Is Masturbation Good For You?

Kevin Anthony 0:11
Welcome to the Love Lab podcast a safe place to get real about sex. Whether you’re a man, woman, single, or couple, this is the show for you.

Céline Remy 0:20
We are your hosts, Kevin Anthony and Celine Remy and we are here to guide you to go from good to amazing in the bedroom and beyond.

Kevin Anthony 0:27
All right, welcome back to the Love Lab podcast. This is episode 180. And it’s titled is masturbation good for you? Oh, yes, we’re going there. We are going to spend an entire show talking about masturbation. We’re going to talk about it from the men’s perspective. From the women’s perspective, is it good for you what science says?

Kevin Anthony 0:50
What do people say? And we’re even going to throw in some statistics about how many people actually masturbate. Because you know, there, there are segments of society, there are some groups that do believe that masturbation is bad for you. I mean, whether they’re religious groups or no fab groups, or whatever it is.

Kevin Anthony 1:12
And we will cover a little bit about the potential downsides of it as well. But those things aside, all of the science points to the fact that it is good for you, which we are going to get into. And, you know, there’s a lot of people that really deny like, oh, no, I don’t masturbate that’s bad for you, you’re gonna get hairy palms and blind go blind, you know. But the reality is like pretty much everybody masturbates. And we have the facts and the data to prove it.

Céline Remy 1:43
Buckle up, it’s going to get very juicy. give a big shout out to our

Kevin Anthony 1:51
Well, it’s gonna get juicy.

Céline Remy 1:54
In case you haven’t heard yet, of the secret club of men who are great in bed, then check out power and mastery at power and mastery.com. It is the most complete sexual mastery training for men, whether you want to have hard directions last longer, or increase your sexual skills and even have better masturbation practices, and go to power and mastery.com.

Céline Remy 2:15
So let’s face it, for most masturbation is something that looks about like a five minutes activity with a seven to 10 seconds, climax or fireworks, something that happens, right. And the question is, well, they might find this very good and satisfying, really. But is there more to it? Is there more than these may have five minutes? Could we take masturbation to the next level? And if we do, what can happen as well?

Kevin Anthony 2:49
Yeah, well, I think after this show is over, anybody that listens to it is suddenly going to realize I should be masturbating a lot longer.

Céline Remy 3:00
That is correct. Well, let’s answer our question. Is it good for you? The short answer is, is most likely yes. And again, you got to take it for yourself and do your research and come to your own conclusion. But most of the research that’s available shows that masturbation is not bad for you. In fact, it can benefit your health. So that’s the exciting part because it can benefit you feel better to have pleasure but you have can also benefit from it.

Kevin Anthony 3:28
Okay, one thing we got to just get out of the way, right from the start is that basically, everybody masturbates. Mm-hmm. For the most part, so.

Céline Remy 3:38
So we found this study by tengas, which is an adult toy distributor, and they did this in 2020. So it’s pretty recent. And the different stats in terms of like, their self-pleasure report, how many like they came up that 71% of Americans agree that masturbation improves their mood, was a form of self-care in the last year.

Céline Remy 4:03
But not only did they do that, but they also broke it down into categories of who masturbate and how much do they masturbate? So know Kevin’s got the little screenshot there, and he’s gonna enlighten us.

Kevin Anthony 4:14
Yeah, I found this fascinating. I mean, you found the chart, but I was looking at it and going, Wow, this is really interesting data. Okay. So let’s just start with the first sort of myth that men masturbate more than women. According to this data, while it is slightly skewed towards the men’s side, we’re talking 54% of men and 46% of women.

Céline Remy 4:39
That’s not a big difference. It’s not a big difference. So we women do masturbate? I do.

Kevin Anthony 4:46
I’m curious to like it, I wonder if for some women there’s a little bit more shame about it. Like guys are like, Yeah, of course. I read one out all the time. Right. You know, like, I wonder if that 46 Number is really rare. rep or if it might be a little bit higher than that.

