If You Have To Schedule Sex, Does It Mean Your Relationship Is Doomed?
Today I’m answering one of the most controversial and polarizing questions I get asked these days: should you schedule sex?
The thought of scheduling sex brings up a lot of dread for couples. Many couples believe that if they’re not having spontaneous sex, something must be wrong with their relationship, or with their sexual chemistry or compatibility.
For many people, making the decision to schedule sex feels like an admission that your sex life is officially dead.
But is that the truth? Is scheduling sex only for desperate, incompatible couples?
Of course not!
In fact, the people who schedule sex tend to be incredibly intelligent, dedicated, and thoughtful partners who understand the reality about how sex works in relationships.
Here’s the thing – sex never really is all that spontaneous! Even at the beginning of your relationship.
When you first start dating someone new, your entire relationship is foreplay. You’re planning dates. You have days or even weeks at a time where you’re building up anticipation for seeing each other again.
When the day comes, you’re distracted all day long, thinking about what the date is going to be like. You might spend hours getting ready.
Then you spend a day or an evening together, letting that anticipation build and build even more.
By the time you finally taking your clothes off, it feels like you’re practically going to burst with excitement.
There is nothing “spontaneous” about that. There are days – or even weeks – of planning and anticipation for that date you scheduled.
Even as your relationship progresses, you’re still putting in effort into prioritizing your sex life.
You’re making sacrifices for each other. You’re saying “no” to other things. You’re carving time out of your schedule.
It feels more exciting because it’s new, but it’s still effort, planning and scheduling.
Once our relationships are more established, that effort starts to feel less exhilarating. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Even if your relationship isn’t new anymore, you can still make scheduling sex feel like a lot of fun.
If you do it the right way, scheduling sex can be one of the best things you ever do for your relationship.
Take my recent Summer Sex Challenge as an example. That involved tons of planning and scheduling, but the couples who went through it said they experienced one of the most passionate, playful, and active months of their entire relationship!
The truth is that we schedule and plan for the things that are important to us.
If your best friend is getting married, or if your kid has an important baseball game, you don’t leave it to chance that you’ll remember to go, that you’ll feel spontaneous desire to go, and that you’ll magically be free of other commitments or obligations.
It’s important to you, so you carve out the time for it and plan on showing up.
Why should sex be any different?
If you’re still a skeptic, let me give you another example, this time from one of the couples who went through my online course for overcoming mismatched sex drives: The Passion Project: A Couples Blueprint To Rediscovering Desire And Reigniting The Spark. (For the record, I got permission to share this story, and I’ve changed or omitted any identifying details.)
Stephanie and Katie are both ultra-successful (and ultra-busy) business owners living in a major city. Stephanie had a higher sex drive initially, but she started getting sensitive about getting turned down by Katie. Stephanie’s way of coping was to try to “shut down” her own sex drive, and stop initiating. She was hoping that this move would push Katie to initiate more frequently, but it didn’t work. Katie could sense that Stephanie was trying to “test” her, and she felt too much pressure to initiate.
Here’s Stephanie’s take: “We were both resistant to the idea of scheduling sex, for the exact reasons you mentioned. But your point about scheduling the things that matter was a punch to both of our guts. We’re both extremely organized, and proud of ourselves for always being on time and keeping our commitments. We realized we weren’t making those same kinds of commitments to our relationship. We followed your tips about how to properly schedule sex, and we’ve both been pleasantly surprised by how big of an impact it has had. We’re having more sex and we’re feeling more important to each other.”
Here’s Katie’s side: “In taking The Passion Project, I realized that my sex drive is Responsive. Having a date on the books helps me build my desire. I have fun getting myself ready for our dates, and telling Stephanie how she can help me get in the mood too. I never thought scheduling sex could be sexy, but I’m a believer.”
(Want to know if you’re a Responsive sex drive type? Head here to get my free guide to the two sex drive types and how to know which one you are!)
Ready To Rediscover Desire And Reignite Your Spark?
If you’re interested in learning more simple, practical tips that can help you and your partner overcome mismatched sex drives and have a more frequent, more pleasurable, and more satisfying sex life, check out The Passion Project.