Solo Sex Is Exploding—and It’s Making People Better Lovers

In this episode of Talk Sex with Annette, we explore why solo pleasure is becoming a major cultural shift—and how it’s actually improving partnered sex, not replacing it.

Joined by Sarah Tomchesson, Certified Intimacy Coach and Director of Marketing at Magic Wand, we break down insights from the 2026 Sexual Wellness Trends Report based on data from 1,000 participants. The findings reveal how solo sex supports desire, confidence, nervous system regulation, and deeper intimacy with partners.

We cover:

• Why solo sex is increasing across generations
• How pleasure-focused practices improve partnered sex
• Why orgasm isn’t the goal—and why that leads to better sex
• Simple ways to start a solo pleasure practice that supports real connection

This conversation blends culture, science, and real-life experience to reframe pleasure as a powerful tool for better sex and stronger relationships.

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Chapters

• 1:30 New Name, Same Locker Room
• 2:22 Solo Sex As A Cultural Shift
• 3:34 Meet Sarah And The Magic Wand Study
• 6:12 Who’s Masturbating More And Why
• 8:22 From Performance To Pleasure
• 10:19 Responsive Desire And Learning Your Body
• 14:13 Safety, Trauma, And Rebuilding Trust
• 16:32 Shame, Culture, And Nervous System Repatterning
• 19:44 Gen Z, Queer Trends, And Access To Info
• 23:28 Pleasure Over Orgasm: What Data Shows
• 26:09 Practical Payoffs Of Regular Solo Play
• 29:15 Using Solo Skills To Enhance Partner Sex
• 33:35 Confidence, Curiosity, And Shamelessness
• 36:22 Is This True For All Genders
• 39:04 Three-Week Habit And Sensory Practices
• 43:32 Resources, Plugs, And Closing Cheers

Transcript

SPEAKER_02: 0:46

I'm Annette Benedetti, host of the podcast formerly known as Locker Room Talk and Shots. The show has a new name, Talk Sex with Annette. But at its core, this is still your locker room. It's where we strip away shame, get curious, and speak the unspoken about sex, kink, dating, pleasure, and desire. Around here, nothing's off limits. These are the kinds of conversations we save for our boldest group chats, our most trusted friends, and of course, the women's locker room. Think raw, honest, and sometimes unapologetically raunchy. If you've been here from the beginning, thank you. And if you're new, welcome to my podcast where desire meets disruption and pleasure becomes power. Now, let's talk about sex. Cheers. Right, Love. Today's Talk Sex with Annette Topic is why solo sex is the new sexual revolution and how it's making us better partners. For a long time, we've treated solo sex like a side dish. Something private, something optional, and something that matters less than partnered sex. But culturally, that's changing fast. Solo sex isn't just more common, it's becoming central to how people understand pleasure, desire, and intimacy. And according to new data, it's not replacing connection, it's actually making people better partners. Today's episode is about why solo sex might be the quiet sexual revolution happening right now and what it tells us about desire satisfaction and the nervous system. Now, I know my longtime listeners and anyone who's tuned in recently knows I have launched the 365 days of orgasms. Pleasure is the resolution journey, which involves a lot of solo sex. And I've talked a lot about how it improves your sex life with other people as well as your own. But my guest is going to take this conversation deeper with us and help us understand what's going culturally around this phenomenon. My guest today is Sarah Tomchesson. She's a certified intimacy coach and sex educator and the director of marketing at Magic Wand. Y'all know which one we're talking about. Y'all have one. I do. I know that. One of the most iconic pleasure brands in the world. Sarah has spent nearly two decades shaping sex positive education. Thank you, ma'am, and legendary pleasure brands. She's here to talk about Magic Wand's 2026 sexual wellness trends report, which uncovered some really powerful shifts in how different generations are relating to sex, solo pleasure, and satisfaction. This conversation is about culture, science, and what happens when we finally stop treating pleasure like an afterthought. And before we dive in on that note, I'm going to remind you that I'm over on OnlyFans, and that is where I'm sharing my sex and intimacy, how-tos, demos, audio guided self-pleasure meditations, and one-off coaching opportunities. You can ask me all the questions you want to ask me, those one-off questions there. I'm also over on Zubstack doing a lot of the same. You can find me in both places with my handle at TalkSexWithanet. You can also scroll down to the show notes where you will be able to find all the places you want to find me and Sarah below. So don't forget to do that. But for now, Sarah, can you tell my listeners just a little bit more about you?

