How to Last Longer During Sex

How to Last Longer During Sex

How long do you last in bed?

I’m sure I can pull up some statistics right now saying the average sex session is 5-7 minutes, but the majority of guys last less than 3-4 minutes.

Knowing this doesn’t really help you though. It just puts you into the comparison game, gives you fodder towards beating up on yourself, and increases your sexual performance anxiety, something we'll talk about in a moment.

I’ll be honest, I’ve had times I’ve lasted well into an hour and I’ve had times where I was literally a “two pump chump” and came within less than a minute because I was so highly aroused, knowing full well what is required to last longer. It doesn’t matter as much as you think it does, especially if you’ve been building skills elsewhere in the bedroom.

Although, there was a time in my life when I was more insecure and unconfident, believing that my skill in being able to last longer somehow made me more of a man, that I was obsessed with figuring out how to last longer. So I did eventually become better at that skill.

What lasting longer boils down to is managing your arousal level, and I’m going to teach you how to do that mentally and physically, with techniques to use on your own to prepare for sex, and techniques to use during sex.

How long do you really need to last?​

I find “premature ejaculation” to be a funny label because it presumes that there is a definitive time that every man must last. The amount of time that you think you should last is subjective to you and your partner. There’s really no right or wrong timeframe to cum if you both are left satisfied.

So the question is then, how long do you need to last in order for her to be satisfied?

From the surveys done by Aella, which by no means is comprehensive, women prefer 20-30 minutes of penetration after 15-30 mins of foreplay.

However, the amount of time that women would like to have intercourse with you before you ejaculate can vary widely. A woman who really enjoys intercourse and orgasms easily from penetration may wish to go longer, while the woman who could care less about intercourse and typically orgasms by other means probably doesn’t care too much.

Furthermore, not every interaction you have with that same woman will be all night long sexcapades. Quickies are fun sometimes, too.

That being said, because of the level of arousal control and physical stamina required to have continued penetrative intercourse for 45 mins, 60 mins or more, many women have not experienced that, so it’s hard for them to say if they would enjoy that more. In my experience, it’s usually a pretty unique experience for them, but not something I can’t naturally do or want to do all the time.

What happens far more often is drawing out foreplay because I like to intentionally savor each step of the sexual encounter, then having a shorter round of intercourse, then cuddling and talking, followed by a longer round of intercourse, then alternating back and forth between chilling and fucking until I’m either bored or tired. To be honest, I don’t know how long any of those phases last because I stopped watching the clock long ago and focused intently on the moment. All I really know is when we enter the room and when we’re finished. I’m sure there are times that are shorter and times that are longer, but it doesn’t really matter. We’re both left satisfied.

The one concept you need to know to last longer: The point of no return​

Earlier I told you that in order to last longer you need to control your arousal levels. Specifically, you need to learn how to bring yourself back from the point-of-no-return (PNR).

The PNR is the exact point at which arousal turns into ejaculation orgasm. In order to ejaculate, your body enters momentarily into the sympathetic state (fight, fight, or freeze) and causes muscles to contract. In our pelvis, we have what is called the pubococcygeus (PC) muscle which rapidly contracts and tightens causing us to orgasm and expel semen.

The reason it’s called PNR is because once you tip over this point, your body enters into this involuntary chain of events for which you can’t stop. The train is in motion and must meet its final destination at all costs.

During a typical sex session, you are working up your arousal levels to the PNR, tipping it over, and ejaculating. All you need to do in order to last longer before ejaculating is identify what the PNR feels like, and keep your arousal levels from reaching that point. Easily said, harder to do.

You can identify the PNR by pleasuring yourself and noticing the following sensations when you reach the PNR:

• Your breath becomes faster, more shallow and constricted.
• You feel compelled to tense your body and tighten your muscles.
• Your entire attention is focused on your genital area.
• Your movements become more mechanical.
• Your genital area is charged in a sharp or heavy way.
• Your pleasure is increasing very quickly.
• You feel the desire to apply even more stimulation.
• Your lower belly is tense.
• You feel compelled to squeeze your penis muscles.
• There’s a sharp feeling in the top of your penis, as if semen is already coming out.
• You feel a sense of urgency to cum.

That moment when you feel the need to cum, to rush or to tense up is the moment just before the PNR. Once you cross that point, you will ejaculate!

Ok, so you might think all you need to do is keep your arousal levels low and you’ll never cum. Problem with that is if you lower your arousal levels too much, then you won’t be turned on and will most likely lose your erection.

Your real task is to manage your arousal levels, keeping them high enough that you maintain an erection, but low enough that you don’t cross the PNR.

