• Celebrity
    • Daniel Kaluuya Digital Cover
    • Digital Cover Method Man
    • Digital Cover Zazie
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
    • If Not For My Girls
  • Fashion
    • ESSENCE Fashion House 2022
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Black Beauty Awards 2022
    • ESSENCE Hair Awards 2022
    • AVEENO Skin Health Startup Accelerator
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
  • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weave
    • 4C
  • Love
    • Love & Sex News
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Black History Month
    • ESSENCE Gift Guide 2022
    • ESSENCE + smartwater Live Well Challenge
    • Build Your Legacy 2022
    • Dream & Plan with Confidence Prudential
    • AMEX Platinum Travel
    • Homecoming Season 2022
    • Lifestyle News
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
  • News
    • Paint The Polls Black
    • Sponsors Recognition Page 2022
    • Latest News
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Video
  • Festival
    • 2023 ESSENCE Festival Of Culture
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2022 Fest Videos
  • Events
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2022 Girls United Summit
    • 2022 ESSENCE Fashion House
    • 2022 Black Women In Hollywood
    • 2022 HOLLYWOOD HOUSE
    • 2022 Homecoming Season
    • Wellness House
    • She Got Now
    • Dear Black Men
    • I Am Speaking
    • Power Tools
  • Studios
  • Girls United

WHERE BLACK WOMEN COME FIRST

Every day we're serving Black women deeply. Come get a plate of goodness! Sign up for daily content and exclusive offers you'll love!

Your email is required.
Your email is in invalid format.
Confirm email is required.
Email did not match.
By clicking Sign Up, you agree to our Terms of Use and that you have read our Privacy Policy
Skip to content
SUBSCRIBE
  • MAGAZINE
  • NEWSLETTER
  • Celebrity
    • Daniel Kaluuya Digital Cover
    • Digital Cover Method Man
    • Digital Cover Zazie
    • Celebrity News
    • ‘Yes, Girl!’ Podcast
    • Entertainment
      • Paint The Polls Black
    • Black Celeb Couples
    • Celebrity Moms
    • Red Carpet
    • If Not For My Girls
  • Fashion
    • ESSENCE Fashion House 2022
    • Fashion News
    • Street Style
    • Accessories
    • Fashion Week
  • Beauty
    • Black Beauty Awards 2022
    • ESSENCE Hair Awards 2022
    • AVEENO Skin Health Startup Accelerator
    • Beauty News
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
  • Hair
    • Hair News
    • Natural
    • Relaxed
    • Transitioning
    • Weave
    • 4C
  • Love
    • Love & Sex News
    • The Solve Podcast
    • Weddings
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
  • Lifestyle
    • Black History Month
    • ESSENCE Gift Guide 2022
    • ESSENCE + smartwater Live Well Challenge
    • Build Your Legacy 2022
    • Dream & Plan with Confidence Prudential
    • AMEX Platinum Travel
    • Homecoming Season 2022
    • Lifestyle News
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Money & Career
    • Entrepreneurship
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Black Travel Guide
  • News
    • Paint The Polls Black
    • Sponsors Recognition Page 2022
    • Latest News
    • Raise Your Voice
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Video
  • Festival
    • 2023 ESSENCE Festival Of Culture
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2022 Fest Videos
  • Events
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2022 Girls United Summit
    • 2022 ESSENCE Fashion House
    • 2022 Black Women In Hollywood
    • 2022 HOLLYWOOD HOUSE
    • 2022 Homecoming Season
    • Wellness House
    • She Got Now
    • Dear Black Men
    • I Am Speaking
    • Power Tools
  • Studios
  • Girls United
Home · News

Seven Days to Better Sex

Try our guide for one week to a better sex life
By · Updated October 29, 2020

Want to take things between the sheets to the next level? Get ready to embark on one week of extended foreplay that will banish bedroom boredom. You’ll feel more sensual all over, and you’ll discover hot spots you never knew you had.

Day One: Clear the Deck

Grab a pen and a journal-you’re going to start a sex diary. But there’s a hidden challenge in this adventure: At first you need to use your diary to write about any negative sexual experiences you’ve had. “You have to let go of disappointments, hurts, shame and fears about sex so they don’t eat away at your future happiness,” explains Patti Britton, Ph.D., author of The Art of Sex Coaching: Expanding Your Practice (W.W. Norton). Change the way you think about any bad experiences by writing positive affirmations in your diary, such as, “I forgive myself for the time I got an STD.”

