March 11, 2019

S is for Spontaneous Desire: What Spontaneous Desire Looks Like For Women

March 11, 2019/ Dr. Chelsea Page

Spontaneous, excited desire is what we are often programmed to think is the “right” type of desire. This is because the “I want to jump you now” mentality is what we often see in the media because it creates quick, steamy sex scenes, which sells movies. But what does spontaneous desire actually look like in long-term relationships? And even more, what does it look like for women? The reality of these questions is important to your understanding and approach to the sexual side of your relationship.

What Spontaneous Desire Looks Like for Many Women

Spontaneity: “coming or resulting from a natural impulse or tendency; without effort or premeditation; natural and unconstrained; unplanned”. - dictionary.com

Spontaneity comes with the expectation that desire for sex with your partner should randomly and excitedly pop up in your mind and body and this will quickly move you to take action toward your partner. This is what occurs for many men because the higher levels of Testosterone in their system not only provides a big push of desire but it also allows an “override” to what may else be going on in their life. Sick? Testosterone says no problem. Super stressed at work? Testosterone says heck ya let’s have sex! But for women who don’t have these high levels of testosterone, desire looks a whole lot different.

For most women, the dominant type of desire they experience is Responsive Desire, but this doesn’t mean that spontaneity is completely lost. Instead, you need to know what spontaneity looks like for women and how it is different from how men experience spontaneous desire. Many women come to me with worry and frustration around “wanting to want to have sex”. To them, they are wanting and waiting for the full mind and body takeover that happens for their male partners. And their partners are waiting for the same and think, ‘well this is how I experience desire so it must be how she should feel it, and if not, what’s wrong with her or with me?”. Answer: nothing.

So what does spontaneous desire look like for women? Think of spontaneous desire for women like an introverted friend - someone that likes their alone time, is quiet and isn’t going to jump with excitement at every opportunity at a party, and even if they decide to go to a party it may take a while to get into that mindset and stay there. Let’s call this friend Ms. Spontaneous. Men, on the other hand, have Mr. Spontaneous who is more like an extroverted friend that is up and ready and eager to go and not a whole lot sways their desire to show up at the party, and once they are there they will likely stay to the end. Knowing that Ms. Spontaneous in women is more on the introverted side allows you to approach your spontaneous desire in a helpful way.

Create An Invitation for Your Spontaneous Desire

To help Ms. Spontaneous to show to the intimate party is to first create an invite that is enticing. Since your spontaneous desire shows up in you, you want to have an inviting space for your desire to even consider showing up. Think of it like inviting her over to your internal house. If you have a whole bunch of things piled in front of your door and blocking the access of your desire to you, then not only is Ms. Spontaneous not going to feel welcome, the door isn’t going to be easy to open. So you need to clear out the blocks in front of the door.

To create an invitation that your spontaneous desire will even consider you want to notice what helps you feel good and open, and what contributes to you feeling blah and closed off. This means minimizing stress and doing the things that have you feel good, at ease, and open to connecting. For example, working out, having some alone time, and eating healthy creates for me a welcome environment for my spontaneous desire to feel invited. On the flip side, being in the go-go-go mindset, stressed and eating half a pizza is going to have me feel blah and my Ms. Spontaneous will look at me like “are you kidding!? I’m not going to show up when you’re like that!”

Know How Your Spontaneous Desire Says “Yes” to Intimacy

Even with a good invitation, Ms. Spontaneous, being the introvert she is, will also often tentatively think about saying yes to going to the intimate party with your partner. She will not shout “heck ya!” or jump up and down in excitement at the idea of being intimate with your partner as these are reactions that testosterone produces and are more characteristic of Mr. Spontaneous. Instead, Ms. Spontaneous will say yes tentatively and will do so in a whisper. This tentativeness is not that you don’t love your partner or find them super wonderful and sexy, Ms. Spontaneous is just a bit timid. And because she’s tentative and a bit soft-spoken and doesn’t respond with an in-your-face reaction, you need to be keeping your ear out for it.

What are the signs you should look out for? Thoughts like:

“I would like to be close to my partner”

“Maybe I want to kiss my partner later”

“Hmm being intimate kinda sounds OK ‘cause I want to connect with my partner and I know usually once I get going I’ll be glad I showed up”

“Maybe I could...hmm...I don’t know...”

These are the quiet, tentative thoughts that Ms. Spontaneous will use to get your attention rather than shouting “I want to have sex!”. You need to listen for these small flame thoughts and feelings rather than expecting a big mind and body takeover. Because of this, the wanting to want to have sex is more like wanting to want to be close and being open and curious as to how the “party” will be.

Create a Good Intimacy Environment for Spontaneous Desire

What also helps Ms. Spontaneous to want to go to the intimacy party is to create an environment that will be welcoming. First, she doesn’t want to be pushed or convinced to go to the party. The Extroverted Mr. Spontaneous in men can sometimes do this and it just turns Ms. Spontaneous off and away from wanting to go to the party. She needs to decide for herself if she wants to go. She will also need some time to transition to the idea of going to the party, which I will talk about in the next post on T is for Transition, And importantly, she will want to know that when she shows up to the party that there isn’t pressure to be a certain way, do certain things, or stay until the end. Creating a pressure-free intimate environment is key for Ms. Spontaneous to want to join the party. Having some experiences where there is no pressure for all or nothing sex during intimacy will help Ms. Spontaneous to show up more. One of the best ways to do this is to set aside time for intentional intimacy. Setting time aside is helpful for female desire because knowing ahead of time when she will be engaging intimately will give time to prepare and be in the right headspace. I like to think of this as planned spontaneity. So although the time is planed, what you do with that time can be completely spontaneous and open to anything using your pleasure pie pieces.

Now It’s Your Turn

Use this next week or so to be curious about your friend Ms. Spontaneous. With your spontaneous desire being the introverted type, you want to be aware of what the signs are that your desire is perhaps interested in the “intimate party”, what helps your desire to show up at the party, and what helps it to stay. Be curious as to what helps Ms. Spontaneous to show up in your life and how she lets you know she’s kinda, sorta interested in intimacy. What things also have her shake her head no at even the idea of intimacy? Is it the pressure she feels when showing up to the intimate party? Or perhaps Ms. Spontaneous wants to get your attention but she can’t get a word in because you are so busy and Ms. Works-A-Lot is running the show. Be curious about what helps and doesn’t help Ms. Spontaneous because the more open and loyal you are to her the more she will want to show up for you. Let me know what you’ve learned, what changes you notice, and where you’re getting stuck in the comments below or feel free to message me!

Things to Remember

Spontaneous Desire is different in women than in men
Spontaneous Desire is like a tentative, introverted friend
You need to create a nice invitation for Spontaneous Desire to show up
Ms. Spontaneous will let you know she’s interested in a soft, hesitant voice.
A pressure-free environment is helpful for Ms. Spontaneous

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