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It’s about pleasure not performance
Joyce Penner, coauthor of The Gift of Sex (passionatecommitment.com) and her husband Cliff Penner, are internationally recognize sexual therapists. In this episode, she gives her 3 secrets to her marital success. Listen in to hear the vital differences to how a man and woman gets turned on.
A woman delights in her sexuality
You’ll Discover:
- Ensure your marital success through 15 minutes a day
- emotional – something positive
- spiritual – prayer or scripture
- physical – full body hug and passionate kissing
- Women and men are on different tracks and what tracks they are on
- The tip she learned before marriage about her own sexuality that helped her marriage
- How women need to get their needs met in marital intimacy so that they can be fully able to give for the benefit of their whole marriage
- How being uncomfortable in our body actually undermines the enjoyment we should be having in sex
- How a short and simple exercise routines she has done for 20 minutes a day has helped Joyce stay fit and vital for 47 years
- How to be intimate even when you’re a mom
no need to fight with your husband
Resources Mentioned:
Couple is Newly Married or Preparing for Marriage:
Getting Your Sex Life Off To A Great Start
The Way To Love Your Wife
Couple is Married and no major problems:
The Gift Of Sex
Couple Needing Guidance on Specific Barriers:
Restoring The Pleasure (how to and behavioral tools)
a woman gets turned on when she feels good about herself
Tweetables:
- Leave the negatives unsaid.
- There is nothing more elating for him, than a woman who delights in her own sexuality.
- A man gets turned on to a woman when he sees her. A woman gets turned on when she feels good about herself.
- The more a man tries to fix her the worse she feels about herself.
- Be intentional for intimacy, not just sex. But intentionally plan for connection.
- As the woman, if we think about what we need and then get those needs met, then we’re going to have more to give. And when we have more to give, he’s going to be happy too.
- Penner’s P’s: Plan, Prepare, Pursue enjoyment (rather than do your duty), Pleasure rather than perform and Pucker up & kiss!
Thanks for listening! I hope you are encouraged to live in wholeheared intimacy!
Love,
Belah
—
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0:00
delight your marriage episode nine.
0:03
Welcome to the delight your marriage podcast. This show where you hear from amazing and inspiring wives sharing their struggles, triumphs and advice for this journey called marriage. Here’s your host, belah. Rose.
0:20
Hi there, this is Bella, I hope you’re having a great day, which just do me a favor and give a quick smile doesn’t make you feel better. So I am excited to share the second half of Joyce pinners interview today. And she shares the first half in episode eight. So definitely check that out, where she talks about the struggles in her marriage that actually kind of, you know, started out with a really conservative background. And now she’s got an amazing ministry with her husband. And today she talks about some really amazing insights to women enjoying sexual intimacy. You know, it’s not something that was easy for me to just fall into enjoying and fall into the passion that you see in the movies. But it’s really great insights, she shares even some of the secrets to a wonderfully happy marriage and how to really prep your mind for enjoying lovemaking. One thing I love about Joyce is that when you hear her story, you know that she’s lived the things out. I mean, she’s not new to this whole marriage game. She has been married for 51 years, and has children and grandchildren and has worked full time and has been a stay at home mom and has had a sick child and has been in school. And I mean, they’ve been traveling, they’ve just had so much life experience together. And yet here she’s dumbing down the key principles for really enjoying marriage together and intimacy together. It’s wonderful. And you’re going to hear just phenomenal insights. So if you have a pen, and you’re the note taking type, go ahead and write these things down, because comes at you fast, but it’s really good. Alright, so here’s Joyce.
2:20
So you’ve alluded to a couple of things already, including your faith in prayer. And but I’m interested, if you could say the chief, three things that have been central to your marital success, what do you think you could say?
