…continued[Last time we talked of three types of sexual thoughts: auto-erotic, erotic, and illicit, focusing on auto-erotic thoughts.] The next category is erotic thought, the goal of which is to intentionally arouse ourselves or our partners. As a single person, intentionally entertaining erotic fantasy is like playing with fire and is perhaps why Song of Solomon warns, “Do not arouse or awaken love before it is time!” (2:7; 3:5; 8:4, NIV)
But if you’re married, of course, intentionally arousing yourself and your spouse is a good thing! I’m reminded of a seventy-two-year-old woman who called me in response to my book The Sexually Confident Wife a few years ago. She explained that for the first thirty years of her marriage, she was sexually frozen. She didn’t want to entertain her husband’s sexual advances at all because she feared displeasing God with the thoughts that ran through her mind when having sex. You can imagine the impact this mind-set had on their marriage. Divorce court was the next scheduled stop in their relational journey, until her husband convinced her to see a therapist.
After hearing her concerns, the therapist simply asked, “If God created you with a brain that can imagine certain thoughts and fuel your own sexual energy and your marriage bed, as a result, isn’t that a blessing rather than a burden?”
This woman proclaimed, “I decided I’d rather give up the guilt than give up my marriage, and I’m so glad I did!” The woman continued, “Our sex life over the past twenty years has been amazing, and I have more intense orgasms at seventy-two-years-old than I’ve had my whole life!”
I remember thinking, “Yes! Perhaps the best is still yet to come!” Seriously, I was so grateful for her brave confession and cherished words of wisdom! They’ve stuck with me, and hopefully they’ll stick with you too.
To be continued…
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Excerpted from The Fantasy Fallacy: Exposing the Deeper Meaning Behind Sexual Thoughts by Shannon Ethridge. Copyright 2012. All Rights Reserved. Published by Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, TN. Used by Permission. Not to be copied without Publisher’s prior written approval.