This is where learning your body’s arousal levels on a scale of 1-10 is extremely helpful. You can do so by being aware of how aroused you are during self pleasure where 1 would be little to no arousal like you’re staring at a wall watching paint dry, and 9 being the PNR when you are ejaculating at 10 in arousal. Feel the difference in your arousal as you move closer and closer to 10.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to try and keep your arousal level between a 5 and 9 the entire time. You can do this by edging yourself, a technique we’ll discuss later, bringing yourself to the edge of ejaculation, and then coming back down in your arousal. In theory, you could continue doing this forever and never cum.

7 Techniques to last longer during sex​

Technique 1: Reduce your sexual performance anxiety​

Sexual performance anxiety is a form of performance anxiety where you anticipate not being able to perform in bed the way you would like (either staying erect the entire time or lasting as long as you think you should).

In order to ejaculate, your body actually enters momentarily into the sympathetic state (fight, fight, or freeze) and causes muscles to contract. In our pelvis, we have what is called the pubococcygeus (PC) muscle which rapidly contracts and tightens causing us orgasm.

When you get so caught up in “lasting a long time” that you get anxious about your performance, you can get so panicked that you wind up losing control of this PC muscle and contracting your body, and this can lead to rapid ejaculation.

The other scenario is if you’re worried about losing your erection, you can really rush things to try to make the most of it while it’s still there. This can result in hurrying through foreplay, getting to penetration as quickly as possible, and then ultimately cumming quicker than you’d like.

Premature ejaculation can also have a nasty feedback loop. If you cum too quickly one time, this can lead to sexual performance anxiety, and lead you to overthink your ejaculation every time in the future.

I outlined several ways to reduce your sexual performance anxiety in this article. The bottom line is you have to get out of your head and back into the sensations occurring in you and your partner’s body.

Technique 2: Kegels vs Reverse Kegels​

Recall, earlier I spoke of the PC muscle which controls your ejaculation as well as the flow of urination. The PC muscle is located in a network of muscles in your pelvic floor, the layers of muscles, ligaments, and fascia (or connective tissue) that stretch like a hammock from your pubic bone in front of your body back to your tailbone. These structures make up the bottom or “floor” of the bowl-shaped pelvis (in both women and men). Just like any other muscles, these muscles can be trained to strengthen, gain better mind-muscle connection, and improve the voluntary control of the muscles.

There are two exercises that can be used to improve your PC muscle:

• Kegels: voluntarily tightening, squeezing, and contracting the muscle
• Reverse Kegels: voluntarily relaxing or releasing the muscle

As a guy, your first thought may be to build up the strength of your PC muscles by doing kegels, but you may actually be making the problem worse by doing so. The PC muscle is not like your bicep where the bigger the better and you just need to hammer the hell out of it at the gym. Having an optimally functioning PC muscle that you have better control over is about balance, with the right amount of tonality but not overly tight.

If you’re a man who does a lot of lower body workouts like squat and deadlift, or you have a job where you’re sitting all day long, it’s more likely that your PC muscle is overly contracted and tight, and for you, doing reverse kegels would be more beneficial.

You’ll need to gain awareness and connection with that muscle in order to assess and exercise in the way that is right for you. To identify the muscles, squeeze or contract the muscles you use to stop the flow of urine. Another way to identify these muscles is to imagine trying to keep from passing gas. It might feel like your pelvic muscles are being pulled up into your body when you do this.

How to perform kegels:

• Identify and isolate the pelvic floor muscles. Don’t flex your ass like you’re trying to show off your glutes, don’t flex your legs, and don’t flex your abs. Focus just on contracting only the pelvic floor muscles.
• Tighten and hold. Contract your pelvic floor muscles for three to five seconds and then relax. If you’re a beginner, aim for five repetitions. As you get stronger, increase to 10 contractions held for 10 seconds each with 10 seconds of rest in between (a “set” of 10). You should be able to perform a set of Kegels in five minutes or less. Aim for three sets of Kegels per day.
• Add variety with:some text
  • Position changes: Try performing your Kegel exercises while lying down, sitting, or standing to strengthen your muscles in a range of positions.
  • Rapid holds: Tighten your pelvic floor muscles quickly, hold for one or two seconds, and relax. Short contractions activate fast-twitch muscle fibers to help your body respond quickly (e.g. when coughing or sneezing) to prevent urine leaks.
  • Long holds: Tighten your pelvic floor muscles gradually, taking several seconds to reach your maximum contraction and hold. Work toward holding each contraction for 10 seconds with 10 seconds rest in between. Long contractions can increase pelvic muscle-supportive strength and endurance.

Reverse kegels target the same muscle group, just in reverse. Rather than the feeling of the muscles going up into your body, the exercise makes them feel as if they are dropping or expanding, similar to the moment of relief during urination or a bowel movement.

