sin.
Ok. I think that is fine for you to have that as a personal boundary. I am very much in favor of having personal boundaries or guardrails. For example, one guardrail that some married men have is to never meet alone with members of the opposite gender. If a situation arises that it would be unrealistic or hurtful etc. to completely avoid such a meeting, the man can contact his wife and explain that he needs to make an exception to the guardrail and why. I think an important aspect of such an approach is that the person with the guardrail does not think themselves to be more righteous than someone else that doesn’t (“What you take meetings with people of the opposite gender? How could you?”).
Saying it is sinful implies that nobody should do it.
I think that our church leadership has not told us that masturbation is a sin in decades. If it was abhorrent in the sight of God, would not the church leaders have a duty to clearly and unequivocally label it as sin for the members?
I speculate that church leadership recognize that this can be a grey area that some marriages might need in order to continue and be successful. Church leaders have broadly tried to stay out of the marital bedroom and I think this is wise. (big caveat about abuse or unrighteous dominion)
skipper wrote:
the general counsel in the Church to control our bodies
I think that Christian religions have historically had a spectrum of belief regarding of supremacy/dominance of the spirit over the body. Some of the more extreme views of spirit over body being the ascetic religious orders.
The LDS church has generally rejected those extremes and taught a more moderate stance with spirit and body together forming the soul and not having superiority or dominance from the spirit over the body or of the body over the spirit.
That is my understanding and my perspective. It is perfectly ok to have a different understanding and we can still coexist within the same fellowship of faith.
:thumbup: AmyJ wrote:
I don’t know that declaring what they do as a sin does them (or any future spouse(s) ) any favors – especially our brethren. And judging our single brethren as “sinning” winds up spiraling to future relationships as well – it’s hard to bring your best self to the table when you are constantly holding yourself back as inferior because of “temptation” that is biological component – and has little to do with your character.And if you are “the wife” in the situation – do you culturally shame your husband for doing those things, ignore it, take it personally (he’s not asking it from you after all – and so you may not be “enough” – whatever that looks like), make yourself available (making you the gatekeeper for when your husband does – and your fault if you are not the “off valve” when he needs it), or just normalize it is a thing that happens? These are just a few of the options I have encountered in my experience – and most of them just put more distance between the partners because of bringing “judgement (and shame) to the table”.
We are accustomed to the husband being the higher desire partner and that does indeed seem to be more prevalent. However, it is also sometimes the case that the wife is the higher desire partner and the husband the lower. This can create additional hardships because as a society we have come to expect the male to want sex and pursue the female and when that script becomes flipped it can really mess with people’s self esteem. Like that their bodies are not allowing them to perform their gender roles correctly and something is really wrong with them.
I have to say, I am really surprised by the amount of attention this subject has received. There is no judgement, just surprise.
Minyan Man wrote:
I have to say, I am really surprised by the amount of attention this subject has received.There is no judgement, just surprise.
I just figured that circumstances converged in time & space to have this fragmented conversation around pleasure, biology, gender-based performance expectations, shame/guilt, relationships, “sin”, and narrative-framing.
Amy: I did not know how to interpret your last post. I am not sure if the shrug and comment was supportive of Minyan post regarding his surprise by the amount of attention this topic. I have rarely found most serious conversation to be aligned to instrumentally rationality where point A leads linearly to point B. I think what you summed – very well – is how real life is. Self-stimulation is often linked to fragmented conversation around pleasure, biology, gender-based performance expectations, shame/guilt, relationships, questioning if it is sin, and narrative-framing. Do you mind sharing what the non-verbal shrug meant? Are you thinking that this conversation is silly?
Others:
I think I differ with most of you, I think masturbation in most (not all) cases a sin, but one that can be repented at the bedside. Those few cases where it may not be sinful are the ones that have been outlined well in this thread, a man or woman who has high sexual tension, but his/her spouse cannot engage in sexual activity for a good and valid reason (and that spouse should not feel shame or guilt nor pressure). I believe in those cases it can save a marriage and prevent worse sin. But I think in most cases, it is not related to the rare cases stated above. And I am not suggesting this is something easy to control for some people.
