I view
oral sex as a gift to my partner.

Besides the emotional satisfaction of giving pleasure, and in extenuating circumstances like 69, it’s done without any pleasure of my own.

I used to view giving oral like a hassle or a task. It can be tiring, messy. There might be cramping involved.

I also didn’t like giving oral because I didn’t actually know how to. I wasn’t confident in my ability.

However, by gaining confidence in knowing how to please my partner, I began to enjoy it as well. That’s when I started thinking of it like a gift.

When you give someone a gift, you usually feel pleasure from making them happy and from doing something solely for the other person.

Once I realized that I felt the same way about giving oral, it gave me a much different motivation. I actually took it upon myself to get better, just for the sake of the other person. I was giving a better gift.

I view receiving it differently now as well.

No matter how good the oral sex is, it still feels nice knowing that my partner is giving this physical pleasure just for me. It’s like receiving a gift and not actually caring what it is, because it’s coming from a place of selflessness.

In discussions with other people, most tend to agree with me. The pleasure from making someone else feel good is why they enjoy or don’t mind performing oral sex.

When people said they don’t like giving oral, it was usually because of the physical discomfort — sore throats, tongue cramps, bodily fluids. But they did agree with my points about how oral sex can be seen as a gift.

I then remembered that gifts also have costs, usually money. But in the case of oral sex, it could be seen as the physical discomfort that might be involved.

Giving a gift is one of the nicest and most selfless things you can do for another person. Giving oral should not feel like an obligation, but rather something to look forward to and for both partners to enjoy.

Michael Karp can be reached at [email protected] or @_MichaelKarp on Twitter.