Deep breathing can help the down-training process. During deep or diaphragmatic breathing, the diaphragm lowers to make room for the breath, and the pelvic floor relaxes or drops. During exhalation, the diaphragm rises to push air out, and the pelvic floor raises.

How to perform reverse kegels:

• Identify and isolate the pelvic floor muscles. Don’t flex your ass like you’re trying to show off your glutes, don’t flex your legs, and don’t flex your abs. Focus just on contracting only the pelvic floor muscles.
• Relax and breathe deeply. Stop contracting the pelvic floor and begin taking a deep breath into the bottom of your diaphragm (stomach). Imagine the breath pushing the bottom of your pelvic region outwards. Let go of the tension in your pelvic floor, as if you are urinating or having a bowel movement.
• Try to spot the difference in feeling between tension and relaxation.
• Continue through several breathing exercises. Just as you did with kegels, you can go through a set of 5-10 deep breaths, progressively loosening the pelvic floor with each breath.
• Massage the area. The pelvic floor can be further relaxed by massaging the area between your anus and testicles, including the inner thighs connecting to this area, as you perform your breathing exercises.

Both kegels and reverse kegels can be performed any time of day, multiple times a day.

Technique 3: Edging and stamina training​

Now that you have identified your pelvic floor muscles and have better control of them, it’s time to start stamina training.

For most of your life, you have masturbated in the same way, using friction to get to ejaculation as quickly as possible. You start when you're aroused and ride that arousal all the way to the finish line until you cum. This trains your body to become very efficient at cumming quickly. If we graphed your arousal levels, it goes from 0-10 fast and tips over into the PNR before you’re aware of it.

In order to help you last longer in bed, you want to train yourself to be able to control your arousal level, bringing it back from the edge of the PNR repeatedly, extending the time before ejaculation. The graph of your arousal levels would look like this:

This can be achieved by practicing stamina training or “edging” yourself for extended periods of time. You’ll first begin by training to last for 10 mins. As that becomes easier, you’ll extend your sessions to 15 mins, 20 mins, and so on.

How to perform stamina training:

• Start masturbating, and get yourself up to a 7 out of 10 on the arousal scale. (You’ll just have to subjectively decide what this is for you, it’ll be easier to identify with practice).
• Stop, breathe and let yourself fall back down to a 5.
• Now work up to an 8, and then stop again and let yourself slide down to a 6.
• Up to 8, down to 7
• Up to 8.5, down to 7 again. A 8.5 is just before the PNR.
• Repeat the 8.5 to 7 cycle over and over again until you get past 10 minutes.
• You can either ejaculate at this point or stop entirely without ejaculating.

During the periods when you are trying to lower your arousal, use the following:

• Change your stroke and slow it down significantly instead of stopping entirely. If you’re too aroused, especially at the 8.5 level, you can stop stoking entirely.
• Squeeze the PC muscle like you’re doing an intense kegel. Hold them for at least 10 seconds, but the longer you can hold the more you’ll come down. (You might also have success doing a couple shorter 5-second holds, or a bunch of quick 1-second holds).
• Then take deep, diaphragmatic (with your stomach) breaths and relax your pc muscles.

Set aside time every night for this kind of practice. The more the better. It will be very tempting to just let yourself go when you’re hitting those 8.5 peaks, but trust me, exercising like this will be worth it.

Technique 4: Strategic Foreplay Ordering​

The previous techniques were things you did mostly on your own before having sex with a partner. Now it’s time to discuss the techniques to use during sex, starting with strategic foreplay ordering.

For the average couple, most foreplay follows a similar pattern:

Kissing / touching -> Cunnilingus -> Fellatio -> Intercourse

The problem with this is that you're going from intense oral stimulation, raising your arousal levels, straight into intercourse. You want to be going into intercourse at a 4 or 5 arousal, not at an 8 where you’re already ready to pop.

What’s more effective is alternating between both of you for who's getting the focus of being aroused in order to allow you to cool down, with the added benefit of giving her orgasms before even getting to penetration and your orgasm.

So our basic example:

Kissing / touching -> Get her off once manually -> Fellatio -> Cunnilingus -> Intercourse

Of course, this site talks a lot more about BDSM and kinky activities, so you could include a whole range of different activities before getting to intercourse. Furthermore, intercourse doesn’t have to be a straight dash to ejaculation, and you could interweave other activities in, allowing you additional cool down periods.

For example:

Kissing / touching -> Impact play -> Fellatio -> Fingering -> Handjob -> Cunnilingus -> Intercourse -> Using a vibrator -> Fellatio -> Intercourse

During any of the activities where you are being stimulated, after you get to 7-8.5 arousal a couple times (same edging technique as before, just this time you tell her to “stop” at the peaks), switch it up so you can cool down while you get her off a few times.

