How to Talk About Sex in a Way That Opens Her With Melanie Curtin

Jason Lange: All right, and welcome back. So on today's episode, I am really excited to welcome my first guest to the show. So we've done over two dozen episodes now, and this is the first time I'm having someone else on, so you don't have to just listen to me yammering. And it is my great honor to have on my good friend and coaching partner, business partner, and just all around superstar Melanie Curtin, who is one of the most gifted sex researchers, writers, and somatic coaches I know and has really been spearheading how to talk about sex in relationships. And today, we're specifically going to be speaking, you guys, men, about how to talk to women about sex. And not only that, do it in a way that actually opens them up and will most likely lead to better sex and even potentially more sex, something that many men are often wanting. So why don't you just introduce yourself a little bit, Mel, and kind of what brought you to this body of work and how did you get to where you're at?

Melanie Curtin: Yeah, so I actually started my journey as co founder of a startup nonprofit to stop sexual abuse in the Jewish community. So I spent a number of years working in New York City and looking at sexual abuse, and we were mostly actually looking at boys, boys and young men and men. And there was a lot of abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community, as there is in every sort of intensive religious community on earth, everywhere around the world. And I kind of graduated from that into coaching because I wanted to make a difference and I wanted to help with this issue. And I realized that unless we have a healthy and safe sexual culture overall, we are going to have more abuse than not. So sort of addressing it from the other. The other angle. And I. One of the things that I ended up doing was sex research because I wanted to know the answers to certain questions, like how many men are good in bed? And I was dying to know. And I wasn't satisfied with the research that was out there, and I wanted to get more granular. And so I started doing my own research, and I was fortunate to be able to garner quite a lot of results. Thousands of people would participate in my research because I was a writer, and many of my pieces did very well, and people would sort of come in that way. And I got to collect quite a lot of data. So, yeah, I was going to share some of that today around how to talk about sex, because when I asked people, you know, what are your top three sex problems? What are your top three dating problems? What are your top three relationship problems? The word communication kept coming up again and again and again as the number one, both men and women. And I would say that the vast majority of my survey respondents were heterosexual or pansexual, bisexual. So people who have sex with the opposite sex. And that's mostly what I'm going to be speaking to today. I think that these concepts apply to everyone and every relationship structure. But mostly that's who's been showing up to my research. And the question of how to talk about sex, I think, is a difficult one for men, especially, because feedback I've gotten is, I feel like I should already know how to do this. And so eliciting feedback from a feminine partner can feel really vulnerable. It can feel like, well, I should already know how to go down on her perfectly, or I should already know how to please her. And, you know, as we'll discuss my. The name of my course, the online course that I have for men is called Please her in Bed, which was pulled directly from the research. There was a young man who said, I don't really know how to please her in bed. I wish I did know how to please her. I wish she would tell me, basically. I wish she would tell me more things. I wish she would give me more feedback and give me more guidance. Because I just want to please her. And I feel like I'm not really sure if I am. He has said something like, there's this thing about you're supposed to be able to give her an orgasm and you're supposed to be able to tell when she has one. But I can't tell. But I feel like I can't ask because if I ask, that's not cool, right? And I think that's such a great summation of a lot of men's experience of am I doing it right? I feel like I'm doing it. Am I doing it? I think I'm doing it. Am I doing it right? And the truth is that it's actually pretty complex. A woman in bed. And one of my favorite quotes from the research was from a bisexual woman who she identified as bisexual. She has sex with both sexes. And she said, a hundred percent women are harder to fuck. The cues are more subtle, the energy is more subtle. It's a harder It's a harder task. Men are a lot more obvious and I personally love those stories. I love stories from people who experience both sexes in a similar way. You know, for example, trans folks are the only people on earth who had a felt experience of being a man and felt experience of being a woman. I find those stories absolutely riveting because there's no one else having that experience. So I think that's validating. I would imagine if I was a man having sex with women, to have a woman say no, it's really harder.

Jason Lange: Yeah. You're not just making it up, you're not imagining it.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. So that's a bit of how I got into what I got into. And I can keep going or pause for you.