Kevin Anthony 5:04
Just curious. Alright, we’ve got more stuff more data for you. Okay, how about married versus dating? What do you think about that one? This probably won’t come is that much of a surprise to people? But married 44% Dating 18%?

Céline Remy 5:27
Well, it probably has to do with the fact that you have new relationship energy when you’re dating. And it’s all you think about the other person, and you have so much like sexual energy, and you jump on each other all the time if you can see each other, but actually, here then that you would masturbate more.

Kevin Anthony 5:43
Yeah, cuz you’d be horny. But here’s why I think those numbers are the way they are, I think because a lot of married couples are not having the sex that they wish that they could have. So they masturbate instead, whereas the dating people, like, you know, I remember and this goes back quite a few years.

Kevin Anthony 6:00
But I had a good friend of mine, he was on a couple of dating apps, you know, and, you know, he had gone to three dates a week and have sex with different women pretty much every date that he went on. And so I used to laugh all the time, because, you know, like, he would pass judgment on people that had, say lifestyles like poly or whatever.

Kevin Anthony 6:18
And it’s like, yeah, but you have more sex? Like, will you have sex with more different women in like, a month than most poly people do in a year? You know, so I think that has a lot to do with it. It’s just that nowadays, especially with dating apps, and things like that, the dating crowd is probably having a lot more sex than the married crowd.

Kevin Anthony 6:37
But if that if that’s true for you, if you’re married, and you’re not having that kind of sex, and you really, really, really, really, really need to go to sleep Remy calm, and you need to hire either both of us or one of us to fix this for you. Because honestly, you should be having a lot more sex.

Céline Remy 6:53
Some interesting fact to hear before we move on or between the straight, and the people identify identifying as LGBTQ A plus all of that. What’s interesting is that masturbation seems by far to be more of a straight activity, meaning that 88% of people identifying as straight masturbate versus only 20% of those who identify as something else. That’s very interesting.

Kevin Anthony 7:25
It is very interesting. I have a couple of thoughts as to why that is. But honestly, since I’m not LGTB, Qt QA, QA keeps changing. So it’s hard to keep up and it’s a mouthful of letters. But anyway, the, because I’m not that I’m just purely speculating, in this case. So I’m gonna, I’m gonna leave those like if you want to comment, you know, send us a message and say why you think that might be, we would find it fascinating because honestly, we don’t really know. So,

Céline Remy 8:02
a few more things here, they found again, that 71% of Americans are okay, talking about self-pleasure with their partner and 51 are comfortable chatting with friends about it. It’s interesting because of some research, so different ones and different results. And we’ll talk more about masturbation when you’re in a relationship, but let’s jump into what science has to say when it comes to masturbation.

Kevin Anthony 8:26
Okay, so we, we’ve, we’ve sort of gotten, you know, we’ve established the fact that most people masturbate, yeah. And it’s far more prevalent than most people would admit. And it’s pretty even across the board for all different categories. Alright, so we’ve gotten that out of the way.

Kevin Anthony 8:47
We’ve kind of alluded to the fact that it has health benefits and things like that, but let’s just grab a couple of quotes from some different medical websites and what they say about

Céline Remy 8:59
medical health line, you can start medical. Wow, you know, it’s health-related

Kevin Anthony 9:04
health-related. Thank you. Yeah. What I didn’t do when I put these in here is these all were quoting studies, I was like, Oh, we don’t want to sit here and quote studies for 45 minutes on the show. But all of these things are basically based on research studies in these sort of online news magazines that report on it so

Céline Remy 9:25
so how offline has to say that masturbation is a common activity. It is a natural and safe way to explore your body feel pleasure and release built-up sexual tension. It occurs among people of all backgrounds, genders, and races, despite the myths. These are actually there are actually no physically harmful side effects of masturbation. Ooh, great. comeback to that.

