It’s a vicious cycle of emotional dysregulation: the inability to have pleasure drains us of enthusiasm for life; anxiety and depression rob us of the appetite and enthusiasm to pursue pleasure; and these negative emotions keep feeding off of one another.

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

Our relationship with our sexuality gives us a way to assess our capacity for pleasure, and, as we do so, evaluate the functioning of the emotional brain.

My studies indicate the brain is so widely and strongly activated by orgasm, infusing nearly all regions with oxygen, that orgasm may serve as the best possible “exercise” for the brain. My research also suggests how the inability to experience this release robs us of a crucial way to destress and keep our bodies, emotions, and brains regulated and

Capturing this evidence of blood flow to the brain also showed that an orgasm not only feels good but is good for us. We are meant to experience pleasure.

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.

We are deeply into sex, but at the same time, deeply at odds with it, often misunderstanding our own urges, needs, and desires. We judge our sexual longings, we curtail our desires, and we cut ourselves off from all that it affords us. We convince ourselves that we just don’t need it or want it. This is a problem that speaks to an unhappiness at

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

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.