Why Good Sex Matters: Understanding the Neuroscience of Pleasure for a Smarter, Happier, and More Purpose-Filled Life

By looking through the lens of how our brains are wired for pleasure, we will learn how to reclaim our innate, biologically wired capacity and need for joy, fun, exuberance, curiosity, and humor in all aspects of our lives.

In these studies, I also wanted to understand more about female sexual response, which was so understudied, and how exactly the brain is involved. I looked at how some of my ladies of the lab responded under two different conditions: orgasm brought about when a woman stimulated her own genitals, and that induced by a partner’s stimulation of her ge

We’ve been told by sex experts that the cause of an inability to enjoy sex is sexual dysfunction, brought on by age, hormonal disruptions, or other diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, or depression. And yes, these conditions all play a role in sexual shutdown. However, the underlying causes for sexual dysfunctions that im

My life’s work has taught me that the ability to notice, experience, and tolerate the sensations in the body that accompany the thoughts in the mind is critical to empowering wholeness and well-being. We dwell so much in our thoughts, our interpretations of our experiences, our strivings, and our expectations that we register very little of what is

And yet, what I observe daily in my clinical practice is that for all of this pleasure-seeking behavior, all this wanting of pleasure, very few of us seem able to fully experience the sensations or satisfaction we seek.

But most of us who experience anhedonia do so without this outward cry of rage and despair; indeed, the majority of people suffering from anhedonia do so in relative silence, living lives tangled up in a stew of negative emotions, unable to experience the pleasure that would break them free. Though this silent majority may be leading otherwise prod

A client may not realize that they are experiencing an emotional imbalance, but they do know if they can’t orgasm. Our sex lives are often the bellwethers of our emotional issues.

This view of pleasure as being momentary and inconsequential is problematic and essentially inaccurate. It’s deeply rooted in Western culture, stemming from religious thought extending back millennia, when pleasure was associated with sin, a life of intemperance, and the body being a source of evil or human weakness. Indeed, abstaining from sex was

Driven by the neurotransmitter dopamine, our SEEKING system is meant to cue us to feel enthusiastic about going into the world to pursue what we need and want through experiences. When this system becomes overstimulated and hijacked by chronic stress and attention overload, a domino effect occurs, disrupting all the systems at once, making us hyper

What this distinction actually misses is the important role that pleasures of mind and body play in our emotional lives—moving us toward what will be good for us and moving us away from painful or toxic experiences that will harm. Pleasure as an emotion is meant on some level to help us live more effectively.