SPEAKER_01: 4:19

Sure. Yeah. I got started as a sex educator 18 years ago. So I've officially become an adult sex educator, I guess. I've worked with a number of pleasure brands now, finding my way to Magic Wand, which is just the ultimate in pleasure, in my opinion. And last year I had my first opportunity to participate in a scientific study. And that was really exciting to work with sex researchers to uncover questions, answer questions like how does abstinence impact people's lives? How does practicing pleasure on a daily basis impact people's lives? And we had a thousand participants, and that's actually where the sexual wellness trends data came from.

SPEAKER_02: 5:04

And we're going to be digging into that today and helping y'all understand why you should not only be having some solo sex, a lot of it, but how it's no longer something that you, you know, need to be ashamed about. Everybody's doing it, how it's going to improve not only your own sexual life, but down the road your relationship with your partner. So that's why you want to stay to the end because you're going to know by the time we get to the end of this how to use solo sex to improve your own sexual life. And it's going to make you a better partner and how to use it to do that. I'm ready to dive in. I love talking about self-pleasure, solo sex. So let's get ready to talk about sex. Cheers. Cheers. I want to start with the results that you got from this. It was a what what were we calling a sexual wellness trends report for 2026? What did it say about solo sex?

SPEAKER_01: 6:08

So the thing that was surprising and that we weren't necessarily setting out to answer is how much solo sex folks are having. So this was a thousand participants. All participants had vulva's, most of them identified as women, but we did have some trans and non-binary folks in our sample group. And 69% of participants are masturbating every week, but more than 70% of our participants were partnered. So this was really exciting to see just how invested folks are in their sexuality in a really holistic sense. And something that stood out is that Gen Z and queer folks are actually masturbating at much higher rates, even though they're partnered at equal rates to the heterosexual women in the study and the older women in the study. So younger folks are masturbating every day more often than older and heterosexual participants. So what that says to me is that the trends are really shifting and our values are shifting when it comes to sexuality.

SPEAKER_02: 7:28

Well, that brings me to why do you think solo sex is becoming such a big cultural conversation right now? And what's leading to that shift?

SPEAKER_01: 7:38

I think you hinted at it in the intro that there is starting to be more of a focus on pleasure than performance-based sex. So the old model of sex is very performative, it's very goal-oriented. But when you're centering pleasure and relaxation, self-confidence, being connected to your body, what you find is that you actually want to be engaging in sexual activities and in pleasurable activities more frequently than maybe you're aligning with your partner or for different reasons, right? Like sex isn't just about having an intimate connection with your partner. It's about having an intimate connection with yourself as well. And so when you're letting those values guide you, you actually find that solo sex is integrated more in people's lives.

SPEAKER_02: 8:37

I always masturbate when I have a partner. I love having alone time to be in pleasure and experience pleasure without having to worry it about someone else at all. I just don't want to have I want to be selfish and just enjoy, you know?

SPEAKER_01: 8:59

Do you think that plays a hand in it? Like, yeah. I mean, I think my question to you is that's actually kind of revolutionary, right? To be centering yourself and your needs. And a lot of women, folks with vulvas, are socially conditioned to actually not really be thinking about their pleasure, to really orient their sex towards their partner's pleasure. And so I'm sort of curious how you got to a place of really investing in your solo play, because I think it takes some deprogramming actually.

SPEAKER_02: 9:35

Yeah, I started, I'm 51 now. I want to say early 40s, I had completely lost my sensuality, my sexuality, just my sense of being like an attractive sexual woman, which had been really core to my identity prior to having kids and getting married and stuff like that. And I just wanted it back. I wanted to feel sexy again. I wanted to feel alive again. And it started, I don't know, because I look, I wasn't well educated as I am now back then on pleasure. And it started with masturbation and just a lot of it, and then exploring my fantasies and masturbating while I was doing it. And I was single, maybe becoming single again and dating again. So I was like, well, I get this chance to be single, I'm gonna explore a lot, and that involved masturbating sometimes like four hours at a time. Actually neglect some work. I mean, I neglected things, and it also helps bring re-ignite my libido, which had kind of been evasive. And that's where it started. And I found myself through, I found myself again. I want to say again, maybe even a more authentic version of myself through self-pleasure and solo sex. And I wouldn't realize until many years later, and maybe even kind of in the last couple of years, like how profound it was and all of the things it gave me. Like I had never known where my G spot was or had internal orgasms. Now I can have G spot and A-spot and blended and multiple orgasms. You know what I mean? Like I didn't even know that world was open to me. And now that it's open to me, I love to share it with someone else, but there's just something about being alone. It doesn't matter how I look. I'm not worried about someone else's pleasure and just enjoying it's very relaxing and fulfilling for me.