Céline Remy 9:47
Medical News Today has to say that however, masturbating may have several positive effects including boosting hormones and chemicals that promote positive emotions, feelings, and sensations Psychcentral had to say that although many people feel uncomfortable talking about masturbation, nearly all of us have done it at some point. It’s an entirely common practice.

Céline Remy 10:11
And when done in moderation, it’s not bad for you. Very interesting, haha, but it’s good for you. And half.com says that a new study actually has something serious to say about the typical dude’s favorite shower activity, masturbating frequently could significantly reduce a man’s risk of prostate cancer.

Kevin Anthony 10:30
Yeah, there have been some studies done on that to show that there actually is a decrease in prostate cancer. So, you know, those are just a few quotes from some health-related websites that basically are showing you’re demonstrating to you that even mainstream health and science agrees that masturbation is perfectly healthy.

Kevin Anthony 10:50
Whether it’s a man or a woman, it’s a great healthy thing to do. So, yeah. I know, it’s almost it is actually 2022. And in this day and age, there are still people who think that somehow masturbation is wrong or bad or going to hurt you in some way.

Kevin Anthony 11:09
And so I thought it was important to put that stuff in here to show people that basically, all of the health experts agree that masturbation is perfectly healthy, perfectly normal, and actually brings with it a list of benefits, which we will talk about a little bit.

Céline Remy 11:26
Yeah. And all the beliefs that you have, I just believe that you are taking on and they could be changed that just a set of ideas that you have decided to bid by or follow. And they usually call like cultural programming. And you can move past that. So if the beliefs that you’re having are not making you happy, it’s time to change the beliefs and find ways to make yourself happier.

Céline Remy 11:52
So being in guilt and shame, and all of this is not going to be sustainable in the long run. I’m going to talk a little bit about the brain effects of masturbation because it’s quite fascinating what happens because when you masturbate, it can release certain hormones in your body, and they have a positive effect on your mental and physical health. One of the top three hormones that get released are number one is endorphins.

Céline Remy 12:17
So you probably have heard of those because they are like the feel-good hormones. They are the ones that are pain-reliever, they lift your mood and reduce your stress. Yeah. Endorphins, dopamine gets released, and it’s a hormone associated with happiness. What’s interesting, too, is that some people sometimes associate that dopamine with addiction, and like there’s two sides to dopamine, but we can come back to that later.

Céline Remy 12:46
And the third hormone is oxytocin, which is often called the bonding hormone, the love hormone, and it’s all associated with bonding. And this is like, what happens when you touch another human being, you know, I mean, we’ve had so many years now of social distancing, and then being scared of other humans that it’s like, now you can really see that it makes a difference when you get to be around people and touch people like there are things that get that happens in your body.

Kevin Anthony 13:15
Yeah, absolutely. There’s, there’s no coincidence that isolation was used for the last few years. But that’s a whole nother subject, we won’t go there.

Céline Remy 13:27
Okay, before we dive into the benefits of masturbation, we have an invitation for you is a new year and you might want to take your relationship new to a whole new level. So if you feel like your relationship is missing some of the components that maybe you used to feel you feel like you’re stuck in a rut, just sex is not where you wish it could be where when you got together, you thought it was gonna be mind-blowing.

Céline Remy 13:52
And it’s just kind of been going down rather than up and then Kevin, and I would like to invite you to join us in our program, we work one on one with couples. So both Kevin and I coach couples together, and it is a fantastic program, where we help you bring the passion back between the sheets and be more synched up.

Céline Remy 14:11
You get to learn communication skills, you get to learn like intimacy practices and sex stuff, tantric stuff. I mean, it’s jam-packed. And so go to kevinanthonycoaching.com/passion. To learn more about this program. Now is the time to take your relationship to the next level kevinanthonycoaching.com/passion and join our synergy program.

Kevin Anthony 14:34
Yeah, like how you read that? Nice.

Céline Remy 14:40
Bad let’s talk a bit about the benefit. Kevin

Kevin Anthony 14:44
has a long list of benefits.