Jason Lange: Yeah, well, I think that's a great frame that even in the way you started collecting that research. I think one of the cool things you're doing in one of your gifts is creating a welcoming space for people to have the conversation. So you're actually doing the thing that you're even trying to transmit to guys like this, listening to be able to do themselves, like to actually create the space so you can have this conversation and everything I think we're going to cover today, this is such an important thing for you guys to know is one of the ways you can distinguish yourself as a man is actually by turning towards these types of conversations and having a little bit of training, a little bit of capacity, you know, some things we can talk about today for how to do that. But even more than that, just a willingness to, you know, kind of receive that feedback and have those conversations that can be, you know, really vulnerable on both sides. Really, really vulnerable. But your willingness as a man to kind of open that space up can be a huge distinguishing factor in terms of creating a healthy, sustainable, long term relationship and to really do things differently than what a lot of men do do, which is kind of, you know, not all men, so obviously, but especially not men listening to stuff like this. But the kind of like I'm going to use this woman's body to get off and then roll over and fall asleep like that. That's a real thing. You know, it's a stereotype because that is a thing that can exist out there on one end of the spectrum. The other end is, yeah, I just don't know. Like, I don't know, I don't know. Am I, Is it working? Does she like this? Should I do something different? She hasn't said anything. So, you know, all that kind of stuff. I think we'll get into. But so I just really wanted to frame that, guys, that everything we're about to explore with you here today in this conversation, the more you can be the one to bring that conversation to your partnership, the more powerful I think you'll become as a masculine leader.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. And I think that's a good segue into my, you know, my research question of how many men are good in bed was a direct, a direct result of my own curiosity as a pretty sexually active woman. It felt to me like men who are good in bed are very rare, very rare. And I wanted to know, is it just me? Is it just my experience? Because I'm one single point of consciousness in the world and I, maybe it's who I'm attracting or maybe it's my own biases or my own, just my own experience or who I've slept with. And I was really dying to know, is this true? Is it true that men who are good and better rare or is it just me? So I asked thousands of women who have sex with men, I'm going to use that term, women who have sex with men instead of straight women because it's more inclusive. So I asked thousands of women who have sex with men how many of the men that you've slept with were good in bed. And I'm looking at a pie graph that you can't see, but essentially over half of women said 70% plus of men are not good in bed. And this definitely tracked to my experience. And basically part of the, I think part of the reality is that women's bodies are a lot more sensitive than men's bodies and we take longer to get turned on. So there's a statistic I'm going to cite that I haven't been able to find. So I'm going to give a range. But basically it's pretty agreed upon in the research that a male person, his body will become fully aroused in about seven minutes. He has the capacity to become fully aroused in about seven minutes. Doesn't mean he always will, but he has the physiological capacity to do that. Right. All the blood is down there, all systems go, Everything's happening. He is just ready. And for a female bodied person, it doesn't take twice as long, which would be 14 minutes. It doesn't take three times as long, which would be 21 minutes. It can take up to 45 minutes for her to become fully physiologically aroused. Now, I'm not saying that every sexual encounter needs to be 45 minutes. What I'm saying is what Repeatedly came up in the research again and again and again, which is my experience as well, is that men are going way too fast and. And they're using way too much pressure. Too much, too much pressure. It's too rough. That's how women would describe it. Too fast. And the reason that's important is that as a woman becomes aroused, you can actually touch her with more pressure and it will feel good, but at the beginning, it's too much. So it's not even that he's necessarily doing something quote unquote, wrong, but what kept coming up was too much, too fast, too rough.

Jason Lange: Pacing.

Melanie Curtin: Yes, pacing. And it was really poignant. Sometimes in the. In the research on the men's side, you know, they would say something like, I know I move too has too fast because I'm hungry, because I'm too hungry. And they would talk about the experience of deprivation. Essentially, when I asked about sex problems for a lot of men, the. The problem was I don't get enough of it. I feel deprived. I'm starving. That came up. That word came up a lot. Starving or thirsty. And I know that's sort of a slang term, but I think it comes from a real feeling of need and lack. And that feeling of need and lack and hunger doesn't show up on the women's side when it comes to sex problems. What shows up is it hurts. The number one sex problem for women is it hurts. And that is a huge contrast to men, because with the very rare exception of sometimes a woman has used teeth during a blowjob, men really didn't talk about pain when it came to sex. Many, many, many, many women talked about pain, myself included. So, you know, a man being too rough with his fingers would actually bruise my clitoris. And that's not fun, right? And so now in a sexual encounter, what I would often find is I'm into the guy, right? Like, I've gone on a few dates or a date. I'm into him. He's attractive. I want it, right? We're kissing, we're making out. And then as it's progressing, I'm trying to protect my body because he's too fast and it's too rough, Especially with his fingers. Especially with his fingers, but really with everything. And so I'm simultaneously trying to enjoy myself, but also trying to protect my body from pain. And that's not a fun experience.

Jason Lange: I think this is such a key. I just want to highlight for guys how important this really is, because in terms of the polarity and the energetics of that if you're having to protect, right. If a feminine partner, even if it's just subtly, like constantly kind of adjusting herself or doing these micro things or sometimes macro things to try not, you know, to. To minimize pain, that that's actually going to change the polarity. That's like a masculine presence, right? That's like not fully open and surrendered. So that's going to have an impact. It's just really important. Like, there's the pain and there's the actual energetics then of she's not going to be. The feminine partner is not going to be fully in it, right? Because there's actually like a conscious having to, like, manage the experience, which I don't think a lot of guys are aware of because our biology is so different. Our skin is so much thicker. Like, there's. There's a density to a lot of men that I don't think they realize is not the same in the feminine. Right. Like how things. The sensitivity of the skin in general is much, much higher for feminine partners. And I think, you know, it's important to just become aware of that pacing thing again, because I think what's so important about what Mel's saying is it's. It's not that it's impossible to have that much pressure or speed. It's the. The Runway to get there is a little different. And as someone, you know, who on this podcast and your show has certainly talked about my addiction with porn, right. Just such a clear source of a lot of this in the culture of what sex is supposed to look like, right? That in Pump Hard done, like, there's no warming a woman up, Right. If anything, it's always just the kind of woman warming the man up to get an erection, and then it's go time.

Melanie Curtin: Yes. I can't tell you the number of times I've been watching a porn video and cringed because in real life, I'm like, ah. Like, they meet up, they kiss, he pulls down her panties and sticks his finger in. I mean, literally, it's that fast. And I'm like, ow, ow. Ah. Like, I can't. It hurts me to watch. And it's. It's not effective. If you want to be good in bed, if you want to be a man great at sex with women, don't watch porn as a way to have sex. You can watch it as a way to get turned on. I think, you know, everyone has their relationship with porn. It's a whole other podcast episode. I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with Porn. I'm not saying never watch porn, but do not watch porn and think this is how to have sex with women in a way that makes them feel good.