2:35
Hmm, that’s good. I would say leaving the negatives unsaid. As much as possible. We all have those where we’d like to give a cutting comment, or put down or we’re really angry about something. Wait, take your time. Don’t react in a moment of emotion. And don’t leave those negatives unsaid. Let go of those. Wait, you may you need to talk about it many times. But most of the time, probably. But wait till you’re not feeling all the negativity and emotion and hurtful things that we could say. And then staying connected. And we actually have come up with a formula for intimacy that’s written in one of our books called the book is called The Way to love your wife, our most recent book, and we’ve come up with that formula in our daughter, the one that actually had all the health issues just got married two years ago, and it’s the one that’s expecting her first baby and her and her husband incorporated that formula for intimacy in their kind of contract they made with each other for their marriage. But it basically is the most important part of it is 15 minutes a day. And many couples will say well, that’s not very much. But so many times, we think we should do so much that we don’t do anything because we don’t get we don’t take the time to do the 15 minutes and then 15 minutes a day. We start teaching long before we end practicing ourselves long before we learned about that it actually makes sense in terms of this sex on the brain research. But it’s taking time to look into each other’s eyes and just share something positive about your day. And we just did that last night sitting at our little bar where we either our dinner when we’re just the two of us and just sharing something we’re excited about. We’re planning this trip to Europe or we’re going to be teaching and we just made some fun connections. They’re sharing some thing about your life that you’re positive about, and looking into each other’s eyes, because that’s what raises the brain chemical, oxytocin, we’ve learned that afterwards. That’s what keeps us trusting and connected. And then having a prayer together, just holding each other’s hands and depending on where couples are in their lives, and just it can just be a short prayer, reading a Bible verse together a short devotional we had, for a while we used parrot, les and Leslie parents had a flip calendar for, you know, every day of the year, we read that for a while, just different things, we had some Bible verses that we memorized when we were in, in school, and that are in a pack, sometimes we read those, those were helpful just reading having. So first, the emotional iContact fan, the spiritual connection with God, and then a 22nd Hug. And that we don’t time it anymore by just giving us a full body hug. And the research shows that 22nd Hug, again triggers the oxytocin, the trust our more in the bonding, and then five to 30 seconds of passionate kissing, that doesn’t lead to sex, and that keeps the spark alive, that keeps our brain chemical with dopamine, even after you’ve been old, like us guys, and married 51 years, you can still get a little spark in there. And so having that 15 minutes in that passionate kissing isn’t an indication of whether or not you want sex is just an indication of really giving yourself to each other, and keeping that spark and connection. And so many times couples Stop kissing, because passionately, because they it has become a symbol or a message of whether or not we want sex. And if it signals that, then we stop kissing, because we’re not sure we wanted at that time, you know, at dinner, and we don’t know how we’re going to feel by bedtime. So we don’t kiss passionately because we don’t want to give a false message. But staying connected with that formula, we think is so important. And then emphasizing, and enjoying emphasizing the enjoyment of each other and the things, building the things that we like to do together. And whether that’s taking walks, whether that’s stinging, whether that’s
7:38
going out to dinner, if we can afford to do so even if it’s a little thinner, doing things that are positives and ways that we enjoy each other are so important. And finding those so those are the I’d say leaving negatives behind staying connected, and emphasizing the enjoyment of each other.
8:02
Those are wonderful keys. I love that so much. And that formula is just golden. So the 15 minutes a day. So it’s either I looking at each other and
8:11
sharing some sauce, something positive, and it doesn’t have to be something positive about the other person. It could be something positive you thought of. Yeah. Okay. So that’s the first and then the spiritual connection, or prayer. And then a hug and a kiss, the physical. So it’s basically the emotional, the spiritual and the physical.
8:36
I love that. And I think for all the wives listening it that deserves a conversation with your husband to just say, Honey, can we commit to doing this
8:45
and making a deal with him that if you kiss him passionately, it doesn’t mean you want sex. Because so many women and this is particularly for the women, they stop kissing passionately, you know, if they’re busy with the kids or whatever, and he comes up and he wants to kind of snuggle and give her a kiss, whether he’s coming home from work or she’s coming home for work, whatever it is. What goes through our mind is let’s see. Now I don’t want to lead him on. You know, I don’t want to give them the wrong message. But if you know that you’re going to kiss passionately and it doesn’t mean that you want to have sex you just want to kiss passionately. And we as men, women are different that way men often when they kiss passionately get aroused when a man is aroused. He wants it with women. We are it’s like we function on two tracks. And just because our body is physically there, we aren’t always emotionally there. So we have to men have to realize that that we need to let our bodies get there. And then sometimes our emotions come along but particularly if we feel connected. It helps us be ready. More so that that’s what we find is very helpful.
