UrbanUpdate

For “Routine Excellence,” GQ asks creative, successful people about the practices and habits that get them through their day.

Sex expert Emily Morse begins her day like many motivated morning people do: some water and a workout. It’s then that her routine begins to sound a bit different. “Then I try to do my meditate-masturbate-manifest practice,” says the host of the podcast “Sex with Emily” and author of Smart Sex: How to Boost Your Sex IQ and Own Your Pleasure. Of course, it’s not that other people aren’t also meditating, masturbating, and manifesting (independently or in combination). It’s just that they’d be less likely to talk about it. But it’s that openness that has made Morse one of the culture’s most popular sex positive voices, a voice she hopes to use to “reprogram our minds around sex.” One aspect in particular that she wants us to rethink? Pleasure, which, by calming our nervous system, can help us navigate a difficult day. But currently, our relentless pursuit of productivity makes pleasure something we only allow ourselves after we do everything else. “Pleasure shouldn’t be so conditional,” says the woman who likes to begin her day with some.

GQ: What are some non-negotiable practices or habits that you have on a given day?

Morse: When I wake up, I try to have 20 ounces of water with lemon before coffee. I'm a morning workout person. I’ve got to wake up and move my body: yoga, Pilates, weights, a run or hike. Then, I try to do my “meditate, masturbate, manifest” practice—but that's not always accessible. There have been times where I've made that my goal for 30 days and it’s really amazing what happens. But I always meditate, for at least 10 minutes. Then I can do all the other things. I check in with my assistant. We go over the schedule for the day and the outstanding emails that come in. Every day is different. If I'm interviewing guests, I’m reading their book, or I’m prepping for a show, or for meetings with my team.

Can you walk me through the meditate, masturbate, manifest practice?

Meditation is an important part of releasing ourselves from the jail of our thoughts, and it allows me to be more mindful, more aware, and more present. Masturbation is a really healthy practice, whether you're in a relationship or not. One of the benefits of masturbation is that the orgasm signals our parasympathetic nervous system to start downregulating and calming the body. At that time, the brain’s also pumping out serotonin, which is responsible for our good mood relaxation. So the neurochemistry of having an orgasm is really helpful for calm and clarity. It’s a really great time to manifest and to think about what you want to be happening. What do you want to happen that day? What do you wanna happen in the next month? I often use it to think about my day and I'll think about the meetings that I'm having or the show that I'm doing. What does that look like when it's successful? How am I feeling? What am I doing? I picture myself in those moments. Which is so woo. Some people change the channel when you say manifesting. But really it's about, what's your purpose? Where do you wanna be clear? What do you actually want to happen? There's such a clear point of clarity after masturbation. Also, it links your pleasure with your goals.

Why is it important to link pleasure with goals?

We're a society that loves to get things done. It’s all about working and knocking everything off your to-do list and achieving certain goals. Pleasure often becomes the reward. We only think we deserve it after we do all these things. My mission is to get people to prioritize pleasure as part of their overall mental and physical health. I'm not just talking about sex. It’s getting a massage, or hanging out with your friends. Like, what gives you pleasure? What are you doing that actually makes you feel good, that you don't feel like you had to jump through a bunch of hoops to get? I calendar those things. I prioritize them.

I realize this is a question coming from that very productivity-focused mindset, but how do you think about making sure you're getting enough pleasure? Do you quantify it in some way? What's your metric?

Well I have that pleasure percentage exercise in my book, where you break down everything that's pleasurable to you, put a number beside it, and you do a math equation and figure out what percentage of your week is actually associated with pleasure. When I first did this, I realized like 3% of my life was pleasure. That's no way to live! Many of us are getting into burnout, we're just hustling. The weeks where I get a massage and see more friends, I start to notice my nervous system will calm, I feel more connected, more inspired.

Is there a number of orgasms someone should shoot for having a week?