Céline Remy 14:47
You’re still doubting that masturbation is good for you. So

Kevin Anthony 14:51
most of these again, you know, I love quoting studies because it brings legitimacy to things and then people sometimes who are against stuff go Oh, Science said, so, therefore, it must be true. I mean, that’s not necessarily the truth. But that’s how people often feel about it. However, again, I didn’t want to get into, you know, quoting study after study after study and turn this into a boring scientific episode.

Kevin Anthony 15:13
But just so you know, everything that’s listed here on this benefits list, has a heap of studies behind it, like scientific studies behind it, not just anecdotal reports from people who I felt better, you know, I literally studied all of this stuff. It’s really interesting. I read some, I’ve read the abstracts of some of these studies when, when researching this, and it was really interesting.

Kevin Anthony 15:36
I’m like, wow, they actually, like, conducted a real scientific study to figure out whether or not this was true, you know, so it’s interesting. So here we go. Number one, it can help you sleep better. So they actually did do studies on this, one of the things they found was that people that masturbated at night before they went to bed, had better sleep than those who didn’t.

Céline Remy 16:02
Yeah, but it’s also kind of a catch 22 Because some people can’t sleep without it. And then I think it can turn into something else, which we’ll talk about that later.

Kevin Anthony 16:12
So obviously, anything has the potential to get out of hand. But

Céline Remy 16:16
it’s not the what is the how you know.

Kevin Anthony 16:19
would suggest, like, you know, don’t get in the habit of you have to masturbate every night or you can’t fall asleep, like that would be a problem. But let’s just say normally, you fall asleep just fine. And one night, you’re kind of wide awake, and you’re like, I can’t fall asleep, because that happens to everybody. Masturbation may be able to help you.

Céline Remy 16:39
It can boost your libido. Funny how when you start to use it, you just feel more of it. And what more of it

Kevin Anthony 16:47
absolutely, is something we talk about all the time, like when we’re working with couples when we’re talking about sex, somebody, inevitably one of the partners in the couples like, wow, I’m not really in the mood. And one of the things that we try to help them understand is that the more frequently you use it, or you have sex, the more actually you’re going to want sex, it’s just, it’s the way that it works.

Kevin Anthony 17:12
So it’s the same thing here is you can actually use masturbation to stoke the fire, so to speak, right. So obviously, if you and again, everything has a downside, if you overdo it, you could potentially end up having less desire, but if you use it reasonably moderately, it can put you in what we call that constant state of arousal where you are aroused all the time.

Kevin Anthony 17:37
And that can actually help you have more sex in your relationship. Alright, before we get to the next one, though, I just want to say that sometimes in relationships, one partner will not like it when the other one masturbates. Right? Where the be like, Wow, I don’t want you

Céline Remy 17:56
because it’s taking away from our sex.

Kevin Anthony 17:59
Exactly. Now, again, if it becomes a real problem where they want, they don’t want to have sex anymore, because they’re constantly masturbating, then that would be true. But in most cases, it’s the other way around, where it actually stimulates your libido and makes you want to have more sex.

Kevin Anthony 18:20
So as long as your partner is wanting to masturbate in a healthy way, with a healthy frequency, you should be happy about that you should support that and go, yeah, that way, when I’m ready, you’re like ready to go to,

Céline Remy 18:35
you know, I think that that whole thing comes from the person complaining. And usually, I’m going to be like, but stereotypes down here a little bit. But usually, it’s the woman saying, I don’t want him to masturbate because it’s like cheating, or, or there’s not going to be enough for me later. What that truly means is that she’s not satisfied, and she’s not getting the sex that she wants and needs.

Céline Remy 18:55
So she’s afraid that if he does some sexual activity, she’s going to have even less than what she’s currently getting. And the underlying thing here is the fact that she’s not satisfied. And so sometimes it also would be interesting when your partner says an objection like, Why, what’s really behind it? Is it because they’re not getting enough of it themselves? Is it because they’re not getting the sex they want?