9:57
Yeah, I just love that and and I’d like to kind of move into the next section about intimacy, specifically, let me start by asking if you could share a tip kind of about intimacy that was very vital to your understanding. And you wish someone had told you earlier in your marriage? Well,
10:14
actually, it was what I learned in the preparation to marriage class I took that I brought into marriage, and has been vital to our life all along, and we teach it to women. So it I didn’t discovered in marriage, I anticipated it in marriage. And it was so important because I would not have naturally come, I don’t think with that expectation. But because I was taught, it was so positive, I came with the expectation that it would be good for me. And, unfortunately, so many times in the church, women are taught, and we’re kind of taught this already in dating, that the whole idea that we not lead him on, and that we are the ones who have to set the boundary, rather than that we can get with our sexuality, and enjoy it with our husbands. And as we’ve understood scripture, it just is so key that what I brought to marriage was, this was going to be good for me. It wasn’t about whether or not I was going to please Him, and that he was the one that needed sex, and I was just going to do my duty. And duty sex never works long term for either, you know, make, keep the husband at home and happy for a while. But it’s not really a lot of fun having for the husband, to have sex when it’s just the wife’s duty either. And it’s certainly not good for her. So getting with and embracing her own sexuality and going for it for her is so important. And that’s what we talk about developing our book, the way to love your wife. And we’re just now in the process of writing a book for the woman about embracing her sexuality and sharing it with her husband. And the whole model through Scripture is that the husband is to love his wife, like Christ loves the church, how does Christ loved the church, he gives up his rights as we read in Philippians, chapter two, he gets with her, he Christ gets with us where we are. And when the husband gets with the wife, where she is, whether that’s being exhausted with a new baby, being ill, having barriers that she brought, maybe from her past, it may not even be something he caused, you know, she may have brought something from her past, past abuse, or having been raised in an alcoholic home are things that affect her in the marriage sexually. But if it’s with her, and loves her the way she is, rather than getting on his agenda, gives up his rights as Christ did for us and gets with us, then she can heal, she can get with her own sexuality and share it with him. And they can both end up happy, because he gets a woman who’s enjoying sex for herself, and sharing it with him. And there’s nothing more elating for him than a woman who delights in her own sexuality. And that’s what I brought to marriage because of that class, which was surprising when you knew who I was at that stage of my life, a little naive, innocent men and I,
13:56
I’m interested from the wife’s perspective, since that’s most of our audience. Right? She kind of do to help her husband to to help her, you know,
14:07
right. And it’s the if, and I’m not, this isn’t just because I’m wanting to sell books, books, but I the easiest way for me to do that at this point would be to help them if they could get the book, the way to love your wife, which is hard. I wish the title wasn’t that it first came out under the title The married guys guide to great sex. And that title is a lot easier to sell to women and bring home to their husbands. Then the wages love your wife because it sounds like he’s doing a bad job. And if she can tell them hey, it’s exactly the same book that was originally called the marriage guys guide to great sex and it is a great guide. It is the way that a couple’s going to end up doing so much better and if they can read it out loud together. It doesn’t beat him up. It just helps him learn the best way to help her get with her sexuality and allow it to come from inside her. Because we as men, women are very different. A man gets turned on to a woman when he sees her, a woman gets turned on when she feels good about herself. And so many times when a woman isn’t wanting sex, or has resistance or whatever, the husband is really sweetly trying to fix her. But the more he tries to fix her, he’ll bring her the book, he’ll do this, you know, just and the more he tries to fix her, the worse she feels about herself, then she feels badly that she isn’t satisfying him and keeping him happy. But that syndrome is just a downward spiral. And when, when she went, she can feel good about herself, and get with herself and on her pace, rather than on his pace. It just works better for both of them. And reading that out loud together, they’ll learn so much, it won’t just be that the man will learn the the woman will learn to. And if they can talk about it and try it and see, you know, how can we make the shift we’ve gotten into this pattern that isn’t working for us. Let’s try a new pattern. Let’s see if we can make it work better. And that’s the best resource, we have to help with that.
