How Watching Porn Saps Your Sexual Creativity
Written by Zach Grossfeld
She texts me, "I'm outside."
I open my apartment door, and we lock eyes for a five-count.
This look isn't a what the fuck are you doing stare. We both know what's about to happen. It's a stare of desire paired with anticipation.
Then, I step forward to close the gap between us, press my right hand against her throat, and push her back against the closed door.
With my other hand against her hip, I bite her neck just past the brink of pain as her hiss builds into a deep breath.
She grabs my dick firmly, smirks, then pushes me off her and points to the white armchair beside the door.
After we rip off the last of our garments, she presses my back against the white armchair as I watch her get on top of me from the seated position.
At first, she rides me slowly, but in control.
Throughout the next fifteen minutes of choking, thrusting, and kissing, not a word is said. Only after the fucking subsides, when we're both lying naked in each other's arms on the futon (somehow we made our way over there), do I open my mouth and say, "So, how was your day?"
Has the exact situation I just described happened to me?
No.
Have I been a part of something similar?
Sure.
To be clear, the above sexcapade is a fantasy. I don't like to say fantasy because something about the word feels it will never happen. Let's call it a sexperience.
This premise of this sexperience, in particular, is simple:
Two people who have shared multiple sexual experiences and are comfortable with each other meet at a location. This spot could be an apartment, hotel room, doesn't matter, as long as it's agreeable to both. Then, they fuck. The only rule is that both people aren't allowed to say a word to each other, starting from the moment that they arrive, until after the fucking is over.
A couple of months ago, I started writing down these sexperiences and other things that turn me on. I don't see these ideas as anything different than the ideas I write down for my podcasts, articles, and video content.
On my phone, I keep a bunch of notes for future experiences. One of them happens to be for sex. I view all of these ideas as pulling from the same creative well. I don't have to "turn on" a different part of my brain.
They flow together.
Also, I stopped watching porn around the same time I started keeping this sex diary. Although this could be a coincidence, I highly doubt it. I think that the latter unfolded from the former.
So why did I quit porn? Was it to gain some moral high ground or because it was the "right" thing to do? No, not really. I have no problem with people who watch porn or make it.
For eight years, I had been a consistent consumer of POV, College Fuck Fest; you name it.
The number one motivating factor in quitting porn was to reduce my screentime. Most nights of the week, I would watch porn for 15-20 min and then dive deep down the post-ejaculatory rabbit hole of Twitter and YouTube.
So, instead of trying only to watch porn and avoid the rabbit hole, I cut out my phone altogether at night and decided instead to read.
Besides the expected effects of not watching porn (better sleep, increased libido, more sexual enjoyment with my partners - check out the book Your Brain On Porn by Gary Wilson for more hard evidence), I noticed something else happening: my sexual creativity started to run wild.
When I say sexual creativity, I don't mean walking into a classroom and thinking, "Oh man, what if me and the teacher banged each other's brains out like they do on PornHub."
When I say sexual creativity, I mean getting in touch with what turns me on and expanding on those intimacies.
Watching porn is like watching a movie. It's entertaining, but the action on the screen leaves nothing up to your imagination. The director, screenwriter, actors, and anyone else involved in crafting the story share the burden of creativity. All you need to do is sit there and jerk it.
As a regular watcher of porn, I cut off those "movies" cold turkey. After a weeklong flatline period where my sex drive dropped (Very common among porn users, read more about it here), I started fantasizing, not about typical porn ideals ("Oh fuck me Daddy, yeah, cum on my tits with your 16-inch cock"), but about siutations that genuinely turn me on.
For the first time, I was creating sexperiences in my head in a real way, detached from the lens of mainstream pornography. These sexperiences are grounded in common observation, the same way an idea for a podcast would pop into my head:
Wow, that was a great book. I'm going to reach out to the author to record a podcast.
Wow, that was a sexually charged passage. What if a woman read that passage out loud while I went down on her? What would that be like?
I find myself exploring ideas surrounding sex in a way that I never did before I quit porn. Every so often, I'll even put twenty minutes and write down what pops into my head:
What really turns me on?
What have I enjoyed most from past sexual experiences?
Do I want something to happen during sex that I'm not verbalizing to my partner?
I enjoy the power dynamics of choking.
Does my partner do something during sex that I don't like, and I'm not telling her?
I love it when she looks me in the eye while she sucks my dick.
One of these writing sessions bore the idea for the sexperience at the start of this article. I thought about sex as its own language and how much could be communicated simply by how we fuck each other.
How cool would it be if we only used the language of sex before spoken word came into play?
When I write these things down, I'm not thinking the perfect tits or apple bottom ass. While I enjoy both of those qualities, they aren't driving creativity. Instead, I'm thinking about the atmosphere, the foreplay, the dialogue, power dynamics, and other factors that will enhance sex with an attractive woman.
Apart from physical qualities, what are the common threads of my sexual experiences that turn me on?
Even if you've had the same sexual partner for years, what are the qualities that make up the hottest encounters?
Don't be ashamed of exploring what turns you on.
You can make all the lists you want, but if you don't share them with your partner, the process is not as meaningful.
And don't think of sexual creativity as separate from your "normal" life, like I did before I stopped watching porn.
Sexual creativity should be an expression of who you are, not locked away in a separate bin only to be accessed at specific points. Once I stopped spoonfeeding myself with nightly porn sessions, I unlocked a type of creativity that I never knew existed.
Now, I'm not saying that I walk around like a horny bastard 24/7, but I do have noticeably more sexual energy. The difference is that I use this energy in a productive, exciting way, instead of wasting it on porn.
Sex is one of the greatest gifts that few people fully explore before they die. You don't need to quit porn to be creative about it.
That's just me.
Do I think that the lack of porn helps? Yes, but you can still watch porn and get in touch with your inner freak.
Also, I don't want to paint the picture that I don't masturbate. I still jerk off, but when I do, it's not to porn. I tap into that creativity and use my imagination.
Again, if you're continually watching movies, it's hard to write a script and access the inner creative.
When porn falls to the wayside, your arousal is up to you.
What turns you on?
Do you like getting peanut butter sucked off of your toes?
Great, just be sure to ask about nut allergies beforehand ;)
Cheers to Electric Fucks.
Your freak podcaster,
Zach
Auxoro is an independent and mostly self-funded platform that relies on people like you to push the conversation forward. At the moment, we have no sponsors or outside investors. Everything from travel expenses to podcast equipment to web design is paid for purely out of pocket and by the people like you who support us. We love what we do and are happy to invest in ourselves, and a little help goes a long way as we continue to bring the biggest and best conversations to you. Thank you for your donation, however small, and for expressing support for our work and its continued survival.
SUPPORT AUXORO ON PATREON (Thank You)
SUPPORT AUXORO ON PAYPAL (Thank You)
SUPPORT AUXORO ON VENMO (Thank You): @Zachary-Ross-4
AUXORO NEWSLETTER - JOIN OVER 1,000 OTHERS & SUBSCRIBE
AUXORO MERCH - HOODIES & TEES NOW AVAILABLE
Contact:
Business email: Zach@auxoro.com