SPEAKER_01: 12:39

Yeah, I think our kind of traditional model of desire and you know how you jumpstart your libido is really centered, is a very like male-centered model, which is spontaneous arousal, that you can just, you know, access it at the drop of a dime. And in fact, I think most people really have responsive desire, which has to get nurtured. It's a much more embodied kind of desire that requires that you connect with your body, and then the arousal and the desire comes, right? Like build it and then they will come. So for women in particular, I think solo play is a fantastic space to really start learning their own desire and arousal patterns. Because this idea that you're gonna just spontaneously want to have sex, say 24-7, is built on this really outdated information. A lot of us in our early sexual lives find that we can access desire and arousal with ease. But over time, that really, really changes. And so as you spend more time with your body, you start learning your cues, you discover new erogenous zones, which is something that you're describing being really meaningful. And suddenly the world of pleasure really opens up. And for a lot of people, I think it's safer to do that through solo play than with a partner because you just immediately take out the element of pleasing your partner, both physically, but also the visual of like being so attached to how you look versus how you feel in the moment. And it just offers up so much new and expansive exploration.

SPEAKER_02: 14:35

Absolutely. Absolutely. I also feel like the more I enjoy solo sex, the more spontaneous desire I have. It's like the more that you eat really delicious food, the more you want it, the more you think about it and desire it. The other thing about having, if you will, a dialed-in solo sex life, and the more comfortable you are with it and the more efficient you are with it. Like now, I I'm my own best lover. I can I can give myself any kind of orgasm I want relatively quickly and enjoy it. When spontaneous desire shows up, which is usually when I'm in the middle of work and doing suddenly, like I always say the pussy calls to me, she stays like I'm turned on. I can actually set my work aside, go, I have my favorite toy in the bathroom, I have one in my bedroom, I have one out, like tucked away if I want to be on the couch, you know, and I can answer the call. I really promote answering the call because I think with women, it does you have spontaneous desire, but it never happens just because it may not be because your partner walks in and you're like, oh, I'm turned on. It's usually like I'm cleaning the house, and suddenly you're like, Oh, yeah, I don't know why you're here. And we don't do anything about it because it's at a weird, you know what I mean? We're told sex should only happen at certain times. Yep. At night in bed, or when your partner's there, or it's a sexy time. And so we box it away. And I'm like, I don't care what I'm doing. If there's not somebody here that would be inappropriate for me, I'm like, oh, she's in the mood. I'm gonna go take care of her. And I think doing that makes my body or my mind, my nervous system feel safe to let spontaneity and desire happen more often.

SPEAKER_01: 16:28

Yeah, I love that you bring up the nervous system because I do think it's a retraining of our nervous system, right? Like when you spend time really understanding what brings you pleasure, you teach your body that pleasure can be safe for you. And so then when you have moments like downtime or relaxation, or suddenly you have a little bit of space to fantasize, you are creating this kind of pathway towards pleasure. It's like there's an invitation there. You've ingrained it into your body that it is safe and enjoyable, and you get to like actually experience the benefits, the stress release, the can the body confidence, all of these things that we know, the release of oxytocin, right? All these things that we know that pleasure can bring but can activate the reward pathway. You are developing a better relationship with your internal system of trust, relaxation, self-intimacy. I mean, I can't, I really just can't say enough about building a relationship with your own body.

SPEAKER_02: 17:45

Which is what solo sex does. Solo sex creates trust with your body. And I talk a lot about I'm a survivor of childhood sexual assault and rape. And one of the things I've learned on my journey is a lot of the things I felt I had didn't have access to during sex, meaning, like I used to not have any sensation during penetration, only discomfort, maybe pain, but numbness. So I didn't understand why anybody would enjoy penetration, right? A lot of those things my body was doing, it was shutting down my access to sensation and to feeling and to pleasure down there to keep me safe because it didn't trust that sex could mean something good for me. And so in solo sex, I've been able to create that trust with my body again. I'm now dry in the driver's seat. I'm able to say, I know you want to keep me safe, body, but this is gonna be safe. I promise to you, it's gonna be safe, right? And my body has started to wake up and go, all right, well, maybe I'll let you say hi to the G spot. We're ready to come out and play. You know what I mean? And it creates trust. And I think it's hard to explain to people this concept of creating trust with your own body. Like they're like, what do you mean? It's your body. But our bodies are like amazing. They they they know how to protect us even when our brains don't, right? And so they'll do their own work. And wouldn't you say that solo sex is really a great route to doing that, not only teaching yourself what brings pleasure, but also creating a new relationship with your body.