I found this summary on Wikipedia to be helpful:
Skipper, I didn’t think it was a silly conversation – I am actually glad that people are here typing and reading about parts of at ongoing, very fragmented conversation around some of the aspects of sexuality and relating to others. This may be one of the most important conversations here because sexuality and faith are key aspects/building blocks a person uses to build and re-build identity, a worldview narrative, and a moral framework.
If anything, it was a tone neutral response to Minyan Man’s surprise at the attention these topics are receiving (kinda in the vein of “I don’t know what to tell you about being surprised here”). A lot of content for women is writings in a variety of directions on interacting with male sexuality, and I am married raising 2 girls (currently 15 and
– so sexuality (and many subtopics) come up.I guess my stance is that at times, masturbation is a “sin” when it is blatantly and selfishly used in place of a mutually shared activity with a partner that is explicitly and enthusiastically consenting. To me, the “sin” isn’t the act itself, but the rudeness of shutting down an interested partner without rescheduling and how that situation is communicated about and planned around. As far as “sinning under God’s law”, we are talking about “going against what individuals claiming to speak for God” have said originally in the Bible, and transmuted across time and culture to what modern Christians (LDS folk included) understand about sexuality and religion. I am not confident that Christianity collectively got the full memo about what “God Said” and I am hesitant to assume that church leaders (non-Jewish and Jewish alike)
understand what God meant. I do think that our sexual ethics was inherited from both the Catholics and the Protestant Reformation – and that our LDS revelation hasn’t added a lot of unique features to the sexual ethics framework.
I recognize that I am likely very much an outlier here in how I am judging the situation and what the most important factors are here.
Amy: May I ask what you mean by the polygamy dimension? I ask as some people (I believe mainly men) have made an argument that polygamy was needed (1840s and 1890) because men have a high sex drive and women did not. (I believe back them there was also an LDS belief that you could not have sex with a pregnant wife for fear of damaging the baby, so many men could not have sex for nine or so months). I am not sure how you connect polygamy to the broader theme of masturbation – but I am wondering if it had to so with what I just explained above. If not, how so? And as Roy has already posted, sometime a married women can have a higher sex drive than men.
Church leaders have stated that masturbation is an act of selfishness – and this is what I think you are also communicating. I think I understand the binary you are creating with “sinning under God’s law” and being thoughtless to a partner, but I think there is overlap here.
My mind goes different ways. One way that it goes is that if a husband and wife have sexual problems, I think they need to have open communication, with both people leaning more toward listening than speaking. Communication is the key, along with personal revelation. If they cannot align, in a win-win way, then going to a licensed counselor might be a good step. In a past post Roy suggested negotiated scheduling of sex at a frequency that both partners agree on. That is one strategy.
My mind keeps wandering how many married men, who have had regular sexual intimacy, can control their sexual arousal, if they needed to (such as if their wife had an illness or a car accident and could not be intimate for a long period of time). That is, if a couple have had win-win sex, both feel their needs are met and it is decently frequency over a longer period of time, and then a wife can no longer engage in sex for a valid reason, how many men would struggle with this. It would be years of biological conditioning. The reason I became involved in this post was due to this thought. Per past post, I have a trusted male LDS friend share they had great difficulties with this and then, as I shared, my wife had to fly to another part of the united States for a family matter and we were away over a month (first time ever in a long marriage) and I gained an experiential firsthand account of how hard this can be. I am simply wonder how other men would respond, and really a questioning of how much control do men have over their sexual arousal. I find it a little weird that we may not have as much control as we think and I further wondering if this is part of God’s design in how He made man.
skipper wrote:
Amy:May I ask what you mean by the polygamy dimension? I ask as some people (I believe mainly men) have made an argument that polygamy was needed (1840s and 1890) because men have a high sex drive and women did not. (I believe back them there was also an LDS belief that you could not have sex with a pregnant wife for fear of damaging the baby, so many men could not have sex for nine or so months). I am not sure how you connect polygamy to the broader theme of masturbation – but I am wondering if it had to so with what I just explained above. If not, how so? And as Roy has already posted, sometime a married women can have a higher sex drive than men.
