The activity is often recommended by sex therapists because it allows partners to easily get to know each other’s most intimate desires, exposes them to new ideas they may not have considered but find intriguing, and gives them an easy way to bring up a kinky interest that perhaps they haven’t been able to talk about thus far.
“I think these are wonderful tools to explore erotic interests, but they are even better to open conversation,” Zimmerman adds.
That is, in addition to being a great source of inspiration, perhaps the biggest benefit of the Yes/No/Maybe list is that it simply opens up the lines of communication.
Couples can sometimes go years without ever meaningfully talking about their sex life, and it does them a great disservice. We know from research that people who talk more about sex tend to have more satisfying sex lives, whereas those who have less sexual communication tend to enjoy their sex life less, too.
“If neither partner knows what the other’s expectations, desires, or needs are around sex, there isn’t much chance of continually making it better,” AASECT-certified sex therapist Holly Richmond, Ph.D., LMFT, CST, previously told mbg. “Couples that talk about sex can have better, more exciting sex the longer they are in the relationship, which is exactly the opposite of what we’ve been told to believe, that sex gets worse or more boring the longer you are together.”
In other words, the key to a sustainably steamy sex life is being willing to sit down at talk about it. And if it’s not something you’ve been doing much of lately in your relationship? The Yes/No/Maybe list is one simple and pretty fun way to get started.