Céline Remy 19:17
Is it like what’s behind that and they’re not getting enough attention, they’d rather spend that time with you. And if you find that then you can separate the masturbation and really the need underneath from that person, what they’re really seeking and needing. Okay, let’s continue.

Céline Remy 19:33
We’ve already talked about the hormones, but we’ll have to mention that again because it releases serotonin and dopamine in the brain, but it also deliver more oxygen to the brain. Ooh, does it make you smarter than

Kevin Anthony 19:46
Yes, as a matter of fact, it does. Opposite what they told us when we were kids that it was going to make us stupid or it actually makes you smarter because it increases circulation there are so it’s not just because you’re moving or whatever that increases the there’s a whole host of physiological changes that happen inside the body when you masturbate or have sex, but especially when you orgasm, that’s what

Céline Remy 20:12
I was gonna say, isn’t a lot of that when there’s that hormone or shower that happens when you experience an orgasm.

Kevin Anthony 20:20
Yes, which causes all kinds of things to happen like blood vessels to dilate and increase circulation and you know, the release of the serotonin and dopamine and all that kind of stuff. So it does actually increase blood flow to your brain, not just to your genitals.

Céline Remy 20:36
Another great benefit of masturbation is it can relieve pain. And sometimes if you have a headache, just try to masturbate rather than pop a pill and just see how that helps

Kevin Anthony 20:49
way healthier than popping a pill.

Céline Remy 20:51
Absolutely. And another benefits of masturbation when done right, it can strengthen your pelvic floor muscles. And what’s interesting, why would you strengthen your pelvic floor muscles we, by the way, have whole episodes on the cables and pelvic floor muscles, all of that we have more than one on that.

Céline Remy 21:07
So go back to history. But why would you want to have strong muscles because in case you have not yet noticed when you have an orgasm, what happens? It’s a mythical contraction of your pelvic floor muscles that is happening. So the more times your muscles, the stronger your orgasms.

Kevin Anthony 21:25
Learn only that as a man, the more toned your pelvic floor muscles are, the more control you have over them. The more you can control your ejaculation, you can learn to separate orgasm from ejaculation, you can learn to delay your ejaculation so you can make love longer and experience that amazingness even more. Ooh,

Céline Remy 21:47
alright, let’s move on a little bit more. It can help to relieve stress, which I think we are all familiar with, we don’t really need to say more about that. But here’s one that’s really good is that it can show you what you like, why would you want to know that? Because then you can teach your partner

Kevin Anthony 22:06
this, you know, this one sounds like kind of a no-brainer. And yet, it’s not really a no-brainer, because we work with a lot of clients. And these are not necessarily young people. You know, like I’m working with a client now he’s 49, I think 4950 ish, somewhere right around there. You know, and, you know, he openly admits that he feels like he’s fumbling around when it comes to sex, that he doesn’t really know he never really learned, you know what to do.

Kevin Anthony 22:39
So it’s not necessarily tied to age. In other words, there are a lot of women who a man will say, Well, how do you like to be touched? And she’s like, I don’t know. Right? Well, you should know. And one of the ways that you would know is you touch yourself and you go, whoo, I really like that. No, yeah, of course, you can do that in relationship to right, like, you can touch her and she can provide your feedback.

Kevin Anthony 23:02
But a lot of times when we find it harder to provide feedback at the moment, when they’re with a partner, then to really just pay attention when they’re on their own. I know what do you think about it

Céline Remy 23:13
kind of depends. Because you don’t want to be too heady, right? V stuck in your head. But sometimes it’s easier when somebody does it. Because you can really relax and just pay attention to the sensations. But then you never really have a good idea about what’s truly done. But when you do it on yourself, then you really understand it. So that’s one of the benefits about that, especially if you were to use a mirror or to pay attention, like what is really happening.

