How to Move from Worrying about Writing Sex to Enjoying It

#4 In the FWSG Series

Did the phrase “writing sex” elicit a specific response inside you? For most writers, it does. Excitement, dread, denial. It’s not the same for everyone because of you, the person. Your experience in the world and your belief systems add to this thinking.

Ask yourself:

How do you feel about writing sex?

What do you know about sex to write about it?

Let’s explore what this is about and how to lessen the worry and enhance the enjoyment of writing.

Person of the Writer

In Writing Sex – Own Where You Are

Most writers I talk with have a lot of nervousness and anxiety about writing sex.

That comes from so many places. Upbringing. Ideas about sex and how you do it. You could create that list for yourself.

Then, the writer part kicks in. Now, you straddle two worlds. Your own and your story world.

How do I describe sex, put it in my story, or have my characters enjoy it? Add all your other questions here.

Regardless of your questions, you can replace them with positive perspectives that offer a different outcome.

What if they think I do what I write? We can’t keep people from thinking about what they think. Maybe they are interested, jealous, or shocked. But we have control over our thoughts about it and can keep it interesting for ourselves. I say keep them guessing.

What if I don’t know enough? Do some research. Sex-positive websites can help. Look at writers you admire and who write sex well, and you connect with their writing. What are they doing? How did they get there? Be brave and ask.

Be sure to note that I’m not just talking about the notion of the physical embodiment of sex. Sexuality takes many forms. It is the umbrella that the physical sex sits under. How are the affection, intimacy, communication, and sensuality handled within and by the characters?

What if I don’t know what I don’t know? Get yourself a book sex coach and learn. The thing I know about sexuality is that once someone begins an investigation for any reason, it changes them. They may have a new perspective or outlook or be applying the new information in their lives.

In Writing Sex – Know and Clarify Your Boundaries

You can practice this in your own life. Since you are straddling these worlds, reality and fiction, it is essential that as you create characters so their sexuality matches their personality and the situations you put them in.

When you do this, you eliminate author intrusion. That means you stay in your reality world and let the characters have their world. The characters have the sex they want, which might be very different that the sex in your life.

This occurs when you give them everything they need to make it happen and get out of your own way.

In Writing Sex – Know that the Activities of Sex are a Learned Skill

No one is born with the ability to have great sex. It takes communication, understanding, and education of the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of sexuality. We all accumulate this over a lifetime. If negative aspects have honed your understanding of sex, you may need to spring clean a little and get clear on it.

Being a writer allows you to investigate things. Who says you can’t be a direct recipient of your learning along with your characters? Go for it.

From Worry to Enjoy

In the end, maybe your writing is a way for you to learn about your sexuality. We each take a different path to become a fully actualized human, which includes our sexuality. Perhaps you found a new mechanism in writing to do that for you.

I don’t know about you, but I enjoy creating the characters and, based on who they are, learning about how they might approach sex and how they carry it around with them. I feel like a detective. That is the fun of writing about it.

Now imagine what it would be like if you got a two-for-one in sexuality. You decide to learn about sex by writing it to work with your characters, and in the end, you get something new for you.

That is where true enjoyment lies.

This is information from my upcoming book, The Fiction Writer’s Sexuality Guide: Sex-It’s More Than a Scene. In Session 2, The Person or Self of the Writer, the release date is May 28, 2024.

Don’t miss a blog post in the series. Here is the first in the series, and you can continue to FWSG Blog Post #5.