In terms of sexuality, Polygamy functioned as a legal way to have mistresses/concubines legitimately in some households. In other households, it was more of an elite social club entry rite that didn’t have a sexual dimension at all. Most of the individuals I meet come to the conclusion that Polygamy was more trouble then it was worth when it was officially practiced. I actually later retracted my statement fragment because I felt that it was missing the point I was trying to make, but that’s cool.
From what we can tell from history, it seems that Joseph Smith introduced polygamy when he introduced sealings for additional spouses. It gets complicated about what he meant by the practice of polygamy but JS is sealed to something like 30+ women if you look in the Family History database (not the end all and be all of exactness, but still good enough for here and now).
Brigham Young took polygamy into a procreation bent with the polygamy model being 1 man for multiple women (easily over 30 I believe) and has something like 54 children to show for it.
In the 1890’s, Polygamy was officially discontinued so that Utah could become a state in the United States with a variety of splinter groups starting with a testimony of Joseph Smith and/or the Book of Mormon.
But when most people think about “Mormons” and “Sexuality”, they think of Polygamy because that is one of our religion’s contributions to the field of “Religion and Sexual Ethics”.
skipper wrote:
Church leaders have stated that masturbation is an act of selfishness – and this is what I think you are also communicating. I think I understand the binary you are creating with “sinning under God’s law” and being thoughtless to a partner, but I think there is overlap here.
I agree that there is overlap. People can be “selfish” in how they live as sexual beings, just as how they live as house-dwelling beings and the type of beings they are when they go out into the world. I personally assign masturbation a moral code as “morally neutral” in terms of sinful behaviors and charge that the greater sin is miscommunication and in harming one’s partner through shutting them out if they want to participate because it seems to be a very common avenue of great relationship harm.
skipper wrote:
My mind goes different ways. One way that it goes is that if a husband and wife have sexual problems, I think they need to have open communication, with both people leaning more toward listening than speaking. Communication is the key, along with personal revelation. If they cannot align, in a win-win way, then going to a licensed counselor might be a good step. In a past post Roy suggested negotiated scheduling of sex at a frequency that both partners agree on. That is one strategy.
As near as I can tell, having a good sex life requires relationship repairs, a decent understanding of the biology of all involved genders (that is not held in contempt or disrespect), and time to trust the process. Talk is cheap if it’s not backed by connective behaviors.
skipper wrote:
My mind keeps wandering how many married men, who have had regular sexual intimacy, can control their sexual arousal, if they needed to (such as if their wife had an illness or a car accident and could not be intimate for a long period of time). That is, if a couple have had win-win sex, both feel their needs are met and it is decently frequency over a longer period of time, and then a wife can no longer engage in sex for a valid reason, how many men would struggle with this. It would be years of biological conditioning. The reason I became involved in this post was due to this thought. Per past post, I have a trusted male LDS friend share they had great difficulties with this and then, as I shared, my wife had to fly to another part of the united States for a family matter and we were away over a month (first time ever in a long marriage) and I gained an experiential firsthand account of how hard this can be. I am simply wonder how other men would respond, and really a questioning of how much control do men have over their sexual arousal. I find it a little weird that we may not have as much control as we think and I further wondering if this is part of God’s design in how He made man.
Yes. As far as I can tell, men struggle more with sexuality (and arousals) when they do not have a (usually female) partner to share it with. I assume that it is part of God’s design, but I do not know that for certain. Communities and religions building communities assert that men have more control over the process to hold men accountable for some of the children that are produced.
But women struggle when they are interested in sex and their partner is not as well. The literature is there (including in Cosmo and other daring magazines). And female sexuality isn’t as easy to talk about or find good research on (though getting better thanks to the internet).
My atheist/agnostic philosopher grandfather taught a course called “Love and Sex” at the college level. During one of our grandparent-grandchild conversations in my early adult years, he said something along the lines of in terms of male sexuality, the best paradigm would be to have 2 wives – the wife of his youth to raise children and be a companion with, and a young wife to have regular sex with. I suspect it was very much in line with the reasons being discussed in this thread. He himself had a startup marriage that produced my dad, and then a fairly long-term healthy marriage that was more of the companionship style (as near as I can tell, giving up the “ideal” 2+ female setup).