Jason Lange: Because most of it is not that terrible instruction manual. But I think for some. For some men, that's the only instruction manual they have. So they kind of internalize that as that's, you know, what it should be, and it's just not the case.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah, yeah. And I wanted to briefly touch on. On stakes because I think, of course, a lot of men want to be good in bed, and it's important to be good in bed. And it's actually more important than I thought. So in one of the questions I asked in my research was, have you ever broken up with someone because of the sex? And I think that in our culture, we think that sex is more important to men than women. We. I at least had that perception going into my research. There were a few results that really surprised me, and this was one of them. And so I asked people, have you broken up with someone? And 49% of men said, yes, I've broken up with someone because of the sex. Including marriages. Right. Divorce, lack of sex or sexual incompatibility was cited as a reason for divorce. And so I'm like, oh, okay, 49%. So I'm looking at the women's data, expecting it to be 35% or 25% or some amount less. Turns out to be 61%. And in 3% of the. That had an other box where you could fill in. And many of the women in the other box said, I've never done it before, but I'm contemplating doing it right now. Yeah, I think the number is higher. I think it's more like 64%. That's a lot of women. It's a lot of women. And I think that many women do what I did, which is I never told the man in question. This is a large part of why I'm leaving you. I just left. And that gets into what I think is really the heart of this discussion, which is, why is it so hard for women to speak up about sex? Because it seems like, oh, well, there's a really obvious, you know, solution here, right? If a woman is in pain, she should just tell the man. It should be easy. She should just tell him, it's fine. It's fucking terrifying. It's fucking terrifying. So what I found was when I asked, you know, without any sugar coating, what do you wish you could have told a previous partner about the sex? This. This came up this divide, I call it the divide. Basically. Here, I'll read you some quotes from the research. So I asked men who have sex with women, what do you wish you could have told a previous partner about the sexual. Someone says, I need her to tell me what she likes, what she needs. Another says, tell me what feels good and what doesn't. Another says, she won't tell me how to be better. And then you go to the women's side and you say, what do you wish you could have told a previous partner about the sex? And she says, about my likes and needs, basically everything that are my needs, how I wanted to be touched or how to touch, be more specific about what I want and more important, what I don't. So it's like star crossed lovers, right? The men are like, I wish you would tell me what you need and I wish I could tell you what I need. And it seems like, well, it's really obvious, she should just get over it and tell him what she needs. So there are four basic reasons why women are so afraid to talk to men about sex. And the first one is basically my biggest fear, which is like there are four things that we're afraid you'll say. So the first one for me is if I tell you like, ow, that kind of hurts, can you slow down or can you use less pressure? I'm afraid you're going to say, oh, you don't like how I do it? Well, fuck you then, you stupid cunt. I'm afraid that if I speak up for what I need when it's not working, specifically when it's not working, that you'll lash out at me. And this is a direct quote from the research, says he was so emotionally fragile that if I tried to redirect him or tell him what I needed or wanted, he would get hurt and then bring up what I said in public to shame me. Another woman said there were times I asked him to go slow, but didn't say it's because it hurts. Somewhere along the way I did start saying it hurts. But he took it really personally. He said, what's wrong with you? You don't like sex? It ruined our relationship. So this, this fear that we have, we women have is founded. Some men will respond very, very poorly to perceived criticism, whether that's about sex or something else. So, and I think sex has this added layer of vulnerability that for both, for everyone, so that it makes it even harder, right? It's like hard for me to speak up about something that's not working in our Relationship in general, super duper hard for me to speak up about what's not working for me sexually. So that's thing number one that we're afraid of. The second thing that came up a lot was, I'm afraid that you'll go away. I'm afraid you'll withdraw and you'll stop trying and you'll leave. So if I say, ow, like, that kind of hurts, like, could you slow down or do it a little differently or maybe like, less pressure? Less pressure. He won't say anything. In the moment, maybe he'll adjust, maybe he won't, but he'll back away and he'll slowly just leave. He'll just leave. That's a terrifying possibility for us. And this was a quote from the research. She said, I'm not afraid he'll attack me or anything. I'm just afraid he'll turn away and never come back. Third thing that women are afraid you'll say is, my last girlfriend was way easier and less work than you. You're broken. And, you know, I. Frigid is another word that I think gets thrown around. I think that word broken comes up a lot on the women's side in the research. I'm afraid I'm broken. I feel like I can't, you know, I can't come vaginally. I'm broken. I rarely have orgasms with a partner. I must be broken. I just want to be really clear that no one is broken. This is not. That's not a thing. And I've worked with plenty of survivors of sexual abuse who were an orgasmic, meaning they could not have orgasms or they were not having orgasms, who now have orgasms. Really, human beings are quite resilient, and trauma therapy works so clear. There is no broke. No one is broken. There is no broken. And asexuality is also a thing. And if you're asexual, you're not broken either. That's just your orientation. So. But I think it's important for men to understand how scary it is for women that they really, really do. Many women believe that they are broken, that there's something fundamentally wrong with their sexuality because they, for example, can't get turned on fast enough, or they don't get wet or things like that. When actually, I suspect that in many cases, they've just never had good sex. They've just never had sex that was slow enough, that was attuned enough, that was actually going at the pace of their bodies. And so what they experienced was a little bit traumatic. Right. Because if you penetrate a vagina when it's not ready, that's a trauma for the physical tissue. Right. And a lot of women are overriding their actual body sensations because they want to please their partner. They want the man to have good sex, or they want to preserve the relationship, or they want it to be working. They want it to be working and they think it's them, oh, I must not be, you know, able to be turned on in the right way. It must be me. I must be broken. So that's just something to know. And then the final one that we're afraid you'll say if we, you know, provide any direction. Because sometimes, you know, a lot of what we're talking about right now has to do with that number one sex problem for women, which is pain. And I think that's a really important thing for men to understand is how much we can be in pain during sex. Because even if you're doing the same thing as last week, depending on where I am in my cycle, I will be more sensitive. So that thing that worked last week might not work this week. I might need less today than I did. And that can be confusing for men. So the last thing that we're afraid you'll say is if it's. If it's something like, I want you to bend me over, or I want you to call me names, or I want you to, you know, do something sort of in the realm of darker sexuality, I would say were afraid that you're going to say, wow, you're really slutty. And this is a real thing. This is still a real thing. We are still afraid that you won't respect us if we're openly sexual, if we're wanton. Right, that word. Wanton woman. Like we are. There is a part of us, I think, in all women that's afraid of being judged for actually being sexual. This is a quote from a woman who said, I have always had an easier time talking about and doing new things with a fling rather than my partner, because I don't care what my fling thinks, but I don't want my partner to think I'm a trashy whore. And that all of this is kind of leading up to this. This point, which is, if you're a man who has sex with women and you want her to be honest with you about the sex, you should not assume she will tell you. Don't assume like, oh, if something's not working, she'll tell me. She'll tell me if it's too rough. She'll tell me if it's, you know, if it's not working. She'll tell me if she wants something different. Do not assume that. Assume that she will not tell you anything unless you invite her out. That's kind of what we're going to start to get into. I'd love to hear your thoughts on what I just shared, but make the assumption that she will not tell you unless you coax her out. Unless you invite her out.