Céline Remy 23:41
Let’s talk about a few more of the benefits, I can help you practice mindfulness. But you cannot be doing that, with your five minutes quick rub that we described at the beginning of the show. This way of masturbating does not give you that experience of mindfulness. What is mindfulness? Mindfulness is the art of being present.

Céline Remy 24:03
And in the moment, and so if you just masturbate with the goal in mind of ejaculation and that destination, and you have no idea what’s going on, on the journey, that is not mindfulness. Mindfulness is about slowing things down, paying attention, feeling your body, feeling the sensations, feeling your breath, and seeing if just by paying attention to those you can get to a whole new level without having to go over your edge just yet.

Kevin Anthony 24:30
Yeah, I mean, one of the cool things about using masturbation for mindfulness is that you don’t have any other distractions happening. So like, you know, not that being with a partner is a distraction. But when you are with a partner, you should also be focusing on your partner, right?

Kevin Anthony 24:45
And what’s happening at that moment. So there’s more stuff going on, that you need to sort of keep track of, whereas with the masturbation practice, it’s just nothing but you write so there’s just a lot less for you to have to focus on which means you can focus more on, specifically that practice. So well, I’m

Céline Remy 25:05
gonna go quickly over a few more because there are a few more points that we wanted to bring into today’s show. But we’ve talked about the improvement of blood flow, it can boost your confidence. And it’s kind of tied to knowing your body, knowing how you work also, especially for women, I think if you know how to give yourself an orgasm, you feel so much more confident that you don’t have to depend on somebody else from the outside,

Kevin Anthony 25:27
they also found that and this is again, tied to the orgasms. But the people who had more orgasms actually were more confident,

Céline Remy 25:35
fascinating. Of course, it can improve your sex skills, because again, it’s learning what you like how you like to be touched, and then translate to become a better giver, because you start to pay attention more. And it’s a great way to deal with different sex drives. And we’ve mentioned that earlier. So in a relationship where one wants more sex than the other, then you could take matters into your own hands and be still fully satisfied.

Kevin Anthony 26:01
Did you say member in your own head? Oh, no, sorry, that was a “matter”. We got to make at least a few masturbation jokes.

Céline Remy 26:12
Your face a couple more things, I can reduce the risks of prostate cancer. And that has to do with the ejaculation with that pumping that has

Kevin Anthony 26:21
prostate because the prostate makes some of the fluid that makes up your semen. And so if you are not releasing that release periodically, then it can build up and there can be stagnant energy in there. So flushing that out, it’s kind of a good thing. They’ve done studies on that, too.

Kevin Anthony 26:39
I read at least two of them and prepping for the show like it is a real thing. In other words, is it something that I theorized about for years like hey, this would probably be good because of this reason? And now there’s a real science to back that up.

Céline Remy 26:54
And then last but not least, it can prevent cervical infection and UTI for tenting. And we put that in there because it’s quite fascinating. We’ve done a whole show on the clitoris, where we explain a lot more about what tenting is. But quickly tempting is the pulling up that happens within a vagina, a woman’s vagina, and when she is aroused, everything kind of goes up hence that tent-centered image.

Céline Remy 27:20
And so when that happens, apparently can prevent cervical infection in UTI, so it keeps you healthy. Yeah, you want to make sure you wash your hands prior to touching yourself.

Kevin Anthony 27:32
Alright, so we gave you a pretty good list. That’s that is not the full exclusive list. That’s like all the top ones. I’m sure if we kept digging and digging through the research, we’d find a few more. But I think that’s a long enough list for you to realize that this is actually okay for you to do like there’s a serious benefit to it. But

Céline Remy 27:54
are there side effects? Are there negative points when it comes to masturbation?

Kevin Anthony 27:59
There could be right just like anything like if you were to drink too much water, you could die? Yes, you literally can. That’s not a joke. So everything has a potential downside, if not used correctly, and there are a few here. So, therefore, we must cover them.