SPEAKER_01: 19:32

Yeah, and I think also another thing that a lot of folks are working through is shame, right? I mean, we just have so many problematic messages about sex, particularly like women's sexuality in our culture. And the body wants to protect you from shame. Like we as humans actually can't, we don't have a high capacity for shame because it's really risky to get like shunned, right? From your community. Like you need other humans to survive. And so when we have, when our body's response is largely built around shame, then what you find is tightness, that feeling of pressure. So there's a lot of avoidance that comes with that. And solo sex is a space where you can be with yourself and work through, unpack some of that stuff in a bodily way, which then helps how you show up for partnered sex, if that is something that you're interested in integrating into your life, right?

SPEAKER_02: 20:35

Well, for sure. I mean, you can tell the difference between having sex with a partner who's filled with shame and one who's like in a sex positive space, right? Like very different experiences. But what I'm interested in talking about right now, because you mentioned before, it's Gen Z and queer folk who are sort of leading this cultural shift and masturbating daily more often than the older generations and heterosexual people. I'm curious as to why you believe that's the case. I'm also curious as to why Gen Z and queer folk, what are the similarities? Why is it, what do they have in common? Yeah, great question.

SPEAKER_01: 21:26

So, what I mean, here are my thoughts on it is that when you're really So the sexual revolutions up until this point have really been about access, right? Like access to birth control, access to abortion, bodily autonomy. And I mean, sadly, we're backsliding right now, which is tragic. And, you know, we've got a big fight ahead of us, right? To regain some rights. But this sexual revolution, I think, is more about taking bodily autonomy to another level and thinking about the orientation towards pleasure. I mean, all of the work that we've done up until this point has led to a space where young people are on dating apps that I think in many situations are it's a pretty unsatisfying way to try to connect with other humans, right? I agree. They are orienting more towards a pleasure-based model and throwing out a lot of these old paradigms. And I think the reason that you see young people and queer people sharing this in common is that there are just those shared values of autonomy, bodily safety, pleasure. And they're just not as bought in to this kind of penis and vagina model of sex that we have inherited. And I don't think that that's necessarily coming so much from like this amazing sex ed we have access to in this country. I think it's really, you know, the ways in which like digital culture has expanded access to information and just the priorities of the younger generation are really different. And like I said, I was really surprised in our like the baseline data that we gained from the magic wand study to see that it's not that young people and queer people aren't partnering. It's just that their priorities as far as their sexual practices are shifting. So I think that there's a little bit more intention that's going into the kind of sex that they're having.

SPEAKER_02: 23:48

Well, it's interesting to me too that you say that they're partnering because I feel like in the media right now, the only thing I ever hear about is how young people, especially men, aren't partnering and aren't having sex. And again, I never assume I live in a little bit of bubble of a bubble. I'm over here in Portland. And I am a queer woman, a pansexual. I date people of all genders, and I'm just not seeing that reflected in my pool. Now I understand that that's just my pool. But what are your thoughts on that? Because what your study shows is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_01: 24:33

Yeah. So one thing to, you know, look at our data with the understanding that these are folks who were recruited by sex researchers, sex educators, and therapists who have, you know, some sort of partnership or work with us at Magic Wand and by Magic Wand, right? So I think that these are sexually intelligent and sexually curious people, our sample size. So perhaps they are already a bit more intentional about their sexual practices. They might be a bit more informed because they are seeking out, like one of the interesting statistics is that 86% of our sample of a thousand folks with vulvas in North America had sought out some form of support around sexuality. So whether that's listening to a sex podcast, reading sex books, going and actually seeing a sex therapist or like a pelvic PT, these are the kinds of support resources that these folks are accessing. So when you increase your sexual IQ, when you feel the call of your sexual curiosity and you actually let it guide you into discovering more information about yourself, about your partner, about sex toys, these kinds of things, suddenly I think you get more intentional as far as how you're engaging with your sexuality.

SPEAKER_02: 26:02

So if you are listening to this podcast right now at this very moment, you're already well on your way to having a better sex life because you're working on increasing your sexual IQ. I love that concept. It's come up again and again in the interviews I'm having with experts, that gaining the knowledge, knowledge is half the battle battle, folks. And it's no joke. That applies to all areas of your life and very much so your sex life, right? Yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_01: 26:41

I think one other thing I just want to throw in there, which got me really excited, is that our sample size are they are facing the same sexual health challenges that everybody out there is facing. Struggle reaching orgasm, anxiety during sex, maybe reaching orgasm too quickly, right? These these things that we hear about a lot. I think 60% of our sample struggles to achieve orgasm, but 74% of folks in this study said that they're satisfied with their sex life, which to me means they are prioritizing pleasure over orgasms.