Jason Lange: Just to. Just to kind of summarize those guys, the four fears, right? Like a fear of, like an aggressive response, an abandonment response, a you're broken response, or a you're a slut response, right? So those are just some of the reasons, you know, there's another one in there that might actually be, I would say maybe a subset of abandonment in a way that is one I maybe have experienced or I have experienced. That I do know men experience, which is just collapse, which is just like a total internal. Like, oh, okay, like, then I'm not. Right. There's just like a shutdown with feedback that I imagine doesn't feel particularly good for a feminine partner either, but that those four are things you have to just be acutely aware of. And that, you know, the pacing piece, you know, even with that broken one. I was. As you were explaining that I was thinking too, like, I think that's a side that maybe doesn't get talked about also with the impact of porn. So there's a woman that goes from 0 to 60 and is crying out in ecstasy and having multiple orgasms from a guy ramming her, you know, 30 seconds into their interaction. Is that normal sexuality? I can't do that, so I must be broken, right? I can. You can kind of feel how even on the feminine side, I think it creates that for a woman. Like the. That's what's supposed to be in the way that a lot of men. Well, I'm supposed to be able to go for 40 minutes and da, da, da, da. It's just not the case, I think, on either side. And the willingness to open that conversation, I think is so powerful and so generous and takes resilience, guys, right? So you actually kind of got to be open to receiving feedback and know that it's just feedback, right? It's not about you as a person. I think that's sometimes, you know, the, The. The male problem is I am my dick. If it's big, I'm awesome. If it's small, I'm not. And if it's. If I'm Performing, I'm great. If I'm not, you know, I'm not. But that's not the case. It's, you know, the thing that actually matters is your willingness to take feedback and have the conversation that's going to make you a way better lover than any of that other stuff, which I imagine there's some research for.

Melanie Curtin: Yes, and I'm glad that you brought up that, that thing about what makes a man good in bed, because I think there's such, there's such a disparity between what men think makes a man good in bed and what women think are actually reporting that they crave. So for example, when I asked women about the men who were best in bed, less than 3% talked about penis size.

Jason Lange: Hear that again, gentlemen. Less than 3%.