Kevin Anthony 28:16
So you don’t go and hurt yourself because you wanted to get all the dopamine that you could possibly get and have the healthiest genitals in the world. And so you masturbated 10 times a day every day. And then you hurt yourself. Like we wouldn’t want that to happen to you.

Céline Remy 28:32
So as Kevin said, it can become a compulsion. Again, it’s not the what it’s the how it’s how you use it. It’s not a masturbation addiction is not considered an addiction in the addiction-like thing, whatever that’s called, thank you. It’s never considered an addiction for the mental health stuff. Ivor. So again, it’s because technically you can’t be addicted to masturbation, but it’s a compulsion.

Céline Remy 29:01
And that’s compulsive behavior. And people can have that not that’s, that can happen. It could excessive wrath, masturbation could physically damage your genitalia. So I’ve worked with a few clients where they had that happen, where they either broke their penises or created something like some weird like scar tissue like something happened.

Céline Remy 29:22
And then they had some pain and then they couldn’t move their penis a certain way. I mean, you know, rough way, if you remember, not good. This is why

Kevin Anthony 29:30
it has to be unless not because it’s theoretically possible, but because we’ve literally had clients who have done this Yes,

Céline Remy 29:37
yes. We’re not speculating we’ve seen that happen. Yeah. And then it can cause a problem in a relationship as one of the negative side effects and the way that would come it’s kind of linked to the fact that people can become, like, have this compulsive behavior and what happened when there’s this type of like, let’s call it an addiction.

Céline Remy 29:57
Even though it’s not specifically an addiction, but when happens is there’s a lot of loss of interest in life in things in general, you can have low energy, have like procrastinate, feel depressed, you know. And this is also interesting because all of that can happen if you have low hormones and your hormone balance is out of balance. But it could happen if you go too far in the spectrum and kind of plunge into having a compulsion around your masturbation.

Céline Remy 30:25
And some men talk about that when they masturbate too much and watch a lot of porn. There are some studies that do say that porn, watching porn, like compulsory, compulsory will be like, creating imbalances in your brain. And so again, the hormonal imbalance can create all of these things happening from the loss of interest, depression, and all of that

Kevin Anthony 30:46
is possible. But you know, as I stated at the beginning of this, just remember that anything used wrongly, can be a problem, there are people, you know, like, every doctor that you talk to, will tell you that exercise is good for you. Like everybody pretty much unanimously agrees that exercise is good for yet, exercise taken to an extreme level can actually be bad for you.

Kevin Anthony 31:09
They’ve done studies on some of these extreme athletes and they have more heart problems, and you know, different things like that. So taken to an extreme level, it can actually be bad for you. So don’t focus so much on these negative effects. But just know that if you’re the type of person that tends to take things to extreme levels, there could be downsides. And that’s, that’s what they are, but in general, used in a normal way, it is perfectly normal, and healthy.

Céline Remy 31:39
Let’s talk about it in a relationship. And I also want to talk about masturbation, like, if you only masturbating to porn, if you can only masturbate with sex toys, there’s a problem, you want to be able to do it in multiple ways, not just one way when you only do something in one way you create a deep groove and you can only get aroused a certain way.

Céline Remy 31:58
And when you take this out, especially if it’s something external, like porn or toy, you are basically giving your power away to this external thing. When that external thing no longer is there, you feel lost and don’t know how to connect with yourself. So it’s important to be able to do different ways of masturbation find sometimes you might use porn, sometimes you might use a sex toy, sometimes you’ll be sitting sometimes laying down sometimes standing.

Céline Remy 32:22
Sometimes it’s a quickie, sometimes you like giving it at least 20 minutes, a half-hour. Sometimes you ejaculate. Sometimes you don’t. Sometimes it goes somewhere. Sometimes it doesn’t like very it explore without having any intention. But just being present with what

Kevin Anthony 32:36
is I think most guys heads just exploded by the sheer number of options that you gave. Because for most guys, a guy that looks exactly the same way every time, which is you masturbate for three to five minutes, you ejaculate. And it’s over until the next time, and you just blew their minds with all the possibilities.

