Who doesn’t want to speak the same language as their partner when it comes to intimacy? RIGHT? Sex can be a bit of hit and miss when you don’t understand how to connect and engage someone’s sex drive, before, during and after sex. If you know the Five Love Languages for yourself and your partner(s), cool! However, you can definitely raise the bar by learning about your Sex Languages as well.
In 2016, Dr. Weiss published a book called “The Five Sex Languages” as a complimentary response to the “The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate” published by Dr. Gary Chapman in 1992. The Sex Languages according to Dr. Weiss are: Fun, Desire, Pleasure, Patience, and Acceptance/Celebration. I can get on board with these, but for me, there were some distinctions I thought I’d play with to flesh out the Sex Language lexicon.
In the Sex Language of Fun, Weiss says that things like spontaneity and creativity are important. Great, but to me Creativity is a larger umbrella that could have Fun and spontaneity as subsets. What if your desire for costumes and role play are less about being fun and more about transporting you and your partner into an altered reality? I suppose it could be argued that that is inherently fun, but to me, the word “fun” just simply felt too limiting. Perhaps it comes down to how the word makes me feel. For me Creativity is about expression of imagination and can be quite serious. Serious fun. (Heheh.) And it can also capture those who enjoy a giggle, a romp and a playful spirit.
His next Sex Language is Desire. In this category Weiss talks about needing signs that you are wanted. Love this and have no desire to change it (see what I did there?). He also mentions the idea of enjoying feeling pursued as part of showing Desire. Which ultimately I added as it’s own category; Pursuit. For me, there is a need to break these two apart. A sense of being desired is easily achieved through a text telling me that my partner can’t wait to see me or that they think I’m a sexy beast. Beyond that, however, could be a real need to have chances to pursue my partner, to have separation so that I can miss them, spend time alone filling my own cup so that I am more excited about the next opportunity to connect with them. I might enjoy seeing my partner doing the things they love or are good at from afar so that my desire has space and distance in which to flourish. I might even want to see them flirt with or be intimate with someone else so that I can appreciate their incredibleness. If we are always together and there is never separation, I may not feel the need to connect, and might ultimately lose interest.
Weiss’ third language is Pleasure. The idea behind this is that a partner whose Sex Language is Pleasure will need opportunity to please you, to experiment with how to do that. Exploration of what makes a partner tick sexually is what excites them. I found this one a little lacking. To me this is too large a category to make it meaningful. So, I broke it down into the following: Kink, Sensory Stimulation and Romance. Kink represents a desire to explore things that aren’t considered “vanilla” in the bedroom; such as power exchanges, BDSM, fetishes, voyeurism (which may also be part of a Pursuit language) and exhibitionism. Sensory Stimulation is for those who really value and long for all of their senses to get some attention. Being mindful of music, lighting, the feel of the sheets, scents and food/drink all affect their sexual mood. And finally, Romance. For people whose language is Romance, the really get their groove on when their partner gives them grand gestures, holidays, candlelit dinners, poetic language, slow dances, picnics and whispers of sweet nothings.
The fourth language of the bedroom Weiss wrote about is Patience. Where someone longs for things to not be rushed, and time to be a major investment, alongside things like massages and gentleness before, during and after sex. To me this category is a bit problematic and could easily be part of of both Sensory Stimulation and Romance.
Lastly, Weiss offers up Acceptance/Celebration. He notes that this language is about feeling accepted and celebrated for all that you are. Maybe it’s the words and the weird alignment of two different aspect of value that are on opposite sides of the spectrum. I mean, I could accept things about my partner that I don’t particularly like and celebrate the things that I particularly like, OR I could Value my partner, and remove the need for two separate words. That’s why I prefer to simply call it the Sex Language of Value. In order to feel connected and want intimacy, I need to know my partner Values who I am in all my parts, including those things they might simply accept all the way to those things they would celebrate about me.
But WAIT! There’s more!
Something that Weiss didn’t address, and that I personally really need, is the Sex Language of Intellectual Stimulation. This doesn’t mean that you crave partners who are the most educated in the room – not at all. Rather, the way they think, how they express ideas, words they choose, how they articulate their desire, how they engage in long discussions or debates all feels to you like foreplay. Talking about your sexual experiences, debriefing what worked and what didn’t and stimulating your mind before, during and after sex is what keeps you engaged sexually.
So, folks, here are my revised Eight Sex Languages:
Creativity, Desire, Pursuit, Kink, Sensory Stimulation, Romance, Value and Intellectual Stimulation
If you would like to take my short quiz to find out more about your Sex Languages, please feel free to contact me via my contact page and I will happily send it to you!