SPEAKER_02: 27:26

I love that. I definitely struggle with, I still often on struggle with reaching orgasm. I've I've gotten way better at it. Masturbation. Masturbation helped me get there, but I still have times where I'm just like, dear God, body. And there is it's really useful to stop thinking that the point of engaging in sex and play, intimate play and erotic play is to have the orgasm. The point of doing it is to, you know, enjoy eroticism, to be in pleasure, to be in that that really wonderful, hot, fun space, play a space, right?

SPEAKER_01: 28:09

I think when we get really orgasm focused, it becomes about like optimizing your sex. And when you're pleasure focused, it's really about letting it be uh an experience where that pleasure guides. And that is not necessarily this linear kind of A to B model. There's like all of these fun places that you can go in between the arousal and the orgasm that help you feel connected to your body and that just give you all of the benefits of, you know, the the hormone release, the relaxation, the giddy feelings, right? Like however you experience pleasure in your body, there are going to be benefits. And the old model that I think that we are shifting out of is getting outdated really quickly as people are starting to expand their definition of pleasure.

SPEAKER_02: 29:16

Well, I'd like to also just put in there real quick orgasm also doesn't have to be the end of sex. Yes. I mean, it's useful to think about that. It's useful to think about that. I just have to plug that really quick. It's one of the things that frustrates me the most. Like the everyone thinking orgasm is the like period on the sentence that they just wrote in bed. And you can keep going. You can keep playing after that and enjoying sex.

SPEAKER_01: 30:42

Yeah, and if you break that down, what does that ultimately, like, where does that stem from? It stems from a very penis-centric approach to sexuality, which is for a lot of folks with penises, once they ejaculate, for them, like the blood flow leaves and the arousal lessens. And so, like, oh, we're done. It's like, uh, no, no, no. This is not the model that we want to be investing in.

SPEAKER_02: 31:09

Absolutely not. I think something that is intriguing about this conversation, too, is that while Gen Z and queer folk are leading this cultural shift, it's not something that someone of any any generation can't easily hop on board with, learn from, and benefit from. So if you're listening to this and you are my age, 50, 40, whatever, 30, 60, I know that I've got a lot of mature people who listen to my podcast, but it doesn't mean your time is done. It just means you can look at a younger generation as a model for where you want to take your sex life now. So that being true, can we talk about what are some things people can learn from this and start to use in their own life to make a shift toward better sex through solo sex practices?

SPEAKER_01: 32:12

Well, I think first and foremost, it's about regularity, right? Like whatever you do with consistency is what creates your habits. Your habits create your daily experiences, and then that really shapes your life, right? So if expanding your pleasure is a priority for you in the new year, say maybe you set a pleasure-related goal or resolution, which would be awesome, like practice it with regularity. And sometimes that means that you're gonna, it's just like going to the gym or like eating a healthy meal, right? Like you're not gonna necessarily feel up to it. Do it anyways. And I'm not saying to push through when like your body's in full shutdown or you're having a triggered response or these sorts of things, like obviously flow with the information that your body and your energy levels are giving you. But sometimes it's about not expecting the arousal and the desire and those sorts of things to already be present, but to just do it anyway. So, one of the structure of the magic wand study was there was a week of abstinence, there was a week where you used your magic wand every day, and then there was a week of returning to your regular sexual activities. My data is not included in the study because I wasn't randomly selected, but I went through the study with everybody because I wanted to kind of understand what was happening. I'm not someone who uses my magic wand every day. And there were days that I was like, oh, seriously, I got to use this magic wand again. I also was using the rechargeable, which is not my model. I like the mini the best. And I have to tell you, the act of stepping away from my desk, for the most part, I was using my magic wand during the day because I'm I work and I'm a parent. And so that was when I could make the time for it. Stepping away from my desk every day to experience pleasure had such benefits for me, even when I didn't feel like doing it. Actually, kind of sometimes, especially when I didn't feel like doing it, because those were the times that I was stressed and I had other priorities and yada, yada, yada, whatever. And it just that whole week, it was like this cumulative effect that built over time, where by the end of the week, I was like, well, maybe I'm a little bored with the magic wand, like the sensations of it. But this practice of actually just taking time to myself, connecting with my body, experiencing pleasure. I was more relaxed. I was better at my obligation, like my big old list of to-dos that I have to do every day. And I felt more connected to myself.

