Moment 113 - Why You're Not Having Sex & How To Get It Back: Jay Shetty

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0:32We were just talking about doing hard things. So let's talk about sex. Sex is a huge part of relationships. And one of the really interesting things I want to talk to you about is, if again, if I look at my friendship group, my small friendship group of maybe six guys, right, my best friends, I'd say three of them are currently having a really, really hard time as it relates to sex with their partner. For a variety of reasons, reason number one that I've heard, my partner doesn't like having sex. We have sex once every three months. Reason number two I've heard, my partner doesn't like the way that I have sex.

1:13On those first two points, I'm horrified, surprised that so many people I speak to are struggling in that department with sex. And there's not the conversation around sex is either non -existent or poor influenced. Yeah. What's your take on sex and what's going on in the world? Yeah, I'm so glad you brought it up because I think that because of social media, there's this image that everyone else is having sex, and I'm not. Like I feel like that's like a very big feeling that a lot of people have. And all the stats show that people having less and less sex. There are more and more sexless relationships and marriages every single year and it's so much more common yet in our groups and online, everyone feels like, are they getting some and they're getting some and they're getting some, but I'm not.

2:01And the truth is most people are not getting any. And that's just, I don't have the stats off hand right now, but whenever I've looked at the trends, that's what the trends show. To me, it comes back down to everything we've just been talking about. Sexual chemistry and attraction and connection is all based on a. How someone feels about themselves. If someone themselves is not feeling taken care of by themselves, attractive, investing in themselves, growing, feeling like they're becoming more and better, it's very unlikely that they're going to want to share their body, mind, emotions, and heart with anyone else in the most physically intimate way, which is sex.

2:46It's just unlikely. And chances are, if you don't think you're having those conversations, you want to have with your partner, where you are being open, where they are working on their values, where we do see each other striving, chances are that you're not going to want to have sex with them either. And so what we're seeing is that the challenge we're having in sex is actually coming from everything else that's going on, that there isn't a sense of growth, joy, purpose. Like, great sex is a byproduct of great connection and intimacy. It's not a replacement for or a source of. If I asked everyone who's listening right now, put your hand up if you've had amazing sex, but no connection in a relationship.

3:27Right? Like, that's been real. We've all used sex as a crutch. We've had relationships where every time we argued we had sex, it solved the problem. Every time something was going wrong, we had sex. It was figured out somehow. And the studies show that the chemicals released during sex make you feel like you're getting closer, even though you're not actually emotionally closer. So when you look at all of the stats, when you look at all the research, when you look at everything we've just described, sex is a byproduct of a healthy individual and a healthy individual and a growing individual and a growing individual coming together, sorting out their differences, having the fights they need to have, having the conversations they do, that naturally creates vulnerability, which leads to being able to expose ourselves at the deepest, most physical way that we possibly can.

4:14And how can you expose yourself that vulnerable, if you can't even have a vulnerable conversation with your partner, because you just switch on the TV every night and avoid that difficult conversation? It becomes like a transaction. It becomes a transaction and then sex becomes in the best case a crutch and a hopeful aspiration on a special night or whatever it may be, or something we wait for and plan for and it never works out. As opposed in the worst case, it just becomes something we're both not talking about, comfortable about or even doing. Or an obligation. Or an obligation. Yeah, yeah, yeah, like an obligation.

4:50Someone's just sitting there like, you know. Come on three minutes. Literally. Alright, let's get it over and done with. Like that mindset and I'm like, well, like there isn't, because we've lost intimacy in relationships. There is no intimacy and so you can't force it physically. There's no intimacy in porn. There's no intimacy in porn for sure. They don't like do the small talk. I don't pay for that. There's no intimacy in porn. There's no, and the problem is, and this is, you know, the book starts with this quote, but it solves this problem very, very neatly and carefully. And it's this idea that the Buddha was once approached and asked, what's the difference between I like you and I love you?

5:32Which is a brilliant question. And the Buddha replied, when you like a flower, you simply pluck it. But when you love a flower, you water it every day. And to me, the one night stand, the porn, the dopamine hit, the release of chemical is the plucking. Right? That's what we're all plucking all day long, because that's all we can do. But the watering, the intimacy, developing intimacy, growing from entertainment to experiments, to experiences, to education, to engaging in service together. All of this creates so much intimacy that physical intimacy is a natural byproduct. It's not something you have to manage or engineer or manufacture.