People always want me to quantify their sex life. I would say one is better than none. But I’m not gonna give people a certain amount of orgasms.

Of all the habits and practices you have that are not explicitly sexual, which do you think has the most impact on your sexual wellness?

Exercise and movement. Blood flow. I cannot emphasize enough to people how much their physical health impacts their sexual health. That's why in my book Smart Sex, I have the five pillars of sexual intelligence [embodiment, health, collaboration, self-knowledge, and self-acceptance]. Being a great lover has nothing to do with the size of any of your body parts, or the sex positions, or how many times you've had sex. It’s the foods you're eating, how you're moving your body. Have you had therapy and worked through issues? How are you in touch with your body during sex? Do you disassociate it? Do you talk to your partner about your needs and desires? All of those things are gonna contribute to you having a healthy sex life.

What are some exercises or questions romantic partners can work into their routine to make intimacy more of a practice?

Doing a sexual state of the union is great—it could be once a month, or once a quarter. What's been working for you? What's not working? What's the most memorable time we've had sex, and what made it so memorable? Is there anything on your sexual bucket list you've been wanting to try? Lately it feels like we're not having sex as much—what can we do for each other that would make sex more likely to happen? What's the best time of day for us to have sex? Also I want to normalize the fact that when you're in a relationship with somebody—long-term relationship, but it could even happen in shorter relationships—your sex life is gonna get rote, and it's going to crave some variety. Some people don’t know what’s on the menu for sex and they don’t know how to keep it interesting. This is why the yes-no-maybe list on my site is one of the most downloaded things over the year. It’s a list of like a hundred sex acts. Couples can take this quiz separately and then come together and be like, “Oh, I didn't know you wanna talk dirty. We could try doing that.” Or, “Let’s bring in some spanking.”

Most Popular

CultureTyler, The Creator Photographer Brick Stowell on Documenting the “Mystical” Lore of Odd Future and His Flog Gnaw ExhibitBy Frazier Tharpe

CultureCillian Murphy Talks Small Things Like These (and Rewatching Peaky Blinders)By Esther Zuckerman

CultureWhat to Watch When You Don’t Want to Think About the ElectionBy Frazier Tharpe

What's a way that you access the erotic or the sensual on a regular basis that doesn't have to do with sex?

I would say breath work. Breathing allows me to smooth the energy through my body. We are all energy and sex is energy as well. If you’re doing breath work or exercise and you squeeze your pelvic floor, or do a kegel—this is for men too—that allows you to be more intentional and more connected to your body. A lot of us disassociate during sex, or we're completely disconnected from our genitals. A great breathwork practice helps. I think nature helps too. Going on a hike helps me feel more in touch with my erotic energy.

Being overworked, tired, and stressed is a major turnoff for a lot of people. What do you do when date night is coming up and you’re like, man, I’ve had a killer week and I just am not feeling sexy?

I may be redundant here, but for me, it’s going for a workout, or taking a hot shower. I go into a sauna or a steam, or I just breathe. I separate myself from work. It's really hard to go from work to date night if you have not disconnected and you haven't reset your nervous system. Any kind of healing element will help: a hot, hot shower or hot bath or deep breath work. I'll use some lotions that make me feel good, and dress in something that makes me feel sexy and erotic. What really helps is amplifying all the senses around me. Our senses are key to tapping into our erotic self and our sexual self. I always have a candle going, or incense, music playing in the background. I love putting body oil on my body. I have soft blankets and pillows. My home is a sensual place because it helps support a more erotic, present calming lifestyle when everything else can feel very chaotic.

What I’m hearing is that men should be lighting more candles as part of their routine.

Sometimes I forget and I light a candle and it immediately calms you, having that scent. Sometimes we’re so busy. Make sure the lights are right. If overhead lights are on, turn 'em off. Make sure there's music. Men should do all this—and also like, change their sheets.

I have some friends who've been in long-term relationships who schedule their sex. That strikes me as a place where pleasure and routine intersect. Where do you stand on scheduling sex?