SPEAKER_02: 35:01

All right. So I'm gonna use her story as a plug for my 365 days of pleasure is the resolution. So just so you know, and my longtime listeners know, in 2022, I decided to embark on a challenge of one orgasm every day for a year, which I completed.

SPEAKER_01: 35:22

Amazing.

SPEAKER_02: 35:23

And a lot of what I learned, I learned a lot, as you can imagine. I learned a lot, right? During that time. And it is interesting how pushing through, and in the journey I'm taking people on now, they don't have to masturbate every day. Just so just letting you guys reminding you guys, don't get scared. I did though push through a lot of those times when I was like, I don't want to do this, like I'm not up for that. And it was interesting, it did rewire my brain. One of the funny things that came out of it, you talked about how you know there's stress that makes you not want to have sex and all of that. Now, when I get stressed, especially when I have a deadline, my I the pussy calls and it's like horny right now. And I think what happened was by pushing through during stressful times, I would get that oxytocin rush afterwards. My stress would drop, and my body's like, oh hmm, maybe I found a cure for this uncomfortable state. So now when I get stressed out, I get horny.

SPEAKER_01: 36:32

That's kind of amazing.

SPEAKER_02: 36:34

It's funny, isn't it? Yes, it's like often bizarre, but that is what's happened because again, orgasm and not just orgasm, but pleasure and any kind of sexual stimulation can give you all those really great hormones and you know make you feel better. So let's talk specifically about how launching on a solo sex journey people who aren't doing that right now aren't doing it very much or feel ashamed about it. I want to motivate them here. How can we use that journey to improve our overall sex lives with our partners or maybe a future partner?

SPEAKER_01: 37:18

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think first of all, think of it as not replacing partner sex. It's really about building your capacity for pleasure. It's about increasing self-knowledge, it's about taking some of the pressure out of partnered sex because that's a big, I mean, I think that that's one of the main issues that people in relationships deal with is this pressure of kind of mismatched or misaligned libidos or desires or interests or time, you know, just like the general structure of one partner's life versus the other partner. And so when we can take that pressure for our own needs off of our partners, then you actually get to come to your partnered sex with more intentionality. Like boundaries, better communication, these sorts of things really can improve your sex life with a partner. And solo sex helps you to build some of these skills, in my opinion, because it is shifting the paradigm away from this is only a thing that I experience with, in most cases, this one single partner who I'm with, right?

SPEAKER_02: 38:47

Right. And by regularly exploring your pleasure in a way that feels safe. So maybe it doesn't feel comfortable to explore different sensations with a partner. If you're like, hey, I want to know what more of a like scratchy feeling on my skin is, or to be spanked feels like, or like, I want to try heat and cold. Maybe asking your partner for that feels you feel too self-conscious. But during solo play, you can explore all kinds of things, physical sensations. You can pull up ethical porn and and fantasize about different situations you might want to experience, whether that's like a threesome or sex with the same person of the same. You can actually explore those things. And then when you're with somebody else, you have information that you learned to share with them. Like now, when I'm with a partner, I can tell them like if I want them to find my A spot or my G spot, I can be like, I don't know exactly where it is, you know. Or if I need, I know one interesting thing I learned during my journey was that if you take a flat palm and you put it on my lower belly or over my the pubic mound, it stops me from orgasming. Like that, you cannot do that if I'm close to orgasming and I get that sort of grounding sensation, it takes me away from the orgasm. But if you run really light fingers over my skin around the inner thighs or in that area, it will actually accelerate my movement toward orgasm. I found out these things through my own self-pleasure journey. I can now tell them to a partner and give them that information so it's easier for them.

SPEAKER_01: 41:38

Yeah, and upskilling is hot, right? Like a partner who knows their own body then can take the courageous step of asking for what they want. Ultimately, you're coming into partner sex because you're wanting to experience mutual pleasure together. And if you have a partner and that is not what they want out of partnered sex, then please move on, right? Like find somebody else, because there are people out there who are invested in the mutual pleasure. And so being able to give your partner the tools, the roadmap, the information that they need to help bring you pleasure is so valuable. And that's not to say that if you don't have this information about your body, that it is not hot to have sex with you, but it is going to add a level of dimensionality when you can bring those skills and that information to your partner play. It allows your explorations together to deepen and your communication to improve.