16:29
That’s wonderful. And that’s definitely something I want to read. So that just sounds really, really good. Because I’m sure that even if let’s let’s say there’s a wife listening, who’s like rolling her eyes, thinking, My husband will never read that with me. Even if the wife reads it herself, just to get insight into her own her own. I mean, what you just said was golden, a woman gets turned on when she feels good about herself why I’m right, that is absolutely golden. And that means, you know, making sure that exercise is a regular part of your life and making sure that, you know, a good eating plan is in place. And these kinds of things that make a woman feel good, already getting the endorphins going, without having the guilt of having to do it, but actually doing it and kind of getting into that space of feeling good. I mean, I know I’m much more willing to have a great sex life with my husband, if I if I do feel good. That’s
17:24
absolutely, absolutely. And there will be times, you know, like you say, you just have a new baby, you’re not going to feel as good about yourself as your body changes in your body goes through things and helping the husband understand that and and helping him affirm you the things that can be affirmed and enjoyed and, and you affirming that in yourself. And yes, if you can, if you can do that, even if he won’t read it with you, it will help and just trying to make some of those changes in your life can make such a big difference. Just some little ones like that.
18:08
Right? Yeah, putting on the lipstick, you know, getting your wardrobe. To the to the level that you enjoy it. What are some other maybe keys that
18:18
oh, yeah, that is so important. So important. It’s so it’s in for some men, they don’t even notice that. And that’s fine. If it doesn’t, you know, he doesn’t. But if you notice it and you feel better about yourself, you’re going to be different. And when a woman walks by mirror and looks in the mirror and says oh, I don’t look so bad, I thought it perks you up, you feel better. When you do and exercising does help and eating right and taking time, that time to make yourself feel good about yourself is so important. And learning that What does help me feel best about myself in each of us will be different than that and there will be differences in terms something that a little tidbit that helped me I just came to my mind. I when we had our first two kids, I was a full time professor of nursing because my husband was in graduate school so I was supporting us and getting up like at four in the morning and breastfeeding and heading off to work and and he was the student taking care of the baby at home while he was studying and we worked it around classes and stuff. But what I learned early on is that I took a power nap every day and again this doesn’t work for everybody but it’s still I don’t do it as much now because I can I’m not as exhausted but when I am when we’re traveling and speaking and stuff that power nap is so important. I just have a little electric timer and electronic timer beside my bed and I set it for Half an hour, and I lay down and usually I wake up before the half an hour is up, sometimes I don’t even fall completely asleep. Sometimes I just fall asleep for two, maybe 10 minutes. But taking that time each day, I started when our first child who’s now turning 47, which is hard to believe when she was born, because I was, I was getting up so early and breastfeeding and working and all that. And I found that power nap just kept me going. And then I still had energy for us, for the two of us. That connecting time, so that that was a little clue that was helpful to me. It might be taking a bubble bath, it might be, you know, just laying down stretching out for a few minutes, it may be whatever it is finding that spot for yourself that refreshes you and renews you.
21:01
I love that. And one thing I know that you speak specifically about and are talking about soon, is keeping the passion alive while you have kids. And especially with your with your story of actually having kind of seeing both sides of the spectrum while having kids and then having I’m sure passion was interrupted during those two years that you talk to us about. But just you know, how can you help? You know, I’ll definitely listen closely into your answer, because I’ve got two little ones at home now. So you know, for the wives out there that have kids either at the home, what tips you can give them?
21:38
Yes. And one is to plan and be intentional. And that’s what are, the formula for intimacy is about the 15 minutes a day. So it isn’t just planning for sex, but it is planning for that also. Because when at that stage of our lives, the sexual relationship can really suffer because we don’t have time. And it does seem almost like the baby knows when you’re going to have sex. And that’s when it starts crying. The toddler notice and comes running down the hall. I mean, it’s like they do get the vibe or something. It seems like it always happens when the babies are little, but planning for it. And it doesn’t end people say how can you plan for it? How do you know you’re going to be in the mood, you don’t have to plan for getting around having sex, all that just plan to have the time that you can touch and be close and cuddle and kiss and enjoy each other’s bodies. And if it leads to that great, but in you don’t often we as women don’t have to be in the mood, if we take the time and spend the time together, we eventually do get in the mood when our bodies kick in. And we’ve feel you know, we get some feelings because we’re being touched. So taking the time and planning it into our lives is so important first just for connection. And then also for more like one time a week or something where you’re going to have some time together. And if we don’t do that, when we have little kids, if we just leave it, and it will just take, you know, five to 10 minutes at the end of the day, when we don’t get much out of it. And then we don’t tend to want it because we’re not getting much out of it. So we do have to plan for it rather than wait for spontaneity, and then prepare ourselves for it. If we know we’re going to do it, we’re going to have time together. Think about it during the day. What is it that would feed me? How can I get some of my needs met? What do I need in terms of touch can I just be held. And that sounds selfish. But ultimately, if we think about what we need, again, as the woman and we get those needs met, then we’re going to have more to give and when we have more to give. He’s going to be happy to but if if we don’t think about what we need, and we just do it out of duty for him. Eventually, it just shuts down more and more rather than keeps it alive. So planned for it, prepare ourselves for it by mentally thinking about it picturing the positive times we’ve had together all that. And then, you know, do any other preparation, whether it’s taking a bath, whether it’s showering, whether it’s you know, whatever it works for us to get ourselves there and relax that nap during the day. And then focusing on what is positive when we are together. Again, enjoying each other and focusing on that positive and notes are probably some of the best things. Keep kissing passionately, daily. Without that leading to sex.
