Mating in Captivity

Mating in Captivity

by Esther Perel

Getting to the end of the RA Favorite Books….  Finished reading Esther Perel’s Mating in Captivity, a book written from a therapist’s stand point on what makes a monogamous relationship successful.  Perel shares a newer perspective on how to keep intimacy and sex with the same partner exciting for decades.  Written in 2007, Perel had over twenty years of experience and draws on many stories from clients. The failures of many sustained physical connections was a result of not understanding and owning our own histories and issues related to ourselves.  Why does sexual desire end despite the fact that we love the one we are married/partnered to?  How come sexual desire wanes as the years progress?  How does one unlock ‘erotic intelligence’? She goes in depth on how security can sap our vitality for the one we love and the need to know why we go back to our instinctual responses, unable to resist them.  At times, the book felt like I was reading the headlines you see on a magazine, such as Men’s Health or Vogue: “How to excite your partner by doing the unexpected” or “Unleashing the animal in you”….  It certainly can resonate with anyone committed to lifelong love and excitement with your partner, but, in the end, it also reads as a collection of case studies with the reader searching for the chapter that resonates with them.  Certainly a different type of read than I have been given before.  That’s why it is so fun to work at NYU!