SPEAKER_02: 42:44

Yeah, I guess I love the way you frame that. Through your own solo sex journey, you build skills. Hopefully, you build a toolbox because you're gonna want, like you said, even using the one toy for a week, you were like, okay, I'm kind of bored of this one sensation. So maybe you get a clittoral suction toy, or maybe you get a butt plug to put in. Will you do it? You know what I mean? You build your little toolbox, and who doesn't want a partner who comes to the table with skills, new skills that maybe you don't have and toys? I really appreciate a partner who brings their own toys, you know. I don't want to be the only one contributing to that thing. And just like new ideas for play, fantasies bring new fantasies, right? Then you end up with this beautiful expansive sex life. Yes, they can see some things, you can teach them some things, you can try. New things together, you know.

SPEAKER_01: 43:43

I think also one of the side effects of getting familiar and really owning your own pleasure is a certain authority and confidence that you come with. I mean, and my gosh, like how far can you take confidence as far as like sexual like interest and prowess and attraction goes? I mean, a confident partner is so who knows themselves and is also interested and asking questions and these sorts of things. I mean, those are the things that I think make you the best kind of lover is that balance of curiosity, but also internal authority, like knowing yourself and knowing your body. It's so hot.

SPEAKER_02: 44:30

And there's something really hot about shamelessness. Yeah. Right. True self-pleasure, like it's like self-worship too. Solo sex, there's a lot of self-worshipping in it. It's a great way to build self-love, but it makes you kind of shameless about sex. It's like, yeah, I like this. Yeah, I've explored this. Like, why wouldn't you? And something is really hot about that, right? Rather than the person who's like, you want to do what? And like, I don't know, I feel weird about that, you know. While that's a very real experience, it's not exactly inviting intimacy. If you feel you know what I mean? As opposed to the person who's like, Oh, hot, let's talk about it, you know.

SPEAKER_01: 45:12

I mean, just as you're talking, like I'm seeing the kind of the different energy of like a shameless approach. It has so much openness to it. Whereas, like when I think of shame or there's like a holding kind of a restriction to it. And what we know about orgasmic experiencing is that the it's a contraction and release, right? Like you can't actually have an orgasm without that release piece. There's an opening to it. And when you can bring that sort of open, expansive energy along with the self-knowledge, wow, I mean, this is a recipe for having really expansive orgasmic experiences.

SPEAKER_02: 45:55

It's interesting. Through this conversation, what I really didn't expect going into it was to realize one of the biggest gifts you're going to get from embarking on your own solo sex journey and having regular solo sex is your the chances that you're going to build and gain self-confidence are huge. And I know for people of all genders, confidence in bed or with the opposite sex, or with what what whichever sex you are desiring to have sex with is so key. It's so key. And this is a fantastic way to gain it. You don't need anything but yourself, your hand, maybe toys. Like I I like all the toys. My listeners know. I'm like, I'm a big promoter of central products to help you along the way. But it's free to you. This is it's it's an it's inherently yours. Right. This pleasure is inherently yours, and this practice is yours. That's fascinating. I I I didn't, I mean, I've talked about self-love a lot, but I guess I haven't really thought about the confidence piece as much and what a gift that is.

SPEAKER_01: 47:13

I mean, that was one of the in the course of the study, one of the elements that got the biggest boost actually for participants between abstinence week and magic wand week was their sense of self-confidence, which really bottomed out during abstinence week. And so that was from the get-go, as we were starting to analyze the results, one of the kind of key takeaways. And I also was really excited by that because when you think about so if you're wanting to improve your partner sex, right? I think one of the things that is most helpful for intimacy is not to have this sort of like tight scarcity mindset around it, right? And what you're describing right now is like once you own your pleasure, it's something you can take with you, and you're not as reliant on a partner for it. And so it kind of inherently means that you're not gonna accept bad sex, right? Like if you know I got me, then it gives you an opportunity to really meet each other in a way with high expectations and openness and love, not like high loving expectations, let's say, right? And then it just means that you get to upskill and level up together.

SPEAKER_02: 48:38

All right. So an important question, because I know it's going to pop up when as we're talking about solo sex being important for the self, but also to improve partnered sex, would you say this is true for all genders, or does it differ by gender?

SPEAKER_01: 49:00

I do think it's important for all genders, absolutely. But we have to think about the cultural context in which people are raised, where folks with penises have a lot more permission to explore their bodies from an early age. You know, like I mean, I hear parents joke about, right? Like the sock, I always knew that he was jerking off. And it's like, I can't even imagine if like my parents thought I was masturbating and them having like any positive feelings around that, right? So when you are socialized female or going through struggles early in life, trying to understand your relationship to your own body, I think that there's more shame that you're working through. There is a lot more energetic blocks that live in the body through your lived experiences. And so, in a sense, I think for women and queer and trans people, there's perhaps more value in the self-exploration and the bodily, like having access to body autonomy because it is something that you kind of have had to fight for.