Melanie Curtin: 97% of women did not talk about penis size. It doesn't matter that much. 0% mentioned a man having a good body and less than 5% talked about the man staying hard for a long time. So to be great in bed, you do not need to have a huge cock, you do not need to have six pack abs, and you do not need to be able to stay rock hard for hours. That's not true. It's just not what women are talking about. But 70% of women mentioned one characteristic that I go over in the course in depth because that's what they're actually talking about. This is what we really want and it's really not about the size of your cock. And you know those that the you're talking about the feedback. And it's a little bit like at work, I think it's easy for a manager to think, oh, my employees will tell me if something's not working, they'll let me know. That's very different than the manager going to the employees and saying on a regular basis, I always want to know if you're ever uncomfortable. I always want to know if something's not working for you. I always want to know if you are not feeling valued in any way. Always. I want to know that's going to come across differently and that person is going to have different people coming through their office door and letting them know than just the passive. I've never mentioned it at all. I just assume my employees will let me know. So there's being open to feedback and then there's actually eliciting feedback. And you know, I think that the, a critical part of this is actually knowing, knowing a few things like you said, Jason, like just this conversations, like knowing what a female body is like, which is. It's a lot more sensitive than you. It takes a lot longer to warm up than you do. It requires presence, right? It's like the things that turn on the feminine are your attention, your presence. And that is not really pictured in porn as there's such a focus on the body parts rather than the quality of attention that's on me. And women repeatedly talked about, for example, when they talked about the men who are best in bed, one of the things that surprised me was a lot of them talked about, you know, he would put attention on me during the day. So whether it was text messages or affectionate glances during the day, if it was a more established couple or, you know, in dating scenarios, it was the attention he put on me before we got together that night. And it hadn't even occurred to me when I was putting together my own list. But it makes a lot of sense because that's all sort of warming her up, right? That's all kind of revving the engine and getting her going and then coming back to that. You know, the male body can become aroused in seven minutes. So a man doesn't need attention during the day for him to be. You know, some men do, but a lot of men don't. A lot of men can just in the moment, they're like, let's do this. And women's bodies don't all work that way. And for a lot of them, you know, exquisite sex is actually not just about the time between the sheets, but what happened before then. And the quality of attention that I'm receiving from you, both sexually and non sexually before the fact is hot. Like, that's part of the actual physiology of turn on for women.

Jason Lange: That's such a key. I think for guys when, you know, when you talk about the 45 minutes piece, there's like, oh, that means sex is going to have to take a long time. And what's important to know is that whole Runway doesn't just have to start with that encounter. Right? Actually, the. I don't remember. Maybe it was you. I don't remember where. Who delivered the metaphor. You know, guys like metaphor. We like. We like machines. And I heard the one thing of, you know, male genitalia and sexuality you can think of like a blowtorch on a woman's sexuality. More like a slow cooker crock pot. Like it's got. It's gotta warm up a little bit. Now, the key is that doesn't have to just mean in the sexual act, right? In the normal. What we'd Consider foreplay of. I've got, you know, I'm kissing her and taking off her clothes. It can start way earlier, just with the energy and the presence and the connection and attunement that that all is part of that Runway that I think it's just really important for guys to know and not something we always want to take responsibility for as men. You know, as, as a man, I can get it. Sometimes I feel lazy. And it's just like I just want to have sex right now rather than spend a day kind of connecting and warming you up and romancing. But that it really makes a difference. It really makes a difference. And the thing I keep wanting to have guys realize is it'll actually lead more towards the type of sex you do want to be having.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah.

Jason Lange: The more you put in that time and work with her pace.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. And it doesn't have to be, like you said, elaborate. I remember when I originally ran the course, there was a married man and he had gone on a date night and so instead of sitting across the table from his wife, he sat her, you know, on his side or next to him or something, and he had his hand on her thigh during part of dinner. And he was like, I think she really liked that. And I think it really helped us connect. And so then, and then when they had sex later, it was really good. And so it doesn't need to. It's not an elaborate shift. It's just knowing that this really, really is part of the feminine turn on system. It's part of it, it's inherent in it. It's. And, and of course that's not true for every single woman. But I can tell you, looking at the research, it's a lot of women. It's a whole lot of women. And it's exciting because, you know, when you put these pieces together, these things that aren't taught in porn and these things that, you know, you. Let's say you're learning here, or I always say, make sure you're learning about sex with women from women. If you're a man who has sex with women, make sure you're learning about it from women. Because porn is created and generated and produced and directed by men, for the most part, and mostly white men. That's the truth. Like it's a, it's a pretty specific genre and it's not, it doesn't include everyone. And, and a lot of, I think material about sex ends up being about like erogenous zones or the physic. The physical, the physical part. But for some reason, it misses this huge physical part, which is female bodies are a lot more sensitive and, and tender is a word I would use, especially at the beginning of an encounter. Like, I said, yes, towards the end when, like, you know, all the blood is down there, everything's happening, lots of friction is going to feel really good. But towards the beginning, she's going to want it to be slower, she's going to want it to be less pressure. So there was a guy who took my course who was dating a woman, and he took the course and then he went down on her and he was like, I heard noises I'd never heard before. Like, I. He was like, I was clearly not doing it right before and no one really told me. So I thought it was, I thought it was, I thought it was acceptable, but this was a whole other thing. And at the end she said, wow, you're really good at that. And he was like, never heard that before. That was also new. Yeah, not something in my repertoire. You know, I had never gotten that feedback, but I thought that was such a great example of. He had never asked and no one had ever, no woman had ever shared with him how it was. And that was my experience too, is I didn't, I wasn't telling men ever that it's not really working for me or ow. Or I'm not really, like, it's, it's too much and so it's numbing me. I just didn't say anything, right. I just would grin and bear it because I was so scared to speak up. So I think that the, you know, part of the beginning of the course has to do with how to actually elicit that feedback from women. And I think that's really sacred. I think it's a really sacred offering that the masculine can provide to really want to get to know this partner. And so I think that combination of literally just slowing down, being more gentle with body parts, putting attention on her, all of that is going to go 50% of the way, right? That's actually going to help a lot. And the 100% is if you think of women like cars, right? Every car is different and every car has the same parts, except Tesla's. Tesla's are a whole other thing. Gas powered cars, they all have a transmission, they all have spark plugs, they all, you know, they all have the same parts, but all cars are different. Some of them pull to the left, some of them, you have to do this little jiggle thing to get the window to work. Some of them, you know, the FOB doesn't open the doors anymore. Every car is different and that's kind of how women are. So the whole point of eliciting feedback and understanding how to open a woman sexually is about your specific car. It's about that specific woman. So whether you're in a long term relationship or you're in a short term dating relationship, you're still going to be learning about that person's physiology and what turns that person on. And that's going to be different for every person. But it can, can be fun, right? It can be this kind of pressure or that kind of pressure, or it doesn't have to be intimidating. It's more of an orientation to it. Like, oh, I'm learning a new car is more like a range instead of I suck at sex. Because I think that's again, coming back to that why it's so hard for men is because a lot of them, I keep getting this on the research is I feel like I should already know how to do this. I feel like I'm less of a man if I don't know how to please a woman in bed. If I can't make her come. I suck at sex. And that orientation, of course it would be scary to get any feedback because if the feedback isn't good, it means I suck as a person or as a man. It goes to my manhood, which is a non starter. Right. It's like, well, of course a man isn't going to elicit feedback there because he doesn't want to hear that he's not good or that something's not working. And that's very different from of course you know how to drive a car. You're just learning how to drive this specific car, which makes it more like a learning experience instead of, yes, I suck at driving. I can't drive at all. I'm a terrible person that can't drive.