6:09Like, it's not this separate thing. It's based on how close I feel to you. And the point is, when don't feel close to our partners, because we don't do anything that makes us closer every day. Sleeping in the same bed as someone does not make you close to someone. Living in the same house as someone does not make you close to someone. The only thing that makes you feel close to someone is when you feel you can be open and when you feel seen, heard, and understood in your most vulnerable, darkest and open times. If you can do that, everything else is going to work. But if you can't do that, you can't just make it happen in a moment because you're meant to be together.

6:52You're meant to be in love. What about masturbation? Do you think masturbation to porn helps or hurts you? What about the other relationships? I think in the long term, it hurts. I think it's unhealthy because it's an avoidance and an escape, right? That's the point. It's like, what is it being used as? It's not being used as self -connection or self -understanding. It's being used as escape and avoidance of the actual topic. And all that's doing is rewiring your brain for false expectations, diminishing returns as well. All the studies that I did look at show that porn is making you work harder you're going to have to find something more extreme.

7:31All the stats that I saw showed that you had to watch more extreme porn to get the same feeling. So the most search porn and the most watch porn was abusive, sometimes violent, sometimes rough, hard call. All the search terms were more extreme to get the same feeling because of the diminishing returns of the chemicals that are being released. And so now you're rewiring your brain to not feel as much pleasure from normal sex or more traditional conventional sex. You're now saying that I'm only going to feel pleasure from sex when it's potentially abusive, violent, somewhat rough, hard call, whatever else it may be.

8:13So I think that's massively unhealthy. There's something that does to your expectations as well. That's the expectations of the key of... That's what we're saying. Yeah. You expectations of sex become completely unrealistic. Your expectations of intimacy are just thrown out the window. There must be so many people listening to this. Both men and women because both sexes do watch porn. It's quite naive of one to assume it's just men that are jacking off in there. Of course. In their bedrooms or whatever. But I've got this people listening to this who have a partner that's constantly watching it.

8:44And they know they watch it potentially. Maybe they've caught them a few times. And they really want them to stop. They think it's maybe killing the desire in a relationship. It's a difficult conversation to... Oh, God. You know? Yeah. It's really tough. And like I said, when I was... I think it'd be interesting to look at this. And I would be fascinated to see whether the people that are watching porn and I need to talk to more people than I have about it. The people that I know that watch porn and that's why I'm only speaking for my experience. Don't feel good about it. They internally, deeply at the root when we're in a coaching session and we get to the core of it.

9:23They feel guilty. They feel shameful. They feel embarrassed about it. It doesn't make them feel good. And they wouldn't openly admit it in a community of people. Now, I'm speaking about a very specific group of people that I've... That have come to me for help or support in their relationships. They don't feel good about it. That doesn't mean they don't feel good when they're watching it. I'm saying they don't feel good afterwards. When they think about it, when they reflect on it, they're like, that's not what I imagined would be my sex life. That's not where I thought I'd turn to for satisfaction and enjoyment.

9:51So, to me, that's again, comes back to down the same approach. And that's why the approach is always the same. We're always approaching the problem from... Or the challenge from empathy and compassion. We're not approaching it from judgment and accusation of like, are you such a waste? You're such a lazy... You know, like that mindset doesn't ever make someone want to open up. Like, if you went up to your partner and said, God, you just watch porn all the time. You're just one of the worst guys. Having seen all my mates, they're doing this and they get this from their partners. And what are you doing?

10:22That person's never going to tell you. When they watch porn or what their challenge with it is or how embarrassed they feel or whatever it may be. Was if you went up to them and said, Hey, you know, I know that you watch porn and I wanted to know when it started. Like, when did you get into it? Like, allow yourself to be an interviewer about it, not an interrogator. And I feel like one of the biggest mistakes we make in our relationships is we interrogate our partners, not interview them. Let's be curious. Let's actually try and understand it. Let's look at it because it's human. It's natural.

10:50Like we said, like 99 % of people are doing it anyway. So why are we pretending like it's only in our relationship? Why are we pretending that, oh, no one else does this, but only my partner does this? That's not true. So if it's that widespread and it's that common and there's this huge industry that's been built off of it, why are we judging our partner and why are we making them feel less than? Too much porn. I don't. I mean, when you, you know, I mean, three years of being a celibate monk, with no access to the internet or phone, gives you some good training. Yeah, I feel like, so I grew up, and I like to play white too, I feel like I started having sex early.