25:13
Yeah, and it sounds like really planning and being intentional was the first one and then really considering what you as the wife need from your husband. Because when you’re filled up, you’re able to give more, and I just love that that’s,
25:28
that’s so vital. Right? We talk about the the peace from the pinners plan, prepare, pursue enjoyment rather than do your duty, pleasure rather than perform. In other words, just really get into the enjoyment, and pucker up and kiss. So those are the kind of plan prepare, pursue pleasure and pucker up and kiss. So those are the key key points.
25:59
I love that that’s that’s fantastic. And one that comes out to me, especially the the pleasure rather than perform, that’s vital, especially to a woman, you know, when when you know the husband is turned on, by the way we look. So we want to kind of look good all the time. And we, you know, to be perfect, and yet, that can be such an inhibitor to us actually enjoying the experience.
26:24
Yes. And it’s interesting. Often, the husband doesn’t need us to be perfect. If we’re enjoying ourselves, that is far more important to him than that we are perfect. And that when we don’t feel good about ourselves that can get in the way of our enjoying ourselves. And then it can feel like it’s because we’re not looking perfect, or we’re not perfect, or a body isn’t responding or whatever it is that he’s unhappy, but he’s not unhappy, he’s unhappy because we’re not enjoying ourselves. And so it’s, again, we want to get out of the downward spiral and, and have a positive upward movement. And we try to break into some of those negative thinking patterns.
27:13
I think it’s interesting that we were talking about how a woman gets turned on when she feels good about herself. And and then we started talking about things like going to the gym. And, and I think I want to make sure the listeners realize that we’re not saying you need to look perfect to enjoy sex. That’s not what it is. Right? It’s actually you want to feel good about yourself to enjoy sex. Yeah. So whatever you need to do to get to that place of feeling good about yourself, go for that.
27:46
And it’s usually less than more, we tend to put so much pressure on ourselves to do more. My kids, especially my daughters always laugh at me because I have this little exercise routine that I started literally 47 years ago after our first child was born. And I do it most mornings, it takes about 20 minutes. And it’s one of these rope things that you hook on to a door and then I put weights on my feet and, and my ankles and wrists and do these exercises with that. And then I have a little trampoline, where I work out. And then I do a few yoga things and a few push ups. It’s 20 minutes a day. It’s like my 15 minute, you know, connecting. And my daughter’s laugh at me that that’s my exercise routine. But it’s worked for me. And it keeps me feeling good about myself. And that’s what that’s what key really back to what you’re saying and isn’t that we’re perfect. It’s that we feel good about ourselves. And each person has to discover what that is for each of us where we are on that.
28:56
So I just want to go ahead and ask as we’re wrapping up. Is there a book or program that you specifically recommend?
29:04
If the couple is preparing for marriage or just got married, we would recommend our book Getting your sex life off to a great start, and the way to love your wife. If a couple is married and has been married a while and everything is pretty good. They just want to make sure they’re no big problems. We would recommend the gift of sex and the way to love your wife. If a couple is struggling in some areas and need to overcome some of the typical barriers to a good sexual life, we would recommend restoring the pleasure and the way to love your wife. So one of the three books getting your sex life after great starts the gift of sex or restoring the pleasure which talks about more the How to the things to do and then the way to love your wife is much more the spiritual attitude role, how we interact Act, the process, that’s not some of that’s in the other ones too. But the other ones are much more, giving you tools, the actual behavioral tools of how to be and, and the way to love your mind is more about attitude and spirituality.
