I once worked for a male online clinic that allowed men to ask sex and medical therapists anything they wanted to know about sex, anonymously.
Anything!
There were four experts, all of us waiting expectantly, fingertips poised over the keyboard for live chats.
‘I wonder what they’ll ask us,” I said excitedly on my first night, expecting a wide array of weird and wonderful dilemmas and questions.
Four hours later – and two years later, after doing the clinic every week for four hours – I knew the answer. We were all asked pretty much the same question, over and over and over and over again.
How do I stop coming too fast?
Well, this is what I’m about to tell you.
Here you’ll find a list of specific instructions on how to use a highly successful technique called ‘peaking’.
If you have an iphone, there’s even better news: you can download my Edge Stamina App which takes you through the process, free.
Otherwise, read on…
Forget what you think you know
Old techniques were all about distraction: trying to keep your mind off an impending orgasm by doing tasks like counting backward from 500.
These were marginally useful (and I’ve been guilty of suggesting it myself) but new research has discounted the distraction theory – for good reason.
Even as you’re saying ‘346’ in your head, another part of your brain is saying ‘What does he think I am, stupid? As if this is going to grab my attention when I’ve got a pair of breasts/hot pair of pecs right in front of me, my penis is nestled in a nice, warm, tight place, my girlfriend/boyfriend’s moaning and throwing their head back and….’
It’s the old ‘pink elephant’ syndrome – tell yourself not to think of pink elephants and that’s all your brain will conjure up.
Recent studies suggest the trick isn’t to remove yourself from the situation, but to stay very much in the moment.
This doesn’t mean you’re sexually twiddling your thumbs until you decide the time is right to let loose. With practise, men can do what most women can do: stay in the moment by hovering in the plateau stage of orgasm, totally turned on but not out of control.
The technique which teaches you to control your orgasms enough to be able to hover at will is called ‘peaking’.
Peaking gets you into a habit of keeping a mental score of exactly where you’re at on your personal arousal scale (1-10).
This means knowing your orgasm so well, you know exactly what’s going to send you over the edge and when.
Think about the last time you had a spectacular orgasm: that’s a 10. Zero is when you’re at your in-laws making small talk over Sunday lunch – no arousal at all.
As you move from zero arousal to lift-off, you move through the spectrum from 1-10.
Most guys know what it feels like just before they orgasm.
This moment is the point of no return – you’re going to orgasm no matter what and even your mother walking in wouldn’t stop it.
What I want you to do is focus on the moment BEFORE this.
The sensation you feel BEFORE you’re on the home run with no return.
You might rate that point as 7 on the pleasure or arousal scale. Other guys might get to that point at 4 or 5.
Once you can identify that moment – know exactly how that feels – you can safely let yourself get aroused to this point without tipping over the edge.
Remember: it’s not the point of no return that you’re rating, it’s the point before that. The point where if you stop stimulation, you don’t orgasm.
Confused? Don’t be.
Take matters into your own hands – literally – and all will become clear.
THE ONE MONTH ACTION PLAN TO MAKE YOU LAST LONGER
Every time you masturbate (and this only works if you do it every single time), follow the same format.
What are the circumstances? When was the last time you had sex? What’s your mood? How much have you had to drink? Are you feeling anxious or stressed? Keep note of what effect each of these factors has on how long you last.
Time yourself Hit your phone timer when you’re feeling fully aroused and then masturbate while timing yourself. Keep a record over the next month or so of exactly how long it takes you to orgasm, from start to finish, so you have a sense of how you’re progressing.
Identify your orgasm triggers Try watching porn and see how this affects how long you last before ejaculating. Try mentally fantasising or deliberately not doing that. Try using lube or not using lube. Try different grips, different speeds, different techniques. These are all orgasm triggers and your aim is to be aware of as many of yours as possible, so when you’re with your partner, you know what to expect.
Stop or slow down when you feel yourself losing control
Either stop touching yourself completely or do it softer and slower until you feel in control again.
Bring yourself almost to the point of orgasm, then stop or slow down
In the first few sessions, you might not achieve this at all. Keep trying. Aim to bring yourself almost to the brink as many times as you can in one masturbatory session.
It takes time and practise but the more you do this – refuse to let yourself go from 1-10 quickly and game over – the more you’ll teach yourself to be in control of when you climax.
Stay focused on where you’re at
Have a continual conversation with yourself. ‘I’m hovering around the six mark, so I can afford to keep going hard for a bit longer’ or ‘I’m definitely an eight, so I’d better stop or slow down until I calm down’.
Add a ‘stroker’
Use your hand and some lube to begin with, then, when your sessions start lasting longer, make it more challenging by using a masturbation sleeve or stroker. Sleeves imitate what it feels like being inside someone. If you practise using the sleeve and can control yourself with that, you’re more likely to be able to control yourself when you’re inside your partner.
Rate yourself after a month
Masturbate at least 3-4 times a week using this technique and you can expect improvement within a month. If you’re not happy with your progress, keep going for another month.
Ideally, you’d stick to this format for three months for best results.
Try it with your partner
The trick now is to apply the same techniques when having sex with your partner.
You know from masturbating exactly what your orgasm triggers are, now think about what guarantees orgasm with your partner.
It might be a certain position, moving fast, thrusting hard, them kissing your neck, pulling your testicles, pressing on the perineum, pinching your nipples.
It might be that in order to stay in your safe zone – a nicely in control 6, for instance – you might opt for thrusting without any extra stimulation at all for a while. (When you’re ready to let loose, that’s when they can go for it.)
As you become more confident at being able to hover at the level you know you can control, for as long as you’d like, that’s when you can start to slowly introduce other stimulation.
In the meantime, continue the ‘stop or slow down’ technique.
Not only is it effective, it actually makes sex better. There’s more teasing and it prolongs the whole session.
Ideally, you’d tell your partner and work as a team on this but if you don’t want to say what you’re up to, simply say ‘I want our sex to last as long as possible so let’s take it slow today’.