SPEAKER_02: 50:19

Right. But while solo sex and a solo sex journey help everybody of every gender be a better lover to other people. Although I want to say I also think all the things you gain for yourself are very important. However, we are focusing on what will also help you do embed with someone else.

SPEAKER_01: 50:39

Yeah, I do think that solo sex is for all genders really beneficial in your partnership. I think that if you are someone who struggles to understand your own pleasure and it doesn't come with ease, there probably are maybe a bit more benefits to really understanding your own personal pleasure map than someone who just like from a young age has known how to get off, feels comfortable in their body. And in those cases, sometimes it's also really helpful to understand your partner's pleasure map as well. So if your partner is someone who struggles with being embodied, experiencing pleasure, probably what's going to help you be a better lover with that partner is really understanding their pleasure map in addition to your own, if that makes sense. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02: 51:39

All right. Well, we are at that time where I need to give my listeners some takeaways. They've listened to this. This is a lot of information to take in. Very useful information. So going from giving them all this information, now let's give them takeaways. If they want to start their own solo journey or figure out how to use what they are learning and when they currently have to improve their partner's sex life, tell them where they should start, some things they should be doing tonight, tomorrow, the next day to move in that direction.

SPEAKER_01: 52:12

I think first and foremost, figure out what you can do three times a week for three weeks. This is one of the best ways to start a new habit because it can be really intimidating to start thinking about I have to start masturbating every day. No, no, no. What can you commit to that makes you feel connected to your pleasure three times this week, next week, and the week after? Something you can do with regularity. And if for you, masturbating feels like maybe a few steps down the line, then I would say find the pleasure practice that does feel accessible. Something that's sensorial, involving your senses. If it doesn't necessarily have to be orgasmic to start, but just start locating pleasure, like where it lives in your body. Open up your access to that. Do it three times this week, next week, and the week after.

SPEAKER_02: 53:16

Can you give a couple of examples of what that might be if it's not, you know, masturbatory?

SPEAKER_01: 53:21

Yeah. I mean, I'll start with a really, really simple one. It's like your first sip of coffee in the morning. Smell it, take it slow, really taste it, feel it go down your throat, notice the sensation as the taste and the warmth hits your tongue. Really feel into that sensory experience. Notice where it shows up, like what lights up in your body, right? That's really good information to have in terms of where your pleasure experiencing is. You could do this with like smelling a rose, also, right? Like actually like take in the scent, feel the petals, like rub them along your face or your neck, maybe the like inside of your elbow, right? Like you can have these really beautiful sensorial experiences that maybe are even a bit sensual with very everyday things. And I think once you can open up permission for that, then you can start expanding from there. So if we're using the rose, I mean, you probably are not wanting to pour coffee all over your body, right? But like if we use the rose experience, like maybe you take the rose and now you're like, oh, well, I really like when you know my partner whispers in my ear, okay, what does it feel like to take the rose and like run it along your neck and your ear, right? So you can just start expanding from wherever you're starting from.

SPEAKER_02: 54:57

And if you have a rose suction toy, you can just go where you want it to go. It's so funny when you mentioned the first taste of coffee. My eyes rolled back in my head. I'm like, yep, all right, got it. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01: 55:09

That every morning.

SPEAKER_02: 55:11

Thank you so much. That's a very practical, easy place to start for everyone. It teaches you to be embodied. It's part of self-pleasuring, right? We do self-pleasure all day throughout the day, and we don't even know it, and we miss it because we're not embodied. We're in our head, we're thinking about all the things that are going on, and and we can't even enjoy these little moments. So starting there is a great place to start. Thank you so much for joining me today and sharing this cultural shift, which I think is fantastic, and helping my listeners understand where it's coming from, why, and how it can improve their lives. I promise you. I promise you it can at any age, right? Uh so can you tell them more about where they can find you and engage with you after they listen?

SPEAKER_01: 56:02

Yeah. So I am an intimacy coach. I do a fair amount of sex education as well. My website is Sarah with an h tomchesson.com. I'm on Instagram at Sarah Tom Tom. And I do have a Substack. My Substack is Pleasure Practices, and it is substack.sarah TomTom.

SPEAKER_02: 56:27

Fantastic. Well, so go and check her out, folks, and also promptly go take care of yourself. Right now. Thank you so much for joining me today. This was a great conversation. I learned a lot from it, and I know that my listeners will benefit from it. So I hope to have a chance to have a conversation again with you in the future. Thank you so much. And to my listeners, until next time, I'll see you in the locker room.

SPEAKER_00: 56:54

Cheers. Cheers.