Do you have 2 minutes for sex?

One of my students in her 20's recently told me that she couldn't touch her toes. So I asked her what kind of sex life did she expect to have if she couldn't get her legs over her head, or at least over her partner's shoulders?

Seriously though, my point to her was that the importance of flexibility should not be overlooked for our general health, but more specifically, for the health of our sex life. Feeling limber translates into feeling more comfortable with movement - changing positions, trying new positions, and better enjoyment of our favorite positions. So I would like to give you a very simple stretch that can have a big impact on your flexibility and your sex life. It's easy to do and takes very little time.

It's called a Rag Doll Stretch and in it, you stretch by allowing yourself to just hang loose. First you stand up and make sure have a little bit of room around you. When you first start to do this stretch, it's a good idea to have something to hold onto if you need it, like a table or the arm of the couch. Next, you are going to bend forward and let your arms and head just hang down in front of you. Don't worry if you can't stretch very far. Over time you will see the difference! The beauty of this stretch is that you are going to let gravity do all the work for you. You don't need to push or bounce - just hang. And pay attention to the position of your head. Since your head weighs as much as a bowling ball, if you are holding it up at all, you are tensing your muscles. Instead, you should let it hang loose so that you can relieve the tension in your shoulders and neck and take pressure off of the bones of the neck. If you are looking at the front of your legs or thighs, then you know your head is in the right position.

Now, just breathe normally and take notice of any areas where you have tension. Each time you exhale, imagine any tense areas of muscle becoming relaxed and stretching long and easy. For any stretch to be effective, you have to hold it for at least 30 seconds. If you give it a full 60 seconds, you will allow a good stretch of the muscle fibers and start to feel results. And you can see how it targets a lot of muscles at once - from the back of your heels, up your legs and your entire back, back of the neck, and up to the base of your skull.

So practice this stretch for 1 minute at the beginning of your day and 1 minute at the end of your day and you'll make a big difference in your flexibility. That's less time than it takes for a commercial break! So even though our flexibility decreases over time, we can do something very simple to improve it which can translate into a better sex life. It loosens up the back for better thrusting, lets you move your legs up onto your partner's shoulders for a different positioning of your hips, and helps relieve tension in the neck for all you wonderfully-indulgent givers of oral sex!