Let’s take a look at men and what women need to know about them — how they see sex, how they speak about, and how they are motivated by it.

“Men and women are very different, yet the same in this critical way; we all want to be understood, seen, known, and appreciated for who we are.”

Chelsy Brause

Understanding this will:

• Make it easier for you to initiate sex
• Help you feel safe around his desire for sex
• Lead you to want to connect to him in new deeper ways.

It all starts by letting go of the belief that was forced on us by our friends, media, and society — that all men are wrong in how they approach sex.

If you are willing to open yourself to the opportunity to understand your man’s needs and emotions towards sex, then you will discover how much safer it feels for you to initiate sex and actually enjoy it.

You won’t feel pressured to perform, rather you will find opportunities to connect with him physically and sexually that feel good to you.

This can spark improvement in any stage of your relationship.
❤️ Dating ❤️
❤️ Early years of marriage ❤️
❤️ Long-term relationships ❤️

Read through this list with an open mind. These experiences may be different than yours — and that’s ok. This list is to start necessary conversations to understand your man, and spark coming closer together to meet each other’s needs.

Buckle up, it may shock you….

⚠️ Disclaimer: these only apply in a loving and supportive relationship. This excludes relationships where the man is manipulative, physically/emotionally violent, or is habitually on drugs or alcohol. It excludes situations where you do not feel safe to speak up without repercussions.

1. In a committed relationship, men express love and care through what he does for you. It’s his primal nature. When he commits, for him, it means that he is taking on the responsibility to protect and provide for you and the family. It’s the equivalent of bringing home the bison to feed the village. In modern life, it looks like bringing in a salary, having a home, providing food for the table — and doing it consistently. These are not romantic — but they’re essential to how he understands his role in the relationship. Providing emotional support is not always an obvious aspect of providing for a woman.

2. His desire to protect and provide is primal and primary. He loves to do it. And there is another way that he wants to be seen in the relationship — for the man that he is, not just a provider. He wants to be your lover, too. He wants to provide you pleasure and to be the one to make you happy.

3. It’s not unique to men to want to be appreciated; we all thrive from being seen for our contributions. The way men feel most appreciated in a romantic relationship is through being wanted by their partner sexually — being wanted for the MAN that he is. For his physicality, his body, his genitals. You wanting to reach out and touch him and be with him sexually confirms to him that you value him as a man he is (not just a father or provider). It fills his heart with appreciation and love.

4. Thus: the way to a man’s heart is through his genitals. When a woman shows him that she values him through sex, sex opens up his heart. Sex is the gateway for men to connect to a woman emotionally and vulnerably. Some of that has to do with testosterone: he opens up when he has spent it and can now access the softness behind the strength.

5. Men initiate sex as a way to connect to the woman and her heart. Men are literal in their language, so when he wants sex with you, he will ask for sex. What he really is saying is that he wants to connect with and be with you.

6. Men love fun and play. It’s where they can let go of problem solving and they’re no longer responsible for rent, work or taking care of others. It also happens to be when they’re most emotionally available. When men have regular play in their lives — with their buddies AND crucially with their romantic partner — they can relax and open up emotionally. Sex fits into this category. It’s where nothing is asked of them, and they can put down their protector and provider responsibilities and just be themselves. Whereas pleasure is the fuel for the woman’s libido, play (including sexual play) is fuel for his emotional availability.

7. Men put a lot of pressure on themselves to perform sexually. He wants to be worthy of you. He wants to please and pleasure you. That confirms to him that he is a man — not just a father or provider. He does not want you to fake it to make him happy; he wants genuine and actionable information that will help him actually deliver and make you happy.

8. What men love about sex with women is her warmth, sensuality and softness that comes from her being relaxed and surrendered in sex. These stand against the roughness and toughness he experiences of himself and his body. He gets nourished by her pleasure and surrender — especially when it’s his body that’s the cause of it.

9. Men want you to trust them. Men pride themselves on being dependable and strong — it’s what being a protector and provider does. When a woman entrusts her body to him sexually, meaning that she puts her walls down and allows herself to enjoy herself with him, her trust in him makes him feel like a man. He gets nourished, and it motivates him to do more and to live up to the woman’s expectations. Your sexual trust in him is a sign of his worthiness — that’s he is worthy of your pleasure and surrender. That’s how important you are to him.

10. Criticism, complaining and shaming will deflate and kill a man’s excitement, desire and willingness to show up emotionally for you and the relationship. These emasculate by castrating his ability to protect and provide. At best, men temporarily pull away under criticism and shame; at worst, they stop showing up altogether. What restores his desire to show up is appreciation and clear communication about what you need to be happy.

11. Men want information on what you want because it empowers them to do it for you. It’s actionable. Their feelings will be hurt when he finds out that you had not been enjoying yourself and didn’t provide that information and lead him on doing things that are not working. The worst thing is to not trust him enough to tell him what you really want — because it confirms his insecurity that he is not worthy of your trust. This motivates him to show up for you more.

12. Scarcity of sex and sexual play makes a man hungrier for sex AND emotionally unavailable. It also makes him more aggressive and goal-oriented. That is the effect of unmitigated testosterone. When he “needs” sex, he needs the release from the grips of testosterone and into the softness of his woman’s body. Not knowing when he’ll get sex again makes him desperate go for the goal next time he has it, and get in as much in as possible. Regular and consistent physical connection fills him up and makes him emotionally available.

13. Men love porn — but not for the reason women think. It’s the woman’s excitement they crave. There is something magical about being in the presence of a woman feeling so relaxed and excited for physical pleasure. Her turn-on is an elixir. But it’s not just seeing any woman excited — it’s what he wishes he could get from his woman, the woman that he is committed to and that loves him. It’s what he wants to experience with his partner, but in its absence, he will settle for at least a virtual taste of it (however toxic it may be).

14. Men are single-focused, meaning they can fully pay attention to one thing at a time. I like to call this “work mode”. Which means he works in segments; when one segment is done, he becomes available for the next. It makes them amazing at going for that bison or fighting wars, without being pulled away by distractions. At the same time, single focus makes it challenging when trying to connect emotionally to him while his mind is on something else. If you approach him while he is in the middle of something, he may give off cold, distant energy — but it does not mean that he feels that way towards you. If he is not emotionally unavailable during the day to flirt and connect in different ways that would make you feel important, it’s usually because he is focused on something else that’s important to him. But it does not mean that he will not do that if you ask him. In asking for what we need, we become that thing that’s important to do during the day, and his single focus will turn to you. It just needs to be defined.

This is just the tip *heh*… on the difference between men and women around sex and relationships.

Key takeaways:
👉🏼 We are very different.
👉🏼 We experience the world differently.
👉🏼 We have different desires and needs.
👉🏼 We initiate sex differently.
👉🏼 We interpret experiences differently.

It doesn’t mean it translates as instinctively working well for us. Often it doesn’t.

It means that one person’s needs don’t take precedence over the other’s.

Men and women have significantly different needs physically and sexually — and both need to be honored, met and respected. And it takes communication, negotiation and intentionality to make sex work for both people.

Because we are the same in this one very important way: we all want to be understood, seen, known, and appreciated for who we are.

The goal is to work with each other’s differences and to assume that we all have reasons for being the way we are. By learning about what drives and motivates us — we can communicate to learn. And by asking for what we need and what would have us feel met in sex, we create passionate moments together.

If you loved this, and want to learn how you can understand your man with actionable next steps that create lasting change in your sex and relationships – get The Art of Loving Man workshop