Kevin Anthony 32:57
The other thing I would say too is that not all of those benefits can be achieved using that short little cycle that I talked about, you really need to do those different options that you talked about, like, you’re not going to achieve the same level of mindfulness. If you do it that way, you’re not going to be able to create the same amount of tone in your pelvic floor muscles if you do it that way. Right? So there are certain benefits you’re not going to get from it unless you

Céline Remy 33:28
if you take the Quickie route. Yeah, now it just doesn’t really work. So in a relationship, I truly support masturbation, you know, whether you’re single or not, but like specifically in a relationship, because again, sometimes you might be in the mood and your partner may not be. I think masturbation should be celebrated. It does.

Céline Remy 33:48
You know, it doesn’t have to always be done in front of your partner, but it should be done in the open meaning. It’s not something you should hide from your partner. And you could even be like, Hey, I’m going to the bedroom, I’m going to go masturbate, and it’s like, awesome, you know, like, something that is celebrated,

Kevin Anthony 34:03
like when I come home and you’re like, Guess what I did today while you were gone.

Céline Remy 34:09
Exactly. And the thing is that masturbation doesn’t stop when a relationship begins. You masturbation practice, you’ve been doing it since you know, probably you were a teenager. And it doesn’t end when you meet somebody else. And hiding your masturbation in your relationship or your partner is is potentially missing an opportunity for sexual communication and a chance to improve your sex life.

Céline Remy 34:32
I find that people who can openly talk about their sexuality and masturbation their preferences have better sex than those who just don’t really mention it. It really is it like you need to be able to talk about it. Maybe it’s difficult at first, but just give it a try. And even in a relationship that solo sexual activity is safe and can lead to more sexual like shared sexual activities like we mentioned earlier, where we said that improves libido like Kevin was talking about that where if you give this attention to yourself, you want it to give it more to your partner as well. Right?

Céline Remy 35:09
And in reality, is sexless relationships actually reduced masturbation, and those who masturbated the most were typically in a partnered sexual relationship. vaccinating. This is organic from all different studies that were done. But this is kind of busting the myths, right? Absolutely.

Céline Remy 35:30
And so if you are in a relationship where you are hiding things and not talking about masturbation, it is time that you learn the tools. If you don’t know how just hire us, we’ll help you get there. Read a book, listen to the Love Lab share what you know, both of you listen to this live lab and then you know, talk about how that landed for you. But open up the lines of communications.

Kevin Anthony 35:53
That’s always the key, it almost doesn’t matter what part of sex love or relationship you’re talking about. You’ve got to open up those lines of communication. It’s the foundation of everything. All right, well, there you have it. That is the definitive answer, in my opinion, of whether or not masturbation is good for you. So I highly suggest you carve out a little time today. For little self practice a little self-love.

Céline Remy 36:22
And you know, make it the 20 minutes at least like 15-20 minutes minimum. Really

Kevin Anthony 36:28
give yourself that especially if your guy you need to train yourself.

Céline Remy 36:31
Yes, because your body does not know the difference. This is me masturbating. Now, this is me with my partner. Hmm, I’m gonna last forever, like no way. So for sure. And understand that masturbation is part of your biology is part of who you are. So you just want to own it. Love it integrated. Don’t make it the sole focus of your life. But just make it a fun part of your life.

Kevin Anthony 36:54
Yes. All right, everybody. That’s all the time we have for this episode. And we will see you next week.

Kevin Anthony 37:06
We hope you liked this episode of the Love Lab podcast. If you enjoy this show, subscribe. Leave us a review and share it with your friends.

Céline Remy 37:13
And for more free exclusive content. Join us in the passion vault at kevinanthonycoaching.com/vault.

Kevin Anthony 37:27
Thanks for listening.

Céline Remy 37:29
And remember, you’re amazing