30:21
Okay? Okay. And I’ll have each of these listed out in the show notes. So be sure to check those out at delight your marriage.com. And we’ll have all that. My last question for you. Which last bit of insight is if you could go back to year one in your marriage and sit yourself down, what’s one piece of advice you would give to you choice?
30:43
Don’t get annoyed with stupid little things.
30:49
Very, very good advice. If you want to elaborate on that, or is that
30:54
the I think I said enough about it. I was just thinking, how it’s just worked so much more smoothly, when I don’t get off on little things that bugged me. And it takes away I mean, it uses so much energy, because when I, if I make those kinds of comments, then we get into an argument about it, he gets defensive. And we’ve just wasted 15 minutes an hour or whatever, and we don’t feel good about ourselves are in each other. So why did I bring it up in the first place? You know, kind of like? Did it really make any difference? If it’s really something important than I need to plan a time sit down and talk about this is bothering me if this is how it’s affecting me? How can we work on at night not not making a critical statement, but rather, talking about this is something I want us to work on, I do want us to improve in this area, but not getting off little corrective, negative idiosyncrasies that bugged me.
32:08
I love that. I love that. And we should all be so wise.
32:14
Choice one I should always right.
32:18
That’s right, day by day are still 51 years of marriage, and she’s still getting there.
32:25
Yes, that is so true. And boy, if we have that attitude, that’s maybe what it should be. That we are always learning. And we are always that work in progress. And that’s what God says, I mean, that’s what Scripture says, you know, we’re striving towards, we see the mark, we see the model, we see how we are to be in with God’s help, we’re moving in that direction, but we can’t do it on our own. And we won’t be perfect, and we will make mistakes. And we have to be gracious with ourselves, even if he is with us. And with our spouses
33:00
so much. And Joyce, just before we say goodbye, could you tell us how to connect with you?
33:06
Yeah, through our website, passionate commitment.com. I’m the one that answers all the emails we get, like seeking help, or information or whatever. I answer all of those. Sounds wonderful. Well,
33:20
Joyce, thank you so much for I spent a lot of time and energy with us. And this has just been an incredible interview. I know the wives are going to be so encouraged as I am. And just thank you so much for your time.
33:33
You’re welcome. It was enjoyable. Blessings to you with your new little one. And the other one will be wonderful years together.
33:42
Thank you choice. And coming back to talking to you the listener. Just amazing. So many of the insights Joe shared, you know, as a woman of let’s see 51 years of marriage, and she still says she’s learning every single day growing, it just doesn’t end. And I think that’s that’s a beautiful example of life. I mean, it’s true, all of us by the end of our path. I mean, we’re still learning and growing. I mean, otherwise, hopefully, we’re, you know, in heaven by that time if we finished learning, you know, maybe, I don’t know, I imagine that we’ll be learning still in heaven. I love learning. But anyway, I mean, that’s why I try to share so many resources with you and share what what the guests have, you know, created that will help you because, you know, I’m looking literally right now at my my bookshelf of sex books. And it’s just extensive because I love learning about this stuff. I love understanding more about intimacy and really having a vital, wonderful sex life with your husband. I mean, why wouldn’t you want that? So definitely check out, delete your marriage.com/nine which is going to have all of Joyce’s books that she shared with so it’s delight your marriage.com/nine and it’s just marvelous everything that she shared, I am really looking forward to reading some of these books, especially the way to love your wife. That just sounds wonderful as well as the gift of sex. But definitely check those out. And go ahead and implement what Joyce said she gave so many actionable ideas. I just encourage you, if you need to go back and listen to it again, bring a notepad and just write down the things that you need to keep in mind going forward because that’s these are serious keys to a happy, wonderful marriage and life. So I hope that you have a great rest of your day and you’re encouraged to live wholeheartedly, in your marriage and in your life. Okay, God bless you. We’ll talk soon. Bye.
35:45
Thanks for listening. If you’ve been blessed by this, why not share it? Until next time, live with love, wisdom and passion
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