Jason Lange: Yeah. What I like about that is I think there's a, there's a whole frame around that I love of like to some extent, I think you have to discover good lovemaking with a partner. Like it's, it's actually a back and forth kind of interactive thing you create. It's not like you both just come in knowing how to make it awesome. Which, you know, even beyond porn, I think is kind of the, the movie fantasy we see of just they meet great love sparks and all that without ever talking about these types of things. Right. They never show that.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. And they, and they, they don't show the woman saying ow. In Sex scenes, right? They don't. It's like every time you see a sex scene, the man knows exactly what he's doing and it's all smooth. And that's not really the case in my experience. Very, very rare. And again, the. The fun thing about doing research on the men that were best in bed was the quotes for the women talking about those men. So, for example, this one woman said it was slow and deliberate and left me begging in the end. Another woman said, I feel like he read me like a book, played me like a fine instrument. And another one said, he broke me out of the cage of vanilla sex that was my marriage. So I think that really good, deep, attuned sex is a massive gift to the feminine, that that is one of the biggest gifts the masculine can provide. And it doesn't have to be within the context of a sacred, committed relationship. I've had some of the best sex of my life, not in a committed relationship. But the man was so present with me. He was really there. He was really paying attention to my body. He was listening to all. With all of his senses, not just with his, you know, ears. He was really listening to me. He was really with me. And that. That is why, you know, our coaching program is called Pillars of Presence, because that relationship skill completely maps to the bedroom, that if you want to be a deeply nourishing and incredibly skilled lover as a man, man, you gotta be present in your body. You gotta be present in your body. That's what really women are craving. They want your presence in your body and your presence with. With her. In her body.

