Willpower C: Before doing any exercise, take a few seconds to imagine yourself doing the exercise extremely well and in full compliance. To imagine all the details: such as asking your partner to do it with you, paying attention to your level of sexual arousal/tension, asking her to stop, asking her to resume stimulation, etc.
This brain rehearsal takes only a few seconds, but it is very beneficial. The famous diver Greg Louganis did this before every jump, imagining himself doing it perfectly; the famous golfer Jack Nicklaus did the same before every shot. You can do this rehearsal anywhere. For example, if you and your partner are preparing for practice, here and now you can close your eyes and do the rehearsal, or you can go to another room – for some reason, my patients prefer to go to the bathroom to do it – and spend a few seconds there.
Willpower D: Every day, preferably when you first wake up or before you go to bed, take a few seconds to imagine the wonderful feeling you will get once you can control your ejaculation.
Willpower E: This is the self-promotional dialogue exercise in Chapter 21. Remember: do this exercise whenever you get discouraged or think you have failed to do the exercise.
Please breathe deeply
Proper breathing can help you develop ejaculatory control. In short, taking a few deep breaths helps slow down the sexual arousal/tension that leads to rapid ejaculation. The breathing that needs to be done should be deep and relaxed. Unfortunately, many people don’t breathe this way. Whenever a patient takes a deep breath, many actually tense up more. They tense the muscles in their chest or shoulders, and sometimes contract the muscles in their neck, or even their arms, or even hold their breath (which of course makes anyone more tense).
The best way to relax your breathing is the one taught by most schools of meditation. There is no significant tension contraction in the muscles, and the belly (not the chest) expands and bulges as you inhale. That is, if you put one hand on your belly while breathing, you will notice that your belly protrudes slightly outward when you inhale, and slightly inward when you exhale. If you are not used to this type of breathing, it will take more practice to master it.
Keep in mind: the goal is to relax; on each inhalation, place your hand on your belly to make sure it bulges slightly outward and try not to contract any muscles. If you find this difficult, imagine that your belly is a deflated balloon, each time you inhale it is filled with a little air, each time you exhale it is released a little air. This is fictional, of course, because the air always goes to the same place: your lungs. However, imagination is usually helpful.
Once you can do this, it’s best to practice it regularly. Deep breathing like this is probably the fastest way to help most people relax. Try taking a few deep breaths like this while doing masturbation exercises and while your partner practices stopping stimulation. You can also experiment with deep breathing when you are being stimulated or having intercourse. It’s a matter of habit, because you are doing the opposite. The more aroused you are, the more likely you are to take short, shallow breaths, or even gasps. With practice, however, most men can overcome this tendency and take relaxed deep breaths.
If you want to further use the relaxation method to help yourself gain ejaculatory control, you can imagine inhaling air downward into your pelvis to relax the muscles and the entire pelvic area. The more relaxed your pelvis is, the less likely you are to ejaculate.
Masturbation exercises
As mentioned earlier, everyone who is willing to masturbate should do these exercises, even if you don’t feel like you need to. If you really don’t want to, you can do each exercise just once.
These masturbation exercises assume that you masturbate in the same way that most men do, i.e., by holding the body of your penis and pumping the glans up and down with one hand. Some men masturbate in other ways – for example, lying prone on a bed, on a pillow, on the floor, or on a couch pressing and rubbing their penis. Unfortunately, these ways are not appropriate for developing ejaculatory control. You should probably learn to masturbate in a typical way.
Here are specific masturbation training methods
1: Abort – Initiate masturbation
Time required: 15 minutes
Steps
A: Masturbate with dry hands (no lotion or other lubricant on your hands) for 15 minutes without ejaculating. As mentioned earlier, focusing on the penis or pelvic area, you know your level of sexual arousal or sexual tension. When you feel you are still in the control zone, discontinue all stimulation and 1) experience the sensation of sexual arousal or sexual tension; 2) take several deep breaths. After the level of sexual arousal/tension has dropped significantly (the drop can last from 10 seconds to over a minute), resume stimulation. The stopping time, the time you wait for the sexual arousal/tension level to subside, is also included in the 15 minutes.
When you first start doing the exercises, you may need to abort many times. As you gain experience doing the exercises, you will know better when to stop and how long to wait, so you will need to stop less often.
When you only need to stop once or twice within 15 minutes, then proceed to step B.
Step B
Step B: Exactly the same as Step A, except now use a lubricant on your hands, such as KY gel, Albolene, or massage oil. If you only need to stop once or twice within 15 minutes, you can continue with exercise 22-2.
Problems that may occur
1) You need to abort again as soon as stimulation resumes. This may mean that you stopped too late, or stopped too briefly. Try to abort earlier, wait a little longer, and then resume stimulation.
2) The erection disappears completely or mostly fades when you abort. This is not a serious problem, but it may mean that you aborted too long. Try aborting briefly.
The following uses the concept of fine-tuning, which is a more subtle change in stimulation than aborting stimulation. There is nothing wrong with aborting stimulation during masturbation, partner stimulation, or intercourse, but there are other options. I discovered many years ago that men with good ejaculatory control do not thrust quickly and violently in a sustained manner, but vary their thrusts to help control ejaculation. They move in certain ways when they want to ejaculate, and in other ways when they want to delay ejaculation, just like Fred described earlier. You will learn these other ways as well. You will be able to use these subtle adjustments when needed, and of course, you can even discontinue if you need to.
2: Fine tuning method of masturbation
Time required: 15 minutes
Steps
A: Masturbate with a dry hand for 15 minutes without ejaculating or aborting. While the arousal/tension level is still within the control zone, change the stimulation to control your ejaculation process. The types of changes that can be made are: slowing down the rate; changing the area of maximum stimulation – for example, stimulating only the body of the penis instead of the glans; changing the type of friction – for example, changing long strokes to short strokes, or using circular movements. Try only one variation at a time. Find out what works for you and be consistent.
These fine-tunings need to be done a little earlier than aborting stimulation. If you do it too late, you can always abort stimulation to prevent ejaculation. After the arousal/tension level subsides, you can resume the type of stimulation that turns you on the most if you wish.
If you can comfortably masturbate for 15 minutes without ejaculating using only the fine-tuning method, then you can proceed to Step B.
Step B: Exactly the same as Step A, except now you have to put lubricant on your hands.
If you are able to masturbate comfortably within 15 minutes after masturbating with the fine-tuning method using lubricant, then you can proceed to the next exercise.
What is the next step?
Readers who have a partner and are willing to do the exercises with their partner to improve ejaculatory control should read the following section and follow the exercises and suggestions that make up most of the rest of this chapter.
If you don’t have a partner yet, you can wait and see how your ejaculatory control is when you do have a partner. If your lack of control was unique to your last relationship, you may get better after you get through the first few times with your new partner. In the meantime, you can continue your masturbation practice and spend a few minutes each day imagining how you will apply the skills and understanding you have just learned to your new partner.
Imagine yourself gradually having sex with your new partner, imagine telling her about the problems you are facing, imagine stopping the action when you get too excited about intercourse, and then resuming the action when you feel you can control it. If the situation becomes clear after the new relationship is established and you need to make improvements in ejaculation control, you can do some of the following exercises with your new partner. If you want expert help before then, you can consult a sex therapist, receive therapy alone, or work with a partner substitute for therapy.