Scheduling sex is one of the most effective tools for couples to make sure that they actually have the sex that they both want. I completely understand how unsexy the thought of it is: Great, my schedule says, pick up the dry cleaning, drive the kids to soccer and have sex. But when couples don't schedule sex, they are couples who are struggling with sex. Usually there's a high-desire partner in a relationship, and a lower-desire partner. So the person's always making the bid for sex and then they're getting rejected. Then the partner who's rejecting feels like, what's wrong with me? Why don't I want sex? So if you say, “Saturday night is the night for sex,” you don't have to worry about it every other day of the week, and you can collaborate on that sexual experience with your partner: “Okay, it's date night, what should we do? Where should we go? Let's make sure we've got lube and the toys are charged. Let's make it sexy.” It's about being intentional with your sex life. Most people are not intentional with their sex life. Most people are like, I hope it happens.

Most Popular

CultureTyler, The Creator Photographer Brick Stowell on Documenting the “Mystical” Lore of Odd Future and His Flog Gnaw ExhibitBy Frazier Tharpe

CultureCillian Murphy Talks Small Things Like These (and Rewatching Peaky Blinders)By Esther Zuckerman

CultureWhat to Watch When You Don’t Want to Think About the ElectionBy Frazier Tharpe

Do you have any advice for people for whom masturbation became a distraction during the work-from-home era? Asking for a friend.

I think the first thing is noticing if you're using it as a distraction, and maybe if it's become more of a problem in your life. Are there consequences? Meaning you can't get turned on unless there's porn, or you can no longer get turned on when there's a human in the room. But if it's not a problem, go for it. It helps people with stress and anxiety.

What thoughts do you have on how we can better integrate sex and sexual education routinely into our daily lives?

Most of us can agree that we get abysmal sex education. Now with the ubiquity and the availability of porn, we have porn without sex education—sort of a disaster. The first solution is having conversations about sex. What I've learned in doing my podcast for almost twenty years is that it's a language. So reading books about sex, finding sex positive voices to follow on Instagram. Talking about it with your friends, too. That's such a game changer. There's still a big portion of the world, even in America, that feels like, I could never ask my friends about their sex life. Be that person in your friend group that's like, what is your sex life like? How do you orgasm? When you keep hearing it in a normal, non-judgmental way, it does take away the taboo and the shame. I think a lot of us have to reframe and reprogram our minds around sex. Many of us are still very in the dark about how to talk about sex. We still carry a lot of shame. I also talk in my book about the pleasure thieves, the things that keep us from pleasure. It’s really important for us all to look at our own internal messages and around sex. Do we have shame? Have we had trauma? Is our anxiety getting in the way? A lot of people don't realize that if you live in a heightened state of anxiety and worry, your cortisol level is spiked and it's nearly impossible to get into a place of arousal. Those places don't live well together. They don't coexist.

I like to ask people if they could go back 10 years, what's something they’d spend less time on and more time on and the exact same amount of time on? I wonder if you can answer that specifically through the lens of sex.

If I could go back in my sex life, I would spend less time having performative sex. Like less time worried about if my partner was pleased, I'd spend less time faking orgasms, less time being performative, I would probably spend more time masturbating. I would spend the same amount of time communicating about sex with my partners.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

More Great Wellness Stories From GQ

The Only 6 Exercises You Need to Get a Six-Pack

You Should Be Doing Hamstring Stretches Every Day—Here’s Why (and 7 To Try)

The Many Stealthy Ways Creatine Boosts Your Health

Flexibility Is a Key to Longevity. Here’s How to Improve Yours, According to Experts

How to Actually Build Muscle When You Work Out

Not a subscriber? Join GQ to receive full access to GQ.com.

Clay Skipper is a Staff Writer at GQ.XInstagramRelated Stories for GQRoutine ExcellenceSex and Relationships