Jason Lange: Yeah. I think that's a key thing for guys to know is so we have the capacity to be as sensitive with our presence and our body and attunement as any woman. I think it just takes a little more practice for men. But the process of becoming more present and attuned allows us to lead from that place in a way. You know, I was. I was just thinking, in some ways, based on some of my experiences of like, that word pacing keeps coming up of like, as I learn to become a more present and attuned sexual partner. Particularly, you know, with my wife, it's like, you know, I'm bringing the fire, the engine, the desire a little bit. And when I bring that in a just slow, attuned, sensitive way, she makes it very clear when she's ready for a gear shift. Right. Like, I think of that quote you left with the woman who at the, you know, at the end, she was like, I want more like when you can become this attuned and present, you know, it'll become clear just from a woman's biology and voice and breath and oftentimes she'll make it clear, you know, she will actually start voicing it from that, that kind of place. But you gotta have that on ramp. You gotta have that slower kind of sensitive warm up that you can totally learn. And it doesn't, it's not going to diminish, I think. You know, I think one thing, you know, know I'm feeling into based on some of my experiences and what you said of like that, that thirsty quality. So there's like, I got, I gotta get it fast, right? Because I'm just like, I'm dying for men. That is a big kind of pain point, I think, think. And this is where again, just being the masculine leader, you can kind of be the one to kind of work with that and it's ultimately going to get you more of what you want. And you know, something we talk about a lot in our program that I think just really kind of is pulled from all your research is the sex versus connection thing that a lot of guys, we use sex to get connected. So come in, I want to do my thing and then, you know, I can feel connected to her or in my body or. Okay, for a lot of women, good sex flows from good connection. So when you're talking like he put his presence on me or you know, even through texting, like that's building the connection. And when that is energized, oftentimes for a lot of women, things work better. Right? And one of the criticisms that I've had men in our program attest to is like, I just haven't put in the energy to the connection, but I still want, you know, and like that's, yeah, yeah, I still want the sex. And there, there is, you know, there is just a little to know about that. Guys like that, that has a cost. Like that is part of just where we do have to stay committed to showing up in, in relationship. And I think the thing I've learned in my life that is sometimes shocking is it doesn't actually take a lot. Like we think it's this, oh, I gotta like wine and diner. It's like make a couple nice comments about her ass throughout the day. And like, yeah, that really helps. Like it really does something, you know, in a way that sometimes I think I've talked myself out of it. And guys, it can feel like so much work when it's like, no, these can be Small, really fun, expressive moments that they don't have to be super long, but it's kind of like it's just slowly simmering the pot, so to speak.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah, definitely. It's like watering the plant. Like the plant needs watered. It needs to be watered. She needs to know that you think she's beautiful. I remember one of my clients saying, well, you know, I married her. I. The ultimate commitment. Like, doesn't. Shouldn't that be enough? And I'm like, people cheat, dude. They. It's like for women in relationships, a lot of the insecurity is, yeah, you wanted to me before, but do you still want to me? Do you still want to me now? Do you still want to. Hey, it's like our insecurity is right there too. We don't, we're not, you know, these perfect sex goddesses that we have all of our own stuff around. Feeling attractive. Feeling attractive at this age, right? Feeling attractive at this age as you're aging with a partner, all of that is really relevant. And feeling witnessed, feeling seen, feeling seen kept coming up. For women in the men that were best in bed, I really felt seen. I felt beautiful, I felt gorgeous. To him, I, they used a lot of words around. I felt irresistible. It was the quality of his attention that was doing that. It wasn't his necessarily. It was literally the quality of his gaze, how he would speak about her. You look so beautiful. This part of you looks so beautiful right now. And it's, you know, not something that you can force. It's not something that you can, you know, sort of to your point. It's not something that if you haven't, basically, if, even if you haven't put the energy in up till now, you can start now. It's not something that you have to have banked up. You can start at any point doing this. And I remember there have been a few instances where I've had to, you know, leave a man for non emotional reasons, right geographically or whatever it is. I remember the last few times that we would have sex. In every case I felt really seen. It was like, oh, now he sees my body because he knows he's not going to get it for a while. But it's different quality of attention when he's actually there witnessing, being with. And I've had the experience with multiple men of, you know, they're kind of with me a little bit and then I'm like, oh, they just checked out. They're definitely in a porn video right now or they're not really with me. They're just trying to stay hard. Right. All of his energy, his capacity, his consciousness isn't actually with me. It's on, shit, I gotta stay hard. I gotta stay hard. And so when you're focused on that and your attention is on that, because, again, you're on that list of, I think I need to have a huge cocktail. I think I have the perfect body, and I think I need to stay hard for hours. No, you don't. You do not have to do those things to turn on women. In fact, we will be more turned on and we will be more in our bodies if you're actually with us, putting attention on us, worshiping our bodies, loving us, and your cock isn't hard in that moment. People. Cocks get hard, and then they don't. And then they get hard again, and then they don't. You don't have to stay hard. They. The whole time. You don't even have to stay hard, you know, for an entire encounter. That's not what women say makes us. Pleases us in bed. It's not. It's like, that's part of it, but it's not the whole thing. And there's such a focus on that, for example, in porn, that I really think that men are like, well, this is the most important thing. I have to. And so they're putting 90% of their attention on this, and we feel missed. And then we're like, oh, what? You know, and you're fingering me too hard. Like, no, I don't. I don't want to see you again. You know, like, I've definitely gone on dates where I'm like, no, I don't want. Yeah, but I didn't tell him. I didn't tell him. That was why. Because I was scared.

Jason Lange: Totally. I. I think what you just shared, that eroticism doesn't require hard penis.

Melanie Curtin: Yes.

Jason Lange: Or even for either partner to have an orgasm.

Melanie Curtin: Yes.

Jason Lange: Be told there's so much to explore there that I think is not always known to men, where we're like, hey, we have a penis. You touch it and, like, do your thing versus, like, there's a whole body we can explore with each other. Touching, kissing, energetics, eye contact, breath, voice, you know, all these different powerful things, but that it doesn't require. You know, I think that one of the kind of paradoxical ways I have certainly experienced and other men I've talked to have experienced losing presence in the bed is being so concerned with staying hard or being so concerned with doing it right so she'll have an Orgasm. We're not actually connected.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah.

Jason Lange: Like, there's no actual connection. And that's what she misses.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah.

Jason Lange: That, you know, that can be just as big a problem.

Melanie Curtin: Yeah. That came up in the research around faking it. Because I asked women about faking it, and I asked them why a lot of it was, it's not working. What he's doing isn't working. It's not going to get me there. But I feel like he'll feel like a failure if I don't get there. So I fake it. Or I want him to feel like he won. Like, I want him to. I want him to have the experience of, like, he won. He's winning. He's. He, you know, he won, which is generous on the one hand and also sad to me. I find that sad because it's like that it isn't actually, you know, that pleasurable, what's going on. But there is such a pressure for her to feel like she has had an orgasm so that he feels like a man or so that he feels like he succeeded. And that's. You know, I've had a lot of really pleasurable sexual experiences where I didn't have an orgasm. And it felt like it was because we were just exploring and he wasn't attached to feel it. I can feel when a partner's attached to me having an orgasm. I can feel that. It's like there's this sense of this has to happen in order for me to feel like I did it right. I can feel it. I can feel that pressure, and it's not that comfortable. Whereas I can feel when a man is like, this is awesome. I'm having a great time. I'm not in a hurry. This is. Your body is amazing. We're just here. That feels great. And probably I'm more likely to come from that, right?

Jason Lange: Totally.