AmyJ wrote:
As far as “sinning under God’s law”, we are talking about “going against what individuals claiming to speak for God” have said originally in the Bible, and transmuted across time and culture to what modern Christians (LDS folk included) understand about sexuality and religion. I am not confident that Christianity collectively got the full memo about what “God Said” and I am hesitant to assume that church leaders (non-Jewish and Jewish alike)understand what God meant. I do think that our sexual ethics was inherited from both the Catholics and the Protestant Reformation – and that our LDS revelation hasn’t added a lot of unique features to the sexual ethics framework.
I agree, and I have more to say on this aspect but I don’t have time at the moment (I’ll come back). But what I wanted to quickly get out there is that those “speaking for God” are doing so with a very poor connection at best, and simply expressing their own ideas (and saying it’s from God) at worst. One of the main things I learned from studying Joseph Smith is that while on occasion God actually spoke to him with a voice (of some sort, it may not have been actually audible) most often it was more impressions or thoughts – much like the way we are taught to get personal revelation. In other words, Joseph’s revelations for the most part were no different than our own – no fire or thunder, just a “feeling.” And Joseph had difficulty putting those impressions or feelings into actual words, as anyone would. I also believe every bit of what we have recorded in scripture (from Joseph and any other prophet) is filtered through that prophet’s own experiences, thoughts, feelings, and even prejudices – it’s never God’s pure words (because there mostly weren’t any words).
When I get a moment to come back, I’ll talk about sin – but essentially I believe what constitutes sin depends greatly on our own point of view and which God we know – the vengeful King God to whom we are lowly servants (more like the OT) or the loving and merciful Father God to whom we are children (more like the NT). (I know LDS theology is that the OT God and the NT God are the same “guy,” but I have never been able to reconcile that and there are actually religions that believe and teach they are two very separate and different Gods.)
DarkJedi wrote:
I agree, and I have more to say on this aspect but I don’t have time at the moment (I’ll come back). But what I wanted to quickly get out there is that those “speaking for God” are doing so with a very poor connection at best, and simply expressing their own ideas (and saying it’s from God) at worst. One of the main things I learned from studying Joseph Smith is that while on occasion God actually spoke to him with a voice (of some sort, it may not have been actually audible) most often it was more impressions or thoughts – much like the way we are taught to get personal revelation. In other words, Joseph’s revelations for the most part were no different than our own – no fire or thunder, just a “feeling.” And Joseph had difficulty putting those impressions or feelings into actual words, as anyone would. I also believe every bit of what we have recorded in scripture (from Joseph and any other prophet) is filtered through that prophet’s own experiences, thoughts, feelings, and even prejudices – it’s never God’s pure words (because there mostly weren’t any words).When I get a moment to come back, I’ll talk about sin – but essentially I believe what constitutes sin depends greatly on our own point of view and which God we know – the vengeful King God to whom we are lowly servants (more like the OT) or the loving and merciful Father God to whom we are children (more like the NT). (I know LDS theology is that the OT God and the NT God are the same “guy,” but I have never been able to reconcile that and there are actually religions that believe and teach they are two very separate and different Gods.)
I wanted to add that these words are men’s words – they are citing authority from God from the perspective of male community leaders and male priests may be incomplete due to their primarily male origin. The focus of the writings we have in the Bible is “where you collectively impregnate matters” and “stay away from thoughts that lead you collectively to improper impregnation”. Which isn’t bad advice and is on some levels the drive to have access to birth control in a lot of settings. I do wonder if part of the conversation about “masturbation as sin” is conflated as “impregnation and rape as sin” because the acts themselves may feel very similar but have wildly different consequences and are not the same.
But here is a trippy question – what if masturbation was so common in the OT and NT times that literally “everyone was doing it” as act(s) not even worth the commentary of finding a person who could write and the supplies they needed to write about it? Like it was a “non-issue” from a sinning point because it provided public health benefits and cautioning against it would actually sink the communities and tribes being built?
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