Technique 5: Changing sex positions for better edging​

Edging during foreplay is easy, but during sex it’s a little different. You don’t want to keep stopping and starting thrusting since that’s going to be frustrating for her, and it’ll give you performance anxiety from worrying about cumming too soon.

Instead, you can edge yourself during intercourse by switching up your positions. Some positions create more friction and stimulation for you, which causes you to move up arousal levels quickly, while others have decreased sensation for you (and sometimes more sensation for her!)

A position with her legs more closed (more friction) plus you doing the thrusting while lying down (e.g. missionary) will be high stimulation and get you off faster.

But a position with her legs spread and you standing or kneeling will have less stimulation. Same story if she’s on top of you grinding back and forth instead of up and down.

To decrease arousal, use low stimulation positions that are:

• Low friction, less stimulation of your dick
• Use either shallow thrusting or grinding back and forth with no thrusting
• You're in control with a slow tempo
• You’re not contracting pelvic floor muscles as much to perform movement like standing or laying on your back

To increase arousal, use high stimulation positions that are:

• High friction with lots of stimulation
• Use deep thrusting motions to stimulate the entire length of your shaft
• Quick tempo and rapid movement
• You’re contracting your pelvic floor muscles a lot during thrusts

As you’re having intercourse, if you’re getting overly aroused reaching 9, you can switch from high stimulation positions to low stimulation positions. Likewise, if you’re falling to a 5 arousal, then you can switch to a position that is more stimulating.

If you have to stop stimulation all together, then switch to just focusing on her and stimulating her with your hands, mouth, or toys while you come down. It’s far better to continue stimulating her than to just stop abruptly. As you do so, pay attention to your pelvic floor muscles, squeezing and holding them a few times, and then letting them relax.

Technique 6: Breathing to move sensations​

Your breath and your arousal levels are closely linked to one another.

Next time you have sex, pay attention to how you breathe when you're about to cum. It will be similar to what's known as tumo breathing or breath of fire: short, rapid, and shallow. If you breathe like that while having intercourse, it’s just going to push you quicker to ejaculation.

So you are going to want to do the opposite in order to decrease your arousal: long, slow, and deep.

As you’re having intercourse, pay attention to your breathing. Consciously make an effort to slow your breathing down and breathe deeply into your diaphragm. Doing so will have the added benefit of keeping your pelvic floor muscles relaxed as you breathe into them like a reverse kegel. Because of your focused attention on the breath, you're more likely to stay attuned to the sensations occurring in yours and your partner’s body, keeping you from getting into your head and getting sexual performance anxiety as well.

You may notice as you bring more attention to your pleasure, that much of the sensation feels like it’s concentrated on your dick. At the moment of ejaculation, it feels like 100% of that sensation is located here. There’s a tantric practice known as the microcosmic orbit that can help you to dissipate that concentration to the rest of your body, keeping you from feeling like your dick is on the urge of exploding.

To perform the microcosmic orbit:

• Begin breathing deeply into your diaphragm and pelvic floor
• On the inhale, visualize the pleasurable sensations moving from your pelvis, circling down under the spine, up the back and over the crown of the head. Pay attention to how the rest of your body feels in these areas as it travels up them.
• On the exhale, visualize the pleasurable sensations moving from your head, down the front of your body and back to the pelvic region.
• Repeat the orbit.

Doing this will allow you to create a better mind-body connection with the pleasure sensations throughout the rest of your body. As you strengthen that connection, not only will you increase your ability to last longer, but you’ll experience more full body orgasms rather than just a release from your dick.

Technique 7: Multiple rounds​

Remember how I said that even though I know all these techniques, there are still times I cum quicker than I would have liked? Sometimes I’m either so aroused by her or stressed out from the day that it happens. The last failsafe for me has always been to go for multiple rounds, as in, ejaculate once and then have intercourse again after my refractory period.

Because you’ve already ejaculated, your body has less of an urge to do so again. You have decreased sensation and it takes more stimulation to get you aroused. So, if you remember to put into practice the techniques above, your second round will most likely far out pace your first by a lot. Sometimes I’ll even ejaculate the first round, and then just fuck till I feel satisfied and not cum the second round (which then often leads to a third round of intercourse later).

I think this last technique is important because it takes a lot of stress off of you to perform. Instead you try your best the first round, but don’t sweat it if you cum quickly. You just go for another one and enjoy yourself.

Lasting as long as you want is only one skill​

By now you should have realized that lasting a long time is not the end all be all of sexual competency. It's one of many skills you can learn on the road to becoming more skillful in the bedroom. As you begin to gain mastery over controlling your ejaculation time, consider expanding your repertoire by developing your Dominance, varying the types of sexual actions you engage in, and learning how to use your voice to dirty talk during sex. Learning any of these will make sex more enjoyable for the both of you and set you apart from other men.