Melanie Curtin: But that. No, I think that that part about faking it is very related to this conversation. Because, you know, if she felt safe enough to say, like, I'm tired, it's just not gonna happen tonight, that would be much better than feeling like shit. If I say that he's gonna collapse and it's gonna be worse, or if I say that twice, he's gonna go away like, I'm fucked. I have to kind of hide my sexual truth because I don't want to lose this relationship. So I think it's all, you know, tied together. And when you look at the men who are best in bed, you know, one of the fun things in the course is I have the Word clouds of the actual responses from women. So you can see the big words and the small words. And one of them in the men who were best in bed was time. Right? Time. He took his time. Time was a huge word. Cause it was like this sense of savoring kept coming. Women didn't use that word. But it was like, I felt like we had all the time in the world, or he took his time with me, or it was just obvious that there wasn't that sense of like, okay, we're doing it. I've got to stay hard. I've got to get hard. I've got to stay hard. I've got to, you know, do this jackhammer thing. And then, you know, and then I've won. Then I've. I've done the. I've completed the thing. I've checked it off the list. I did sex. Well, like, that's not actually how. How it works for women.

Jason Lange: And that. That's just another great lens, guys, to highlight the connection versus outcome, I think, is another way to think of that. If you're focused more at the. On the outcome than the connection. So gotta orgasm. Gotta get her to orgasm, whatever that may be, that's what's gonna be missed. But if you're focused on the connection of, hey, it's feeling really good for us to be here right now, and that's enough, you know, how else could we feel good right now? What else could we explore? The possibilities are actually limitless when that's where you keep your focus. You know, that's the kind of amazing thing about this shift, which includes communication, which includes presence and attunement in bed and in a willingness to create us to know how to create the safe space to kind of invite that feedback and elicit that feedback from a partner who it could be incredibly vulnerable for her to share. You know, I think that's another thing that's good for some of you men to know is it's quite possible some of your partners have never had the opportunity. And so even you may ask once and they may not be quite ready yet, doesn't mean you shouldn't ask again. To keep making it clear that, hey, there's a safe space here, you know, if ever anything's not working, I want you to let me know. No, you know, I love to know what turns you on. That even if you ask, you know, or frame this conversation or invite it, it may not happen right away because there's like a lot of trauma there for. For some women and a lot of Uncertainty. And that's where it's just you kind of got to gently keep opening the door.

Melanie Curtin: Yes, I talk about that in the course, about sort of holding the pose. So saying, I always want to know. I'm an open door. I always want to know. And then repeating that, right? It's not going to happen the first time, might not happen the second time. And then you got to back that shit up if she tells you. Actually, it kind of hurts. Like, the way that you rub my clitoris is like a little too, too much right on it. If you could go like up or down or something, you need to say, thank you for telling me. And if it stings, you can say, oh, it stings a little to know that. And thank you for telling me, but you better back that up because if you say, I always want to know, and then she tells you and you sulk or you pout or you somehow punish her for telling you, man, you're fucked. Like, she's not going to tell you again. So it's okay if it stings and you can say, oh, ah, I noticed that stings a little to hear and to think about all the ways I've not done it right in the past. And thank you for telling me. I really want this to feel good for you. I really want this to feel good for you. That's, you know, part one of the course is all about that of like, here's how you get into the pose and then you hold the pose because you are the masculine, you are the oak tree, you are holding the space. That is how you help your feminine partner relax and open.

Jason Lange: Holding the space is just another way to think about presence, guys. So as you get present with her, she'll open. And having tools like Mel's course are going to be what makes that easier for you. It's going to help that be easier for you. It's going to give you some confidence in leading those discussions. And so, yeah, where can guys learn more about you and your course, which they should all sign up for. Jason Lange: Nice.

Melanie Curtin: Dear men. All one word. Yeah.

Jason Lange: And Definitely check out her show. I mean, she's done hundreds of episodes at this point, thousands of hours of material. That is a game changer for so many men. We hear from every day that that's what they're finding out in the world and is kind of the water in the desert for so many men that have never had anywhere to talk about this stuff and to have a woman on their side. I know. I think that's something that. That's really unique. I've seen about how you work with men is like, hey, I'm actually your ally in this. Like, I want you to have good sex. Like, I think not a lot of men are used to having a female champion their sexuality.

Melanie Curtin: Yes.

Jason Lange: All this, everything you're teaching is just in service of that.

Melanie Curtin: Yes. And I just. I'm so passionate about sort of reassuring men like, you don't have to be perfect. You don't have to have a perfect body. You don't have to be hard for hours. You don't have to have a large cock. I'm telling you, I've done the research. That's not what it's about. So anyone can do this. You got this.

Jason Lange: Yeah. You can do it, guys. And it just starts with a little bit of awareness. So definitely check out Mel's podcast, the Dear Men podcast. Check out her course, please her in bed. And then if you want to work with us deeper, you can check out the free training here on our site. And we love going into this stuff from top to bottom, head to toe, inside out that, you know, sex is just one piece on the full range of what it means to be a masculine leader with. With presence in the world. So definitely check us out. We'd love to work with you and Mel. So great having you on. Thank you so much for the just relentless service and dedication you bring to so many men.

Melanie Curtin: Thank you, Jason.

Jason Lange: Real honor. Till next time, Want to work with Mel and I. Check out our free training at Evolutionary Men webinar, and then follow the instructions at the end to book. Book a call with me and we can talk about what's going on in your sex and love life and whether joining our intensive men's group coaching program is right for you.