11:30And so early in the sense for me, so I felt that when, with the years where most of my friends were watching porn, I was having sex. And so I didn't get into it as a habit early on in life, which is where I found it formed for most of my friends. And then by the time they were having real sex, I became a monk, and so it was a really weird order of stuff. Does that make sense? Yes, for me, it was that idea of like, yeah, it was just, I think I had the real thing when my friends were watching porn, and then by the time they were having the real thing, I was on such a different path. Three years of celibacy.

12:11Three years of celibacy, we do it to you. It was one of the hardest. No, thanks. It was one of the hardest and best things though, because one of the things we don't realize, and I want to address this, and celibacy is really interesting thing to address. I would love to see more people, and this may be not a popular concept, and I'm good with that. I would love to see more people date people, without having sex for a committed number of months. So committing with the new person that you're dating to not make sex a connection point. So one of my good friends did this recently as well, and he found that it gave him the ability to make better decisions as to whether there was real intimacy, whether there was real connection, and whether there was something real here that could be built upon with sex.

13:02As opposed to, God, I'm just so attracted to her, and she's so attracted to me, and we just have the best sex ever, or we don't. And then that's what it's all hanging on. And so I actually would go down that route and say that celibacy doesn't have to be practiced, how I practice there's three years as a monk. Celebrity can be practiced in small doses, not because you're trying to be celibate, and you're trying to repress yourself. That's not what I'm encouraging. What I'm encouraging is why not use it as a way of making healthier decisions? Because studies show we don't make good decisions after we have sex.

13:33And studies show that we don't make good decisions when we've had sex with someone for a long time, because that's completely rewiring how we feel about them. So that's one way of looking at it, and the other way I'd say even going even more extreme is being celibate as a monk allowed me to redirect all that energy and the word for monk in the tradition I stayed in is Brahmacharya, or Brahmacharya. And what that means technically is proper use of that energy. So celibacy is not a repression or a suppression or a closing off. It's reutilizing that vital energy in a different direction. If you think about how much money, time, and energy you've spent chasing someone that you liked.

14:19The amount of time in your head, the amount of time on your phone, text messages, dating apps, the amount of money you spent, I would have been so rich if I never took anyone out on a date before 21. Like, think about all the money I wasted on showing off to women before I was 21. That dumb perions. Yeah, exactly. Take all of that energy, think about what you could achieve creatively. If you used all that energy used to pursue another person, if you use that energy to create, because it's creative energy. So to me, celibacy was far more about I got to use three years of creative energy in doing a lot of self -work that I otherwise could have taken years to do because of so many distractions and pursuits that kind of spread that energy across.

15:08My girlfriend came up to stairs yesterday when I was having a shower and she said to me that she tried the heel protein shake, which lives on my fridge over there. And she said, it's amazing. Low calories, you get your 20 odd grams of protein, you get your 26 vitamins and minerals, and it's nutritionally complete. If you haven't tried the heel protein product, do give it a try. The salted caramel one, if you put some ice cubes in it, and you put it in a blender, and you try it, is as good as pretty much any milkshake on the market.

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16:12We no longer have to juggle multiple systems and having everything together has reduced the number of manual tasks and errors. Over 41 ,000 businesses have chosen to future proof their business with NetSuite. So if you'd like to learn how it can help your business, head to netsuite .com slash Bartlett and free download the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning. That's netsuite .com slash Bartlett. Q1 is often when businesses start implementing new systems and processes in hopes of creating efficiencies for the year ahead. And over the course of my career, I've learnt just how crucial having the right systems in places, one which has helped me across many of my investments is NetSuite.

16:50They're also a sponsor of this podcast. NetSuite is the number one cloud financial system through their streamlined platform. You'll find all of your accounting financial management inventory and HR in one place. Their technology has been a real game changer, especially for my team at Flight Studio. As over the last year, we've moved out of startup mode and into scale at mode. We no longer have to juggle multiple systems and having everything together has reduced the number of manual tasks and errors. Over 41 ,000 businesses have chosen to future proof their business with NetSuite. So if you'd like to learn how it can help your business, head to netsuite .com slash Bartlett and free download the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning.

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