How to get turned on is a question about your own body first, before anyone else enters the room. Juliette Karaman, an intimacy and touch expert in the UK, teaches exactly this: safety first, then slow, specific touch, until your skin starts answering again.
That is me. A woman sits across from me and tells me she wants to want her partner again. Her whole plan has been waiting for him to flip the switch back on. He can’t. It was never his job.
What does getting turned on mean?
Getting turned on means your body is alive, full stop, before any other human comes close to it. I call it scrumptiousness.
It is the life force running through you. The thing that has you move your shoulders a certain way. Maybe a little lust-filled, maybe a bit taboo. It wants to meet the world and meet another body. It starts with you, always alone.
Why can’t I get turned on when I feel disconnected from my body?
Your nervous system decides whether it is safe to open before your mind gets a say. You cannot think your way into aliveness.
Stephen Porges spent his career on this and called it neuroception. Your body has to register safety first. Only then does it let itself swell and open. So when low libido and that cut-off feeling arrive together, the question I ask is this: when did you stop feeling safe enough in your own body to turn yourself on at all?
Numb counts too. Numb is also a sensation, a lack of sensation, and it tells you where to start.
How do I turn myself on, on my own?
Start with safety, then give yourself three minutes of slow touch and ask one question: is that a yes? This is how to turn yourself on without any pressure to perform.
- Touch Base®. Thumb to forefinger, feel the ridges, say “I am safe right now”, and hold for two minutes.
- Find the inside of your wrist. Turn one hand palm up. Find the soft patch between the heel of your hand and the start of your forearm.
- Stroke it slowly. Two fingers of your other hand. Can you feel it? Is your body saying yes to that?
- Change one thing at a time. The other direction. Lighter, almost grazing. Your nails instead of your finger pads. Watch your hand, then close your eyes.
- Notice which one your skin answers to. That is where your own map of touch begins.
Most women have no idea at first. That is the honest answer, and it is the right one. Four women came up to me recently and said they could not feel anything on the inside of their wrist, and thought they must be frigid. The difficulty means the exercise is working.
What are ways to get aroused if I feel stressed or numb?
Make it smaller, slower and safer than you think it needs to be. For a stressed or numb body, how to get aroused is mostly about the conditions you set.
- Touch Base every day. Every day, so safety becomes something your body expects.
- Your little bundles of joy. A bath. Oils on your skin. You might call this self-care. I call these my little bundles of joy.
- Self Touch Dates. Specific and small enough that you can build on each one.
- Let numb be there. Notice it, stay with it, and keep the touch slow enough that you can feel every single stroke.
Your skin is the biggest organ you have, and it craves touch. Often the very touch you have not yet given yourself.
Why can I get turned on alone but not with my partner?
Some of what you learn alone travels into the bedroom with a partner, and some of it does not. Researchers in Essex measured this, and split body awareness into three separate skills.
| Skill | What it predicted |
|---|---|
| Noticing a sensation | How often women climaxed, alone and with a partner |
| Trusting what the body reports | How satisfying it was, alone and with a partner |
| Steering attention back to the body | Solo sex only. It did not transfer to partner sex. |
So the noticing is worth three minutes of your life, because it travels. The trusting part needs another person in the room. You cannot trust a body whose no has never been respected. That is why I love working with couples, and why I talk about it in The Skill You Practise Alone Does Not Transfer to Partner Sex.
This is the beginning of The Touch Reset: structured time, structured safety, your Pleasure Language, then self Touch Dates you can build on. You can hear the whole thread in It Was Never About Him.
Picture it a year from now, exactly as it is. Same ceiling, same clock. Then picture three slow minutes with the inside of your wrist, and your skin saying yes.