Bedroom Bonus: Freeing yourself. “You’re healing the past first so you can set a course for a positive future,” says Britton. You’ll also see how any bad experiences have put a hex on your enjoyment of sex now.

 

Day Two: Remember Magic Moments

Once we release the things that hurt us, we can plug in to the things that turn us on. Close your eyes and think back to the last kiss that took your breath away, your steamiest night, your best orgasm. Welcome to your next three diary entries. Feel free to include romantic book passages, take notes on leg-crossing movie scenes, or even pen the lyrics to steamy songs you like listening to over and over again. Just be sure to jot down exactly what it was about those moments that drove your body wild. Was it the scent of your man’s cologne? The firmness of his grip? Write it down so you can repeat it.

Bedroom Bonus: Tapping into pleasure. You’re connecting with what gets you hot so you know how to push your own buttons-and can show others too.

 

Day Three: Rock Your Body

In the morning, pop Mtume’s “Juicy Fruit” into your CD player and go for a jog. Try a new yoga class. Or rent an aerobic striptease workout DVD to burn some calories. Then in the afternoon, get your body silky smooth. Have your nails done, or stop by a spa for a body wrap, a facial or even a Brazilian wax. “It makes you feel sleek and sexy,” swears Debbie Ethridge, owner of Washington, D.C.’s Fusion Day Spa, where Brazilians are a client favorite.

Bedroom Bonus: Increasing your stamina and sensual feelings.

 

Day Four: Dress the Part

We dress sexy not just to please someone else but also to feel more erotic in our own skin. So ditch the stockings and put on the fishnets you never thought you’d wear to the office. Give the cotton T-shirt you wear to bed a rest and put on a baby-doll cami. You might also want to undress the part and slide between the covers naked, letting the folds of fabric caress your bare skin.

Bedroom Bonus: Getting in the mood. “I’m a proponent of dressing up as though you’re a sex siren, just to see what it feels like,” says Britton. You may discover a look that turns you (and someone else) on.

 

Day Five: Read Some Erotica

Crawl into bed and stay up late reading steamy stories to yourself or a partner. Not sure where to start? Browse your bookstore’s erotica section, or look online for titles like Brown Sugar anthologies (Washington Square Press), Punany Poet books (punanypoets.com) or Best Black Women’s Erotica (Cleis Press).

Bedroom Bonus: Discovering new turns. “Your brain is your major sex organ,” explains Suzanne Rapley, Ph.D., a Santa Barbara, California, sex therapist. “As we read, our bodies start responding to the images conjured up in our brain, and all sorts of surprising sensations are the result.”

 

Day Six: Talk the Talk

After you get out of the bathtub today, spend more time than you usually would putting on lotion. Take a long, soft look at yourself in the mirror-naked-and shower yourself with self-affirmations. Don’t be bashful. Touch every spot from your face to your breasts to your thighs and think: I am lovable, I am sensual, I am lush. And don’t just think it. Believe it.

Bedroom Bonus: Building confidence. “We’re constantly telling ourselves we’re not sexy enough, and that keeps us from feeling confident and connected during sex,” says Rapley. Self-affirmation can turn all that around.

 

Day Seven: Pick One Toy

Finding the right sex toy can help unlock the mystery of what your body craves in bed. For instance, do you love that popular vibrator called the Rabbit? That might mean you need more clitoral stimulation during sex. Shop discreetly online, or for fun, visit a local sex-toy shop solo or with a partner.

Bedroom Bonus: Locating your heat zones. It’s impossible to tell a lover how to please you if you don’t know how to please yourself.

 

NOW Get It On!

 

…if you haven’t already. Though our sexuality is honed over a lifetime, by opening up to new ways of thinking about sex over the past week, you’ve fast-tracked yourself to one hot night of delight. Enjoy!

COMPANY INFORMATION
  • Our Company
  • Customer Service
  • Essence Ventures
  • Change Your Address
  • Contact Us
  • Job Opportunities
  • Internships
  • Media Kit
  • tag
SUBSCRIBE
  • Newsletters
  • Give a Gift of ESSENCE
  • Magazine Tablet Edition
FOLLOW US
MORE ON ESSENCE
  • Home
  • Love
  • Celebrity
  • Beauty
  • Hair
  • Fashion
  • ESSENCE festival

ESSENCE.com is part of ESSENCE Communications, Inc.

Essence may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.

©2023 ESSENCE Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Essence.com Advertising Terms

Get The ESSENCE Newsletter and
Special Offers delivered to your inbox

By clicking Sign Up, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

Get The ESSENCE Magazine
by subscribing below
subscribe now