As A Woman Wants - Reviews, Sex

Nagoski E

As the woman wants. Master class on the science of sex

M.: Mann, Ivanov and Ferber, 2016.

Only 30% of women consistently reach orgasm during intercourse. Others succeed only occasionally, if not never, but they are all perfectly normal and healthy

This book is a study of how female sexuality works, based on scientific evidence and neuroscience. Emily Nagoski, a sex education expert with twenty years of experience, collected answers to a variety of questions about the structure of the female body, sexual desire and pleasure, and also told how to apply this knowledge in practice. This is a book for women who want to fulfill their sexual potential.

The book is divided into four parts:

• 1. "(Not so) elementary anatomy."
• 2. "Sex in context".
• 3. "Sex in Action".
• 4. "Ecstasy for all".

The first part tells about the body, and in particular about the structure of the genitals. It also describes the mechanism of sexual response at the brain level: a dual control model of suppression and arousal (brake and gas). The author explains how the mechanisms of suppression and excitement interact with other systems of the brain and with the outside world, which determines what effect (arousal or suppressive) a particular sensation or person will have on you at a particular moment.

The second part of the book, Sex in Context, is a reflection on how all organs and systems behave in the context of emotions, relationships, perception of one's own body and sex. The two main emotional manifestations - love and stress - have conflicting effects on sexual responses.

Emily Nagoski will talk about how society and culture shape and limit sexual manifestations and how you can use the positive and protect yourself from the negative influences of the external environment. External circumstances and your mood have as serious an impact on your sexual health as your brain and body.

The third part of the book, Sex in Action, focuses on sexual response. Sexual arousal is not always directly related to what happens in the genitals. Non-concordance when the genital reaction? (moisture or dryness) does not correspond to the emotional state (feeling of excitement or lack of it) - it is quite normal.

The fourth part of the book, Ecstasy for All, explains how to learn to take complete control of your sex life and achieve peak sexual pleasure. An entire chapter of this part of the book is devoted to orgasm: what of what we know is true and what is not; how to achieve an orgasm, and the kind that they write about in books.

In several chapters, you will come across questionnaires and tasks. For example, it is suggested to think about times when you had great sex and what factors of the external context influenced it.

Throughout the book, stories are told from the lives of four heroines: Olivia, Merritt, Camilla and Laurie. These are fictional characters, but their questions and problems are very real. These four images were created by the author based on the numerous stories of women who attended her lectures and sent questions by mail (of course, some details had to be changed for reasons of confidentiality).

Helpful advice from the author

• 1. The most important thing you can do to have an amazing sex life is to accept your sexuality as it is right now, even if it is not what you expect it to be.
• 2. To get rid of outdated, contrived cultural standards, you must go through a process of mourning and despair.
• 3. To facilitate this process, train yourself to non-judgmental meta-emotions (emotional coaching). Recognize that feelings are a normal part of life and that when something bad happens, it is perfectly normal to feel angry, fearful, or sad.
• 4. When you give yourself permission to be and feel unrestricted, your body is able to complete the cycle, cross the tunnel, and step out into the light.

Here is what Emily Nagoski says about what prompted her to write the book: “… I'm tired of living in a world where a woman constantly hears lies about her body, where a woman is considered an object of sexual desire, and not a subject of sexual pleasure, where sex is used as a weapon against women and where women believe that their body is flawed, simply because it is not a male body. I'm tired of living in a world where from the very birth a woman is taught that she should treat her body as an enemy."

The book will be useful not only for those women who do not receive or receive insufficient satisfaction from sex. Those women who think their sex life is okay will also come in handy. After all, there is never enough pleasure.